Winter Season Chapter 21

Seunghyeok chuckled softly, as if the words he had just spat out were ridiculous even to himself. However, Yihyeon merely sat there with his lips tightly sealed. At the sight of Yihyeon like that, Seunghyeok slowly erased the smile from his face and gestured toward the pizza box with his chin.

“What are you doing? I told you to eat.”

Yihyeon had not touched pizza since he worked part-time at a pizza parlor around the age of twenty, but he had no intention of bothering to inform Seunghyeok of this. Biting his lower lip hard at the nauseating smell of cheese, Yihyeon answered quietly.

“Can I leave if I eat this?”

“We’ll see.”

“…”

“Eat first, okay?”

Yihyeon swallowed a rising sigh and picked up the slice of pizza placed in front of him.

As soon as he took a bite, the greasiness of the cheese rushed in along with the characteristic tomato flavor, making him feel like he was going to gag. However, not wanting to show it to Seunghyeok, who was watching him intently from the side, he chewed and swallowed it haphazardly.

With every single bite, it felt as if he were eating trash. He clenched his molars hard to endure the sour liquid rising in his throat.

Whether he knew of Yihyeon’s situation or not, Seunghyeok gave a smirk and leaned back against the sofa again. Seeing Seunghyeok tilt his glass once more with his eyes cast down, the gang members now began to take an interest in Yihyeon. One of them, after gauging the mood, threw a question toward Yihyeon.

“Hey, anyway, how old were you when you became gay? Does that just happen overnight, like you’re doing this and that with girls until the day before and then suddenly it turns out like that?”

“Ahaha! Hey, you crazy bastard. Why are you asking something like that? Have you ever seen gay shits doing that with girls? They’re probably born that way!”

The men, completely drunk, grabbed each other by the collars and collapsed with a thud, but everyone was just watching and snickering. Gu Seunghyeok, sitting next to them, also chuckled and flicked the lid of his lighter with a click.

Yihyeon was the only one there remaining expressionless. Even at a conversation clearly meant to mock him, Yihyeon sat still without a single action like clenching his fists or grinding his teeth.

“Fuck, hey. Then when he went to catch a whale while holding his mom’s hand, did he get a hard-on for the male urologist’s hand too? Pfft, fuck, that doctor bastard must have felt like total shit.”

“You bastard, why the hell are you asking that? Are you interested? Hey, you’ll catch it if you do that, you punk. Haha, be careful, or you’ll become a gay and get your back taken too.”

“You son of a bitch, why are you saying such filthy things!”

Yihyeon, who had been sitting still with his eyes cast down, let out a long sigh. He could feel neither a reason nor a necessity to sit there any longer. At the moment he stood up from his seat and tried to grab the wallet placed on the table, Seunghyeok, who was beside him, snatched it first.

“…”

Seunghyeok, who was casually rolling the item that had come into his hand, opened the wallet and checked the inside. After rummaging through the interior insincerely, he discovered something and burst into a hollow laugh.

What was pulled out by his long, straight fingertips was a flat, individually packaged condom.

“I guess you bastards with dicks use things like this when you do it, too.”

“…”

“It’s not like you’ll get pregnant, so is there a need to bother putting one on?”

With a mutter that sounded like a monologue, Seunghyeok tossed the unused condom wrapper onto the table with a thud. After being momentarily flustered by Seunghyeok’s sudden behavior, the gang members snickered and spat out various comments.

“Awoo, hyung-nim, that’s how you don’t catch diseases and stuff. You didn’t know? I heard gays use condoms better because they’re afraid of catching diseases! I heard they put on two layers and stuff like that while ramming and being rammed by each other; is that true?”

If he had been seated in this spot to be insulted, it was a success. Yihyeon grit his teeth hard at the surging sense of shame. He tried to snatch the wallet held in Seunghyeok’s hand without a word, but Seunghyeok dodged it by stretching his long arm to the side.

“Why do you carry around such a worn-out thing like a beggar? Don’t the punks you meet buy you something like this?”

“…”

“I’ll give you money, so throw that away and buy a new one.”

As he rummaged through his pants pocket, Seunghyeok’s body tilted heavily due to the influence of alcohol before finding its place with someone’s help. He fumbled all over his body as if looking for his wallet and then frowned. Watching that scene, Yihyeon stood up from his seat while grinding his teeth.

“I bet it’s great to be able to proudly spend money earned by beating people up.”

Seunghyeok’s hand stopped moving at the voice that was shivering with coldness. He dropped his arms onto his knees and let out a short, incredulous dry laugh. After wiping his face with one hand, Seunghyeok looked up.

“And the money earned by giving up your back hole is clean, I suppose.”

“…”

“I don’t think you’re in a position to distinguish between clean money and dirty money, yet you’re acting all noble. Because you keep doing that, I’m getting curious.”

“…”

“Just how much you’re trying to make with that measly body of yours.”

Seunghyeok, who laughed with a wheezing sound, found a fifty-thousand-won bill rolling around in his jacket pocket and held it out to Yihyeon.

“Fifty thousand won should be enough, right?”

“…”

“Sell it to me once, too. I can’t do it myself, but I could probably find a decent guy for you.”

Looking at the banknote held out in front of him, Yihyeon’s expression hardened. It was the moment he felt certain that the Gu Seunghyeok he remembered no longer remained. The person sitting here now was a different person from back then. Well, he himself had changed so much, so there was no way Gu Seunghyeok would have stayed the same.

Yihyeon, who was standing still and looking down at Seunghyeok, locked eyes with Seunghyeok, who was smirking at him, and spoke coldly.

“Gu Seunghyeok. You’ve changed a lot.”

“…”

“You’ve turned into a real piece of trash.”

Seunghyeok’s lips, which had been turned up mockingly, flattened into a straight line at once. It seemed like a light flickered in his eyes, which had been loosely relaxed, but it soon vanished behind his closing eyelids. He stroked his eyebrow with a slow gesture and let out a wheezing laugh. After a moment of silence, his closed lips opened.

“You sure speak harshly.”

Seunghyeok, who smirked to himself, slowly opened his eyes. He set the wallet down on the table with a clack in front of Yihyeon and spoke.

“Here, take it.”

“…”

“And if possible, let’s not see each other again, Yihyeon.”

A hollow laughing sound occurred, followed by a low, sunken voice.

“It’s no fun anymore.”

The one who had created excuses for a fight and scraped at someone’s insides was Gu Seunghyeok, not him. And yet he says not to see each other again? Look who’s talking.

Yihyeon looked down at the wallet placed in front of him and reached out. Having finished speaking, Seunghyeok was buried and leaning against the sofa as if he had truly lost interest. Yihyeon took in the sight of him closing his eyes and swaying his glass once more before turning his back. Passing the people who were having a drinking party, he quickly stepped up the stairs leading to the upper floor.

While he was glad about the fact that he didn’t have to be involved with Gu Seunghyeok again, the image of his face hardening at a single word he said kept coming to mind. Even though he was the one who had said even worse things, he had an expression that made it seem as if Yihyeon had become the perpetrator.

In the midst of that, his stomach began to churn because of the pizza he had been forced to eat. His stride began to quicken slightly, and as he reached a place where there were no people, it turned into almost a run.

Yihyeon flung open the bathroom door he saw in front of him and immediately ran to the toilet to gag. The pizza slices and lumps of food he had swallowed without chewing properly poured out along with gastric juices.

“Fuck… This is why I said I wouldn’t eat it…”

The corners of his eyes, which had turned red from nausea, stung. After flushing the toilet and standing up to approach the sink, Yihyeon wiped his mouth while facing his moist eyes in the mirror.

The cold stream of water touching his fingertips was as sharp as a blade. Even though there should be nothing left in his stomach after vomiting everything up, it felt heavy as if something were still sitting on it.

༘⋆🤍˚ .❄️₊˚ෆ

<BIG Fitness Club. New Opening Event. First 30 people>

A paper filled largely with primary-colored sentences scratched past his white, chapped fingertips. A pedestrian who bumped into Yihyeon’s arm with their body stepped down the subway station stairs just like that, without so much as an apology.

His entire body had long since become cold from the whipping wind. A stinging sensation somehow seemed to arise from his numb fingertips that had lost sensation. Looking down, bright red drops of blood were slowly welling up from the part scratched by the paper.

“…Ah.”