Chapter 56: 24.2

“Are you drunk?”

Woo-hyun asked, seeing Yoo-hwa’s reddened face.

“No.”

Contrary to her answer, Yoo-hwa’s eyes were glistening and out of focus.

He thought she was good at drinking because she answered his question quickly, and didn’t think she would look like that with only half a can.

Woo-hyun covered his smiling mouth with the beer can.

“You look good. It was a good decision to ask you to have a drink.”

Woo-hyun said after a sip of beer.

“… Yeah. I haven’t drunk in a while, so it feels good.”

“…”

“Is it because I’m drinking with you?”

“…”

“No, I mean…”

The startled Yoo-hwa, who seemed to have spilled her innermost thoughts without realizing it, tried to fix it, but all she did was hesitate. Her moving lips soon closed, hopeless. Instead, Yoo-hwa’s gaze reached Woo-hyun’s long fingers, holding the beer can.

“I feel the same.”

“…”

“It’s comfortable drinking with you. It’s been a long time since I drank with someone like this.”

Woo-hyun responded lightly, holding the can of beer.

“… Really?”

Yoo-hwa, who would normally say nothing, asked in a more excited voice than usual.

“Yeah.”

That was genuine. It’s been a long time since he drank with someone else. And drinking with Yoo-hwa wasn’t that bad.

Yoo-hwa smiled openly. Woo-hyun looked at her slightly smiling mouth and eyes bent like a crescent moon without blinking.

“I’m glad.”

“…”

“There are moments like this.”

“…”

Yoo-hwa, who said vague words that could not be understood, picked up the can of beer. The rain became heavier and heavier, pounding on the roof even harder.

“… Can I ask you one question?”

Yoo-hwa asked cautiously.

“What is it?”

“Why… did that complicated thing start? I mean, you said there was a circumstance… I was wondering what happened. If it’s difficult or troublesome to talk about it, you don’t have to.”

A little drunk, Yoo-hwa was brave. She was trying to snoop around his past, which she would not normally dare. Woo-hyun smiled deeper than before when he was asked about himself for the first time.

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Woo-hyun had several answers. What answers did he need to say to get deeper into Yoo-hwa’s heart, what words would touch her?

“My sister was going to be pimped if I didn’t get stabbed.”

He could lie. As he always did, so that she didn’t know what was true. But he said it with sincerity.

“They would pay me twice as much if I survived being stabbed. And then, I was still alive, with debt.”

It was a moment when money was more pitiful than death.

“Now that I paid off my debt, I’m living with inertia.”

His reason for dying had disappeared. Although he didn’t have a reason to live either. He didn’t want to be stabbed to death by someone else for no reason.

That’s why he was living.

Woo-hyun expressed the true feelings he wouldn’t tell anyone, with the ridiculous excuse of drunkenness.

“… I see.”

“…”

Yoo-hwa lowered her head, unable to give a proper answer to the heavy truth. Woo-hyun’s expression disappeared slightly.

He was dumbstruck. He thought that if it was Kim Yoo-hwa, she would say something. At least things like ‘because it hurts.’ At this moment, whether it was empathy or consolation or whatever… he just wanted to hear it.

Maybe he was the one who got drunk.

Woo-hyun murmured in self-scorn.

The floor was filled with water droplets that were dripping from the beer can. Yoo-hwa slowly wiped them off with a tissue. She folded the damp tissue and hurriedly wiped the dry floor once more. After repeating that meaningless act several times,

“I want you to be happy.”

Yoo-hwa said, amid the silence. Yoo-hwa, who slowly raised her head, looked at Woo-hyun with drunk eyes. The moment he faced her tearful eyes, Woo-hyun thought that someone seemed to be sticking their hands inside him and rummaging around.

He wanted to hear anything, but when he heard more than he expected, he felt like he was going to lose his mind.

Why was she saying that at this moment, what did she mean by that, why… was she wishing for his happiness once again? Did she know what he was here to do? Did she know the sister that he sold his life to protect had died at the hands of her brother?

He held back the irrational urge to scream, clenching his teeth tightly.

“I hope you can do that now, Woo-hyun.”

Yoo-hwa called his name for the first time in a long time, after meeting again. The emotions that had risen all at once faded as if they had never existed in the first place.

Each of Yoo-hwa’s words turned his emotions into a mess.

Woo-hyun’s shoulder sank down powerlessly.

“I really… I hope so.”

Woo-hyun was in despair at the sincerity she quietly added.

Kim Yoo-hwa, who sometimes went beyond his expectations and thoughtlessly showed her true feelings… He had a feeling that he couldn’t defeat her.

Pitch-black darkness swarmed in.

In the afternoon, after drinking two cans of beer, Yoo-hwa collapsed to the floor. Woo-hyun, who barely supported her head, laid Yoo-hwa down in his bed and covered her with a blanket. Woo-hyun sat leaning against the wall and looked at Yoo-hwa quietly. The ambient changed just by having Yoo-hwa in the room.

The drunken Yoo-hwa spoke well. Although it felt like she was saying anything because she hated the silence, Woo-hyun listened quietly because her voice, talking quietly about him, matched well with the sound of the rain.

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