Romantic Gangster

#14

Seo Ji-woo didn’t appear anywhere for three days. Although Lee Hyun-joon knew there was no reason for Ji-woo to come to the billiard hall after finishing his flyer distribution job, he spent three days hanging around the billiard hall, loitering in front of his house, and visiting the usual corner store under the pretext of buying cigarettes.

Even after buying cigarettes, he lingered in the alley hoping Ji-woo might appear, and even went to the front of the house where he had dropped Ji-woo off. But not knowing the exact address, and realizing that even if he did, there was no particular reason why he had to meet Ji-woo, he just ended up returning home each day.

He vaguely remembered hearing about some part-time job Ji-woo had, but he didn’t know the location. He couldn’t call or message the number left on his phone. He thought about sending a message pretending not to know, asking “Who is this?” but his pride wouldn’t allow it, so he had to give up.

Trying to convince himself that he should lose interest, that it was for the best since Ji-woo was annoying anyway, was futile. Honestly… he was going crazy with curiosity about Seo Ji-woo, who had been constantly hanging around him, appearing wherever he went, chatting annoyingly, following him around, and then suddenly disappearing.

He was reminded of Ji-woo not only when applying the ointment, but also when his hand touched the pocket where he kept it, and when he looked in the mirror at the wound on his face.

Moreover, remembering Ji-woo applying medicine on the wooden platform made him feel strange every time he saw it. Because of that damn ramen Ji-woo had given him despite his refusal, just seeing that brand of ramen, both the one Ji-woo gave and the one he bought himself, trapped him in a hell of questions – where did Ji-woo disappear to, had he given up on persuading him, was his persistence really only that much?

“Ah, shit.”

On the fourth day since Seo Ji-woo’s disappearance, Lee Hyun-joon finally couldn’t stand it anymore and put on his school uniform. Then he went to school. He realized school was the only place where he could naturally pretend to run into Ji-woo by chance, without hurting his pride or showing that he was deliberately looking for him out of curiosity.

In the end, damn it. Making me go to school on my own feet. Is this a strategy too? Grumbling, Lee Hyun-joon left home a little after nine o’clock.

* * *

The sunlight entering the infirmary was warm. Ji-woo exhaled while watching the school nurse taking his temperature.

“Your fever has gone down, but it’s still a bit high. Does your head still hurt a lot?”

“It’s better than yesterday.”

“It seems like heat cycle symptoms. In the past, these symptoms wouldn’t appear until you were twenty, but nowadays it’s getting earlier. Recently, even a first-year student had a heat cycle burst at school. His pheromones were strange, and even taking three suppressants didn’t help.”

“What happened then?”

“Luckily, he came here right away, and we gave him cycle suppressants and sent him to the hospital. You’re not at the point where your heat cycle will come immediately, but still be careful. Always carry extra suppressants with you.”

“Yes, I will.”

Ji-woo, after taking a headache pill, left the infirmary. Last Saturday, while doing his part-time job distributing billiard hall flyers, he suddenly started feeling chilly and his condition deteriorated rapidly. He barely finished work and returned home, unable to do anything and lying sick until Monday morning. It wasn’t until Tuesday morning, today, that his condition somewhat improved.

Although he still had a headache, the strange symptoms of shivering, nausea, and alternating between feeling hot and cold had subsided, making it somewhat easier to function.

He wondered why, and now learning it was heat cycle symptoms… Although he knew he couldn’t avoid heat cycles as he would turn twenty in a few months, it still felt unfamiliar. To safely get through a heat cycle, one had to either spend it with an alpha, mixing pheromones, or go to the hospital for an injection to suppress the cycle. Honestly, both methods felt unrealistic to Ji-woo.

Still, thinking it was fortunate that his body had improved for now, Ji-woo climbed the stairs. As he slowly climbed up holding the handrail and entered the corridor where his classroom was, he saw a tall figure standing in the hallway, peeking into the classroom. He wasn’t sure why he recognized him, but as soon as he saw him, he thought it was Lee Hyun-joon. Ji-woo approached and gently grasped Hyun-joon’s arm.

“Lee Hyun-joon?”

“Shit, you scared me!”

Seeing the face that turned around with genuinely surprised eyes, a smile spread across Ji-woo’s face. During the weekend, he had been too unwell to care about anything else, and yesterday he had been lying down all day, unable to check if Hyun-joon had come to school. Seeing that Hyun-joon had come to the classroom on his own made him feel good.

“Why are you standing outside instead of going in? Were you looking for me?”

“W-why would I be looking for you?”

“I told you to come to school, didn’t I?”

“…”

“Didn’t you come to see me?”

He could have just said no, but the denial didn’t come out immediately. Hyun-joon thought, ‘I’ve really lost all my pride, damn it.’ Feeling embarrassed to death, he just chewed on his innocent lips.

“W-why would I come to school to, to see you…”

“Let’s go in for now.”

“Hey, why should I go in?”

“It’s weirder not to go in when you’ve come this far. Let’s attend class and have lunch together later.”

“…Lunch?”

“Yeah.”

Ji-woo’s hand slipped to the inside of Hyun-joon’s arm. Embracing his arm, Ji-woo led Hyun-joon into the classroom. Hyun-joon moved his feet as if he had no choice.

As Hyun-joon entered the classroom, the noisy interior became quiet. Everyone’s eyes turned towards him, making Hyun-joon frown. This was why he hated coming to school. Because they didn’t treat him normally.

Because he was a dominant alpha, because he had a bad personality, because he often fought, because he rarely came to school, because he was an orphan.

The reasons for their stares were varied.

“Here’s your seat.”

“…”

But if there was one thing different from before, it was that there was someone who spoke to him. Seo Ji-woo was the first person to hold his arm, show him his seat, look him in the eye, and ask to have lunch together.

He didn’t whisper speculations about why Hyun-joon had come to school, nor did he give annoying sidelong glances as if afraid of starting a fight if their eyes met. He said what he wanted to say out loud, right to his face, and looked directly into Hyun-joon’s eyes instead of side-eyeing him.

“My seat is over there. In front.”

Hyun-joon, taking in the empty seat in front that Ji-woo pointed to, reluctantly sat down.

“Oh, the teacher’s here. Do you have a textbook?”

“No.”

“I’ll give you mine. Just a moment.”

Ji-woo went to his seat and took out his textbook. He also took out a mechanical pencil and gave it to Hyun-joon.

“You’re probably going to sleep anyway.”

“Still, it’s better to have one than not.”

“You…”

“I can share with Young-jae.”

At the familiar mention of Young-jae’s name, Hyun-joon briefly glanced towards the empty seat next to him and nodded vaguely. Ji-woo smiled at Hyun-joon’s response and quickly returned to his seat.

“…”

As soon as he returned, Ji-woo said something to the guy sitting next to him, and the guy called Young-jae pushed his textbook to the middle of their two desks. Soon, Ji-woo opened something like a notebook and started writing. Hyun-joon stared intently at Ji-woo’s side profile with his chin resting on his hand.

He felt like Ji-woo looked a bit more sickly than when he last saw him. He seemed to lack energy, and his face looked even paler.

Is he sick or something? Well, it’s not my business.

With no desire to listen to the teacher’s rambling and finding it torturous to just sit idly and waste time, Hyun-joon put his head down and closed his eyes. He couldn’t understand why he couldn’t just get up and leave, even though that’s what he wanted to do.

“…”

But one thing was certain: when Seo Ji-woo had approached him earlier, pretending to know him, when he grabbed his arm, when he didn’t let go and dragged him into the classroom…

It had felt quite good.

His whole body felt tingly, making it difficult to try to sleep while lying down. When he sat up straight, his eyes met directly with the teacher standing at the podium. The startled teacher continued the lesson without singling him out.

Hyun-joon rested his chin on his hand again and gazed at Ji-woo’s round back of the head and his neat side profile as he sat straight without a single posture change, continuously writing something.

Until the end of the class that he thought would be unbearable, until that pale face turned to look at him.

Just before the end-of-class bell rang, the teacher left the classroom. Hyun-joon, who had been staring only at Ji-woo without realizing the bell was about to ring, was startled and quickly averted his gaze when he saw the round head turning towards him. Even though he hadn’t done anything that shouldn’t be discovered and didn’t possess anything, he felt as if Seo Ji-woo had caught him doing something.