Winter season volume 2

Major Snow: When the Snow Falls Heavily (1)

Thud. Thud.

 

“Hoo… haa…”

 

The dull sound of something being struck, accompanied by ragged breathing, echoed through the chairman’s office. Chairman Gu wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, his shoulders heaving, then dropped the golf club he was holding as though throwing it onto the floor.

 

“Get up.”

 

Seung-hyuk, who had been sprawled on the floor, let out a faint, derisive laugh at the sight of the bloodied golf club landing before him. He planted one hand on the floor and pushed himself upright. A weak cough escaped him.

 

Chairman Gu paced briskly in front of Seung-hyuk, who was getting to his feet at an unhurried pace, trying to calm his anger. His doctor had warned him countless times to watch his blood pressure, but remaining composed in a situation like this was no easy matter.

 

“What did you tell me? With your own mouth, you said you’d bring me the goods on the day of the completion party. You said you’d put them right in front of me, without fail! Did you or did you not?”

 

“…”

 

“It’s already been three weeks since the goods disappeared, and you’re still stumbling around because you can’t find one bloody thing?”

 

Leaving the blood seeping from his split lip untouched, Seung-hyuk stood with his hands behind his back and tilted his head, running his tongue along the inside of his cheek. He had thought he had clenched his teeth tightly enough when he was struck, but apparently he had bitten through the lining of his mouth. He could taste blood.

 

“The prosecutors and police are all desperate to boost their figures before the end of the year. Do you know they’re turning everything upside down looking for something to pin on us? That money hasn’t even been properly laundered. The moment those copper bastards catch a whiff, they’ll come crawling. If something leaks to the press just before the capital company goes public, what the hell are you going to do, Director Gu? Eh, you little shit?”

 

Seung-hyuk had expected this sort of tantrum from Chairman Gu the moment Tae-sik told him the lounge’s basement storeroom had been empty. The man might once have ruled the district with his fists, but now he was little more than an old man with one foot in the grave. Seung-hyuk could take a beating and let it pass.

 

The real problem lay elsewhere.

 

When they had opened the basement storeroom using the password Yi-hyeon had obtained, all they had found was a single Barbie doll in the middle of the empty room. Just remembering that blatant mockery made Seung-hyuk’s throat go dry.

 

“I’ll give you more time. Go and deal properly with those fucking bastards from the Seungri gang.”

 

Seung-hyuk clicked his tongue, unimpressed that Chairman Gu was still looking in the wrong direction. At the sharp sound, the chairman’s eyes widened. He turned his head and let out a breathless, disbelieving laugh.

 

“You think this is funny?”

 

Seung-hyuk looked down impassively at Chairman Gu as the older man approached, rubbing his own wrist. Standing before him with fury in his eyes, Chairman Gu seized his sharply defined jaw in one hand and forced his face towards him.

 

“Or do you think your father’s words are a joke?”

 

Every time the broad palm adorned with a gold ring patted his cheek, the man’s sickening perfume filled his nostrils. Seung-hyuk lowered his eyes without expression, turning his face forward each time the chairman knocked it aside.

 

“Seung-hyuk, I’m only keeping you alive and giving you another chance because you’re my son, you little bastard.”

 

“I took a worthless brat wasting away in an orphanage, clothed him, fed him and raised him.”

 

“…”

 

“So you should repay that kindness, shouldn’t you? Eh?”

 

The palm cracked across his cheek. Seung-hyuk swallowed silently. Chairman Gu glared at him for a moment, frustrated that he merely lowered his gaze without reacting, then abruptly released him and walked towards the sofa.

 

“I happened to run into Prosecutor Seo recently. That young fellow seems quite ambitious.”

 

“He’s already busy poking his nose into everyone’s business. Sort this out before he catches the scent and comes running.”

 

Chairman Gu put a cigar from the table between his lips and lit it with a trembling hand. He exhaled a long stream of smoke, then looked down at his mobile phone.

 

“Oh, and we’ll need to quietly get rid of Executive Director Lim.”

 

“…”

 

“He never used to be like that, but apparently he’s got himself hooked on gambling. He knows far too much for us to leave him alone. He’s been a headache for a while, so we might as well clean everything up now.”

 

Chairman Gu gave the order to have someone discreetly killed as casually as if he were discussing the weather. Seung-hyuk stared at the pattern of the floor tiles, his face just as expressionless.

 

“I’ll send the information through Kwak Tae-sik. You can go.”

 

With the cigar still hanging loosely from his mouth, Chairman Gu waved him away without even looking at him. Only then did Seung-hyuk raise the back of his hand to his split lip, wipe away the blood and leave the office.

 

“B-Boss! Are you all right…?”

 

The chairman’s secretary bowed calmly despite the battered state of Seung-hyuk’s face. As Seung-hyuk pushed the door open and stepped into the corridor, Tae-sik, who had been waiting outside, hurried over to him.

 

Seung-hyuk knocked away the hand offering him a handkerchief and strode towards the lift. Whether the golf club had caught him badly or not, his whole body ached with every step. The persistent metallic taste in his mouth was unpleasant too. He frowned irritably and spat out a mouthful of blood.

 

“Take me to the office.”

 

Silence filled the car as it left the car park and joined the road. Tae-sik, who was driving, kept checking Seung-hyuk in the rear-view mirror, but Seung-hyuk remained motionless with his arms folded and eyes closed. Tae-sik glanced at the dried blood beside his boss’s slanting eye and spoke cautiously.

 

“Boss, those injuries look quite serious. Shall we stop by Dr Nam’s on the way?”

 

“You want to advertise that I’ve been beaten up? Just drive.”

 

If the visible wounds were that bad, the injuries beneath his clothes were probably worse than usual. But Tae-sik knew Seung-hyuk hated having to repeat himself, so he closed his mouth and steered on.

 

“Welcome back, Boss.”

 

As soon as Seung-hyuk entered the office, the large men lounging around sprang to their feet. Their eyes widened at the sight of him.

 

“Bloody hell, are you all right?”

 

Seung-hyuk brushed away their worried looks with a few dismissive gestures and headed straight into his room. The men were left exchanging uneasy glances while Tae-sik followed him inside.

 

Seung-hyuk collapsed onto the sofa without even removing his shoes. He kept grimacing, apparently bothered by the blood still seeping from his split lip. Tae-sik approached and stood before him with his hands clasped.

 

“I questioned one of the sharp operators working under Gu Jin-hyuk, but I didn’t get anything useful. I don’t know whether he caught on and moved the goods halfway through, or whether he planned the whole thing from the start…”

 

Tae-sik glanced at Seung-hyuk’s face before continuing.

 

“We also need to consider the possibility that Kwon Yi-hyeon talked.”

 

“…”

 

“As things stand, he’s the most suspicious person.”

 

Seung-hyuk silently ran his tongue over the roof of his mouth. The metallic taste of blood lingered on its tip before fading.

 

If, as Tae-sik suggested, Kwon Yi-hyeon had confessed everything to Gu Jin-hyuk, then even his drugged wandering through the lounge corridors must have been an act.

 

Seung-hyuk thought there was no way that could be true, yet he found it ridiculous that he could not be certain it was false. He remembered Yi-hyeon’s flushed face and his half-unfocused eyes, then slowly opened his own.

 

“Bring me Kwon Yi-hyeon’s loan agreement.”

 

Seung-hyuk took the white sheet of paper Tae-sik fetched and quietly stared at the three characters written at the bottom. Kwon Yi-hyeon. The neat handwriting brought that familiar blank, clean face to mind.

 

Pale, translucent skin and a slender, high-bridged nose. Eyes that curved upwards at the corners like a cat’s, with a small mole beneath one of them. Seung-hyuk could remember with painful clarity how tears had spread over that mole, turning the skin around it red.

 

Kwon Yi-hyeon. Kwon Yi-hyeon…

 

He could not tell whether he wanted to trust Yi-hyeon or wanted to find a reason not to. One thing was certain: whenever he pictured those distinctively dark eyes and their unwavering gaze, his throat seemed to tighten and dry out. The sensation was uncomfortable, irritating. It set his nerves on edge like putting his foot into a trainer full of sand.

 

Seung-hyuk crumpled the agreement in one hand and lowered his arm.

 

“Contact Kwon Yi-hyeon. Tell him he doesn’t have to repay the money he borrowed. Say the debt’s been settled in full.”

 

“…Yes, Boss.”

 

“And Chairman Gu will be sending over a job that needs cleaning up. Once we get the details, pick a day and send some of the lads out first.”

 

“Understood.”

 

Having finished speaking, Seung-hyuk raised an arm to cover his eyes, signalling that Tae-sik should leave. Tae-sik bowed and quickly walked out. Silence settled over the office once Seung-hyuk was alone.

 

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

 

Seung-hyuk breathed slowly in time with the steady clock, trying to master the emotions surging inside him. Everything was getting on his nerves, from the unpleasant throbbing throughout his body to the complete mess of the situation. Worst of all was the fact that, even now, he could not get Kwon Yi-hyeon out of his head.

 

The more he told himself not to take an interest, the more he thought about him. He wondered how Yi-hyeon would react when they next came face to face.

 

Remembering Yi-hyeon pinned beneath him, crying, made something stir in his lower stomach. The thought of seeing him like that again had scarcely crossed his mind before Seung-hyuk let out a cold, incredulous laugh.

 

Had fucking a gay bastard driven him mad?

 

Seung-hyuk lifted Yi-hyeon’s crumpled loan agreement again. His eyes naturally fell to the name written at the bottom.

 

Borrower: Kwon Yi-hyeon.

 

His throat felt dry again.

 

***

 

Bzzz. Bzzz. Bzzz.

 

The uninterrupted vibration buzzed beside Yi-hyeon’s ear. Without opening his eyes, he frowned and groped around beside his pillow.

 

His fingertips caught his mobile phone. He picked it up and managed to check the screen. An unfamiliar number was displayed. Struggling to clear his hoarse throat, he answered.

 

“Hello?”

 

“Is this Kwon Yi-hyeon’s mobile?”

 

“…Yes.”

 

The voice on the other end sounded vaguely familiar. Where had he heard it before?

 

“As of today, your debt has been settled in full, Mr Kwon. The thirty million won principal and all the interest. Director Gu Seung-hyuk says you don’t need to repay any of it.”

 

The instant the man mentioned Gu Seung-hyuk’s name, Yi-hyeon felt the last of his sleepiness disappear. He had thought there was something familiar about the man’s stiff yet slightly insolent way of speaking. It was the voice of the man who followed Gu Seung-hyuk around like a shadow.

 

Finally coming to his senses, Yi-hyeon quickly pulled the phone away from his face and checked the time.

 

Monday, 11.30 a.m.

 

His usual starting time at work had long since passed, yet there were no missed calls or messages on his screen.

 

Even the strongest sleeping pills should have worn off by now. Which meant Gu Jin-hyuk must have woken up, realised Yi-hyeon was not beside him and still made no attempt to contact him. No matter how disorientated Jin-hyuk had been from the aphrodisiac, Yi-hyeon should have drunk the wine with him and fallen asleep beside him. If he had, he would not be trembling now at the possibility of being suspected.

 

Yi-hyeon dragged one hand down his face and brought the phone back to his ear.

 

“Hello?”

 

But there was no answer. The call had already ended.

 

Letting out a long sigh, Yi-hyeon struggled to push his heavy body upright. He forced his swollen eyelids open and looked down at himself. His appearance was so dreadful he hardly knew how to describe it.

 

His shirt, which had originally been so white it was almost bluish, was now covered in dark reddish stains. It had come untucked from his trousers, which were badly creased, and his belt was completely undone.

 

His physical condition was far worse than anything visible on the outside. His entire body throbbed as though he had been beaten, and it felt as if someone were repeatedly stabbing the back of his head with needles.

 

His stomach churned as though he were suffering from terrible motion sickness. Unable to suppress the rising nausea, Yi-hyeon hurried into the bathroom and clung to the toilet. After repeatedly retching and bringing up nothing but pale stomach fluid, he returned to the bed utterly exhausted.

 

What on earth had happened yesterday…?

 

He had come out of the bathroom in the guest room, searched through Gu Jin-hyuk’s mobile phone, then somehow managed to put his clothes back on and escape into the corridor. He had asked a waiter he happened to encounter for help. Then he had run into Gu Seung-hyuk, who had taken him somewhere.

 

…Ah, Gu Seung-hyuk.

 

‘Swallow it all.’

 

‘Haa… ah… ngh…!’

 

‘I’ll give you the cock you’re so fucking desperate for.’

 

The scenes surfacing in his mind felt strangely unfamiliar, almost as though they belonged to someone else. The face looking down at him, silhouetted against the ceiling lights. The powerful hands gripping his hips and waist while thrusting upwards. The heavy weight wrapped around his body as though restraining him. Every detail seemed impossible to believe.

 

Because the other person had been none other than Gu Seung-hyuk.

 

Yi-hyeon could easily guess what Seung-hyuk must have thought when he saw him clutching his phone and begging someone to call any man for him. Those cold eyes must have been filled with disgust and revulsion. He could not begin to imagine what had led someone who looked at him that way to make such a decision.

 

In truth, if he had been abandoned in the middle of that crowded event while under the influence of the drug, something far worse might have happened to him. But the fact that the person who had found him was Gu Seung-hyuk continued to trouble him.

 

“Haa…”

 

Yi-hyeon buried his face in both hands and sighed deeply. His memories of lying beneath Gu Seung-hyuk, breathing desperately, came back in disconnected fragments. Then, at some point, everything had abruptly gone black. It seemed Seung-hyuk must have carried him home after he lost consciousness.

 

Although he had received a telephone call informing him that his debt had been cleared, there were too many things weighing on his mind for him to simply forget everything and move on. Had Seung-hyuk found what he was looking for? How should he deal with Gu Jin-hyuk from now on? And what on earth had Seung-hyuk been thinking when he did those things yesterday?

 

No matter how uncomfortable it might be, Yi-hyeon felt he needed to meet him face to face and talk.

 

With another long sigh, he lowered his legs from the bed and slowly stood up. The instant his feet touched the floor, muscle pain spread throughout his body as though he had been beaten all over again.

 

He barely managed to straighten up and make his way towards the bathroom. Then he felt something trickling down between his buttocks. He knew exactly what it was.

 

A wave of humiliation washed over him. His face suddenly burning, Yi-hyeon clenched his teeth.

Yi-hyeon stopped outside an old building. Despite having visited only a handful of times, Seung-hyuk’s office had already become strangely familiar. He raised his head and checked the fourth-floor windows. The lights were on.

 

Instead of heading towards the stairs, Yi-hyeon walked into the alley beside the building. He moved behind an outdoor air-conditioning unit covered in snow, took out a cigarette and lit it. The cold air immediately wrapped around his body. Cigarette ends crushed against the ground and rubbish scattered everywhere looked just as messy as the thoughts inside his head.

 

Yi-hyeon stood looking down at a corner of the alley, exhaling smoke that was more like a succession of sighs. He had finished one cigarette and was lighting a second when someone’s voice made him turn his head.

 

“Ah, for fuck’s sake. It’s so bloody cold my balls are going to freeze off. Hurry up and finish your fag so we can get back upstairs.”

 

Two large men in black winter jackets had just entered the alley. With their hands shoved into their pockets, they hunched over their cigarettes and aimed their lighters at the tips. Their backs were turned towards Yi-hyeon, who stood farther inside.

 

“Hey, Hoon. Did you see the boss when he came in earlier?”

 

“He’d been to headquarters, right? He did seem particularly bad-tempered today.”

 

Judging by their references to the boss, they appeared to work under Gu Seung-hyuk. Yi-hyeon’s second cigarette had nearly burned down to the filter, but the two men were blocking the alley entrance. It did not seem possible to squeeze past them, so he put a third cigarette between his lips and waited for them to leave.

 

“So that’s why he’s in such a foul mood. Although the atmosphere’s been bloody awful since yesterday.”

 

The man muttered around the cigarette in his mouth. His companion moved closer, leaning towards his ear as though about to share a secret.

 

“Listen, I only know this because I overheard the boss on the phone, so keep it to yourself.”

 

“What is it?”

 

“Apparently there’s something the boss has been looking for, but it wasn’t where it was supposed to be. He was having a fucking terrifying conversation about whether someone had moved it or whether they’d been looking in the wrong place from the start. I figured I’d better stop listening before I heard something I shouldn’t, so I got out of there. You should just pretend you don’t know anything.”

 

For a whisper, his voice was remarkably loud. Yi-hyeon, who had been staring absently at the ground, raised his head.

 

They hadn’t found the goods?

 

Judging by the context, they must have been talking about what had happened at the party. But no one had mentioned anything about that during the telephone call earlier. Yi-hyeon frowned, wondering whether something had gone wrong.

 

He turned towards the alley entrance, hoping to hear more, but the men were already rubbing their arms against the cold as they walked away. Yi-hyeon slowly straightened from where he had been leaning against the wall.

 

His job might only have been to obtain the password, but hearing that they had failed to find the goods still bothered him. He ran his tongue across the roof of his mouth, stubbed out his cigarette and started walking.

 

Bang. Bang, bang.

 

After climbing the stairs to the fourth floor, Yi-hyeon knocked on the old iron door. The sound rang out loudly. He turned the handle with a blank expression, then faltered at the number of eyes suddenly directed towards him.

 

“What bastard…?”

 

The men, dressed from head to toe in black as always, were gathered together, standing rigidly as they stared at him. It was certainly different from the usual sight of them sprawling on sofas, playing cards or sniggering over their phones.

 

Yi-hyeon bowed his head in confusion, and one of the men greeted him.

 

“Oh! You’re here. Good timing. Come to see the boss?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Come over here a second.”

 

Yi-hyeon stared at the man beckoning him over in a low voice, then approached. Another man standing beside him held out a tube of ointment and some plasters. When Yi-hyeon looked up instead of accepting them, the man frowned and scratched his forehead.

 

“Could you take these in and give them to him? The boss is in such a foul mood that none of us fancy going in there.”

 

At Yi-hyeon’s troubled expression, the man quickly grabbed his hand and deposited the ointment and plasters in his palm. The unexpected request was one thing, but what concerned him more was hearing that Seung-hyuk was in a bad mood. He wondered if he should have stayed away. Still, having come this far, there was no avoiding it.

 

Yi-hyeon glanced at the closed office door and gave a small nod. As he walked towards it, he heard the men behind him sigh with relief.

 

He reached the door, wrapped his fingers lightly around the cold handle, then let out a breath before slowly turning it and pushing it open.

 

Click.

 

The first thing he saw was a pair of legs extending beyond the armrest of the sofa. The rest of Seung-hyuk’s body was hidden from where Yi-hyeon stood, as though he were lying down. Yi-hyeon ran his tongue over his lips, closed the door and moved towards the front of the sofa.

 

The soles of his trainers made soft sounds against the floor in the silent room. As he took a few more steps, Seung-hyuk’s upper body came into view. At first, Yi-hyeon wondered what all the white marks on his black jacket were. Then he realised they were footprints.

 

His gaze moved over Seung-hyuk’s black shirt, patterned with tiny flowers, and up towards his face. With one arm covering his eyes, only his nose and mouth were visible.

 

“If it’s not important, tell me later.”

 

Hearing Seung-hyuk mutter without even checking who had entered, Yi-hyeon bit the inside of his cheek without replying. His eyes were fixed on the split corner of Seung-hyuk’s mouth, where fresh blood seeped out whenever he moved. Dried blood clung near his temple, visible between his fingers, and a long scratch marked one cheek.

 

The sudden overlap with an image from the past made Yi-hyeon clench his fist without realising it.

 

Why do you always end up like this, making it impossible for me to pretend I haven’t seen?

 

“…What?”

 

Perhaps he found it strange that someone had come in without saying a word, because Seung-hyuk lowered his arm and opened his eyes. When he discovered Yi-hyeon standing in front of the sofa, looking down at him, he frowned slightly.

 

“Didn’t you get a call from Kwak Tae-sik?”

 

“I did.”

 

“Then what are you doing here?”

 

“I just wanted to make sure.”

 

Apparently dissatisfied with the answer, Seung-hyuk’s frown deepened. He turned his face away from Yi-hyeon and closed his eyes again.

 

“Get out.”

 

Silence filled the office. Yi-hyeon looked at Seung-hyuk’s injured face for a while, then down at the ointment and plasters in his hand. He doubted Seung-hyuk would treat his own wounds even if he handed them over. After a moment’s hesitation, Yi-hyeon sighed and pulled a tissue from the box on the table.

 

Kneeling in front of the sofa, he brought the tissue to Seung-hyuk’s bleeding mouth. At the gentle pressure against the wound, Seung-hyuk flinched before fixing him with a sharp glare.

 

“What are you doing?”

 

“Keep still.”

 

Ignoring the glare, Yi-hyeon wiped away the bloodstains. Seung-hyuk abruptly knocked his hand aside with the back of his own. Yi-hyeon met his eyes calmly.

 

“The people outside asked me to do this.”

 

“…”

 

“It’s not as if I’m enjoying it, so just sit still for a minute.”

 

At that, Seung-hyuk clenched his jaw so hard that it bulged, then lifted his arm to cover his eyes again. Yi-hyeon looked down at him and squeezed a thin smear of ointment onto his fingertip.

 

When he touched the wound beside Seung-hyuk’s lip, where scabs had formed messily, tiny beads of blood mixed into the clear ointment. The injury looked painful enough to make Yi-hyeon frown. He spread the ointment along the split corner of the mouth and the long scratch, leaving only the wound beside Seung-hyuk’s eye, hidden beneath his arm.

 

Yi-hyeon hesitated before reaching out and taking hold of one wrist. The warmth of the skin against his own felt strange. He lifted the heavy arm and lowered it out of the way, and Seung-hyuk’s eyes, which had remained closed the entire time, opened.

 

Their gazes met without anything between them. Seeing his own reflection in those black eyes made Yi-hyeon feel as though he were looking at a stranger. He swallowed and hurriedly looked away.

 

As he applied the ointment to the long cut, he was keenly aware of Seung-hyuk watching him. When he lowered his eyes, those cool pupils framed by sharp corners were far too close.

 

They were near enough for their breaths to mingle. Their gazes kept meeting.

 

The delicate silence was uncomfortable. It felt like a moment when he ought to say something about what had happened at the lounge yesterday, whether to offer thanks, explain himself or ask a question. But he could not bring himself to speak.

 

After trying to organise his tangled thoughts, he impulsively opened his mouth, wanting only to break the uneasy tension pressing against his chest.

 

“…Yesterday, we both made a mistake. I know it must have been unpleasant for you, but let’s pretend nothing happened and move on.”

 

“What?”

 

“I was supposed to drink the wine with the sleeping pills in it and fall asleep beside Gu Jin-hyuk too. That way he would have suspected someone else instead of me.”

 

The moment Yi-hyeon voiced the concern that had been troubling him since he overheard the men downstairs, Seung-hyuk’s eyes turned icy. Looking down at him from so close, Yi-hyeon faltered, his finger hovering over the wound.

 

Smack.

 

Seung-hyuk coldly knocked away the hand touching his face and slowly sat up. He rose with a scornful laugh, rubbed the back of his neck and walked towards the desk by the window.

 

“Is that what you’ve been thinking about the whole way here?”

 

“…I wasn’t in my right mind because of the drug. If I’d been sober, nothing like that would ever have happened.”

 

“So what you’re saying is, if you’d been sober, you’d have been rolling around with Gu Jin-hyuk instead of me. Is that it?”

 

His low voice was threaded with bitter, self-mocking laughter. Unsettled by the sudden change in his mood, Yi-hyeon bit down on the inside of his cheek and stood. It seemed unlikely that saying any more would help. He was gripping the plasters tightly in his hand when Seung-hyuk spoke again.

 

“We checked the storeroom on site as soon as we confirmed the password. It was completely empty.”

 

Bracing both hands on the desk, Seung-hyuk tilted his head and gave a short laugh. He picked up the ashtray and moved it in an arc, as though pretending it were an aeroplane.

 

“Almost as if somebody had been tipped off and had plenty of time to move everything.”

 

Clack. The ashtray landed roughly on the desk. At the same instant, Seung-hyuk raised his head, and their eyes met. His mouth was curved upwards, but he looked furious. When Yi-hyeon merely stared back without reacting, Seung-hyuk continued.

 

“Kwak Tae-sik suspects you.”

 

“What do you think?”

 

Ah. Information had leaked, and Yi-hyeon was under suspicion.

 

His face went rigid as he grasped the situation. Seung-hyuk’s expression gave him no clue what he was thinking. Yi-hyeon stood still, meeting his gaze, before speaking.

 

“Would you believe me if I said it wasn’t me?”

 

“Who knows? Depends on your answer.”

 

“A bloke who’ll sell his body for money might be willing to sell information too.”

 

The look in Yi-hyeon’s eyes sharpened. Seeing him glare, Seung-hyuk laughed softly and shrugged.

 

“Why the long face? It’s not as if I’ve made anything up.”

 

“But it doesn’t matter.”

 

“If you were so dedicated to fooling me that you even swallowed an aphrodisiac, I suppose I ought to turn a blind eye even if you did it.”

 

Their eyes locked. Seung-hyuk raised one corner of his mouth and clicked his tongue loudly.

 

“You must have been really desperate for money to go that far.”

 

He looked away from Yi-hyeon, whose eyes were blazing, and yanked open the metal drawer beneath the desk. He carelessly pulled out a bundle of fifty-thousand-won notes, several dozen bills held together with a rubber band.

 

“Take it.”

 

Seung-hyuk tossed the bundle towards Yi-hyeon. It brushed his shin before falling to the floor. Yi-hyeon slowly lowered his gaze to it. Seung-hyuk tilted his head and continued.

 

“I’ve already torn up the loan agreement, so don’t worry about that. Think of this as payment for your trouble.”

 

“…”

 

“You took drugs and even spread your legs to provide a service. It’s only right that we show you some appreciation in return.”

 

Keeping his eyes fixed on the money lying on the floor, Yi-hyeon slowly parted his lips and ran his tongue along the inside of his cheek.

 

It was true that he had sometimes met people and ended up in bed with them quickly and easily. But he had never accepted anything in return. That seemingly insignificant rule was the last of his principles, something on which he could base a little self-respect. Since the accusation was untrue, he had always told himself there was no need to respond to such provocations.

 

Strangely, though, today every word from Seung-hyuk felt like the point of a dagger stabbing into him. Had he really been expecting Gu Seung-hyuk to react differently towards him today? Simply because their tangled circumstances had led them to sleep together once, almost by accident?

 

Yi-hyeon slowly bent and picked up the bundle of notes. Whatever he might have been thinking unconsciously, he had not come all this way to be treated like this. His feet, which had seemed rooted to the floor, began to carry him slowly towards Seung-hyuk.

 

Seung-hyuk watched Yi-hyeon approach with a rigid, expressionless face. Yi-hyeon was the one who had been insulted, yet Seung-hyuk looked as if he were the angry one. Yi-hyeon stopped in front of him and spoke slowly.

 

“I’m sorry you couldn’t find the goods, but I didn’t tell Gu Jin-hyuk anything.”

 

“And I think I’d better give this back.”

 

Yi-hyeon glanced impassively at the bundle in his hand. Then he lifted one side of Seung-hyuk’s jacket and slipped the money into the inside pocket. He looked straight into Seung-hyuk’s unreadable face and said quietly:

 

“It’s your fee for sex.”

 

“…Hah.”

 

A beat later, Seung-hyuk let out a breathless laugh. He touched his jaw and mouth with the look of someone who had been caught completely off guard. Yi-hyeon released his jacket, stepped back and turned away without looking over his shoulder.

 

Nothing sounded behind him as he walked to the office door and took hold of the handle. He paused briefly, facing the door, and spoke.

 

“Now the debt’s paid, we’ve got no reason to see each other again, have we?”

 

“…”

 

“Let’s try not to cross paths again.”

 

The door clicked open. Yi-hyeon stepped outside without delay, though there was a hesitation in his retreating footsteps that even he did not recognise.

 

“Have you worked in a convenience store before?”

 

“For about a year and a half.”

 

“That makes things easier, then. Good. You can start next week.”

 

Sitting in the small back room of the convenience store and fidgeting with his fingers, Yi-hyeon silently bowed his head at the manager’s answer. He had used the last sheet of paper for his CV. If he had failed this interview too, he would have had to buy more. He was relieved to receive a positive response.

 

After exchanging numbers with the manager, he said goodbye to the part-time employee on duty and stepped outside. A biting wind swept over his pale cheeks. He buried his face in the scarf around his neck and hurried along.

 

His days had become so uneventful that the time he had spent worrying about whether Gu Jin-hyuk would call or turn up outside his home now seemed almost ridiculous.

 

He had returned to a life scarcely different from the one he had known before: hunting for part-time work during the day and turning up for his shifts at the bar where he had recently started working at night.

 

It was an ordinary, bleak existence. No more confronting enormous men in black suits, their bodies swollen with muscle and fat. No more telling lies to deceive somebody.

 

An old, worn-out building divided into small flats, rather than a dizzyingly high apartment with a panoramic view of Seoul at night. Those were the things that suited him.

 

Looking back, it had only been a few weeks of straying from his ordinary life, yet it felt like months. How absurd that walking down the street in broad daylight wearing a comfortable jumper and coat, rather than a suffocating, close-fitting suit, should feel unfamiliar. Yi-hyeon gave a quiet, self-mocking laugh.

 

“Hello.”

 

He climbed the narrow stairs through the bitter wind and opened the door to the bar, which had not yet opened for the evening. Haewon, who had worked there for two years, was pushing a mop across the floor in black trousers and a white shirt.

 

At the greeting from the doorway, Haewon looked up. When he saw Yi-hyeon, his eyes curved in a gentle smile.

 

“Oh, Yi-hyeon. You’re early.”

 

“My interview for the convenience-store job finished early.”

 

“Really? How did it go?”

 

“I’m starting next week.”

 

Haewon followed Yi-hyeon towards the staff room as he unwound the rough scarf from his neck. Yi-hyeon hung his coat on the rack at one side, then tilted his head at Haewon, who was leaning against the doorframe.

 

“Is there something you wanted to say?”

 

Haewon was still watching him with a strange expression as he pulled off his jumper and straightened the white shirt underneath. Eventually Yi-hyeon stopped what he was doing and turned towards him.

 

“So, what happened yesterday? Did you get home all right?”

 

Yesterday? Ah… yesterday.

 

“That bloke used to come in once a week at most, if that. I was wondering why he’d started showing up so often lately. He’s the best-looking customer we’ve had in ages. Well? Did anything happen between you two?”

 

Haewon narrowed his eyes and grinned suggestively, prodding Yi-hyeon in the arm. Yi-hyeon pressed his lips together, lowered his gaze and folded the jumper he had taken off.

 

“It wasn’t like that. We said goodbye outside the bar and went our separate ways.”

 

“Eh? Seriously? Why? He’s not your type? He’s tall, has that properly masculine face, and he’s pretty sexy.”

 

The man Haewon was talking about was a customer who had left the bar at the same time as Yi-hyeon after closing the previous night. He had sat drinking in front of Yi-hyeon on his first day of work there, and since then had appeared almost every other day.

 

He always took a seat at the bar, sipped his whisky and eventually left. Yesterday, however, he had stayed until closing time and followed Yi-hyeon outside after his shift.

 

As Yi-hyeon put a cigarette between his lips, the man had lit it for him and suggested they go for another drink together. Yi-hyeon had considered it briefly, his breath mingling with the cigarette smoke, before shaking his head.

 

There had been no particular reason for refusing. The man would not have been a bad choice for a one-night stand. He simply had not felt like it.

 

“No particular reason. I’m not really in a position to see anyone at the moment.”

 

Yi-hyeon set his neatly folded jumper to one side and bowed his head slightly as he moved towards the door. Looking disappointed, Haewon stepped aside and followed him out to the main room.

 

“Then if that customer comes in again, can I take care of him? He’s just my type.”

 

“Of course.”

 

“If you spot a decent-looking customer while you’re working, let me know. We ought to have some pleasures in a job like this, don’t you think?”

 

Yi-hyeon smiled faintly and picked up the mop Haewon had put down. As he pushed it firmly across the black tiled floor, a long wet streak appeared, then quickly vanished. Rolling up his shirt sleeves, Yi-hyeon adjusted his grip on the handle.

 

There were hardly any customers for the first hour or two after opening, but the seats began to fill as soon as evening arrived. Two men sitting at a table were so busy leaning close and whispering into each other’s ears that they barely noticed Yi-hyeon putting their food down. He bowed without expression and returned behind the bar to rinse his hands under running water.

 

He was drying his hands on a cloth when he happened to look up and see the man from the previous night coming through the entrance. Yi-hyeon nudged Haewon in the side, and Haewon hurriedly put down the plate he was washing.

 

Haewon smiled brightly at the customer, but the man walked straight past him and sat in front of Yi-hyeon, who was taking a lemon from the fridge.

 

“Hello.”

 

“Ah… yes. Hello.”

 

Yi-hyeon caught sight of Haewon awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck and pressed his lips together. The man seated opposite was staring up at Yi-hyeon as though studying him.

 

“Would you like your usual?”

 

He set down a coaster and a glass of water as he asked. The man nodded. Yi-hyeon took a bottle of whisky from the display behind him, poured a measure into a rocks glass and placed it before the customer. Then he fetched the lemon again and picked up a small knife, pretending he had something to do.

 

“Did you get home safely last night?”

 

The man’s pleasant voice sounded soft and gentle. Yi-hyeon kept his eyes lowered and nodded.

 

“Yes.”

 

He knew a one-word answer was rather curt, but he was conscious of Haewon standing nearby. Yi-hyeon silently began slicing the lemon. The man spoke again.

 

“You look really tired. Haven’t been sleeping well?”

 

“More or less.”

 

In truth, his insomnia had returned, and he had spent the entire night tossing and turning. Instead of explaining, Yi-hyeon offered a faint smile.

 

The man took something from his pocket and set it on the bar. It was a small bottled tonic for fatigue, the sort sold in pharmacies.

 

“Have this. It might help you get through your shift.”

 

Yi-hyeon’s hand paused over the lemon at the sound of a kind voice he had not heard in so long. Was he just starved of people, or starved of affection? Whoever offered him warmth like this, he found himself helplessly affected by it.

 

Biting the inside of his cheek, Yi-hyeon looked at the tonic and slowly bowed his head. Unable to bring himself to refuse, he reached out. The man watched him quietly. Their fingertips briefly touched as the small glass bottle changed hands.

 

“…Thank you.”

 

It was around then that the owner arrived at the bar. Yi-hyeon and Haewon bowed in greeting as he hurried into the staff room while talking to someone on his phone.

 

“The boss seems busy today,” Haewon remarked.

 

“He does.”

 

The words had scarcely left Yi-hyeon’s mouth when the owner emerged from the staff room again. He was frowning and scratching near his eyebrow.

 

“Is something wrong, boss?” Haewon asked warmly.

 

The owner answered as though he had been waiting for someone to ask.

 

“Sweetheart, can you ride a motorbike?”

 

“Me? No. My dad always said I was absolutely forbidden from riding one.”

 

“Oh, this is a nightmare. Someone I know wants me to bring over some alcohol he left with us, right now. It’s really expensive, so I can’t send it by ordinary courier. I was going to take it myself, but somebody’s just called saying I have to go somewhere urgently… They said they needed it immediately. Bloody hell, what am I supposed to do?”

 

Haewon gave an awkward laugh and scratched the back of his head. Yi-hyeon glanced at the man sitting opposite him, then turned towards the owner.

 

“I can go.”

 

He was uncomfortable with the customer’s unbroken attention. Rather than give false hope to someone he had no intention of pursuing, it seemed better to run an errand for the owner. That would be best for the man, for Haewon and for himself.

 

Yi-hyeon put down the knife, and the owner’s face brightened instantly.

 

“What? Yi-hyeon, you know how to ride a motorbike?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Thank goodness. Here, take this. Be careful with it, because it’s seriously expensive.”

 

He handed Yi-hyeon a heavy glass bottle wrapped in several layers of protective plastic. When Yi-hyeon returned from the staff room wearing his coat and scarf, the owner held out his phone. A photograph of someone filled the screen.

 

“I’ll message you the address. And this is the person, all right? Make sure you hand it to her directly, not to anyone else. She’s being a pain, so tell her the delivery charge is double—thirty thousand won.”

 

The photograph showed a pretty young woman, apparently in her early to mid-twenties, smiling as she held an elaborate cake. Yi-hyeon nodded and wrapped his scarf more securely around his neck.

 

“Haewon-hyung, I’ll be back. Can you cover things here?”

 

He gave the customer opposite a brief nod before turning to Haewon. Haewon smiled and patted Yi-hyeon on the back.

 

“Take care.”

 

With the motorbike key from the owner, Yi-hyeon headed to the car park. A knife-sharp wind slipped beneath the hem of his coat. He began to regret volunteering in this weather, but it was too late now.

 

Fortunately, the helmet covered his entire face, so at least the wind would not be able to cut across his cheeks. He patted the motorbike’s seat twice and pulled the helmet onto his head.

 

He rode quickly to the address he had been given and found a building whose extravagance was obvious even from the car park. The luxurious interior finishes seemed designed to intimidate anyone who entered.

 

He parked the motorbike in one corner among the expensive sports cars and stepped into a lift. Instead of taking him straight to the fourteenth floor, it automatically selected the lobby level. When the doors opened, a hall even more lavish than the underground car park greeted him.

 

“May I ask what brings you here?”

 

Several young men in tailored black suits, radios attached to their clothing, approached. Only then did Yi-hyeon feel embarrassed that he had been too lazy to remove his helmet. He pretended not to care.

 

“Fourteenth floor. Delivery.”

 

When he indicated the wrapped bottle, one of the men held out his hand.

 

“You can leave it with us. We’ll pass it on.”

 

“I was told the recipient wanted to take it personally. You can check.”

 

Yi-hyeon moved the bottle away as he spoke. The man rubbed the back of his neck, looking troubled, and said something into his radio. A short while later, he called Yi-hyeon over and led him to the lift.

 

The man tapped a card against the closed lift and personally selected the fourteenth floor. The building was absurdly secure as well as extravagant. As the doors closed, Yi-hyeon looked at his reflection in the polished surface and gave a humourless laugh. Maybe he should have taken the helmet off after all.

 

Ding.

 

The lift opened on the fourteenth floor. In the middle of a broad corridor leading towards a powder room stood an enormous soundproof door.

 

Instinctively sensing that the owner of the bottle was behind it, Yi-hyeon stopped and clenched his fist once before pushing down the handle.

 

“Hahahaha!”

 

Laughter from men and women spilled through the gap as soon as he opened the door a fraction. When he pulled the heavy door wide and stepped inside, several pairs of eyes immediately turned towards him. Yi-hyeon faltered.

 

“What’s that?”

 

Around a dozen men and women sat on a large sofa. They all appeared to be in their twenties, and some were half-undressed. One man wore no shirt at all, while one woman had no skirt, only stockings.

 

As Yi-hyeon hurriedly looked around, he saw banknotes, cheques and alcohol bottles piled on the table. Apparently wealthy people behaved just as disgustingly here as they did in clubs. Had he not been wearing the helmet, his displeased expression might have been obvious. He was belatedly grateful for it.

 

Realising he was merely making a delivery, the people quickly lost interest. Yi-hyeon collected himself and scanned the faces on the sofa, searching for the woman in the owner’s photograph.

 

He stopped moving when he saw a man lounging against one end of the sofa, his arm draped over the shoulders of a young woman. His Adam’s apple bobbed beneath the helmet.

 

“Oh! My booze must be here!”

 

Even as the woman who must have ordered the bottle approached from the other side of the room, Yi-hyeon could not look away. His unsteady gaze remained fixed on Seung-hyuk, reclining on the sofa with a relaxed expression.

 

He was not wearing his usual flashy shirt and formal suit, but something more casual. In a collarless shirt with several buttons undone and a pair of tailored trousers, he seemed less imposing than usual.

 

“This came from Wibert, right? Hand it over.”

 

Yi-hyeon knew Seung-hyuk could not recognise him beneath the helmet, yet his heart hammered with an inexplicable tension. Oblivious to this, the woman snatched the bottle from his hands and began tearing away the wrapping.

 

“Hey, look! It’s here! I stole this from Dad and put it aside. Fuck, what a waste. I’ve handed it over now, so it’s my turn, right? Number Three has to take off Number Seven’s underwear with his mouth.”

 

“Who’s Three and Seven?”

 

“Oh, fuck. Are you completely insane?”

 

“Ahahaha! Fucking hell, that’s mental. Kim Myeong-seok and Park Hyo-chang? That’s fucking hilarious.”

 

“Hey, I’m filming this! That’s all right, isn’t it?”

 

“What are you waiting for? Hurry the fuck up, you bastards!”

 

All Yi-hyeon wanted was to collect the delivery fee and leave, but the young woman was excitedly pointing her phone at the two men. He stood awkwardly, running his tongue across the roof of his mouth, unsure what to do. The man designated Number Three knelt in front of Number Seven.

 

“…Excuse me.”

 

“Ahahaha! Fuck, this is insane. Seriously!”

 

Yi-hyeon took a few steps towards the table and spoke quietly, but his voice was swallowed by cries of shock and laughter. He was just deciding that it would be easier to pay the delivery charge himself than push through the crowd and ask for it when Seung-hyuk’s deep voice cut through the noise.

 

“Is that all?”

 

Everyone turned towards him at once. Yi-hyeon also looked back in the direction he had been deliberately avoiding.

 

Even with so many eyes on him, Seung-hyuk wore his usual unhurried expression. He removed his arm from the woman’s shoulders and slowly unfastened the watch on his left wrist.

 

“If he sucks the other one off with his mouth…”

 

The gleaming silver watch landed with a light thud in the middle of the table, among the piles of money.

 

“…I’ll throw this in as well.”

 

His lazy voice seemed even deeper than that of the man who had left the bar with Yi-hyeon the previous night. A beat later, the room erupted.

 

“Holy fuck…”

 

Starting with one person’s quiet exclamation, the excited crowd began urging Numbers Three and Seven on even more loudly. Number Three’s face reddened. He bit his lip, put both hands behind his back and knelt between Number Seven’s legs. Seung-hyuk watched the two men intently.

 

“Hey, you’d better take it all the way down your throat!” someone shouted gleefully.

 

As Number Three lowered his head towards Number Seven’s crotch, Yi-hyeon saw Seung-hyuk’s fingers tighten around his glass.

 

Seung-hyuk was closer to where Yi-hyeon stood than he had initially realised. His heart pounded at the thought of being recognised. Amid all the noise, he could only stare at Seung-hyuk.

 

“What? You’re still here?”

 

It was the young woman who had taken the bottle who finally roused Yi-hyeon from his frozen state. Remembering what he had been about to ask, he lowered his voice so that Seung-hyuk would not hear him.

 

“You still need to pay the delivery charge. Thirty thousand won.”

 

He spoke deliberately quietly, but his voice echoed inside the helmet, mingling with the noise around him. Looking annoyed, the woman picked up a hundred-thousand-won cheque lying on the table and handed it to him.

 

“Keep the change as a tip.”

 

She immediately turned back towards the entertainment, leaving Yi-hyeon to bow his thanks belatedly. He hurriedly turned to leave, but just as he reached the door, a woman’s soft voice drifted from where Seung-hyuk sat.

 

“What’s got into you, oppa? You normally hate games like this.”

 

Yi-hyeon’s steps faltered. Then Seung-hyuk’s low, level voice followed.

 

“I know.”

 

“Still disgusting, though.”

 

Thump. Thump. Thump…

 

Even though he knew the words were not directed at him, his heart began beating faster for no apparent reason. Yi-hyeon bit his lip, hurried to the door and pulled it open.

 

Throughout the short journey from the party room to the motorbike he had parked, Seung-hyuk’s face and voice kept returning to his mind.

 

“When you were the one who suggested it,” Yi-hyeon muttered.

 

Feeling unfairly indignant, he removed his helmet and set it on the motorbike’s seat. He ran a hand through his flattened hair, took a cigarette from his pocket and put it between his lips.

 

If Seung-hyuk found even watching something like that disgusting, what had he been thinking when he went to Yi-hyeon at the party? Had he felt some meagre sense of responsibility after seeing Yi-hyeon floundering under the drug’s influence? Had he been afraid Yi-hyeon would ruin the plan if left alone? Or perhaps…

 

Yi-hyeon suddenly remembered the look in Seung-hyuk’s eyes as he gazed down at him in bed. He shook his head sharply, as though trying to drive the thought away. After everything Seung-hyuk had said to him in the office, it was a ridiculous possibility. So ridiculous that Yi-hyeon let out a short, breathless laugh at himself.

 

He lifted his head and looked into the darkening sky, slowly exhaling cigarette smoke. The white plume rose against the starless blackness and disappeared. They would never see each other again anyway, so it did not matter which explanation was true.

 

Yi-hyeon threw away the cigarette end, started the motorbike and twisted the throttle hard.

 

***

 

The first thing Seung-hyuk saw when he opened his eyes was the rounded crown of someone’s head between his legs. Wondering what the hell was happening, he looked around and recognised the surroundings.

 

It was one of the lounge rooms where he had slept with Kwon Yi-hyeon.

 

The previous night, he distinctly remembered staying late at a drinking party for the children of important families before going home. He could not understand why he was here now. Frowning, he tried to sit up from the sofa, but his body would not move, as though something heavy were pressing him down.

 

What the fuck?

 

He wondered whether he was experiencing sleep paralysis and tried to twist his shoulders. Then he felt something brush the insides of his thighs. Instinctively tensing his legs, he looked down and saw a small-built man stroking his inner thighs.

 

Nothing made sense—neither why Seung-hyuk was there nor who the man between his legs might be. But the direct stimulation as those hands moved along his thighs and over his briefs made him frown. Blood began gathering between his legs despite himself. Seung-hyuk bit his lip and stared down at his growing erection.

 

After a few strokes, the outline of his cock was clearly visible through the fabric. Soft lips settled over it, followed by a damp tongue that licked slowly along its length. With every movement of the man’s head against his briefs, heat seemed to rush towards his groin.

 

The man licked him through the material for some time before slowly drawing down the waistband. His exposed cock jutted into the air, so fiercely erect that the veins stood out.

 

The man stroked the shaft upwards with both hands, then took the tip into his mouth. A hot tongue swept over the head before the man swallowed more than half the length, enveloping it in the warmth of his mouth.

 

“Haa… fuck…”

 

The man sucked firmly, then smoothly drew back until only the ridge of the glans remained between his lips. Again and again, he swallowed Seung-hyuk’s wet cock and pulled away. When his tongue pressed against a vein beneath the head, Seung-hyuk felt a heavy ache below his navel and tilted his head back.

 

Each time the tip rubbed against the roof of the man’s mouth, a sharp shiver travelled down his spine. Wet sucking noises filled the room as the man moved his head backwards and forwards.

 

Ordinarily, the mere thought of another man sucking his cock should have made him recoil in disgust. Yet his thoughts felt unusually loose and unfocused. Seung-hyuk cupped the back of the man’s head and pushed him down towards his lap.

 

He could distinctly feel the narrow throat closing around the head of his cock. Holding the man’s head with both hands, Seung-hyuk began to move his hips slowly as though fucking him. His cock pressed against the man’s tongue and the roof of his mouth, repeatedly thrusting deep into his throat.

 

Seung-hyuk growled softly as he thrust upwards. Pleasure built in layers until he was on the verge of coming. He drove his cock further into the open throat, seized a fistful of the man’s hair, then quickly pulled his hips back.

 

His cock slipped from between the saliva- and precum-slick lips, and thick, hot semen shot out in force.

 

It trickled down beneath the man’s eyes, the skin around them red and raw from tears. Breathing heavily, Seung-hyuk looked down. When he noticed the small mole beneath the man’s left eye, his grip tightened on the handful of hair.

 

The eyes that had remained closed all this time suddenly opened.

 

The instant Seung-hyuk met Yi-hyeon’s gaze, he woke from the dream.

A car carrying Seung-hyuk and two men in black suits sped along the motorway. The driver turned the radio down and glanced anxiously at Seung-hyuk through the rear-view mirror.

 

As soon as Seung-hyuk had climbed into the car, he had ordered someone to buy him a hangover remedy. He had emptied the bottle, folded his arms and closed his eyes. Whenever the driver glanced at him, he was in the same position, so thankfully he seemed to have fallen asleep.

 

Seung-hyuk was hardly an easy-going man at the best of times, but today he seemed even more menacing than usual, perhaps because of his hangover. The driver pressed the accelerator carefully, determined not to aggravate him.

 

“I saw him when I was doing the rounds, you know.”

 

After a long stretch of driving in silence, the man in the passenger seat apparently grew bored and spoke. Fortunately, he had enough sense to whisper after checking on Seung-hyuk. The driver glanced into the mirror again and answered quietly.

 

“Who?”

 

“You know. That pretty little bloke who used to come in and out of the office all the time.”

 

The driver remembered the small-built, rather sharp-looking young man he had seen several times at the Gawon-dong office.

 

“Where?”

 

“You know there’s a gay bar over in Yeongchang-dong? I saw him outside downstairs, smoking with an apron on. Looks like he works there.”

 

After hearing that Yi-hyeon was gay, the man had visited the office in Gawon-dong several times out of curiosity. He had never seen a homosexual in person before, so he had found it fascinating and watched Yi-hyeon as though studying him. Yi-hyeon had stared back sharply with the outer corners of his eyes tilted upwards.

 

Thinking back, it might have been a wary look. The man belatedly felt offended at the possibility that the gay bastard had misunderstood his interest.

 

“Homos really are different. Who the hell decides to work in a place like that?”

 

“Oi, better for gay bastards to work in a gay bar than for blokes like us to go in there and get fucked up the arse, isn’t it?”

 

The driver nodded, thinking his companion had a point. Men who fucked other men ought to be kept together. If he had not heard the rumours, he would have assumed Yi-hyeon was normal too.

 

“He looks normal enough, doesn’t he? But when night comes, he must get fucked by some bloke and moan his head off. Fuck, I reckon the bastards who shove their cocks up another man’s arse are something else.”

 

Imagining Yi-hyeon pinned beneath another man and moaning made the passenger feel oddly unsettled. He glanced towards Seung-hyuk for no reason, then lowered his voice.

 

“Hey, we’re nearly there. Stop talking in case the boss wakes up.”

 

The other man widened his eyes and snapped his lips shut, and the car fell silent again.

 

They left the motorway, followed a deserted country road and finally stopped at the container terminal of a port, where enormous shipping containers stood stacked like building blocks. Several black saloons had already arrived. The driver brought the car to a gentle stop and turned carefully towards the back seat.

 

“Boss, we’re here.”

 

Seung-hyuk opened his eyes without appearing to wake at all. The rear door opened immediately, and Tae-sik bowed his head. Scowling, Seung-hyuk pressed his fingers hard against his temples and swung his legs out of the car.

 

“Everything’s ready.”

 

Seung-hyuk continued frowning as he followed Tae-sik. Watching his expression carefully, Tae-sik ventured a question.

 

“Did you drink a lot last night?”

 

“If that bastard Han Seong-ho contacts me again, deal with him yourself. Fucking hell, where did he get that filthy drug?”

 

After spending so long in the car, the cold wind seemed to settle his stomach a little. The sea breeze was bitter enough to cut through his clothes. Muttering that he was freezing to death, Seung-hyuk walked where Tae-sik indicated.

 

With both hands in his pockets, he stepped into a shipping container. The large men standing in a line along one wall immediately bowed. Opposite them, a middle-aged man was tied to a folding chair, his face a bloody mess.

 

Seung-hyuk had specifically told them there was no need to be unnecessarily rough. Judging by the man’s condition, however, he must have put up quite a fight. Seung-hyuk frowned at the middle-aged man’s ankles, where the ropes had rubbed the skin raw and bloody.

 

“Mmph… ugh…”

 

“Take the tape off him.”

 

One of the men hurried over and peeled the blue tape from the captive’s mouth. His agonised scream reverberated around the container.

 

“It’s cold, so let’s cooperate and get this over with quickly. Then we can all go inside.”

 

Seung-hyuk sat on a metal chair opposite the man, crossing his legs. He took one hand from his pocket and held it out. Tae-sik passed him a file.

 

“Let’s see… Executive Director Lim. Seventeen years in charge of finance at Taeseong Construction. Then seven years working under the chairman, cleaning up every kind of mess imaginable. You must have been terribly busy handling slush funds, shell companies and all sorts of other things. When did you find the time to learn to play cards?”

 

“D-Director Gu…”

 

“Did you have much luck at the casino?”

 

Seung-hyuk read from the file without interest, closed it and handed it back to Tae-sik. He slipped his hands into his pockets and regarded the man with his head tilted. Executive Director Lim forced his swollen eyes open and spoke in a trembling voice.

 

“I-I only went a few times, out of curiosity. It had n-nothing to do with the company…”

 

“The chairman seems to see it differently.”

 

Clicking his tongue, Seung-hyuk picked up a pistol and a suppressor from the small table beside the chair. Tilting his head, he began slowly attaching the suppressor.

 

“Your son and your wife moved to America recently, didn’t they? They’ll be given more than enough to cover his education.”

 

With the suppressor fitted, Seung-hyuk stood, giving a small grunt of effort, and strolled towards the bound man. Executive Director Lim’s eyes shook more violently the closer he came.

 

“D-Director Gu…!”

 

Seung-hyuk chambered a round and pressed the end of the suppressor between the man’s eyebrows. Lim began trembling so hard that his teeth chattered. Seung-hyuk looked down at him without expression.

 

“Any last words?”

 

“P-please spare me! Please, please…!”

 

“Everyone says the same tedious things. That’s what makes this so boring. Tch.”

 

Seung-hyuk wrinkled his face and tilted his head. As the forefinger resting on the trigger slowly moved, Lim squeezed his eyes shut. The tension inside the container stretched almost to breaking point.

 

Then Seung-hyuk made a short sound, playfully imitating a gunshot.

 

“Bang.”

 

Lim had been shaking with terror, imagining the pain to come. When neither a shot nor anything else followed, he cautiously opened his eyes.

 

Seung-hyuk was licking his lips and turning the pistol from side to side, examining it. Before Lim could even breathe out in relief, Seung-hyuk spoke.

 

“Well, that was the chairman’s message…”

 

He returned to his chair and casually scratched his head with the end of the suppressor.

 

“Now, how about you and I have a little chat?”

 

Looking into the muzzle of the pistol, Seung-hyuk raised his eyebrows and continued.

 

“Executive Director Lim, you must have handled all sorts of things while cleaning up Chairman Gu’s messes. Accounts under false names, slush funds, shell companies, bribes, embezzlement, improper favours…”

 

“And so on and so forth.”

 

He drew out the last words and clicked his tongue sharply.

 

“You’ve got a neat, tidy list of all those things, haven’t you?”

 

Lim’s eyes darted about at the question. He managed to shake his trembling head.

 

“I-I don’t know anything about that. I only did what the chairman told me.”

 

Seung-hyuk did not respond, and a heavy silence settled over the container. He sighed softly, closed his eyes and pressed his temples again.

 

“Executive Director Lim, it’s unfortunate for you, but I’m in a very bad mood today.”

 

Pop!

 

The suppressed report cut through the air before Seung-hyuk had even finished speaking. Lim’s pupils widened. He hunched forwards over the shoulder that had been shot, then let out a delayed scream.

 

“A-aaagh!”

 

“Oh, my mistake. That wasn’t a blank.”

 

“Agh! Aaah…!”

 

“I might make another mistake, so keep yourself braced firmly against that chair.”

 

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

 

Each muffled shot lit one side of Seung-hyuk’s face with a brief reddish flash. Several neat holes appeared in the container wall behind Lim, narrow beams of daylight streaming through them.

 

Lim was trembling so violently that he was close to convulsing. He groaned like an animal, not even realising he had wet himself.

 

“Well? Does any of this seem familiar now?”

 

“Hhh… agh… hh…”

 

“I don’t want to have to explain myself at length.”

 

Seung-hyuk checked the magazine, clicked it back into place and chambered another round. At the sound, Lim, his face soaked with tears, gasped out an answer.

 

“Th-there is! There’s a ledger! A record of everything the chairman ordered me to do…”

 

Seung-hyuk jerked his chin. Tae-sik immediately approached Lim and began searching the pockets of his bloodstained suit.

 

“I-it’s not on me now. If you let me go, I’ll find it and bring it to you.”

 

Seung-hyuk stared at the pool of urine beneath the chair, then impassively aimed the pistol again. Another quiet shot sounded, and flesh burst from Lim’s left calf along with a spray of blood.

 

“A-aaargh…!”

 

“Director Lim. Did I sound as if I were asking you to negotiate?”

 

“Agh, hh… I-I left a laptop at a pawnshop near the casino in Jeongseon. Everything’s on it, ahh…”

 

Tae-sik planted a hand on Lim’s bullet-wounded shoulder and removed the mobile phone from the inside pocket of his jacket. He wiped the blood from his hand, searched the contacts and found the pawnshop’s number. Holding the screen in front of Lim, he made the call.

 

“Ugh… hh…”

 

After screaming in pain for so long, Lim seemed almost to have lost his senses. Tae-sik patted his cheek a couple of times, and he nodded shakily.

 

“Hello. Sorry to trouble you. Have you got a laptop left in the name of Lim Tae-jin? Ah, you do. Yes, yes. Understood.”

 

Tae-sik ended the call and nodded to Seung-hyuk. Seung-hyuk stood without a word.

 

“I-I’ve told you now, so please, just spare my li—”

 

Pop.

 

The life vanished from Executive Director Lim’s eyes in an instant. Seung-hyuk had fired his last round into the man’s chest. He tossed the pistol to Tae-sik and put his hands into his pockets.

 

“Take care of the rest yourselves.”

 

“Yes, Boss.”

 

Seung-hyuk left the container and walked straight towards the car without hesitation. One of the men hurried after him, stepped ahead to open the rear door of the saloon, then rushed round to the driver’s seat.

 

“I’ll take you home, Boss.”

 

Seung-hyuk rested his head against the seat and closed his eyes without replying.

 

***

 

When Seung-hyuk opened the front door of his home, the lights throughout the house came on softly. He looked without warmth at the almost empty interior, sparsely furnished enough to feel desolate. After throwing his jacket carelessly onto the dining table, he went straight to the kitchen.

 

He took out a bottle of whisky and poured a measure into a glass. Then he fetched a small packet containing white powder from a cupboard and tipped it straight into the drink. He watched the powder dissolve, leaving faint wisps behind, then picked up the glass and swallowed the contents in one go.

 

He was too worn down to feel guilty about killing one more person, but that did not mean he felt particularly good about it.

 

As if that were not enough, he had dreamt about Kwon Yi-hyeon before dawn, only to hear an utterly unwanted account of Yi-hyeon working in a gay bar. His mood was fucking foul.

 

Seung-hyuk threw off his watch, undid a couple of shirt buttons and went to lie down on the living-room sofa.

 

The light fading from a man’s eyes. Flesh bursting like a water balloon. The sickening metallic stink of blood. He briefly found himself thinking how tired he was of this work. Then a teasing warmth began spreading upwards from his toes.

 

His body relaxed languidly, losing its strength, while his thoughts broke apart and reassembled themselves in senseless patterns. He surrendered to the effects of the drug and closed his eyes. Immediately, the dream from before dawn appeared vividly in his mind.

 

He remembered Yi-hyeon’s lashes heavy with tears, the thick semen trickling down his cheeks and those dark eyes gazing up at him. A familiar ache formed in his lower stomach.

 

Seung-hyuk roughly loosened his belt with one hand, pulled his hardened cock out of his briefs and wrapped his fingers around it. He rubbed his thumb through the precum beginning to leak from the head.

 

As he breathed out languidly and stroked the erect shaft up and down, pleasure mixed with the drug’s effects, seeming to claw at the inside of his skull. He pictured Yi-hyeon’s face in the dream, streaked with tears and sticky semen, and the ache below his navel grew heavier.

 

He imagined the pink opening hidden between Yi-hyeon’s pale, soft buttocks, his face flushed red to the tips of his ears and his slender fingers clutching the sheets. Seung-hyuk tightened his grip.

 

His languid breathing grew hot. He clenched his molars. It seemed as though the rhythmic slap of his hand against his body was echoing from every direction, while his vision flickered and blurred.

 

“Ngh…!”

 

The pleasure mounted until it reached its limit and burst. Semen spurted from the darkly flushed head of his cock.

 

His vision went distant, and a dizzying sensation enveloped him, like falling from a great height. His throat moved sharply as his head tipped back. Then everything turned black.

 

How much time had passed? When he opened his eyes after what felt like losing consciousness, the windows had turned dark. Seung-hyuk slowly raised an arm and pressed his aching forehead.

 

He no longer felt the dizziness or flashing lights that had followed taking the drug. Instead he was dazed and lethargic, as though waking from a very long sleep. It felt much like being drunk.

 

He moved slowly, wiped the semen from his trousers with tissues and stood up. Staggering a little, he made his way to the dining table where he had left his jacket.

 

He searched its inside pocket for his phone and, after several fumbling attempts, managed to connect a call to Tae-sik.

 

“Hello, Bo—”

 

“The lad who drove me earlier… send him to my house. Right now.”

 

Seung-hyuk ended the call before hearing an answer and dropped the phone onto the table. Then he sank back onto the sofa, nodding off and waking in fits and starts until the doorbell buzzed. He sat up, pushed his fallen fringe back and collected his jacket and car keys before going to the front door.

 

Outside stood a rough-looking man with a long scar beside one eye. Before the man, who was standing ramrod straight with nerves, could speak, Seung-hyuk tossed him the keys and headed towards the lift. The man kept glancing at him as Seung-hyuk leaned his head against the lift wall and closed his eyes.

 

“Where would you like to go, Boss…?”

 

After Seung-hyuk settled into the back seat and the man took the wheel, the driver frantically wondered whether he had done something wrong. The longer Seung-hyuk remained silent, the drier his mouth became. Breaking into a cold sweat, he checked the rear-view mirror. Seung-hyuk sat with his eyes closed in much the same position as earlier that day.

 

The man was just about to turn around, wondering whether the boss had fallen asleep, when Seung-hyuk’s low, husky voice sounded through the car.

 

“You said you knew where Kwon Yi-hyeon works.”

 

“Pardon? Who?”

 

“…”

 

“Ah! Y-yes. I saw him in Yeongchang-dong.”

 

“Go there.”

 

“Yes, Boss.”

 

He started driving without another word, but his thoughts were in chaos. More than the shock of realising Seung-hyuk had heard their entire conversation earlier, he was troubled by whether he ought to remind his boss that they were heading to a gay bar.

 

He considered dropping a hint and glanced in the mirror again. But Seung-hyuk had had his head tipped back and his eyes closed ever since getting into the car.

 

Ah, fuck it.

 

Whatever happened, his only job was to follow orders properly. Instead of opening his mouth, the driver bit down on his tongue and pressed the accelerator gently.

 

The black saloon sped through the deserted streets.

“Take care getting home.”

 

At the cheerful farewell, the last group of customers remaining at the tables finally got to their feet. The moment they went out through the door, Haewon gave a long yawn.

 

“Ah, I’m bloody exhausted.”

 

The part-timer who worked on the floor twisted around, thumping his aching back, while the owner sat at the counter, opened the accounts book and lit a cigarette. Yi-hyeon blinked his dry eyes a couple of times and pressed his thumb against the area around them.

 

“Good work today, everyone. Let’s get everything closed up quickly and head home before the sun comes up.”

 

“Yeees.”

 

Drawing out the word, Haewon pulled on his rubber gloves and started washing the mountain of dishes. Standing beside him, Yi-hyeon searched for a glass cloth to dry the wet glasses, but he could not find one.

 

“Haewon-hyung, do you know where we keep the new glass cloths?”

 

“Ah, I put them under the counter over there.”

 

Yi-hyeon went where Haewon pointed, squatted down and began searching. The things beneath the counter were piled up without any order, and the cloths were nowhere to be seen. He was sifting through spare receipt rolls and tissues when the bell over the entrance jingled.

 

“Sorry, we’re closed,” Haewon called towards the door.

 

Yi-hyeon looked up at him from his crouch, rubbed his tingling legs and began to stand.

 

“Hyung, they’re not under…”

 

He stopped mid-sentence as he turned and found himself looking straight at someone who had no business being there. A sound escaped his lips before he realised it.

 

“…Gu Seung-hyuk?”

 

As though he had heard that murmur, barely loud enough to reach the person next to Yi-hyeon, Seung-hyuk approached the bar. Everyone preparing to close up, including the owner behind the counter, turned to look at him.

 

“…?”

 

Seung-hyuk paid the attention no mind and took a seat directly in front of Yi-hyeon as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Yi-hyeon stood staring down at him, wondering what he was playing at, until Haewon cautiously spoke.

 

“I’m sorry, sir, but we’ve finished serving for the night…”

 

At Haewon’s friendly apology, Seung-hyuk scratched his eyebrow with an annoyed expression. He took his wallet from his inside pocket, counted out some notes and dropped them onto the bar. Even at a glance there looked to be at least ten fifty-thousand-won notes. Keeping his gaze fixed on Yi-hyeon, he spoke.

 

“Tell them all to get out.”

 

What was going on? Did he know Yi-hyeon? Was he a customer of Yi-hyeon’s? The staff exchanged bewildered glances. The quick-witted owner, however, immediately sprang up and began gathering the notes from the counter. Then he backed away and seized Haewon and the part-timer by an arm each.

 

“We’ve extended our opening hours by one hour! Ha ha… Well then, enjoy yourselves!”

 

He winked at Yi-hyeon, quickly collected his belongings from the staff room and ushered the others out of the bar. In an instant, the door jingled open and shut again.

 

“….”

 

Only a moment earlier, Yi-hyeon had been cleaning up with everyone else. Now he was suddenly alone with Seung-hyuk. He felt both confused and stunned. As he collected himself, he became abruptly aware of the jazz music that had been playing all along. Standing still and looking down at Seung-hyuk, he frowned.

 

“How did you find this place?”

 

“A glass of Kavalan Sherry.”

 

“Don’t you remember me saying we shouldn’t see each other again?”

 

At Yi-hyeon’s sharp words, Seung-hyuk tilted his head, folded his arms and lazily raised his eyes.

 

“And who taught you that you could make some bloody announcement like that and disappear?”

 

He clicked his tongue and continued.

 

“Yi-hyeon, I’m the one who decides whether we see each other again. Not you.”

 

They stared at one another for a long time, almost as though locked in a contest. Seeing the intensity in Yi-hyeon’s eyes and the frown between his brows, Seung-hyuk gave a short laugh that seemed entirely out of place.

 

Yi-hyeon frowned more deeply. Something about Seung-hyuk seemed different from usual, but he could not quite bring himself to ask. After watching Seung-hyuk stare at him with his chin propped up, Yi-hyeon sighed softly and fetched the whisky from the display.

 

He resolved to demand overtime pay from the owner. Pouring the drink into a teardrop-shaped whisky glass, he placed it in front of Seung-hyuk.

 

“Drink that and go. This isn’t the kind of place you belong.”

 

Contrary to Yi-hyeon’s expectation that he would argue, Seung-hyuk merely lifted the glass to his lips. His long fingers tapped a steady rhythm on the counter.

 

Yi-hyeon stood opposite him, wary of what he might say next. When Seung-hyuk remained silent, he finally picked up the glass cloth.

 

He must have had a drink somewhere before coming here.

 

Seung-hyuk was staring at some point inside the bar as though lost in thought. That gave Yi-hyeon a chance to glance at him while polishing glasses. He seemed quieter and more languid than usual. A couple of buttons were undone on his customary brightly patterned shirt, and his hair had not been styled, leaving it dishevelled. He looked unusually gentle.

 

Yi-hyeon pressed his lips together and tried hard not to be conscious of him.

 

Someone who hated the very thought of going anywhere near a gay establishment must have had a reason for seeking Yi-hyeon out at this hour. And, as far as Yi-hyeon could see, there was only one possible reason.

 

“I really didn’t tell Gu Jin-hyuk anything.”

 

“If that’s why you came, you’ve got the wrong idea.”

 

“Who said that was why I came?”

 

Seung-hyuk slowly lifted his gaze and stared at Yi-hyeon insistently. Uncomfortable under that wordless scrutiny, Yi-hyeon lowered his eyes and rubbed at the glass for no reason.

 

He checked the time. There were only about five minutes left of the hour the owner had promised. Feeling he had done more than enough for his boss, Yi-hyeon tightened his grip on the cloth.

 

“You need to leave now. We have to close—”

 

“Kwon Yi-hyeon.”

 

Seung-hyuk interrupted as Yi-hyeon set down the clean glass and tried to speak casually. Yi-hyeon lifted his head and met Seung-hyuk’s eyes.

 

“Cry for me.”

 

“What?”

 

“Cry like you did when you were underneath me.”

 

Yi-hyeon felt his face flush with humiliation. Yet Seung-hyuk’s expression was far too serious for the words to be merely an attempt to insult him. Yi-hyeon pressed his lips together and glared back.

 

“Stop saying weird things and get out. We’re closed.”

 

There was nothing more pointless than becoming worked up all by himself in front of that expressionless face. His grip tightened around the glass. He bit the inside of his cheek and turned away. Then a quiet voice reached his ears.

 

“The other bastards make me sick.”

 

“So why the fuck are you…?”

 

Seung-hyuk murmured almost to himself. Even with the jazz playing loudly in the bar, Yi-hyeon heard every word clearly. He had heard correctly, yet could not understand what the words meant.

 

When he turned back, Seung-hyuk’s hand on the counter tightened into a fist, then opened again. He took some notes from his wallet, left them on the bar and walked out without another word.

 

Only then did Yi-hyeon feel as though he could breathe again.

 

They had done little more than face each other in silence for a while, yet he felt utterly drained. Perhaps he had been far too tense.

 

Before the empty glass and the few fifty-thousand-won notes left on the counter, Yi-hyeon swallowed and clenched his fist.

 

He was leaving an hour later than usual, so he cleaned only the inside of the bar and hurried down the stairs. He locked the door and turned around. Several paces away, a red point of light hovered in the darkness. As his eyes adjusted, he recognised the person holding the cigarette.

 

He hadn’t left after all.

 

Seung-hyuk watched him while dragging on his cigarette so deeply that his cheeks hollowed. The burning tip glowed bright red. Yi-hyeon stared at it in a daze, almost as if it were a will-o’-the-wisp meant to lure people astray. Then Seung-hyuk slowly approached.

 

Yi-hyeon took a step backwards to avoid him. The cold wall of the building pressed against his back. A shiver went through him as their eyes met.

 

“If you gave me money and called it my fee for sex…”

 

“Then I ought to get my money’s worth.”

 

Seung-hyuk threw away his cigarette and seized both Yi-hyeon’s wrists. Before Yi-hyeon could say a word, he tilted his head and pressed his lips lightly beside Yi-hyeon’s ear.

 

“Wh-what are you doing?”

 

Startled by the sudden action, Yi-hyeon went rigid and twisted his head away. He shook it from side to side, trying to keep his sensitive ear out of reach, but it was useless.

 

A heavy breath settled beside his ear, sending a sharp sensation up his spine. Yi-hyeon bit his lip hard to stop himself from moaning.

 

“Hah… d-don’t…!”

 

His ears had always been sensitive, but perhaps the contrast between the warmth of Seung-hyuk’s mouth and the cold skin of his ear made everything feel more intense.

 

Soft lips nibbled at his earlobe. Then a wet tongue traced its way up the curve of his ear. Sticky, intimate noises reached him from close inside it.

 

The sensation rolled through his body like insects crawling across his skin. Yi-hyeon twisted and pressed his thighs together. It would hardly have been surprising if he grew hard on the spot.

 

Even the breath falling against him made his tailbone tingle. Now Seung-hyuk was using not just his lips and tongue but his teeth, and Yi-hyeon could scarcely think. He tipped his head back, pushed against Seung-hyuk’s arms and spoke.

 

“G-Gu Seung-hyuk, stop it.”

 

His voice was enough to provoke the half-intoxicated Seung-hyuk. With a breathless scoff, Seung-hyuk stopped pressing the pointed tip of his tongue inside Yi-hyeon’s ear and drew back his lips.

 

He retreated only far enough for the tip of his nose to brush the outer rim. Seeing Yi-hyeon tremble, he raised a corner of his mouth. Then he lowered his head further, pressing one brief kiss after another along Yi-hyeon’s cheek, beneath his ear and down to his jawline.

 

“Hh… haah… hh…”

 

Yi-hyeon had done nothing but stand there, yet his heart was racing as though he had sprinted a hundred metres. He tipped his head back, struggling for breath and trying to understand what was happening. Seung-hyuk gave him no time to think.

 

Burying his face against Yi-hyeon’s neck, he caught the edge of his black roll-neck between his teeth and pulled it down. Then he parted his lips and kissed the exposed Adam’s apple.

 

The wet tongue licking his throat felt unbearably distinct. Each time Seung-hyuk’s lips lifted away, cold wind swept across the damp skin and sent a chill down Yi-hyeon’s back.

 

When Yi-hyeon opened the eyes he had been squeezing shut, he saw Seung-hyuk bending far down because of the difference in their heights. As Seung-hyuk pressed closer, Yi-hyeon felt something hard against his stomach.

 

“Gu Seung-hyuk, what the… hh… what are you doing?”

 

Wheeeeew!

 

A long whistle sounded from the entrance to the alley just as Yi-hyeon managed to force out the hoarse question. Seung-hyuk lifted his mouth from his throat and turned his head at an angle.

 

“Well, I never. Never thought I’d live to see two blokes fucking in the street.”

 

Several men stood at the bright end of the alley, leaning with their weight on one leg, tattoos reaching all the way up their necks. They did not look as if they were merely passing through. Seung-hyuk slowly eased himself away from Yi-hyeon.

 

“Oi, you fucking homos. If you’re going to do that, get a room. A fucking room! Making a disgusting spectacle of yourselves in the street, eh?”

 

Their swaggering walk, coarse speech and clothing made it obvious they were not ordinary passers-by. Yi-hyeon looked up at Seung-hyuk without thinking. Seung-hyuk raised an eyebrow at the men, then let out an incredulous laugh.

 

“Oi, is that bastard laughing at us? Hahaha! He’s lost his bloody mind!”

 

The men came towards them, puffing with indignation. The one in front picked up a length of timber propped against the wall, apparently hoping to intimidate them.

 

He walked along tapping it against his shoulder. As the distance closed, he noticed that Seung-hyuk was larger than any of them and briefly faltered. Then he remembered how many men were on his side and recovered his swagger.

 

“What, you bastard? What? What?”

 

The tattooed man lifted the timber and prodded Seung-hyuk’s chest. Looking irritated, Seung-hyuk rubbed his eyes and knocked it away with the back of his hand. The man’s eyes flashed.

 

“Look at him, showing off in front of his boyfriend!”

 

He seemed enraged that neither Seung-hyuk nor Yi-hyeon looked sufficiently intimidated. He turned his head this way and that, making indignant noises. Seung-hyuk sighed and pushed his fringe back.

 

“Those bastards can’t even police their own territory properly…”

 

At Seung-hyuk’s mutter, the tattooed man frowned and raised the timber to shove his shoulder again. Seung-hyuk was faster. He caught the end of the wood and kicked the man hard in the stomach.

 

The tattooed man went sprawling. His companions exchanged startled looks. Then they understood what had happened, their eyes flashed, and they rushed towards Seung-hyuk and Yi-hyeon.

 

“Oi! Get those bastards!”

 

Before the shout had finished, Seung-hyuk seized Yi-hyeon’s wrist and sprinted towards the far end of the alley. He moved unbelievably fast for someone who had been drinking. Yi-hyeon was dragged along, bewildered, as shouts of “Hey! Hey!” rang out behind them.

 

“Hah, hah… Oi, G-Gu Seung-hyuk…!”

 

By the time his tightly gripped wrist began to hurt, they had reached the deserted end of the alley and hidden in a gap between two buildings. It was barely wide enough for the two of them to stand face to face. Yi-hyeon looked up at Seung-hyuk in disbelief, his shoulders heaving as he tried to catch his breath.

 

“You… hh… you’re supposed to be a gangster, and you’re running away from thugs like that?”

 

“There’s no beating a mob.”

 

Seung-hyuk’s broad chest was rising and falling heavily too. The absurd answer drew an involuntary laugh from Yi-hyeon, and Seung-hyuk laughed lightly along with him.

 

“….”

 

Silence returned almost at once. Yi-hyeon became acutely aware of their tangled legs pressed together and the body directly in front of his face. Even breathing seemed to require care. He chewed the inside of his cheek, unsure where to look, and was just twisting around to leave the gap when a voice suddenly came from outside.

 

“Where the hell did those bastards go?”

 

Yi-hyeon stiffened. Seung-hyuk caught his arm and pulled him back towards himself.

 

“Hey, search farther down there. I’ll look this way.”

 

Yi-hyeon stood rigid, his eyes darting around. With Seung-hyuk still holding his arm, it felt as though he were trapped in Seung-hyuk’s embrace.

 

He could do nothing but press his lips together as footsteps approached outside the gap and eventually faded away. He let out a sigh of relief and lifted his head. His eyes met Seung-hyuk’s.

 

Seung-hyuk was watching him with an unreadable gaze, neither cold nor warm. Suddenly, Yi-hyeon remembered what Seung-hyuk had done to him outside the bar. His heart lurched.

 

“I-I think we can go now.”

 

Yi-hyeon hurriedly averted his eyes and turned his head. In an instant, Seung-hyuk tightened his grip around both wrists. Yi-hyeon clenched his molars, then slowly raised his face to look up at him.

 

In the narrow gap between the buildings, all that could be heard was their quiet breathing as they recovered. Their white breath mingled in the freezing air.

 

Thump. Thump. Thump. Everywhere their bodies touched, hearts were pounding so quickly that Yi-hyeon could not tell whether the rhythm belonged to him or Seung-hyuk. Knowing it was pointless, he edged backwards a little.

 

“Kwon Yi-hyeon.”

 

A low, heavy voice broke the stillness of the cold dawn.

 

“I’m saying this because I think I might be seriously fucked.”

 

“Let me check one thing.”

 

Seung-hyuk’s lowered gaze was fixed just beneath Yi-hyeon’s nose. Yi-hyeon could not answer; his lips only moved soundlessly. Seung-hyuk continued.

 

“I’ll believe you when you say you didn’t leak information to Gu Jin-hyuk.”

 

His low voice sounded between their almost-touching mouths.

 

“Kiss me.”

 

Yi-hyeon’s heart seemed to drop, and his pulse began pounding at his temples. His mind went completely blank. He stared at Seung-hyuk with unsteady eyes. Seung-hyuk, who had been looking down at his lips, raised his gaze to meet them.

“Not going to do it?”

 

Seung-hyuk tilted his head without hesitation.

 

“Then I’ll do it myself.”

 

“Mmph—!”

 

An unfamiliar sensation settled over Yi-hyeon’s lips. He instinctively clenched his fists to push Seung-hyuk away, but the hands gripping his wrists tightened too. His lips parted involuntarily with the pain, and the hot tip of a tongue slipped between them.

 

Seung-hyuk’s tongue entered naturally and curled around Yi-hyeon’s rigid one. Seung-hyuk’s face was reflected in Yi-hyeon’s eyes, which had widened with surprise. Without closing his own eyes, Seung-hyuk kissed him more deeply. Under the insistent, wet pressure, Yi-hyeon’s head began to tip further and further back.

 

Yi-hyeon only came to his senses and pushed against Seung-hyuk’s chest when the other man drew back for a moment to change the angle of his head. The sight of a silvery thread of saliva stretching between their lips jolted him awake as sharply as a blow to the back of the head.

 

When Seung-hyuk moved to kiss him again, Yi-hyeon turned his head away. From close by, Seung-hyuk lowered his eyes and looked at him. Struggling to steady his heaving chest, Yi-hyeon whispered:

 

“…Don’t.”

 

A disbelieving scoff sounded above him at the almost inaudible words.

 

“Next time you want to refuse, try doing it a bit more clearly.”

 

His voice was so low and heavy that Yi-hyeon felt his heart drop. Before the last trace of the words had faded, Seung-hyuk’s lips covered his again and his tongue pushed into the gap between them.

 

In the narrow space between two buildings, where the yellow streetlights barely illuminated their outlines, their gazes remained locked like shackles from less than ten centimetres apart.

 

Their noses touched, yet the breath slipping between their lips felt impossibly hot. Yi-hyeon clenched his fists.

 

He did not know any more.

 

It was not long before his eyes closed.

 

***

 

There was no clear reason he had tossed and turned until late in the night, finally falling asleep around sunrise. One thought had led to another until, before he knew it, pale morning light was spreading beyond the window.

 

Even after he and Gu Seung-hyuk had done far more than that, his mind had never been this confused. Yet the events of the previous night kept replaying in his head as though he were watching strangers on a cinema screen.

 

‘Let me check one thing.’

 

Each time Yi-hyeon remembered that low voice, he felt as though he were suddenly falling from somewhere high, a sickening tightness forming in his stomach. He could not understand why he had closed his eyes instead of pushing Gu Seung-hyuk away.

 

Could he really excuse it by saying he had been swept up in the moment? Whenever he became involved with Seung-hyuk, everything seemed to unfold in unexpected ways. He was helplessly carried wherever the other man pulled him, like being tossed about by waves.

 

Was it because traces of feelings he had never quite erased still remained?

 

“Haa…”

 

Perhaps he already knew the answer. He simply did not want to admit it.

 

Yi-hyeon lowered the arm he had been resting over his eyes and stared at the pale sky beyond the window. Snow was drifting down, and the weather was so overcast that he could not begin to guess the time.

 

He picked up his phone absent-mindedly. It was already past one. Even though he did not have a shift that day, it was rare for him to sleep so late, and his whole body felt stiff and sore.

 

He went to the bathroom and turned on the cold tap, hoping it might wake him properly. Then he caught sight of himself in the mirror, and his hand stopped. The exposed skin of his neck was covered in mottled red marks.

 

He was well past the age of blushing over such things, and nobody else had seen them, but his face still grew hot with embarrassment. Yi-hyeon quickly lowered his head and splashed cold water over his face with both hands.

 

His phone, which had been silent until then, began vibrating while he was drying his face with a towel. Gu Seung-hyuk’s name was displayed plainly on the screen.

 

For reasons he could not explain, his palms and fingertips tingled. He stood looking down at the phone without answering until the call ended.

 

Bzzz. Bzzz.

 

Almost immediately, the phone began vibrating again, and someone knocked at the front door. Yi-hyeon wiped the water from his face with the towel and opened it.

 

Gu Seung-hyuk stood there with a phone held to his ear.

 

Yi-hyeon silently looked up at him. Seung-hyuk turned sideways and walked straight into the room. He looked around once, then picked up Yi-hyeon’s phone, still vibrating on the desk.

 

“Is this phone just for decoration? Why don’t you answer when I call?”

 

“…What do you want?”

 

Seung-hyuk ignored the question and began wandering around the flat. With him standing in such a small room, the already low ceiling seemed even lower. He glanced over the entire place, which could be taken in at a single look, and asked curiously:

 

“What happened to that fancy place you had? Why are you living somewhere like this?”

 

“Gu Seung-hyuk.”

 

“What?”

 

“I asked what you want.”

 

Yi-hyeon grabbed Seung-hyuk’s wrist before he realised what he was doing. Seung-hyuk stopped, his gaze suddenly settling on Yi-hyeon’s neck. Remembering the mottled marks on his pale skin, Yi-hyeon hurriedly tightened the towel hanging around it. The man responsible, however, spoke as calmly as if nothing had happened.

 

“Get dressed. We’re going out.”

 

He sounded as confident as someone turning up for an appointment they had already made. Yi-hyeon could hardly help being bewildered by a man who had arrived without warning and demanded that he get ready to leave. He frowned.

 

“Did we make plans without anyone telling me?”

 

“Was I supposed to ask? Playing hard to get, are you? Fine, then. I’ll see you at the car in five minutes.”

 

“I’ll wait downstairs.”

 

Seung-hyuk checked his watch and issued the order as he pleased. He gave the phone in his hand a little shake.

 

“And I’m taking this.”

 

The door closed. Left alone again, Yi-hyeon ran a hand over his mouth. Only one person had come and gone, yet he felt as drained as if he had been through something momentous.

 

Given the choice, he would have ignored Seung-hyuk and stayed at home to rest. But now that the man had taken his phone, he could not. Sighing softly, Yi-hyeon fetched a black roll-neck jumper from the chest of drawers and pulled it over his head.

 

Outside, thick snow was pouring from the sky. He had not noticed through the window earlier, but it must have been snowing all night; the black tarmac was completely blanketed in white. It was a year of unusually heavy snowfall. Yi-hyeon climbed into the black saloon parked outside his building.

 

“Give me my phone.”

 

“Put your seat belt on first.”

 

Seung-hyuk sounded determined not to yield. Yi-hyeon sighed and fastened his seat belt, and the car began moving smoothly. Without so much as turning his head, Seung-hyuk took the phone from his inside pocket and handed it over.

 

Yi-hyeon looked out of the window without speaking. People were walking along with their bodies hunched against the large flakes falling diagonally from the sky. He had assumed they would be going no farther than the office in Gawon-dong or somewhere nearby, but the car left the local roads and joined the motorway.

 

Only then did he ask:

 

“Where are we going?”

 

“To work.”

 

To work?

 

“Then why have you brought me?”

 

Yi-hyeon stared at him with a frown, unable to understand what he meant. Seung-hyuk, his elbow resting by the window, touched his lips. He remained silent for a long time before finally speaking.

 

“Have you ever been to the sea in the middle of winter?”

 

“…”

 

“I haven’t.”

 

Yi-hyeon turned his gaze towards Seung-hyuk’s profile.

 

“Better to go with someone than stand there looking miserable by yourself, isn’t it?”

 

Yi-hyeon could have argued about any number of things, starting with why on earth he should go to the sea with him. Yet something about Seung-hyuk’s expressionless face as he said it troubled him.

 

He had nothing particular to do at home anyway. Deciding to treat it as an act of charity, Yi-hyeon kept quiet and turned back to the window.

 

The car raced along the motorway. Snowflakes repeatedly settled against the glass, some large enough for their six-sided crystals to be visible.

 

They passed through several tunnels, driving through the enormous flakes. A few hours later, they arrived at a town marked by a sign reading Jeongseon, Gangwon Province.

 

Perhaps because they were in Gangwon, the days seemed shorter. The sky was already coloured in a strange mixture of red and blue.

 

“Fuck…”

 

Yi-hyeon had been dozing in the moving car, listening to snowflakes strike against it, when a sudden jolt woke him with a start.

 

“What bastard leaves something in a place like this?” Seung-hyuk muttered.

 

Yi-hyeon looked at the route on the navigation screen and then at the road ahead. The arrow pointed towards a snow-covered track whose edges were barely distinguishable.

 

After working the controls and moving the car backwards and forwards several times, Seung-hyuk finally managed to free it. Frowning deeply, he turned in the direction the navigation system indicated.

 

Streetlights stood only here and there, and not a single other car passed. Darkness surrounded them. To make matters worse, the snow was falling even harder than before.

 

Eventually they seemed to reach something resembling a town centre. Massage parlours and what looked like illegal gambling establishments began appearing along the roadside. After passing them, the car stopped in front of a shabby old building, patches of white tile missing from its walls.

 

‘You have arrived at your destination.’

 

When the navigation stopped speaking, only silence remained in the car. Yi-hyeon listened to the soft accumulation of snow and looked at Seung-hyuk. Without speaking, Seung-hyuk unfastened his seat belt, opened his door and climbed out.

 

“Wait here a minute.”

 

Apparently he had business there. Brushing the falling snow from above his head, Seung-hyuk pushed open a brown iron door and climbed the stairs. Yi-hyeon looked up at the second floor, where a window was lit. Above it hung a sign that looked decades old, bearing the word PAWNSHOP.

 

Yi-hyeon looked away from the sign and glanced around. It had been a long time since he had seen snow covering everything so completely. Perhaps that was because they were no longer in the city.

 

He opened the car door and stepped outside. His foot sank into snow almost up to his shins. As he stretched the stiffness from his body after sitting for so long, flakes settled on his hair and shoulders.

 

He was looking around, worried about whether they would be able to make it home, when footsteps sounded on the stairs.

 

Seung-hyuk appeared carrying a black laptop bag. He tossed it onto the back seat, switched off the car’s engine and locked the doors. Yi-hyeon stared up at him with wide eyes as Seung-hyuk irritably swept his fringe back.

 

“What are you doing? Aren’t you coming?”

 

“If we drive in this weather, we’ll end up stranded in the middle of the road. Apparently there’s somewhere to stay a little farther on. We’ll go there for now.”

 

Yi-hyeon frowned and looked around. Snow was falling so heavily he could actually see it building up. Driving did seem difficult. He had no idea how things had ended up like this, but there was nothing for it except to follow Seung-hyuk in silence.

 

It was only a little past six, yet the sky was as black as midnight. Against it, the white snow stood out even more clearly. The enormous flakes fell with an almost unbelievable slowness. Rather than saying it was snowing, it seemed more accurate to say the snow was pouring down. Flakes settled on Yi-hyeon’s eyelashes, the bridge of his nose and his lips, then melted, only to be replaced by others.

 

His feet sank with every step. Each gust of wind lifted fine white powder from the heaps around them. When he looked back, the path the two of them had taken was plainly marked in the snow.

 

White breath streamed from between his lips. Yi-hyeon stared at Seung-hyuk’s back some distance ahead and quietly called his name.

 

“Gu Seung-hyuk.”

 

The six-sided snow crystals surrounding them seemed to swallow every sound, leaving a heavy silence. Into it, Yi-hyeon spoke softly.

 

“Walk with me.”

 

Only then did Seung-hyuk turn to look at him. Seeing Yi-hyeon’s fingers reddened by the cold—he could not keep his hands in his pockets while struggling to balance—Seung-hyuk took off his own black leather gloves and offered them to him.

 

Yi-hyeon hesitated before accepting them and sliding his fingers inside. The lingering warmth of Seung-hyuk’s hands tingled against his frozen fingertips, slowly thawing them.

 

After another ten minutes or so, a small, brightly lit house came into view ahead. The faded characters on the wall announced that it offered rooms for travellers, and both men quickened their steps.

 

Seung-hyuk stopped at the gate and knocked while Yi-hyeon brushed the snow from his head.

 

“Is anyone there?”

 

The pounding echoed in the air. Something rattled inside, footsteps approached, and the gate swung open.

 

“Do you have a room?”

 

A middle-aged woman surveyed the state of Seung-hyuk and Yi-hyeon with a troubled expression. She looked up at the snow-filled sky, then stepped back to let them in.

 

“What on earth are you doing out in weather like this? Come in first.”

 

They bowed and stepped through the gate. A traditional old house spread out before them, two hanok-style buildings connected by a broad wooden platform between them.

 

As Seung-hyuk and Yi-hyeon sheltered beneath the eaves and brushed the snow from their hair and shoulders, the woman who had opened the gate brought them towels.

“There’s only one room available. Will that be all right?”

 

Yi-hyeon’s eyes briefly met Gu Seung-hyuk’s, but it was hardly a situation in which they could afford to be particular. When he nodded, the woman pointed towards a room on the right-hand side of the wooden platform.

 

“I’ve switched on the boiler, so it’ll warm up soon. You must be freezing. Go and wash up. I’ll make you some dinner.”

 

They thanked her and opened the door. The room was surprisingly tidy. With yellow vinyl flooring and a folded mattress and quilt stacked to one side, it had the air of an old country home.

 

The adjoining bathroom was barely large enough for one person to shower. Somewhere nearby, they could hear the boiler running with a steady hum.

 

They took off their trainers and socks, soaked from struggling through the snow, and stepped inside. The moment Yi-hyeon put his bare feet on the floor, he sighed with relief.

 

Seung-hyuk seemed to feel the same. He sat on the floor and leaned back on his arms, tipping his upper body behind him. Yi-hyeon stood and turned his back to take off his coat.

 

“I’ll wash first.”

 

Once inside the bathroom, he removed his wet clothes, picked up the shower head and turned on the water. The warmth thawed his body, and he finally felt alive again. He was not thrilled about having to put his jeans back on when the hems were cold and damp, but there was no point wishing for anything else in these circumstances.

 

He showered quickly, got dressed and came out to find Seung-hyuk gone. Thinking he might have stepped outside, Yi-hyeon put a cigarette between his lips and went out.

 

He spotted Seung-hyuk near a dilapidated chicken coop beside the house, smoking and talking to someone on the phone.

 

“Yeah, I found it. I’ll bring it up tomorrow. Find me someone who can handle the forensics. Someone who won’t make cleaning up afterwards a nuisance.”

 

Yi-hyeon moved to stand beside him and lit his cigarette. He felt Seung-hyuk glance his way. Seung-hyuk ended the call, slipped the phone into his pocket and exhaled smoke.

 

“Go and wash.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

Yi-hyeon watched the falling snow for a while before speaking.

 

“The forecast says it should ease off tomorrow.”

 

He took out the gloves Seung-hyuk had lent him and held them out. Seung-hyuk put them in his pocket, and silence returned. Their breath mingled with cigarette smoke as it streamed from their lips.

 

The silence surrounding them was uncomfortable and yet not uncomfortable at all.

 

Who would have imagined that he and Gu Seung-hyuk would ever stand peacefully side by side again, looking at the same falling snow? It felt almost like the old days, before anything had happened between them.

 

“….”

 

Yi-hyeon caught himself remembering the past and clenched his molars. Then he left first.

 

The meal their hostess prepared was simple. A few vegetable side dishes and grilled fish stood on the table. They sat facing one another and finished everything. By the time they returned to their room, it was only ten, yet Yi-hyeon was so sleepy that his eyes kept closing.

 

Leaning against the wall with his phone, he repeatedly nodded forwards. Watching him, Seung-hyuk nudged him with his foot.

 

“Hey, Kwon Yi-hyeon. Put the bedding out and sleep.”

 

Rubbing his eyes, Yi-hyeon went to unfold the bedding stacked in a corner. There was only one double set: a floor mattress and a quilt. With a troubled expression, he checked Gu Seung-hyuk’s face and placed the two pillows side by side.

 

Seung-hyuk frowned. Yi-hyeon murmured defensively.

 

“…We haven’t got a choice.”

 

Yi-hyeon lay down first. Seung-hyuk switched off the light and joined him. In darkness so complete that not even a faint outline was visible, Yi-hyeon became acutely aware of the person beside him.

 

Only moments earlier, he had felt overwhelmed by sleep. But once he closed his eyes, all his attention gathered behind him. The quilt rustled with every movement, making even breathing something he did carefully.

 

Yi-hyeon slowly turned his head towards Seung-hyuk. Once, long ago, he had watched Gu Seung-hyuk’s shoulders rise and fall in darkness like this.

 

Thinking of those days, when they had been younger, smaller and more inexperienced, brought a strange, constricted feeling to his chest. More than nine years had passed. Could traces of it still remain?

 

Staring into the darkness and blinking, Yi-hyeon spoke quietly.

 

“Gu Seung-hyuk. Are you asleep?”

 

“…Not yet.”

 

“Shall we ask each other three questions?”

 

Silence followed, with only the quiet presence of snow piling up outside. Taking it as a refusal, Yi-hyeon was about to turn away when a low, hoarse voice reached him.

 

“What do you want to know?”

 

Yi-hyeon hesitated before speaking.

 

“Doing that kind of work… Do you kill people too?”

 

“…If I don’t want to die myself.”

 

“How many people have you killed?”

 

“Don’t remember.”

 

“Then…”

 

Yi-hyeon’s lips moved.

 

“…Back when we were at secondary school.”

 

Another brief silence followed. Then came the sound of him swallowing, followed by a quiet question.

 

“Because of what happened… do you still hate me?”

 

His tone was composed, but the words carried weight. Could whatever Seung-hyuk had felt back then really be expressed by something as simple as hatred?

 

If he swallowed, Yi-hyeon felt certain Seung-hyuk would hear it. He was worrying the inside of his cheek when Seung-hyuk’s voice broke the silence.

 

“Kwon Yi-hyeon.”

 

“…”

 

“We’re leaving early tomorrow. Shut up and go to sleep.”

 

No more words followed. Yi-hyeon considered the meaning of that silence. Since Seung-hyuk had at least not answered yes, perhaps he could interpret it positively. Then he remembered Gu Seung-hyuk’s expression when they first met again, and it seemed impossible.

 

Various thoughts drifted chaotically through his mind before settling. His eyes blinked slowly, then at some point closed altogether. He thought he might have heard rustling and someone getting up beside him. But by then, Yi-hyeon was already deeply asleep.

 

***

 

Scrape. Scrape.

 

The sound of a broom clearing snow from the courtyard reached him. Yi-hyeon slowly opened his eyes to a bright blue sky beyond the window. Turning his head without thinking, he noticed the empty space beside him. Gu Seung-hyuk seemed to have risen first.

 

After quickly washing his face, Yi-hyeon opened the door and stepped outside. Clear, crisp air greeted him. Fortunately, the relentless snow had stopped. Sunlight spread in every direction, making the accumulated snow gleam silver.

 

Yi-hyeon crouched at the edge of the wooden platform, drawing his body in. Water dripped from the icicles beneath the eaves, leaving deep little holes in the thick snow.

 

Drip. Drip.

 

For a while, he listened to the snow melting from the roof and falling into the gutter. Then he stood and addressed the landlady, who was sweeping.

 

“Excuse me. Have you seen the person I came with?”

 

“Oh, that young man? He went out before dawn. I think he’s sitting in the car out front.”

 

He could have woken me. Why had he gone out first and left Yi-hyeon feeling unnecessarily guilty?

 

Yi-hyeon hurriedly got dressed and bowed to the landlady. After thanking her, he went outside. The black saloon they had abandoned outside the pawnshop the night before was now parked in front of the house.

 

Through the windscreen, he saw Gu Seung-hyuk sitting with his arms folded and his eyes closed. How long had he been there? Had sharing the same quilt with him been so uncomfortable?

 

As various thoughts crossed his mind, Yi-hyeon lightly tapped the windscreen. Seung-hyuk opened his eyes. The instant their gazes met, Yi-hyeon felt as though his heart dropped. Trying to loosen his stiff expression, he forced a smile. Seung-hyuk’s unreadable gaze clung persistently to it.

 

The car sped along the early-morning roads and stopped at an unfamiliar beach overlooking the East Sea. When Yi-hyeon got out after Gu Seung-hyuk, a salty wind whipped fiercely through his hair.

 

He turned and saw Seung-hyuk taking a cigarette from his pocket. Looking away, Yi-hyeon began walking towards the water.

 

Behind him, everything lay beneath white snow. Ahead, ochre sand glistened with seawater. Each time the waves pushed deep onto the beach, the ground darkened before gradually paling again. With his hands in his coat pockets, Yi-hyeon quietly watched the sea.

 

There had been a time when he wanted to surrender himself to those ceaselessly advancing waves. He had thought it might be nice to let everything go and close his eyes in peace. After being rejected in every way and driven out of his home, his life had been a succession of such thoughts.

 

What had sustained him were memories of individual moments. The fierce, vivid midsummer sunlight on the day they took their final graduation photographs. The early-evening dusk seen from his first rooftop room. An unseasonable splash in the sea along a cold, barren shore before the first buds appeared.

 

Whenever alcohol and medication left him reaching habitually for something sharp, those unremarkable memories would settle in his mind as though trying to stop him.

 

And one person appeared in those memories particularly often.

 

Slowly turning, Yi-hyeon looked towards Seung-hyuk, who stood some distance away. Over the figure smoking with his hands in his pockets, he saw another Seung-hyuk: a little shorter, with cropped hair and a younger face.

 

A scene seemed to unfold before him of the two of them splashing each other and shouting on a wide, deserted beach. Then the setting changed. The old arcade outside their school. An empty classroom after lessons. A convenience store. A shabby office. A room filled with traces of himself.

 

The shifting scenes slowly returned to the deserted beach in the middle of winter. Watching Seung-hyuk, Yi-hyeon took one slow step backwards, then another. Behind him, waves crashed noisily. The cold winter wind stirred his dark hair.

 

Yi-hyeon looked away first and turned.

 

Watching him, Seung-hyuk unconsciously clenched his fist. Standing alone in the middle of the vast beach, Yi-hyeon looked so indistinct that he seemed liable to disappear at any moment.

 

Crushing out his cigarette, Seung-hyuk hurried towards him. With every step through the deep snow, his strides grew longer. Keeping his eyes fixed on Yi-hyeon, he murmured.

 

“…Kwon Yi-hyeon.”

 

“Kwon Yi-hyeon!”

 

Yi-hyeon stopped in his approach towards the open sea. Seung-hyuk was suddenly close, turning his slender body round. Beneath the clear winter sunlight, his pale face, soft with fine down like a white magnolia blossom, shone brightly.

 

“Gu Seung-hyuk?”

 

It happened in the briefest instant.

 

Seung-hyuk’s heart dropped.

There was no conversation on the drive from Gangwon Province back to Seoul. Seung-hyuk wore a serious expression, apparently lost in thought, and Yi-hyeon felt no particular need to speak to him.

 

By the time the car had passed through Gyeonggi Province and entered familiar streets, Yi-hyeon spoke near the entrance to the alley where his building stood.

 

“Drop me here.”

 

Seung-hyuk glanced around and pulled over without a word. The moment Yi-hyeon climbed out of the passenger seat and shut the door, the car sped away.

 

Yi-hyeon had no idea why Seung-hyuk had suddenly turned so cold again, but he was certain the man would reappear as he pleased in a few days. He swept back his fallen fringe and shook his head, then stopped at a small supermarket near the entrance to the neighbourhood and bought some food.

 

He was walking uphill towards his home, shopping bags in both hands, when the phone in his back pocket began vibrating.

 

He quickly shifted the bags into one hand and took out his phone. At the name on the screen, his heart seemed not merely to sink but to fall straight through the floor.

 

[Executive Director Gu Jin-hyuk]

 

It was a shock to realise he had completely forgotten Gu Jin-hyuk’s existence simply because his days had been quiet and ordinary. The last time he had seen the man was at the lounge, when he had watched him drink the drugged wine and fall asleep.

 

Yi-hyeon had not reported for work since that day. Surely Jin-hyuk must have known he was responsible. Should he not have found it strange that Jin-hyuk had made no contact at all? Yet everything involving Gu Seung-hyuk had occupied his thoughts so completely that he had not even considered it.

 

Or had he simply reassured himself? Seung-hyuk’s plan had failed, so Gu Jin-hyuk had lost nothing. Perhaps they could all carry on as though nothing had happened.

 

The idea made no sense if he thought about it for even a moment.

 

Unable to answer, Yi-hyeon stared at the phone and quickened his steps. He felt as though Jin-hyuk might be watching him from somewhere. His hurried walk became almost a run. The phone continued vibrating without stopping.

 

When his building finally came into view, he felt a little relief. He hurried up the stairs, his chest heaving. Gripping the still-vibrating phone, he turned at the final landing and stopped at the sight of someone sitting outside his door.

 

It was Gu Jin-hyuk.

 

He sat on the old stairs in his customary immaculate clothes, holding a bottle of wine identical to the one they had drunk at the lounge that day.

 

Seeing Yi-hyeon falter, Jin-hyuk placed his hands on his thighs and rose.

 

“It would have been better for you if you’d simply answered the phone, Mr Kwon.”

 

“What are you doing here?”

 

“I thought we might have a drink together.”

 

“Have you been well? Sorry it took me so long to get in touch. I’ve been dealing with a backlog of work.”

 

Jin-hyuk stepped closer and personally tapped the decline-call icon on Yi-hyeon’s phone. The sudden rush of his perfume made Yi-hyeon’s skin prickle, sending a shiver down his spine. When he stepped back involuntarily, Jin-hyuk laughed softly.

 

“Relax. It’s not as if I’m going to eat you.”

 

“…”

 

“Ah, though I suppose that’s difficult when you’ve got something on your conscience.”

 

Tilting his head as if amused, Jin-hyuk gestured towards Yi-hyeon’s front door with his chin.

 

“Ha ha. I’m joking. Could you open the door? It’s cold out here.”

 

Yi-hyeon’s mouth went dry at the thought of what might happen if he let Gu Jin-hyuk into his home. But the man was right about one thing: this was not a conversation they could have on the stairs of his building.

 

He clenched his trembling fingers into a fist, entered the passcode and opened the door.

 

“…Please come in.”

 

Yi-hyeon stepped inside and moved aside. Jin-hyuk entered the cramped hallway, then walked into the room without even removing his shoes. As he looked around the small flat as though inspecting it, Yi-hyeon’s heart hammered and his hands trembled.

 

Whether he noticed or not, Jin-hyuk casually perched on the edge of the desk. He lifted the wine bottle and examined it before speaking in an unhurried tone.

 

“Do you have a corkscrew and some glasses?”

 

Surely he had not really come to drink, so what was the point of asking? Yi-hyeon went to the kitchen and returned with a cheap corkscrew and two mugs, which he set down beside Jin-hyuk.

 

Seeing the logo of a well-known coffee chain on the mugs, Jin-hyuk gave a small laugh. He uncorked the bottle and poured the wine into them, then held one out to Yi-hyeon.

 

“Drink. I haven’t put anything in it this time.”

 

Yi-hyeon accepted the mug and gripped it tightly with both hands. Watching him, Jin-hyuk raised the corners of his mouth and took a sip from his own cup.

 

“You did something rather interesting to the wine last time, didn’t you, Mr Kwon?”

 

“…I think the aphrodisiac must have been too strong. I suddenly felt sleepy while I was washing, so I hurried out, and you were already asleep. I left you to rest because I didn’t want to disturb you.”

 

Jin-hyuk gave a short laugh at the explanation Yi-hyeon had prepared in advance. He drank another mouthful of wine before speaking.

 

“Mr Kwon. Do you really think I came here without getting the contents of that glass tested?”

 

“…”

 

“If that was your plan, you should have taken the glass with you or smashed it. Got rid of the evidence somehow.”

 

Yi-hyeon’s face went white. Jin-hyuk, however, seemed only amused by his distress. He gazed at the red liquid in his mug and continued.

 

“Well, it doesn’t matter. It’s not as though I took you in without knowing you had other ideas. And I found the whole thing rather novel.”

 

“But the missing goods—that’s a bigger problem.”

 

“They weren’t something that should have fallen into Gu Seung-hyuk’s hands so easily.”

 

Yi-hyeon bit the inside of his cheek. Seung-hyuk had said the storeroom was empty, but Jin-hyuk seemed to believe the goods had reached him. Was he trying to test Yi-hyeon? Yet the anger he appeared to be suppressing did not look entirely feigned.

 

“I thought you might try to steal some information at most. I never imagined you were planning something like that. You really do have an excellent poker face, Mr Kwon.”

 

Jin-hyuk laughed softly, set his mug on the desk and began walking around the room. Yi-hyeon watched him nervously. After examining the small studio flat, Jin-hyuk stopped by the refrigerator and noticed a picture frame lying face down on top of it. He picked it up.

 

The photograph was of Yi-hyeon’s family when he was in middle school. It was the only picture he had left. He had been unable to throw it away, thinking he might need it someday, so he had merely laid it face down where he would not have to see it. Now he regretted that decision.

 

Jin-hyuk tilted his head and studied the photograph.

 

“You must take after your father. He looked much better when he was healthy.”

 

Yi-hyeon, who had been staring at the floor, looked up sharply. Jin-hyuk spoke as though he knew about his father’s present condition. Seeing Yi-hyeon’s reaction, he smiled with interest.

 

“I was curious, so I looked into him. I hear your father used to be quite a famous pastor.”

 

By now, Yi-hyeon’s head was fully raised and his eyes fixed on Jin-hyuk. Jin-hyuk remained entirely at ease despite the fierce glare.

 

“It’s hard to believe a man like that embezzled hundreds of millions of won in church donations. Especially someone with such a reputation for piety and integrity.”

 

“…”

 

“Still, since it ended with a suspended sentence, I suppose he had people he could rely on.”

 

Smiling, Jin-hyuk tapped the photograph with one finger and leaned against the wall at an angle.

 

“Ah. And this must be your older sister, the one who’s getting married soon.”

 

Yi-hyeon’s Adam’s apple moved sharply. He had expected Jin-hyuk to investigate his background, but he had never imagined the search would reach his family. He had lived for years as though he no longer had one. Yet having them brought into the conversation so directly left him unable to move.

 

A chill ran down his spine. The instinctive sense that he had become entangled with the wrong person shot through his mind like an arrow.

 

Yi-hyeon clenched his fist and bit his lower lip. Jin-hyuk gave an amused, scornful smile and put the photograph down. Raising the mug to his lips, he spoke.

 

“Mr Kwon, did you ever think it was strange that your building suddenly caught fire?”

 

Yi-hyeon remembered the fire that had broken out on the ground floor a few weeks earlier.

 

‘You know that LPG cylinder they kept out front? They say it exploded. But Young-min’s mother reckoned she saw some men she didn’t recognise hanging around… I don’t know. The police will have to investigate to find out properly.’

 

He remembered the neighbour saying the fire had apparently started at the gas cylinder outside. That sudden blaze had forced Yi-hyeon to stay alternately at Gu Jin-hyuk’s and Gu Seung-hyuk’s homes.

 

“…You did that?”

 

He did not want to believe that other residents had suffered because of him. Perhaps he had underestimated how dangerous Gu Seung-hyuk and Gu Jin-hyuk really were. His lips parted slightly as he glared at Jin-hyuk.

 

“Mr Kwon, to people like us, an individual life is a very easy thing to deal with.”

 

“If your father’s health deteriorated while he was being reinvestigated, or if the house where your mother or sister lives suddenly caught fire, it would hardly be anything unusual from our point of view.”

 

Jin-hyuk took a step closer. Yi-hyeon could only clench his fists and remain silent, staring at him fiercely.

 

“Those people have nothing to do with me.”

 

Jin-hyuk curled his lips upwards, apparently entertained by the sharp response.

 

“But they’re still your family. You’re colder-hearted than I thought. Shall we talk about something else, then?”

 

He abruptly thrust his face close to Yi-hyeon’s before drawing back, then took something from his inside pocket.

 

“While looking into your relationship with Gu Seung-hyuk, I came across a rather interesting name.”

 

It was a USB drive no larger than a finger. Jin-hyuk tossed the little device into the air and caught it easily. For reasons he could not explain, the gesture filled Yi-hyeon with dread. Such feelings had an unfortunate habit of being right.

 

“Lee Chan-yang.”

 

At the unexpected three-syllable name, Yi-hyeon’s pale face froze.

 

His steady breathing quickened, and his heart began to hammer. He stepped back without realising it. Jin-hyuk moved closer, idly twirling the chain attached to the USB drive around his finger.

 

“Lee Chan-yang kept this for nine years. Do you know what sort of video might be on it, Mr Kwon?”

 

“How… how did you get that?”

 

That video could not possibly have reached Gu Jin-hyuk. He had burnt everything himself. The sudden rush of old memories made his vision darken. His eyes widened and trembled as they remained fixed on Jin-hyuk’s hand.

 

“Technology’s improved a great deal. They can restore footage like that very clearly these days.”

 

Jin-hyuk’s smile widened at Yi-hyeon’s distress. Yi-hyeon backed away again as though trying to escape.

 

“I think Gu Seung-hyuk’s got something wrong. I don’t care what he gets up to.”

 

“But if you raise a dog to chase thieves and it starts barking without even knowing who holds the lead around its neck, that’s a problem. Don’t you think?”

 

With every step Jin-hyuk took towards him, Yi-hyeon retreated another. But there was nowhere far to go in the cramped studio flat. The back of his calves struck the bed. Unable to retreat any farther, he perched precariously on the edge and looked up at Jin-hyuk.

 

“If I ask where you moved the goods, you’ll only say you don’t know…”

 

Jin-hyuk lightly raised his chin and turned his face from side to side, as though appraising him.

 

“What am I going to do with you?”

 

Rather than feeling offended by the insulting treatment, Yi-hyeon was overwhelmed by fear. The mere mention of a video he had believed destroyed and forgotten for nine years emptied his mind of all thought.

He quickly reached to snatch the USB drive swinging before his eyes. As though expecting it, Jin-hyuk lifted his arm out of reach and scoffed. Yi-hyeon’s throat dried with despair. He spoke, stunned.

 

“…What do you want from me?”

 

Only when Yi-hyeon asked with a trembling face did Jin-hyuk smile with satisfaction. He placed a hand on Yi-hyeon’s head and stroked his hair gently, as if petting a dog.

 

Yi-hyeon’s fingernails dug marks into the palms resting on his knees. Jin-hyuk checked his watch and rolled his tongue against the inside of his cheek.

 

“Luckily, I still have a use for you.”

 

“…”

 

“Meet me just five more times. Then I’ll forget everything you did and we can put the whole affair behind us.”

 

Yi-hyeon moistened his dry lips.

 

“Then the things I might have done to your family will never happen. And you’ll get this USB drive back.”

 

Countless thoughts flashed through Yi-hyeon’s mind. Jin-hyuk surely could not like him so much that he would resort to such vile blackmail merely to see him. There must be another scheme involved. But Yi-hyeon had no choice in the matter.

 

“It sounds like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for you, Mr Kwon. Don’t you agree?”

 

“…Five times?”

 

“Unlike certain people, I don’t make a habit of stabbing others in the back, so you needn’t worry.”

 

There was no way someone like Yi-hyeon could resist a predator who strode around his home in outdoor shoes. The thought that he must not be drawn in had vanished the moment Jin-hyuk mentioned the video. He had no idea how he might escape the situation.

 

Yi-hyeon lowered his trembling gaze and clenched his teeth. Jin-hyuk shrugged and stepped back.

 

“Fine, then. I’ll give you a little time to think.”

 

“…”

 

He took a hotel key card from his wallet and placed it on Yi-hyeon’s desk.

 

“Tomorrow evening, ten o’clock. Taeseong Hotel, room 2101.”

 

He closed his lips in a silent smile, then turned without saying anything more. His footsteps clicked across the floor towards the entrance. Just as he reached it, he made a small sound, as though remembering something.

 

Yi-hyeon, still sitting in a daze, looked up.

 

“Wash yourself properly before you come. I don’t like the smell of other bastards on what belongs to me.”

 

Jin-hyuk laughed softly, opened the door and left without looking back.

 

Long after he was gone, Yi-hyeon remained sitting on the bed, staring at the floor. He could not summon even the will to clean away the messy footprints Jin-hyuk had left behind.

 

Thinking of how helplessly he had yielded to the man’s threats drew a bitter laugh from him.

 

Where had everything gone wrong?

 

Tracing it backwards, he came first to the Kwon Yi-hyeon who had drugged Gu Jin-hyuk’s wine because he could see no other way, even though he knew it was wrong. Farther back was the Kwon Yi-hyeon who had borrowed money from Gu Seung-hyuk because he had been unable to refuse his mother’s request.

 

And Jin-hyuk had said he had obtained Lee Chan-yang’s video while investigating Yi-hyeon’s relationship with Seung-hyuk. Had he never become entangled with Gu Seung-hyuk in the first place, the video would never have ended up in Gu Jin-hyuk’s hands.

 

The thought that he could not even blame anyone else made him frustrated. His heart continued beating anxiously. Under the pressure that seemed to squeeze his entire body, he kept biting his blameless lips.

 

Ironically, Gu Seung-hyuk’s face kept returning to his mind.

 

Even if he met him, he would not be able to say anything.

 

Nevertheless, the need to see Gu Seung-hyuk pushed its way through his fear-filled thoughts.

 

Remembering the cold expression on Seung-hyuk’s face when they parted earlier, Yi-hyeon hesitated. Finally, he picked up the phone lying on the floor some distance away and dialled Gu Seung-hyuk’s number.

 

The ringing continued until an automated voice announced that the person he had called was unavailable and he would be transferred to voicemail. He considered leaving a message, then dialled again. The call still went unanswered.

 

Perhaps Seung-hyuk was driving.

 

His hesitation lasted only a moment. Yi-hyeon stood, determined to find Gu Seung-hyuk right away.

 

He could not decide whether to go to Seung-hyuk’s house or the Gawon-dong office. In the end, he hurried towards the bus stop for the office.

Yi-hyeon noticed his hands trembling as he looked out of the bus window, so he clasped them together. When a familiar stop was announced, he got off and turned towards Seung-hyuk’s office at the end of the quiet block.

 

When he had first come here, everything had felt strange and uncomfortable. How had things changed so much? After only a handful of visits, even the nearly empty building seemed familiar.

 

He climbed the stairs and pulled at the iron door covered in stickers. It was firmly locked. He knocked and put his ear against it, but heard no movement inside.

 

Was nobody there?

 

Belatedly regretting that he had not gone to Seung-hyuk’s house instead, Yi-hyeon crouched on the stairs. The cold seeped through his trousers. He took out his phone and called Seung-hyuk again.

 

Contrary to his expectations, the ringing stopped and the call connected.

 

“Gu Seung-hyuk?”

 

“…What?”

 

Yi-hyeon had cautiously spoken his name because there was no answer at first. The reply came a beat late. Seung-hyuk’s voice was colder than Yi-hyeon had prepared himself for, and all the words he had rehearsed disappeared from his mind.

 

He curled inwards, lowered his head and looked at his shoes. His lips moved, and he found himself saying something pointless.

 

“I was just wondering whether you got home all right.”

 

Silence was the only answer. Yi-hyeon felt as though even the sound of his swallowing would travel clearly down the phone.

 

When Seung-hyuk still did not respond, Yi-hyeon lowered his gaze and fiddled with one of his trainers. Grains of sand from the beach were caught between the laces and rubbed against his fingertips.

 

“You called just to ask me that?”

 

Yi-hyeon bit his lower lip at the cold reply. Apparently he had not imagined the change in Seung-hyuk’s mood during their journey home from Gangwon.

 

He quickly thought back over the last two days, trying to remember whether he had done something wrong, but nothing came to mind. He could not make sense of Seung-hyuk’s constantly changing moods. Feeling unfairly hurt, he pressed his lips together.

 

“I’m outside the office. I came because there’s something I need to talk to you about.”

 

Seung-hyuk was the one who had sent him into Gu Jin-hyuk’s clutches in the first place, yet he was also the only person Yi-hyeon could ask to help him escape.

 

Perhaps if he explained that Jin-hyuk was threatening his family, without mentioning the video, Seung-hyuk might find a way to help. Yi-hyeon spoke quietly, trying to hide the tremor in his voice, but the response was cold.

 

“I won’t be at the office until this evening. Tell me over the phone.”

 

“…I’ll wait until you come. It’s not something I can discuss over the phone.”

 

A short sigh came through the receiver, followed by the same low voice.

 

“Suit yourself.”

 

The call ended before Yi-hyeon could answer. He stared at the phone with a blank expression, put it away and rested his head against the wall. Thoughts drifted through his mind.

 

He did not know why Seung-hyuk had kissed him, or why he was angry. He did not know how Jin-hyuk had obtained the video or how much he knew. Everything was happening in a whirlwind entirely beyond his control, and Yi-hyeon could see neither a way to put things right nor a path of escape.

 

The circumstances were too difficult to explain to anyone else. The only person he could turn to for help was Gu Seung-hyuk, who knew how the entire situation had begun.

 

Yet Seung-hyuk was behaving even more coldly towards him than Gu Jin-hyuk, for reasons Yi-hyeon did not understand.

 

For some strange reason, that made him feel hurt and resentful.

 

Wind whistled past the old window. The stairs were freezing, and Yi-hyeon’s toes began to go numb. Since he had no idea when Seung-hyuk would arrive, he did not dare leave for a nearby café.

 

He folded his arms and huddled as tightly as he could, shivering for so long that he lost track of time. By the time he looked up again, darkness had settled beyond the window that had been bright earlier.

 

Yi-hyeon had been dozing with his head against the wall when the sound of heels clicking on the stairs below made him slowly open his eyes. Perhaps because he had fallen asleep somewhere so cold, his entire body felt stiff.

 

The clicking footsteps stopped directly in front of him. Still crouched on the stairs, Yi-hyeon saw neatly pressed trouser legs and black shoes enter his field of vision.

 

He slowly lifted his head to look at the man’s face, but it was too dark to see clearly. Only the familiar perfume and clothing told him it was Gu Seung-hyuk.

 

Yi-hyeon looked at his wristwatch. The hands pointed to eleven. He staggered to his feet.

 

The strong smell of alcohol lowered his spirits further. Someone had been waiting for him, and he had spent his time drinking. But Yi-hyeon was the one who had insisted on waiting. He had no right to resent Seung-hyuk for it. Trying to clear his stiff throat, he pretended everything was fine.

 

“…You said you’d come in the evening. This isn’t evening. It’s the middle of the night.”

 

Seung-hyuk did not answer. In the dim light, Yi-hyeon could just make out the shape of one tightly clenched fist. Unable to meet his gaze, he lowered his head and continued.

 

“…There’s something I wanted to discuss with you. It’s not really the sort of thing I can—”

 

“You waited for me?”

 

The voice interrupting him was unbearably low and heavy. Yi-hyeon swallowed and raised his head. Seung-hyuk stood two steps below him, yet their eyes were level.

 

In the darkness, Seung-hyuk’s black eyes seemed to burn like those of a starving animal searching for prey.

 

Ignoring the way his heart began to race as though he had climbed to some great height, Yi-hyeon whispered:

 

“…I said I would.”

 

“You waited here in weather like this, just because you said those words?”

 

Yi-hyeon did not nod or answer. He only looked at Seung-hyuk.

 

At that moment, the flickering bulb in the stairwell above went out with a soft pop, taking the last light with it. Seung-hyuk’s husky voice sounded in the sudden darkness.

 

“You asked me whether I still hated you.”

 

“…”

 

“Fuck. Yes…”

 

The low voice that followed sounded strangely damp.

 

“Let’s see how much of a fucking fool I can make of myself.”

 

In an instant, Yi-hyeon was pulled upright and hot lips covered his. The eyes he had glimpsed in the darkness stared at him with an intensity that seemed ready to swallow him whole.

 

Yi-hyeon looked at them in shock, then slowly closed his eyes.

 

Bang!

 

The storage cabinet behind him rattled loudly as his back struck it. Pale, bluish moonlight from the window washed over the office.

 

“Mmph…”

 

He could scarcely gather his thoughts. The moment the door opened, Seung-hyuk’s tongue had forced its way between his lips. The thick tongue swept relentlessly through his mouth, making his already dazed mind even hazier.

 

Before Yi-hyeon could work out how he had been pulled from the stairwell into the office, his back was against the cabinet and his head had been tipped upwards.

 

“Ngh… mmph…”

 

This kiss was different from the probing one before. Their tongues tangled with desperate hunger, until Yi-hyeon’s breath seemed to lodge in his throat. Each time their heads shifted and a little gap opened, he snatched a breath before Seung-hyuk kissed him again. The wet sounds of their lips and tongues rubbing together made his thoughts dissolve.

 

“Haa…”

 

Their lips separated briefly, and their gazes met at close range. Seung-hyuk looked down at Yi-hyeon’s heaving chest and saliva-slick lips. Then he raised a hand, closed Yi-hyeon’s eyes with it, and pressed their mouths together again.

 

With his sight shut off, Yi-hyeon’s other senses grew painfully sharp. Every time the pointed tip of Seung-hyuk’s tongue moved between his parted lips, mimicking the rhythm of sex, an ache gathered low in his back.

 

He felt as though a single kiss would be enough to make him hard. He twisted and drew his hips back, but a firm thigh pressed between his legs.

 

The hard muscle rubbed insistently against his swelling cock. A tingling sensation spread through his lower stomach, and his breathing grew ragged. Yi-hyeon caught the hot hand covering his eyes with both of his own, pleading:

 

“I can’t… hh… I can’t breathe.”

 

At the weak pull on his wrist, Seung-hyuk rested his forehead against Yi-hyeon’s and briefly lifted his lips away. Their uneven breathing filled the small space between them. Their eyes met from less than a fist’s width apart.

 

Seung-hyuk stared into his pupils as though searching for something, then kissed him again.

 

Pressing his weight forwards, Seung-hyuk forced Yi-hyeon to retreat, their legs tangling as they crossed the cramped office. When the backs of Yi-hyeon’s legs struck the sofa, Seung-hyuk caught the back of his neck firmly.

 

Under the pressure, Yi-hyeon fell backwards onto the cushions. Seung-hyuk climbed over him, and Yi-hyeon looked up, breathing hard.

 

“Haa… haa…”

 

The office was too dark to see Seung-hyuk’s expression. Yi-hyeon did not know what he was thinking, but this was the last moment when he could stop it.

 

Perhaps what had happened at the party could be dismissed as an accident. The second time would be different. And the eyes looking down at him from so close were startlingly clear for those of a drunken man.

 

Yi-hyeon’s chest rose sharply as he whispered:

 

“…Don’t do something you’ll regret.”

 

He barely managed to speak between breaths. The only reply was an incredulous scoff. Seung-hyuk lowered his eyes towards Yi-hyeon’s mouth.

 

“I’ve already regretted it.”

 

The moment he finished speaking, their lips met again and his tongue entered Yi-hyeon’s mouth. Seung-hyuk tangled it deeply against Yi-hyeon’s even teeth, hard palate and the root of his tongue, occasionally letting out a low, simmering breath.

 

The hard heat of his groin rubbed shamelessly against Yi-hyeon’s, making every point of contact seem to burn.

 

Just when Yi-hyeon felt as though his whole body was boiling, Seung-hyuk seized the hem of his roll-neck and pulled it up in one movement. The heating had not been switched on. When Yi-hyeon’s naked upper body was exposed to the chilly air, goosebumps swept down his back.

 

Seung-hyuk lifted his mouth from Yi-hyeon’s as he shivered, slowly straightened and looked down at him. He rubbed his saliva-slick lips with his thumb and raised an eyebrow.

 

“Haa… haa…”

 

Seung-hyuk suddenly remembered the sight of a man pulling up Yi-hyeon’s jumper and caressing his nipples in a pub toilet. The nipples, close in colour to his lips, looked pale pink in the darkness. Seung-hyuk lowered his hand and brushed one lightly with his forefinger.

 

“Men can feel it here too?”

 

He did not need an answer. The instant his finger touched the nipple, Yi-hyeon’s waist jerked and his body curled inward.

 

Smiling faintly, Seung-hyuk caught both Yi-hyeon’s arms and pinned them down. Then he lowered his head and gently bit the flat chest, sweeping the tip of his tongue over the hardened nipple.

 

“Ngh…!”

 

A high, sharp moan escaped Yi-hyeon. As he twisted, Seung-hyuk seemed to soothe him by flattening his tongue and licking around the areola.

 

Yi-hyeon writhed and shook his head, but it was useless with both arms firmly held and Seung-hyuk sitting astride him. When Seung-hyuk twisted and pressed the other nipple with one hand, Yi-hyeon could do no more than weakly grasp the solid arm above him.

 

“Gu Seung-hyuk… hh…”

 

Tormented by teeth, tongue, fingers and nails, his nipples quickly became red and swollen. Every touch stung and hurt enough to make him flinch, yet pleasure threaded through the pain.

 

A helpless, aching sound escaped his tightly bitten lips. Seung-hyuk watched Yi-hyeon’s head tilt back and his waist arch, then slowly straightened.

 

The flushed face, tangled hair and swollen nipples glistening with saliva were intensely arousing. Seung-hyuk’s own cock stood rigid inside his briefs.

 

He moved on his knees until he was level with Yi-hyeon’s chest, then finally unfastened his belt and pulled out his cock. Erect enough for the veins to stand out, it tapped against Yi-hyeon’s lips.

 

“Open your mouth.”

 

Before Yi-hyeon could part his lips himself, Seung-hyuk pushed a thumb between them. The thick thumb pressed down his tongue, opening a gap through which the swollen head of his cock slipped. The heavy, hot tip settled on Yi-hyeon’s tongue and rubbed against it roughly.

 

Feeling the warm lining of Yi-hyeon’s mouth against his cock, Seung-hyuk let out a low sigh. He fixed Yi-hyeon’s head in place with both hands and began slowly thrusting his hips backwards and forwards. Saliva Yi-hyeon could not swallow acted as lubrication, producing wet, slippery sounds.

 

“Mmph… mmph…”

 

Each time the shaft slid out and pushed back in, striking the back of his throat, Yi-hyeon gagged reflexively. He writhed and grabbed Seung-hyuk’s thighs, but the solid body would not budge. His eyes began to blur with involuntary tears. Desperately, he relaxed his throat and moved his tongue along the cock entering and leaving his mouth.

 

Something still seemed to displease Seung-hyuk. His jaw tightened and relaxed. Frowning with one eyebrow, he stopped moving while only the head remained in Yi-hyeon’s mouth. Yi-hyeon raised his eyes to examine his face.

 

Seung-hyuk’s lowered gaze was burning. Yi-hyeon looked away and began moving his own head instead.

 

Slurp. Slurp. Slurp.

 

Wet sounds filled the air. His lips, stretched wide around the thick cock, hurt as though they might split, but Yi-hyeon knew how to keep his teeth out of the way and open his throat.

 

He swallowed the full length, tightened his throat around it and heard a low, aching sigh from above. He drew back with his tongue stroking the raised vein, then leaned forwards to take it again. Suddenly, fingers caught his hair and pulled him back, and Seung-hyuk moved away.

 

“…Fuck.”

 

Despite being so aroused that his erect cock nearly touched his stomach, Seung-hyuk looked furious.

 

“How many men’s cocks have you sucked to get this fucking good at it?”

 

He shoved his hair back irritably, undid Yi-hyeon’s belt and dragged his trousers and briefs down together. His eyes flicked down and back up. In a voice almost like a growl, he whispered:

 

“Kwon Yi-hyeon. Did you get this hard every time you did it?”

 

Yi-hyeon’s cock, confined tightly in his briefs throughout, was standing firmly erect. Seung-hyuk scoffed, stroked his own cock a few times and pushed it between Yi-hyeon’s buttocks.

 

“W-wait.”

 

Startled, Yi-hyeon raised his upper body and pushed against Seung-hyuk’s shoulder. When Seung-hyuk looked at him as if to ask why, Yi-hyeon frowned and averted his gaze.

 

“I need to loosen up first. I’ll do it myself, so just wait…”

As soon as he had spoken, Yi-hyeon slipped two fingers into his mouth to wet them, then pushed them into his hole. He had decided in a hurry, frightened that if he did not loosen himself quickly, Seung-hyuk might force that enormous cock straight inside him.

 

Seeing Yi-hyeon, his face deeply flushed, inserting his fingers into his own arse and stretching himself open made Seung-hyuk’s cock jerk hard. Biting his lower lip, Yi-hyeon tried to hold back his moans while rubbing his fingers against his inner walls.

 

“Hh… haah…”

 

“Having the time of your life all by yourself, are you?”

 

Seung-hyuk ran his tongue along the inside of his cheek, caught Yi-hyeon’s wrist and made him withdraw his fingers. Then he dragged Yi-hyeon’s hips towards him, lifted both legs abruptly and pressed down behind his knees. Yi-hyeon’s body folded almost in half at the waist, exposing his pink opening.

 

Seung-hyuk stared insistently at the tightly closed hole.

 

“…”

 

Embarrassed by the way he was being examined, Yi-hyeon tried to twist away, but it was useless. Seung-hyuk pressed his legs down more firmly and spat directly onto the opening.

 

Before the clear saliva could drip from the fine folds, a long, thick finger pushed ruthlessly into the tight gap. A sharp moan escaped between Yi-hyeon’s teeth.

 

“Hah… ngh…!”

 

It was only a finger, not a cock, yet he felt twice as sensitive as usual. There was nowhere near enough moisture, and the friction against his inner walls was all the more distinct. When Yi-hyeon clenched involuntarily around it, Seung-hyuk frowned.

 

No matter where he rubbed, the opening did not relax. Instead, the soft tissue gripped him stubbornly. At this rate, it seemed he might not be able to fuck him at all that night.

 

Frowning, Seung-hyuk spread his fingers and spat between them. The extra wetness made it just a little easier to force two fingers back into the tight hole. Yi-hyeon covered his mouth with his forearm and turned his head aside.

 

“Hh…”

 

The pale chest heaving rapidly. The aching sounds escaping Yi-hyeon’s lips. His cock pressed against his stomach, leaking precum.

 

Everything Seung-hyuk had not seen during their previous encounter seemed to spur him on. He began thrusting his fingers more firmly, putting his weight behind each movement, while stroking his own cock with his free hand.

 

“That’s enough, isn’t it?”

 

Yi-hyeon was nowhere near loose enough to take his cock, but Seung-hyuk impatiently pressed the head against him. Yi-hyeon, who had turned his face aside and was trying to steady his breathing, hurriedly lifted his hips.

 

Penetration like this would be too much, but Seung-hyuk’s expression was alarming. Desperately searching for some way to stop him, Yi-hyeon noticed that while he himself was completely naked, Seung-hyuk had not taken off any of his clothes. He spoke quickly.

 

“Wait, Gu Seung-hyuk. Why haven’t you taken off—”

 

Before he could finish, his mouth was covered and the tight opening below him was forced apart. He gasped at the pressure, nothing like the feeling of fingers, but Seung-hyuk pushed his cock in without hesitation.

 

“Hhng…!”

 

“You’ve got time to worry… about that?”

 

The thick, long cock pressed through the soft inner walls, forcing a path. When the flesh clenched so tightly that he could go no farther, Seung-hyuk drove his hips forwards with sheer strength. Yi-hyeon threw his head back, panting under the pressure that made him feel as though his insides were being pushed upwards.

 

“You weren’t like this last time. Fuck, why are you so tight?”

 

Seung-hyuk withdrew the cock that was halfway inside, then thrust upwards hard again. The sensation of the enormous shaft mercilessly stretching his narrow insides felt unfamiliar.

 

He pushed forwards and pulled back repeatedly, as though trying to widen the tight passage. Before long, his cock struck somewhere deep within. Yi-hyeon’s breath caught in his throat and his entire body trembled.

 

“Hah… hh…!”

 

The cock, buried to the root, scraped along Yi-hyeon’s rigid inner walls as it withdrew, only to thrust hard inside again. Seung-hyuk pressed down more firmly behind his knees and drove his hips forwards. With every slow stroke of the thick shaft, Yi-hyeon could distinctly feel the veins and the ridge beneath its head brushing his inner flesh.

 

Already frightened by the pleasure beginning to rise, he tried to shift even a little, but Seung-hyuk immediately forced his legs down. When he raised an arm to cover his face, Seung-hyuk caught his wrist and pinned it to the sofa.

 

The eyes watching him during every thrust were as relentless as an animal’s. In the end, Yi-hyeon could do nothing but tip his head back so far that the crown of it pressed against the sofa.

 

“Hhng…!”

 

“Hoo…”

 

Seung-hyuk buried his cock completely, straightened his back and released a long breath as he pushed his hair away from his forehead. Seeing Yi-hyeon trembling with his body thoroughly penetrated filled him with a strange satisfaction that seemed to rise from his toes.

 

When he noticed Yi-hyeon’s own cock standing rigid against his stomach, its head nearly reaching above his navel, Seung-hyuk reached for it without hesitation. He pressed his thumbnail against the tip, where precum was gathering, and Yi-hyeon’s body jerked violently.

 

“You’re shaking this badly from just that?”

 

“Aah… hh…!”

 

“What kind of bastards’ cocks have you been taking all this time, eh?”

 

Seung-hyuk seized the moment and drove his hips forwards with a hard thrust. At the sudden stimulation, semen spurted from the tip of Yi-hyeon’s cock.

 

The sight of white fluid streaming down the pale pink head broke the last of Seung-hyuk’s restraint. As though everything he had done until then had been mere play, he began fucking Yi-hyeon in earnest.

 

“Hh… haa…”

 

“Aagh…! Haa! Haa! Ngh…!”

 

Yi-hyeon’s inner walls were still twitching and contracting through his orgasm as the thick cock scraped fiercely against them. Overwhelmed, he grabbed the armrest, but he could not stop his body being driven higher up the sofa by Seung-hyuk’s pounding thrusts.

 

Apparently dissatisfied with Yi-hyeon sliding away from him, Seung-hyuk lowered his body over Yi-hyeon’s. Bracing his arms on either side of Yi-hyeon’s head, he thrust into him violently from below.

 

“You little… fuck…”

 

“Ngh… haah…!”

 

Yi-hyeon’s insides felt utterly churned up. He could not think through the sensation of being struck over and over. His whole body trembled under the stimulation, made all the more intense by the sensitivity left after coming.

 

Seung-hyuk seemed either not to notice or not to care. He put more weight into his thrusts, pressing down on Yi-hyeon as though trying to crush him beneath his body.

 

Yi-hyeon was folded almost in half, with his knees near his shoulders. He could see the thick cock moving in and out of his hole. Each time Seung-hyuk drove down into him, obscene wet sounds rose from where their bodies joined around the tightly stretched opening.

 

Yi-hyeon clenched his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut.

 

“Ahh… hah… fuck… haa…”

 

The moans coming from above sent a sharp tingle down his back. Seung-hyuk’s breathing was growing harsher, as though he were nearing his climax.

 

Thud. Thud. The sound of his groin striking Yi-hyeon’s buttocks grew faster, and Yi-hyeon’s vision began flashing white. Trembling like a leaf, he wrapped his arms around Seung-hyuk’s neck as though clinging to him.

 

“Ah… hng… hah, hah… hhng…!”

 

“Ngh…!”

 

The cock filling him jerked, and Yi-hyeon felt something hot spreading inside him. His white-blurred vision gradually regained its colour, but his trembling body showed no sign of calming.

 

At last, his arms slipped from around Seung-hyuk’s neck and fell limply beside the sofa. The skin around his fever-bright eyes was red.

 

Seung-hyuk looked down at him, his hips still moving slowly, then bent to catch Yi-hyeon’s lips with his own. He sealed off Yi-hyeon’s hot breath and swept his tongue throughout his mouth. Yi-hyeon, struggling for air, turned his head from side to side, panting, but Seung-hyuk only pressed him more insistently.

 

Yi-hyeon grasped Seung-hyuk’s wrist in a pleading gesture, making a low, pained sound. Only then did Seung-hyuk release his mouth and slowly withdraw his cock from Yi-hyeon’s red, swollen opening.

 

“Haa… haa…”

 

Their harsh breathing echoed through the quiet office. Seung-hyuk slowly straightened and looked down at Yi-hyeon, who was panting with his face turned aside. Whitish semen dripped from the head of Seung-hyuk’s cock, then flowed out of Yi-hyeon’s gaping hole and down between his buttocks.

 

Seung-hyuk reached out and slowly traced the fluid with a finger.

 

Yi-hyeon’s overstimulated body jerked weakly, but Seung-hyuk ignored it and rubbed around the opening. Watching the entrance that had held his cock moments earlier twitch and spill semen made his throat dry and his lower back ache.

 

Running his tongue along the inside of his cheek, Seung-hyuk released Yi-hyeon’s legs and rose. Then he swept his tangled hair back and slowly began undoing the buttons of his shirt.

 

It was still dark outside, and the night was only just beginning to deepen. Sensing what would follow, Yi-hyeon exhaled feverishly and closed his eyes.

 

He must have been kept awake until dawn and then fallen asleep as though losing consciousness. When he opened his eyes, the world beyond the window was bright, and water was running in the shower room at one side of the office.

 

Forcing his eyes to stay open, he checked the clock. Fortunately, he still had time before his shift at the convenience store. He rubbed his swollen eyelids and began to sit up, only to let out an involuntary groan as muscle pain struck his entire body.

 

His voice was terribly hoarse. Every part of him felt as though he had been beaten. Yi-hyeon buried his face in both hands and let out a long, deep sigh.

 

Around then, the sound of the running shower abruptly stopped, leaving an unfamiliar silence. Yi-hyeon hurriedly snatched his jumper from the floor and pulled it on. His badly swollen nipples stung where the coarse fabric touched them.

 

He was trying to get up from the sofa, which was a mess of sweat and bodily fluids, when the bathroom door opened. Seung-hyuk emerged wearing only trousers, rubbing his hair with a towel. He noticed Yi-hyeon and spoke indifferently.

 

“You awake?”

 

“…Yeah.”

 

“Go and wash.”

 

He acted as confidently as though he saw nothing strange about their being in an office. Yi-hyeon, on the other hand, was anxious about the state he was in and the possibility of someone turning up at any moment.

 

He hurried towards the shower room. Seung-hyuk shifted slightly aside to let him pass. Warmth from the body that had just stepped out of the shower gently brushed Yi-hyeon’s skin before fading.

 

The first thing Yi-hyeon did after entering the shower was turn the hot tap all the way on. Standing beneath the pouring water for a long while, he finally felt the tension easing from his aching body.

 

Wiping the water from his face, he steadied himself against the wall with one hand and pushed a finger from the other into his badly swollen hole. He watched the semen that had collected inside him stream down his thighs and disappear into the drain. Only then did it begin to feel real.

 

He had slept with Gu Seung-hyuk. Again.

 

He had come to tell Seung-hyuk about Gu Jin-hyuk’s visit, his threats and his proposition. How had things ended up like this instead?

 

‘You waited for me?’

 

Yet when he remembered the burning look in Seung-hyuk’s eyes as he said those words, he could not bring himself to speak about Jin-hyuk. If he could find some way to deal with it alone, he wanted to pretend nothing had happened.

 

Even after finishing his shower, he stood beneath the water for a long time. When he finally opened the door, he saw Seung-hyuk sitting cross-legged on the very sofa where they had been together.

 

He had thought Seung-hyuk would have left, since there was no particular reason for him to stay.

 

“You’re still here.”

 

“Was I supposed to leave?”

 

“…No, that’s not what I meant.”

 

Yi-hyeon answered while avoiding his eyes. Seung-hyuk gave an incredulous laugh and rolled his tongue against the inside of his cheek.

 

“You’re cold-hearted, Kwon Yi-hyeon. You were trembling and clinging to me like you loved it, but now we’re done, you want me gone? Is that it?”

 

Yi-hyeon had no memory of clinging to him in delight, but he pressed his lips together rather than answer.

 

He gathered the clothes from the table and put them on, then shook the water from his hair. Throughout, he could feel Seung-hyuk watching him. He tried to ignore it, but eventually turned towards him.

 

“You can go first.”

 

“What are you doing today?”

 

Seung-hyuk asked as casually as ever. When Yi-hyeon only stared, he continued.

 

“You’ll be working at the bar tonight. Until then, what? Your convenience-store job?”

 

“Have you been investigating me?”

 

“It’s one of the few things I know how to do.”

 

Seung-hyuk shrugged with an easy expression. Then his phone vibrated. He checked it, stood and looked down at Yi-hyeon.

 

“Hello? Yeah, got it. No, I’m at the office. I’ll be there soon. Yeah.”

 

Still holding the phone to his ear, he gestured towards the door with his chin. Yi-hyeon followed him out of the office into the fresh morning air.

 

Seung-hyuk said a few more words into the phone, then raised a hand to hail a passing taxi. As Yi-hyeon moved to walk away, Seung-hyuk caught his wrist and pushed him into the back seat.

 

“Call me after work. We’ll get something to eat.”

 

“…I’m busy.”

 

“Yeah. Think about what you want to eat too.”

 

Seung-hyuk took two fifty-thousand-won notes from his wallet, handed them to the driver and slammed the rear door shut. Having said everything he wanted without regard for Yi-hyeon’s answer, he turned away without hesitation.

 

The taxi driver cheerfully asked for his destination and began programming the navigation system. Yi-hyeon fingered his still-damp hair and watched Seung-hyuk’s retreating back.

 

“Off we go.”

 

As the car moved and passed Seung-hyuk, Yi-hyeon’s gaze involuntarily followed him. For an instant, Seung-hyuk seemed to turn his head and look towards the taxi too.

 

Yi-hyeon reflexively looked away and fixed his gaze on the advertisement on the seat. His fingertips were pulsing as if he had been caught stealing glances at someone.

 

He had practically gone to work without sleeping, and his mind remained hazy throughout his shift. Pressing his fingers against his aching eyes and massaging the back of his neck did nothing to dispel the exhaustion.

 

Yi-hyeon sat behind the counter reading a book. He closed it, slid his hand into his pocket and leaned his head against the cigarette display.

 

His fingertips caught on a plastic card. It was the one Gu Jin-hyuk had left behind the previous day.

 

Ten o’clock tonight. Taeseong Hotel, room 2101. The man’s voice seemed lodged in his head, impossible to forget.

 

Yi-hyeon still could not decide whether going there was the right thing to do. Just in case, he had asked Haewon to cover his shift at the bar. The closer the appointed time came, the heavier his chest felt, as though a stone were pressing against it.

 

Jingle.

 

The bell over the door jolted him from his thoughts. Yi-hyeon reflexively opened his eyes and slowly began to stand.

 

“Welco—”

 

He looked up while rubbing his face and found Seung-hyuk standing there in a camel-coloured coat. Behind him were several large men Yi-hyeon had seen at the office before.

 

The memory of what had happened in that office the previous night made his face feel hot. Whether they noticed or not, the men came in without changing their expressions.

 

“Pick out whatever you want.”

 

“Thank you, Boss!”

 

At Seung-hyuk’s gesture, his men scattered through the convenience store, gathering various items. One even took a shopping basket, apparently determined to make the most of the opportunity.

 

Seung-hyuk showed little interest in their choices. He walked towards Yi-hyeon with both hands in his coat pockets.

 

Yi-hyeon rubbed his eyebrow and asked:

 

“What are you doing here?”

 

“Buying cigarettes.”

 

“You came all this way for one packet of cigarettes?”

 

The Gawon-dong office, where Seung-hyuk spent most of his time, was a thirty-minute walk from here. It made no sense to bring all these people along just to buy a packet of cigarettes.

 

When Yi-hyeon stared at him, speechless, Seung-hyuk spread the sides of his coat slightly with his hands still in the pockets and shrugged.

 

“Don’t believe me? Shall I say I came to see you instead?”

 

Yi-hyeon frowned and watched him for a moment, then forced himself to look away and turned towards the cigarette display. He took out a packet of Marlboro and placed it on the counter. Something in Seung-hyuk’s expression changed.

 

“You even know what I smoke?”

 

Yi-hyeon flinched at something he had not realised about himself. He had simply remembered seeing Seung-hyuk smoke that brand a few times and picked it up without thinking. Now that he considered it, he could not understand why he remembered.

 

Avoiding Seung-hyuk’s eyes as one corner of his mouth rose in amusement, Yi-hyeon began scanning the items accumulating on the counter.

 

Ten bottles of soju, several packs of dried squid, crisps and other snacks, jelly sweets, razors and even shoe polish. Yi-hyeon bagged the random assortment and gave Seung-hyuk the total.

 

“Ninety-four thousand five hundred won, please.”

 

Seung-hyuk, who had been looking down at Yi-hyeon the whole time, immediately took a warm bottle of soya milk from the heated cabinet beside him and set it in the middle of the counter.

 

“This too.”

 

Yi-hyeon silently scanned the barcode. The total on the screen changed to ninety-six thousand one hundred won. He stood waiting for Seung-hyuk to respond. Seung-hyuk took two fifty-thousand-won notes from his wallet and handed them over.

 

“The rest is a tip for the part-timer.”

 

Yi-hyeon, who was counting the change, stopped at those words. It was only a little under four thousand won, not hundreds of thousands or millions.

 

He could not decide whether to thank him, as he did when middle-aged customers occasionally handed him notes as a tip for his hard work, or respond sharply that he did not need it.

 

While he hesitated, a large hand reached across the counter and the soya milk disappeared. Looking up, he saw Seung-hyuk had already turned his back and was heading through the door.

 

Yi-hyeon stood staring with three thousand-won notes and a few coins in his hand when one of the large men in black spoke to him.

 

“We’ll use the tables outside, all right?”

 

Before Yi-hyeon could even answer yes, the men were talking loudly among themselves and heading out. Left alone in the spacious convenience store once more, he hesitated before putting the money in his waistcoat pocket.

 

Four thousand won or so… it was nothing much.

 

Between serving the occasional customer and tidying various shelves, his shift ended before he knew it. The part-timer who was supposed to relieve him always arrived early, but for some reason she had not even contacted him yet today.

 

Wondering whether something had happened, Yi-hyeon was counting the cash in the register when the bell jingled and hurried footsteps approached. He looked up to see Hye-jeong, her eyebrows drooping in apology.

 

“Yi-hyeon, I’m sorry! My bus broke down on the way, so I had to change. I’m really sorry I’m late. I’ll come twenty minutes early tomorrow.”

 

“It’s all right. I was just wondering whether something had happened to you.”

 

Still apologising, she hurriedly put her things in the staff room, pulled on a blue waistcoat and came behind the counter.

 

“By the way, Yi-hyeon, have you seen what’s outside?”

 

“Outside?”

 

“There are these men who look like gangsters, all dressed in black, taking up every table… Who are they? I was so nervous walking past them!”

 

“Ah…”

 

Yi-hyeon checked that the till balanced, closed the register and lowered his eyes with a troubled expression. He had assumed they would sit there for a short while and leave. It was embarrassing to discover they had been occupying the tables the entire time. No wonder some customers had been whispering strangely as they came in.

 

Frowning, Yi-hyeon pressed his fingers against his tired eyes and removed his waistcoat.

 

“I’ll have a word with them on my way out.”

 

“No, Yi-hyeon, just leave them. What if they do something to you because you spoke to them?”

 

“It’ll be all right.”

 

Yi-hyeon put on the coat he had retrieved from the staff room, bowed to Hye-jeong and headed for the entrance. Despite what he had said, he was not certain the men camped outside would listen if he told them they could not stay there.

 

The moment he pushed open the door, icy wind sent a shiver down his spine. Why on earth were they sitting outside in weather like this?

 

Sighing briefly, Yi-hyeon walked towards the little terrace beside the shop. When he raised his head, he saw the dark-clothed group occupying three red plastic tables.

 

Seung-hyuk stood out among them in a beige suit beneath his camel-coloured coat. Sitting deep in a plastic chair with his legs crossed, he looked almost arrogant. Yi-hyeon hesitated before approaching.

 

“You can’t sit here drinking like this.”

 

At Yi-hyeon’s voice, Seung-hyuk lifted his eyes from the phone he had been scrolling through with his thumb. Then he nudged the knee of the man beside him with the toe of his shoe.

 

“Oi. Take the lads back to the office.”

 

“Yes, Boss.”

 

They sprang to their feet as soon as he finished speaking. Gathering up every empty soju bottle and snack packet, they cleared the area and disappeared in moments.

 

Seung-hyuk watched them leave, checked his watch and looked up at Yi-hyeon.

 

“You’re late.”

 

Instead of replying, Yi-hyeon straightened one of the crooked plastic tables. The men had even pushed in the chairs neatly, so there was nothing else to clean.

 

He turned to leave, seeing no reason to remain. At once, a hand caught his wrist.

 

“Where are you going? You’re going to leave someone who’s waited all this time just to have a meal with you?”

 

So that was why Seung-hyuk had stayed there for hours. Yi-hyeon was the one left speechless by the way he had waited entirely of his own accord and then spoken as though Yi-hyeon were at fault.

 

He could not adjust to this abrupt change in Seung-hyuk’s manner. Was he behaving this way because they had slept together yesterday? Yi-hyeon pulled his wrist free.

 

“I have to go.”

 

“Yeah, to that fucking gay bar at five.”

 

Today, Yi-hyeon was supposed to go to the hotel where Gu Jin-hyuk would be waiting, not to the bar. But he could not make himself say it. When he averted his eyes with a stiff expression, Seung-hyuk jerked his chin towards him.

 

“Aren’t you cold?”

 

Yi-hyeon looked down. He was wearing the long coat he always wore. It might look thin, but it was warm enough that he had been wearing it for years.

 

Wondering what Seung-hyuk was about to find fault with now, he stared at him. Seung-hyuk took something from his pocket and pressed it abruptly against Yi-hyeon’s exposed neck.

 

“Not there. Here.”

 

“Fuck, it’s gone cold.”

 

He was holding the soya milk he had chosen earlier. The glass bottle had left a trace of lukewarm warmth against Yi-hyeon’s throat.

 

Yi-hyeon slowly relaxed after his involuntary flinch. Seung-hyuk threw the bottle straight into the bin without a second thought. Then he caught Yi-hyeon’s wrist again and began pulling him along.

 

“Come on. I’ll buy you something nice.”

 

There was still plenty of time before ten o’clock, when Jin-hyuk expected him. But Seung-hyuk believed Yi-hyeon was going to work at the bar that evening. There were only about thirty minutes until his supposed shift, so Yi-hyeon could not imagine what Seung-hyuk intended.

 

Besides, having slept together that morning and then parted so casually, the thought of sitting down to eat together felt uncomfortable. Yi-hyeon had never felt this way with anyone before. Strangely, it was only with Gu Seung-hyuk.

 

But there was no stopping Seung-hyuk when he had made up his mind. Yi-hyeon followed reluctantly.

 

The place Seung-hyuk chose was unexpected. Yi-hyeon looked up at him when he pulled back the awning of a roadside food stall.

 

“Auntie, two portions of tteokbokki and four fried snacks, please. We’ll help ourselves to the fish cakes too.”

 

“Oh, goodness! Director Gu, is that you? I haven’t seen you in ages.”

 

“Been busy with work. My lads still come by often, don’t they?”

 

“They do, but I’d much rather see your handsome face than theirs.”

 

Seung-hyuk gave a soft, breathless laugh at the woman’s teasing. She told them to wait and stirred the rice cakes on the hotplate, then spooned the tteokbokki onto a green plate patterned with white spots.

 

Soon, a plate of appetisingly red tteokbokki and fried snacks stood before them. Seung-hyuk picked up a skewer as though accustomed to the place and ate a rice cake. When he noticed Yi-hyeon standing beside him and simply staring, he spoke indifferently.

 

“What? Don’t you like tteokbokki? Want some sundae instead?”

 

“Why isn’t the handsome young man eating? My tteokbokki’s delicious, you know.”

 

“Auntie, could you slice up a portion of sundae for him too?”

 

“No, it’s all right.”

 

Yi-hyeon watched Seung-hyuk for a moment, then hesitantly picked up a rice cake and put it in his mouth. The sweet, spicy flavour spread over his tongue.

 

“Here, have this too. Eat plenty, young man.”

 

Even though he said several more times that it was fine, the woman set a plate of sundae in front of him anyway. Yi-hyeon bowed his head in thanks, and Seung-hyuk watched the crown of his head without expression.

 

They ate in silence. Whenever Yi-hyeon’s hands felt cold, he wrapped them around a paper cup of hot fish-cake broth.

 

The breath escaping his reddened lips mingled with steam rising from the hotplate, drifting through the food-scented air. Unlike the pocket of warmth gathered around the stall, a bitter winter wind brushed his back the entire time they stood there.

 

“What was it you wanted to talk about yesterday?”

 

Seung-hyuk’s casual question made Yi-hyeon choke as though something had caught in his throat. He coughed, and Seung-hyuk handed him a paper cup of water.

 

“Why are you so startled? What’s this about?”

 

His gaze was calm. The moment their eyes met, Yi-hyeon abruptly imagined that composed expression twisting out of shape. It felt as though something had seized him tightly by the back of his neck.

 

Gu Jin-hyuk offered me a deal. He threatened my family’s safety and held a USB drive containing an old video over my head.

 

If he told Seung-hyuk that, the sordid history of his family, the video Jin-hyuk had obtained and the events of his school days—the very things he wanted so desperately to hide—would inevitably come to light.

 

But if he endured meeting Gu Jin-hyuk just five times, he could bury those truths deep in the darkness again.

 

Was it right to dig up an old past that Seung-hyuk did not need to know about now?

 

“Kwon Yi-hyeon.”

 

At the sudden sound of his name, the instinctive thought that he must not tell Seung-hyuk about Gu Jin-hyuk flashed through his mind.

 

Yi-hyeon lowered his damp palms, averted his eyes and opened his mouth.

“No. I was going to ask whether your birthday’s coming up.”

 

The excuse Yi-hyeon had managed to come up with after desperately searching his mind was nothing more than a question about Seung-hyuk’s birthday. He had suddenly remembered hearing one of Seung-hyuk’s employees mention at some drinking gathering that his birthday was not far off.

 

Seung-hyuk raised an eyebrow at the unexpected subject.

 

“You waited for hours just to ask me that?”

 

“…I was wondering whether I’d missed it.”

 

Seung-hyuk looked at him as though studying him, then turned his head and raised the paper cup to his lips.

 

Yi-hyeon worried about what further excuse he could possibly offer if Seung-hyuk continued questioning him. He lowered his head to hide his stiff expression and began poking aimlessly at the sundae on his plate. Then a voice beside him spoke, sounding strangely cheerful.

 

“It’s the day after tomorrow. You haven’t missed it.”

 

“Why? Planning to do something for me?”

 

Seung-hyuk gave a light laugh as though he had made an absurd joke. Yi-hyeon tucked his lips inwards, then answered quietly.

 

“…Yes. I’ll do something for you.”

 

Seung-hyuk paused at his answer, then laughed with a breathless sound. Yi-hyeon thought it might be the first time since their reunion that he had seen Seung-hyuk laugh with such genuine pleasure.

 

Still looking ahead, Seung-hyuk set his paper cup on the table and said:

 

“Make sure you keep that promise.”

 

Yi-hyeon could not meet his eyes. He answered with a small, “Mm.”

 

“Get in.”

 

When they emerged from the food stall, a car and driver were waiting, though Yi-hyeon had no idea when they had arrived. Seung-hyuk gestured towards the car with his chin, but Yi-hyeon instinctively stepped back and shook his head.

 

“No. I’ll walk.”

 

“Don’t make me tell you twice. Get in.”

 

Yi-hyeon swallowed. This was his last chance to tell Seung-hyuk the truth: that he was not going to the bar at all but to meet Gu Jin-hyuk, who had visited the previous day and threatened him by using his family against him.

 

Yet the words would not come. It was as though something were lodged in his throat. The moment Gu Seung-hyuk learnt the truth, the fragile peace between them would inevitably be shattered.

 

If he could endure it alone, just five times, everything would return to the way it had been. It would solve both what he had done at the lounge and the problem of the video that could one day become a leash around Gu Seung-hyuk’s neck.

 

More than anything, Yi-hyeon did not want to bring up Gu Jin-hyuk and see that terrifying change come over Seung-hyuk again. So he shook his head once more and took another step backwards.

 

“You really are stubborn.”

 

Seung-hyuk gave a helpless laugh, looking at him in disbelief. Then he took something from his pocket and held it out. It was a bottle of soya milk identical to the one he had bought earlier.

 

At Seung-hyuk’s gesture to take it, Yi-hyeon hesitantly extended a hand. The bottle settled into his palm, so warm it was almost hot, as though it had only just been taken from the heated cabinet.

 

Pressing his lips together, Yi-hyeon gripped the bottle tightly and turned away first.

 

He felt a powerful urge to look back. Was Seung-hyuk still watching him, or had he climbed into the car and left without a second thought? But Yi-hyeon merely tightened his hold on the bottle and walked towards the bus stop.

 

***

 

The hotel was not far from the place where Yi-hyeon worked. There were still several hours until the appointed time, but he did not feel able to go home and relax or wander around the neighbourhood. Instead, he sat endlessly in the ground-floor lobby.

 

He checked the time again and again, hoping that ten o’clock would never come, but the hours passed steadily and far too quickly. As the hands of the clock moved closer to ten, his heart began pounding violently and nausea gathered in his stomach.

 

There could be only one reason Gu Jin-hyuk had summoned him to a hotel. Yi-hyeon tried to think of it as merely giving up his body once, but every time he remembered how Jin-hyuk had behaved at the lounge, the hand holding his phone began to shake.

 

The bottle of soya milk he had been clutching as though it were a lifeline had long since cooled to lukewarm. Seeing that the appointed time had almost arrived, Yi-hyeon reluctantly stood and walked towards the lift.

 

When he tapped the card Jin-hyuk had given him against the panel, the floor was selected automatically and the lift began moving. Yi-hyeon watched the numbers change above him and worried his lower lip between his teeth.

 

He walked along a corridor thickly carpeted underfoot and stopped outside room 2101, the number Gu Jin-hyuk had given him.

 

For a moment he hesitated, wondering whether he should run away even now. Then he remembered Seung-hyuk’s languid smile when Yi-hyeon had promised to celebrate his birthday.

 

And Gu Jin-hyuk’s voice returned to him too.

 

‘Technology’s improved a great deal. They can restore footage like that very clearly these days.’

 

Yi-hyeon bit his lower lip hard. This seemed the only way to disentangle himself cleanly from the sordid mess between Gu Jin-hyuk and Gu Seung-hyuk.

 

If he kept silent and endured it five times—just five times—he could bury everything again without anyone getting hurt.

 

Steeling himself, Yi-hyeon brought the key card to the reader. The lock clicked open.

 

He took hold of the dark handle and pushed. The heavy door opened smoothly, allowing light to spill through the gap. Yi-hyeon squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, then opened them and stepped forward.

 

His footsteps crossed the threshold between the corridor and the room, leaving a trace that appeared and vanished.

 

Continued in Volume 3.