Hit by a Pitched Ball Chapter 7

Yunjae checked the time first. Then he debated whether to wake Taebeom, who was deep in sleep and not moving a muscle. When thirty minutes passed and he still didn’t wake, Yunjae reluctantly placed his hand on Taebeom’s shoulder.

“Excuse me…”

He lightly shook his shoulder, but there was no sign of him getting up. Growing unnecessarily anxious, Yunjae searched for “professional baseball.” The day’s game schedule appeared right at the top. Fortunately, today Taebeom was scheduled to play at the home team’s stadium. So there was still plenty of time.

However, considering the checkout time, it wasn’t all that leisurely. Yunjae decided to first remove the arm wrapped around his waist. Carefully, he lifted the arm with both hands. For some reason, it felt like he shouldn’t handle it carelessly. Only after barely pulling his body back was Yunjae able to escape the bed.

Trying not to wake Taebeom and avoid touching his arms or body anywhere meant he had no room to pay attention to his own body. After getting out of bed and standing on the floor, Yunjae felt an immediate muscle ache, letting out a groan through his teeth as he sank down beside the bed.

Resting his arms on the edge of the bed and burying his face, he swallowed the pain with grunts. Then last night’s memories flashed through his mind. Little by little, he recalled how he’d ended up here and how things had turned out this way. Thinking that far, it seemed miraculous that his lower body was still attached.

“…Ah, interesting.”

“…”

Caught up in distracting thoughts, Yunjae suddenly lifted his head. At some point he’d woken up, Taebeom was watching him, half his face buried beside the pillow, only one eye exposed. Taebeom blinked slowly. His amused gaze looked straight at Yunjae’s flushed face. Cold sweat ran down his spine. If there had been a mouse hole, he would have gladly crawled into it even naked.

“It doesn’t seem like you’re trying to make me laugh.”

“It wouldn’t be.”

“Will you help me?”

“Then would you close your eyes for a moment? That would be helping.”

A brief silence passed. With a soft snicker, Taebeom nodded half-heartedly, buried his face completely into the pillow, and lay prone. Yunjae silently rose from his spot. For a moment, he was entranced by the exposed shoulder and back muscles, but quickly snapped out of it. Taebeom’s shoulder twitched. Fearing he might wake up, Yunjae dragged his heavy body into the bathroom.

As the hot water touched his body, his stiff muscles seemed to loosen little by little. Yunjae painstakingly cleaned himself, emptying the inside. Every movement made his muscles seem to scream. Yunjae moved as little as possible to dry off. As a result, it took quite a while before he could leave the bathroom.

“Wash…”

Now that he was fully awake, Yunjae steeled his resolve to sort out yesterday’s events. But his resolve didn’t last long. It crumbled into nothing the moment he discovered Taebeom sitting with his legs spread wide, completely uncovered, leisurely drinking water. What the, wh-what is that?

His heart pounded violently enough to shake his ribs. Yunjae stared intensely at Taebeom’s lower body. His shock-filled eyes landed on his smooth groin, completely hairless. Taebeom paid no mind to the overt gaze. He put down the water bottle he’d been drinking and stretched to loosen his neck. Rubbing his temples with the heel of his hand as if his head hurt, he squinted one eye.

“Ah, I guess I overdid it yesterday. My head hurts so much.”

Overdid it? Who? You?

“I’ll wash and come out. Will you get ready? Let’s have lunch together. I’ll pay.”

“…Something expensive.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m going to eat something expensive.”

Yunjae muttered, even clenching his fist as if steeling his resolve. Taebeom, belatedly understanding Yunjae’s words, burst into loud laughter.

“You’re really funny. Hyung.”

Yunjae’s gaze turned to Taebeom. As he entered the bathroom, he shook his head back and forth. All the while, he kept chuckling as if it were endlessly amusing. He plays around differently from how he looks. Frowning at the muttered words he’d caught, Yunjae threw the towel he was holding at Taebeom.

For a moment, Yunjae had forgotten what Taebeom did for a living. Watching Taebeom casually catch and wave the towel thrown at him, Yunjae let out a hollow laugh and a short sigh.

Ah, he’s really unlucky. That guy.

∞ ∞ ∞

If they lose again today, just quit baseball, you bastards..

Lol Looks like they will

Is this a gathering place for bullshit? lol

Bitterly looking at the streaming app, Yunjae let out a chuckle and quietly pressed the like button. As soon as the lineup appeared, Yunjae turned on the broadcast as usual, responding to the consecutive notifications. Then he grabbed a can of beer from the fridge and sat down.

Ha Taebeom

I’m starting today.

He’d done something he shouldn’t have, and already this much time had passed.

Gazing meaninglessly at the message he’d received late in the afternoon, Yunjae picked up the remote with a somewhat complicated expression. As if by habit, he scrolled down the channels twice, and on the sports channel that had just started, a shot panning across the full ground was being broadcast.

Perhaps because the weather was gradually warming up, the stands were already full even before the game started, despite it being a weekday. After all, it was a match between Ha Taebeom, called the KBO idol, and Hawks’ veteran ace Kim Juwon, so fans of both teams would find it too good to miss.

In any case, both players flew high whenever they faced the Buffaloes, so from Yunjae’s perspective, they were equally unlucky. Well, still, Ha Taebeom was definitely more…

Of all things, during the last game between GW Buffaloes and BG Wolves, the highlight replay before the game showed Ha Taebeom catching the final strikeout in the bottom of the ninth inning. As the final out count lit up and Ha Taebeom’s smiling face appeared, it overlapped with the Ha Taebeom he’d met at the drinking party not long ago, and his movements came to an abrupt halt.

Yunjae rubbed his stiff face several times with his palm and propped his chin on it. His thoughtful eyes traced the predator dominating the mound. When he’d moved seats without anyone noticing and sat across from him, had he really not known that the other was a man who got aroused by other men?

Had he truly not foreseen the end of such guileless, one-dimensional desire? Taebeom’s excited voice, as he smiled with crooked, mischievous eyes and pressed against him, kept fueling his gloom.

He’d tried to ignore it. But there was no helping how his nerves bristled at the ambiguous feeling of knees constantly bumping and subtly brushing against him. Even if the sensual contact had no intention behind it, it ultimately led to the outcome of that day.

According to the data, he was clearly heterosexual.

‘Move over.’

‘Wow, you really seem to hate me.’

‘I said I don’t hate you. I was just saying that. Are you drunk?’

The man, leaning his elbow on the table and tilting his upper body, was doing things he shouldn’t do unless completely drunk. When he’d grabbed his wrist using the melting ice cream as an excuse, what had that gaze been like? Even though several days had already passed, every time he recalled that day, his whole heart stirred.

Every time he couldn’t help but glance, the face he met didn’t seem to have that much alcohol in it. Perhaps that too was because he himself was drunk. The problem was that he’d lightly brushed it off.

He shouldn’t have…

‘Hyung. You can’t say you don’t remember tomorrow.’

‘Well, you already know I’m a man with one of these, …can you really do it?’

‘Can’t you see this? You say such cute things.’

“Of all people.”

Yunjae frowned at the vivid afterimage and let out a pained groan. Whenever fragmented memories tormenting him over the past few days surfaced one by one, he got a headache. It was the same now. Yunjae massaged his throbbing head and sighed.

The problem was that he’d gone in with a sound mind but ended up lying on the bed dead drunk. He wished he could have remembered nothing at all. Unfortunately, the memories slowly raising their heads made it impossible to ignore this name, no matter how much he wanted to.

At first, he’d avoided contact once or twice. But the reason he couldn’t keep avoiding Taebeom, who persistently reached out, was because of those memories. Because he too bore responsibility for what happened that day.

“…I wonder if I should call it laid-back.”