Chanwoo thumped his chest hard as if he were frustrated. Only after rambling on for quite a while—saying that even if they were told they would die tomorrow if they didn’t love each other, he’d rather just die tomorrow—did he finally manage to escape Eunho’s sharp glare.
Sobin watched Eunho, who kept spouting nonsense, with a strange look in his eyes. When Eunho felt the stare and looked back at him, Sobin instantly wiped the expression from his face.
“Seems like things got awkward because of me.”
With an embarrassed smile, Sobin spoke, and Chanwoo waved his hand.
“No, hyung. It was my slip of the tongue anyway.”
“Don’t do that—both of you, just go sit down.”
Sobin gestured toward the inside of the café. It was a window seat where two sofas were placed side by side.
“Chanwoo’ll have an iced Americano. And our rabbit friend will……”
Eunho looked up at the menu board above Sobin’s head. His gaze passed over the coffee section and drifted toward the desserts.
“Carrot smoothie?”
At the word carrot, Eunho’s head snapped down instantly. Their eyes met, and Sobin flashed a grin.
“I’ll pay for the drinks. Stay as long as you like.”
Wearing a kindly smile, Sobin gave a slight bow of his head. The sense of stability Eunho had felt from him at first was already gone.
***
The café was fairly crowded.
Maybe because there were so many one-room apartments and officetels nearby, customers kept coming in nonstop—from takeout orders to students who came to work on assignments. Thanks to that, Sobin, who had suggested they sit and talk together, couldn’t leave the counter because he was busy making coffee.
“There are a lot of customers.”
Watching him from afar, Eunho swallowed his carrot smoothie. The early-season air conditioning breeze scattered his soft pink hair.
“It used to be a dead café with flies buzzing around, but I heard after that hyung took it over, it got popular.”
“Where did you meet him?”
“Huh?”
Caught off guard by the unexpected question, Chanwoo stammered.
“W-where did I meet him?”
“Yeah.”
They had been together from high school through college; there were no secrets between them. Just as Chanwoo had taken care of him like a mother, Eunho also rarely didn’t know something about Chanwoo.
Which meant Sobin had appeared during a period of time Eunho didn’t know about.
“He’s not from school, and he’s not from a club either.”
“Well, that’s, uh……”
Fidgeting restlessly, Chanwoo hesitated.
He glanced at Eunho, then at Sobin, then back again. Faced with Eunho waiting quietly for an answer, he finally opened his mouth.
“I met him at Moon Bar……”
“W-why the hell would you go there?”
Have you lost your mind? Eunho’s eyes widened. Moon Bar was a bar exclusively for gay men in this neighborhood. Back when they were clueless twenty-year-olds, he had gone there with Chanwoo and ended up getting thoroughly chewed out by Yi-beom, who had come to pick them up.
More importantly, Kim Chanwoo was a perfect heterosexual. How many girlfriends had he had all this time…… The straw Eunho had been holding slipped from his mouth.
“Y-you’re gay?”
“I’m not!”
Chanwoo shouted and shot to his feet. No wonder he was a water deer—his voice carried loud and clear.
Everyone in the café turned to look at him. So humiliating. With his face burning red, Chanwoo quickly sat back down.
“I’m not gay. You’ve seen me date girls.”
He whispered in a voice as small as an ant’s.
“I’ve lived as a straight guy for twenty-five years—what do you mean, gay?”
“Then why did you go?”
“……I just happened to stop by. I heard there was a water deer gathering there.”
Chanwoo let out a sigh. When he had first become a water deer Beastman, his booming voice had been a serious problem for a while. Like a water deer shrieking kki-ee-eek, no matter what he said, his voice rang out thunderously.
Even when he casually asked, “Did you eat?” or called out, “Mom!” his voice would carry loudly enough to reach the downstairs neighbors, so he couldn’t even go outside. That was why he hadn’t been able to visit Eunho during the time they’d lost contact.
“Ever since I became a water deer, I’ve had a lot of issues. I didn’t know what to do, and then I found out there was a gathering.”
“And that gathering just happened to be at Moon Bar……?”
Chanwoo nodded. By the time he realized the meeting place was Moon Bar, he had already exchanged messages saying he’d attend.
“Anyway, that’s not the important part. The important thing is I fixed my voice there.”
As expected, there were many other water deer there who had gone through similar problems. When he followed the tips they gave him, his voice mysteriously grew quieter. It was a solution you couldn’t find on the internet.
“Maybe because the owner of Moon Bar is a herbivore, he hosts all sorts of gatherings.”
Chanwoo tapped Eunho’s cup lightly.
“Sobin hyung was at the rabbit gathering in the seat next to ours.”
A rabbit gathering. Eunho looked toward the counter. Maybe if he went there, he might find his own solution. Something like a way not to be afraid of a tiger.
As if on cue, Sobin, who had a moment of free time, approached their table. Dressed in a white shirt with a black apron tied around his waist, he looked less like the café owner and more like a promotional model for the café.
“What are you two talking about so secretly?”
Setting down a bowl piled high with cookies, Sobin sat down next to Chanwoo.
“If it’s something fun, I’d like to join in.”
“We were talking about when we first met, hyung.”
“Ah, at Moon Bar?”
“Yes.”
Would he really find an answer if he went to the rabbit gathering? Eunho looked Sobin up and down as he popped a carrot-shaped cookie into his mouth.
Overall, his impression was gentle, but at times his expression turned rather sharp.
Five years of dating a criminal. Sometimes, people whose faces blatantly screamed I’m a bad guy were less dangerous than those with an impression like Sobin’s.
Perhaps because he and Chanwoo were close, the two were already whispering to each other. It seemed they were talking about what had happened at Moon Bar.
After hesitating for a moment, Eunho spoke.
“……I heard there’s a rabbit gathering.”
“Ah.”
Sobin turned his gaze toward Eunho.
“It’s a meeting held at Moon Bar every Friday. The venue is Moon Bar, but there are a lot of women too.”
“Ah……”
“There’s still a lot that isn’t certain…… Mostly, we all just gather because we’re frustrated.”
At that, Eunho nodded. On the internet and social media, there were countless rumors, but the government guidelines had yet to announce characteristics or codes of conduct for each Beastman type. The reason was that there were so many different kinds, and many facts were still unknown.
“If you ever run into any problems, Eunho-ssi, stop by.”
Sobin held out a small business card. On the white card were the words Clear Animal Hospital engraved neatly.
“I also work as a veterinarian on weekends, so I’m quite good at treating rabbits.”
“……”
“If something hurts, or……”
Sobin’s eyes gleamed strangely. It was the same hostile look he had when mentioning tiger Beastmen.
“If someone tried to harm you.”
The moment his low voice resonated, Eunho bit his lip. Only a fool wouldn’t understand what Sobin was implying.
The notice posted at the café he used to frequent. The absence of carnivore Beastmen he hadn’t seen once on his way here. And now Sobin’s words. All of them were arrows pointed at Yi-beom. After hesitating, Eunho pushed the business card back across the table toward Sobin.
“There’s no one who’s going to harm me.”
“What I meant was……”
“Our Ahjussi isn’t that kind of person.”
He even peeled apples shaped like rabbits for him and cut vegetables himself to bring to him. Staring at Sobin, Eunho added,
“There won’t be any reason to contact you either.”
Over Sobin’s figure, his own image from last night—running away from Yi-beom—overlapped. Remembering how he had burst into tears and run straight to hyung made his chest throb.
“Ah, I’m sorry if that offended you.”
“……”
“Still, take the card. You never know what might happen.”
Forcing the card back toward Eunho, Sobin stood up. After exchanging a glance with the bewildered Chanwoo, he returned to the counter.
Eunho furrowed his brow as he mulled over Sobin’s apparent aversion to carnivore Beastmen. Even though he hadn’t agreed with a single word, he somehow felt as though he had badmouthed Yi-beom behind his back.
Any sense of solidarity as fellow Beastmen had long since disappeared.
I miss Ahjussi.
He wanted to see Yi-beom’s face. Rather than spending time talking to Sobin, it felt like it would help more to gather his courage and hold Yi-beom’s hand once more.
Slurp, Eunho sucked down the last of his carrot smoothie and stood up. Chanwoo, who had been munching on cookies, looked up at him.
“Where are you going?”
“To Ahjussi.”
“Now? You’re going right now?”
Eunho glanced down at Chanwoo’s phone lying on the table. Several chat windows were popping up across the screen. At the top, the words Water Deer Gathering were visible.
“Yeah, see you next time.”
“Hey, hey, Jung Eunho!”
He could hear Chanwoo’s voice from behind, and maybe even Sobin’s as well, but Eunho didn’t turn around.
Stepping out of the café, Eunho picked up his phone. Yi-beom’s photo filled the screen. Just looking at it made his heart sink.
“……Oh.”
Eunho’s eyes widened.
“Ah, Ahjussi told me to call him……?”
Only then did he remember the note he had received that morning. When he checked the time, it was already well past lunchtime. Gasping, Eunho hurriedly called Yi-beom.
After only two rings, Yi-beom answered.
[Jung Eunho.]
This is bad. Eunho sucked in a sharp breath.
[Where are you?]
“……”
[Why didn’t you call—]
Behind Yi-beom’s voice, another unfamiliar voice could be heard. As if speaking to that person, Yi-beom’s voice paused briefly. Eunho tightened his grip on the phone.
[……Right now…… Really?]
At the intermittent sound of Yi-beom’s voice, Eunho strained to listen. But he seemed to have moved the phone away while talking, and Eunho couldn’t make out the words clearly.
Who is that?
