Can Love Be Transferred Too? 31

#31

“Gasp.”

It felt like my throat was blocked. I tried to breathe in urgently, but it had the opposite effect. Pheromones that felt so dense they seemed to stick together viscously soaked my entire body.

Reflexively reaching out, I pressed the button to open the window. But nothing happened. Bae Taeseong, sitting in the driver’s seat, had already locked the function.

“……Hyung, stop……”

“I want to stop too.”

The hand that was trying to grab the door handle slipped smoothly. Bae Taeseong, supporting my swaying body with one arm, buried his nose in my wrist.

“It’s not coming off easily. The other person must be dominant too.”

I tried to answer but my throat was blocked and there was no room for sound to leak out. His form wavered in my blurred vision, then rough hands rubbed around my eyes. Only then did my vision clear up a little.

“At first I thought you might have come back from dating someone outside.”

“Huu……”

“Well, you’re not the type to be that cunning. It’s only been a week since I’ve known you, but I could tell that much.”

Every time I panted for breath, Bae Taeseong’s pheromones stuck densely to me. A sharp burning sensation gathered at the root of my tongue and near my solar plexus, like burning bamboo kindling.

“I told you, didn’t I? Since we entered here anyway, we were given room to change, whether for me or you.”

Had I heard such words? I think I saw it exactly…… I’m not sure. I can’t remember properly right now.

“This will probably cause misunderstandings too.”

I muttered in a slightly cracked voice.

“Either way, going in covered in pheromones is the same. Unlike what was on me before, everyone will know this is Taeseong hyung’s……”

“I have an alibi anyway. I slept at the dorm and just went out briefly in the morning.”

Bae Taeseong slowly stroked my cheek. The movement looked more like wiping something away.

“Let them misunderstand. I’m curious what your X will say, so let’s see.”

“He won’t care at all. I guarantee it……”

Then Bae Taeseong chuckled and whispered.

“Our Yoo Sanho-ssi doesn’t seem to know how beastly Alpha bastards are.”

“……”

“Anyway, I don’t mind getting some misunderstandings.”

He said.

“Let’s use this excuse for both of us to change.”

I shook my head vigorously.

“Could I possibly change?”

Of course I wanted to change. I was sick of a life that only knew Lee Chan. That’s why I tried to be brave. I gave Jin Woohyeon my contact information and tried bringing up past stories.

But I still felt hopeless. What if all this is meaningless struggling? Even though I did such radical things for me, it seems like nothing has changed yet.

“Change comes at some moment.”

Bae Taeseong answered.

“No matter how much you want it and try, it acts like it will never move, then suddenly jumps to the next stage.”

An explanation followed that people who exercise grow like that after reaching a certain level.

“They also call it a critical point.”

Critical point. A point that a substance that stubbornly maintained only one form must reach in order to have completely different properties and direction.

“You just need to cross that one point, Yoo Sanho.”

His voice was engraved heavily within me.

“Boiling over will be instantaneous.”

* * *

Bae Taeseong gave me the car keys and got out first. Only then did I realize the car had arrived at a public parking lot near the dormitory.

Only after breathing deeply and calming down for a long time did my mind finally clear. I staggered out of the car and hastily gathered my luggage from the back seat.

I happened to give some snacks to a camera director nearby and informed them of my return. When they suggested interviewing immediately, I asked if they could wait since I looked a bit messy. I wanted to go to the dormitory and at least change clothes.

“I feel like I rested, but why am I more tired……”

Dragging my feet and opening the front door, I.

“……Oh.”

Of all times, I ran right into Lee Chan.

He was dressed up gorgeously, perhaps about to go out for a schedule. Thanks to his colorful piercings and light makeup, he looked like a fully adorned male peacock.

I was the person who got most enchanted by such beautiful aspects of him. No matter how angry I was, when he smiled like that, my heart would melt away.

But strangely, such Lee Chan didn’t appeal to me anymore. He just looked like a poisonous plant that was gorgeous and pretty but would lead to death if bitten wrong.

My lifelong poisonous mushroom that only said things that would hurt me whenever he opened his mouth.

“Yoo Sanho.”

As soon as he made eye contact with me, he frowned sharply. Before I could guess the reason, he grabbed my arm and pulled me.

“Let’s talk for a bit. Follow me.”

“Why suddenly…… Lee Chan! This is, Chan!”

In an instant, my body was dragged along. Since he was going up the stairs two at a time, I almost fell several times trying to keep up with that pace.

I even hit my knee once, but Lee Chan didn’t look back. He was like someone who couldn’t see anything.

“What are you, Yoo Sanho.”

He only let me go after arriving at the rooftop.

“I’m asking what you are.”

The voice asking with clenched teeth was exactly the same tone he used when venting his anger on me. Lee Chan probably judged there would be no cameras here.

I couldn’t help but burst into a hollow laugh.

‘As if that’s possible.’

Cameras are hanging in the kitchen, laundry room, storage, and even near the entrance. With watching eyes densely positioned throughout the house, what was he trusting to think this place was okay?

Sure enough, when I glanced around, I could see a small camera hidden by the flower bed.

I let out a small sigh and answered.

“What about you, coming at me out of nowhere. When were you pretending not to know until now…… Aren’t you going out? It seemed like you had a schedule.”

Then Lee Chan irritably retorted.

“Is that crap important right now?”

“That crap.”

I was dumbfounded in front of his incomprehensible actions and words.

“That was always important to you. Why are you suddenly acting like talking to me is more important?”

“It’s Bae Taeseong, right?”

“……What?”

“It was strange from when you took the car out, not just going for an early morning run. What did you do with Bae Taeseong in the car?”

Only then did I realize why Lee Chan had dragged me here. So he was getting angry like this because Bae Taeseong’s pheromones were all over my body no matter how much I tried to shake them off.

Why on earth. What kind of relationship are we supposed to be?

“If it was just being close to some degree, there’s no way I’d ask like this.”

I tried hard to read what emotion was in Lee Chan’s face. Irritation, anger…… no, no. Something was different. At the base, there were other emotions that could be the cause.

“Did you stick together using your cycle as an excuse?”

Competitiveness.

“You cried and wailed that it couldn’t work with me, when did you make me into trash?”

A sense of deprivation.

“It wasn’t that it couldn’t work with me as a partner, it was just that I wasn’t good enough.”

“……Chan.”

“I didn’t even know that and was foolishly deceived by you, shibal, being anxious about that damn trauma or whatever and wasting time.”

And…… jealousy, or inferiority complex.

“Isn’t this against the living rules, Yoo Sanho? You pretended to be gentle but were the first to climb onto the kitchen stove.”

At first I thought something was bubbling, like small bubbles. I thought it was just small foam created by water stirring.

But it didn’t disappear. It kept growing, eventually rising to the calm surface and starting to shake everything.

Water that had reached its critical point was boiling. It was about to boil over from the precariously filled container.

“Lee Chan.”

The emotions I had kept pressing down all along surged up hotly. The fact that there were cameras, and thus that I should be reasonably careful, evaporated from my mind. Like boiling water becoming hot air.

“You’re really a fucking bastard.”

“What?”

“What does it matter if I get covered in Taeseong hyung’s pheromones or get covered in some unknown Alpha’s pheromones? We broke up. Who was the person who said let’s break up? Was it me? Wasn’t it you?”

“Hey, whose fault was that?”

“Because of me? That’s also my fault? How is it my fault? You cheating on me, you dumping me overnight because you had a good person, is all my fault? The fault is……”

“Yoo Sanho. That’s.”

“Listen to me!”

I screamed as if shrieking. I could see Lee Chan flinch and step back. Objects in front of me swayed irregularly.

“I always only listened to your words. Whatever bullshit you said, I always listened. But you can’t even listen to this?”

Liquid that had boiled over flowed down my cheeks, dripping. It overflowed without a chance to stop it. I no longer had the strength to block it. I didn’t want to make any effort for Lee Chan’s sake anymore. I was sick of everything.

“I didn’t do anything. I couldn’t. That trauma you complained was uncomfortable was a matter of life and death for me. Did you think I didn’t want to overcome it? Did you think I enjoyed being treated as a pathetic person by you?”

“……”

“I was a fool who only knew you, that’s right, Chan.”

“……Yoo Sanho.”

“But I’m not stupid enough not to feel miserable watching you wander outside because I couldn’t give you what you wanted in the end. I know how to feel ashamed too. I know how to be sad, upset, and embarrassed……”

I had longed for it. The day I could embrace you without any fear. The moment I could kiss you without thinking of that damn bastard who took away my last family member. The nights and dawns we’d share together, and the next day.

I was the one who anticipated it tens, hundreds, thousands of times more than you.

I waited my whole life for just that morning.

“Just because I couldn’t walk in step with you, I pretended not to know every time you cheated……”

“……”

“Now no matter who I end up with or how, you should pretend not to know too.”

I said while crying loudly, as if lamenting, pleading, threatening, confessing, and reproaching.

“So like you did before, keep ignoring me from now on.”

The resolution that I would love you for life.

“I’ll do the same to you.”

The belief that we’d be friends for life.

“I came here as your ex-boyfriend……”

The determination that I would remember your name until the day I die.