7MOH SS 1 Part 3

3. No Favors, Just Love

7:48 AM. His eyes finally opened only after the alarm, set at nine-minute intervals, rang twice more.

The space beside him was empty as usual. When he reached out, the sheets felt cold enough to make him wonder if anyone had ever slept there at all. Jeong-in had grown quite accustomed to waking up alone and to Chase’s absence.

The moment he opened his eyes, he grabbed his phone from the nightstand. A notification showed a new email had arrived. It was experimental data from an overseas partner company, timestamped around 4 AM due to the time difference.

Jeong-in pushed off the covers, sat up, and scrolled through the email. As he swiped through the screen, he checked the key values and briefly organized the direction for follow-up experiments in his mind.

After stretching his arms and getting out of bed, he began preparing for work alone.

Traces of Chase remained throughout the house. The bathroom light he hadn’t managed to turn off blazed bright, and his razor sat out of place alongside a damp towel. The toothpaste cap was left open.

Jeong-in washed up briefly and tidied each trace one by one. The carelessness so unlike Chase made him feel more sympathetic than anything. It was a morning where pity preceded irritation, thinking, Chase must have been rushed again today.

Every July 1st, new residents begin work at hospitals across the United States. It’s the day when freshly graduated medical school students, still wearing lab coats with creases not yet smoothed, are assigned as official hospital staff.

They undergo residency training lasting anywhere from three years at minimum to six or seven years. Though it’s a training period, they face real patients, and the weight of responsibility grows with each passing day.

It had already been a month and a half since Chase started his residency. His specialty was cardiothoracic surgery, among countless specialties, the most grueling field where one couldn’t let their guard down for even a single moment.

He left home every day between 5 and 6 AM. Rounds started at 6:30. He typically got off around 7 PM, though days when that schedule was actually kept could be counted on one hand.

The maximum work hours per week for residents set by medical institutions was 80 hours, but that was merely a standard on paper.

In reality, exceeding that was commonplace. Between surgical standby, emergency calls, and overnight shifts, working 24 hours straight was standard, and some days stretched close to 30 hours without rest.

As a result, Jeong-in had grown accustomed to Chase returning home and collapsing into sleep as if knocked unconscious.

After finishing his simple tidying and heading to the kitchen, he noticed a mug sitting on the island counter that Chase must have left behind after drinking from it.

Jeong-in casually picked up the cup and took a sip of the half-remaining liquid, then immediately rushed to the sink and spat it out.

“Ugh… Just how many shots did he put in this?”

The coffee made his mouth tingle from just briefly holding it, it was so bitter it seemed questionable whether it was meant for human consumption. But knowing this was necessary just to get through the day, the bitterness lingering on his tongue seemed to linger in his mouth particularly long.

Jeong-in picked up a banana that had just started developing brown spots. After eating it as his breakfast, he grabbed his house keys and left through the front door.

On the first floor of the condo was a bicycle storage area exclusively for residents. Bicycles packed tightly between metal frames each waited for their owners. Among them was Jeong-in’s, a gift from Chase when he started his job.

This neighborhood was densely packed with schools and commercial facilities, and toward Kendall Square in the distance, pharmaceutical companies and startups clustered closely together. With just one bicycle, most distances could be easily covered, so many people in this area rode bikes.

Jeong-in wheeled his bike outside and naturally merged into the flow.

Breathing in the fresh outdoor air lifted his spirits. It was a morning bathed in clear sunlight for the first time in a while.

Pedaling hard on his commute always made him recall his school route in Bellacove years ago. From California to Boston. Though the scenery surrounding him and the scent of the air had changed considerably, the memories from that time remained vivid.

Following the bike path along the Charles River where sunlight sparkled on the water, passing through residential areas and commercial districts, Jeong-in reached the complex where his company was located.

Verixxa, where Jeong-in worked as a third-year principal researcher, was a mid-sized Boston-based pharmaceutical company primarily targeting rare genetic diseases.

There was a clear reason he had chosen this company over numerous major pharmaceutical corporations.

Organizations where research leadership flowed strictly from the top down, structures requiring adherence to predetermined pipelines, conservative atmospheres where decisions moved slowly and risks were avoided, he thought he wouldn’t be able to do the work he wanted in places like that.

In contrast, Verixxa had a researcher-centered culture and was clinically focused. Patient-centered values were clear, and actual connections with patients were the most closely maintained.

It was a company where he could most directly feel the sense that something he created had saved a life, and that was the biggest reason Jeong-in chose this company over other options.

Jeong-in parked his bicycle in his designated area and locked it as always.

“Mr. Lim.”

The security team leader, who remembered the faces of just about every researcher, greeted him first.

While Chase had gone through medical school to become a resident, Jeong-in had also steadily built his career. He was no longer simply a member of a research team but had become a fairly high-ranking researcher who directly led and took responsibility for projects.

When he tagged his ID card at the reader in front of the main entrance, the automatic door opened with a beep. There were several more gates beyond. Security was tight, befitting a research facility. People without access authorization could never enter, and the movements of individual employees were also recorded in the system.

Jeong-in passed through the experimental building corridor and entered the office. Inside was already lively with researchers who had arrived. Papers continuously poured from the printer, and the occasional ring of phones and sounds of keyboard typing filled the space.

“Lim, Biocern shared their data. Did you check the email?”

As Jeong-in headed to his seat, senior researcher Abigail Harts strode up beside him.

“Yes. I got it early this morning, and I’m planning to organize it and apply it directly to the experiment setup.”

“How is it? Do you need to make many changes?”

“The receptor response values are bigger than expected, so I might need to modify a few primers.”

“Share the results as soon as they’re in.”

“Yes.”

After finishing the brief report, just as he sat down and was about to turn on his laptop, Jeong-in’s phone vibrated. It was Chase.

Chay❤️: [Did you get to work okay?]

He must have found a brief moment after finishing rounds. Jeong-in’s fingers busily slid across the screen.

To Chay❤️: [Yeah]

: [And you? Did you eat something?]

: [Eating something quick at the cafeteria now]

The employee cafeteria at the hospital provided a menu marginally better than a high school cafeteria. But it was terrible nonetheless.

Jeong-in looked down at his phone screen and let out a deep sigh of sympathy.

Chay❤️: [I miss you]

: [We live together and I still miss you, does that make sense?]

Chase was going through a fairly difficult time adapting to his new routine. Even someone with stamina like his seemed to find it burdensome to be stuck at the hospital for close to 20 hours a day.

Sleep was always insufficient, and after standing in the operating room for hours at a time, his mind would go foggy as if lacking oxygen.

However, his senior residents advised him to consider being physically exhausted fortunate. As the years progress, he’d have to make medical decisions himself, and he’d face moments where a single judgment could determine life or death. From then on, the mind breaks before the body, they said.

This week too had been breathless with on-call shifts and nighttime surgical standby, but fortunately, tomorrow was a day when Chase could finally rest for once.

Chay❤️: [Let’s eat something delicious tonight and not leave the bed]

: [If you’re going to say something that dirty out of nowhere, give me an NSFW      warning first]

: [There are people in the cafeteria, I almost got hard]

Jeong-in burst into laughter at his playful message. Even though he must be exhausted, Jeong-in felt both grateful and touched that Chase was trying to lighten the mood with jokes.

Jeong-in suddenly thought: Isn’t that what real strength is? Someone who can laugh even in their hardest moments. Someone who can show composure to the person they love. Wasn’t that kind of person truly strong?

Chay❤️: [I wish it was evening already]

  : [I miss you]

With Chase’s day off approaching, Jeong-in planned to leave work a little earlier than usual today and stop by the supermarket.

His phone’s memo app was filled with an ingredient list: tomatoes, celery, onions, carrots, beef, chicken stock. And below that, the recipe his mother had given him was written in detail.

Today, Jeong-in planned to make the stew his mother used to cook for him when he wasn’t feeling well as a child.

A rich, nutritious stew where ripe tomatoes and sweet vegetables simmered together, and chunks of meat cooked until they melted in your mouth. He wanted to serve it with heart-shaped crackers and eat it together with Chase.

When he got off work and came home, they’d eat a warm dinner together, then go to bed early and sleep as much as they wanted without an alarm. Maybe that would help relieve some of his accumulated fatigue.

Lately, Chase’s eyes had become sensitive. Not just from being tired, but because he spent every day facing actual patients while carrying extreme tension.

Chase’s cardiothoracic surgery was called the most suffocating residency in the hospital. Most patients were either critically ill awaiting heart or lung surgery, or people who had just finished surgery and were in a precarious recovery period.

Emergency situations could arise at any time from bleeding, cardiac arrest, pneumothorax, respiratory failure, sepsis, and there were patients who died during surgery or after ICU admission.

When Jeong-in thought about Chase standing in such an environment all day, he felt something heavy pressing down on his chest.

Doesn’t everyone want to be cared for at some point? To be cared for like a child in someone’s cozy embrace. To be touched with gentle hands in a comfortable place.

Today, Jeong-in wanted to care for Chase like that.

With that feeling in his heart, Jeong-in dove into his work faster than usual. He organized data while looking back and forth between two monitors, compiled meeting materials, and created summaries with links to relevant papers.

Three meetings ran back-to-back from morning, and after a quick lunch, meetings to coordinate follow-up experiments continued like a marathon.

After finishing everything efficiently, Jeong-in hurriedly stood up. He rode his bike straight to the supermarket.

As Jeong-in shopped with his basket, his movements held more anticipation than urgency. He bustled around the supermarket, selecting beef with good marbling, and from the vegetable display, he picked fresh tomatoes, carrots, celery, and onions. He also chose a cheap bottle of red wine for the stew, and finally grabbed heart-shaped crackers from the snack and biscuit section.

After paying and loading the heavy bags into his bicycle basket, his phone briefly vibrated.

Chay❤️: [Sorry, I suddenly got put on call]

: [I probably won’t be able to leave the hospital until after midnight]

Jeong-in’s shoulders dropped as he read the message.

Disappointment flickered through him, but it couldn’t be helped. Thinking of Chase trapped at the hospital for nearly 20 hours again, he just felt sorry for him.

To Chay❤️: [It’s okay, I had a lot of work anyway and thought I’d need to work late]

He sent that reply to ease Chase’s guilt and got on his bike.

His cooking skills were clumsy anyway, so maybe it was fortunate he didn’t have to rush the preparation. Besides, when Suzy had given him the recipe, she’d added that the longer it simmered, the more tender the meat became, and the flavor deepened when eaten the next day. Deciding to go home and simmer it in advance, Jeong-in pedaled hard.

It was just as the condo building was coming into view.

From the intersection came a piercing metallic screech along with the sound of brakes skidding. Then a loud crash shook the earth.

A minivan that hadn’t properly reduced its speed had rammed straight into a pickup truck stopped ahead. A silver sedan following close behind suddenly swerved to avoid the collision. But it couldn’t avoid hitting the minivan’s corner and spun out, losing control.

The completely out-of-control vehicle slid, unfortunately, toward Jeong-in. Through the car window, he felt like he locked eyes with the terrified driver in the seat.

Jeong-in reflexively turned his handlebars. He barely avoided the collision, but before he could reduce speed, the bicycle tilted to one side. Without time to properly grab the brakes, Jeong-in’s body plunged to the street along with the bicycle.

Soon he felt a burning pain between his wrist and elbow. Looking down, he saw the items spilled from the shopping basket soaked in red liquid. For a moment his heart sank, thinking it was his blood, but looking closer, he saw the wine bottle had broken.

“Ah…”

He felt a searing sensation and hot liquid flowing down. Looking at his forearm, blood was streaming. A shard of the broken wine bottle seemed to have cut deeply through the flesh.

Jeong-in barely managed to pull himself up and staggered over to sit at the edge of the sidewalk.

His ears rang from the screams of a passerby. He saw people rushing toward the accident scene. Someone held a phone to their ear frantically explaining something, while someone else carefully opened the doors of the crashed vehicles to pull out injured people. It was complete chaos.

“Oh my, are you okay? You’re bleeding a lot.”

A middle-aged woman approached Jeong-in and offered a handkerchief. Half-dazed, Jeong-in nodded and pressed the handkerchief she handed him firmly against the wound to stop the bleeding.

In his hazy vision, people’s movements looked like slow motion. It felt surreal, as if space and time had warped.

If he’d been delayed by even one second, he really could have been hit by that car. At that thought, goosebumps rose all over his body.

Before long, several ambulances and police cars arrived at the scene in succession. While paramedics busily attended to the drivers with more serious injuries first, one of the police officers controlling the area spotted Jeong-in.

He asked Jeong-in for his name, date of birth, and how he got injured, then called over a paramedic.

“Pupil response looks fine.”

The paramedic knelt down, shone a light in Jeong-in’s eyes, and asked several questions to check for cognitive impairment. When Jeong-in answered clearly, he checked the bleeding wound.

“This looks like it needs stitches. We need to check for debris too. Let’s get you to the hospital for now.”

He carefully helped Jeong-in into one of the ambulances.

On the way to the hospital, the fluorescent light on the ceiling of the ambulance he was riding in for the first time swayed dizzily with each bump.

After wrapping Jeong-in’s injured arm with a bandage and providing light hemostasis treatment, the paramedic clipped a small device to his fingertip to measure oxygen saturation and wrapped a blood pressure cuff around his uninjured arm. Fortunately, all results were normal. Aside from the torn forearm, there seemed to be no major problems elsewhere.

And some time later, when he got off at the designated area in front of the emergency room, Jeong-in realized he was at Brannum Medical Center. Where Chase worked.

Jeong-in entered the emergency room on his own two feet instead of on a stretcher and soon stood in front of the reception desk. After confirming basic personal information, the receptionist asked for an emergency contact.

Naturally, he should have written Chase’s name. But soon Chase’s face, soaked in exhaustion, floated before him on the paper. Besides, just minutes ago, Jeong-in had told him he’d be working late to reassure him.

He didn’t want to bother him with something as minor as a few stitches. After hesitating, what Jeong-in wrote wasn’t Chase’s name.

[Justin Wong]

When he handed over the form with insurance information filled in last, the receptionist said, “You’ll be called soon,” and pointed to the waiting chairs.

Sitting in a daze, Jeong-in fumbled through the backpack beside him with one hand and pulled out his phone. He called Justin. It was to let him know in advance so he wouldn’t be alarmed if the hospital contacted him.

Justin had joined the R&D office of a global tech company in Cambridge as a software engineer right after graduating from MIT. Thanks to that, even after graduating from college, the two could remain by each other’s side in the same city.

— Jay? What’s this about at this hour?

As soon as he heard the words “traffic accident,” Justin shouted “What?” Jeong-in quickly added that he wasn’t seriously hurt, and only then did the sound of breathing reach him through the receiver.

Justin said he’d rush to the hospital right away and hurriedly hung up. It was fortunate timing since he had no bicycle and was wondering how to get home.

After the call, he followed a nurse’s guidance into the emergency room.

Meeting a doctor in America wasn’t easy. As expected, after sitting awkwardly on the designated bed waiting for quite a while, a doctor with a deeply tired face approached.

The ID card on his white coat’s chest showed the name Sean McCarthy, a blurry ID photo, and the words “Surgery Resident Physician.” He must be living with his body ground down at the hospital every day like Chase. At that thought, a moment of sympathy passed through him.

The doctor unwrapped the bandage the paramedic had applied and checked the trauma site. The torn area was on the outer forearm between the wrist and elbow, it didn’t look big, but he said it was deeper than it appeared.

Unable to rule out the possibility of remaining glass fragments, the doctor tried palpating while gently pressing around the wound.

“Ah…”

Seeing Jeong-in flinch slightly, the doctor removed his hand from the wound.

“I’ll anesthetize you right away. Then we’ll check an X-ray and suture it right up.”

After finishing his words, he looked up again and glanced at Jeong-in’s face. Then he narrowed his eyes and asked in a cautious tone.

“Haven’t we met somewhere before?”

A thin line appeared between Jeong-in’s brows. Though he said nothing, faint wariness rose in his expression.

As if caught, the doctor quickly made excuses.

“Ah, I’m not trying to hit on you… Sorry. That did sound too much like that. I’ll give you the anesthetic shot.”

Since childhood, Jeong-in was the type who could only relax if he watched the needle go in with his own eyes. As he stared down at the anesthetic needle piercing his arm, urgent footsteps came pattering.

“Jay! What on earth happened!”

It was Justin’s familiar voice. Approaching while gasping for breath, his gaze slid from Jeong-in’s face down to his torn, blood-streaming arm.

Justin’s eyes widened as far as they could go as he covered his mouth.

“Blood… blood is… ugh…”

Only then did Jeong-in remember that Justin was especially terrified of blood. That’s why his parents had given up early on raising their son to be a doctor. That was an uncommon decision for Asian parents.

“I’m fine, Justin. Wait in the waiting room.”

Justin took a short deep breath as if trying to calm his startled heart, then nodded vigorously. Then he left the emergency room with quick steps, almost as if fleeing.

The X-ray confirmed there were no glass fragments remaining in the wound.

Jeong-in lay on the bed looking down at disinfectant slowly flowing into his arm. The transparent liquid spread around the wound, wetting the skin. Perhaps thanks to the anesthesia, the lack of cold sensation felt oddly surreal.

After a moment, the doctor pulled his mask up over his nose and approached. He carefully grasped the forceps and spoke.

“That really wasn’t a pickup line earlier. I know how to make proper pickup lines, that really wasn’t one.”

Jeong-in didn’t particularly respond to the doctor’s words, seemingly trying to clear up the misunderstanding. Then the doctor, thinking something, became even more flustered.

“No, I don’t mean you’re not worthy of being hit on. Of course you’re pretty… Sorry. I’ve been awake for almost 22 hours now. My words keep getting tangled.”

“That must be hard.”

When Jeong-in replied lightly, the doctor’s expression lightened considerably.

“Alright, now I’ll stitch you up cleanly, as if I’d gotten a full 10 hours of sleep.”

The needle holder carefully pushed the needle into the skin and suturing began. With just five stitches, and since there was no vascular or muscle damage and it was a narrow laceration, the suturing didn’t take long.

After a while, Justin reappeared with his eyes squinted as if watching a scary movie. Only after seeing that Jeong-in had finished dressing the wound did he relax and approach closely.

“Is it done? Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Just five stitches, that’s all.”

When Jeong-in answered nonchalantly, Justin looked around briefly, then asked in a serious voice.

“But where’s Pres? Isn’t this the hospital where Pres works?”

Jeong-in answered that he hadn’t contacted Chase since he wasn’t seriously hurt and didn’t want to bother him when he was busy and exhausted. At that, a worried look appeared on Justin’s face.

“Hmm… Will it be okay? Keeping something like this secret.”

“Secret, what secret? I’ll just tell him at home later. I don’t want to call someone out from work for no reason. He’s already having such a hard time these days.”

Though Jeong-in spoke calmly, Justin still looked unconvinced, as if he couldn’t readily agree.

* * *

“Prescott!”

Someone snapped their fingers at the end of the corridor, calling his name. A senior resident with half his body out of a patient room door was beckoning him with a hand gesture.

Chase turned around. He wore a white coat over blue scrubs, also commonly called surgical scrubs. It was exactly the same outfit as that Halloween about ten years ago.

Under the hospital’s faded white lighting, the letters engraved on the ID card on his chest flashed for a moment.

[Chase A. Prescott, M.D.]

To earn those two letters, M.D., after his name, he had poured in an enormous amount of time and effort. And finally, he stood here.

He opened the sliding door and entered the patient room. A white man in his seventies with white hair lay on the bed. He was a patient who had undergone coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG), been in the ICU, and only recently been transferred to a general ward.

The senior who had called Chase spoke to the patient.

“Patient, from now on Dr. Prescott here will be taking care of you.”

The moment the old man, leaning back on the bed, saw Chase, his face contorted. And he erupted in fury.

“What? No! Not that flashy model-looking guy! I want to be treated by a real doctor, not a fake!”

Unfortunately, this wasn’t Chase’s first time experiencing this. He approached with a forced smile.

“I’m a real doctor too, sir.”

“Fake!”

Once he actually started working as a doctor, he encountered quite a few people who made hasty prejudices that he must lack skill based on his appearance. Chase had to endure those suspicious looks numerous times in outpatient clinics and wards. He’d gotten used to it, but it never stopped hurting.

“Just bring that Indian guy from earlier! At least he’d be smart.”

After barely persuading the patient who was making a scene while spouting racial slurs and other verbal abuse, and leaving the room, he felt completely drained. With a deep sigh, he roughly ran his fingers through his hair and quickly walked toward the exit where the emergency stairs were.

He wanted to catch his breath alone for even a moment, but there was already someone there. Sean McCarthy sat carelessly on the floor, frantically tearing open a sandwich wrapper.

“Hey, Prescott.”

“McCarthy.”

Sean McCarthy was a third-year surgery resident, also a Harvard graduate. He tapped the spot next to him a couple of times, and Chase silently plopped down where he indicated.

“Can’t go home today either?”

Sean asked in a mumble as he shoved sandwich into his mouth.

“I’m stuck here until midnight at least.”

The conversation wasn’t long, but even in the brief silence, a strange sense of empathy flowed.

When he leaned his deeply fatigued body against the wall, even the sound of Sean munching on his sandwich somehow sounded comfortable, like white noise.

After sitting like that for about five minutes, Chase slowly got up.

“I’ll head out first. Enjoy your meal.”

“Yeah.”

Just as he was about to move toward the exit, Sean shouted as if remembering something.

“Ah! I remember!”

“Yes?”

“I was wondering where I’d seen him, he was that friend who used to hang around with you!”

“Who?”

Sean spoke with a relieved face, as if he’d finally figured out something puzzling.

“He was an Asian patient. His name was Jay, I think…”

“…What? Why was he here?”

“He’s in the ER right now.”

Chase’s eyes shook greatly. Intoxicated with the satisfaction of having solved a puzzle, Sean continued carelessly.

“There was a three-car pileup near Harvard Square today. He was brought in by ambulance…”

Before he could finish speaking, Chase had already bolted from his seat and was running out. At the bang of the emergency door, Sean muttered the rest with a dumbfounded face.

“…It was just five stitches. I should have said that first…”

* * *

When Jeong-in saw Chase standing before him, having run over with breath rising to his chin, he couldn’t help but be surprised. How on earth did he know he was here?

Jeong-in immediately looked at Justin, but Justin raised both hands high as if proclaiming his innocence and shook his head vigorously.

Chase stood frozen in place. Like someone facing a scene he could hardly believe, he stared piercingly at Jeong-in.

The ER attending physician who had come to decide on Jeong-in’s discharge spotted Chase and acknowledged him.

“Dr. Prescott?”

But Chase looked in no state to respond.

“Do you know the patient?”

Just as Chase was about to open his mouth at the attending’s question, Jeong-in intercepted the answer.

“We’re friends. He must have come because he was worried. Hi, Chase.”

At Jeong-in’s response, Chase’s expression hardened further. The muscle bulging above his jaw showed his low mood and how much he was suppressing his emotions right now.

Meanwhile, the attending nodded with an understanding expression. Then he approached Chase and patted his shoulder.

“Your friend’s condition is fine, so don’t worry. You must have been really startled.”

After the attending left, Chase first grabbed the chart. It said “traffic accident trauma patient,” but aside from the laceration on the forearm, there seemed to be no other injuries. Sean McCarthy’s name was written in the space for the attending physician’s name.

He put down the chart almost like throwing it back in place. His blue eyes pierced straight toward Jeong-in. Didn’t they say the hottest flames are blue? It felt like sparks were crackling from his eyes.

“Jeong-in Lim.”

The moment Chase opened his mouth, Justin and Jeong-in flinched simultaneously. It was because he had never once called Jeong-in with his last name like that before.

As the two blinked their surprised eyes in unison, a frighteningly low voice resonated through the air.

“Explain. What… is this situation right now?”

His voice even trembled slightly at the end, as if he was incredibly angry.

Flustered, Jeong-in didn’t know what to do. With his words stuck, his lips only moved for a while before he smiled awkwardly, as if trying to somehow defuse the serious situation.

“Chae… So, what happened was…”

“Are you kidding me right now?”

Chase couldn’t wait for Jeong-in’s excuse and spoke almost shouting.

Justin, seeing Chase’s angry appearance for the first time, squirmed and stepped back like an animal sensing danger and dodging. At that movement, Chase’s gaze shifted to Justin.

Meeting those sharp blue eyes, a startled Justin shook his shoulders like hiccupping.

“What about you? Did you know?”

“N-no, I just… J-Jay put me as the em-emergency contact…”

“Ha… What? Emergency contact? You think this makes sense right now?”

Jeong-in looked around, rolling his eyes here and there. Chase was even more astounded at that sight. Even in this situation, does he have the leisure to be mindful of others’ gazes? His heart had been squeezing and felt like it would burst right up until this moment of running down to the ER.

Not knowing his feelings, Jeong-in carefully opened his mouth.

“First calm down, let’s go outside and talk.”

That calm tone only fanned Chase’s anger even more.

Jeong-in was always someone who first thought about what others would think. He was bothered by the nurses’ sideways glances, worried that Chase, who had just started his career, might become the subject of gossip for no reason, and that it might harm his future work life.

If he raised his voice in such an agitated state, it would only draw more people’s attention.

“Let’s go outside. Let’s talk outside. Okay?”

Deciding they needed to leave this place first, Jeong-in grabbed Chase’s arm and led him out of the emergency room. But once they left the building, Chase grabbed Jeong-in’s wrist and pulled.

The outside air was muggy and humid. The place they headed to was a secluded flowerbed beside the building. The sound of the ER entrance doors automatically opening and closing could be faintly heard. It wasn’t a place completely devoid of passersby, but at least there seemed to be no one who would pay attention to their fight.

Chase still stared at Jeong-in with an overbearing gaze.

“Explain.”

The anger that had built up solidly was revealed in his voice.

Jeong-in swallowed, not knowing where to begin. His chest felt tight as if being squeezed, and it felt unfamiliar for Chase to treat him with such a sharp expression and tone.

“First calm down a bit…”

“You think I can not be angry right now?”

His eyes were sharply honed, and clear anger floated in his blue pupils.

“Chae, I just… You’ve been having such a hard time lately. At the hospital from dawn till night, not getting sleep… I know how hard you’ve been struggling…”

“So?”

Chase twisted the corner of his mouth as if sneering.

“So you lied about working late? Hid that you were in a traffic accident? Made me hear through someone else that you were brought to the ER?”

“Rather than a lie, it was more consideration… Besides, ’hiding’—if you put it that way, I’m being made out to be…”

“Why? Am I wrong?”

Jeong-in flinched at the sharp tone and raised voice. And Chase didn’t miss that opening.

“Since when has your emergency contact been Justin?”

“That’s…”

Jeong-in, who was about to make an excuse, swallowed his words. From the start, Chase didn’t seem to have any intention of accepting any explanation.

“What exactly am I to you?”

“Chae.”

“Do I have to hear about you through other people? Am I only that much to you?”

Jeong-in’s brow furrowed. He felt frustrated and hurt by Chase, who rarely seemed to consider his perspective.

“Then what? Should I call someone caring for patients on the brink of life and death to come and go over just a few stitches? I wasn’t even seriously hurt anyway.”

“Why are you the one judging that?”

“It’s my body, why can’t I judge?”

Jeong-in’s tone, which had been suppressing emotions thinking it was priority to calm Chase who must have been surprised, gradually grew sharper too.

“Is this even a conversation? Why won’t you listen to what I’m saying? I didn’t want to add to it! Work and patients are enough to make you struggle! I did it because I was worried about you!”

“Is that your best excuse? That it was all for me?”

“Yes! This is my best! At least I thought this was best!”

“For whom? Maybe for you. Did I whine to you about how hard things are? Or did I get irritated?”

Jeong-in glared fiercely at Chase. But Chase couldn’t stop like his brakes had failed.

“Do you know how shitty this feels? Like I’ve become less than dust to you.”

“Stop exaggerating.”

Jeong-in bit his lip slightly. He barely suppressed the surging emotions that kept welling up. Unaware of Jeong-in’s state, Chase spoke sarcastically.

“One thing’s certain. I’m far less than your real ’friend’ Justin.”

“Don’t be sarcastic!”

“Oh, we were friends too, weren’t we? But why did you say ’friend’? You might as well have called me ’bro’ again there.”

Jeong-in’s face hardened. Calling him a friend to the attending physician was consideration meant to protect him from discriminatory gazes.

He just didn’t want him to be judged carelessly for dating another man, and didn’t want him to bear unfair prejudice as a white man with an Asian partner.

Jeong-in spoke in a sharpened voice.

“Do you, in all your privilege, know anything about prejudice?”

“I wonder. Aren’t you the one really having prejudice? Arbitrarily assuming everyone will be that way.”

That remark flew like a fatal blow. Jeong-in shook his head slightly and looked at Chase with a disillusioned expression. Though moisture welled in his black eyes, he gritted his teeth and held back.

“Fuck you, Chase Prescott.”

Jeong-in turned sharply around.

Chase roughly ran his fingers through his hair out of habit and grabbed Jeong-in’s forearm.

“Jeong-in. That just now…”

“There’s no need to say more! I understood everything you wanted to say.”

It felt like his worrying and considerate heart had been condemned as lies and cover-ups. It felt unjust and unfair. The overwhelming emotions rose up to his throat. Jeong-in pulled his hand free from Chase’s grip, but was soon caught again.

“We’re talking. Don’t just leave.”

As if having no intention of being held back, Jeong-in shook off his arm with all his strength and shot back sharply.

“Who are you? The position-keeping police? Or are you a king? Your Majesty! May this humble subject take his leave?”

“You’re the one being sarcastic.”

Chase looked at Jeong-in with a deep sigh, as if frustrated.

“Jeong-in. Are you saying you don’t regret what you did today?”

“Yes! Want me to add one more? I won’t regret saying this either. Chase Prescott, you’re an asshole.”

As soon as Jeong-in spat out those words, he turned around. And this time he left before Chase could grab him.

* * *

When he entered the hospital room fuming, he saw Justin sitting restlessly like a child not knowing what to do between parents who had fought badly.

“Let’s go, Justin.”

Jeong-in said in a cold voice and picked up his backpack that had been placed beside the bed.

“U-uh? Just like that?”

Jeong-in quickly completed the discharge procedure, leading Justin, and left the hospital.

Justin’s small electric car headed to a pharmacy in Cambridge. He could easily receive medicine through electronic prescription at a pharmacy registered in advance.

Jeong-in was prescribed antibiotics to prevent infection and painkillers to suppress the pain that might come when the anesthesia wore off completely.

When he got back in the car with the medicine bag, Justin asked cautiously.

“Where should we go now?”

Jeong-in, who had been absorbed in thought looking straight ahead, turned toward Justin.

“Justin. Can I stay at your place?”

Justin nodded without hesitation.

“Of course that’s fine with me.”

“Then I’ll impose on you.”

Jeong-in stopped by home to simply pack only what was necessary, then went to Justin’s place.

Justin’s place was a newly built condo near Kendall Square. It had a compact structure with one room and one living room, but thanks to white walls and wide windows reaching to the ceiling, it didn’t look cramped. The living room was filled with a large TV and various game consoles, and had a cozy-looking corduroy sofa.

Sitting on the sofa, Jeong-in pulled his knees together to hug them, rested his chin on them, and just stared out the window.

“Are you okay?”

Along with a cautious voice, a mug was placed in front of Jeong-in. Faint steam rose from the cup.

“It’s chamomile. I don’t know why I even have chamomile tea bags at my place though.”

Jeong-in forced a smile and picked up the cup. The yellow tea water rippled slightly in the cup. Chamomile was known to be effective in calming the mind and body. Jeong-in breathed in that sweet scent deeply, like taking a deep breath.

“What did you guys talk about to end up like this…?”

To Justin’s cautious question, Jeong-in exhaled the breath he’d taken in instead of answering. As the anesthesia wore off and a tingling sensation gradually returned to the wound area, his uninjured chest felt sore.

How many years had they been dating already?

Looking back now, they’d bickered over trivial problems he couldn’t even remember, but this was the first time they’d fought so intensely, the first time he’d left home.

Jeong-in told Justin, who had settled on the couch across from him, about what happened today and the sharp conversation he’d exchanged with Chase.

“Oh man…”

Justin, who had been listening silently the whole time, couldn’t continue for a while, then muttered with a sympathetic expression. It was a situation where both people’s positions were understandable enough that he couldn’t take either side.

“But you know. I’m not trying to take sides… but Pres earlier, he literally froze.”

“…”

The image of Chase Prescott, always calm and relaxed, turning pale and running into the emergency room as if nothing else was visible, floated before Justin’s eyes.

“Think about it. Could Pres have known how badly you were hurt, whether it was minor or serious? If he only heard that you were brought to the ER from a traffic accident?”

“…”

“He might have thought the reason you couldn’t contact him was because you were seriously hurt.”

Jeong-in slowly pulled a cushion close and buried his face in it.

It wasn’t that he didn’t understand Justin’s words. But what still came to mind was Chase’s eyes looking down at him coldly. His affectionate expression had disappeared without a trace, and only overbearing anger showed on his unfamiliar face. His attitude of never once trying to listen, and even being sarcastic, telling him to go to his friend Justin.

“Still, he could have tried to think from my position at least once.”

“Well… that’s true.”

Chase’s words that Jeong-in was the one with prejudice stuck in Jeong-in’s heart like a dagger.

He wanted to deny it, but to some extent it was true. When meeting people, Jeong-in often first approached with the wariness of ‘this person might also be racist.’ If they weren’t, it was truly fortunate, and when he actually faced discrimination, he’d console himself thinking ’I knew it’ as if his judgment had been correct. It was a kind of defense mechanism to protect himself, but at the same time, an undeniable prejudice.

“We’re too different.”

Jeong-in said in a powerless voice.

“He can’t think at all about how scary discrimination is, how scary prejudice is.”

“Still… you two have a lot in common too.”

Jeong-in squinted at Justin as if he’d heard something ridiculous.

“We do?”

“You’re both Harvard graduates.”

Jeong-in let out a laugh through his nose.

“That’s a commonality tens of thousands of people share.”

“Um… you’re both right-handed.”

“Technically speaking, Chase is ambidextrous.”

“You both have English as your native… no, that’s not right.”

“Just give up, Justin.”

“You’re both mammals… Ha… This is the first time I’ve felt this powerless.”

Jeong-in brought out the words he’d been saving up as if he’d been waiting.

“You should have heard that sarcastic tone. And sometimes he’s shockingly thoughtless.”

“Still, leaving home like this isn’t the answer. When you sit face to face with that handsome face, doesn’t your anger cool down a bit? Especially those eyes. When they’re bright, they’re like a Siberian Husky…”

When Jeong-in glared sharply, Justin slid his eyes away and stood up from his seat. He went to his room and came back out carrying a white bedsheet.

As he carefully spread the sheet over the sofa, Justin asked.

“Still, you’re a guest… Do you want to sleep in the bed?”

“No. I’ll sleep here. And what do you mean guest between us.”

Justin ordered pizza for dinner. He offered a slice of pizza hot enough for the cheese to stretch, placing it on a plate, but Jeong-in immediately shook his head.

Justin didn’t ask anymore. He knew well that when Jeong-in got angry, his appetite was the first thing to disappear.

Jeong-in leaned deeply back against the sofa and stared blankly out the window. Then he muttered as if to himself.

“Maybe… the day when Chase and I perfectly understand each other will never come.”

Justin listened to Jeong-in’s words while munching on pizza.

“Chase and I, from one to ten, everything… We’re really fundamentally different people. How long can we keep adjusting? Can two people who are fundamentally different be together?”

“Still, you two have one clear thing in common.”

Justin hurriedly swallowed what was in his mouth, washed it down refreshingly with cola, then continued.

“You’re madly in love with each other. How long has it been for you guys? Eight years? Nine years?”

“…”

“Even after all that time, it’s still hot.”

From their clumsy, fresh high school days, through campus life filled with romance, to now when they’d both become full-fledged working adults. Many things had changed, but their feelings for each other hadn’t faded in the slightest.

A solid wall built up layer by layer with time and memories surrounded the two of them.

“Even now. If you weren’t burning hot for each other, would there even be a fight? Would you be this anxious?”

At Justin’s words that hit the mark, Jeong-in couldn’t really refute.

After clearing the eating area, Justin put his cup in the sink and headed to his room. Though tomorrow was the weekend, he said he had to go to work, mentioning a project with an approaching deadline.

“Good night, Jay.”

“You too.”

The door closed, and Jeong-in was left alone in the dark living room with only one lamp on. He flopped his body onto the sofa and stared blankly at the unfamiliar ceiling. The unfamiliar house, unfamiliar air, unfamiliar silence, suddenly, sadness washed over him.

Recently, Jeong-in had tried hard. Chase tried to keep an unchanged face in front of Jeong-in, but Jeong-in could see him struggling not to collapse. He talked less and became sensitive even to small things. When he first lost a patient, someone he’d been close to, he spent days with vacant eyes.

Jeong-in wanted to comfort his tired body and mind. That’s why he, who had no talent for cooking, had called his mother to ask for a recipe. When Chase came home after seeing patients all day, subsisting on junk food, he wanted to feed him warm, healthy home-cooked food.

But all those plans went awry with an unexpected accident. That fact alone was devastating, but Chase had gotten angry before even hearing his story.

It felt like his attempts to move him, his moments of wanting to be considerate, had been thrown to the ground without being acknowledged.

Did he want to see Justin first after getting hurt and frightened? When Jeong-in saw the car sliding toward him at frightening speed, the only face he thought of was Chase’s.

That Chase didn’t know this, no, that he didn’t even try to know, felt devastating and hurtful. The cold gaze itself looking at him was a wound.

Jeong-in tightly hugged the cushion beside him. Thinking he’d rather just fall asleep, he closed his eyes, but his chest ached too much to sleep.

Time crawled by slowly. Past midnight, his phone started vibrating. As expected, it was Chase. When he didn’t answer the call, a message arrived.

Chay❤️: [Where are you]

: [I’m home now]

: [Let’s talk]

Jeong-in switched his phone to silent and placed it face down so the screen wasn’t visible. Then he closed his eyes again.

Before long, a ringtone sounded from inside Justin’s room. There was a clatter as if he’d dropped his phone. It was obvious who would make Justin so flustered without even looking.

Whether the door wasn’t closed properly or the room wasn’t soundproof, Justin’s voice answering the phone came through clearly.

“H-hello. Yeah… Huh? No? I don’t know… That… Yeah… He’s here.”

Justin exposed Jeong-in’s location all too easily. If this were an action movie, he was the type who should never be given the role of the spy protagonist’s best friend.

After a while, Justin came out of his room with the phone to his ear. His face, lit by the dim living room lamp, was full of awkwardness. He briefly took the phone away, covered the microphone part with his palm, and asked in a whisper.

“He wants to talk to you?”

Justin’s cautious gaze turned to Jeong-in. But Jeong-in avoided that gaze and replied coldly.

“Tell him I’m sleeping.”

Justin rolled his eyes as if he couldn’t stop him and returned to the call.

“Oh dear. He must have been so tired that he fell asleep…”

Justin, who had been mumbling, soon took the phone from his cheek with an awkward expression.

“He says he heard your voice just now.”

“Tell him I have nothing to say.”

At Jeong-in’s firm tone, Justin let out a small sigh, then relayed like a messenger.

“He says he has nothing to say…”

Justin listened to Chase’s voice again after conveying Jeong-in’s words. Then he relayed Chase’s words to Jeong-in.

“He says he’s on his way here now.”

“Tell him I have nothing more to say, so if he has something to say, send it by email.”

“He says he has nothing more to say and to send it by email… Did you hear? Ah, yeah. Yeah.”

This time Justin spoke to Jeong-in without even taking the phone away.

“He says he just arrived here. He’s parking now.”

“Same as always. He comes and thinks I have to go down.”

Jeong-in’s lips twisted. The words muttered like talking to himself were close to sarcasm. Meanwhile, Justin, who had hung up the phone, conveyed Chase’s last words.

“He says he’s at the bottom of the building. He’ll wait until you come down.”

“Tell him to stay there all night or whatever, do as he pleases.”

Justin silently looked at Jeong-in. It was an earnest gaze, as if asking, “Are you serious?”

Jeong-in turned away from that gaze. And as if he’d already made his decision, he answered with firm silence instead. Justin returned to his room with a heavy expression.

Time passed again. The living room was quiet, with only the sound of the refrigerator compressor running like a faint background noise.

“He thinks I’ll go down? Not a chance.”

Jeong-in, who had muttered to himself, headed to the kitchen to wet his dry throat. Holding a glass of water, he wandered around the living room for no reason, then glanced down out the window.

The sunroof of a dark gray SUV gleamed under the streetlight. It was Chase’s BMW.

Jeong-in threw himself back on the sofa and closed his eyes, planning to just fall asleep. But before long, he opened his eyes wide and got up from his seat.

Chase had been awake for over 20 hours now, and even before that, he hadn’t been eating or sleeping properly for days. His accumulated fatigue must be considerable.

“…How annoying.”

He couldn’t understand why he was being considerate of him even at a time like this.

Jeong-in quietly left the house still wearing his striped pajama pants and a short-sleeved t-shirt with the print worn off. As he pushed through the common entrance door, the muggy summer night air clung to his skin.

Chase, who had been leaning against his car, immediately stood up and took a couple of steps forward the moment he spotted Jeong-in. Jeong-in stopped walking at an awkward distance. He kept his gaze toward the roadway.

“Why did you come?”

Instead of answering, Chase first opened the passenger door.

“Get in. Let’s go home.”

“If you have something to say, say it and go back.”

Chase took a deep breath and called Jeong-in’s name in a tired, sigh-like voice.

“Jeong-in.”

“Don’t call me like that.”

Sometimes Chase called him as if addressing someone ten years younger. Usually it sounded like an expression of love, but in a situation like now, it wasn’t welcome at all. It felt like he was treating him like a lacking person incapable of rational judgment.

A cold current flowed between the two standing at a slight distance.

Cars passed by intermittently on the street. Jeong-in kept his gaze on the roadway, watching red taillights disappear trailing long tails, while Chase quietly gazed at him.

Boston in August was hot during the day but the temperature would drop to the high teens at night. Jeong-in slightly hunched his shoulders and wrapped his arms around himself.

It was Chase who broke the silence that had continued for quite a while.

“Get in the car and let’s talk.”

“I said no, didn’t I?”

“You’re shivering right now.”

Still, Jeong-in didn’t move an inch. Chase let out a short sigh as if frustrated and moved his hands to take off the jacket he was wearing. It was clear he was trying to put it over Jeong-in.

“Fine. I’ll get in. I just have to get in, right?”

As if displeased that the situation wasn’t going the way he wanted, Jeong-in lightly stomped his foot and got in the passenger seat.

When Chase got in the driver’s seat and closed the door, a faint sharp wine smell wafted through the enclosed space. Jeong-in’s eyebrows immediately shot up.

“Don’t tell me! You drove after drinking?”

Instead of answering, Chase silently pointed to the back seat with his chin. In the back seat with the seat folded down, Jeong-in’s bicycle was loaded, and next to it was the shopping basket, soaked with wine and a complete mess.

Chase said in a heavy voice.

“I went to where the accident happened. It wasn’t fully cleared up yet.”

As if the sanitation workers hadn’t been there yet, glass fragments and broken plastic pieces were scattered at the accident scene. Skid marks remained long on the road, and yellow warning tape set up to one side swayed thinly in the wind. The remnants of the accident still occupied the street.

Chase parked the car at the edge of the road, then got out for a moment to look around the scene. Though there were no deaths, it was a three-car pileup with one seriously injured person and several minor injuries.

The fact that Jeong-in had been right there, at that exact time when the accident happened, made Chase’s heart sink with shock once again.

In the midst of that, he discovered a bicycle roughly leaned against a streetlight. It seemed to have been temporarily moved aside so as not to obstruct pedestrian traffic.

He almost passed by carelessly, but the frame’s color and shape were familiar. Of course they were. Chase himself had bought it for Jeong-in. Jeong-in had meticulously chosen something sturdy with a basket where he could put his backpack, at a price point that wouldn’t make him cry if it got stolen.

Chase lifted the bicycle and loaded it into the car. He didn’t forget to gather up the items scattered messily nearby, presumably bought by Jeong-in, one by one.

“I roughly picked them up and brought them. Are they yours?”

At Chase’s question, Jeong-in stared at the thin eco-bag he used as a shopping basket without any answer. The thin cloth soaked with wine was stained so badly its original color couldn’t even be recognized, and the ingredients he’d carefully chosen one by one had now become trash.

Surging feelings welled up again. Just hours ago, while choosing those items, he’d imagined the moment of sitting at a warm dinner table with Chase. When that excited feeling came back, the current emptiness felt even greater.

Watching Jeong-in frown, Chase asked carefully.

“Were you going to make something?”

Jeong-in didn’t enjoy cooking. He was the type who thought it extremely inefficient to spend over two hours making something that took 20 minutes to eat.

“Jeong-in.”

Even when called as if prompting an answer, Jeong-in acted like someone determined to keep his mouth shut. Chase turned completely toward the passenger seat.

“Are you not going to talk to me now?”

It wasn’t an agitated voice.

“Not even going to look at me?”

Rather, it was closer to a careful, coaxing voice.

Jeong-in still only stared straight ahead.

“Say something.”

“I have nothing to say. Even if we went back to that situation earlier, I would have made the same choice.”

It would have been good to stop there. But Jeong-in ended up adding one more thing.

“If you can’t understand that and it makes you so angry, then maybe we’re just not right for each other.”

“…What?”

The air in the car sank coldly as if ice water had been poured. Only after spitting out the words did Jeong-in realize what he’d said. Though he was the one who had hinted at an ending, emotions surged through him first.

“Are you done talking?”

It was a frighteningly low voice.

“No matter how angry you are, there are things you shouldn’t say.”

At Chase’s voice, seemingly suppressing anger, Jeong-in’s chin trembled. The rising emotions swayed like water barely holding at the surface. And with the last drop, they finally overflowed. Like the moment surface tension breaks, Jeong-in collapsed that way too.

“Did you ask if it hurt! If I was surprised! If I was okay! You didn’t ask any of that!”

The lump stuck in his throat burst out like a cough. The emotions he’d held back again and again poured out as tears. As if he hated even showing himself crying, Jeong-in hurriedly wiped away the teardrops with the back of his hand as soon as they rolled down his cheeks.

Meanwhile, Chase froze, unable to say anything. For a long while, all he did was stupidly blink and stare at Jeong-in.

And finally, as if realizing, he let out a sigh-like lament from deep in his throat.

“Ah…”

It was a short, powerless lament.

“I’m… sorry.”

An apology flowed from Chase’s mouth for the first time.

“Did I… do that? Didn’t even ask those things… just pressed you…?”

Jeong-in turned his head toward the window. He didn’t want Chase to see him crying.

He had almost been caught up in a major traffic accident. He’d fallen while trying to avoid it and got hurt. He’d earned a badge of honor. He’d wanted to shove the wound stitched tonight in his face and act dignified, talking about it like a great heroic tale. He hadn’t known that small wish would escalate into tears and fighting like this.

Chase apologized in an anguished voice. It was a tone soaked in desperation.

“I’m sorry. I was so surprised earlier… No, no excuses needed. That’s absolutely my fault.”

Only then did Chase recall how he’d acted the moment he saw Jeong-in in the emergency room. He’d thought all sorts of things, but seeing him laughing with Justin as if nothing was wrong, it felt like blood was rushing backwards.

He’d been so angry he couldn’t afford to be selective. He’d really pressed him hard. He remembered Jeong-in, seemingly quite surprised and flustered, forcing an awkward smile with just the corners of his mouth pulled up.

“I don’t need it. I’m leaving.”

The moment Jeong-in reached out to open the passenger door, Chase grabbed his arm and pulled him into a tight embrace.

“I was wrong. You were really upset. I was wrong.”

“Let go!”

Jeong-in struggled with his whole body and pushed against Chase’s shoulders. He grabbed and tore at his clothes, hitting him haphazardly. But there was no way he could break free.

“I really hate you.”

In Jeong-in’s trembling voice, the emotions he’d suppressed today were complexly tangled.

Chase spoke with his lips buried against Jeong-in’s ear.

“Give me some consideration for extenuating circumstances. After hearing you were in a traffic accident and in the ER… how could I have been in my right mind?”

“…”

“While running to the ER, do you know what I was thinking?”

“…”

“If something happened to you, what way could I follow you in death… I thought about that.”

“…What?”

Only then did Jeong-in look at Chase.

“I’m a doctor, so I thought it wouldn’t be particularly difficult.”

“…”

Chase carefully felt along Jeong-in’s arm to find and hold the hand wrapped in bandages.

“Did it hurt a lot?”

“…I was so surprised I didn’t even know it hurt.”

Chase gently placed his fingers over the bandage. Then he rubbed very slightly over the wound with his thumb. As if he could erase the wound that was there.

“It makes me angry that someone else stitched your wound. It makes me angry that another person’s name is in the space for the attending physician next to your name.”

“…Sorry.”

He hadn’t thought of that. But thinking about it now, he felt regret that it would have been good if Chase had treated him directly. Of course the scar would fade with time, but the wound he stitched would have become his trace remaining forever on his body.

Chase kept fiddling with the area around the wound as if his regret couldn’t be hidden.

“I’m really good at suturing.”

“That person was skilled too, though.”

“Don’t say another man was skilled, even as a joke.”

A laugh leaked out between Jeong-in’s lips.

Chase quietly cupped Jeong-in’s cheek. Warm body heat spread through his palm.

“There’s nothing more important to me than you. So I want to be that way for you too.”

“You think you’re not?”

Chase carefully brushed past Jeong-in’s ear as if touching a delicate flower and continued speaking.

“To the point where others’ gazes don’t matter at all… I just want you to be absorbed only in me.”

That was quite difficult for Jeong-in. Jeong-in hadn’t grown up in an individualistic culture. He’d spent his childhood in an environment where being conscious of others’ gazes and expectations was natural.

“Jeong-in… You used to confidently wear t-shirts printed with math symbols. You stuck to yourself without caring what others thought. I thought that aspect of you was cool.”

Jeong-in looked at Chase and quietly shook his head.

“How they see me, that’s not the problem.”

As if asking what then, Chase lightly raised his eyebrows.

“However people judge me, I can just endure it and ignore it. I don’t care how people passing on the street think about us. But…”

Chase patiently waited for Jeong-in’s words to continue.

“That’s your workplace, Chae. It directly affects you and your career. What if among your superiors there’s someone who hates homosexuality and that person opposes your promotion? If they disadvantage you?”

Chase sent an affectionate gaze as if Jeong-in was too lovely.

“Look at me, Jeong-in.”

Jeong-in lifted his eyes. He saw Chase’s face, once a boy, now a fully mature man.

The honey-blond hair and blue eyes like they held the Mediterranean were the same, but traces of fatigue were thinly spread over his delicate features. Even so, he was still beautiful.

“I judge others, I don’t become the subject of others’ judgment.”

It was an utterly arrogant statement, but coming from Chase, it strangely had persuasive power.

“Of course I know you don’t care about others’ gazes, Chae. But I do. And I always will. I’ll always worry, wondering if it might be because of me.”

Chase looked at Jeong-in as if thinking for a moment, then spoke in a calm voice.

“Then let me put it differently. Financial companies like Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo have also been steadily donating to or investing in medical foundations and hospitals. Morgan Stanley even built a children’s hospital with their name on it. But Prescott has never once contributed to the medical field.”

“…”

“The hospital director even requested a meeting, wondering if we wanted to attract investment. I declined though.”

Chase added his last words, driving the point home.

“Do you think someone like me will face disadvantages anywhere?”

Jeong-in, who had been rolling his eyes here and there as if lost in thought, soon slowly lowered his gaze with an understanding look. When he did that, his long, dark eyelashes settled like a fan, and the thin double eyelids usually not visible were revealed.

That small fold that showed only thinly at the corners when his eyes were wide open appeared clearly and prominently when he lowered his eyes. Perhaps that’s why it always gave the feeling of accidentally glimpsing something secretly hidden.

Even after all these years together, Chase still found Jeong-in to be a mysterious being. Seeing him every day yet finding him fresh each time, he was certain he’d probably never tire of him for life.

“Look at me.”

At Chase’s words, Jeong-in lifted his gaze. His pitch-black eyes like the darkest night were still like a black hole pulling him in.

“They say love doesn’t beg.”

Chase carefully held Jeong-in’s injured hand and kissed the back of it. It was a cautious yet earnest gesture, as if performing a sacred rite.

“But I’ll beg like this. Let me be the first to know when you get hurt. Tell me first when you’re in pain. Let me be the first to know everything about you.”

“…”

“Just love me. I don’t want your consideration.”

“…Is self-torture your hobby?”

“I guess so.”

Only then, as if the resentment settled in his heart was loosening a bit, Jeong-in let out a long sigh and dropped his shoulders.

Just then, a faint vibration was transmitted from under his hips. Chase had started the car.

“Chae?”

“Let’s go home.”

Before he could stop him, his car was already smoothly pulling onto the road.

“Just like this? I left all my stuff there. My medicine is there too…”

“I’ll bring it all first thing when I wake up tomorrow morning.”

“Still…”

“Were you really planning to sleep at another man’s house?”

Chase calmly drove the car toward home.

Their condo was only about a ten-minute drive from Justin’s place.

The inside of the house they entered after opening the door hadn’t changed at all from when they left in the morning. Looking at the darkened kitchen, Jeong-in stopped for a moment. One corner of his heart felt strangely empty.

Chase quietly called out to Jeong-in, who was standing alone in the middle of the living room staring at the kitchen.

“Jeong-in?”

“…I was going to make stew.”

“Stew?”

“It’s what my mom used to make often when I was sick. You looked so exhausted…”

After finishing his words, somewhere in his chest ached dully again.

Chase, who had walked over with big strides, stopped in front of Jeong-in. Then he gently held Jeong-in’s shoulders.

“Let’s go to the supermarket as soon as we wake up tomorrow. After shopping, we’ll make it together and eat it. Since you’re the one who got hurt, you should eat it.”

“…”

Chase gently pressed his forehead to Jeong-in’s forehead. The tips of their noses touched. Like animals communicating, Chase gently rubbed Jeong-in’s nose with his own.

As if moved by that action, Jeong-in’s hands that had been hanging down slowly rose and lightly rested on Chase’s lower back. A small comforting voice came with it.

“…You must be tired.”

As soon as Jeong-in seemed to accept him, Chase acted spoiled as if he’d been waiting.

“Yeah… I’m so tired I could die. Dr. Jacksley dumped the on-call shift on me again and ran off.”

“Jacksley again? Fucking Jacksley, I won’t let it slide. Let’s report him to the physician committee or wherever.”

Chase shook with small laughter. With his face buried in Jeong-in’s nape, he whispered petulantly.

“I was so surprised today I don’t think I can sleep. Hold me and put me to sleep.”

“…Are you five years old?”

“Use your arm as a pillow too. I’ll sleep on your uninjured arm.”

“…Let’s go first. You need to sleep.”

“Will you do it? Arm pillow?”

“…Yeah.”

Jeong-in led his big lover, who was pretending to be a child and acting spoiled, toward the bedroom.

After washing and lying in bed, Chase burrowed into Jeong-in’s small embrace, folding his body up tightly. It seemed his request to be held to sleep hadn’t been entirely a joke.

Chase’s voice rumbled low with his face buried in Jeong-in’s chest.

“You know what? Today was our first fight.”

“There was that time you parked carelessly and got ticketed.”

“Was that a fight? I remember getting one-sidedly scolded.”

“…”

Avoiding answering, Jeong-in just closed his eyes. Sleep poured over him immediately. Probably because too much had happened today. He’d been surprised and hurt, and emotionally drained, so his body surrendered first.

Just as he was sliding toward the border of sleep, Jeong-in felt a ticklish yet strange sensation and slowly opened his eyes.

Looking down, he saw his t-shirt puffed up and moving. Chase had stuck his head inside the t-shirt and was licking his chest.

“Chae!”

Jeong-in tried to grab Chase’s head and pull him out, but he wouldn’t budge.

“You shouldn’t be doing this right now. You haven’t slept properly for days. You’ll ruin your body like this. You need to sleep quickly…”

“I hate consideration.”

Chase spoke against the chest soaked with his saliva. Hot, humid air filled the inside of the t-shirt.

“…Just love me.”

At the words like whining yet sincere, the strength slowly left Jeong-in’s fingertips that had been pushing his head away.