Small Habits
I watched him for a few days and decided that Cha Jun-jae was like a wounded stray cat.
I planned to fix his messed-up head with steady kindness and attention. It would be good for him, good for me, good for his sister, and good for his brother-in-law. Only then could we all do what we needed to do with lighter hearts.
The rainwater embrace incident had happened three days ago. I decided it was time to change my approach. Cha Jun-jae was the kind of man who would cry one moment and smile the next if I showed him affection. This was completely different from how I’d treated him before. Until now, I had coldly withdrawn all interest no matter how he lived or what he did to survive.
“Hup.”
This was my new daily routine. I woke up early, went jogging, came back and drank a glass of water, showered within ten minutes, then jotted down any ideas that came to mind in my notebook. In the empty spaces, I wrote down thoughts about how certain scenes should be shot. By then, I would hear him calling for me from upstairs or he would come down and peek out. It happened at least a dozen times a day, so I was slowly getting used to it. As soon as I sensed Cha Jun-jae stirring, I moved quickly. I was in a hurry to secure time for my own work.
“Are you awake?”
I approached Cha Jun-jae and checked his temperature. He was gradually getting better. Yesterday I had caught him taking a cold shower while he was still sick. When I threatened to drag him to the hospital if he did it again, he cooperated—albeit reluctantly—with getting better. For Cha Jun-jae the child who hated hospitals, it was a very effective threat.
“Your fever’s dropped a lot.”
Apparently displeased by my words, Cha Jun-jae burrowed back under the blanket. It was a clear signal that he wanted a reward, so I slipped into the space beside him and hugged him tightly.
“Take your medicine too. I brought breakfast.”
While jogging, I had picked up blueberry hotcakes from a nearby café. I’d bought them with Cha Jun-jae’s money, since he had offered to cover living expenses for the time being.
“It smells amazing, though.”
He didn’t smell like someone who had just woken up. The scent was strong and pleasant. I buried my nose against his tense shoulder and stayed there for a while, but Cha Jun-jae suddenly shifted his upper body as if uncomfortable. Startled, I let go of him and sat up.
“Sorry.”
I was only trying to be nice. Yet here I was, getting worked up and crossing the line between man and woman. I washed my face with dry hands, then glanced sideways. I could feel his blatant stare. Cha Jun-jae was half-buried in the blanket, watching me.
“What? I already said I was sorry.”
My tone came out a little curt. Cha Jun-jae paid it no mind and simply offered me a gentle smile.
“I’d like it if you kept doing that from now on.”
“…You’d like it if I kept doing that?”
“It makes me want to live longer.”
Cha Jun-jae seemed unaware that we had already crossed far beyond the boundaries of normal friendship. But what could I do? From the beginning, we had never really been friends. The moment we decided to live together like this—cohabitation that wasn’t quite cohabitation—we had already given up on any normal relationship. For now, my goals were symbiosis and survival. And it was definitely better to choose smiles and hugs over hatred and resentment.
“By the way, when did you shower?”
“While you were out exercising.”
I opened my mouth wide in admiration of his meticulous scheme. So he had known I went out at the crack of dawn. How had he noticed me sneaking out so quietly? Yesterday, the day before, and today too. Cha Jun-jae had rubbed his eyes as if he had just woken up. That explained the floral scent coming from his whole body.
After some back and forth, I finally managed to wake Cha Jun-jae and brought him downstairs. We sat across from each other at the dining table and transferred the hotcakes I had brought onto plates. That’s when I discovered one of his habits. Cha Jun-jae didn’t eat breakfast properly. Unlike me, who felt drained all day if I skipped it, he would just down a cup of coffee and call it a meal. Even now, after setting the table, he immediately went to the machine and brewed coffee. The rich aroma of the beans filled the entire first floor.
While the coffee dripped, Cha Jun-jae did a quick shoulder stretch. He had done the same yesterday. Living in the same house meant I was starting to notice all the little habits other people would never see. Another idea came to me, so I quickly grabbed a nearby memo pad and wrote it down. While creating the male lead character “Hae-su,” I had been incorporating things like Cha Jun-jae’s habits. I was chewing on the end of my pen, lost in thought, when the deep scent of coffee reached me, carried by his beautiful hand.
“Eat first.”
“Ah, right.”
Cha Jun-jae stood right beside my face and didn’t leave, staring intently at the memo. This was also something we had agreed on—that I could add stories that came to mind while watching him into the film. But the expression on Cha Jun-jae’s face as he read it carefully was close to displeasure.
“Why, why?”
I covered the memo in a panic, afraid he might tell me not to write it. Only then did Cha Jun-jae seem to notice me; his eyes widened.
“Is there a problem?”
“I just realized… that this is what I look like.”
It could have been mistaken for a Cha Jun-jae observation log, but he seemed surprised by something else. My tense neck let out a breath of relief.
“Oh, that’s all it was.”
After an awkward moment of avoiding each other’s eyes, Cha Jun-jae returned to his seat with his hot coffee. We sat facing each other and ate the hotcakes in silence for a while. The fluffy bread and sweet syrup comforted me after I had already sweated buckets that morning. I was humming a pleasant little tune when Cha Jun-jae suddenly blocked my fork with his own.
“What?”
“Hey. When you film in Korea… can I come watch?”
Cha Jun-jae spoke quickly, his face blank, unable to meet my eyes. His lowered lashes trembled as if he were nervous. But unlike Cha Jun-jae, who was holed up in this island lodging, many people in Korea would recognize him. Only a very small number of people knew we had been classmates since elementary, middle, and high school.
“If you buy me something delicious.”
I was tired of the usual on-set fast food—ramen, hamburgers, that sort of thing. At the mention of buying something delicious, Cha Jun-jae’s cool eyes began to curve into crescents. Ah, my heart was vibrating up and down.
“I’ll buy a lot. A whole lot.”
“Not too much, though…”
I bit my fork and lowered my gaze this time. Cha Jun-jae’s fork was only digging into the spots right next to where mine went. Realizing this, I tried to glare at the owner of the fork. Having successfully distracted me with his mischief, Cha Jun-jae asked casually, as if it were nothing.
“What are you doing after you eat?”
“What are you going to do today?”
“What about you, Eun-dam?”
“Swimming, working, going to the café.”
“Then I’ll swim, work, and go to the café too.”
“No.”
At my refusal, Cha Jun-jae’s expression cooled rapidly. I tapped his fork, which was once again heading toward the edge of depression. Before the gloom could settle back into his eyes, I quickly finished speaking.
“I told you no swimming until your cold is completely gone.”
“Yeah.”
“Instead, you can sit there and watch me.”
Cha Jun-jae, who had been rolling a single blueberry with a thoroughly unimpressed face, suddenly lifted his head. The hopeful sparkle in his eyes felt overwhelming, so I looked away and added,
“If you’re bored, you can come along. I’m not forcing you. I just really want to go to the sea for the first time in a while.”
“I’ll go.”
Without even a second’s hesitation, Cha Jun-jae answered. Of course he would. As I chewed my hotcake, I wondered where this growing sense of satisfaction was coming from. It was the fact that the broken Cha Jun-jae was obediently following my words.
It felt incredibly sweet.