“Why?”
He curled his lips into a faint smile and asked again.
“Why should I have done that, Hoon?”
Like an innocent child asking a grown-up about the world, Bae Jung-yoon threw the question back at him. And Go Hoon felt just as lost.
After all that effort to keep his distance. Then why yesterday? Why didn’t Jung-yoon just ignore it? Or, at most, pretend to intervene and stop it—just go through the motions. Why go out of his way to swing a steel pipe at Park Ki-cheol?
He hadn’t done anything like that for Jung-yoon. Hadn’t he told him before—if someone’s bothering you, speak up? So why, when it came to Kim Yeo-jin, was he answering like that? What made her so different from him?
He thought he knew the answer, and yet it still didn’t make sense.
If—if Bae Jung-yoon really did know he was Kkongddeok, and that’s why he was going this far… then why not just say it? Was he still waiting? Waiting for his cat to choose to come home on its own?
If that was it, then Go Hoon couldn’t give him what he wanted. He was no longer going to live as a cat. He was going to live as a person. A person who didn’t need Bae Jung-yoon’s protection.
“Yeo-jin telling you about it, in any form—that was her asking for help.”
After a long pause, Go Hoon finally spoke. Bae Jung-yoon blinked his pitch-black eyes and replied flatly.
“I don’t know. Was that really a call for help? I couldn’t tell.”
People have different ways of crying out. Not everyone says “help me” out loud—that’s not the only kind of distress signal. And picking up on the nuance in someone’s words isn’t easy. That’s why it’s so easy to miss.
“But, Hoon.”
That was why Go Hoon didn’t want to blame Bae Jung-yoon.
“Didn’t you kind of know, too?”
Because he knew he didn’t have the right to act like he was any different.
What’s the real difference between you and me? Those dark eyes seemed to ask the question outright.
And Go Hoon couldn’t flatly deny it. He’d picked up on it, too—that Park Ki-cheol had taken an interest in Kim Yeo-jin.
He just didn’t want to get involved, so he pretended not to see it. And given the bad history he had with Park Ki-cheol, he was even less inclined to step in.
Truthfully, he hadn’t thought the situation was that serious. He hadn’t imagined that something he’d brushed off as minor would end up leaving such a deep scar on Kim Yeo-jin.
That’s why Go Hoon knew he was also at fault. He’d taken things too lightly. Even though he knew full well what kind of person Park Ki-cheol was.
“Hyung, it’s been a while.”
“How’ve you been?”
A voice from the past suddenly rang in his ears. Go Hoon instinctively clenched his fist.
Yeah. Again—he’d let it slide, acting like it was nothing. Repeating the same mistake he once made.
“I knew. That’s why I regret just walking away. Don’t you?”
“So what? It’s already over.”
Bae Jung-yoon’s voice was cold. Any decent person would feel at least some sense of responsibility or remorse. Or at the very least, say they did.
“Hoon, instead of picking apart who’s to blame, let’s just focus on what we do next. That’s what matters now.”
The friendly, considerate Bae Jung-yoon everyone else knew—he wasn’t here. From yesterday onward, it seemed he’d decided to show Go Hoon his real self.
“So we just sweep it all under the rug and pretend it didn’t happen?”
Go Hoon shot back, his voice full of disapproval. Bae Jung-yoon tilted his head slightly, face unreadable.
“For Yeo-jin’s sake and for Ki-cheol sunbae’s, it’s better that way. If we stir things up, they’ll both get dragged into the spotlight, and nothing good will come of it.”
From Park Ki-cheol’s perspective, burying the incident was obviously the better option. In a world where people are quick to condemn any kind of sexual harassment or assault, the mere rumor of it could ruin him.
“What about Yeo-jin? What does she want?”
What about Kim Yeo-jin’s side of things?
At this point, what mattered most was her will. It wasn’t up to Go Hoon or Bae Jung-yoon to decide anything for her.
If she chose to report Park Ki-cheol, no one could stop her. Nor should they.
But it seemed she wasn’t ready to take that step.
“She said she just wants to let it go quietly. She doesn’t want to blow it up and make her parents worry.”
Go Hoon recalled her face last night, when he’d asked whether she should contact her parents. She’d said she didn’t want to burden them with it.
“And she doesn’t want anyone around her to find out about it either.”
He couldn’t say he didn’t understand how she felt. That’s why Go Hoon couldn’t bring himself to tell her she should report Park Ki-cheol.
People are hypocrites. Even though the blame should fall entirely on the perpetrator, they always seem to find fault with the victim too. Go Hoon knew that ugly truth about the world. He had no right to criticize Kim Yeo-jin’s decision.
Honestly, he wasn’t sure what would be the right choice for her anyway.
“Did you actually talk to Yeo-jin properly about this?”
But even knowing all that, the reason he asked the question was because a trace of doubt had slipped through.
He didn’t know what exactly Bae Jung-yoon had said to Kim Yeo-jin. To Park Ki-cheol, it had looked like a threat. And there was no guarantee he hadn’t treated her the same way.
There was no way Bae Jung-yoon hadn’t caught on to the pointed edge in Go Hoon’s question. Slowly blinking, he let out a faint laugh.
“You don’t trust me, do you, Hoon?”
Go Hoon stared at him in silence.
And it made sense—not trusting him was only natural. Bae Jung-yoon had already revealed far too many unexpected sides of himself.
Watching him quietly, Bae Jung-yoon eventually relaxed his expression and smiled gently.
“You can go ask Yeo-jin yourself if you want, Hoon. But just remembering yesterday already looked hard enough for her. I think that’s enough for today. It’s probably best not to stir it up any further.”
And that was true. Even just telling Bae Jung-yoon must have taken a huge emotional toll. She probably wanted to erase those nightmarish memories entirely. To recall them, to speak them aloud again—how unbearable that must be.
Thinking of her, the tension in Go Hoon’s shoulders drained away. What else could he even do in this situation? He didn’t know. He just felt powerless. Leaning back against the wall, he slowly blinked.
“…Did you tell Yeo-jin that Ki-cheol sunbae got hurt?”
“Yeah, I did.”
A quiet curse slipped from between his lips. Sure, it was something she had every right to know—but the words still left a bitter aftertaste.
He’d almost wished she wouldn’t find out. If she didn’t know about Park Ki-cheol’s condition, maybe she could hold onto her anger—keep hating him, free from any guilt or hesitation.
Go Hoon let out a long sigh and pressed his temple with his thumb, trying to ease the pounding inside his head. Watching him, Bae Jung-yoon added, as if trying to reassure him:
“I told her he just got hurt by accident, that he tripped or something. So don’t worry too much.”
Maybe he should be relieved that at least Bae Jung-yoon hadn’t told her the full story. As if sensing how conflicted he was, Bae Jung-yoon continued in a calm voice.
“Yeo-jin was really worried. She kept asking if this whole mess was hurting us too—if we were getting caught up in it because of her.”
She’d said the same thing last night—asked whether she was making things harder for her sunbae.
That tendency to worry about others more than herself left Go Hoon speechless. As he stood there, wordless, Bae Jung-yoon kept his eyes on him and spoke again, voice even lower now.
“So what happened yesterday stays between us, okay, Hoon?”
Go Hoon looked up at him.
The meaning was clear: don’t tell anyone. Not about the ugly incident between Kim Yeo-jin and Park Ki-cheol, not about anything he saw or heard that day.
“There. Now you look pretty.”
The image flashed through his mind—Bae Jung-yoon gently wiping the blood from his face with a handkerchief, smiling softly as he did.
“Do you trust me?”
The words slipped out without thinking. Maybe it was a challenge. But Bae Jung-yoon didn’t flinch—his composure remained intact, and he tilted his lips into a calm, confident smile.
“Yeah. I trust you, Hoon. You’re not the type to run your mouth.”
And he wasn’t. Go Hoon was quiet. Always had been. People who carry secrets tend to keep their lips locked.
It was no different now. Go Hoon couldn’t say anything in response—he just looked at him. Meeting his gaze, Bae Jung-yoon leaned in slightly, lowering his head to eye level, and whispered with a deep smile:
“Keep the secret, Hoon.”
Just like you always have.
Those black eyes seemed to be telling him exactly that.
