Togetherness (3)
Suho had a habit of acting playful.
He always sounded so mature, but the reason I once saw him as a child was simple.
Suho would tease me like an irritable little kid, scratching at my nerves every single day. I wanted to grab him by the collar and shake him like a naughty child, yet I couldn’t bring myself to do it—because he might actually get hurt.
“You’re asking because you really don’t know?”
“That’s right.”
“You don’t know a lot of things, and it’s pretty interesting, isn’t it?”
It really was interesting.
Suho was the one who had tracked down my home address.
His information-gathering ability was so impressive that even if he entered an information olympiad, he might actually win.
Even if he hadn’t done it himself, just using his wealth to have someone else investigate me or my family… I wonder if he could have done it.
‘No way. Not even Suho would do that.’
No matter how much Suho seemed to ignore the boundaries when it came to me, I knew he wouldn’t.
The guy was surprisingly rational.
Anyone could see he had an IQ that belonged to a pure science type.
He was also the one who had personally researched countless papers to create the ASCS Delay Agent.
I still couldn’t understand how someone with almost no emotions at all had read my romance-heavy novels.
Even though the actions I saw from him were mostly driven by emotion—
Love was one of the strongest feelings a person could have.
It was the kind of emotion that could last a lifetime and etch one person’s name into another’s heart forever.
Or like in old folktales, where children raised by a devoted stepfather fell in love and ran away together.
Suho’s actions toward me were clearly emotional, and I could tell just from everything he had said and done.
The guy was in love with me.
Yeah.
I couldn’t deny that fact either.
“I don’t know everything about you, you know.”
“I don’t know your true feelings or how you really see me…”
“I don’t know any of that either.”
“Hmph.”
If he knew, he’d be a god.
Knowing someone’s heart is either being a god or writing their story in a novel.
“Still, isn’t it more important to tell you how I feel?”
“Intelligence is worth a thousand gold, right?”
“Sigh…”
I wasn’t sure if that was even a real saying.
But his words and actions clearly meant one thing.
“Well… I don’t know. I’m going back to my studio.”
“I’ll come with you.”
I couldn’t pull my hand away from his gentle clasp.
My hand hurt and felt strangely weak, but the moment his skin touched mine, all strength melted away.
I sat in the chair, booted up the computer, and stared at the monitor as it slowly brightened.
Even though I wasn’t looking, the computer would have turned itself on perfectly well. But right now I couldn’t tear my eyes away.
Suho sat behind the monitor like a vigilant guardian… or like a man completely smitten in love.
“It’s on…”
The second the computer finished booting, I opened the Novel World.
Thanks to Suho, the chapters I sent to the publisher had been scheduled to upload several days in advance. So even though this was only the fifth chapter, it was already the fiftieth one officially registered.
The scheduled chapters were uploading normally.
“It’s doing well.”
The views might not have been as high as before, but I no longer cared about that.
Some people might be reading and watching to see what happened next. Others who had already finished the previous chapters would just skip forward because the story was the same.
Right now, the most important thing was deleting the countless titles I had piled up.
Annual Run, Draft Run, Habit-Title Swapper.
At least three titles had to be erased from my life.
“Yeah, right.”
My quiet murmur was met with Suho nodding vigorously like he was happy about something important.
‘He thinks I’m looking at the screen and saying it’s going well, huh?’
“Huh?”
“There’s another monitor over here too.”
“I’m watching the screen like you do.”
Suho read my thoughts like a mind-reading wizard.
‘He’s still scary.’
If we ever fought, I had a feeling we’d lose every time.
“Why? Were you looking at me?”
I assumed Suho was staring at me, but when he said he was looking at the monitor, an unfamiliar feeling of disappointment washed over me.
I was confused.
Was he falling for me… or for my stories?
“Why? Why are you still sulking like that?”
“When did I ever sulk at you? When did I ever say that?”
My glance at him was met with Suho’s teasing challenge.
‘I shouldn’t have looked back…’
Our eyes met. Suho smiled as if he had been waiting for exactly that moment.
He had probably expected me to keep staring at the monitor.
But the second I looked at him, he stepped in close, grinning like he had won.
“You’ve been making your cheeks red all day. It’s so cute.”
“I’m not joking around with you, idiot.”
I turned my gaze away from his as naturally as possible.
I shifted my eyes back to the monitor and opened a few communities like nothing was wrong.
It would probably be better to hear opinions from complete strangers than from Suho, who was smitten with me.
Strangers’ evaluations would be more honest—
I decided to start with the community known for its harsh criticisms.
I figured a calm, gentle community might be safer than one that bit first.
They say you should strike first, but I wasn’t about to throw the first punch—
“Hey, did you see the reservation for the fox run?”
“It’s all the way to chapter fifty?”
“Remake, so that’s possible. Yeah, we should still keep watching.”
“Hey, reread the fox run.”
“There are some changes in the content.”
“The extras are new and super detailed.”
“Which episodes?”
“23 and 24.”
“It’s only up to five, right? How did you like it?”
“If you own it, you can read the previews early.”
“Fool.”
“He seems determined to continue.”
“I can’t tell about persistence, but it looks fine so far.”
“I’m just neutral.”
“Neutral in an uphill battle? You’ll slip, idiot.”
“Hahaha, uphill, for real.”
“At this point, climbing is the way to go.”
“Suho.”
“Yes?”
“You asked me something yesterday in the car.”
“Huh? Oh, that thing?”
“Yeah.”
The moment I met his eyes, my earring jingled.
“Tell me.”
“I’ll tell you first, and you won’t back down, right?”
“If you don’t like it, I’ll keep going until you do.”
My cheeks burned.
I didn’t know if his hands were hot or my cheeks were hot.
Clearly both were burning.
I unconsciously covered my lips.
If it were before, I would have grabbed his hand and pushed him away.
But things had changed.
Suho always did something when he touched my cheek.
I had decided I couldn’t stop his actions anymore, so my body had chosen to protect me.
“Suho.”
“Why are you covering your lips?”
“It’s just… that…”
I couldn’t bring myself to say, “Because you might suddenly kiss me.”
Instead I gathered the words I had meant to use to distract him.
“What you said to your father…”
“Why do you call him ‘father’ instead of ‘Suho’s dad’?”
Suho was like a difficult-to-conquer boss mob.
One side would pull aggro and avoid instant death, then suddenly the aggro would flip and the instant-death pattern would come from the other side.
Every step I took felt like stepping on a mine. No matter where I stepped, the explosion went off.
“Because you keep teasing me. Anyway…”
“What exactly did he say?”
“He said you like shrimp. After your mother left, he struggled a lot. And right after you became a man, you struggled even more. After you got sick, you read my novels every day and finally laughed again.”
My cheeks turned even redder from the words I had blurted out.
It wasn’t my own thoughts at all; it was exactly what Suho’s father had said.
But the way it was spoken changed everything.
It was like I was some huge writer.
I felt horribly embarrassed.
A writer who saved someone buried in pain.
Could I really be that?
“Suho.”
“Yes?”
“Why are you crying?”
“I’m not crying, idiot.”
I shook my head. Suho’s hand gently stroked my burning cheeks like he was dribbling a ball.
He couldn’t speak, but his heart was clearly telling me everything.
It’s okay.
It’s because of you.
‘I’ve changed a lot too.’
Even though I had been writing romance novels and using 19+ pen names, I had never felt this emotional.
The vague loneliness I used to feel in the middle of the night in a tiny room… I was feeling it in broad daylight.
“I don’t want your pity, Suho. I want you to stop feeling sorry for me…”
“Ah, you crazy bastard!!”
I thought the story was incredibly moving.
But I had to correct myself.
The guy was just a bloodshot-eyed, hot-blooded kid who liked coloring.