Just This Once
Thud.
Jiyeon's breath stopped. Her whole body went rigid. The man's hand was on her ass, and her thoughts snarled over themselves.
What do I do? Should I get angry? Pretend I didn't notice? Kim Taehyung, what are you doing? If you're watching, help me!
Taehyung's eyes went wide on the salon CCTV. It felt as if a current had shot all the way to the roots of his hair. The pleasure was so fierce he wondered whether this was what a drug felt like, and he sank into it, drunk on something he had no way to stop.
"More... keep going."
He said it with his hand closed around himself as he hardened.
"Please, have a seat."
Jiyeon barely got her mouth to work. The words came out, and at once she thought she ought to have been angry—but she didn't have the courage for that. The fear was bigger. Mercifully, the man took his hand off her and sat down in the chair. His face was calm. Hers was not. Her heart hammered like something unhinged, and she resented Taehyung, resented him again and again.
While she dried his hair, the man met her eyes and was the first to speak. The voice, she thought, was softer than his age had any right to be.
"Would it be all right if I came by later, just for a blow-dry?"
"Yes, of course."
A small fear moved through her, but she couldn't tell him no, so the answer came out short.
"How much is it?"
"Ten thousand won."
He didn't say another word until the dry was finished and he opened the salon door and left. The tension drained out of her. Jiyeon braced a hand on the styling chair, let out a long breath, then ran for the break room, flung the door open, and shouted.
"What was that?! You saw all of it, didn't you? How could you just sit there!"
Taehyung didn't seem to hear a word of it. He yanked her skirt up. She was already furious, and being ignored while he flipped her skirt only made it worse. She shook his hand off.
"What's wrong with you? I'm in the middle of—"
"Hold still."
He cut her off, caught her wrist in his right hand, and slid his left inside her panties. A small moan slipped out of her, but the anger didn't go down with it. She was already soaked through. His fingers and her sex stuck together in the slick.
"You're drenched."
The words shamed her. She couldn't tell whether it was the wet panties, or the fact that she had gotten aroused in a moment like this, or what a man so much younger had just done. The confusion made her lash out at Taehyung for no good reason, only to hide it.
"You think this is fun?"
He didn't listen. He pushed his middle finger in, and it was drawn up soft and easy. A thin moan left her. The strength went out of her legs; she stumbled backward until her shoulders met the wall.
"Don't."
She was still in the middle of being angry, and giving in to him right there would have cost her pride, so the word came out. It wasn't a firm refusal. He paid her no mind. He drew his finger back and let it go, touching her gently. It was gentle. In the break room, the wet sound of skin against skin spread between them.
Squelch. Squelch.
The shameful noise came out of her own body, and Jiyeon's face burned red. She lifted a hand to stop the moans that kept escaping. Taehyung lifted her onto the table and brought his face down between her legs. Over and over he replayed it—the hungry way that young man had looked at her chest, and the sudden hand on her ass—and he was sure that was why she was this worked up. The same as him.
"You liked it, didn't you? It turned you on, didn't it, that young guy looking at you like he was touching you, until you got this wet?"
"Haah... what are you even saying? It's not like that, nnh..."
"When he grabbed your ass, you wanted him to keep going. You wanted his hand up under your skirt."
"Aah—no, stop."
She left her feeling body behind her and thought his questions were ridiculous. Her, with a man the age of her own son? Over nothing more than letting him see a chest with no bra under it, and a hand coming up onto her ass? It was absurd. And yet the feeling came back anyway, the moment that hand had climbed over her. The more she denied it, the more Taehyung's finger inside her made her think of the other man's.
Right in front of his eyes, her slick ran down along the finger buried in her pussy. He rose, kissed her, and spoke against her mouth.
"When that guy touched you, I thought I was going to lose my mind, I was so turned on."
Imagining it was what the man had wanted to do, he set his hand on her ass and squeezed hard enough to spread her open. His fingers moved rougher through the parted lips. His palm and the hair between her legs grew wet.
"Crazy bastard."
She thought he really had lost his mind, and still the shame kept surging up and spilling out of her. Taehyung shoved his pants down and pushed himself into her. For a second she wondered how many years it had been. Was she simply glad to have him after so long, or was it this situation that had her worked up? She pulled him in hard. Her moans grew louder.
"Ah!... ahh... that's good..."
His firm hips drove without rest between her thighs. She felt the heavy length of him filling her completely and closed her eyes. The monitor on the table toppled. Neither of them cared. They stayed on the pleasure rising out of their bodies.
Taehyung tipped her back and closed his big hand around her throat. The harder his grip, the tighter she locked her legs around him. He sank deeper and filled her. Their sounds rose, and her toes curled. He groaned loud and fell against her.
"Aaah!"
Jiyeon clutched him close and stroked his hair.
"That was good..."
He said it still held in her arms.
It wasn't until she got home that Jiyeon seriously considered what he had said. At first she meant to ignore it. All the way back, though, Taehyung kept telling her how badly the moments before the sex had excited him. It was a side of him she hadn't seen in a long while. But every time she told him to stop talking nonsense, he wilted the way a man does after he comes, and in that wilted shape she saw her father—the one who had left when she was little—laid over him. All at once, fear put down a root in her.
"Mom. Just fifty thousand won."
Junwoo spoke to her where she sat at the table.
"You already have your allowance."
"I spent it."
"Hey! How long has it even been since you got it, and it's already gone?"
"Come on, just this once. I'll really be careful with it."
"Mom doesn't have any money. Hurry up and get to school."
"Not even ten thousand?"
"I said go to school!"
Junwoo shuffled off and picked up his bag. Since Taehyung had lost his job and she had been running the salon alone, money was tight. Sorry for it, she watched her son with a pang. In gray sweatpants he walked toward the entryway, and for an instant the gray tracksuit of the man who had touched her ass at the salon rose up in her head—the thick sweats of the student who had gotten hard looking at her chest with no bra underneath.
"I'm off to school."
His voice snapped her back.
"Go on."
Once Junwoo was gone, Taehyung came out of the bedroom, sat down in front of her, and drank some water.
"You think about it?"
"About what?"
She knew exactly what he meant. She answered as if she didn't.
"What I said last night."
"I already told you no."
He let out a long sigh, like a man let down.
"Then go out today without any panties. You can do that much for me."
She thought it was a stupid thing to say. If she gave him this, though, he might finally stop bringing it up, so she answered as if it were a nuisance.
"This one time. That's it."
The answer was barely finished before Taehyung was at her closet. Whatever he was thinking, he dug through her clothes, picked out the shortest, thinnest dress she owned, and held it out to her. He looked pathetic—and he also looked brighter than he had since the long run of failed job hunts—so she decided to play along. If she wouldn't even give him this, she felt he might vanish like ash.
What could possibly happen? Better than watching him mope.
The dress he had chosen felt even shorter on her. Every time she walked, the hem swayed, and she was careful in case anything showed underneath. Time takes care of everything. Little by little, the fact that she wasn't wearing panties faded out of her memory, and by the same measure her movements in the salon grew natural. Taehyung watched all of it through the salon CCTV app on his phone. Against everything he had hoped for, the shop stayed perfectly calm. A few ma'ams came in—whether for perms or just to gossip, it was hard to say—sat on the sofa, chatted, and left.
He had watched the camera all day. Looking at himself, he felt pathetic, and as usual he was getting dressed to go pick Jiyeon up when the man walked into the salon. Last night's man.
Ding—the door chime.
Jiyeon knew him at a glance and felt her body lock up.
"Welcome."
"Um... I got my hair cut yesterday. Could you tidy up the sides a little?"
"Yes, of course. Have a seat right here."
He sat in the chair in front of the mirror. Last night replayed in her head, over and over: his hand on her ass. Taehyung and Jiyeon both swallowed. He was expectant. She was tense.
"Where would you like me to tidy it?"