Chapter 33
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 33
The meal passed without incident.
It was troubling, the way this woman—who now sat beside me instead of across from me as if it were the most natural thing in the world—kept placing food in my mouth. It was troubling, the way her eyes would crinkle into a smile as she did it. But it was a level of trouble I could endure, so I let it pass.
The truly troubling part came after the meal, when we were standing side-by-side in front of the sink to brush our teeth.
The handcuffs were off. When I’d asked if she could remove them since they made it hard to brush my teeth, she had readily agreed.
I didn’t know her motives, but I wondered if she was slowly letting her guard down around me.
Ssk-.
As I was brushing, I felt thin fingers wrap around the tips of my own.
I glanced at her through the mirror in front of us and saw that she was already looking at me, her reflection meeting mine.
Her eyes curved gently into crescents. Her warmth intertwined with my empty hand. The face in the mirror smiled.
“Heehee…”
A muffled laugh escaped her lips, distorted by the toothbrush she held in her mouth.
A tickle. Her fingers crept up from mine, tickling my palm.
This was troubling.
She was definitely tickling my hand, but it was my chest that felt the flutter.
An unbearable feeling began to stir somewhere inside me, and I clenched my fist, stopping her tickling motion.
The face I saw in the mirror was flushed a faint red.
Her face, and my own.
I’m going crazy…
I had to get out of here.
Any longer, and the atmosphere would turn strange.
I quickly spat out the toothpaste and rinsed my mouth. When I looked over at her, she mimicked my actions, leaning forward to spit into the sink.
Her long hair threatened to fall into the sink, so I reached out and swept it back for her. I felt her flinch at my touch.
My hand revealed the nape of her neck, which had been hidden by her hair. The straight, slender line of it was tinged with red.
“Ah, oh my…”
The dumb sound that escaped my mouth was so funny that I couldn't help but let out a chuckle.
“You should be careful.”
“Okay…”
Her head gave a small nod. The soft texture of her hair in my hand, the straight line of her reddened neck, and her earlobe all stole my attention.
Her cheeks were puffed out with water as she rinsed her mouth. I felt the urge to poke them but resisted, sensing the reaction wouldn't be a good one.
Afterward, she dried her face, linked her arm through mine, and said, “Le-let’s go now…”
“Alright.”
The softness pressing against my arm felt like it was spreading through my entire body.
This is getting dangerous…
Even as I thought that, the warmth that had been hovering around me all day felt strangely pleasant.
While my reason screamed and struggled to stop it, my body simply welcomed her, basking in the warmth.
Ugh…
My head drooped forward on its own. My gaze fell to our feet, which were stepping forward in a perfectly synchronized rhythm.
Of course, everyone walks more or less the same way, but I found myself needlessly attaching meaning to it.
Realizing my pathetic state, my expression soured.
I was hopeless.
Struggling, my ass.
It felt like half of my reason had already defected to her side.
I lifted my head again. If I kept looking down, my thoughts were going to veer off in a strange direction.
I shifted my gaze to the woman clinging to my arm. She was truly a bewitching woman. It had only been four days, yet the way she had me wrapped around her finger was nothing short of sorcery.
Following her lead, I soon found myself inside the dark bedroom.
As I looked at her, a question suddenly popped into my head.
Come to think of it…
From what I’d observed over the past few days, her daily routine was remarkably monotonous.
She wakes up and eats. After a shower, she comes out to the living room to pass the time, then eats dinner, brushes her teeth, and goes to the bedroom.
There must be a time she sets aside for writing, but I hadn’t seen her do it once since I arrived, so I had no idea when she got it done.
Is this kind of life even fun?
It had only been four days, but her pattern was incredibly rigid. It wasn’t that a regular lifestyle was bad, but her daily routine was, apart from that, quite dull.
She had no particular hobbies, no deviations from the norm. She had gone out the other day, but judging from her attitude right after she returned, it felt strongly like she had just been taking care of business.
I wasn’t sure if this was the right way to put it, but it was like looking at a person whose desires had been castrated. A feeling of someone just doing what needed to be done. Like watching a machine executing its programmed inputs.
Even though her attitude toward me was endlessly impulsive, the moment I was removed from the equation, that was the impression she gave.
I recalled the questions and answers from earlier in the day.
—Eun-ah, what are your hobbies?
—Y-you, Honeybee…
—Ah… hah…?
It wasn’t a real answer. Every question I asked about her preferences was met with a similar response, so I hadn’t learned much about her at all.
As my thoughts continued, I felt a force pulling me toward the bed.
“Le-let’s lie down now…”
“Ah, okay.”
I turned my head and saw her perched on the edge of the bed, tugging at me. Dokyun let her pull him, lowering his body onto the mattress.
Click.
The handcuffs were fastened once more. It seemed she wouldn’t allow me more than a certain degree of freedom.
As I lay on the bed and relaxed, she snuggled into the crook of my arm, just like every other night, creating a pose where she was nestled against me.
“Hehe…”
Leaning against me, her body went limp and boneless. I moved my hand and gently stroked the back of her head. Her eyes fluttered shut, reminding me of Bborongi, the cat back at my parents’ house.
For a moment, the thought that she resembled my lazy housecat made a laugh slip out.
“Pfft…”
“Uung…?”
As I laughed, she cracked her eyes open and looked up at me. Her dazed expression was so silly that another laugh burst out.
“Pfft, heh…”
The face looking at me remained blank for a moment, then, seeing me laugh, she began to laugh along, as if my joy was contagious.
“Hehehe…”
There it was again. That strange feeling of my heart being squeezed tight. Even as the corners of my mouth twitched into a smile, a wave of anxiety rose from that unidentifiable emotion.
The anxiety surfaced, pressing down on the churning feeling and calming my heart just a little. Once I’d settled down, I opened my mouth to speak to her.
“Time to sleep now, right?”
“Ah, no…?”
Her face, which had been laughing just a moment ago, looked up at me and said that.
“What?”
“Nooo…”
This felt like a familiar pattern. Eun-ah’s arms, which were wrapped around me, began to move, creeping up toward my chest.
“Ah, we still have something to do, don’t we…?”
“Uh…”
Dokyun’s eyes scanned her expression. Her glistening eyes. Her slightly flushed cheeks. The sound of her ragged breathing, a soft heung-.
Dammit.
A cold sweat broke out on my skin. On top of that, an impulse surged through me.
It was obvious she was getting ready to spend the night together. Dokyun’s mind raced, trying to find an excuse to avoid it.
The problem wasn’t her. It was me.
If I couldn’t hold back and we went through with it, I felt like I would be completely broken. Like this strange resonance would swallow my reason whole. That was the problem.
My thoughts spun frantically. I pushed down the nameless emotion and, with fear tucked under its arm, my reason began to run.
A temporary evasion like before wouldn’t work anymore. I no longer had the confidence to endure the impulses that targeted me at every moment. I had to convince her to restrain herself.
I replayed her words, her actions, her triggers. I had to find a way to hold her back.
And then, in the midst of its frantic dash, my reason found a solution in a corner of my mind.
This is it.
Dokyun hardened his expression, summoning a sense of resolve, and opened his mouth to speak.
“Not today.”
“Eung…?”
A look of confusion flickered across Eun-ah’s face, quickly replaced by a pout on her dazed expression.
“Ah, nooo…!”
She was starting to throw a tantrum. She wasn’t angry. I hadn’t hit a trigger. This seemed manageable. I opened my mouth and began to speak again.
“Eun-ah.”
“Yeees…”
I could see her eyebrows furrow as she glared at me. Her lips were about to jut out, which again made the corners of my own mouth twitch.
Shit…
I had to hold it in. My body tensed. The tension spread to the tips of my toes, and they began to stretch out straight.
“We, uh, we already did it last night, and this morning, didn’t we?”
Fwoosh-!
The face before me turned red as a beet. The sullen look vanished in an instant, replaced by embarrassment.
“Ye-yes…”
“That’s twice already, isn’t it?”
“Yes…”
As Dokyun looked at her with a stern expression, Eun-ah’s head began to droop. Her hands, which had been on his chest, started to fidget.
The sight of her being embarrassed was somehow cute. Forcing himself to focus, Dokyun hardened his expression as much as possible and spoke.
“Acting so impulsively isn’t what adults do, is it?”
“Uuu…”
A look of indignation appeared over the embarrassment that filled her face. Back and forth, back and forth. Her expression was certainly busy.
Shaking off the stray thought, Dokyun pressed her for an answer.
“Your answer?”
“Ye-yes…”
Thankfully, it seemed my gambit had worked. I didn’t know why, but she was obsessed with appearing mature.
Despite her childish speech and the somewhat clumsy way she thought, I had gathered from her behavior that the image she wanted for herself was that of an adult.
I had to use that, to drill into her the idea that impulsively sleeping together was not an adult thing to do.
His mind made up, Dokyun once again moved the hand resting on the back of her head, stroking her hair as he continued.
“You’re a cool adult, Eun-ah, so you can hold back a little, can’t you?”
Cool adult, a little. I constructed the sentence with keywords that would persuade her. A flicker of joy appeared on her face.
“Yes…!”
It worked.
“Just a little, let’s just hold back a little, okay?”
“Ju-just a little…!”
I watched her nod her head up and down. Somehow, it seemed I had overcome the crisis once again.
The tension that had gripped my body drained away. Dokyun let a relaxed smile form on his lips and continued to stroke her hair.
“Good girl.”
“Heehee…”
Her mood had already brightened. Her emotional swings were still impossible to follow, but as I got used to them, I was starting to develop a knack for guiding them in the direction I wanted.
The last of the tension left my body. The nameless impulse had completely subsided.
Reason had fully returned.
A breath I’d been holding escaped through my teeth.
If I just kept this up, there would be no problem.
This was as close as I should get to her—just close enough that I could control my own emotions.
This strange, churning feeling was just a delusion. A trick of the narrative. I couldn’t let myself get any closer to this woman.
My own condition was far from good.
“Shall we sleep now?”
“Yes…!”
The face looking back at me was so bright and clear that it must be making me misunderstand. Nothing had changed. This woman was a criminal who had kidnapped me, and I was the poor victim who had to save himself.
No matter how much this woman who had stolen my life tried to shake me, I had to reclaim the life that was rightfully mine.
“G-good night…”
“You too, Eun-ah. Good night.”
This warmth, this heartbeat—it had to be born of fear. It had to be my body, not wanting to be harmed by her, creating a delusion.
“Hehe… Okay…!”
My gaze being stolen away—it had to be so I could watch her, to make sure she wouldn’t hurt me. The tightness in my chest—it had to be the suffocation of my confinement.
It had to be that my own state was so poor that my emotions were flaring up without rhyme or reason.
It had to be. It absolutely had to be.