Still Unable to Find You

Cold streams of water fell like rain, soaking his entire body as they ran down.

The chill pooling around his feet cooled the heat that had risen so foolishly.

Even the anger boiling inside him eased a little.

It was a measure taken because he knew acting on emotion would solve nothing.

Cold droplets clinging to the bridge of his nose, his eyelashes, the tip of his chin, and his black hair hanging over his forehead fell one after another without rest.

“Yoo Sowon, you…”

A voice that sounded almost like a hollow laugh echoed lazily through the shower booth.

“You really…”

“You really make me realize just how deep my bottom goes.”

You make me realize what complete trash I am for feeling desire for you even now.

What difference is there between me and those bastards if I want to lock even someone as pitiful as you inside my arms?

That thought, that scream of self loathing from what remained of his conscience, rang painfully clear.

Woo Jaeyoung didn’t know what love was.

He only knew kindness and mercy flowing downward from above.

He knew nothing about walking side by side, meeting eyes, and sharing laughter together.

Woo Jaeyoung liked Yoo Sowon’s smile.

But he never knew how to make Yoo Sowon smile.

He only knew Yoo Sowon smiled because he loved him, and thought that alone was enough.

It wasn’t something he’d earned through anything he’d done.

But he didn’t care.

Even knowing it would vanish like a mirage the moment Yoo Sowon withdrew his heart and turned away, he left it alone.

Because that soft child who desperately clung to warmth would never turn his back on him.

If he gave only that much of himself, they could still remain together as long as they wanted.

That was what he believed.

That was his mistake.

He never knew, and never wanted to know, that the relationship he had carelessly defined was a sandcastle that could be swept away by a single wave.

“Because hyung isn’t the kind of person who creates weaknesses.”

He had thought living that way was smart.

But hearing those words from Yoo Sowon’s own mouth made him realize just how stupid that choice had been.

Yeah.

That was where he went wrong.

Woo Jaeyoung casually draped a robe around himself and stepped out of the bathroom.

He looked at Yoo Sowon sleeping so quietly in the master bedroom that even his breathing was nearly inaudible, then received Jang Hanseon’s report that he would likely stay asleep until morning.

Instead of wiping the swollen corners of his eyes, he headed for the study.

To the left side of the neat room stood a small door.

Behind it was an Alpha room even the servants weren’t allowed to enter freely.

The small space surrounded on all sides by gray walls held two steel bookshelves facing each other.

Documents, ledgers, and several leather bound books sat neatly in place, greeting their blunt owner.

Woo Jaeyoung pulled out an armful of books from the innermost shelf.

After roughly carrying them back to the study, he opened the sketchbook already placed on the desk.

The moment he saw the first sentence, he knew he had won the bet.

There had never been any need to compare them this carefully.

Because he knew the “original story” Yoo Sowon had seen.

Because he himself had written it.

“Gong Chanhyuk uses people like spare parts and throws them away.”

“Human lives on this side of the world may not even be worth a joke, but biting apart something you’ve taken in on a whim is something not even beasts would do.”

“Hwang Seowoong knew that damned habit and planned to use the Gong family like fighting dogs before discarding them.”

“Funny.”

“My nature isn’t any different.”

“I’m exactly the opposite.”

“I’d bite the hand that raised me.”

“Hwang Seowoong was supposed to inherit Taegang.”

“The problem was that he had no blood relatives.”

“That obsessive man never kept anything that could become a weakness around for long.”

“Love destroys people.”

“That old man always said that.”

“He liked me very much because I neither loved him nor felt particular loyalty toward him.”

“He said he’d pass his power on to the strongest thing under his command.”

“But that wasn’t what I wanted.”

“At first it was.”

“But not anymore.”

“Is it really right to keep Yoo Sowon by my side?”

“At this rate, Yoo Sowon will die.”

“For reasons he can’t understand, in the most miserable way imaginable.”

“Would a child with absolutely no one in the world even feel sadness over it?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’ve never seen that bastard act wronged, sad, or disappointed since the day he was born.”

“He acted as though he left those emotions behind in his mother’s womb.”

“Sometimes I wondered.”

“When would Yoo Sowon, who grabbed onto even a rotten rope because he didn’t want to be left alone, finally come to hate me?”

“When would he realize Woo Jaeyoung is a son of a b*tch born from hell?”

“Could I really carry that kind of life?”

“Would something like that ever suit Woo Jaeyoung?”

“Could I really take responsibility for that little blood clot I only touched because I was curious?”

“What meaning is there in giving someone something they never even wanted?”

“I had many things to do.”

“Focusing on important things was natural for me.”

“Jang Hanseon was a traitor from the beginning.”

“Betrayal is common in this world.”

“What matters isn’t where someone came from, but where they end up.”

“Jang Hanseon has something he wants from me, and in the end he’ll return to me with everything.”

“Where he stops in between doesn’t matter.”

“Even that direction will be the result of my choices.”

“I’ll drench Jang Hanseon in Gong Jinhyuk’s blood and give it to him as a gift.”

He let out a sigh.

“So…”

“You saw all of this before you left.”

Woo Jaeyoung had a habit of recording his life.

He didn’t remember exactly when it started.

He picked up a pen because he wanted to feel that he was alive.

Because for someone who had lived a blood soaked life, paper and pencils were the least ordinary things imaginable.

He wanted proof.

Proof that he was human too.

Proof that moments existed in his life where he didn’t have to kill someone or get beaten half to death.

When he read the disorderly words he’d written down, all those exhausting and miserable moments felt like someone else’s life.

Like a fantasy simply made that way.

Reading his own life as if it belonged to another person somehow made even the nausea rising to his throat bearable.

Sometimes we can’t endure our own lives, and wish we weren’t ourselves.

We want to run away from where we are, but can’t find a way out.

So we dream of disappearing completely.

“…I never thought you’d feel that way.”

I didn’t want you to feel that way.

I didn’t want the coldness of my life to spread to you.

Even if it did happen…

I didn’t want it to be because of me.

“Let me ask one thing, Doctor Jang.”

Woo Jaeyoung asked while silently eating spoonful after spoonful of cold, salty steamed eggs at the table.

Jang Hanseon had just finished packing his things.

“Go ahead.”

“If Yoo Sowon really has dissociative memory problems…”

The doctor frowned after seeing what was inside the pot, but Woo Jaeyoung continued eating as though nothing was wrong.

“Would it hurt less if he never remembered?”

“…”

“I’m asking if there’s any way for him to never get his memories back.”

Couldn’t painful memories simply be thrown away and ignored?

No one said every tragedy in the world had to be embraced and resolved.

If abandoning the pain that hurt enough to make him deny his own existence meant he could start over, maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing.

If it hurt less that way…

If it meant he could smile more…

Woo Jaeyoung felt like he could spend his entire life kneeling at that clueless child’s feet in repentance.

“That would be impossible.”

After thinking for a long time, Jang Hanseon finally answered.

He handed Woo Jaeyoung a glass filled with water.

“As long as his current environment resembles the one from before his memory loss, there’s a possibility those memories will keep resurfacing unconsciously.”

“Even now, he remembered things from the kidnapping and went into shock.”

“It’ll continue appearing like that.”

“Nothing makes people more anxious than symptoms with no explanation.”

“I’ll stay beside him, so what does that matter?”

“This incident should have taught you that being beside someone doesn’t solve everything.”

“…Ha.”

“Even if that worked, Yoo Sowon would spend the rest of his life believing he’s a fake who stole someone else’s place.”

A stranger occupying an empty spot.

A thief who denied a happy ending and stole someone else’s share.

A coward who let greed blind him and chose to remain in a fleeting moment.

“If you’re not planning to keep him as a substitute forever…”

The callused middle finger of someone who had held pens for a long time tapped against Woo Jaeyoung’s chair.

“It’s time for you to find an answer.”

“…Hanseon.”

“The only person who can find the real Yoo Sowon…”

“…is you, hyung.”

Summer morning arrived after the thunder and lightning that had tormented him all night finally faded away.

Sunlight settled over the sleeping boy’s cheeks in tiny scattered pieces.

Like a weak rainbow appearing through fog.

As if answering someone’s call, Yoo Sowon slowly opened his eyes.

Woo Jaeyoung engraved that miraculous sight into his memory.

That scenery inside a sad reality.

“Good morning, Sowon.”

Still unable to find you, summer came.