The Side of My Wife I Never Knew (4)
The moment Sangjun's explicit confession reached my ears directly, strangely enough, far from anger, an odd, peculiar thrill began to pulse through me.
By all rights, I should have grabbed the little bastard by the collar right then and there and flipped the table over.
But my reason had started racing off in an entirely different direction.
He wasn't a face like a celebrity's, but even at a glance he was a fresh, twenty-one-year-old medical student brimming with youthful vigor.
And that green young pup — a smart med student, the kind other people envied — had been carrying my wife in his heart.
The sordid, lurid scene drew itself so vividly in my head: him lying in bed, breathing hard while picturing Jisu's ample breasts and her nipped-in waist, stroking that monstrous thing with his own hand until he came.
My wife... had been the object of those kinds of sexual fantasies for this young kid?
The fact that Jisu — that conservative, cold woman, my wife who never spared a glance for other men — had filled this young, clever med student's head to the very brim stoked a strange sense of conquest and a twisted pleasure in me.
Jisu had always existed quietly and demurely, inside my fence.
And yet behind her husband's back, without me ever knowing, she had become the star of the filthiest, most electric fantasies on that kid's one-room bed, shaking his desire to its core — the thought struck my mind like a blow.
A strange sexual tension fiercer than anger shot a jolt straight down below my stomach.
Clenching my fists, I pressed him with a deliberately colder voice, hiding my pounding heart and my warped excitement.
"...So."
"......"
"With your pants tented out like that, you sat down at the table exactly as my wife led you to. Is that right?"
"Yes......"
Sangjun barely squeezed the answer out in a shrinking voice.
With my fists clenched tight, I tilted my chin, as if urging his next words along.
"So. What happened after that?"
He still kept glancing at my face, carefully dredging up the memory of that day as he continued.
"I pulled out a chair and sat down, and Hayul's mom went into the kitchen and opened the fridge and started taking things out. She was reaching for drinks and fruit, bending her upper body deep inside the fridge... and at that moment, through her thin home-wear pants, her panties line showed so clearly I couldn't tear my eyes away. Every curve was right there..."
"......"
"So... when she stood back up holding a side-dish container, I should have turned my head and stopped looking, but... without realizing it, I just..."
Gulp.
The sound of Sangjun swallowing dryly echoed loudly in the quiet room.
At that instant, the word nuna that had slipped so naturally out of his mouth sent a flash of revulsion up my spine. Does this bastard really call her nuna, right in front of me, her husband? I almost snapped a retort at him, but I bit it back — I didn't want to break the flow of this stimulating story he was unfolding.
At the same time, a bizarre thought flashed quickly through my head.
...So after staring mindlessly at Jisu's panty line like that, did he lose control of himself and pounce on her right there?
A corner of my chest began to thump, swelling with a twisted anticipation.
Wiping away the feeling of my mouth going dry, I snapped at him again.
"Just get to it!! Don't drag it out — tell me straight."
"Ah... well, our eyes met."
"......"
Our eyes met? The tension that had been stretched taut snapped all at once, and a strange deflation washed over me, like air hissing out of a balloon.
Contrary to my secret fantasy that he would have pounced on her like a beast on the spot, their eyes had locked at such an anticlimactic moment that I found myself frowning without meaning to.
Hiding my disappointment, I asked flatly.
"So? Your eyes met — and what did Jisu say?"
"Hayul's mom was turning around with the side-dish container in both hands, and I think she noticed where my eyes were pointed. Because my gaze was nailed downward. I saw her face flush red in that instant. She looked completely flustered, like she didn't know what to do."
Sangjun fidgeted with his collar, as if he were breaking out in a cold sweat even now at the memory.
"I was so flustered my mind went white. I'd been caught red-handed openly ogling her ass, so I figured I'd get cut off from the tutoring, from everything, maybe even reported. So on reflex I shot up out of my chair, grabbed the backpack I'd dumped in the living room, and made a dash for the front door like I was running for my life."
"......"
"And then Hayul's mom slammed the side-dish container down on the table and hurried after me. And then she grabbed my arm and... she said, 'D-don't go, Teacher.'"
He had hesitated, and Jisu kept holding his hand tight and led him back to the table.
The two of them sat facing each other across the table once more.
For a long while, a heavy silence hung over them, so thick that neither could even breathe. It was Jisu who broke the awkwardness first.
"At that age, your blood's running hot, so it's only natural... You peeked at my butt just once and you were ready to run away? Silly boy."
Watching Sangjun hang his head deep and stammer out his apology — "Hayul's mom, I'm so sorry......" — an unexpected thought crossed my mind.
What the hell is with this kid? All that size and he's pure as hell — such a naive little virgin. He peeked at a married woman's butt ONE time, got caught, and tried to pack his bag and flee? Hmm... I guess a twenty-one-year-old baby could be like that.
At his unexpectedly clumsy, boyish display, my tension eased a little — and at the same time, I began to see the thread of why my wife had given this kid an opening.
Swallowing dryly, I prompted him again.
"So? What happened after that?"
The instant the words left my mouth, the scene in the room shifted completely back to that afternoon — the chilly, peculiar air of that kitchen.
"Oh, come on! You peeked at my butt one time and now you're apologizing like you committed a crime? Haha."
Jisu tried her best to lighten the mood, forcing a bright smile.
But at his wife's words, something flared up from deep inside Sangjun.
"Y-you're NOT an ajumma!!"
"I'm sorry?"
"When I first met you, honestly, I thought you were more like a sixth-year senior at my med school!"
At Sangjun's abrupt, blunt remark, Jisu's face showed a flash of bewilderment.
But being taken for a college senior — someone barely four or five years older than the twenty-one-year-old himself, far younger than her actual age — apparently didn't displease her as a woman.
A bright, sunny smile, the same as always, spread across Jisu's lips again.
"Oh my!! Still, comparing a mom in her late thirties, pushing forty, to a fresh-faced coed? Teacher, I thought you were all brains, but you sure know how to charm a woman's heart too, don't you? Haha. Thank you for the flattery, truly."
When Jisu waved it off with a laugh, Sangjun flared up, staring her dead in the eye with an even more earnest look.
"N-no! I really wasn't just saying it! Every time I see you, you're so beautiful and so perfect that my heart pounds every single time I come for a lesson... and even when I go to sleep at night... ah—"
Mid-confession, pouring his feelings out at Jisu, Sangjun suddenly realized what he'd been about to say next and choked his words off in a panic.
It was a hair's-breadth moment — the thing he did when he went to sleep at night had almost come spilling out.
At that absurd, out-of-nowhere confession from a younger man, Jisu's face turned as red as a ripened apple in an instant.
But she couldn't hold it in, and a clear burst of laughter escaped her.
Even if he's legally an adult, and even if Hayul calls him 'Teacher' and treats him like one... in my wife's eyes, was a kid still just a kid? Cute?
Listening to the story, I could read my wife's psychology laid bare, and a strange jealousy and an odd, total absorption rose up inside me at the same time.
"Oh — sorry for laughing. Haha."
Jisu softly smoothed down her laughter with a hand covering her mouth.
His adorable little protest seemed to have dissolved the tension entirely.
But a peculiar curiosity had settled into Jisu's eyes.
"So, even when you go to sleep at night... what? Haha."
"Ah......"
Sangjun's mouth clamped shut, his face the picture of a man who'd just shot himself in the foot.
His face was already flushed crimson down to the back of his neck, like it might burst.
Faced with a naked truth he couldn't bring himself to speak, he hung his head low and fidgeted, at a complete loss.
Watching him quietly, Jisu let out another small laugh.
Then she leaned slightly across the table and coaxed him again, soothingly, so he says.
"It's okay, you can tell me. Hm? What did you do when you went to sleep at night, Sangjun?"
At the sound of Jisu's voice burrowing gently into his ear, Sangjun felt as if his whole body had been bound fast.
"...I... m-mastur......ba......ted......"
With his face burning like a ripened apple and his head bowed as if it would hit the floor, the kid trailed off at the very last syllable, never quite able to finish the word.
It was a whisper, barely louder than a mosquito's whine — but it was a word with more than enough force to tear through the silent air of that kitchen.