March Novel (Completed) - Chapter 86

Gi Taejeong took a short, deep breath and opened the office door. He was about to call Sehwa immediately. He planned to say something conventional like, “Did you rest well?” or “How are you feeling?” He knew Sehwa would be crying, so he wanted to comfort him gently.

But his lips, about to part, wouldn’t open. Sehwa. He had spoken that name so easily in front of his adjutants, but now, in front of Sehwa himself, he couldn’t form a single sentence. Calling him “honey” was actually easier. It was closer to teasing.

But now he understood too well what Sehwa had felt when he chose “honey” instead of his name in the bunker, and what resolve he had made when he later asked if Gi Taejeong could call him by his name… So now, calling him “Sehwa” intimately, dropping his surname, wasn’t as easy as he thought.

Frustrated, Gi Taejeong repeatedly wiped his dry face. Shit. The timing was awful. Why did this have to happen now? He had just been thinking that he didn’t want to make Sehwa cry anymore, and that he wanted to keep him by his side as much as possible.

His promise to explain everything after the trial was over was sincere. He hadn’t planned to do it immediately, but he had intended to confess honestly soon. If they were to stay together, if he was to take responsibility as he had told Sehwa, instead of just playing around and discarding him. He couldn’t deceive him forever.

He had initially thought lightly of Sehwa. Looking back, there had been subtle points that bothered him for quite some time… But back then, even he didn’t know what to call these feelings. So he had pushed him, sometimes teased him, and often made him cry. …If he were to find some excuse, that was it.

In fact, he already knew. That ultimately, if he condensed all this talk, only one word remained: sorry.

Gi Taejeong, to hide his impatience, needlessly took off and put on his uniform cap as he walked past the entrance hallway towards the living room. Explaining the long list of reasons why he had deceived Sehwa would itself cause more pain, but simply throwing out “I’m sorry” seemed too insincere.

Only then did he truly realize. This wasn’t a battle that could be recovered. It wasn’t a fight where he could repay what was taken, or discuss compensation if there was a mistake. The emotions he shared with Sehwa were closer to individual lives than that. Something that, once withered, could not be replaced by anything else, never to be undone.

“I’m here.”

Suppressing the noisy turmoil within him, the first words he chose were so stiff and blunt that even Gi Taejeong himself let out a sigh.

“…Lee Sehwa.”

Sehwa was sitting curled up on the sofa. He must have sensed Gi Taejeong’s presence, but he didn’t turn around. His round, protruding nape was cute but forlorn, and somehow had a quality that made one’s heart ache.

Gi Taejeong suddenly felt he understood why Sehwa only breathed comfortably in his arms. As soon as he recognized Sehwa’s presence, his tension strangely eased. The moment he perceived, not with his nose but with his mind, that Sehwa’s scent filled the air, he felt like he could finally breathe.

It wasn’t even 6 PM yet, and with summer, the days had grown quite long, but the house remained dim. Even considering it was Zone 4, this place was particularly lacking in sunlight.

A reddish-black sunset cast its light into the unlit office. As Gi Taejeong approached the sofa, his long shadow pierced Sehwa’s rounded, flowing shadow like a knife.

“…How are you feeling?”

Gazing blankly at Sehwa’s face, which looked as if it had been thoroughly ravaged by something sharp, Gi Taejeong slumped onto the opposite sofa.

Sehwa only lifted his head, his gaze still averted. Seeing his lowered eyes were entirely red, it seemed he had been crying continuously during the time Gi Taejeong hadn’t seen him.

Looking back, there had been several moments of friction. It was always Gi Taejeong who made Sehwa cry. He had a blade on his tongue, slicing through Sehwa’s heart. Knowing it would hurt, no, deliberately choosing cruel words to hurl at him.

Yet, Sehwa always reached out first. Even while cowering and trying to read his mood, he would chatter aimlessly or ask for something unbelievably small. And at the end of it, what he gained was an even greater affection than before.

With Sehwa treating him like a still life, Gi Taejeong, who was already at a loss, found it even harder to open his mouth. The fortunate thing was that the bag he carried everywhere like a part of his body was resting quietly beside him. So, he still intended to go back with Gi Taejeong. At the same time, a selfish sense of satisfaction subtly bloomed. Yes, Lee Sehwa likes me. Still, in the end, he likes me.

Gi Taejeong brought his clenched fist to his mouth and cleared his throat a few times. He debated whether to acknowledge the gown that had fallen at his feet but decided to pretend not to notice it.

Then, he suddenly recalled the day he first allowed Sehwa to go out. The young face, buying a 3,000 won ice cream, dangling a plastic bag on his wrist, and desperately searching for only him in the darkness. The white body, truly like his own, that he had explored for a long time after making Sehwa take off the clothes he wore under the pretext of an examination.

And another time, he had held and comforted Sehwa here when he was upset because of Mr. Son. They had sat side by side, applying special makeup, and because he was curious about “that thing” Sehwa did, which was supposedly better than sex, he had asked Sehwa to reenact how he dealt with clients.

Quite a few memories were accumulated on just one sofa. The problem was that he couldn’t call them “memories.”

Gi Taejeong placed the heavy shopping bag on the table. He had imagined “what if” scenarios, but he couldn’t turn back time. If he couldn’t change anything, he had no choice but to move forward. He just needed to treat Sehwa better than before. He would just need to comfort him well. After all, Sehwa hadn’t liked him without knowing what kind of person he was.

“…Should we talk on the way?”

“…”

“I think you might have something you want to ask me.”

Sehwa slowly lifted his head, as if he had heard something unbelievable. He stared intently at Gi Taejeong, his back to the ominously flickering light, and let out a cold, hollow laugh.

After laughing like that for a long time, Sehwa finally dropped his head. He rested his forehead on his knees, caught his breath for a moment, then straightened his curled body. Absolutely straight. There was an unknown resolve in his direct gaze.

“Why are you trying to sound me out? You already seem to guess everything I’ve found out.”

“…I don’t really know where you heard what.”

“…”

“I just thought something was strange when you asked unexpected questions… and I guessed that you must have heard something shocking, either from the doctor Lieutenant Kim planted or from Oh Seonran… to the point of collapsing. And I,”

“Brigadier General…”

Cutting him off as if he didn’t want to hear it, Sehwa bit his lip crookedly with his molars. Hard enough to draw blood.

Sehwa had been wearing these clothes a few days ago. It was the same outfit he had worn the day he fled from the Ministry of Defense’s infirmary to the house, like someone being chased out. He had clearly sent someone to pack clothes and other things for him, but it seemed Sehwa hadn’t touched them. Well, he had only worn a gown while here, so there was no reason to look for new clothes.

However, seeing Sehwa largely unchanged from a few days ago, it felt as if time hadn’t passed. It was like any other day before this unexpected crack appeared, making him feel as if anything could be undone. He kept wanting to believe that.

“Is that all? Don’t you… have anything to say to me?”

But Sehwa didn’t seem to think so. He was trembling slightly, like someone waking from a terrible nightmare. No, he looked like someone who had woken from a sweet dream and was now facing a hellish reality.

“…I was going to explain everything. But your condition right now,”

“You clearly said that, didn’t you? That you didn’t want a child or anything like that.”

“…”

“That if you had known, you would have been careful with contraception, that you really didn’t know.”

Sehwa’s voice, cutting off Gi Taejeong’s words as if he didn’t want to hear them, was firm.

“Of course, I didn’t believe that. I thought there was something… Yes, even if you didn’t know at first, I thought you must have noticed later. That you enjoyed yourself, cumming inside, and only realized later that my body had changed… That’s what I thought. But still, your added excuses seemed sincere, so I thought, ‘Ah… things just got complicated unluckily,’ and…”

“…”

“…But this isn’t just ‘knowing it all along’ level, is it?”

His chin trembled, as if he was holding back tears. Every time Sehwa squeezed his eyes shut and opened them, every time the inner flesh of his tightly bitten lips turned white and sprang back, it felt as if the emotions he harbored were crumbling away.

“How can a person be like this, how can you be so cruel…?”

Gi Taejeong said nothing, only quietly watched that sorrowful collapse. He could do nothing. Other than blankly observing his eyes, which had boiled to their limit and were slowly cooling… there was nothing he could do.

“Was it fun? Every time you saw me say I liked you, not knowing how I was being treated inside…”

He must have thought, “What an idiot,” and finally, Sehwa cried.

“That’s not it.”

“…”

“Lee Sehwa,”

“How… I felt…”

“…”

“What resolve I made to accept liking you… you don’t know.”

You don’t know. You couldn’t possibly know. You wouldn’t have wanted to know that kind of thing. His sorrowful words were broken and buried in swallowed sobs. Sehwa covered his mouth with his hand and tried to catch his breath. Had he gotten even thinner in that short time? His sleeves, looser than before, slid down his arm.

…He could no longer make any calculations. His mouth opened without weighing anything.

I’m sorry. Sehwa, I’m sorry.

The words he had hesitated to utter, holding them back countless times, were about to burst out on their own.

“I’ve thought hard about it all this time. I wanted to pay you back in kind.”

However, Sehwa, flushed with anger, seemed to have no intention of giving Gi Taejeong any more chances.

“But… it seemed useless. I have no money, no power, I’m not smart… I have nothing…”

Sehwa stared at his empty hands, then slowly turned his head towards Gi Taejeong. His gloomy gaze swept over the rank insignia on Gi Taejeong’s chest.

“Besides, you treat me not as a person but as precious evidence… How could I give you the same wound I received?”

“I told you it’s not like that!”

He wanted to say he was sorry, he was sorry. But in the end, he denied it as if screaming.

“Damn it, I…”

He didn’t want to seem threatening. It was becoming harder to endure Sehwa’s gaze, which was growing colder. He felt he understood what his calm expression, which he had never seen before, implied. He had resolved to grant anything, to slowly work things out, but in his anxiety, he ended up shouting first.

“It’s true that I didn’t think much of you at first, that I treated you as a means, that I didn’t treat you like a person. But…”

“…”

“You know it’s not like that anymore.”

“…”

“You know I’ve changed a lot compared to before, that I don’t treat you roughly anymore.”

“…”

“…You know, don’t you?”

At his squeezed, pathetic confession, Sehwa slowly blinked. In those brief moments, various colors passed through his sorrowful pupils as if changing film… and in the end, what remained was an empty black.

“…No, I don’t.”

Sehwa urgently bowed his head as if he hadn’t heard anything. Then he rolled up his sleeves to his shoulders.

“I don’t want to know anymore.”

Several lines of patches were wrapped around his exposed, thin forearm. Like an old spell.