The Unbelievers

Chapter 56

“Well, that’s good then.”

Yoo Siwoon’s eyes were carefully examining Eunseong.

He looked at Eunseong with eyes that seemed to have a lot to say. Just like now. Even if it didn’t have the same meaning, at least the fact that he cared for him wasn’t a lie. What made Eunseong despair was that this emotion wasn’t based on affection, but purely on a sense of responsibility.

“I heard you were going to have a drink with your friends after, but have they all gone home?”

“I just told them not to come. I wanted to be alone.”

“… Are you okay being alone?”

“If I’m not okay, can I live with you, ahjussi?”

“…”

“Even if I’m not okay, I have to live alone. Because now no one will come to check if there are strange noises.”

“… I see.”

Eunseong belatedly realized that he was at a strangely noticeable distance from him. It was quite far for having an awkward conversation. It was a physical distance that made it difficult to smell his body scent. Eunseong didn’t move any closer either. Smelling his scent made him feel strange, made his stomach churn and his head dizzy. Eunseong’s unrequited love was taking on a shape that was impossible to hide.

Yoo Siwoon then gestured towards a small box he had put down next to the front door, saying, “Ah.”

“I brought this for you to eat with your friends.”

“…”

Who said I liked this kind of thing? Eunseong pouted. He kept his gaze down, trying not to look at him. He caught a glimpse of the tattoo that he usually covered with something like a dressing band when he was with him. He worried that his delinquency might negatively affect Eunseong’s emotions. In front of him, he covered his tattoos and didn’t smoke carelessly.

Eunseong suddenly wondered how far the tattoo, starting from his protruding knuckles, extended along his arm and chest. He wanted to check after taking off his clothes. He had so little sexual desire throughout his life that he sometimes wondered if he was asexual, but since realizing his feelings, Eunseong had been having many erotic fantasies. The fantasies always started with Yoo Siwoon’s hands.

Eunseong’s eyes, which had been focused on the blue veins and tendons prominently visible on Yoo Siwoon’s rough hands, moved from his hands to his wrists and then to his chest where the tattoo might be.

Reading the movement of his gaze, Yoo Siwoon rubbed his face as if troubled. Eunseong’s eyes, which had been following the tattoo hidden under his clothes, now turned to Yoo Siwoon’s face.

Their eyes met belatedly.

“…”

“…”

Eunseong didn’t know why he kept staring blankly. Being in the same space with him made Eunseong’s chest tighten. He could feel his heart rate increasing, and he became so aware of his breathing that he couldn’t even exhale properly.

Just looking at him, knowing that he was about to send him to a place where he might not even see his face once every three months, Eunseong felt tears welling up. When he didn’t come, Eunseong had felt so disappointed, but now that he was right in front of him, he felt resentful and upset. And he suddenly realized how much he had wanted to see him.

“Do you keep in touch with my dad? If I were to study abroad… I should at least tell my dad, right?”

“We should. I’m trying to find out where he is now. I’ll find him soon. I’ll tell him to contact you.”

“You don’t know where he is?”

“Not yet.”

“Well, he’s that kind of person… Messy and doing whatever he wants.”

“He must have had his reasons that he couldn’t talk about.”

“So he takes out his anger on his child by hitting them?”

Eunseong’s eyes looked up at Yoo Siwoon challengingly. For Eunseong, who couldn’t even imagine what those unspeakable reasons might be, he had no choice but to judge it that way, and as Eunseong said, Seo Jeong-gi’s behavior wasn’t good. One thing was certain: if it were Yoo Siwoon, he wouldn’t have acted that way towards Eunseong.

“It’s cold. You should go inside now.”

“… Last time…”

Eunseong hesitated with his hand on the doorknob and his lips quivered. From his hesitant attitude, Yoo Siwoon could tell that he was about to talk about what had happened between them that day.

“The way I acted strangely that day…”

“… You remember?”

“Not everything… but a little. Acting like a crazy person, or like someone in heat… I don’t know why I acted that way.”

Eunseong spoke painfully, with an expression that showed he really couldn’t understand why he had acted that way. It was because Yoo Siwoon had made him that way. He had deliberately released pheromones to arouse him and approached closely, touching his clearly pulsing veins.

He stood there silently, listening to what Eunseong was saying.

“You were upset because of me that day, weren’t you? That’s why you haven’t come here even once since then. Ignoring all my calls and messages, not answering. Being left on read is the worst feeling in the world.”

“…”

If it were me, I wouldn’t have brought up that incident.

Yoo Siwoon was realizing in this situation that Eunseong was pure and honest, that he had courage as much as he had a clear heart, and even that shook his heart.

Eunseong was mentioning something that he could feel ashamed about, albeit hesitantly. His eyes carefully observed Yoo Siwoon as he asked if he had been displeased. Even though he was hurt, pushed away, and rejected every time by Yoo Siwoon who had to deny it, he wasn’t hiding his feelings.

Yoo Siwoon felt a dull pain in his chest at the sight of Eunseong like this. The urgent desire to embrace Eunseong was causing a pain that twisted his insides.

“I really don’t know why I acted that way that day. I’m not really crazy. I’m not a weird person.”

“…”

Yoo Siwoon’s hand involuntarily reached out towards Eunseong. His large hand cupped Eunseong’s cheek. Like that day, his thumb caressed the skin.

Eunseong startled. His eyes widened towards him. He flinched and let go of the doorknob he had been gripping tightly, and the front door closed. The door lock automatically locked the door.

For a while, they stared at each other silently, and as the sensor light went off, their surroundings were enveloped in pitch-black darkness. Only the red letters indicating the emergency exit maintained any color in the darkness.

Only their breathing, the sensation of the cheek he was touching, and the feeling of the palm covering his entire face overwhelmed them as their vision was blocked. A sensual tension directed at each other swirled like a heat haze in the empty space.

“… It wasn’t unpleasant.”

His voice murmured lowly. Eunseong felt his heart sink. It was like the sensation of the ground suddenly giving way beneath his feet.

Eunseong’s hesitant hand overlapped the back of the hand cupping his cheek. He gently caressed the protruding knuckles and tendons on the back of his hand.

“But why… why are you trying to send me abroad?”

“Because it’s the right thing to do.”

“…”

“It’s the right thing to do, isn’t it?”

This kind of emotion wasn’t moral. He held Eunseong’s cheek and pleaded in a low voice. He was trying to convince himself that they should make a wise and less painful choice so as not to hurt each other anymore.

Eunseong closed his eyes. The palm cupping his cheek was warm. He had the illusion that the man’s warmth was spreading not just to his face, but throughout his entire body.

Regretting that he hadn’t stolen one of his shirts to smell, longing for the man’s scent, he breathed it deep into his lungs.

The first adult shelter he had, the man who had never once shown displeasure even when he knocked late at night. Although he had been trying not to get emotionally closer to him, Eunseong could tell by intuition that Yoo Siwoon enjoyed the time he spent with him.

It was like that with the coffee and milk they drank together in the morning, and when they searched the garden together late at night to find the source of strange noises. Even without proper conversation, they enjoyed the moments of being together, aware of each other.

Maybe he was being childish about these feelings because this man had allowed everything except touching. He felt like he might act unpleasantly towards him again. His heart was pounding, and soon his lower body started trembling, and his skin, which became sensitively prominent at the slightest touch, began to shiver with terrible sensations.

“It’s not… it’s not right. It’s bad. It’s wrong.”

Yoo Siwoon realized with a sinking feeling that all his arduous efforts to distance himself from Eunseong over the changing seasons were going to waste. He felt dejected and foolish about his obsession that he had maintained like a conviction, wondering why he had kept his distance all that time if it was going to end up like this.

Still, Yoo Siwoon instinctively knew that in the end, he wouldn’t be able to touch Eunseong. Yoo Siwoon knew himself best. He was a man who kept his promises, a man who believed that beauty couldn’t stand above ethics. He was a man for whom beliefs were more important than desires.

That’s why he couldn’t acknowledge these feelings for Eunseong even more. If he admitted his feelings, Yoo Siwoon wasn’t confident he could suppress his desires. He had to stop here, even if it was because of the extremely small possibility that the ‘Great Rift’ could have his child, the ‘God who came by a side road’.

The ‘God who came by a side road’ worshipped by his family could become human, destruction, or some kind of beast – no one knew. The very idea that Eunseong might conceive and give birth to such a thing because of him was unbearable.

Nevertheless, he couldn’t take his hands off Eunseong and opened his mouth. His voice was hoarse, and emotion seeped through to a degree that surprised even himself.

“Then why do you keep asking such things?”

“Because I like you, ahjussi.”