Outside, he tailed me around, and when I was home, he explored through sound. Naturally, that made him an expert who knew everything. Illegal information had clearly played a major role in his mastery of the field known as Somerset Quinn.
While glaring at him, I recalled the interior of my apartment. Aside from Torres, who came periodically to clean and do laundry, I never let anyone else in. Even with my manager Ben, we usually met and parted outside the apartment building. And lately, after reinventing myself as a celibate man, I hadn’t invited anyone over at all.
Which narrowed the intruder down to one person.
I hadn’t noticed any traces, but since it was impossible to install a listening device remotely, the conclusion was obvious: Eden had illegally entered my apartment before.
“So you have been inside my apartment.”
“Twice.”
“Twice? Not once, but twice?!”
“The bug started crackling because you accidentally touched it.”
“You can’t call that an accident!”
I snapped loudly, pressing a hand to my forehead. Like a broken toy, I paced in place in a tight circle. Trying to clear my head with pointless movement, I spoke.
“I’m reporting you to the police.”
“That’d be pointless.”
“I’ll tell them to arrest you.”
“No. You won’t. If anything, from now on you’ll become insanely conscious of it. Like suddenly remembering me and stopping in the middle of humming happily to yourself. Or shouting insults meant for me out loud whenever you’re upset.”
Fuck. Fuck.
Even now, Eden showing off how terrifyingly accurate his predictions were pissed me off.
Standing there with his arms crossed, he tilted his head slightly. The gaze studying me suited a blank expression, and indeed, not a trace of emotion stood out on his face.
That pissed me off too.
“I won’t! It absolutely won’t happen the way you say! What the hell do you know, you trashy perverted piece of shit.”
“‘Trashy perverted piece of shit’ is pretty harsh.”
“I can say worse than that too, you know. I’m holding back.”
I fired aggressive finger-pointing gestures with both hands and stormed past him. I walked away like a thundering gorilla, stomping heavily, when he called out from behind me.
“Somerset.”
I’m not turning around. Even if you yank the leash, I’ll pretend not to notice. I never handed you my leash in the first place!
“Somerset.”
Fuck off. Just fuck off.
“Somerset.”
Goddammit.
In the end, I stopped in front of the elevator and turned my head.
“You should take this. Unless you want to wake up tomorrow muttering, ‘Where did I put my car keys?’ to yourself.”
Approaching me, Eden held up the keys.
“Don’t make up lines for me. Your impression sucks.”
Stepping into the arriving elevator, I only stuck my right arm out through the doors. Waving my hand impatiently for him to hand over the keys already, I watched him deliberately drag his feet like some contrary brat.
Even a baby who’d just learned to walk would’ve moved faster.
In that time, the elevator doors nearly closed three separate times before reopening again, but he still didn’t hurry.
“If you’ve got any conscience, leave the sulking to me. You got caught bugging my apartment, and now you’re teasing me too? How does that make any sense?”
As I grumbled, Eden finally handed over the keys after what felt like a thousand years and said:
“By the way, Somerset, you’re not asking exactly where I put it.”
He was quick to notice.
He’d realized I had no intention of finding and removing the listening device.
The faint smile visible through the narrowing gap of the closing elevator doors left a bitter taste in my mouth. If I’d actually had those softly curved lips between mine, they would’ve tasted different, but the sensation his appearance provoked was nothing but bitter.
Tch.
***
That’s right.
I didn’t report him to the police.
After returning home, I simply kept my mouth shut and erased all traces of my presence. By minimizing sound and moving stealthily, I resisted the man who was surely listening beyond the bugging device.
Silence would get under his skin.
Was his earbud broken? Had I discovered the bug and turned it off?
I packed those curses into an artificially maintained silence.
Eliminating sound wasn’t easy. Against the backdrop of complete stillness, even ordinary breathing, the rustling of my shirt, or footsteps became amplified. Even if I stretched my arms stiffly and carefully lowered each foot with tense knees, the slightest lapse created noise.
As a result, even simple actions like shifting positions on the bed or laying my head on a pillow became cautious affairs.
I was trying to torment Eden, but somehow it felt like I was the one being punished.
If all that effort at least came with some dramatic entertainment, maybe it’d have been worth it, but it was unbearably boring.
Thinking about it carefully, it didn’t even seem likely that Eden would be flustered by this. Rather than falling victim to my petty revenge, it suited him far better to imagine him crossing his legs arrogantly, acting completely relaxed as if he’d expected this all along.
The instant I pictured him muttering with a calm face, Somerset Quinn really is simple-minded after all, I kicked the blanket away and shot upright.
Immediately changing tactics, I blasted loud heavy metal music full of pounding beats. I’d planned to torture Eden’s ears and even grinned sinisterly to myself, but before long I shut the speakers off again.
My own eardrums felt ready to burst first, and there was also the issue of bothering the neighbors.
Thinking about other possible strategies, I rummaged through the fridge. Hunger was one of the reasons I’d given up trying to stay silent. I pulled out milk nearing its expiration date, poured it into a bowl, and dumped in an absurd amount of cereal.
Between bites, I deliberately scraped the edge of the bowl with my spoon over and over.
Making unpleasant noises unexpectedly wasn’t great either.
Because I had to hear it too.
My face naturally twisted into a frown.
What would bother Eden while leaving me unaffected? Something even he—who rarely reacted to anything—would hate. Something he’d especially despise…
Ah.
There it was.
I’d found it.
Something that would catch off guard a man who’d lived celibately for years and frowned upon my promiscuous private life.
A sound far too stimulating for him to hear, even if I’d developed a tolerance to it myself.
This time, I could really get him.
Admiring my own genius-level pettiness, I grabbed my phone. Barely paying attention to the cereal anymore, I started searching for porn.
Porn sites were unexplored territory for me, since I usually satisfied myself with real sex instead of consuming fiction. I diligently browsed through this vast world I’d neglected until now.
Thankfully, there were promotional videos available for free without needing an account.
I picked one ranked near the very top.
Onscreen, two naked men with an obvious size difference were embracing each other. The smaller, thinner one looked like he might get crushed at any second, yet he smiled. He seemed completely at ease in the arms of his shaggy-haired partner, as if they were some kind of sanctuary.
Were they supposed to be lovers?
I turned the volume up moderately and hit play.
Sitting side by side on a bed, the two men immediately started kneading each other’s bodies. Typical porn—completely devoted to indulgence as its sole purpose. Every so often they laughed as if conscious of each other, but even that felt scripted.
There was no sense of connection beyond acting.
Pushing aside my now-soggy cereal, I analyzed the porn like a critic. The sight of them sucking and licking each other as though the line between appetite and lust had collapsed, along with their carelessly spilling moans, did nothing for me.
Not that it mattered anyway. I wasn’t watching to satisfy my own desires.
When the two men fully wrapped around each other and started grinding their bodies together in earnest, I raised the volume higher.
“—Hah, hah…”
“—Ahh, ngh, more, ahh…”
They merely touched each other and already their cocks twitched wildly while they writhed dramatically. I even doubted whether the milky fluid dripping everywhere was real semen.
The video looked best suited for feeding fantasies to inexperienced virgins.
No matter how desireless Eden’s life had supposedly been, even he might lose interest at beginner-level porn like this.
I was debating whether to keep watching or search for another video when the man’s moans suddenly climbed to absurd heights, and I decisively shut it off without mercy.
Right before it ended, a line of dialogue played.
“—Sorry. Did it hurt?”
The tangled bodies disappeared from the screen, but I remained trapped in the porn.
The harder I struggled to escape, the deeper the endless sea became.
The video had transformed into my memories.
Did Eden notice too?
The thing that porn actor said—you said it too.
“Sorry. Did it hurt?”
When Eden asked me that, his eyes had been hot and thick with emotion. Sweat ran down his temples, and his lips were redder than usual.
Because I’d bitten and sucked on them.
“Sorry.”
You kept apologizing, your nose wrinkling as though the pain had transferred to you.
Me weakly shaking my head while wrapping my arms around your neck.
It’d been unbearably hot.
Even drenched in sweat, I hadn’t wanted to separate from you.
Even after all this time, the sensations from back then remained so vivid it infuriated me. The thought that I might be the only one still affected by it made my chest feel painfully tight with resentment.
“Fuck.”
I wanted to stop the boiling hostility from turning into pathetic misery. Casually kneading the front of my pants, I parted my lips.
I abandoned indirect methods like porn and decided to use myself as the weapon instead.
My sounds would feel far more real than some stranger’s moans.
If you keep listening, you’ll end up lost in memories just like me. Let’s drown together in that endless sea, you bastard.
Even though the cock clenched through my pants was still fairly soft, my breathing had already grown hot.
Probably because I’d been starving for too long lately.
Running my tongue along the inside of my mouth, I stroked the outline of my shaft.
It made searching through the porn list again to build excitement seem pointless—the sensation hit me like a sudden electric current.
All because, in my mind, Eden had kissed me.
“When you’re okay again… then I’ll move.”
That sweet whisper tried to seduce my senses. The breaths he fed me between repeated kisses carried a strange viscosity.
That sticky gentleness soaked through me.
I squeezed my eyes shut before opening them again and lowering my head.
It was just coincidence. The timing simply lined up.
There was absolutely no connection between Eden’s kisses and my arousal.
Making pitiful excuses to rationalize it, I slipped my hand into my pants. Tugging my underwear down slightly, I rubbed my thumb in circles over the head of my cock.
“Hah…”
I didn’t even need to fake a moan.
A real one escaped quietly on its own.
A man who stopped eating cereal halfway through beginner-level porn only to suddenly start jerking off.
What a productive holiday.
Amazing. Thunderous applause for you.
No wonder my mood was twisting into knots.
Listing out my current state made it all seem ridiculously laughable. But I’d already started, and I had no intention of stopping.
Wiping at the gradually dampening head of my cock, I looked around my apartment—the fortress I’d built for myself. Becoming conscious of the listening device hidden somewhere made my grip tighten.
I rubbed and kneaded myself relentlessly like someone possessed by masturbation.
“Hah… ah.”
The stimulation, after so long without it, made my shaft swell heavily with sensation. Rubbing at the sensitive skin, I unconsciously licked my lips.
I really had starved myself too much.
So starved that I heated up easily.
So starved that I wasn’t in a position to be picky anymore, and ended up devouring the low-grade junk food known as Eden Reed.
I remembered the time we’d pressed our cocks together and ground against each other. I’d been the excited one on top, taking control while straddling him. Despite having no experience, I’d acted aggressively like some sex-crazed maniac, and Eden had looked up at me with laughter in his eyes.
When the thickly swollen head of his cock poked insistently at my navel, the smile on his face had grown even more indecent.
“Uhn—”
“Hngh.”
The phantom echo of the moan he’d once let out overlapped with the real moan escaping my mouth now.
Both felt so vivid that it seemed like Eden was truly here.
Not the Eden beyond the listening device. The Eden I once knew. The man who existed only in the past.
Remembering the hands that had once explored my body, I lifted the hem of my shirt. Feeling the ridges of my muscles beneath my own fingers, I moved upward and pinched a stiffened nipple.
“Ah…”
