41. Late Realization

“I’ll take it slow today. So you can feel it fully too.”

Haein looked at Soohyun with surprised eyes at his unusually gentle tone. His face was still awkward, but his expression had brightened considerably.

Seeing that made my heart feel so bitter.

If she had married someone else, not me, she would have lived being loved.

Come to think of it, Haein had been doing her best since the marriage, just like she said. If her only goal was money, she would have thrown herself at him shamelessly like Im Seyoung a long time ago.

She wasn’t originally that brazen, and if she were the kind of person who could do that, Soohyun wouldn’t have thought of her as special from the beginning.

Only then did Soohyun fully remember why he had tried so hard to protect Yoon Haein throughout their university years.

She was a woman who always smiled brightly, even with eyes that had seen all the hardships of the world at the young age of twenty.

The chatty teaching assistant was already desperate to impress Soohyun. When he subtly probed, she readily told him all about Yoon Haein’s family situation.

At first, he was surprised that her life was more difficult than he had imagined. He found it amazing that she managed to keep her scholarship while working several part-time jobs.

Haein always wore the same clothes whenever they ran into each other, but she looked beautiful regardless of what she wore.

She was different from him, who was born with so much and yet was anxious about not being able to hold onto it all. With the few things she had, she knew how to make herself look beautiful enough.

Haein continued to linger in Soohyun’s mind in that way.

‘Looking into your eyes like this, I think I know what this feeling I’ve been denying all along is.’

A long sigh escaped through his teeth. Once he realized it, it was naturally accepted. It was a feeling he had denied and denied for so long.

‘From the moment I first saw you, my feelings for you overflowed. I just didn’t want to deal with it, didn’t want to bring it out.’

His love for her had already begun before he even realized it.

The late realization struck his heart like a blow. Maybe destiny had already been designed that way on that day, at that moment. Soohyun’s throat tightened at the heavy pain pressing down on his chest.

‘I might have to pay the price now for holding you in my heart as I pleased.’

Soohyun cupped Haein’s face with one hand, then pulled her face away from his. And he slowly laid Haein down on the bed.

***

Like people who were sad they couldn’t become one, their mouths overlapped like a passage towards each other.

Even though she had her back against the bed and had nowhere else to run, Soohyun looked at her with yearning eyes, as if trying to go deeper and deeper into Haein.

They exchanged breaths, not wanting to miss a single one, swirling and intertwining inside each other’s mouths, moving back and forth.

“Haein-ah.”

Haein realized much later that he was calling her name. It was because he had never called her name so tenderly before.

At his heartfelt call, Haein looked into his eyes. He used to call her that way in her dreams, and she checked again to see if he was really saying it sober.

“Sunbae.”

“Haein-ah.”

Soohyun looked straight into her eyes and called Haein’s name repeatedly with longing. His pupils deepened like a dark night.

“You said this was your best. That there’s nowhere else to run.”

“...So I’m sorry.”

Haein whispered apologetically as she hugged his neck. She hated herself for barging into his life and holding him back. She hated the situation where she had to do this against her will.

I hate myself for asking you to do something you hate so much just for my sake. I’m sorry, Sunbae.

She held his embraced body even tighter. No matter how much she whispered her apologies, her guilt didn’t lessen.

“I’m sorry.”

“...Don’t be sorry. It’s not your fault.”

Soohyun gently pulled Haein away and covered her continuously apologizing mouth with his hand. Then he lightly shook his head.

“Stop saying you’re sorry.”

He had so much he wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t come out easily.

He wanted to say that if he hadn’t liked her in the first place, he wouldn’t be here, that in fact, he should be the one apologizing.

If this is your end, I’ll make it less painful. So you can get out of here quickly, in the way you want. In a way that you can feel at ease.

However.

Soohyun looked down at Haein with sad eyes and said,

“Let’s not build feelings for each other while saying sorry.”

Haein’s pupils flickered for a moment as she listened.

“...Ah.”

At Soohyun’s words, Haein felt her heart sink. Even though she knew and understood everything, why did her chest still tighten?

His words were cold, but the way Soohyun looked at her as he held her, and his hands, were endlessly gentle.

Haein met Soohyun’s gaze. His dark pupils, like a lightless black night, were looking at her. His gaze was so deep that she was afraid to look at it for long.

‘Sunbae is someone who has everything... Why do you have such a more miserable look than me?’

Now she understood why he always had the face of someone drowning in a swamp of unhappiness.

She also understood why he looked at her with eyes that seemed to beg her not to leave, while his words sounded like someone desperate not to be abandoned.

Ah, how could I pretend not to know you?

Haein recalled what her father had once told her, that confronting evil with evil would only make it grow like a snowball.

Perhaps Soohyun was confronting the evil that Chairman Park was spreading by cultivating an evil that didn’t suit his nature.

‘Sunbae. They say you have to eat away evil to get rid of it. But if I say this now, you probably won’t understand. So instead of trying to persuade you with many words, I’ll just hold your hand.’

Haein held his embraced body even tighter, afraid of letting go, and pressed her body against his.

Her ten fingers slid down Soohyun’s sweaty back, pressing against it. As she clung to him tightly, Soohyun also hugged Haein so tightly it felt like she would break.

Hands filled with heat explored each other’s bodies, and their bellies met. A languid and hot sensation of their flesh mingling continued for a while.

It was a strange feeling, as if they were melting into each other, their flesh sticking and dissolving, becoming one.

Soohyun’s body against her skin was all hard and hot, making Haein’s touching body burn as if scalded.

“Ah, Sunbae...”

The voice flowing between her lips felt distant, as if it wasn’t her own. Soohyun’s lips trailed down Haein’s neckline.

Her resisting movements were meaningless as the sounds of Soohyun exploring her filled the room.

“Ugh!”

As Soohyun’s face moved lower, Haein arched her back in a curve. The moan that escaped was close to a scream, and Haein covered her mouth with both hands.

Their melting bodies, awakened by a sudden sharp sensation, roused her languidly sinking mind. Haein furrowed her brow and let out a heart-wrenching groan.

Soohyun’s hand overlapped Haein’s palms lying on the bed. He intertwined his fingers with hers, pressing them together tightly.

Each time their skin mingled, their clasped hands gripped each other tightly.

Soohyun lowered his body onto Haein as if sinking, and embraced her. His large chest, which her two arms couldn’t fully encompass, settled over her chest.

“Thank you.”

Many emotions, difficult to express in words, swirled within her chest. Haein reached up and stroked Soohyun’s hair, then wiped the sweat from his forehead again.

The words “thank you” weren’t enough to express all these feelings.

“Thank you for accepting me.”

But having no other words to replace it, she simply repeated her thanks.

“Are you planning to say all the thank yous and apologies you’ll ever make today?”

Soohyun chuckled and pressed his forehead against Haein’s.

“If you want, I’ll do it for the rest of my life.”

It was sincere, but as soon as he said “for the rest of my life,” Soohyun’s eyes sank deeply.

“...If you want.”

Haein spoke once more to emphasize that it wasn’t just a formality.

“I’ll remember that.”

Soohyun accepted her words with an answer that was neither affirmation nor denial. Haein didn’t ask again what his answer meant.

As they held each other tightly, it felt as if something invisible had passed through the hearts of the two people touching.

They held each other tightly for a while, not letting go.

***

Haein was looking at Soohyun’s chest in front of her.

His regularly maintained body was incredibly firm. Haein gently placed her palm on his chest.

The beating of his heart, throbbing beneath her palm, was clearly felt.

“Your heart is beating so fast.”

“Because I’m holding you.”

“You’re very kind today.”

“I don’t want to do anything that will hurt you.”

His words sounded as if this night would never come again, so Haein raised her head to look at him.

Haein, tracing her memories with Soohyun, carefully began to speak.

“...Actually, all my memories with Sunbae were okay.”

“Liar.”

“I’m sorry I was clumsy because it was my first time.”

“It was my first time too.”

At Soohyun’s words, Haein looked surprised. Seeing her incredulous face, Soohyun chuckled.

Haein looked puzzled, wondering if he meant he had deliberately acted like a bad guy. Then Soohyun smiled at her again.

“Why?”

“Sunbae, all throughout university...”

“I deliberately hung out more. It was good for camouflage.”

“What did you need to camouflage?”

“A promiscuous guy, a rough guy, a crazy guy... If I spread rumors like that, people around me wouldn’t be wary. I needed that.”

“Why did you go that far...?”

“If an orphaned chick doesn’t want to be eaten before it grows up, it has to be good at camouflage. In this place where no one takes care of you, it was the best acting I could do.”

Haein recalled her in-laws sitting around her, sneering.

Each individual had an extraordinary aura. As she remembered the gazes that scrutinized her, she felt sorry for Soohyun, who had grown up in that environment his whole life.

He was someone who sat closer to the throne than anyone else, but also someone who was lonelier than anyone else.

“...I didn’t know.”

I’ll do better.

Haein swallowed her feelings and kissed his chest.