Romantic Gangster

#11

“…What. What thoughts of me are you going to have while taking more?”

“I usually meet you at night, right? I might meet you at night again, so I should take suppressants… That kind of thought?”

Hearing the reason made Hyun-joon feel embarrassed for finding those words ticklish. Not knowing exactly where he was itchy, he just rubbed his arm vigorously and got up from the platform, heading towards the stairs.

“Where are you going?”

“To buy ramen.”

“Haven’t you had dinner?”

“No.”

“Because of the fight?”

“…Yeah.”

The last answer came a beat late, slightly embarrassed again. Until just now, he hadn’t thought about it, but somehow the situation of not having dinner because of fighting seemed a bit too pathetic.

“How many packs of ramen do you eat at once?”

“Three. I can’t eat much because I’m sick of it.”

“Wow, three.”

Ji-woo quickly caught up with Hyun-joon, who was taking the stairs two at a time, and stood beside him.

“How many do you eat?”

“One.”

Hyun-joon exhaled as if he’d expected that answer and started walking towards Ji-woo’s house. He was going to buy ramen, but his main reason for coming along was that he didn’t feel comfortable letting an omega smelling so sweet walk alone through the dark alleys of this rough neighborhood.

“I came from that direction earlier…”

“This way is faster.”

Hyun-joon was striding along, mapping the route in his head, when he suddenly stopped, noticing the absence of the sweet scent. He turned around abruptly.

He had noticed the scent was gone, and there was Ji-woo, lagging behind and panting. It seemed he couldn’t keep up with Hyun-joon’s long strides and fast pace. The castella scent, about ten steps behind, approached. It really was a peculiar pheromone scent, no matter how he thought about it.

“Hurry up and follow me.”

As he was about to turn back and continue walking, he felt something tugging from behind. Hyun-joon turned his head again and looked down at the white hand gripping the hem of his T-shirt.

“Just a bit, hah… Can we go, slower? It’s too, fast, I can’t keep up… Hah, it’s hard.”

Between words, his speech was broken by panting. Whether from the exertion or not, the pheromone scent seemed stronger than before. It felt like he’d walked into a shop selling sweet treats. He was already hungry from missing lunch and dinner, and smelling this sweet scent made him feel like he might lose control.

“We don’t have to go together. I’ll go at my pace, and you follow at yours.”

Hyun-joon said harshly, then turned and started walking again. Despite his words, his pace had noticeably slowed. Ji-woo, still holding onto Hyun-joon’s shirt and catching his breath, smiled and came up beside him again.

“You’re secretly quite kind.”

“If I’m kind, I’m kind. What’s ‘secretly quite kind’?”

“Your words aren’t kind, so I can’t say you’re truly kind. It’s just that your actions are secretly kind, unlike your words.”

“Just say I have a nasty temper and be done with it.”

A soft laugh spread through the alley. Hyun-joon stole a glance at the clear, warm-sounding laughter that seemed out of place in this rough neighborhood. It was a kind of laughter he’d never seen before, one he’d never encounter among the people he usually associated with.

“…”

Hyun-joon rubbed his fingertips on his pants for no reason, then grasped the cigarette pack in his pocket before letting go. He really wanted to smoke one, but thinking of the person next to him, he didn’t feel like smoking anymore. It seemed better to send him off first and smoke afterward.

After walking slowly and turning right, they came to a main road. From here, they just needed to cross one crosswalk and walk a bit more to reach the supermarket where he usually bought cigarettes.

“Oh… This is the way to my house.”

“…”

“…Are you walking me home?”

Even the question felt strangely ticklish. He could just answer ‘yes,’ but he felt too strange to casually say that short ‘yeah.’ He wanted to smoke, to splash cold water on his face, to go to the baseball batting cages and just hit balls like crazy.

“It’s not because you’re leaking pheromones. If I just let you go and something happens, shit, I’ll be the one blamed. Even though I didn’t do anything, I’d be the one under suspicion.”

“Thank you, Hyun-joon.”

Ah, shit. Why did he say his name like that… It’s just a name, nothing special about using it, but it felt different from how he usually heard his name.

The pool hall owner called him Hyun-joon, and all the people at Friendly Loan Shark casually called him Hyun-joon too. But for some reason, he couldn’t understand why it felt so different when this castella-scented guy said his name.

“From tomorrow, I’ll really take more medicine.”

“Yeah. Take it and don’t bother people.”

As Hyun-joon was about to cross the crosswalk without waiting, he felt a hand grabbing his arm. Even though no cars pass here at night and they could cross a hundred times without issue, the hand didn’t let go. Hyun-joon had no choice but to wait until the light turned green before crossing.

Even after crossing, he noticed the hand still holding his arm, but he didn’t tell them to let go immediately. It just… well, it didn’t feel bad, so it seemed okay to continue like this.

As they entered the alley, they saw a small shop closed due to the late hour. Passing it, Hyun-joon stopped in front of the house. He felt the hand release his arm. A cool breeze touched his arm, which had felt unusually warm.

“Thanks for walking me home. I have ramen at home, wait a moment. I’ll give you some ramen.”

“It’s fine. Why would you give me ramen?”

“I’m grateful you came all this way with me when you’re hungry, and I also feel sorry. Just wait a moment. I’ll be right back.”

Ji-woo went inside and took three packs of ramen neatly stacked in the cupboard, put them in a shopping bag, and added a few small packs of his favorite potato snacks, feeling it was a bit lacking to just give ramen. He quickly went back outside. Hyun-joon was standing exactly as he had been when Ji-woo went in. He had worried for a moment that Hyun-joon might have left, but was glad he hadn’t.

“Here, ramen.”

Hyun-joon took the shopping bag and looked inside. There were three packs of ramen and a few snacks with some character drawn on them.

“You’ll go broke giving stuff away to people.”

“I don’t do this for just anyone. I’m not in a position to, and I’m not that kind either.”

“So you’re giving it to me specifically?”

“Yes. I told you. I’m giving it because I’m grateful and sorry.”

The face nodding at the words “I don’t do this for just anyone” and “So you’re giving it to me specifically?” etched itself strongly in Hyun-joon’s mind. With a strange feeling, he gripped the handles of the shopping bag containing the ramen and snacks.

“…I’m going.”

“Go carefully. Thanks for today.”

Why does he keep saying such ticklish things? None of the guys he knew ever said goodbyes like this. There were those who’d cackle and curse, telling him to die on the way home, but he’d never seen anyone who’d tell him to go carefully and watch him leave.

Hyun-joon, who had taken a couple of steps with this ticklish, strange feeling, suddenly turned around as if remembering something.

“Hey. What’s your name?”

By this point, he expected to hear a scolding. How could he not know the name, how could he be so indifferent, how could he not know after being in the same class, meeting several times, and spending quite some time together. But instead…

“Ji-woo.”

“…”

“Seo Ji-woo.”

What came back was a name and a smile. The moment he faced that smile, the streetlight seemed to lose its light and Ji-woo sparkled. When he blinked, the streetlight was shining again.

“Now that you know my name, you really have to come to school.”

“Hey, don’t subtly try to persuade me. What does that have to do with anything?”

“You know my face, you know my name, we’ve met like this several times already. That means we’re friends, right?”

“That’s ridiculous. Why would I be your friend?”

Hyun-joon, who had been slowly stepping backward, left those final words and turned around again.

“See you tomorrow, Hyun-joon.”

Hyun-joon’s fingers tightened on the shopping bag at the voice reaching his back. This time, his fingertips tingled.

And that tingling didn’t disappear as he left the alley where Ji-woo’s house was, passed the crosswalk where Ji-woo had started holding his arm, went through the narrow alley where Ji-woo had stood beside him laughing out loud, passed the path where Ji-woo had been panting, and until he saw the ointment, bandages, cotton swabs, and disinfectant on the wooden platform.

* * *

Hyun-joon, after applying more ointment to his lip, put a cigarette in his mouth. It seemed a bit funny to be applying ointment to avoid scars, not caring about his image, but every time he saw the ointment, he remembered Seo Ji-woo’s face telling him to make sure to apply it, so he just did. Ji-woo might look upset later if he saw the ointment almost unused. Well, whether Ji-woo was upset or not wasn’t really his business.

Forgetting to light the cigarette, Hyun-joon sat on the platform with the long cigarette just in his mouth, looking at the empty space beside him for no reason. It was just last night, but it strangely felt like it happened a very long time ago. It was the first time someone had come here and sat with him on the platform, and also the first time someone had applied medicine to his face because he was hurt. Was that why? It felt even less like it had really happened.