Chapter 28: Grass Field

Sometimes, Haesu thinks about this distorted love he carries for Kwon Seha.

He remembers it.

Turns it over in his mind.

Regrets it.

Misses it.

That alone is enough to consume entire stretches of time.

And whenever he tries to do anything beyond that, exhaustion immediately floods his body.

Long ago, his mind became dull in a strange way — a mind that no longer understood what the body already knew instinctively.

And so the same cycle repeated endlessly.

Again and again.

An action without answers.

Without progress.

After finishing dinner with Doyoon, midnight arrived quickly.

Doyoon looked sleepy, but naturally, Haesu couldn’t fall asleep at all.

Even then, Doyoon stubbornly refused every attempt Haesu made to return the master bedroom to him.

Eventually, Haesu was practically shoved back inside like someone who had already lost the argument.

And so he spent several quiet hours awake in that silent room.

The returning dawn felt strangely tactless.

The air carried that peculiar scent unique to the moments before sunrise.

The lowered temperature and the coldness in the room somehow matched it perfectly.

Sitting before the large bedroom window, Haesu quietly watched the early morning sky.

Today, pale yellow light mixed itself among colors resembling the deep ocean.

The contrast felt oddly unnatural.

“A man living with plants…”

Unable to sleep, he read instead.

The book had come from the room where Doyoon now slept.

That room resembled both a study and a resting place for someone exhausted from constant reading and learning.

The bed there was slightly smaller than the one in the master bedroom.

Why would he give this larger room away and deliberately inconvenience himself like that?

The discomfort Haesu kept feeling came entirely from gratitude.

He already knew Doyoon’s kindness toward him wasn’t pity.

That confusion belonged to the distant past now.

And yet, somewhere deep inside, Haesu still carried this lingering discomfort.

Probably because he felt sorry.

Because there were too many things he was grateful for.

That was likely the reason.

Thinking that, he forced himself to focus entirely on the printed words filling the book.

Page after page turned quietly in the silent room.

[To everything I failed to properly say goodbye to, I no longer assign meaning. The man living with plants said this. Once these grasses die, all left in my hands are dried leaves and emptiness.]

[Around where I sit remain unused nutrients and the dirt where dead things were buried.]

It wasn’t interesting at all.

Haesu couldn’t understand why a book like this existed in Doyoon’s study in the first place, nor why this particular one had caught his attention among so many others.

When he first stood before the bookshelf taller than himself, this was the very first book his eyes landed on.

The slightly worn spine stood out to him.

It looked old.

And because of that, borrowing it felt slightly less burdensome somehow.

[If a place lacks proper ventilation from the start, I simply do not grow them there. Even when watered carefully, some still died. Some died merely because the season changed. Others were mutants from the seed stage and could never survive very long to begin with.]

[Even the death of simple grass left me lonely for days. Perhaps because they were never truly just grass to me. Maybe that was the meaning I gave to things unable to speak.]

At that moment, orange light suddenly appeared beyond the huge window.

The sun must have been rising.

Tall buildings became a kind of horizon while sunlight spilled between them.

The brightness made him instinctively lift both hands to shield his eyes before slowly lowering them again once he adjusted.

Like someone entranced, he stared at the scene.

[After that, I never raised the same seedlings again. They could not speak, but I still could not bear watching them disappear from me twice.

…

…

So how much worse would it be for things that were not grass?]

Regardless of how lonely or miserable Choi Haesu felt, time continued passing mercilessly.

One year.

Two years.

Three years…

The days spent with Kwon Seha gradually became a more distant past.

Sometimes Haesu feared that once enough time passed — enough that even ten fingers could no longer count it — he might finally forget.

That fear alone occasionally drove him to sit alone and replay those days repeatedly in his head.

The beginning with Kwon Seha.

Everything that came afterward.

Production for the drama Haesu was filming had been delayed by about three weeks.

The series unexpectedly received four additional episodes.

Filming itself didn’t take long for Haesu since he only played a supporting role, but restructuring and extending every character’s storyline consumed enormous amounts of time.

And because he constantly felt pressured to stay aware of everyone else, there were many nights he couldn’t simply leave once filming ended.

Another audition awaited him after this project finished, but as a rookie actor, his schedule still wasn’t important enough to cause major conflicts.

Even so, fatigue and stress piled up from all the unexpected complications.

Even if it was work he loved, exhaustion was unavoidable.

Acting out someone else’s life required stamina too.

Ever since college, he had done nothing but complain about lacking it while growing increasingly desperate for something he never managed to possess.

After spending endless hours beneath filming lights, he finally left the set.

His already pale skin now made him look genuinely sick.

By the very end, his manager practically carried him back to the car.

At this rate, Haesu almost found himself praying their planned reward vacation would get canceled.

“I’m sleepy. Cold. Hungry too.”

“That’s the full homeless starter pack.”

“Ah… I don’t even have the energy to laugh.”

Falling asleep immediately sounded perfect right now, but he’d spent too long on an empty stomach already.

At this point, he would probably wake up halfway through sleeping just to search for food anyway.

Even if it ruined his digestion before bed, he wanted to eat something first.

After asking his manager to drop him off midway, Haesu entered a Japanese restaurant he visited often.

Maybe because it was late at night, there weren’t many customers.

One man sat eating quietly.

Another seemed to be waiting for a takeout order.

The employee who frequently saw Haesu still had no idea he was an actor.

Even while greeting him warmly with a smile, exhaustion clung heavily to their face too.

They probably want to go home already.

Oddly enough, Haesu felt a strange sense of camaraderie over that.

“One Set A for takeout… actually, make that two servings.”

“Of course. It’ll take around twenty minutes. Is that alright?”

“Yes.”

Since it was nearing nine o’clock, nearby stores had already begun closing one by one.

Sitting by the window and absentmindedly watching the street, Haesu slowly began nodding off.

His hat bumped against the restaurant’s glass wall twice while he drifted in and out of sleep.

By the third interruption, Haesu yanked his cap off irritably and tossed it aside like someone throwing a sleepy tantrum.

His body was exhausted, and now drowsiness was making him irritable too.

At this rate, he felt like he might literally fall asleep while chewing.

Just then, his eyes met the employee emerging with a paper bag.

The moment the employee slid the door open, Haesu jolted upright immediately.

Already done?

Forcing open his sleepy eyes, he stood so quickly it almost startled himself.

Just the thought of finally taking his food home felt enough to wake his brain slightly.

Maybe even excite him.

Once I get home, I’ll eat, brush my teeth, and sleep until my manager comes tomorrow.

That was the plan.

Then suddenly, a man’s hand appeared right in front of him.

Before the employee could say anything else, the paper bag Haesu assumed was his disappeared into someone else’s grasp.

“Ah…”

“Set A takeout order.”

The employee was clearly calling the order Haesu himself placed, yet someone else already carried it away before he could even step closer.

Both pairs of eyes turned toward Haesu, who still stood there awkwardly after jumping up from his seat.

And what flooded him instantly was embarrassment.

He felt ridiculous for pushing his chair back so loudly in excitement.

“Oh. It wasn’t mine…”

“……”

“Enjoy your meal…”

The sleepiness vanished immediately.

Even his loudly protesting hunger suddenly became polite in the face of humiliation.

Pretending nothing happened, Haesu quietly lowered his head and turned away.

Seeing Haesu shrink in embarrassment, the employee laughed kindly and promised his own order would be ready soon.

No matter how reassuring the words were, the embarrassment had already settled in fully.

Why did I say “enjoy your meal”?

What kind of thing was that to say?

When exactly was he going to fix this habit of blurting nonsense whenever flustered?

Meanwhile, the man who had ordered the same meal walked past him.

A poorly hidden smile lingered heavily around his mouth.

And because his gaze stayed fixed on Haesu the entire time, it was obvious exactly who he was amused by.

He paused briefly right in front of Haesu.

“When your food comes, make sure you chew properly.”

“…What?”

“If you eat while half asleep, you’ll upset your stomach.”

After delivering that bizarre comment, he simply walked past Haesu and left.

Haesu didn’t know the man at all, but one thing became immediately clear.

That person was thoroughly enjoying this situation.

And he had definitely watched Haesu embarrass himself while nodding off earlier.

Once embarrassment exceeded a certain limit, it inevitably turned into irritation directed at himself instead.

For the first time that day, Choi Haesu genuinely felt ashamed of his appetite for overpowering his exhaustion.

You absolute pig, Choi Haesu.

Couldn’t you just sit quietly?

Soon his own order arrived as well.

His appetite had briefly disappeared moments earlier, but quickly recovered the instant he saw the fresh food brought out.

Carrying the heavy paper bag, he pushed open the restaurant door.

The glass wind chime unique to Japanese restaurants rang crisply.

His steps felt lighter now.

Since he had already sent the car away with his manager, he needed to catch a taxi.

As he adjusted his cap and started walking again, a pair of shoes suddenly entered his view.

“Huh?”

The person responsible for turning him into a pig was standing there.

It was the same man from the restaurant.

Not that any of this was actually his fault, but Haesu still felt like blaming him lightly anyway.

Without imagining for even a second that the man actually had business with him, Haesu simply tried walking past him.

Seeing someone buying dinner this late made him think the man probably had a tiring day too.

And for once, Haesu found himself having unusually meddlesome thoughts.

He hoped everyone in the world could at least have a good night tonight.

“Excuse me…”

On the off chance, Haesu stopped walking too.

The voice hadn’t even called a full name, but maybe it really had been directed at Choi Haesu after all.

Turning back cautiously, he found the man still staring directly at him.

Like someone trying to say yes, I was talking to you.

“I think I laughed too much earlier.”

“…Sorry?”

“I wasn’t making fun of you, but I thought maybe you misunderstood. So I waited to apologize.”

Immediately, Haesu remembered the embarrassing scene from moments ago.

It really didn’t feel like something important enough to apologize for.

So the fact this stranger stayed behind specifically to apologize only made him more flustered instead.

Maybe my expression looked really bad earlier.

The thought worried him suddenly.

Haesu hurriedly waved both hands dismissively.

“Ah… I didn’t misunderstand.”

“That’s a relief then.”

Sure, it had been embarrassing, but not enough to genuinely get angry at someone over it.

And Haesu wasn’t that kind of person anyway.

Which made him think this stranger waiting around just to apologize might actually be… somewhat considerate by nature.