Chapter 11: Healing

When you take chicken sprinkled with magic cheese powder, add five cheese balls, and one more helping of the bewitching white sauce…

“Oof. This is what I work for.”

A perfect fiery Friday is complete.

“Wait a sec, Bodam. Stop.”

Jo Yeon, who arrived at the perfect time with the chicken delivery driver, stopped Bodam from getting a beer.

He had come over to Bodam’s place to eat chicken and welcome the fiery Friday.

Bodam was treating him as a thank you for his nursing care.

A damp smell, characteristic of the Gate site in Sector 3, emanated from Jo Yeon as he took off his coat and carefully examined Bodam.

“Can you drink? What about your cold?”

Jo Yeon snatched the beer away from Bodam, who had been suffering from body aches for two whole days and was still feeling unwell this very morning.

‘His face was swollen like the moon in the morning.’

Bodam, holding the plastic bag of chicken reverently, looked quite alright.

“What’s this. Are you all better? How?”

His eyelids were still reddish and swollen, and his eyes were full of traces of having cried his heart out, but he didn’t look like a sick person.

Jo Yeon, who put down a grocery bag containing two four-packs of Bodam’s favorite canned beer and chocolate cookies, placed a hand on Bodam’s forehead.

“Your fever’s gone down too.”

There was no way a fever that had been high enough to turn his face red just this morning could have dropped so suddenly just because the sun went down.

“You should have come empty-handed. It’s my treat today.”

Instead of answering, Bodam diverted his attention to the bag Jo Yeon had brought.

Even more puzzled by this attitude, Jo Yeon narrowed his deep-set eyes.

“No way. It can’t be.”

“You set up the chicken. I’ll go put this in the fridge.”

Excited at the thought of eating, Bodam ran to the fridge with the grocery bag.

Jo Yeon’s head tilted as he watched him.

‘Could it be Team Leader Han…?’

Jo Yeon, who had laid out the happy fiery Friday set on the living room’s folding table to make it easy to eat, waited for an answer.

“…”

It would have been more realistic to say that the fever had completely disappeared after taking some medicine and sleeping for a bit.

There was no way Team Leader Han Seung Ho, who would pass by even a dying person with indifference, would use his precious healing ability for his dedicated guide’s cold.

Moreover, Jo Yeon, who had watched from the side how he had treated Bodam, was expecting the answer to be some miraculous cold medicine.

“Tell me.”

“What?”

“What do you think, Bodam Yoon.”

Bodam, who had put the beer Jo Yeon brought into the fridge, sat down with a chocolate cookie in one hand and a green bottle in the other.

Friday was a day for mixing soju.

Though he did wet his stomach on the weekends too—.

“You must have taken some good cold medicine. Right?”

Watching Jo Yeon ask somewhat awkwardly, Bodam, who had flipped the green bottle, grabbed the cap with his right hand and the body with his left, swirling it smoothly, filled the soju glass first.

Jo Yeon watched Bodam in silence as he reached for the alcohol first with the chicken in front of him, then cautiously opened his mouth.

He had a hunch about the ‘no way’.

“Did that son of a b*tch Han Seung Ho fix you?”

Jo Yeon, who emphasized the ‘b*tch’, wore an expression of complete disbelief.

Bodam just slowly nodded his head.

It was just as unbelievable for Bodam himself.

To think that he had received ‘that ability’.

For a mere cold, not some fatal illness.

***

Two hours ago.

Team Leader Han, who appeared punctually at 9 o’clock, did something he rarely did.

He furrowed his eyebrows, creating a wrinkle between them, on a face that was usually as fixed as a photograph.

This meant that he was in a state where he very, extremely, f*ckingly needed guiding.

However, the guide who should have been sitting on the tea table chair or the bed at the appointed time was nowhere to be seen.

The team leader, who scanned the clean, white-toned interior where nothing stood out, first loosened his uniform tie.

For him, who only ever held hands when receiving guiding, to loosen his tie meant that the overflowing wavelength in his body was so severe that he was going all out today.

At the very least, contact on the level of rubbing bare bodies was necessary.

He walked towards the bathroom door, following the scent of the dedicated guide’s energy detected in the room.

The sound of water came from behind the firmly closed door.

Click.

Seung Ho, who turned the handle without knocking, slowly blinked his eyelids.

The door was locked.

“Open it.”

At Seung Ho’s low voice, the water in the sink was turned off.

Soon after, a faint sound of someone clearing their throat was heard.

“Um, hmm. I’m sorry, but if you could give me 10 minutes, no, 5 minutes—”

“Open it.”

Seung Ho replied with the same words to the guide’s voice, which was thick with moisture.

He let go of the doorknob and stood in a straight, formal posture, waiting for the door to open.

“Guide Yoon Bodam.”

“Just 3 minutes, cough. If you’d just sit and wait, I’ll be right out.”

“I said open it.”

Seung Ho, who grabbed the doorknob again after exactly three seconds, opened the door as it was.

With the sound of the handle lever breaking, the door opened as naturally as if it had been unlocked from the inside.

Bodam’s face, even wetter than the water-soaked sink, came into view.

Seung Ho, who stared blankly at the crying guide with his hard eyes, said in an equally hard voice.

“Prepare for guiding immediately.”

Han Seung Ho was being Han Seung Ho.

Team Leader Han, who left a short remark, was not curious about the reason his dedicated guide was crying.

Yoon Bodam, who squeezed out tears once every two days, was almost to the point where one might wonder if crying was his hobby.

Han Seung Ho, who didn’t take an interest in others’ peculiar hobbies, simply pointed out the guide’s dawdling in the bathroom.

“Don’t delay any further.”

It was already past 9 o’clock, the time they had agreed to for guiding.

Yoon Bodam, who usually moved quickly and efficiently before getting yelled at, was dragging his feet exceptionally.

He was pressing a towel to his wet face, seemingly rooted to the spot with no intention of coming out.

And then what he said was.

“Do you need guiding right away?”

“Why else would I be here?”

“…”

“Come out.”

Instead of the sound of footsteps obeying the command, a drenched sigh followed.

Seung Ho, whose wavelength was already rampaging unstably due to the unexpected use of his ability, cracked his neck.

At this, the guide, who had only flinched his shoulders slightly, finally got his feet to do their job.

Seung Ho, whose attention was focused on the presence of Bodam following him, went and sat on the bed first.

The rough wavelength growing in presence inside his body stimulated the chronic muscle pain that had taken root throughout his body.

“Stabilize my wavelength. Within 30 minutes.”

He said, unbuttoning his shirt, which felt empty without the tie.

Contrary to his calm tone and expression, a reaction was gradually rising in Seung Ho’s body.

A clear vein on his thick neck and the slight tremor in his fingertips signaled the urgency.

Bodam, who had come out of the bathroom still holding onto the towel, couldn’t stop his tears.

The tears that wouldn’t dry, to the point where he wondered if he should go to the infirmary, pooled and dripped down.

It seemed his tear ducts had well and truly burst from the collaboration of his cold and his mom’s “I’m sorry.”

Bodam, who wouldn’t be broken by something like unstoppable tears, clenched his jaw firmly.

‘30 minutes? F*ck, I’ll finish it in 10.’

Sensing the Esper’s wildly fluctuating energy, he approached the bed where he sat.

He buried his face in the towel one last time, wiped it hard, and threw it on the floor.

Panting like an angry person with breath mixed with sobs, he climbed onto Han Seung Ho’s lap.

“Take it off for me.”

He was also slightly out of his mind.

His hand, which should have been unbuttoning his uniform shirt like in front of Tae Hwan, fumbled.

It was a state where he had to rely solely on concentration for guiding.

“Do it properly.”

Seung Ho, who had unbuttoned Bodam’s shirt in an instant, exposing his flesh, muttered.

The instinct craving guiding shamelessly revealed a beast-like desire.

It was a face he saw maybe once a month, if ever, from him, who showed almost no change in expression.

A desperate look that needed the other person.

It felt like he was wearing a mask that didn’t suit him.

Bodam, who had exposed only his chest and flat stomach without taking off his shirt, wrapped his arms around Seung Ho’s neck.

As if embracing a precious being, he clung to the Esper’s body with all his might.

He was a precious being.

How could one’s lifeline not be precious?

To increase the absorption rate of guiding, the Esper’s body had to be aroused.

He rubbed his pale bare skin against Han Seung Ho’s uniform shirt and pressed his lips to the veiny neck.

Tenacious droplets falling from his eyes fell like a light rain on the team leader’s shoulder.

Very annoyingly.

“Stop crying already.”

A toneless voice, far from consoling, rumbled low.

The thick hand that was sucking up the guiding wrapped around Bodam’s back.

That Han Seung Ho, who avoided even brushing sleeves with people.

“The guiding keeps getting interrupted.”

That’s how urgent the guiding was.

Bodam, who was about to continue his kisses from the neck to under the chin, felt a thin membrane pop somewhere in his balled-up chest.

He had reached his limit.

His fern-like hands clenched into fists and trembled.

He unwrapped his arms from the b*stard’s neck and tried to get up from his lap.

The sobbing sound he had suppressed in his throat was already leaking out of his mouth.

“Heuk… f…ck, I…”

“…”

“I won’t do it. Heup, it’s disgusting—”

His body, which was staggering and trying to step back, was caught by Han Seung Ho.

He grabbed Bodam’s shoulders and pressed down lightly so he couldn’t get up.

“Why.”

“I said I won’t! Heo-eong, let go! Cough,”

Bodam, who had been letting out a piercing scream, finally coughed as if his throat would burst.

His face, smeared with tears and snot, turned impossibly red.

Han Seung Ho, who faced the blood-red Bodam with a chillingly calm gaze, seemed genuinely insane.

At times like this, Team Leader Han, who seemed more than capable of walking past a dead person without a second thought, felt scarier than Kang Yi Jun, who looked like he could actually kill someone.

Bodam, who lived jostling with them, felt his breath catch in his throat.

Several times a day.

“Why can’t you do it?”

His crying, which had stopped abruptly at Han Seung Ho’s question as if he were genuinely curious, burst out even louder.

The word ‘crazy’ was faintly heard from Bodam’s mouth as he cried uncontrollably.

There were many harsh consonants mixed in with his slurred pronunciation, but a proper word couldn’t be formed.

It was that chaotic of a wail.

Seung Ho, whose cramped muscles began to twitch, asked again.

Thinking that he had to know the reason to offer a solution.

“Why can’t you do it? I’ve asked three times now.”

Bodam, who was now grabbing Han Seung Ho by the collar, hiccuped and panted.

Crying also required stamina.

The refreshing wail, which lasted less than a minute, turned into a pained groan.

“Yoon Bodam.”

Han Seung Ho, who called him by his full name without the title of ‘guide’, pulled on his shoulders, which were flinching with each hiccup.

His head, which had lost its balance limply, came to rest on Seung Ho’s chest.

The weight of his fist-sized face was extremely light.

To the point where one might wonder if he had anything in his head.

“It hurts…”

Bodam, leaning against the hard body devoid of fat, muttered.

Cold sweat was flowing along with his tears.

His fever was rising, and his throat, from all the screaming, hurt even more.

Just when he was wondering if his own body was being used as kindling since there was nothing else to burn on this fiery Friday,

“Don’t cry.”

Seung Ho, who held Bodam’s chin and applied gentle pressure, parted the lips that were mumbling about being in pain.

Lips as skilled as someone who had only ever kissed for 365 days a year naturally overlapped with his.

Not like Kang Yi Jun and Lee Tae Hwan, who acted like they were going to devour him, nor as insincere as Min Ji Oh.

It was a tender kiss.

***

“What kind of bullsh*t is that?”

Jo Yeon, whose sanity had departed, asked.

The pickling liquid from the radish he was opening overflowed from his equally bewildered hands.