If Silk Flowers Bloom by the Water’s Edge Chapter 15

They say no animal is as adaptable as a human. Yet Chaehwa’s heart, which was even growing accustomed to the blowing snow, could not be kind to just one person. That person was Yirok, who had stared blankly at her, not knowing the meaning of the spirit link. Now that the little master’s dignity had fallen to the ground and she was in solitary confinement, it went without saying that in Chaehwa’s eyes, Yirok was a lump of an enemy.

On top of that, he was a man with absolutely no consideration for the person he was bound to by the spirit link. For Chaehwa, who ate three proper meals a day, he was a partner with the worst possible compatibility. As long as they were bound by the spirit link, they were practically one body until her grandmother’s wrath was appeased. But this rotten outsider would only sneak into the kitchen like a thief sparrow and snatch a piece of bread to eat.

He was so stubborn. He was indifferent even when a meal table was brought, listless even at the sight of honey-sticky yumilgwa pastries. His ability to equate the person before him with a stone was also as strong as ever. They only mixed words when absolutely necessary, or when she approached him like a house on fire.

“I’m going to change my clothes, so you better not turn around.”

Yirok, whose condition had worsened since the morning, was silently leaning against the door. The side profile of him, staring only out the open door, was truly heartless. But his struggles, which seemed like a smokescreen, were also on a time limit. He wouldn’t want to be tied to her as a set for the rest of his life, after all.

She was anticipating when his solid iron fortress would crumble. It’s only a matter of time, Chaehwa hummed to herself as she carefully stepped onto a low drawer.

Her cell phone had gone missing since her grandmother’s arrival, but Chaehwa’s people were scattered everywhere like weeds. Above all, Chaehwa had the best intuition among all the jeongmusa in history. A hunch told her that the cell phone would be on top of the six-tiered chest of drawers in the fabric storeroom, where she had dragged him on the pretext of changing her skirt.

Yirok, left to stand guard, was unusually distracted. The laundry staff who frequented the storeroom had been called away for the big clean-up, so there would probably be no interruptions.

“Ugh…”

Chaehwa, standing precariously on the drawer-steps, stretched out her arm. Just as she expected, her hand couldn’t reach the top of the sixth drawer. With her goal just in front of her, Chaehwa had a hard time, accidentally stepping on a folded piece of cloth. As they say, an empty cart rattles the loudest; Chaehwa, who had come up with a big show, trembled all over.

The cell phone dodged her frantic, yet fruitless, hand movements. Just then, her left arm, which had been held back by the spirit link, gained its freedom. Her feet left the drawer and flew into the air. Chaehwa, who had grown tall in an instant, fumbled across the top of the chest and found the cell phone tucked under a box of thread.

As soon as she achieved her goal, Chaehwa lowered her head and looked at the hands supporting her waist. How could this man ignore her warning not to look because she was changing her skirt?

“Did you find it?”

The thick knuckles of Yirok, who had been holding firm without a twitch, gradually tightened around her waist. Chaehwa still couldn’t understand her earlobes, which were growing hot with an emotion other than anger.

“Ah… uh, yeah.”

Yirok lowered her waist with a sense of stability, supporting her with both hands. Only after seeing her stockinged feet safely touch the ground did he step back. He even walked slowly so that Chaehwa wouldn’t be pulled along by his steps.

“What’s so great about that little thing? You really live a hard life.”

But he didn’t let the wave of emotion flow so easily. Chaehwa, putting the cell phone in her lucky pouch, furrowed her brow.

“Gosh, you were doing so well and then you have to…”

“Let’s go. Curfew is soon.”

“I don’t want to.”

Chaehwa sulked as if she had forgotten the reflection period her grandmother had set. She insisted that it was the weak haenang and the household members who were in danger after curfew.

“I’m going to stay a little longer.”

In the moments she could have ignored and let pass, he always left one foot in. In the past, he had put on her flower shoes for her, and today, he had caught her waist when she was in peril and lifted her to the sky. She wondered just how affectionate he could be if he were to be affectionate.

“Answer me. Huh?”

But seeing him respond to her provocation with a blank face, she felt there was still a long way to go. She stood, pulling the spirit link connecting their arms taut, and glared at him. Chaehwa lifted her chin and made an even more provocative move.

“If you want to undo the spirit link, tell me you’ll be good to me from now on. Then we can undo it right away.”

“You can undo it?”

“Yes. I can.”

Yirok’s eyes sparkled for a moment, but he walked over without a change in expression. His downward gaze held no formal courtesy, no politeness. The defiant tilt of his head even made one feel self-conscious. It was probably because of the overwhelmingly disadvantageous eye level. Chaehwa defended her own seemingly losing heart that way.

“What, what, what. Like I said… oh!”

Her body was once again lifted into the air. Just like when he had supported her so she could reach the ceiling, Yirok lifted Chaehwa by the waist again. She flailed her feet as they moved away from the ground, but the hands holding her waist and his expression were both firm.

“Undo it.”

“Hmm… I don’t like your attitude. You have to ask me to undo it.”

At Chaehwa’s unyielding, haughty demeanor, Yirok’s smile hardened. In the midst of it all, Chaehwa attempted to cross her arms precariously. Her feet, dangling in the air, were floating insignificantly, but her expression was full of nerve.

“You’re quite uncomfortable, aren’t you, Yirok? I’m still as comfortable as if I’m in my own home. So you, the uncomfortable one, should be the one to ask.”

“……”

“Go on.”

She was curious to see how Yirok would react if she demanded the submission befitting a subordinate. If a provoked Yirok were to walk out of his self-imposed isolation on his own, wouldn’t the bleak relationship between them change? After all, Yirok was as static and cold as the snow that had been falling relentlessly all winter.

“Hm? Go on.”

When she urged him on by kicking her feet, Yirok’s eyes became like extinguished firewood. She really disliked the way Yirok refused to fall for her provocation and just stewed in it alone.

Whoosh. With a pulling force, the hem of her skirt fluttered as she was brought down to the floorboards. Her toes wiggled inside her stockings, as if reacquainting themselves with the floor after a long time. Yirok’s hands that had been cinching her waist moved to the inside of both of Chaehwa’s arms. The wrinkled, folded part of her yellow jeogori was trapped within Yirok’s palms.

The atmosphere turned sultry due to the parts of her body that were now in contact with his large hands. Yirok’s broad shoulders, now seen again with the distinction between man and woman, were sensual. Slowly, but surely, Yirok’s eyes were wavering. Bewilderment took up most of the space in his gaze.

“If you keep being stubborn, you’re the one who’ll be uncomfortable, not me. Sleeping in a nice bedroom, spending time alone with the precious young miss. Do I look uncomfortable?”

Merely touching her goreum without any dignity, Yirok was more subdued than usual. Only then did Chaehwa realize that his gaze, his emotional state, everything was unstable, and she shook her head. It wasn’t anything else, but that Yirok seemed to have half lost his mind. If she had known he was in such a foul mood, she wouldn’t have made him a target for teasing. Chaehwa, who had picked a fight and came out with less than she started with, just clamped her mouth shut.

“I’m comfortable with you. Because if I just hold onto you, everyone in the house can’t make a move.”

“…You didn’t look comfortable at all.”

“Chaehwa.”

“…What.”

“The person you should be most uncomfortable with in this house is me.”

His smile, devoid of any life, looked sickly. It was because it was a smile where you could see him struggling desperately with empty hands. She got a rough idea of Yirok’s inner thoughts, which the sunlight of Nanjubeol rarely seemed to reach.

“Be uncomfortable when you eat, and be uncomfortable when you sleep. You don’t know when I might suddenly change and act like trash.”

“…Trash? You?”

He seemed more like a trash-wannabe, or a delicate boy who wanted to be trash. He didn’t want to be uncomfortable, he wanted to become uncomfortable. Not even knowing he had been seen through, Yirok put on a punk act. Chaehwa, finding it difficult to stand still, rubbed the storeroom floor with her stockinged feet.

“You don’t know because you’ve only been raised preciously.”

“I know what I need to know.”

“Do you know about kissing a man?”

“You seem to know. About kissing a man.”

“I am a man. It’s very easy.”

And then he tilted his head as if to tease her, his form quite convincing. It wasn’t that she was staying still because she didn’t know what Yirok was talking about. She knew the inexperienced Yirok wouldn’t be able to do it, but she was curious what would change if, by some chance, he did. Things divided into life and death, affection and vows; she was also curious what she, tired of a world of strict dichotomy, would feel. But before their lips could touch, the storeroom door opened with the sound of a breaking icicle.

“Young Miss, the cell phone again…”

Yeonrye, who was entering with a snack tray, was so surprised that she dropped the tray in her hands. The bowl containing cinnamon punch shattered miserably, and a black puddle formed on the storeroom floor.

Of all people to be caught by, it had to be the fussy Yeonrye. It was as if she had lit a time bomb, thinking it was a firework.

“You scoundrel! You, you, you shameless…!”

This scream was only the beginning of that crack.