Chapter 8: A Shadow in the Cafeteria and a Door Code

“Are you really okay with this?”

“I told you it’s fine.”

Sijin answered with a face that said the exact opposite. Even though Haejun had been suggesting somewhere else the whole time, Sijin was being stubborn in his own unusual way.

Earlier, he’d said he’d hang out with Haejun today even if he had other plans. Haejun wondered where they were headed, but Sijin dragged him to the student cafeteria Haejun frequented.

That was just Haejun’s guess, though. It didn’t seem like the real destination. On the way across campus, they ran into Kang Hangyeol and greeted him. Sijin stared at Hangyeol, then abruptly changed direction.

Moon Sijin and a student cafeteria simply didn’t match. He probably hadn’t used this place even once during his school years. He did manage to get a ticket from the unmanned meal ticket machine by copying Haejun, but he didn’t know he had to submit the ticket for the kitchen to start cooking. Only after Haejun grabbed his sleeve and handed it in did Sijin narrow his brows in displeasure.

“That’s all?”

Haejun had habitually ordered the pork cutlet set, so Sijin ordered the same thing. He looked down at the tray in front of him, baffled. It held a fried cutlet about half the size of his hand, clear soybean paste soup, cabbage salad, kimchi, pickled radish, and three little hash browns. That was everything. Even Sijin, who wasn’t a big eater for his age, didn’t think this would fill him up.

Noticing Haejun sneaking glances at him, Sijin forced his expression back under control. Instead of complaining further, he cut Haejun’s pork cutlet for him.

Haejun watched the neat slicing and quietly cleared his throat. Sijin seemed to still treat him like a thirteen-year-old who didn’t know how to handle a knife, but Haejun didn’t mind being taken care of.

‘So this is the kind of food he’s been living on?’

He’d promised himself not to complain, but Sijin couldn’t stop his hand from tightening around the knife. The Baek Haejun he knew was a kid with a big, solid appetite. He hadn’t been a good eater at first, though. Sijin had made him that way. He liked how Haejun would eat anything without leaving a bite, so he fed him all sorts of things, and his appetite had grown visibly.

But what was this? There was no other explanation than that his stomach had shrunk back to its old size because Haejun had been eating garbage like this while Sijin was gone. The small portion was one thing, but the nutritional balance, kitchen hygiene, and quality of ingredients were all unreliable. Not that one could expect much from food made in bulk to be served quickly.

“Good?”

Haejun, chewing a piece of cutlet cut to a decent size, suddenly choked. Sijin hadn’t touched his own tray. He was just watching Haejun eat. His expression, chin resting on his arm and eyes blank, was hard to put into words. The cutlet, which he hadn’t been tasting all that much anyway, now felt like sand in his mouth.

“That’s why I said let’s go somewhere else…”

“You said you eat cafeteria food with your friends all the time instead of with your hyung. How could I not be curious about the taste?”

Haejun barely swallowed the food in his mouth and muttered a response. Sijin shrugged as if he couldn’t care less. He didn’t seem aware of the contradiction between saying he was curious and not touching his own food. He poked at the cutlet with his fork, then put it down, clearly not satisfied.

“You get full from this?”

“Even if I don’t, I just eat it.”

Sijin wouldn’t understand, but the cafeteria was the best option for saving money and time. Haejun usually ate here with Kang Hangyeol, his meal companion, though they did go out to restaurants off campus sometimes. That was just an investment to keep the relationship smooth. A semester together made it impossible not to notice that Haejun’s wallet was thin, but Haejun didn’t want to keep showing everyone how broke he was.

There were plenty of days he skipped meals, of course, but he couldn’t go around explaining all that. So he just silently shoved another piece of cutlet into his mouth.

The hand propping up Sijin’s chin moved to his forehead. He let out a heavy sigh.

“I can’t very well tell you to eat mine, but…”

“Huh?”

“Get up.”

Sijin pushed his chair back and stood up. Then he picked up his untouched tray and tilted his chin toward Haejun. Haejun looked up at him, not understanding why. Sijin took Haejun’s tray too, returned the dishes, and came back.

He headed outside without waiting, so Haejun had no choice but to scramble, grabbing his bag and following.

‘Did something upset him? But Brother was the one who said we’d come.’

He was so busy trying to untangle the worries in his head that he reached the school parking lot before he knew it.

“Get in.”

It was the cream-colored convertible he’d seen before. The man who had walked off ahead without a backward glance now opened the passenger door himself. Haejun hesitated, then got into the car.

“Where are we going?”

“To eat.”

“Didn’t we just eat?”

“Don’t eat there anymore.”

The clipped voice was quite firm. Sijin’s face had been stiff since earlier, and his tone was far from soft, so Haejun wrinkled his nose.

“Then where am I supposed to eat?”

“That’s why I’m taking you.”

“So where?”

“My place.”

“Your house, Brother?” Haejun repeated. Even he found the phrase unfamiliar coming out of his mouth, and he blankly stared forward. Sijin, who had been looking straight ahead, noticed Haejun’s open mouth from the corner of his eye and lifted his chin for him.

He didn’t have the leisure to feel sorry for the pork cutlet he’d left half-eaten. Until they entered a large residential and commercial complex, Haejun looked dazed. And before he knew it, a few minutes later, he was standing at Sijin’s door.

The house in his memory was a grand mansion with white brick, a crimson roof, and a wide yard. A Golden Retriever used to romp across the neat flagstones and trimmed grass. Inside, there were so many rooms you could play hide-and-seek. The fact that the rooms for eating, sleeping, watching movies, reading, changing clothes, and working out were all separate had dumbfounded young Haejun. He especially remembered being amazed that you even had to climb a staircase to get to Sijin’s room on the second floor.

Haejun kept his expression from showing the same wonder it had when he was little. Even though the living room Sijin pointed him to sit in looked twice the size of the place Haejun lived in now.

“Are you living here alone?”

Sijin’s pheromones drifted lazily through the whole house. It was strange that only one person’s pheromones could be detected. If Haejun remembered correctly, Sijin’s parents were also special people.

“I’ve lived alone for a long time.”

Sijin came back with a bottle of juice and poured some into a glass. He handed it over and stared at Haejun until he took a sip. Only then did Sijin look away.

“Drop by sometimes. I’ll give you the door code.”

“No, I don’t need the code…”

“Why are you being all shy now? What about the days you barged into my room whenever you felt like it?”

“…”

“You used up all your shyness back then. Even if I found you sleeping here tomorrow, I wouldn’t think it was strange.”

Sijin was so matter-of-fact about it that Haejun felt even more awkward. His throat felt dry, so he downed the rest of the juice and set the glass down. But it was refilled before he could even blink.

That persistent stare from earlier seemed to be urging him to drink it all again. Haejun chugged the juice without catching his breath. He was already starting to feel full.

It still tasted good, though.

With the leftover juice lingering on his tongue, Haejun looked satisfied.

“More?”

As soon as the glass was empty, Sijin reached for the bottle again. Haejun quickly shook his head.

‘Is it a delusion to see our grandma in him?’

“Alright, then. You’re not picky about food, right?”

“I just don’t like anything too spicy.”

“Still the same.”

Since bringing Haejun here wasn’t really about the juice, Sijin got up easily. When Haejun tried to help, Sijin stopped him.

“Sit still.”

“Why? Aren’t you going to cook? I’ll help.”

“The way you can help is by staying still. Do I need to list every accident you caused in front of me for you to sit quietly?”

Sijin let out a brief laugh, as if the whole thing was ridiculous. Haejun didn’t have much to say back.

Haejun had always been clumsy with his hands. Spilling a bottle of water was basic. Knocking over things that were set somewhere was a given. They were small things, if that, and never done on purpose, but they were enough to give the people around him a headache.

It had caused him a lot of trouble at work, too. Once, while working in a hotel kitchen, he broke a 100,000-won wine glass and lost the entire day’s pay. Since then, he’d made an effort to be careful, but he still got into little accidents even now.

“If you’re bored, look around the house. Just don’t come into the kitchen past the dining table.”

“Can I go into your room, Brother?”

“You asking me for permission is weird, Haejun.”

It was a blanket okay-for-whatever-you-want, but it sounded like Haejun had been unbelievably reckless since he was a kid. In the end, Haejun poked Sijin’s arm with his fist and pushed his lips out.

Along with a pleasant laugh, a faint trail of Alpha pheromone slipped out. Haejun absentmindedly stroked his own neck. For some reason, his palm felt a little damp.

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