#102
In the end, he stayed up all night.
He tried doing push-ups and squats, but because he exercised too much, he felt like his mind became even more alert. So to calm his mind, he tried meditation and yoga too, but sleep wouldn’t come at all, not at all.
He wondered if maybe he couldn’t sleep because the house felt unfamiliar after cleaning it thoroughly for when Kang Dojun would come, so he even tried messing it up again.
Despite all his efforts, his eyes were still wide awake, and all he gained was muscle pain.
This is strange. I slept just fine in my house even when hyung wasn’t here.
Ah, maybe I was drunk then. The memory was hazy now.
He thought he slept for about an hour or two.
As he lay still and placed his arm over his eyes, he could feel the wooden texture of the prayer beads.
‘Why are you a dragon? Not a tiger or ox…’
Shin Gihyeon’s previous words came to mind.
Well, dragons are cool, aren’t they?
But now he felt regret, thinking maybe he should have chosen a rat instead. If he were to do it, Kang Dojun’s zodiac sign would have been better.
…I should call hyung.
Lee Yeonwoo immediately put this into action. Without needing to look up the contact, he clearly remembered the 11-digit number.
“010-47…”
He pressed the screen firmly while entering the number and put it on speaker mode.
The dial tone rang several times but no one picked up.
Is he working?
Just as he was about to hang up to send a text instead of calling, he heard an unfamiliar voice that wasn’t Kang Dojun.
– Hello? Yeonwoo-ssi?
“…Manager-nim? Where’s hyung?”
– Ah, Dojun went into filming right now.
“I see.”
Not fun. Boring. Tedious. Frustrating. Dull. Lonely. Empty. These were the feelings Lee Yeonwoo was experiencing right now.
Hyung is working too, so I should go to the apiary as well.
Room cleaning is… Lee Yeonwoo looked around the messy interior. I’ll do it when I come back.
“Please tell him to call when he’s done with work.”
– It should be finished in about 3 hours.
“Thank you. Manager-nim must be having a hard time for a whole week too.”
– Ah, after the drama filming ends, there’s also a CF. It’s exactly one week and one more day. Well, I’m used to it so it’s fine.
…CF? Lee Yeonwoo pulled his knees together and buried his head in them. He wiggled his toes meaninglessly. I’ve never heard about that.
He didn’t have the energy to respond to news he didn’t even know about. As he stayed silent without hanging up the phone, the sound of Park Daeho tapping the speaker came through.
– Hello? Yeonwoo-ssi?
“Yes.”
– Um… didn’t you hear from Dojun?
“No.”
Ah… Park Daeho added after a brief silence.
– It was decided yesterday, so he was probably going to tell you today.
“I guess so.”
Whether he told him today or tomorrow, he should have told him. Hearing news about him through someone else’s mouth was quite unpleasant.
Lee Yeonwoo flicked his innocent fingernails and asked Park Daeho.
“So that means it’ll take one more day.”
– Yes… that’s how it turned out. Ah, something came up so I’ll hang up now!
“Yes, good luck with your work.”
One more day late? Sometimes saying he’ll come in two days, sometimes saying he’ll come in a week. Maybe the words about being one more day late are also lies.
Kang Dojun keeps lying, but should I wait for him while quitting drinking and consistently cleaning…? Is there a need to do that?
I should have just not held back yesterday and drank alcohol. Then I wouldn’t have needed to eat alone, and I could have had dinner together with everyone at the community center, had a drinking party, then enjoyed sweet sleep.
Soon after, he realized that his and Kang Dojun’s situations were different and shook his head.
‘Hyung is like that because of work.’
Kang Dojun was spending such busy days in Seoul that he even forgot to tell him about his schedule.
Around high school graduation, when grandmother passed away, the weather of that day, the temperature of that day, the smell, the air wrapped around his body and thoughts of that day also began to surface.
A world where everyone was welcoming new daily routines, but only he remained alone, standing still.
Suddenly he wondered.
What am I doing right now?
Just then, without time to be lost in thought, a loud voice came from outside the front door.
“Delivery!”
Lee Yeonwoo pursed his lips as if he was angry. It might have been misplaced anger. He deliberately put force into his footsteps hitting the floor, making thudding sounds as he flung open the front door.
“I never ordered…!”
His droopy eyes blinked toward the delivery driver. Ah, it’s the installation technician.
“…Didn’t you make an online purchase from Demons a few days ago? The King of King solid wood bed?”
“……”
At the technician’s words, he remembered a fact he had forgotten. It was the bed he had ordered together with Kang Dojun after coming to the countryside last time.
The technician checked the marked address and looked around. Then he checked the address again. Next to the lot number, it was written in parentheses: blue roof.
He showed Lee Yeonwoo the address and asked.
“Isn’t this the place?”
“Ah… that’s right. Please come in.”
“Yes. Excuse me.”
Lee Yeonwoo opened the door wide and fixed it in place.
“Where should I put the bed?”
At his question, Lee Yeonwoo opened the master bedroom door and pointed diagonally across from the door.
“Over there. Please don’t put it against the wall, leave a little space. Please have the headboard face toward the window.”
“…Yes.”
The state of the room was terrible. It was exactly as Lee Yeonwoo had left it after tossing and turning in the middle of the night, unable to sleep.
The technician answered awkwardly and moved to take out the cargo loaded in the truck.
Lee Yeonwoo followed behind him, peering curiously.
“Should I help you take it out?”
“It’s fine. But since I need to put the bed in, could you please clean the room…”
“I’ll do that.”
Lee Yeonwoo nodded and immediately went into the room, gathering an armful of scattered items.
Since I’m in a hurry, I can just stuff them into the wardrobe for now, right?
He hurriedly moved to find the wardrobe in the workroom. And when Lee Yeonwoo opened the wardrobe door, he just hesitated without being able to put the bundle of items he had brought inside.
Since he kept light summer clothes in the master bedroom drawer that he used frequently, he had never looked in the wardrobe. He never dreamed that thick clothes needed only for seasons that hadn’t come yet would be neatly stacked inside the wardrobe.
‘When did I organize this?’
Kang Dojun’s touch had reached even here without him noticing. Even to places he hadn’t been able to pay attention to.
He had planned to complain about why he didn’t tell him beforehand when he called later, but seeing this made all those feelings disappear.
He was working hard for him even in places he couldn’t see, but worrying like a child over not getting contacted about being just one day late seemed too childish and petulant.
Right. It’s just one day. It’s not like I’ll die from not seeing him for one more day. Let me install the bed and go to the apiary to catch some wasps.
Catching wasps and relieving stress should make me feel somewhat better.
“Um… the entrance is narrow so we need to tilt it diagonally to get it in. Could you help me a bit?”
At the technician’s request, Lee Yeonwoo glanced down at the items nestled in his arms.
“Yes.”
He couldn’t mess up even the well-organized wardrobe, so he had no choice but to pile the items in a corner of the room and help the technician lift the bed base together.
“We need to tilt it a bit more for it to go in!”
“…Like this?”
Because he had overexercised yesterday, his body was trembling just from supporting it from below. If it’s going to be like this, two technicians should have come to install it…!
When Lee Yeonwoo was only measuring the width and length, Kang Dojun had also recommended measuring the diagonal length, saying that tilting it would allow a bigger size to fit.
Since he was buying it for him, he didn’t complain, but if he had known it would be this difficult to carry inside, he regretted not just buying one size smaller.
Then he had a reasonable suspicion that maybe the technician had deliberately positioned him below, where he had to bear all the weight.
“Wait a moment. Can’t we rest a bit?”
Lee Yeonwoo let go of the bed leg he was holding with difficulty and got up from his position. His hands were tingling from supporting the bed’s weight.
“I need to finish the installation and get back quickly too.”
…Never buying furniture again.
Lee Yeonwoo struggled from below to somehow get the bed into the room.
How precisely did hyung measure the length?
It seemed like he had calculated the bed’s height and the diagonal length of the room entrance to choose a size within a minute margin of error. The math problem-solving method from before too – Kang Dojun must have been quite good at studying in high school.
The two of them barely managed to get the bed into the room.
Lee Yeonwoo swept his hair back and spoke with weary eyes.
“Technician-nim, please come with two people next time.”
If Kang Dojun ordered it, it must be an expensive bed. He had even heard that the installation cost was included in the price. He wasn’t satisfied with how the work was handled.
“Ahem, deliveries are backed up so I barely squeezed out time to come.”
What kind of excuse is that?
Though he kept his mouth shut, what Lee Yeonwoo wanted to say could be felt from his expression.
The technician seemed embarrassed and said he would move the mattress by himself, then brought the remaining parts and began installing the rest of the bed. As he watched him fixing screws and pieces, Lee Yeonwoo quietly slipped away to the kitchen.
Usually you offer drinks at times like this, but unfortunately there was only water. Hmm, do you eat chocolate? Lee Yeonwoo unwrapped a chocolate, put it in his mouth, chewed and swallowed it while looking around the kitchen.
The snacks were bought by Kang Dojun, so it felt a bit wasteful to give them to the technician.
Lee Yeonwoo approached the technician and asked.
“I only have water, should I give you that at least? I’ll put ice in it.”
“Thank you.”
The technician wiped his sweat, seemingly hot, and concentrated on installing the bed.
When he went back to the kitchen and was dropping ice cubes plop plop, his phone vibrated.
‘…It’s hyung.’
He heard that filming would end in 3 hours, but it was a very early time with only about an hour having passed.
“Hello.”
– Yeah, Yeonwoo. Um… about being one day later – I was going to tell you today but Daeho said it first. Sorry. The schedule suddenly got arranged…
“Hyung.”
Unusually, he could feel impatience in his tone. So Lee Yeonwoo also spoke unusually.
“I’m fine.”
– …About what?
A little, just a little, no actually a lot. He had intended to complain. It was childish but he wanted to do that.
But seeing him call at a time when filming hadn’t even finished yet, looking so apologetic, all those feelings disappeared.
“It’s because of work. It can’t be helped. Oh right, the technician came to install the bed just now,”
He didn’t really know how to pretend to be okay for others. So he tried to change the subject and work hard to lighten the mood.
If I talk like this roughly, I’ll seem okay, right?
Since he usually reported even trivial things to Kang Dojun, this time was no different.
Lee Yeonwoo talked continuously without stopping, constantly appealing that his condition was fine. Kang Dojun cut off Lee Yeonwoo’s words.
– Yeonwoo.
He whispered softly.
– Don’t try to be okay.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
