Struggle Chapter 142

“Why not? Did you do something wrong to your uncle? Did you get scolded? Is he going to kick you out?”

Did Lee Nanyoung cause some trouble? If he did, what on earth did he do? Sim Suhwan’s eyes sparkled at this rare occurrence.

“…”

“If you did something wrong, be honest about it and say you were wrong. Your uncle still adores you anyway. Surely he wouldn’t kick you out of the house.”

Nanyoung was someone who had a rigid and upright side, so for matters he judged were not his fault, he would speak the hard truth even if it killed him. Seeing that this time there was no response like ‘It’s not my fault,’ it seemed he really had made some kind of mistake.

Putting his tablet pen down on the table, Sim Suhwan looked at Nanyoung. Nanyoung was just quietly gnawing on his straw.

He had now gotten a new lover and had just sorted out his feelings for Nanyoung into friendship, but the process hadn’t been easy. Because that feeling hadn’t just been a youthful whim, Sim Suhwan’s heart quickly weakened. Though you couldn’t call it a fault to be easily swayed and quick to forgive, Sim Suhwan sometimes found Lee Nanyoung detestable for no reason.

“…Alright.”

It truly isn’t Lee Nanyoung’s fault that you end up granting his request the moment his pale face loses just a little bit of spirit.

“Just call before you come. Don’t expect a clean house or anything. Okay?”

Color quickly returned to Nanyoung’s face.

“Thank you, Sim Suhwan. I’ll buy you a cake. Let’s eat, okay? You like strawberry cake.”

“Buy a whole one.”

Even clicking his tongue, Sim Suhwan ended up laughing.

Knowing full well that he used to like him.

Sim Suhwan spitefully adds one more remark. Thinking he’s at least entitled to this much.

“But if you’re not being kicked out for doing something wrong, will your uncle even allow it? Your uncle is scary, you know.”

Lee Nanyoung’s uncle is far from the loud, stern Misters. Yet he was scary. Even when they ran into him occasionally picking up Nanyoung from school, and he more often seemed to be in a good mood. It wasn’t because he seemed simply hot-tempered or aggressive in nature, but because there was a feeling that he would scold very coldly if there was something he didn’t know about Lee Nanyoung or if his nephew stepped out of line…

“He’s not that scary.”

Nanyoung mumbled, defending Lee Taerok.

“Sure, whatever. If you, who lives with him, say so, I guess that’s how it is. Anyway, I’m going to follow your uncle’s wishes, not yours. Because your uncle scares me.”

At the statement that he would listen to his friend’s uncle, not his friend himself, Nanyoung scowled at Sim Suhwan, though not resentfully.

The reason he was heading to Sim Suhwan’s house and not a hotel was nothing special. If it were a hotel, Lee Taerok would follow him in. If he came like a nightmare and knocked on the door, Nanyoung had no confidence he could keep from opening it. He would open it, and end up welcoming him like a delighted host. Nanyoung grew sullen at the thought of his own reed-like heart and weak will.

“I think I’m really indecisive.”

At this self-reproachful remark, Sim Suhwan snorted.

He had never seen anyone as stubborn as Lee Nanyoung.

∞ ∞ ∞

Even when parting, Sim Suhwan firmly insisted that if Nanyoung was going to stay at his place, he must absolutely get his uncle’s permission.

Nanyoung resolved that today, of all days, he must coordinate with Lee Taerok on what to do when his parents visited.

However, the moment he came home and saw Lee Taerok wearing glasses and looking over documents, that resolution gently melted away. He had to coordinate, he had to get on the same page…. Ah, he really just wanted to endlessly press his lips against his, nothing more. He felt a sense of shame at his own weakness for temptation.

“You’re back?”

Unaware of Nanyoung’s inner thoughts, Lee Taerok greeted him while drinking freshly brewed coffee.

A mug in one hand, documents in the other, glasses on his face. He looked as if he had just walked right out of an advertisement. Nanyoung turned his head away like someone who had just seen a lewd picture.

He was flustered.

Moreover, since Lee Taerok had been extremely busy for a while after putting off work to nurse him, just seeing him so leisurely at this hour was something that hadn’t happened in a very long time. As their only interactions had been Nanyoung waking briefly to the presence slipping under the covers in his sleep and exchanging a short greeting, Lee Taerok in the languid afternoon sunset was excessively provocative.

The moment Nanyoung realized that what he was feeling was sexual desire, he became extremely embarrassed. He hastily averted his eyes, but the warning light in his head that his parents were coming soon had long since gone out. No, wasn’t the warning light broken early on from the very beginning? If not, who would lust after their uncle.

“What are you doing. Come in.”

Taerok nodded at Lee Nanyoung, who was avoiding his gaze.

Lee Taerok sat on the sofa first, and Nanyoung put down his bag, wiped his hands, and came to the living room. As Nanyoung, feeling unnecessarily nervous and unable to look at him properly, tried to sit far away, Lee Taerok hooked him. He hooked him and sat him on his own lap.

“If you tell me first what you’ve done wrong again, I’ll go easier on you.”

A languid voice and a smile drawn with eyes tinged faintly with fatigue.

Lee Nanyoung’s heart began to pound wildly.

He thought words like ‘sex appeal’ were too corny and laughable, but there were times when he saw Lee Taerok and thought he might understand what it meant after all. This was exactly such a situation.

“I didn’t do anything wrong….”

“Seems like you did. You haven’t pulled anything yet, but it looks like you’re cooking something up nicely in your head. Like a firefly.”

Firefly talk coming out of Lee Taerok’s mouth. Nanyoung ended up laughing. Hearing the sound that escaped like a hollow laugh, Lee Taerok wrapped his arm around Nanyoung’s waist.

“Will you tell me, or shall I find out.”

The glasses he only occasionally wore when his workload was heavy had almost no prescription. Beyond them, Lee Taerok’s eyes were extremely deep. Feeling as if he were about to be sucked into them, Nanyoung moistened his lips with his tongue.

“If I find out, it’ll be a bit hard on you.”

Nanyoung knew well enough that Lee Taerok was a strict person. His interrogation nevertheless helped Nanyoung come to his senses. The sense of crisis that this was not the time revived. At this rate, even when his parents were here, he wouldn’t be able to overcome his own desires and would end up wrapped around Lee Taerok.

Lee Nanyoung, who had dropped his gaze, confessed his worry. Since his heart was already in a field of mulberry trees, his head had to at least do the work.

“While my parents are here, I could go somewhere else….”

“No.”

But before he could even finish speaking, Lee Taerok cut him off firmly.

“I thought that talk was already over.”

“When.”

“It’s over.”

Lee Taerok said, staring at Nanyoung with drowsy eyes.

“The more you’re this conscious of it, the more suspicious it looks, I told you. Just live normally.”

“Normally?”

“Well, there will probably be things that are a bit more inconvenient than usual.”

Before he knew it, Nanyoung’s body was tilting. Lee Taerok lays Nanyoung down. Supporting his back with his hand, taking fresh delight in the fact that if he spread his hand wide, he could cover the entirety of Lee Nanyoung’s back. Lee Nanyoung is not the only one starved. The starvation would be greater for him. Because he is much larger than Lee Nanyoung. In body, and in anything else as well.

“So that’s why you have to stay in the house more. Or shall we openly date outside? Shall I hold your hand and go to a hotel? Ah, shall we pick out condoms together, Nanyoung-ah.”

Nanyoung’s mouth pressed firmly shut. His face slowly flushed.

“I can do it right this moment. But you couldn’t do that, right. Still, because you’re a bit more honest in this house, I can’t let you go even more.”

“Wh-what if Mom and Dad suddenly walk in.”

Mom, Dad.

Lee Taerok let out a puff of laughter at that form of address. He can’t even remember when he last called his own deceased parents that.

“It’s my house.”

Before he knew it, his face was slipping under Nanyoung’s T-shirt. He gently rubbed the side of Nanyoung’s stomach with his prominent nose bridge and lips.

“Who could possibly come in without my permission.”

“Haa….”

“Besides, ordinary people don’t suspect uncle and nephew of being on good terms.”

“…Earlier you said we were sinners.”

“Ordinary people don’t suspect in the first place, and I don’t think it’s wrong. Both statements aren’t incorrect.”

Still, he doesn’t think he’s ever lost an argument or a battle of wills anywhere else, but somehow Nanyoung doesn’t seem to have ever beaten Taerok properly even once.

Taerok pestered Nanyoung, whose mouth was firmly shut.

“Take my glasses off for me.”