Winter Season Chapter 46

Yihyeon followed behind Jinhyeok, thinking to himself that he wanted to avoid these kinds of gatherings as much as possible in the future.

By the time he returned to the company and finished the odd jobs assigned by the other secretaries, it was already time to head home. Thanks to Gu Jinhyeok being out of the office for another appointment following the lunch meeting, the people in the secretariat were quickly preparing to leave.

“Mr. Seonghyeon, tomorrow is Christmas. Do you have plans with your girlfriend?”

“My girlfriend is busy with year-end stuff too, so we decided to meet briefly in the evening. I’m just planning to rest at home.”

A belated realization came to Yihyeon at the voices heard from beside him. Ah, now that he thought about it, tomorrow was Christmas. On his phone screen, the date December 24th was displayed in large print. Only then did the trees and ornaments set up throughout the company make sense.

“Me too. Once I come in the day after tomorrow, it’s the D-day for the event, so I expect to be working overtime and losing my mind. I’m planning to get plenty of rest.”

“I hope it all ends soon. Get home safely, and I’ll see you the day after tomorrow.”

“Then I’ll be heading out first!”

Led by Seonghyeon, who bowed repeatedly to people while exiting the secretariat, others began packing their bags and heading home as well.

Yihyeon sat at his desk in the now-empty office and slowly pressed the power button on his computer. Silence had descended upon the secretariat that had been so bustling just a moment ago.

“…”

Large trees decorated with colorful lights outside the window caught his eye. People who looked as small as beans passed along the road like swarms of ants. When he took a step closer to the window and pressed his forehead against it, a faint mist of condensation formed on the glass.

Yihyeon blinked his eyelids slowly.

When he was young, he spent every Christmas at church. After graduation, once he stopped attending church, he would cover shifts for other part-timers at the restaurants, cafes, or clubs where he worked.

To Yihyeon, Christmas was nothing more and nothing less than a public holiday that paid a slightly higher daily wage. Therefore, it was only right that he should feel no great emotion about facing his first Christmas alone with nothing to do.

However, the thought of returning to an empty house alone brought a surge of inexplicable loneliness. Unfamiliar with the hollowness that felt like an empty pit in his stomach, Yihyeon bit his lip hard and pulled his forehead away from the glass.

After locking the secretariat door and coming down to the lobby, he saw people standing in line at the bakery on the first floor. On the faces of those awaiting the Christmas holiday, emotions resembling excitement were visible. They were faces that were the exact opposite of his own expressionless reflection in the glass.

Should he buy a cake?

While blowing out a candle alone in an empty house seemed like the height of pathetic self-pity, a white cake box was soon in his hand. It was an unexpected expense, but the weight in his hand didn’t feel bad.

Yihyeon quickly passed by people gathered in small groups and tightly adjusted the scarf he was wearing. Perhaps because it might become a White Christmas, the sky was entirely grey, making the surroundings feel strangely bright.

Why had he forgotten that the world was not particularly favorable to him? He should have realized it from the moment he saw the walls charred black at the building entrance and the stairs darkly stained with dried ashen water.

The house he returned to after a few days was a mess beyond imagination. As soon as he pulled the front door open, a floor drenched in water and air thick with the smell of burning greeted Yihyeon.

It seemed that water and smoke had leaked through the gaps in the front door, which was loose enough to let in drafts even normally. While still wearing his shoes, he rushed to fling the windows wide open, and a wind like a razor-sharp blade came rushing into the room.

“Sigh…”

A sigh escaped him at the sheer helplessness of not knowing where to start. He placed the cake he was carrying on the sink and wiped his face with both hands.

Yihyeon stood there in the middle of the room for a while, clenching his teeth, before biting his lip hard and bringing out a hand rag. As he crouched in a spot where water hadn’t pooled and wiped the drenched floor, the light-colored rag quickly turned pitch black.

By the time he had roughly tidied the floor, his fingertips were frozen red. His nose, and even his head, throbbed from the acrid smell.

Because of the smell of burning that permeated the entire room, he couldn’t even close the windows, let alone sleep.

Exhaling another long sigh, Yihyeon let his head hang. It seemed impossible to sleep here, but he couldn’t bring himself to be a burden to Gu Jinhyeok once more.

The remaining options were a motel or a bathhouse. But there was no need to agonize. Considering the balance for this month’s living expenses, the answer was already decided.

As he was about to leave the house with his toiletries and a change of clothes, the cake he had left on the sink caught his eye. A sigh mixed with regret welled up at the thought that he had pointlessly done something that didn’t even suit him.

However, if he left it behind, it would only end up in the food waste bin, so he had no choice but to pick up the cake box and leave the house.

Yihyeon passed by people who looked completely excited for Christmas with an expressionless face. Seeing those faces full of laughter, he recalled a maxim one might find stuck to a bathroom door: that people don’t laugh because they are happy, but are happy because they laugh.

Was the reason he wasn’t happy right now because he didn’t laugh much? He didn’t think so.

“One adult, please.”

As he held out his card at the entrance of a large bathhouse located in the city center, he felt the gaze of the part-timer who glanced at him. Since a man had come to a bathhouse alone on Christmas Eve carrying a cake, it wasn’t that he didn’t understand that look. Fortunately, he received the locker key handed over without a word and moved inside.

Given the day, there weren’t many people inside the bathhouse. Yihyeon quickly headed to a corner of the bath area. It was behind a middle-aged man who was washing his hair.

The red bruises left by Subin’s friend still remained here and there on his body. He felt the middle-aged man sitting behind him stealing glances. Since the marks were clearly left by another person, Yihyeon quickly washed his body under the showerhead.

By the time he changed clothes and came up to the common sleeping area, it was nearly dawn. After having a simple meal in the darkened snack bar, Yihyeon entered the sleeping room and took a spot in the furthest corner possible.

On top of not being able to rest properly the previous night, his fatigue was considerable after cleaning his house while exposed to the cold wind. However, even as he lay with his eyes closed, sleep would not come.

It was due to the insomnia that had recently resurfaced. Yihyeon used a hard wooden pillow for his head and curled his body as much as possible. His fingertips, which had been overworked in the ice-cold water, still felt tingly.

While he struggled to sleep, covering his ears with his arms against the sound of snoring, the footsteps of people entering and leaving the sleeping room faintly seeped into his ears.

How many times had he tossed and turned on the hard floor? Just when he thought a considerable amount of time had passed while he was in a light doze, he felt someone take a spot and lie down right behind his back.

He didn’t understand why they chose this specific spot out of so many available seats, but Yihyeon instinctively pressed closer to the wall. As he curled up and crossed his arms to try and fall back asleep, a hand suddenly brushed past his buttock area.

The sudden contact chased away sleep, and he became wide awake. Thinking it must be a mistake, he pressed his body even closer to the wall, but the breathing of the person lying behind him became very close.

Perhaps thinking that Yihyeon was asleep, the person stroked up Yihyeon’s exposed thigh with a touch more daring than before.

Goosebumps erupted all over his body. After his body froze momentarily from the unpleasant sensation, Yihyeon bit his lower lip hard and bolted upright. When he looked back, the middle-aged man he had seen in the bath earlier was lying there right next to him, pretending to be asleep. He could see the man’s eyelids trembling.

Yihyeon just gnawed on his lip while glaring at the man. Since there was no way a CCTV would be in the corner of a sleeping room, even if he shouted at the man in anger here, the man could simply deny it by saying he never did such a thing.

He was angry and felt wronged to just let it go, but the reaction he would get if he made a scene here was obvious. They would despise and mock him, just as the police had last time. Most ordinary people hated even seeing such commotions between the same sex. He would be lucky if he didn’t hear someone say that he must have enjoyed it too since he made it a big deal.