As True as a Dream Chapter 62

Yi Ho looked down in disbelief at Hae-Joo’s bent form as she crawled to her knees and craned her neck to listen to him.

 

The faint smile on his face was gone.

 

Seeing this, Hae-Joo’s complexion became more serious and polite.

 

“You said it wasn’t a mistake because you have a very big heart, but it really was a mistake, and I might have hurt your feelings, and if it wasn’t a mistake, but it was a mistake, I can somehow fix it or make up for it…”

 

“Hae-Joo. Do you know what you’re talking about?”

 

Yi Ho interrupted Hae-Joo’s rambling speech.

 

Hae-Joo winced and shut up.

 

After a short silence, she asked him, looking a bit annoyed.

 

“If I didn’t make a mistake yesterday, did I do something big? If you won’t tell me, how am I supposed to know? I really don’t remember anything, and if you won’t tell me and you’re in such a stern mood, what am I supposed to do?”

 

Somehow her tone was usually scolding.

 

And he knew she was right.

 

Apparently, she’d gotten so drunk yesterday that she couldn’t even walk down the street, and she’d fallen asleep standing up, leaning against him.

 

If she doesn’t remember, she doesn’t remember.

 

But it would be so unfair of him if he didn’t remember, if he didn’t remember kissing her lips and smiling like he was dying to do it.

 

Isn’t it a shame that he’s the only one who remembers the ecstatic kiss that mesmerized him?

 

Yi Ho was stunned as he stared at Hae-Joo with an expressionless face that made him feel even more alienated.

 

‘Resentment? Regret?’

 

He couldn’t believe he was thinking this.

 

“You’re not going to tell me?”

 

Hae-Joo, who hadn’t noticed Yi Ho’s somewhat dazed state, asked again in a confused tone.

 

“If you don’t tell me now, I won’t bring it up again in the future, because no matter how many times I bring it up… it will only make you feel bad, and I don’t know what the hell…”

 

“You did something to me.”

 

Yi Ho abruptly cut Hae-Joo off.

 

“What did I do?”

 

Yi Ho looked down at Hae-Joo, his eyebrows knitted together in concentration.

 

His mouth went dry again as he looked at the pink lips he’d sucked so deliciously yesterday.

 

For a moment, he couldn’t believe that he’d had such a stupid thought, but he couldn’t deny that he felt the same way.

 

Only why should he keep it to himself.

 

“What did I do? Did I… swear at you or hit you… Ugh!”

 

Yi Ho leaned forward in front of Hae-Joo, who continued to swallow the nonsense he didn’t like.

 

One hand gripped the floorboards and the other grabbed the back of her head to keep her from pulling back.

 

His thin lips immediately pressed tightly against her red ones.

 

Her eyes widened and she stared at him, stunned.

 

“You did this.”

 

When he parted his lips slightly, she pursed them as if to say something.

 

But her eyes narrowed as if she didn’t know what to say.

 

Yi Ho lowered his eyes.

 

He tilted his head and pressed his lips to hers again.

 

Hae-Joo’s head jerked back in surprise, but he pulled it back into place.

 

“Boss… Ugh!”

 

Yi Ho kissed her lips again.

 

“Three times.”

 

Hae-Joo’s eyes went black.

 

It was as if the whole world had gone mad.

 

Seeing her like that, Yi Ho felt as if the tightness in his chest finally lifted.

 

“Three times is no mistake, right?”

 

He asked in a somewhat subdued voice, and Hae-Joo’s eyelids fluttered.

 

“Then… am I… am I the reason you’re mad at me for what I did yesterday?”

 

“What?”

 

Yi Ho’s brow furrowed at Hae Joo’s unexpected question.

 

“I’m sorry, I must have been crazy yesterday, I don’t know why I did it… I can’t remember what I did and I can’t remember it, so I’m angry… Ugh!”

 

He kissed her again.

 

Flinching but still welcoming his lips, Hae-Joo asked cautiously.

 

“…Four times?”

 

She wasn’t sure if she was still sober or if there was something in last night’s drink that made her stupid.

 

Yi Ho laughed at Hae-Joo’s inexplicable mishap.

 

When he smiled, Hae-Joo’s face lit up with relief.

 

“I’m sorry, and I’m here to tell you that I’ll never drink again. Ever. Not again… not like yesterday… not again!”

 

Yi Ho thrust her body forward as if to push Hae-Joo away.

 

Hae-Joo’s body lurched backward in panic.

 

She felt like her head or back would hit the ground in pain.

 

Her eyes widened and she clutched his shirt collar, trying to hold on for dear life.

 

But what she expected didn’t happen.

 

The whole time he was holding her by the back of her head.

 

Hae-Joo’s eyes widened in disbelief as she fell to the ground in his hands.

 

Yi Ho, who was crouching over her, put his hand on the side of her head and said, “Will you stop apologizing, it’s getting annoying to hear.”

 

“I’m apologizing for yesterday…”

 

Hae-Joo, who had been clutching the collar of his shirt, slowly let go of it.

 

For some reason, her cautious movement bothered him.

 

“I did the fourth.”

 

“What?”

 

Yi Ho bent his arm on the ground.

 

The distance of an arm’s length became as intimate as before.

 

“You did the first three and I did the fourth.”

 

One by one, Yi Ho took in Hae-Joo’s fine, fine hair, her rounded forehead, her neat eyebrows and large, dark eyes, the teardrop under her left eye, her rounded nose, her full cheeks, her slightly shorter middle, and her wet lips.

 

Then he removed his hand from the back of her head to cover her ears and cheeks.

 

He rubbed her moist cheeks lightly with his thumb and looked into her eyes.

 

“Like this.”

 

Yi Ho’s nose brushed lightly against Hae-Joo’s cheek.

 

His lips brushed against the mountain of her full lips.

 

He licked the plump lips with his tongue and pressed his lips a little deeper.

 

He pressed them with his tongue, tasted them, and then sucked them back to his lips, enjoying the firmness of her lips.

 

Furthermore, Hae-Joo’s lips, which had been tense and stiff, gradually relaxed and she began to suck on his upper and lower lips as he did, as if she was tasting him.

 

Realizing this small change, Yi Ho enjoyed this intimate and hot act even more.

 

So much so that he didn’t want to wake up.

 

So he didn’t thrust between his lips as urgently as last night.

 

His saliva moistened Hae-Joo’s lips and the wet sound they made when they met and parted was pleasurable.

 

After kissing the end of her lips, Yi Ho lifted his eyes to look at her.

 

Hae-Joo’s eyes were closed, red at the corners.

 

Before he knew it, one of her two small, delicate hands was under his shirt, the other resting between his neck and shoulder.

 

Hae-Joo’s lips parted as if they were touching, and her eyelids opened.

 

“…This…is…us…”

 

Confused, Hae-Joo stuttered and opened her mouth.

 

The screen door to the courtyard flew open and a boy of about six or seven ran screaming.

 

“Sister Hae-Joo!”

 

Her lips parted in an instant and clung together again.

 

Wide-eyed, Hae-Joo pushed him away, her face flushed.

 

She staggered to her feet and sat up, covering her lips with her hand and looking at him standing in the courtyard.

 

“It’s you, Myung-ho.”

 

“Sister, why is your face so red?”

 

Fortunately, the child hadn’t seen anything.

 

Hae-Joo looked back at Yi Ho, who was sitting there, looking relieved and as if something had just happened.

 

Then she almost burst out laughing.

 

If you didn’t look closely, no one would know.

 

There was a hint of displeasure that only she, who had been around him so often and intimately, could see.

 

“Sister, I’m going to the mountains later to catch long-lived worms, and I want you to come with me. You’re the best at catching worms!”

 

The child ran in front of her, smiling at her words.

 

“Well. Let me think about it. I have a lot of work to do.”

 

Hae-Joo stroked the child’s soft head.

 

* * *

 

Governor Saito’s private residence.

 

“Kashiri. Kashiri, mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm.”

 

A small, silly humming sound escapes from the mouth of a seventeen-year-old child sitting at a desk by the window.

 

In his hands, bent over the desk, is a piece of black charcoal.

 

He swayed his feet, tracing the charcoal back and forth on the white paper, and suddenly looked up.

 

He wore a black patch over his right eye, but it didn’t seem to affect his vision.

 

“Is everyone gone? I can’t hear them.”

 

Muttering to himself, the child scratched his head, looked this way and that, and then jumped off the stool where he had left the charcoal.

 

Then, with a quick kick of his short legs, he ran out of the room.

 

Soon after, a young woman with a pale face entered the room.

 

“Master… Master, Master, where are you…?”