6) I Want Us to Feel the Same
Han Jun was strange.
He casually intertwined fingers with a friend, hugged him tightly as if they were sharing body heat even though it wasn’t cold, and slept like that. He even buried his face into the nape of his neck. What was even harder to understand was that when he woke up, fully aware that he was holding Yi-hyeon in his arms, he didn’t act surprised at all and remained perfectly calm.
Anyone would’ve mistaken it for “Does he like me?” kind of behavior.
Yi-hyeon would helplessly drift into thoughts like that, only to quickly regain his reason, telling himself there was no way someone like Han Jun could possibly like him. Still, as these incidents increased, Yi-hyeon’s emotions were quickly swallowed by confusion, and before long, even the time it took him to regain rational thought started to lag.
Sitting in the orphanage playroom, Yi-hyeon traced back that day—how he’d bolted upright at Han Jun’s house without even sparing a thought for his aching knee, fleeing the room as if running away—and let out a long sigh.
He’d rejected Han Jun’s consideration when he tried to walk him home, slammed the door shut with a bang, and sprinted like a madman toward the bus stop. Even then, worried Han Jun might follow right behind him, he zigzagged through narrow alleys here and there just to avoid his scent. Thinking back on it now, it wasn’t something worth panicking over. Why he’d reacted like that back then—he couldn’t understand it himself.
He was embarrassed. Embarrassed beyond words.
“Oppa, Yi-hyeon oppa!”
Su-ah, whom he’d promised to help with homework, prodded Yi-hyeon with her pen as he sat there resting his chin on the table, staring blankly out the window.
“Huh—oh? You called me, Su-ah?”
“…You said we had to find Y.”
“Oh. Right.”
His mind felt like it was floating on a cloud, and because of that, Yi-hyeon couldn’t think straight at all.
“Eh? What’s this? The answer’s wrong. Oppa, aren’t you first place in the whole school?”
Su-ah looked at Yi-hyeon suspiciously as she checked his solution.
“I’m not first. I’m second.”
“…Looks more like second from the bottom.”
“Uh—sorry.”
In the end, Yi-hyeon—whose intelligence had apparently regressed thanks to his unrequited crush—had no choice but to postpone Su-ah’s math tutoring until next week.
***
At first, it was a feeling he meant to keep to himself. But as the days passed and memories with Han Jun piled up, he found himself assigning meaning to even the smallest of Han Jun’s actions.
A single kind word from Han Jun, a playful prank—each one stirred Yi-hyeon’s emotions. And if Han Jun felt even a little colder than usual, thoughts like “Did he find out about my feelings? Is that why he’s pulling away?” would take hold, sending Yi-hyeon digging himself into a bottomless hole.
When he later realized it had all been a misunderstanding, he’d find himself looking at Han Jun with affection even thicker than before. That realization—that his feelings kept growing stronger—started to genuinely scare Yi-hyeon.
[Photo of Louis’s paw] xxhanjunini
– – –
[Photo of Louis’s paw]
—[Got something fun, wanna come over after school?]
[Today’s a bit…ㅠㅠ]
[I promised to help the Director with some work]
[Photo of Louis’s paw]
—[What kind of work?]
[Photo of Louis’s paw]
—[Me too]
[It’s something I have to do until night]
[Sorry, next time]
That fear ultimately pushed Yi-hyeon toward distancing himself from Han Jun. But no matter how much Yi-hyeon tried to refuse, Han Jun acted as if nothing was wrong, asking him to meet up outside of school every single time.
[Photo of Louis’s paw] xxhanjunini
– – –
[Photo of Louis’s paw]
—[The movie you said you wanted to see is on Getflix]
[Photo of Louis’s paw]
—[Wanna watch it at my place?]
It was a movie Yi-hyeon had recommended because he thought Han Jun would like it.
Maybe because his mother was an actress, Han Jun loved movies. Unlike other boys his age, his emotional sensibilities ran deep and intense. For that reason, most of the films Han Jun named as his all-time favorites overlapped with the tastes of Yi-hyeon’s mother, who loved melodramas. Every time Yi-hyeon recommended a movie to him, memories of those days spent with his mother resurfaced, leaving him feeling both happy and quietly sorrowful.
Even though he knew he needed to put some distance between them, it still took him a long time to send a reply this time.
[Sorry, I have to help Su-ah with her math homework ㅠ]
Despite typing the message into the chat window early on, Yi-hyeon couldn’t bring himself to press the send button for a long while.
***
“Cheering squads, grab your equipment and set up first. Those competing, make sure you check the times for your events.”
A few weeks after Yi-hyeon began deliberately avoiding Han Jun, the school event he hated the most—the sports festival—finally began. It was right on the cusp of summer, and just sitting still in the classroom solving problems was exhausting enough, yet every single student had to take a seat in the track stands without exception.
Some schools excluded third-years entirely because of CSAT prep, but Yi-hyeon’s school had too few students. Instead, they simply reduced the number of events third-years participated in and went ahead as scheduled. Forced to stay out on the field from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., Yi-hyeon had frozen several bottles of water in the fridge the night before and brought them along.
Since becoming a shifter, his body temperature had risen sharply, and he needed to suppress the heat frequently. Yi-hyeon opened his bag, intending to drink from a bottle of water that had partially thawed.
As if he’d been waiting for this moment, Seo Wonseok walked up and picked a fight.
“Is your orphanage so poor it can’t even afford tumblers or thermoses?”
Wonseok sneered, tapping the water bottle Yi-hyeon was holding with the back of his hand. Tap. Han Jun stepped in, shouldering past Wonseok as he blocked Yi-hyeon’s path. He twisted open the cap of Yi-hyeon’s bottle and brought it straight to his mouth. He gulped down the water loudly, never taking his eyes off Wonseok, who glared at him with clear displeasure.
After drinking his fill, Han Jun wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and placed the bottle back into Yi-hyeon’s grip.
“As long as it’s cold, who cares if it’s in a tumbler or not?”
“Tch. This bastard again.”
Just as Yi-hyeon was about to bring the bottle—one Han Jun had already drunk from—to his lips, Wonseok slapped his hand over the mouth of the bottle and bang! slammed it down onto the desk. Because it was frozen, the dull thud echoed through the entire classroom.
“Fuck. You—every time I try to talk to Yoon Yi-hyeon, you butt in. What, you trying to advertise that you’re a gay or something?”
“If sharing some water gets you called gay, then what do you call someone who wants to look at a guy’s dick? A pervert? A deviant?”
“What the fuck did you just say?”
As Wonseok lifted his eyes, the corners of his mouth twitching, Han Jun openly mocked him.
“What? You talk shit about other people however you please, but when it’s something bad about you, suddenly your feelings get hurt?”
“When did I ever talk shit however I wanted?”
“Your frontal lobe broken or something? Can’t remember? You talk fucked-up shit about Yoon Yi-hyeon’s family every single time. No matter how immature you are, family’s off-limits.”
“Family? Don’t make me laugh.”
Wonseok sneered, and Han Jun’s eyebrow twitched.
“What family does this bastard even have? Oh, that rundown orphanage? Fuck, that trash group pretending to be family just to suck up government subsidies?”
Before anyone could stop him, Han Jun grabbed Wonseok by the collar with one hand and twisted.
“The trash here is you. You pick fights only with kids who keep their heads down because they don’t want trouble, then strut around feeling proud like you’re something special. A bully who’s strong against the weak and weak against the strong—pathetic piece of shit.”
Han Jun tilted his head and sneered. Wonseok didn’t back down, twisting Han Jun’s wrist in return.
“Still cleaner than some bastard born from an affair.”
“You sure about that?”
“What?”
Wonseok’s face twisted viciously.
“I asked if you’re sure you’re clean.”
“Fuck, what the hell are you saying, you crazy bastard!”
“Just in case, you should get a DNA test too. Maybe you were picked up somewhere, or one of your parents cheated—”
Wonseok clenched his fist tightly, like he wasn’t going to let it go. Yi-hyeon jumped to his feet and stepped into the aisle, trying to get between them, but Han Jun shoved him behind his back with the hand he wasn’t using.
“Don’t get involved. That bastard can’t even hit me anyway—”
That was when it happened. Crack. Han Jun’s face snapped to the side.
“Han Jun! Hey—Seo Wonseok, are you insane?!”
As Yi-hyeon shouted, Wonseok loosened his reddened fist and spat out his words for everyone to hear.
“So what the fuck are you trying to say? That my mom and dad had an affair or what? You trying that hard to die, you piece of shit?!”
Han Jun spat the blood pooling in his mouth onto the classroom floor, wiped his lips with the back of his hand, and fixed Wonseok with a slanted gaze.
“Ah… so now you’re using violence too.”
“Fuck, and what if I am? What are you gonna—”
That was when—
“Ah!”
