CHDY 44

As soon as Jaeon had a full day off, he visited his mother’s house without any hesitation. Before Jaeon arrived, his mother had set a table overflowing with food.

The table was filled with everything from the seaweed soup Jaeon liked to rolled omelets and various dried side dishes. Jaeon, savoring the simple, familiar, and longed for taste of his mother’s cooking, focused on his meal for the first time in a long while.

He finished two whole bowls of rice for the first time in a long time, and had fruit after the meal. By the time he came to his senses, he had overeaten to the point where his stomach was bulging.

“Look how nice it is to see you eat so well. I should be next to you taking care of you, but you’ve gotten so thin……”

“I’ve been too lazy to cook lately, so I’ve just been eating whatever. I’ll make sure to eat properly from now on.”

He had lost even more weight after presenting as an Omega and being hospitalized. But he had no intention of telling his mother the truth. It would obviously be difficult for her to accept the fact that her ordinary son had become an Omega overnight. He did not want to deliver a shock with his own mouth that she did not need to experience.

“You know, Mom, I’m going to move down to the countryside sometime next month.”

“……What? What do you mean by that……”

At the unexpected story, Jaeon put down the coffee he was drinking and looked at his mother.

“You should live your own life now, too, Jaeon.”

“What are you suddenly talking about?”

“I always said I’d go down to the countryside to live someday. My hometown. My parents’ house is still there, just as it was.”

“……You’re not in good health, and you’re going to go there alone?”

“I’m not alone. My aunt’s family lives in that town. And all the villagers are people I’ve known since I was a child.”

“……”

“I just want to rest comfortably in my hometown now, Mom.”

His mother had always longed for her hometown. She said she wanted to live there, tending a small vegetable garden. She said she wanted to live surrounded by mountains, with nature, and that it was her only hope.

“Still, it’s dangerous to be alone.”

“I’m telling you. My aunt’s house is right next door. And I know everyone in the village. Besides, I have nothing to be afraid of anymore. Struggling in a foreign place, trying to endure just one more day, that’s what’s scarier for me, Mom.”

His mother tightly grasped Jaeon’s hand.

“Jaeon. Mom is healthy now, so don’t worry. From now on, just worry about yourself. From now on, live your life doing what you want to do. Spend all the money you earn on yourself. Buy some clothes, go out and have fun, and date a little. Okay?”

“……”

“My dream is for my son to be happy. Mom is only happy when her son is happy.”

Jaeon pressed his lips firmly together, upset that she was speaking as if they would never see each other again.

“Are you seeing anyone?”

“……No, nothing like that.”

“A person can’t live alone. If you meet someone good, don’t let him go. Got it?”

He had never dared to even dream of something like marriage. Even dating was difficult, so how could he dream of binding himself to someone for life? There were lives where having something to eat and a place to sleep was enough.

“……Take this with you when you go.”

What his mother held out was a white envelope.

“What is this?”

“You gave me a large sum of money last time, Jaeon. I was holding on to what was left.”

“……”

He could not figure out what “large sum of money” she was talking about. With a strange expression, Jaeon picked up the envelope. When he opened it and checked the amount inside, his expression grew even more serious.

“When did I give you a large sum of money?”

“You sent more living expenses than usual, and you sent extra for hospital bills on top of that. I was so surprised when you suddenly sent so much money after I couldn’t reach you. I felt relieved after seeing the text message you sent after that, so I just accepted it…… but I still tried to spend sparingly to return as much as possible.”

“……”

Jaeon soon realized the origin of that money. It must have been sent by Inha. He belatedly recalled the content of the message Inha had sent pretending to be Jaeon. Now he thought he understood the context of why he had sent such a message.

“Exactly how much did I give you, Mom……?”

His mother looked at Jaeon as if his question was strange, but she soon took out her bankbook and showed him the transaction history.

“……”

Was it his own form of guilt? To have sent such a large sum of money in Jaeon’s name.

Now that he found out about it so late, it was money he could not immediately return. While it felt like a heavy debt, Jaeon was now curious about what Inha had been thinking.

Did he think Jaeon was pitiful after finding out about his situation? Did he look so pathetic and miserable as to warrant such a large amount of money? To him, it might have simply been cheap pity. But the amount was too large to be dismissed so lightly with such words.

“Thank you, my son.”

His mother’s hand wrapped warmly around Jaeon’s. While his thoughts were getting tangled up in a complicated mess, his mother’s smiling face, at least, looked as healthy as it used to. The fact that the surgery’s progress was good made Jaeon feel genuinely relieved.

The two of them held each other in an embrace for a moment. Jaeon prayed that his mother would not be sick anymore.

After leaving his mother’s house, Jaeon wandered around the neighborhood for a while. A full day off was rare, so he could not think of what he should do.

He had nowhere to go, but it felt like a waste of his given holiday to go back home. He could just do whatever he wanted to do, but there was nothing in particular he wanted to do. Jaeon wondered what other people did to spend their time in moments like this, and after blankly watching people, he felt awkward and sat down on a bench in a corner of the park.

“……”

All the people passing by were with friends or lovers. Jaeon realized he did not even have a friend to call when he was free. After sitting vacantly and watching the scenery and the people, Jaeon finally got up.

He went into a nearby station, checked the direction, and got on the subway. It took about 15 minutes to arrive at the large shopping center that stretched out from underground. Even though there were closer places, the shopping center he had gone out of his way to take the subway to was the one where the restaurant he had most recently worked at as a server was located.

On a weekday afternoon, the shopping center was not crowded but relaxed. It was a scene that felt unfamiliar to Jaeon, who had always come here to work with an anxious heart.

In the unfamiliar leisureliness, Jaeon wandered around various places by himself. It felt new to slowly look around the places he had previously just passed by to get to work.

As he was slowly passing by, he happened to walk into a men’s clothing store that caught his eye. In the store that felt unfamiliar because it had been so long, he timidly looked around at the clothes.

He held a navy shirt he liked up to the mirror several times before taking it to the checkout counter. As he came out with it in a shopping bag, he realized it was the first new piece of clothing he had bought in years and felt a strange sensation.

After buying the clothes, he headed to the bookstore on the same floor. He browsed to see what kind of books were coming out these days, and if he found a cover that drew him in, he would also flip through the pages.

He did not know how long it had been since he had leisurely browsed a bookstore. He felt the urge to buy a book, but he hesitated and put it down. He reminded himself that if he bought a book every time he wanted one, it would just become more luggage when he had to move.

After staying in the bookstore for a long time, he took the escalator to the upper floor.

“……”

It was the floor where the restaurant he had worked at before was located. Jaeon peeked inside the restaurant to see if Seongju was there. He did not feel like going inside, so he hesitated and was about to pass by the restaurant.

“Hey, Seo Jaeon!”

He turned around at the sound of a voice calling him from behind and saw Seongju. He had come out of the restaurant’s automatic doors with a surprised expression on his face.

“What the, you should have called before coming!”

“……Ah, I was just passing by and wondered if hyung was here……”

It had been nearly a month since he had seen Seongju. They had not contacted each other much during that time.

“I’m about to finish work, so just wait for 30 minutes!”

Jaeon nodded and sat on a nearby bench. When he had waited for exactly 27 minutes, Seongju came out and tapped Jaeon’s shoulder.

“What’s this, Seo Jaeon coming all the way to see me.”

“……I was just passing by, and I thought of you, hyung.”

“Wow, what’s going on. Hey, this won’t do, let’s go for a drink today.”

Jaeon did not usually enjoy drinking. He was more on the side of not being able to drink at all, but he ended up nodding his head in the moment.

The place the enthusiastic Seongju took Jaeon to was a nearby bar. As he stepped inside, where a large cherry blossom tree decoration occupied the center, the unique atmosphere of the bar reminded him of the past. It was the memory of working as a server at a bar as soon as he turned twenty.

“Hey, I got a boyfriend.”

Right after they sat down and finished ordering, Seongju said it without even giving him a chance to breathe. Seeing Seongju’s sparkling eyes, Jaeon’s heart sank with a thud. He had expected it to some extent, but that did not lessen the shock.

“I have a picture we took together. Want to see?”

Seongju took out his phone and held out the screen. Jaeon unknowingly lowered his gaze. He thought he would be okay, but his heart felt frigid even before he looked.

“……”

When he painstakingly raised his eyes, the photo swam into his field of vision. Blink, blink, Jaeon lowered his eyelids and stared blankly at the screen for a few seconds. Only after looking a little longer with trembling eyes did he realize that the man in the photo was not Inha.

A man with a round face and a friendly impression. There was not a single trace of resemblance to Inha anywhere; it was an unfamiliar face. The moment he realized it was not Inha, the tension that had stood on end like frost instantly melted away. Jaeon rubbed the corners of his eyes, trying to compose his confused gaze.

“……He se-seems like a good person.”

As he stammered, Seongju scoffed.

“Hey, you don’t have to lie. I know, too. He’s not as handsome as the guys I’ve shown you before, right?”

“No. It’s not that……”

Seongju, who had no way of knowing that it was a completely different kind of confusion, was misunderstanding.

“Actually, I thought he had a good impression. He looks kind……”