Projection Novel (Completed) - Chapter 57

During the few days Cheon Sejoo stayed at his house, Sejin dealt with the postponed matters with him. They reported the death, contacted the insurance company to receive the death benefit, and enshrined her ashes on a sunny hillside. Sejin chose a tree burial.

Despite being January, the weather wasn’t particularly cold. On a day when the cold snap had ended and the temperature rose to over C, the two stood on a sun-drenched hillside. The coats over their black suits felt heavy. Sejin looked at the small tree in front of him, his cheeks flushed slightly.

Kim Hyunkyung’s ashes were laid beneath a round, beautiful Thuja tree. The tree Sejin had personally chosen was a rare species said to have been planted in kings’ tombs in ancient times. Though it was very small now, as time passed and Sejin gradually forgot his memories of her, that Thuja tree would grow into a giant, nourished by those memories. Sejin gently touched its green leaves, wishing for the tree to grow healthily.

Soon, Sejin turned his gaze from the tree and finally etched the gravestone before him into his mind. From her birth to her death, countless days had simply become a series of numbers, a fact that left a bitter taste, but that was what death was. It was about remaining as records, as memories, as traces in someone’s life.

Only after seeing the gravestone that contained her life did the fact that he could no longer meet his mother truly seem to become a reality.

“…Let’s go.”

Finally having composed himself, Sejin closed and then opened his eyes tightly, turning towards Cheon Sejoo. The man, who had been watching only Sejin with an indifferent expression, nodded.

They had to go down to the office, then take a shuttle bus to the parking lot, so the two headed for the bus stop. The stop, made from a container, was much warmer inside than outside, with a small heater lit. Sejin seated Cheon Sejoo and turned to where coffee and tea bags were prepared.

“I’m not drinking.”

Cheon Sejoo said that from behind, but Sejin silently took out two paper cups. He put in a Solomon’s Seal tea bag, poured hot water to the brim, then overlapped another cup to protect his hands from the heat before returning to his seat. When he offered it to Cheon Sejoo, who was leaning back in his chair, he shook his head.

“No, you drink it.”

“You like this, don’t you?”

He pushed it away, but as Sejin stubbornly held out the cup, he had no choice. Finally, Cheon Sejoo took the cup with both hands and held it. His large hands enveloped the paper cup, and his fingertips visibly flushed crimson as they warmed. Sejin gazed at him for a moment, then suddenly looked up.

Despite being told to go down first, Cheon Sejoo had silently stayed by Sejin’s side, leaving his entire body frozen. As the hot steam rising from the Solomon’s Seal tea clung to his pale face, only then did a reddish vitality return.

Watching him, Sejin quietly reached out and cupped his hands around Cheon Sejoo’s cheeks. However, his feeling that they would be ice-cold must have been his imagination, for all he felt was a warmth warmer than expected.

“…What are you doing?”

With his cheeks slightly pressed, he frowned slightly and asked. Sejin, pulling up the corners of his mouth as he looked at his handsome brow, simply shook his head. “It’s cold,” he mumbled, and Cheon Sejoo put the cup down on the table and took his hands away.

The palm of the hand that had been holding the paper cup of Solomon’s Seal tea was as warm as a stove. With that hand, Cheon Sejoo caressed various parts of Sejin’s hand, sharing his warmth. Sejin, who hadn’t realized he himself had been as cold as ice, only then felt the chill that had permeated deep into his heart and bit his lip.

When Cheon Sejoo was by his side, he didn’t have time to feel the cold. Because before he could even realize it, he would take away his chill. Sejin was so accustomed to receiving warmth from Cheon Sejoo.

Why do you always only give to me? Sejin swallowed the rising question and leaned his head on Cheon Sejoo’s shoulder. Even when he pressed his weight heavily against him, he didn’t push Sejin away.

When Kim Hyunkyung was in the hospital, Sejin would cry just imagining a life without her. It felt like a life walking on a crumbling world, or a life trapped in deep darkness as if the sun had vanished.

However, once she had actually passed away, he saw that nothing in the world had changed. Sejin found this truly strange. He wondered if something was wrong with him, living the same life as usual, the world was so unchanged.

But now he knew. Loss suddenly comes at the moment you don’t realize you’ve lost something.

Today, Sejin spent the day making side dishes. But after making his favorite fernbrake  salad and putting it on the table, he belatedly remembered that his mother had also really liked it.

At that moment, he couldn’t bear to look at the fragrant greens anymore. Sejin instinctively knew that he would no longer be able to eat fernbrake. Every time he moved his chopsticks, his mother’s face would come to mind, so he could no longer like fernbrake.

Unable to throw away what he had made, Sejin ate all the greens right there. Tears flowed as his mother kept coming to mind, so he couldn’t really taste it. Time passed vaguely, like chewing sand, and as he washed the empty bowl, Sejin realized what this was. It was burying things related to the deceased, one by one, in his heart. For Sejin, that was a loss.

“Sejin-ah.”

“…”

“Are you not feeling well?”

It was dinner time, and Cheon Sejoo, who had settled down after work, gazed at Sejin for a moment then asked. Sejin stared at Cheon Sejoo with gloomy eyes then shook his head.

Each time these moments of loss arrived, Sejin had to control his surging emotions. This was because there was still unresolved resentment deep in his heart. But why of all things, whenever such questions arose, he would repeat the words Cheon Sejoo had told him, calming his mind.

That’s just how it is. Dying is just like that. It’s no one’s fault.

Thus, Cheon Sejoo filled the void left by loss. The words that comforted Sejin, the hugs that comforted Sejin, all his actions that comforted Sejin. Because of him, Sejin could endure each day and find stability, moving past the aftermath of his loss.

Cheon Sejoo steadily filled Sejin’s empty spaces. He was already someone who occupied a large part of him, but he unfailingly overflowed into the spaces that were becoming empty as memories of Kim Hyunkyung crumbled.

With each passing day. And another day, his feelings for Cheon Sejoo grew. Thanks to this, his resolve to slowly get to know Cheon Sejoo, who had feared him and ran away, had somehow loosened, and these days Sejin found himself unknowingly revealing his true feelings.

“Cheon Sejoo.”

“Hm?”

“You need to wipe off the water properly.”

An unconsciously extended hand affectionately caressed the ends of Cheon Sejoo’s hair. A shadow fell over his cool, downcast eyes. Cheon Sejoo looked up at Sejin, who was drying his hair with a towel, and his lips tightened.

“…I’m not a child.”

In the silence that stretched between them, Sejin belatedly realized his mistake. As Sejin said that and covered Cheon Sejoo’s head with the towel, stepping back, Cheon Sejoo began to shake off the water with a straight face, as if nothing had happened.

It was hard to control such overflowing feelings. Sejin couldn’t hide the hands that reached out to him intermittently.

He couldn’t help the hand that brushed the water droplets from the ends of his hair, or the hand that tied the loosened knot of his robe, and Sejin kept trying to cross the line that Cheon Sejoo had drawn.

It was unavoidable. Sejin was originally a quick-tempered and direct person, not good at beating around the bush or waiting. For him to keep his mouth shut with the person he loved right in front of him, that was nothing short of torture.

But unlike Sejin, Cheon Sejoo was cold. As long as Sejin didn’t bring up Kim Hyunkyung, he no longer indulged Sejin’s childishness. He didn’t carelessly allow him to close.

Sejin’s heart was burning from the guard Cheon Sejoo put up, and it was only a matter of time before his true feelings would be revealed in that fire.

It was one such day when Sejin was precariously reaching out beyond the line. On a weekend morning, Sejin, wrestling with Cheon Sejoo on the mat, panted for breath without being able to lay a single finger on him.

“How are you going to knock anyone out like this?”

After returning to his routine, Cheon Sejoo put much more effort into teaching Sejin than before summer came.

It was different from then, when the main focus was light exercise, almost self-defense. These days, Cheon Sejoo would attack Sejin as if he held a grudge, telling him to try and subdue him. Of course, it was impossible. Just being close enough to touch Cheon Sejoo made his body stiffen, so there was no way Sejin could overpower him, even if he just mimicked the moves.

Again, Cheon Sejoo, who had reversed and subdued Sejin, pressed him down with a cold expression. His hands gripped Sejin’s arms. His shoulders ached as if they would dislocate, but all of Kwon Sejin’s nerves were focused on Cheon Sejoo’s lower body, which was on his waist. Sejin, who buried his forehead in the mat to hide his flushed face, mumbled in a muffled voice.

“Do we really have to do it like this? Go a little easier…”

“Talk sense. Who attacks someone gently?”

Cheon Sejoo reprimanded Sejin, who was acting childish, with a displeased expression. Sejin gasped for breath and turned his head to look up at Cheon Sejoo behind him. The face looking down at him was serious. With a face devoid of any humor, Cheon Sejoo was teaching Sejin.

Drained by his seriousness, Sejin mumbled with his cheek pressed against the mat.

“Who exactly is attacking me? In this world, you’re the only one who wants to hit someone as big as me for no reason.”

“…”

At that, Cheon Sejoo stretched his lips in displeasure and released Sejin. He got up and walked to the window, then opened the tumbler on the cabinet and drank water. Sejin quietly turned his body and lay on the floor, looking up at him.

His sweat-soaked hair and part of his T-shirt clung tightly to Cheon Sejoo’s body. A stream of water trickled down from Cheon Sejoo’s mouth onto his shirt, revealing his stretched collarbone. Cold droplets of water fell onto the mat, one by one. As he quietly watched, Cheon Sejoo wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and offered the tumbler to Sejin.

However, they had been grappling for 30 minutes already. Sejin, who didn’t even have the strength to lift his arm, sat up instead of taking it, opening his mouth towards him. He stuck out his tongue and closed his eyes, waiting for water, when suddenly Cheon Sejoo chuckled and nudged Sejin’s leg with his foot. Finally, Sejin, unable to wait any longer, slowly opened his eyes and asked.

“Why?”

“Are you a chick?”

“My arm won’t go up.”

“Don’t be so dramatic over just this much.”

Cheon Sejoo never went easy during exercise. While he would silently hug him and stroke his head when he talked about his mother, he absolutely refused to indulge him without an excuse. Sejin truly hated that conditional tenderness. He wished he was always gentle with him. Feeling suddenly upset, Sejin shrugged his shoulders and glared at him.

“I’m not being dramatic. You hurt me.”

“I didn’t even do anything that truly hurts.”

“Yes, you did. It hurt.”

“Stop fooling around.”

Cheon Sejoo took Sejin’s whining as a signal that he wanted to stop exercising. That’s not it. Sejin’s cheeks gradually puffed out. Pouting and glaring at him discontentedly, Sejin soon snatched the tumbler from Cheon Sejoo’s hand and quenched his thirst with the cold water. As his dry mouth became moist, he finally felt some strength returning. Sejin got up, pulled up his sagging pants, and stood in the center of the mat.

He saw Cheon Sejoo returning after putting the tumbler back on the cabinet. Sejin stood with his arms at his sides, gazing at him, and said,

“Do it again.”

At that, Cheon Sejoo, as if surprised, watched him with narrowed eyes, then lunged at Sejin without any warning. His slender arm came close to his neck. Sejin grabbed Cheon Sejoo’s wrist and pressed his body against him. However, Cheon Sejoo lightly twisted his body and slipped out of Sejin’s embrace. Feeling him move behind him, Sejin quickly widened the distance. Cheon Sejoo, who narrowly missed Sejin’s nape, chuckled softly and whispered, “Good job.” At the voice that tickled his insides, Sejin frowned and turned around.

Sejin didn’t always want to lose to Cheon Sejoo. As much as he liked him, he wanted to show him a cool side of himself, and he wanted to see his surprised face when he was subdued. However, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t defeat Cheon Sejoo. Even though Sejin was now taller and bigger than him, when he faced Cheon Sejoo, Sejin couldn’t exert any strength.

Unlike Cheon Sejoo, who knew how to apply just the right amount of force at the right time, Sejin charged like a dog relying only on his size, so the result was obvious. Cheon Sejoo was someone who was told that using his body in this way was his calling, but Sejin had never even been to taekwondo. For him to defeat Cheon Sejoo was practically impossible for a lifetime.

“Haah, haah…”

As the sparring continued, his breath grew increasingly ragged. Unlike Sejin, who stood panting, Cheon Sejoo stood perfectly still, unruffled. The only difference from before was that a few more beads of sweat clung to his nape. Seeing his seemingly relaxed demeanor, Sejin gritted his teeth and lunged at him.

Kwon Sejin was a twenty-year-old boy full of competitive spirit, and once the fire was lit, there were no exceptions, not even for someone he liked. He wanted to win even more because his opponent was Cheon Sejoo, so Sejin stretched out his arm with the attitude that he would absolutely knock Cheon Sejoo down. His clenched fist sliced through the air.

“I told you to protect yourself, not to attack.”

However, the attempt failed instantly. Cheon Sejoo, who had thrown Sejin onto the mat, grabbed his arms and held them up. A voice devoid of warmth reprimanded Sejin. Kwon Sejin bit his lip tightly and looked up at Cheon Sejoo with a wronged expression.

“That’s the same thing.”

“I told you it’s different.”

“I want to learn how to attack, Cheon Sejoo.”

“What you need to learn is subduing. I’m not teaching you how to attack right now.”

Cheon Sejoo kept explaining it like that, but honestly, he couldn’t understand what the difference was. If you knocked someone out, you could subdue them, right? And he said he would teach him how to hit at first, so why does he dislike it now? Sejin looked up at Cheon Sejoo with a sullen face.

“There’s also a saying that offense is the best defense. So isn’t the best defense also an offense?”

He tried to explain his logic to him in that state, but it didn’t go through at all. Cheon Sejoo listened to Sejin’s words, then laughed incredulously and looked down at him, saying,

“You have no talent for that.”

At his firm words, Sejin narrowed his eyes. He was the one who had knocked out Lee Haegyun and Kim Byungjoon with a lunch tray. Shouldn’t he not talk about talent for violence to him? Sejin, his pride hurt, managed his surging emotions and pulled his hand free from his grip. In that state, he spoke a truth Cheon Sejoo didn’t know.

“It’s because it’s you. I can hit other people properly.”

Sejin was a very dangerous and aggressive person. He just hadn’t gone all out because he was afraid of hurting Cheon Sejoo, but if he really put his mind to it, he could hurt others just like Cheon Sejoo did to him.

But as he thought about that, he suddenly felt wronged. Is Cheon Sejoo giving his all against me? Could he really hit me? I can’t even lay a finger on him… Does Cheon Sejoo have no feelings for me? Sejin, feeling hurt, quietly shut his mouth.

“Oh, really? It’s because it’s me that you’ve never won before? Even though you’re bigger than me now?”

Cheon Sejoo didn’t listen to Sejin’s words. He clearly treated Sejin’s words as bluff and brushed them off. He tightly gripped Sejin’s wrist, which had been trying to slip away like an eel beneath him. He looked down and met his eyes provocatively, then said,

“If you hit me just once, I’ll believe you.”

“I told you! How can I hit you? Who in the world hits their parents?”

Sejin immediately retorted as if it made no sense. In truth, he wanted to ask who in the world is such trash that they could hit the person they love, but he was afraid Cheon Sejoo would run away again, so he invoked the idea of a guardian instead. Cheon Sejoo seemed to find his words simply amusing. He scoffed and said, dismissing Sejin,

“If you can’t hit me, then try to subdue me. But you can’t even do that.”

“…”

In fact, subduing an opponent was much harder than exchanging blows during a fight. However, Sejin, who didn’t know that fact, simply gritted his teeth at Cheon Sejoo’s relaxed demeanor. Fury surged.

In truth, Sejin didn’t think his feelings for Cheon Sejoo were one-sided. Even if it wasn’t a complete love like his own, he believed that Cheon Sejoo also held some feelings for him. He thought that otherwise, he couldn’t be so gentle with him. It was almost a baseless theory, but that’s how it was.

Every time Cheon Sejoo acted as if he had no ulterior motives towards him like that, Sejin would get unnecessarily angry. You have no feelings for me to the point you could hit me, so why are you so good to me? Why are you so gentle? Why do you look at me like that? He was so wronged and upset that he was annoyed.

A strong desire to break his relaxed expression surged. There were countless ways to shatter Cheon Sejoo’s composure. Among them, Sejin knew exactly the easiest and most desirable method for him.

I like you, if he said that, Cheon Sejoo would immediately lose his strength and falter. Subduing him then would be no effort at all. As he imagined Cheon Sejoo’s flustered face before him in that moment, the confession he had suppressed in his mouth for days swelled up valiantly.

I like you, I really like you. Unspoken true feelings plastered his mind, and Sejin lost all reason.

“You think I can’t do it?”

Sejin, gritting his teeth, asked, then grabbed Cheon Sejoo’s hand that held his wrist. He interlaced his fingers with Cheon Sejoo’s, who was looking down at him with a faint smile, as if to say, Go ahead and try.

Their hot palms met, still warm from the wrestling. Considering Cheon Sejoo’s recent actions, he should have coldly pushed him away as soon as their hands touched, but perhaps thinking this was Sejin’s fighting style, he opened his mouth without much suspicion.

“That’s not a very good stance.”

He didn’t even know what Sejin was trying to do, just criticizing his posture like an old man. Sejin ignored him and gripped his hands tightly.

Breaking Cheon Sejoo was easy. The difficult part was what came after. Sejin, having already lost his composure, tightened his grip on their clasped hands, fearing Cheon Sejoo would run away even in that state. Then, looking up at his handsome face from close proximity, he immediately attempted his attack.

“…I like you.”

A low voice echoed in the room.

At the words he had thrown like a bomb, Cheon Sejoo’s expression wavered. It was as expected. His face hardened in surprise, and his body swayed as if his legs had given out. Sejin didn’t miss that moment and pulled one hand free to grab his waist. The sensation of his firm skin, fitting snugly in his hand, was intensely stimulating. Struggling not to succumb to the intoxicating feeling, Sejin glared at Cheon Sejoo.

“What, nonsense.”

Cheon Sejoo stammered, his face pale, and pressed against Sejin’s chest. Cheon Sejoo, pushing him away and trying to escape, wore the same expression as before. Like the time he had pushed him away and ran when Sejin had clung to him, asking why he had come now, he tried to avoid the situation with a fearful gaze. Sejin recognized it precisely.