If Silk Flowers Bloom by the Water’s Edge Chapter 76

The sun, which had been sleeping hidden behind the clouds, glared brightly at the whole earth as if announcing morning. The tremendous amount of jeon and meat side dishes prepared for the Naryesik came up on the morning dining table just as they were. The kitchen staff, who were exhausted from dancing all night long, came out to the dining hall and their sleepy eyes grew wide. The classes and training for the Haenangs ended up postponed until next week so that the lingering afterglow of the Naryesik would not fade. Since even Teacher Myeongil, who teaches the curriculum, was given a vacation, they thought the Haenangs were perhaps going on a spring outing.

However, an unexpected guest was sitting at one table. Young lady Chaehwa was seated, having dressed up beautifully as if to question whether the time of 7:00 AM was wrong. Until now, she was a young lady who had Yeonrye bring her morning dining table separately. How many years is it that they prepared and sent breakfast, lunch, and dinner differently, calling her a significant person of the household. It was a step that did not come to the complicated dining hall, upholding the landlord’s command.

“Young lady, eat plenty.”

“Yeah.”

“Shall I set a separate table for you even now?”

“It’s fine. Leave it here and go.”

Chaehwa, who put an empty spoon into her mouth, shook her head hard. When the kitchen staff glanced, her gaze was pinned not on the pretty and delicious side dishes, but on the young man sitting in the front seat. It was referring to Yirok, who has been attending regularly as if possessed by the meat side dishes from a certain day.

“Our young lady came out with a flower literally stuck in her hair.”

“When they go on a spring play later, I won’t know who is the flower and who is the spring.”

“Didn’t I say there’s something between them?”

Although they whispered so that it wouldn’t be heard by Chaehwa’s ears, Yirok was hearing it all. He thought that if he, who used to come to the dining hall diligently to get meat side dishes, suddenly vanished, they might suspect the relationship between Chaehwa and him. He intended to stop entering the dining hall around the time the link between the meat side dishes and himself was forgotten by others.

However, of all things, because Chaehwa appeared in the morning dining hall and occupied the seat in front of him, the rumor became not the problem. If left like this, it was a piece of cake for the Nanjubeol people to weave Chaehwa together with the meat side dishes Yirok took out. Chaehwa, who might not know she is standing at the edge of a cliff right now, was in the middle of choosing side dishes carefully with her chopsticks.

Yirok, whose appetite dropped because he was sharpening his ears, was only piling plain rice on his spoon. When an opportunity to be just the two of them comes, he should school her to eat breakfast alone. However, Yirok’s gaze was somehow stuck to the table, unable to stretch even once. It was then that a white beoseon touched the foot of Yirok, who was in a staring contest with the plain rice.

The soft beoseon lightly swept his knee as if by mistake. Both knew that one time is a mistake and two times is intentional. The tip of the beoseon came down from Yirok’s knee, which protruded with a bump, and stayed while treading firmly on his calf. It was a contact of a quite different feeling from the time she used to strike his calf beneath the desk in the past.

Chaehwa, as if it were something she didn’t know, was boning the fish meat with a nonchalant face. If she chose a place with many people so that he couldn’t point out the foot prank, Chaehwa was smart.

Chaehwa moved her toes as if twitching them out of excitement from eating rice. Only Yirok, who was pressed underneath, almost dropped his spoon every time it touched ticklishly. In Yirok’s eyes, which looked down long enough to count the number of white grains of rice, last night’s event came to mind.

For a long time after taking off the mask and being unable to make eye contact like fools, he bit his tongue at the sound of searching for the young lady from all directions. Chaehwa, who hated to be caught, flat out grabbed his wrist and began to walk. Because she dragged him along saying they wouldn’t be discovered if they went to the guest room, Yirok took a night walk that wasn’t even in his plans.

Only after the voices calling young lady, young lady, became small did Chaehwa release the wrist she was holding. It was after crossing the middle gate that he remembered the evil-warding talisman hung in the guest room. Yirok stood obstructing the steps of Chaehwa, who was advancing leisurely, and bid farewell.

“Since the fact that you said you were sick was revealed to be a lie, it’s done. You go now, Chaehwa.”

“Did you hide a honey jar or something in the guest room?”

“If I tell you to go, just go, right? There’s also a person searching for you over there.”

“I want to talk with you, Yirok, and then go…”

However, the two people who were quarreling with words turned their heads fussily as soon as their gazes met. Their faces heated up like people who faced a face with the mask taken off for the first time. Chaehwa, who was dealing with Yirok with her hands behind her back, did not continue her words. When the situation of enduring the bright moonlight without even being able to look each other in the eye was repeated, Yirok turned his back. How hot the gaze pouring onto his back was at that moment. Even though she didn’t say much, it was hot as if his back were struck with a switch.

“The mackerel is good today.”

“You like it, young lady.”

Chaehwa’s chopsticks, which drew the attention of the surroundings with smiling words, visited Yirok’s rice bowl as if aiming for that moment. Yirok, who was staring to death at only the plain rice, snapped his head up. Chaehwa had placed the mackerel meat she boned on top of his rice. Yirok, who lifted his chopsticks and picked up the mackerel meat, did so to slide it onto the floor stealthily. I’m saying the first purpose was clearly rejection.

However, Chaehwa’s gaze was picked up and rose together with Yirok’s chopsticks. The moment the gazes of the two met, Yirok’s chopsticks changed direction and stuck to his lips like a magnet. Feeling the taste of the oily mackerel, Yirok ridiculed himself.

“Eating here, it’s delicious.”

Chaehwa, seeing that the mackerel entered Yirok’s mouth safely, shrugged her shoulders and said. Even after that, several times Chaehwa pierced through the gazes that others could not see and placed side dishes in his rice bowl. Since he failed to reject once, the side dishes entered Yirok’s mouth as soon as they were placed.

Starting tomorrow, even if the sky falls, I will not come to the dining hall. Putting side dishes into his dry mouth, Yirok made a firm determination.

A promise he muttered only with his mouth, that is.

🌹₊ ⊹

“I’m not going.”

“Let’s gooo.”

“…I hate it.”

“Oh my, so particular. What is so urgent about organizing your luggage.”

Chaehwa, jumping in place like a rabbit, said upon seeing the luggage over the shoulder of him standing and blocking the door. Yirok truly returned. Chaehwa grinned upon seeing the bag that went up on the bed of Yirok, who uses a wide single room alone. It was a moment when Chaehwa praised herself that there is a reward for writing invitations until her arm fell off. Yirok did not budge from the door, shaking his head stubbornly.

“If you are caught being here, only I will get cursed at by Grandma Yomyeong and beaten up by your nanny. If you like that, stay… if not, stop it so I can organize my luggage and go, right?”

“You are truly tight. Is going on a spring outing together such a difficult thing? Huh?”

“Go.”

Yirok closed his eyes and leaned his head against the doorpost as if he didn’t want to deal with her anymore at all. Chaehwa pouted her lips because Yirok, who made his refusal obvious, was unkind. However, she wasn’t a Chaehwa to give up. Chaehwa, while pretending to take a step back, reached out her hand first. Stealing one heavy arm of Yirok, she dragged it recklessly.

“Then let’s just look at the flowers and come back. Let’s just catch the breeze and come back. Huh?”

Chaehwa’s hand went down wrongly to Yirok’s elbow, which was sturdier than it looked, and after being startled, it moved to his wrist. In that way, it amounted to caressing his whole arm with her palm by mistake. Yirok’s shoulder froze upon seeing the small hand tangled at his wrist. Then, pushed by Chaehwa who was bouncing around to drag him out somehow, he ended up taking one step out of the door frame.

“Yiroook. Do you know how bored I was? Take a photo with me and the flowers. If it’s not you, there is no one to talk about cell phones with anyway. I will also let you know about a new game. How about it? Huh? How about it.”

Because of Chaehwa who was taking away his spirit without even resting, babbling on, Yirok was in the middle of the hallway before he knew it. Chaehwa, who succeeded in the operation to take his spirit away, tucked Yirok’s arm into her flank and went down the stairs. Turning back at intervals, she monitored with an eye-smile whether Yirok’s legs were coming or not.

Yirok, who yielded one arm, went down the stairs with slow steps so that his steps wouldn’t get tangled. Chaehwa’s hand, which was holding and dragging Yirok’s wrist, slipped down again. The two people stopped in the middle of the stairs the moment their palm and palm touched. Yirok stopped, and accordingly, Chaehwa also stopped.

However, Chaehwa opened her eyes round and looked up at Yirok who was behind.

“Why aren’t you following.”

“The hand, you touched it. You.”

“Shall I hold your hand?”

When Yirok shook his head frantically as if at a loss for words, Chaehwa stopped teasing. Releasing the hot palm, she held his wrist once again. For a nineteen-year-old man to walk with his wrist caught. It was a matter anyone would laugh at if they heard, but Chaehwa and Yirok were serious.

From the moment they left the dormitory, the two walked without a trace of a smile. Rather than going on a spring outing, the space between their brows was narrow as if they were going out to war. Sometimes, they let out sighs deeply with their lips as if they hated the spring sunlight.

Just looking at their faces, their relationship looked bad enough that one could deem they had quarreled. However, the fundamental problem was because of the pulsation Yirok’s wrist was making. At that place connected to the heart, Chaehwa also felt and Yirok also felt the beat bouncing rapidly, thump, thump, thump.

“…Let go of the wrist and go.”

Even though there was no person watching, Yirok said in a low voice as if protesting. It was a situation where everything was already caught, but he wished to hide even his tail. If only he withdrew his wrist and cooled his cheeks, it would be better. Chaehwa, who was leading the way, only revealed her red neck and shook her head.

“I hate it. I’m going to go straight like this. I feel like you will run away.”

As if questioning when winter had ever come, the earth showing off its coyness bloomed flowers indiscriminately. In the hearts of the two people as well, a spring that knows only today came. Originally, the flower blooming secretly without the knowledge of the flower bed owner possessed the thickest fragrance. To the extent that even a stranger beyond a thousand ri could smell it. The flowers of the two people were blending into the hill of spring like the same flock.