Foot Worship Chapter 18

On the dining table, along with various side dishes, sat kimchi bean sprout soup that looked spicy and refreshing at a glance. Before I even picked up my spoon to eat, I took a picture with my phone. Goo Jihoon watched me with a satisfied expression and a meaningful smile. I endured my embarrassment and sent the photo to Jerome.

“I’ll eat well.”

I took a spoonful, but it wasn’t enough, so I picked up the bowl and drank it directly. The spicy broth seemed to settle my stomach. Goo Jihoon was talented in many ways. He cooked well, spoke well, and had an excellent ability to read people’s moods. I always envied those aspects of Goo Jihoon. I finished a bowl of rice in an instant, opened the rice cooker, and heaped another full portion. For a man living alone, a home-cooked meal was like a dream.

“It’s really nice eating home-cooked meals since you came back to Korea.”

“With a build like yours, how can you survive on just protein shakes?”

“It’s better than not eating at all.”

Goo Jihoon laughed as if I were hopeless and fiddled with his phone. His background was a photo taken with Kwon Haeyi, both of them pressing their faces together; Haeyi was heavily disguised with a mask and a ball cap.

“Now, talk to me.”

“About what?”

“Mister Jerome.”

Goo Jihoon sucked on his spoon and looked at me with an intrigued expression. I ignored him and piled various side dishes onto my white rice, shoving it into my mouth. I’d stuffed so much in that my cheeks were bulging, and it took a while just to chew and swallow.

“A D/s relationship?”

“No.”

“Then?”

“It’s not anything yet. I don’t even know if we’ll meet twice or just once.”

Recalling that fact made me feel gloomy for no reason. So this is how miserable and hollow a relationship without a future feels. I quickly shook my head to change the subject. We were still a relationship where nothing was clearly defined. No one knew how the relationship would develop yet.

Goo Jihoon, who had a small appetite, put his spoon down without even finishing half of his bowl. Eating like a bird is why you don’t gain weight. Goo Jihoon had a typical slim body with no muscle. He was the type who didn’t build muscle easily even when working out. A few years ago, he had tried to bulk up by eating protein supplements while working out, but instead of gaining muscle, he lost weight, earning him the nickname “Dried Radish Strip.”

“Dried Radish Strip.”

“Do you want to die?”

“No, I’m just saying dried radish is delicious.”

I picked up a piece of well-seasoned dried radish and chuckled. Goo Jihoon glared at me fiercely and shoved the plate of dried radish to the side. Sharp intuition, that one. I suddenly remembered that Kwon Haeyi and Goo Jihoon were in a D/s relationship, and my eyes lit up.

“You’re in a D/s relationship with Haeyi, right? Is that okay?”

“Oh, so the other side is looking for a D/s relationship?”

That crafty bastard. I muttered to myself and shoved more rice into my mouth.

“A D/s relationship depends on the people involved. I was negative about it at first, too, but Haeyi controlled it well, so there were no problems.”

“How did he control it?”

“Sometimes we’d live normally like a couple on weekdays and stick to the Master/sub dynamic only on weekends, or during rest periods, we’d separate it by day and night.”

“Ah… but how does a vertical relationship become horizontal? I don’t really know.”

I shook my head and shoved more rice in. I scraped the bowl clean without a single grain left and put the spoon down. Ah, I’m full. It was a feeling of satiety I hadn’t felt in a while. Goo Jihoon chuckled, stood up, and began clearing the table. I rinsed the used dishes and put them in the dishwasher. Meanwhile, Goo Jihoon turned on the coffee machine and brewed coffee.

“But if you actually try it, it’s really no big deal. It’s so hollow you wonder why you even worried about it.”

“Is that so?”

“You could just start with a D/s relationship first.”

“He said from the beginning he was looking for a D/s relationship. That’s why I gave up.”

“You said you aren’t anything yet. Can’t you just talk about it? Like, decide to meet for a few months as a D/s dynamic and then decide whether to sign a D/s contract or end it.”

I puffed out my cheeks and shrugged. I still clearly remembered the emotion I felt the moment I first met Jerome. It was a very ordinary attraction felt between humans, rather than sexual stimulation. In fact, I describe that day with the childish words that “a halo was shining,” but it’s true that I felt an intense sensation of being pulled by something inside me. I didn’t think lightly of my relationship with him either. I still didn’t know much about Jerome, but just seeing the way he treated me, I knew how good a person he was. So I wanted to think about it carefully before making a decision.

“Want to smoke a cigarette and play a round of FIFA?”

“Sure, why not.”

I grabbed my coffee cup and cigarette pack and headed to the living room. Suddenly, the doorbell rang. Tilting my head, I checked the wall pad.

“Who is it?”

―Quick delivery service.

I quickly went to the front door and opened it. The courier handed me a mysterious box and had me sign for it. The sender was Jerome. I licked my lips and opened the box in front of the entryway. Goo Jihoon watched the box with curious eyes, wondering what it was. Inside the box was a smaller box. I carefully opened it to check the contents.

“Oh my god, what is this?”

“…”

“This is fucking wild.”

Goo Jihoon let out an exclamation he didn’t usually use and wrinkled his nose. I ignored Goo Jihoon’s mockery, grabbed my phone and the box, and opened the bedroom door. I sat down on the floor, opened the box, and took out the contents. What Jerome had sent was a pair of white underwear. But the problem was that it wasn’t regular underwear; it was a jockstrap, consisting of a waist band, two loops for the legs, and a pouch to cover the front. The characteristic was that when worn, the buttocks were left completely exposed.

In my mind, I pictured myself wearing the underwear Jerome had gifted me, and Jerome looking at me like that. I covered my mouth with both hands. Even though I muffled it, a low groan leaked out. My heart pounded like crazy. Just as my hand was about to go into my pants, my phone rang. I took a deep breath and answered.

“Hello.”

―Did you receive the package I sent?

“…Yes. I did.”

―Wear it on Friday. I thought it would look good on you.

My blood rushed to my lower body at the sound of his voice whispering into my ear. I grabbed my waistband and bit my lip hard.

―I sent it early so you could enjoy yourself imagining standing in front of me wearing that. Don’t go jacking off like a degenerate, though. Understand?

“…Yes.”

―Good boy. Rest up, then.

The call wasn’t long. I held onto the phone, which he had disconnected, and slumped onto the floor. My breathing grew ragged, and my body twitched of its own accord. My mind was ablaze with color. I couldn’t bear how much I looked forward to playing with him. Even if he were an inexperienced Dom, I didn’t think I’d be disappointed at all.

I fingered my ear and let out a soft laugh. It was such an unfathomable feeling. To think a person could be this good. My heart raced at a feeling I was experiencing for the very first time. I spread the jockstrap on the floor and squatted in front of it. I touched it with my finger and chuckled.

I am physically sensitive, so I usually don’t wear underwear when I compete in tournaments. But after a mishap where my uniform ripped slightly during a violent match, a junior recommended I wear a jockstrap. Back then, I was just focused on the exercise and didn’t think deeply about it. It was just a minimal line of defense to prevent mishaps. But now that I’d received such underwear as a gift with a play session in mind, the feeling was strange.

“Hey, what are you doing?”

Goo Jihoon’s voice came from outside. I hurriedly packed up the box, put it in the drawer, and went out.

The soccer game I had begrudgingly started due to Goo Jihoon’s whining ended in my overwhelming victory, to the point of being boring. Goo Jihoon, very upset, lay long on the sofa, covering his face with both hands and grumbling repeatedly.

“I could have won, why did I have to screw up right there?”

“That’s skill, too.”