For chat & news, join Flaerin's Discord.
Buy more pods to read ahead!
Become a lifetime bl reader to read all current and upcoming series, forever.
Chapter 22
As Friday approached, Gyuhan’s leg-shaking grew more severe. A childhood habit he’d broken had returned. The thing he wanted back remained silent and absent, while the uninvited guest ran rampant.
Eventually, when he visited his family’s main house, his mother slapped his thigh hard. She had a stinging hand. A red handprint was left on his thigh as if struck by a volleyball player, but Gyuhan didn’t even register the pain.
Friday is almost here. Gong Jio will arrive soon, and I have to apologize to him. That single thought consumed his brain.
As the hour drew nearer, he reached the point where he wished the time would just hurry up and come so he could confess and end this nightmare. Please, let me just confess quickly, get beaten half to death, apologize, and be done with it. Gyuhan groaned in agony, clutching at the fabric of his trousers over his thighs.
And with good reason. While the erectile tissue of his member had ceased activity, his libido was as active as ever.
If you’re going on strike, do it together! Where’s your loyalty?!
Gyuhan felt an itch throughout his body and a sex drive intense enough to keep him tossing and turning, but he had no outlet. Naturally, he had no intention of squandering his precious front on such a trivial occasion after saving it all this time; using the back was out since he currently had no partner; and taking care of it alone…
“God damn it…!”
Gong Jio came to mind.
Gyuhan bit down on his pillow and pounded the mattress with his fist. Should I just close my eyes and do it once?! The temptation certainly crossed his mind, but he didn’t even want to imagine what else he might lose if he crossed that line a second time. If merely thinking of Gong Jio once cost him his erections, doing it twice might cost him his hair. That would make him the first bald man in the Cha family line, which possessed zero hair-loss genes. That humiliation, he could never endure.
“Gong Jio, you dog bastard.”
Gyuhan ground his teeth, sobbing dryly.
“Hurry up and get here so I can fucking apologize.”
Now, whether he was waiting for Jio because he wanted to apologize or because of something else, Gyuhan didn’t even know. He just waited for Gong Jio. Do you know the feeling of ‘please’? Now he understood. He also understood that the matchmaking agency employee hadn’t been begging for his happiness. Because that was Gyuhan right now. Please… and the rest is omitted. Too much to say, beyond words.
Thinking only of Gong Jio, waiting only for him, seeking only him, thinking, waiting, seeking….
And finally, Friday.
From morning on, Gyuhan had a vacant, silly smirk plastered across his face like a madman. Fortunately, since it was Friday, the other office workers were also smiling through exhaustion, so no one found him suspicious.
Friday, 11:50. 11:50 PM. Ah, fuck, why PM? 11:50 AM would be so much better.
Repeating only that, Gyuhan shook his leg, scrolled through photos of Gong Jio, and jabbed his thigh with a ballpoint pen as he waited.
1 o’clock, 2 o’clock, 3 o’clock… Reciting each passing hour, Gyuhan’s condition worsened. By now, the secretary simply avoided entering Gyuhan’s office altogether. Gyuhan kept his phone on, staring back and forth between Jio’s photo and the clock. He had lost track of why he was even waiting, his appearance that of a pure lunatic staring fixedly in one direction.
“He really is pretty.”
With dark circles hanging low, Gyuhan muttered to himself.
Displayed on the phone screen was Gong Jio on their high school graduation day. Beside him was Gyuhan himself, arm slung over Jio’s shoulder, brandishing a bouquet of flowers high in the air.
Gong Jio was pretty, and he was handsome. Who would have guessed back then? That even by this age, both Jio and himself would still be single. Gyuhan had truly believed that by his mid-thirties, he would already be serving as the PTA chairman at his firstborn’s elementary school. And Gong Jio…
“Hm?”
Gyuhan blinked dry, fatigued eyes, letting out a puzzled murmur.
Come to think of it, what did Gong Jio say he wanted to do?
No… had he ever talked about the future?
The sudden question momentarily halted Gyuhan’s anxiety.
4 o’clock, 5 o’clock…
By the time two hours had passed, Gyuhan couldn’t recall a single thing about what Gong Jio had wanted to do or whether he’d ever mentioned the future. Just like his romantic type, Gyuhan knew nothing.
Gyuhan stared blankly at young Jio’s face. When he zoomed in with his fingers, he noticed an expression so rigid it was hard to believe it was a graduation photo.
“……”
Gyuhan couldn’t say a word.
✦ ✦ ✦