Rabbit Hole Chapter 3

“You like Go Unha even though he’s just a guy too.”

He couldn’t win a single argument. Looking at the deflated Geumseo, Go San laughed because it was so pathetic how he, already dumb, got one screw looser every time Go Unha’s name came up. Only that jeering or sarcastic laugh resembled Go Unha. Geumseo almost said, please don’t smile like that again, but barely held it in. It was because he had once been smacked hard on the head for making that request before.

“Then I’ll go to another room….”

“Where are you going. Sit here.”

Go San pushed the chair across from him with his foot. Geumseo went and sat down, then trembled. It was because the iron touching his back was too cold.

“I’ll get straight to the point.”

Saying that, Go San closed the book, crossed his arms, and stared intently at Geumseo. Then he rubbed his chin. Had he bitten him that much? Yang Geumseo’s body was in a worse state than he remembered. Red marks remained even on his hesitating instep.

He felt anxious because Go San wasn’t saying anything. Geumseo, who had been bad at studying, hated being called to the school office, and that’s exactly how he felt right now.

“Hurry up and talk. I’m cold.”

When he tried his best to sound like he was rushing him, what came back was Go San’s T-shirt. Go San had stripped off what he was wearing and tossed it, so Geumseo fumblingly caught it and put it on. Geumseo’s pride was about the size of a hamster’s tail.

Let’s see how great he himself smells, he thought, but Go San’s clothes really did smell enchantingly good. While sniffing at it, he realized this scent was familiar. It was that smell from last night that lingered in scattered fragments of his memory. Evidence that it was Go San, not Go Unha, who had split his ass apart was surfacing one after another.

Watching Geumseo’s ever-changing face, Go San swept his own face once. Then, without preamble, he suddenly got to the point.

“You’re going to have to sleep with me a bit more.”

Not can I sleep with you a bit more, but you’re going to have to sleep with me a bit more? Geumseo misheard it as the former and gave the wrong answer.

“No.”

“I’ll give you money.”

“I don’t want to…. Do you always live like that? And you still have friends?”

“No. I don’t need to say things like that in the first place.”

Everyone had been fooled by Go San’s outer shell. Geumseo was proud that people like himself, who could see properly, would choose Go Unha.

“But I wasn’t asking.”

Go San stood up from his seat. His body, revealed under the shirt he had taken off, was already intimidating enough, but when he stood, it felt even more oppressive.

“I need you.”

“But I don’t need you…?”

“What if Go Unha said he needed it?”

“Then that’s okay.”

“What if Go Unha needed you to sleep with me?”

“…”

“Haha… It’s the first time I’ve seen someone so honest it’s annoying.”

To Geumseo too, Go San was the first and only person who looked even more like a madman when he smiled. Geumseo flinched and asked back.

“Why would hyung Unha need something like that.”

“Go Unha is my agency.”

He knew that. To be precise, the company run by Go Unha and Go San’s parents was Go San’s agency. And he had heard that Go Unha was in charge of Go San’s marketing at that company.

“Then if I perform well, it’s good for Go Unha too, right?”

“Yeah….”

“That’s what this is.”

“No, so what exactly is ‘this.'”

“Since I slept with you, my performance went up.”

“It’s a coincidence.”

Geumseo answered firmly. His face, full of conviction, gleamed. Having washed up, he looked even fairer, appearing too young for his age.

“There’s no way something like that makes sense.”

“It hasn’t gone down for over a year.”

Go San rested his temple on his hand and closed his eyes.

“They call it a slump, right? Yeah. I was in a slump, and after sleeping with you, my record dropped today.”

“Congratulations, but… don’t you call that a coincidence?”

“So that’s why let’s do it more, to check whether it’s a coincidence or not.”

No matter what, the structure of the conversation flowed toward the answer Go San wanted. Geumseo shook his head so hard it seemed like it might fall off.

“No! My ass still hurts…!”

“For someone like that, you came pretty well.”

“No. I don’t remember.”

“You pissed too.”

“I said no!”

“You’re the first bastard who’s ever pissed on my bed.”

Geumseo covered his ears and denied it, saying no. Actually, just a tiny bit… he thought he might remember.

‘Haaahh….’

Even if he couldn’t remember the sensation of the tender flesh of his insides being dragged out, he vaguely recalled trembling uncontrollably below as if plummeting from a very high place.

It felt like his knees and thighs had trembled so hard that his knees had knocked together. Or was it his body and not his knees. It wasn’t his body though…. He couldn’t remember the person right in front of his eyes, but he vividly recalled his knees not closing. No, it seemed like he couldn’t close them.

‘You’re going to have to pay me back for this.’

Ah…! So that voice back then wasn’t hyung Unha, so then…?

Even at the fragmentary scenes flashing through his head, Geumseo feigned ignorance. It was because of an instinctive sense of danger that told him he had to pretend not to know for now.

“You came onto me first, mistaking me for hyung, hyung Unha, and now you’re bitching about it.”

“I, I only did a ki, kiss!”

But even lies only get better with practice. Geumseo ended up talking back without realizing it.

“If someone comes onto you, do you just let them go?”

“Do you just pick up and eat anything like this…? You’re going to get sick….”

“Fuck, it already looks like it’s going to make me sick.”

Go San was starting to get bored. Yang Geumseo was missing a few screws, but his crying was, on the other hand, kind of hot. It wasn’t that he never turned anyone away, but his sniffling cries of hyung, hyung, hyung Unha were pretty appetizing, so he ate him, and it really did look like it would make him sick. No, was it more like a supplement? Go San thought only from his own perspective.

“No, but wait, so you do remember?”

“I remember because I thought I was kissing hyung Unha. I’m going to forget everything now.”

“You pissed on someone else’s body and now you’re trying to shut your mouth tight?”

“That’s why I told you to stop back then…!”

“Ha… So you remembered that too, and you just pretended not to know? You’re really dead.”

Laughing eerily, Go San snatched away the towel covering Geumseo’s lower half. He caught Geumseo’s hand as it went, ah, to cover himself below.

“If you need it, I’ll make you drink.”

“I said no!”

“I could just do it without your consent, but I’m being considerate right now.”

“Are you proud that you could do it without my consent?”

“It’s not pride, it’s a threat.”

It didn’t seem like a joke. The moment Go San pressed down firmly on his shoulder, Geumseo couldn’t budge, as if caught in a trap. Without taking his eyes off Geumseo’s, Go San pulled out his phone from his back pocket. Then, after roughly pressing to unlock it, he called someone.

—Hello.

Geumseo’s eyes sparkled. It was Go Unha’s voice. Hearing it over the phone, it sounded even more similar to Go San’s voice. If it hadn’t been for the manner of speech, he would have suspected it was a recording Go San had made beforehand.

“My record dropped.”

—Really? Has it been a year? How much?

“Check that yourself. Anyway, it’s good news, right?”

Go San laughed eerily. Geumseo was tense, waiting for Go Unha’s answer. It was a funny situation. Even though he wasn’t even a party involved. If you’re that curious, then I might as well make you a party involved. Go San decided on his own, as if doing him a favor.

—That’s great. Now…

He couldn’t hear Go Unha’s happy voice to the end. He wanted to hear it more because it was a voice he had never once heard directed at him, but Go San cut it off abruptly.

“Why did you hang up!”

“You want to hear more? If it’s not a coincidence that my record dropped after sleeping with you, then you can hear more.”

“How could it drop in just one day…. If we sleep together one more time, it might go back to how it was, so let’s just leave it at this….”

“That’s something we’d only know after doing it twice.”

“Aren’t you just saying you want to do it?”

“That too.”

Geumseo was appalled. Seeing that, Go San sneered.

“You’re not going to sleep with Go Unha anyway. No matter how much you chase after him like a dog in heat, you’re not his type.”

“…I’ve never chased after him like I was in heat. It’s not like I’m doing this because I want to sleep with hyung.”

It’s just that if it ever did happen, he wouldn’t refuse, and of course he’d be happy, but that’s about it…. Geumseo mumbled, but Go San had no interest in Geumseo’s feelings. He just needed his body. If that body helped his slump, even better.

“If you want, I’ll put on that hat while doing it. I’ll even let you call me Go Unha… three times.”

“Starting from the fourth time…?”