Runway Chapter 19

I had often heard there were homes like that. Homes that excessively interfere with, no, worry about, their child’s food.

There are even guardians who call the school and fuss over carbohydrates, fats, and proteins…. It’s something any parent could do, but since it isn’t common, it would also become a topic of gossip. Well…, I think that’s possible.

I understand. There’s nothing to understand, what do I know.

“I see.”

I answered briefly and focused on studying. Jeong Hyeonwoo’s gaze rested on me for quite a long time.

I could recognize that gaze immediately, but I didn’t want to react in any way.

I’m selfish. I know. I don’t give others interest either.

I don’t want to give it either. Everything is annoying, and I don’t want to expend emotions either.

I know that relationships can’t just be laughing and chatting and being happy, but even so, deeply befriending people and continuing connections was extremely rare.

Apart from family, the number of people I had interest in, cared about, and worried about was exactly one.

To me….

Timing was good: jiiiiiiing, a long vibration rang. When I moved my gaze toward the source of the sound, Jeong Hyeonwoo touched his phone.

Aunt. After scanning the name on the screen and looking at him, Jeong Hyeonwoo said just a moment and stood up. He answered the call as he moved away. His voice scattered.

“Yes, Aunt.”

Leaving Jeong Hyeonwoo, who had gone outside entirely to talk, I stayed still because it felt awkward to study alone.

When I checked my phone, there was nowhere that had contacted me.

“Lee Wookchan, you bastard.”

In the end, I let out a curse as a mutter. I knew he lived however he wanted, but this was too much.

I tried not to care, tried to live my own life properly, and even tried to think he had died somewhere, but it wasn’t easy.

Lee Wookchan is a real bastard. A bastard, a bastard!

Jeong Hyeonwoo, who returned before long, let out a deep sigh as soon as he sat down. He looked as if he wanted me to ask if something was wrong.

But I quietly kept my place. I put down the phone I had been holding and pretended to focus urgently on studying.

But I couldn’t focus easily, and in the end, I raised my head.

“Did your aunt call?”

“You saw?”

Nod, nod. I answered in place of words. Jeong Hyeonwoo pressed his lips together and smiled.

He pushed his phone to the edge of the desk.

“I don’t live with my parents. I live with my aunt now. I told her I didn’t do night self-study, so she asked what time I’d come in.”

“Ah… I see?”

I gave a simple answer.

Last time, he had said he moved because of his father’s assignment. So it must have been a lie.

That can happen. Everyone has something they want to hide.

“Are you curious why I live with my aunt?”

Jeong Hyeonwoo asked me while keeping a quiet smile. The way he slightly leaned his head forward seemed like he was probing me.

“No.”

At my answer, Jeong Hyeonwoo laughed with a steady sound. Over something trivial again.

I stared at Jeong Hyeonwoo with a blunt face. Jeong Hyeonwoo raised the corners of his mouth brightly and then lowered them, muttering as if to himself, but in clear words that seemed meant for me to hear.

“You really have no interest, that’s hurtful….”

I have no interest in others. I don’t want to care about other people’s business.

Because it’s not my business. I’m selfish.

“…I thought you might be uncomfortable.”

I thought I had said it normally, but my voice sounded discouraged. And Jeong Hyeonwoo seemed to notice that voice too. He spoke in a voice as if soothing a small child.

“You thought I’d be uncomfortable?”

He asked back with a smile.

If I become overly sensitive about my own feelings, I become the same toward others. When I think, I’m uncomfortable with this kind of thing, my train of thought naturally flows into, others must be the same. So I build more walls.

I don’t want to talk about things that would make others uncomfortable. I don’t want to hear them either. Emotions spread easily.

If Jeong Hyeonwoo talked about his own unhappy story, those emotions would easily transmit, and in the end, even my mood would fall into the abyss.

“…”

Jeong Hyeonwoo kept a soundless smile. Though he showed only a high-schooler-like appearance to other guys, to me he often acted quite mature. This time was the same.

“Thank you.”

As soon as he finished speaking, a long message filled his phone. The letters were too small, and because it held so much content, I couldn’t read it. It was as if he didn’t give me the chance to.

Jeong Hyeonwoo calmly touched his phone, and I also touched my phone to soothe the gap.

I looked for Lee Wookchan’s name. The chat room with Lee Wookchan, where conversations had always continued with trivial stories, was now buried below, in a very deep place.

Of course, I hadn’t sent a single message to Lee Wookchan either.

Anyway, that guy lived however his guts told him, so even in the middle of exchanging messages, when he wanted to ignore me, he ignored me.

He was like that even when we were talking about important things. Even when making plans, after actually making plans to come to my house by 10, he wouldn’t tell me he’d be late or couldn’t come today until it was 11 or 12. I just had to wait.

This time too, if I contacted him first, I’d probably just get brutally ignored. I couldn’t even press the messages I had exchanged with Lee Wookchan, and looking at the chat room title with his three-character name, I let out a shallow breath. I didn’t want to think of it as a sigh, but it was a sigh.

“Seonho.”

Jeong Hyeonwoo called me. Instead of answering, I raised my head and met his eyes.

“You haven’t been meeting that friend lately?”

Jeong Hyeonwoo asked. The timing was good too. Because he asked right when I was thinking about Lee Wookchan.

“Who?”

Who else would it be. The human Jeong Hyeonwoo would call ‘that friend.’ I knew the guy he was referring to was Lee Wookchan, but I pretended not to.

It hurt my pride that Lee Wookchan was the only one in my human relationships.

My human relationships are excessively narrow. Actually, I don’t think I even know how. These days, I’m at least getting along with Jeong Hyeonwoo, who takes care of me, but excluding him, I had never properly exchanged a word with the other guys.

Just as I was uncomfortable with my classmates, they were uncomfortable with me. I couldn’t package myself with words like lonely, desolate, or isolated at school. Because it was the same for them.

“Um….”

Jeong Hyeonwoo chose his words.

I waited for what would come out of Jeong Hyeonwoo’s mouth. How would he describe Lee Wookchan.

You know him. That thug bastard. A bastard with no future. A kid whose life is fucked.

Among the words describing Lee Wookchan, I picked out bad ones and thought of them.

Jeong Hyeonwoo’s lips moved.

“Seonho, your friend. The tall, handsome one.”

“…”

This is why I have nothing to say.

It’s true that Lee Wookchan is handsome. This much is an undeniable fact.

He was already a completed face despite being only seventeen.

He looked like a well-grown adult man. Since he was young, his height and build were large. It was family tradition.

Lee Wookchan’s hyung was tall too, and his noona was on the tall side for a woman.

Everyone had slim, firm bodies too. But Lee Wookchan was the biggest among them.

Also, he had a well-refined frame. Among his features, especially his nose bridge and brow bone were firmly set.

His eyes had no double eyelids but were fierce, and his eyebrows had a pretty shape and were thickly grown.

But I didn’t know Jeong Hyeonwoo would package Lee Wookchan like that. Jeong Hyeonwoo and Lee Wookchan had met.

And Lee Wookchan had picked a fight with Jeong Hyeonwoo. He openly revealed his fierceness and made it obvious he was wary.

Because of that, I naturally thought Jeong Hyeonwoo would also describe Lee Wookchan like an ordinary person would.

Ordinary people. I had met many people with Lee Wookchan. They were all ordinary, average people.

Elementary and middle school teachers, my mom, Lee Wookchan’s and my friends…. Most people who lived properly, or wanted to live properly, didn’t usually like Lee Wookchan after encountering him once.

Instead, they asked me, ‘What school does he go to,’ and when I named a school that didn’t even seem like a school, they said, Aah— I see. The meaning was, ‘I figured.’

When I showed a flustered look, Jeong Hyeonwoo added.

“You seemed close.”