Han-gyeom kept stealing glances at Won-hyeok, who had picked up a book lying around the club room and was reading it. Then, remembering something he had to do, he closed the book he’d brought with him and opened his laptop. As soon as the sound of the machine starting up was heard, Won-hyeok naturally lifted his head.
“Ah, sorry. W-was it loud……?”
“Not at all. Looks like you’re working on an assignment?”
“Ah, yes. I have a midterm assignment for a required major course.”
Won-hyeok stared at Han-gyeom for a moment, then closed his book and stood up. Han-gyeom was wondering if he’d really been a disturbance when the other man suddenly came over and sat beside him.
“If it’s a required major, what class is it?”
“Huh? Ah, Introduction to English Literature.”
“That class gives a lot of assignments.”
As if recalling something from the past, Won-hyeok shook his head, but at the same time kept closing the distance between them more and more.
“That’s right. It feels like the professor gives us an assignment every single class.”
“Haha, Professor Jin Young-seo from the English Department is famous for that. Want me to take a look?”
“N-no!”
When Won-hyeok tried to look at Han-gyeom’s laptop, Han-gyeom jolted in surprise and covered the screen with both hands. He was desperate to hide it somehow with his small hands.
“Why?”
“……It’s not good enough to show to you, sunbae.”
“So what?”
“You’re the top student in the department……. It’s embarrassing.”
That was also one of the other reasons Won-hyeok was so famous. He was the legendary student who had never once lost the top spot in the department from first year until now. To show a person like that his completely messy assignment, which was still only at the rough draft stage? Even if the sky split in two, that absolutely could not happen.
“……”
Looking at Han-gyeom, who seemed to be staking his life on defending his laptop with the sole determination of never showing it, Won-hyeok was reminded of a hamster. A small white hamster turning its body to protect the snack it had been given so no one could take it away.
Won-hyeok slowly reached out, trying to stroke Han-gyeom’s hair. But sensing the movement, Han-gyeom quickly pulled his body back. In that instant, the faint smile disappeared from Won-hyeok’s face. His lips set firmly, and he stared at the hand that had nowhere to go.
“Anyway, my assignment is too embarrassing, so absolutely not.”
“Han-gyeom, are you stupid? Like you said, I’m the top student in the department. Then you should be thinking about how to make use of me.”
“M-make use of you?”
As if he had never gone serious at all, Won-hyeok lifted the corners of his mouth again.
“For reference, I got an A+ in that class. I think Professor Jin even showed my assignment during class as the best one, maybe?”
“Professor Jin really did that?”
Won-hyeok nodded. Professor Jin was famous for being extremely picky and strict. It was a given that the exams were hard, and on top of dropping assignment bombs on students, the grading criteria for those assignments were so strict that the professor was already on the English Department students’ blacklist.
There was even a rumor going around that while A’s came out from time to time, the number of students who had ever gotten an A+ in that class could be counted on one hand. And that kind of professor had praised him directly during class.
“And I still have all the assignment materials I’ve done from first year until now without throwing any of them away.”
Han-gyeom swallowed hard. To be honest, he didn’t want to ‘make use of’ his sunbae. But college grades were something that absolutely could not be ignored if he wanted to get a job in the future.
“Th-then…….”
“Yeah.”
“Could you help me just a little……?”
Han-gyeom timidly grabbed Won-hyeok’s sleeve. Won-hyeok looked down at the pale, slender fingers flushed pink like peaches, then slowly nodded.
“As much as you want.”
***
“Wait a second, sunbae.”
“Yeah?”
“Th-this place is…….”
Without realizing it, Han-gyeom clenched his fist tightly. The place they were standing now was in front of a luxury officetel about a ten-minute walk from the school.
“My place. Let’s go in.”
“What?!”
He was so startled that his voice cracked ridiculously. Won-hyeok even laughed out loud, asking what there was to be so surprised about.
“You said you’d give me the assignment materials…….”
“Yeah. To do that, you have to come to my house. It’s not like I’d carry those around with me.”
That was true. They weren’t materials he was currently studying with, but things he’d written last year, so there was no reason for him to keep them at school or carry them around. Why hadn’t he thought of that?
“Then you can just give them to me tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow’s the weekend.”
“Then sometime next week…….”
“Han-gyeom, while I’m giving you the materials, I was also going to look over your assignment a bit. That’s why I brought you here. Would that make you really uncomfortable?”
Won-hyeok tilted his head slightly with a somewhat awkward smile. Gasping inwardly, Han-gyeom held his breath. He’d clearly thought of all this with the good, kind intention of wanting to help a junior, and Han-gyeom had gone and dumped cold water all over it.
“No! I just feel really sorry, that’s all!”
Afraid Won-hyeok might get hurt, Han-gyeom frantically waved both hands.
“What’s there to feel sorry about when a senior in the department wants to help a junior? Still, if you’re uncomfortable, just say so.”
Han-gyeom’s Adam’s apple bobbed hard again. To be honest, he really, really, really wanted to go. Sunbae’s house, his bias’ residence.
“Th-then, excuse me.”
“Yeah, let’s go.”
In the end, Han-gyeom surrendered to the desire to see his bias’ most private space. And just like that, he followed Won-hyeok inside the building.
He had already vaguely guessed it from the exterior, but as expected, this officetel didn’t quite suit the phrase “a college student’s studio apartment.” At a glance, the rent looked incredibly expensive. It was on a completely different level from the ordinary one-room place he lived in.
“It might be a little messy. I left in a hurry this morning.”
The moment the door opened and they stepped inside, the open interior spread out before his eyes. The neat, white-toned space carried a refreshing soap-like scent. It was probably from a diffuser, air freshener, or fabric softener.
“Excuse me for intruding.”
His heart pounded. Sunbae’s house. He had stepped into Do Won-hyeok sunbae’s home. Han-gyeom thought that if he could speak to his past self from last year, there was something he’d want to say.
Past you, aren’t you jealous of the current me?
“Want to sit comfortably? I need to look for the materials.”
“Ah, yes!”
Han-gyeom slowly walked into the living room and carefully perched himself on the sofa. The sofa didn’t seem ordinary either; the way it wrapped around his skin felt incredibly soft. Won-hyeok had given him advance warning that it might be messy, but honestly, Han-gyeom wanted to ask what part of this was supposed to be messy.
It was so clean that it was hard to believe a man lived here alone.
“Ah, I should write down the date.”
Han-gyeom took his phone out of his pocket and opened his calendar app. He selected today’s date, typed, “The first day I visited sunbae’s house,” and saved it.
From inside, he could occasionally hear rustling sounds, as if Won-hyeok was searching for the materials. He wanted to look around the place, but that really did seem rude, so Han-gyeom stayed seated on the sofa and only took in whatever fell within his line of sight, as if storing it all in his head.
That was when he happened to notice the calendar on the coffee table. The stark white calendar, with nothing written on it, had a peculiar marking on just one date.
Next Friday.
On that square was a small sticker shaped like a syringe.
What kind of mark is that? He was staring blankly at it when Won-hyeok, who had been inside, slowly came out into the living room. Feeling like he’d been caught peeking, Han-gyeom quickly jerked his head up, and his hair fluttered widely because of it.
“Han-gyeom, I feel awful. I think the materials must be at my family home. When I moved into this officetel last year, I moved everything I wasn’t using right away back there.”
When Won-hyeok put on an apologetic expression, Han-gyeom suddenly felt his chest tighten with a pang. Helping him wasn’t any kind of obligation, and Won-hyeok must’ve been busy in his own way with department studies and assignments too, yet he was sincerely being this considerate.
“It’s okay. I-I’m really fine.”
“I’ll bring the materials back with me when I go there this weekend.”
“I’m sorry for making things troublesome for you because of me.”
Han-gyeom sprang to his feet and hurriedly gathered up the bag he had carefully set down below. The reason he had come here was to receive the materials and get Won-hyeok’s help with the assignment. But if that most important material wasn’t here, then there was no reason for him to stay any longer.
“Where are you going?”
“Huh?”
“Even if the materials aren’t here, I can still look over your assignment. You followed me all the way here, after all. I can’t just send a guest away. I don’t have any more classes afterward, so I’ve got plenty of time.”
Won-hyeok casually stepped into the path Han-gyeom had been about to take out, as if blocking him from leaving.
“Sit. I’ll take a look.”
Somehow ending up seated on the sofa again, Han-gyeom rummaged through his bag and took out his laptop. He was still a little embarrassed about showing such a pathetic assignment. But he also wanted to accept Won-hyeok’s kindness, and to be honest, he also had the desire to do just a little better on the assignment.
He wasn’t good enough to get the kind of grades that would earn him a full scholarship, but he had always received scholarships that covered part of his tuition, and this time too, he had to.
“This book isn’t easy to analyze, is it?”
“That’s true, but I thought it fit the theme well, so I chose it.”
The assignment for that class was to freely analyze an English literary work of their choosing based on a theme given by the professor.
“Hmm.”
Won-hyeok let out a low sound from his throat as he focused on the screen. He looked like he’d stepped out of an electronics ad, so Han-gyeom stole glances at his profile.
“Han-gyeom, about this part.”
“Yes!”
They said a guilty conscience needs no accuser. He’d been secretly watching him, so when Won-hyeok suddenly spoke to him, Han-gyeom jumped and cried out in surprise.
“I’m not a professor, so why are you that nervous?”
In the end, Won-hyeok even laughed out loud. His laughing voice was pleasant to hear, but at the same time Han-gyeom felt embarrassed for having shown such a ridiculous side of himself.
“I don’t think this part really needs to be here. You already mentioned it once in the introduction, didn’t you? Repeating it twice could hurt the readability.”
“Ah, that’s definitely true.”
It was something he hadn’t considered at all. Nodding, Han-gyeom moved the laptop touchpad and revised the part Won-hyeok had pointed out.
The soft tapping of typing keys echoed gently through the living room. Won-hyeok stared at the pale fingers moving over the thick, old laptop, plain to see at a glance. Fingers that looked like they belonged in an advertisement were slimmer, longer, and paler than most women’s.
From those fingers to the thin wrist, then over the dull gray zip-up hoodie, his gaze finally came to rest on Han-gyeom’s face.
