Chapter 34
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 34
Three days passed.
Nothing about his life had changed in any significant way. Just as before, he would wake up, eat, wash, spend time in the living room, eat again, and go to sleep.
His daily routine continued without deviation. And yet, to say that nothing had changed at all would not be true.
Dokyun lowered his gaze to Eun-ah, who was nestled in his arms.
Tap. Tack. Tap.
He watched the back of her head as she typed away, her laptop resting on her thighs. Since yesterday, she had started writing her manuscript again.
She remained completely focused, not uttering a single word. It was a starkly different sight from the person she had been before.
How fascinating.
As a reader, Dokyun had only ever seen the finished product. The process of a novel actually being created was a strange and wondrous thing to witness.
Letters gathered to form words, words became sentences, and sentences turned into paragraphs.
Her slender fingers danced across the keyboard, then paused. She deleted the previous sentence and overwrote it with a new one.
Black text rapidly filled the blank white page.
Her typing was incredibly fast. He didn’t know if all authors were like that, but Dokyun thought she was a remarkably quick writer.
He knew she was already on about her twelfth page.
He wasn’t sure if it was because he was so engrossed in her writing process or if she was genuinely that fast, but the speed was enough to make him think, Already?
A thought suddenly struck him: what in the world was going on inside her head?
He remembered hearing once that writing a novel was the act of unfurling the landscape of one’s mind into sentences.
He grew curious about her—about the landscape that existed in her mind, a world so concrete that she could write without a moment’s hesitation.
No, seriously, is she a genius?
It seemed entirely plausible. From the very beginning, her writing had always felt complete, fully formed.
Furthermore, what he had seen of her childhood in the diary from the study lent credibility to his hypothesis.
Dokyun recalled the contents of the diary.
[Today, classical humanities...]
[Today, a book on philosophy...]
He didn’t know for sure what her mother had considered important in her education.
However, Dokyun couldn’t shake the feeling that the education her mother had forced upon her was precisely what had created the writer she was today.
As his thoughts drifted, she finished her manuscript and turned to look at him.
“D-Done...!”
The face that glanced up at him was bright and clear. Dokyun met her eyes, which were filled with anticipation. A small smile escaped his lips as he stroked the crown of her head.
“You worked hard.”
“Hehe...”
She would probably hate to hear it, but as she leaned her head against his chest and let out a soft laugh, she looked for all the world like a young child.
She was clearly very intelligent, yet her actions were so juvenile that the dissonance felt strange.
Come to think of it...
One thing he’d learned from observing her was that she was on medication. Twice a day, after breakfast and dinner, she would swallow a few pills with water.
He didn’t know what kind of medicine it was, but he suspected it was for a psychiatric condition.
What kind of illness could it be?
He hadn’t thought about it too deeply before, but it seemed certain she had some kind of mental illness. The problem was, he had no expertise in that area, so it was difficult to identify her specific condition based on her behavior alone.
From some of her words and actions, he’d wondered if it was some kind of impulse control or delusional disorder, but he couldn’t say for sure.
As his thoughts continued, she rubbed her head against his chest, then moved the laptop from her thighs and turned her body to fully embrace him.
“Again, do it again...”
It seemed she wanted more praise.
At her urging, Dokyun patted her back with one hand and continued to stroke her head with the other.
“You did a great job. As expected of an author, you looked so cool while you were concentrating.”
“Heeheehee...”
Her face, beaming with a silly grin, flushed brightly. Her eyes curved into crescents, a light dancing within them.
It was that smile. The transparent smile that blew away all his previous thoughts and turned his insides into a complete mess.
Squeeze.
There it was again. That dull ache around his heart. That strange, constricting flutter in his gut.
Whenever he looked at that face, his body would escape his control and run wild on its own.
Dokyun found it difficult to look at her any longer. He pulled her close, burying that smile in his chest.
“Mmph...”
He heard the muffled sound of her face being squashed against him.
A faint warmth, definitely cooler than his own, radiated from her. A faint, addictive scent pricked the tip of his nose.
A light, child-like heartbeat tapped against his chest. He tried his best to ignore it, but once he became aware of it, he started to become conscious of everything about her.
Just then, he felt a tickling touch on his waist. He looked down and saw her smirking, her fingers wiggling at his side.
It felt strange not to react, so he lightly scratched the waist he was holding with his index finger.
“Bwiing!”
Her body jolted with a ridiculous squeal of laughter.
Was it last night? He had tickled her waist, and she had writhed in agony. A playful mood had taken him over, and he had kept going until she burst into tears.
He had been flustered when she started crying fat tears and had done his best to comfort her, but ever since then, she had been looking for any opportunity to get her revenge.
He found her antics amusing and didn't say anything, but he wasn't very ticklish. It was unlikely she would get the reaction she wanted.
Lowering his gaze, he saw her pouting, her lips jutting out in a sulk.
Poke.
She narrowed her eyes and poked his waist again, but he felt nothing.
Dokyun watched her pout, then put on a smile and spoke.
“You started it this time, didn’t you?”
“Ugh...”
Her eyebrows began to furrow. The finger poking his waist pressed harder, but still, he felt nothing.
Thump. She began to express her anger by bonking her head against his chest.
It seemed he should probably stop teasing and soothe her. If he pushed it any further, things might get hard to handle.
He lowered his head and kissed her on the forehead.
Peck.
“Heut...”
Flinch.
He felt her body freeze. The previous expression vanished without a trace, replaced by a wash of shyness.
He had thought it many times before.
She’s so easy.
As long as he didn’t cross a line and hit one of her triggers, she was a remarkably easy woman to handle.
From what Dokyun had observed, as long as she recognized it as a joke or his actions remained within an acceptable range, her emotions would stabilize just like that.
There was none of the incomprehensible strength that had torn his hand, none of the sudden emotional nosedives.
And that fact kept causing a single hypothesis to bloom in Dokyun’s mind: What if...
He clenched his jaw.
Bullshit...
It was a ridiculous thought. He tried to tell himself that, but it wasn’t easy. That pure smile, directed only at him, was just that powerful.
As his thoughts wandered, he felt the hand on his waist slide slowly downward.
A hand heading for his ass.
Dokyun moved the hand that was patting her back to block it and opened his mouth.
“No.”
“Kkiiing...”
Her voice was laced with frustration, but it was no use. He had managed to stop her after making that promise, but she still tried to make a move on his body whenever she saw an opening.
Dokyun met Eun-ah’s eyes, put on a stern expression, and repeated his warning.
“We made a promise, right?”
“Uuuu...!”
“Your answer?”
“Yeees...”
Her lips were already starting to pout again.
Finding her jutting lips impudent, he poked them with his finger. She promptly bit it.
“Ah.”
She gently bit his index finger with her front teeth and looked up at him. Her eyes crinkled slightly, and a playful look bloomed on her face.
Lick.
He felt the flesh of her tongue sweep over the tip of his finger.
Fwoosh—!
At the wet sensation on his finger, he hastily pulled his hand back and glared at her. He was met with a face wearing a sly grin, one corner of her mouth lifted.
Did she think she’d won? He didn’t like her triumphant expression, so he gave her a gentle flick on the forehead.
“Kkying!”
She squeezed her eyes shut and let out a strange whimper.
“Such a drama queen.”
He had only tapped her lightly. Perhaps she was offended by that, or by his words, because her face turned sullen. She tapped her own forehead and opened her mouth.
“B-Bad...!”
She tried to make a stern face, but the faint blush on her cheeks and the twitching corners of her lips were such a giveaway that she didn’t look stern at all.
‘Bad,’ my ass, he thought, but he couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across his face.
“Pfft...”
Seeing his reaction, she looked frustrated that she hadn’t gotten the response she wanted, and her face grew sullen again.
He found her expression so amusing that he considered watching her for a little longer, but he changed his mind. He pulled her waist into an embrace and patted her back. Her mood instantly lifted, and she began to giggle.
“Hee...”
Ah, I’m really going crazy.
I’m supposed to be acting...
But his feelings kept getting mixed in. His heart was racing again. It must be arrhythmia.
Yes, that’s it. Arrhythmia. His last health check-up was three years ago; it must have developed since then.
It must be from all the cigarettes he smoked. From drinking coffee every other day, from his drinking habit getting worse while living alone.
This pounding in his chest had to be because of a problem with his own body, not because of the small bundle of warmth in his arms.
“H-Honeybee...”
Their eyes met. The eyes looking up at him were so clear that he could see his own reflection in them.
“Yes.”
“I-It’s time to eat...”
Ah.
He felt his mind clear slightly.
“Ah, right. Food.”
“Unn... Let’s g-go now...”
The strength left his arms. As she slipped out of his loosened embrace, he felt a sense of emptiness.
It wasn’t the emptiness of hunger, but the emptiness left by the absence of her warmth.
Reason stirred faintly within him.
...And that was all it did.
The warmth that had enveloped him moments before felt like a dream, so hazy and comfortable that his reason had no desire to wake up. It simply lay there, stirring like someone muttering in their sleep.