If you don’t know, just teach me.

“If I had known this would happen, I would have asked Yeon all sorts of things.”

He mumbled, recalling old memories, and buried his face between his legs. At the time, Yeon had seemed so flustered that he was even careful about asking anything.

His gaze once again drifted down to between his legs. His brows furrowed at the thought of how painfully swollen it had become. When Doha had gripped and rubbed it, an indescribable shiver had run up his spine.

He felt like he was going to come, and it was driving him crazy. So he told him to stop, but Doha didn’t, and in the end, his hand and underwear were messily wet.

‘To think that’s a natural thing.’ He tried to control his agitation by recalling Mooyoung’s words, but he was still embarrassed. ‘Do all other people live like that? Even Yeon?’

Yeon’s face, which rarely reacted strongly to anything, came to mind. He was often called an emotionless doll because of his perpetually expressionless face.

Even Yeon was flustered and at a loss when Sana caught him washing his underwear late at night.

Thinking of that day, he felt somewhat relieved that his current agitation wasn’t so unusual after all.

Even someone like Yeon was flustered and didn’t know what to do, so it was perhaps natural that his own feelings were so stirred up right now.

Click. At the sound of the bathroom door opening, he reflexively raised his head and made direct eye contact with Doha, who was coming out with only a towel covering his lower body.

“Ah…”

He didn’t know what to say.

‘Did you wash your hands?’

He thought of asking, remembering what had gotten dirty because of him, but his lips only parted, then he gave up. The question would sound too strange.

‘I was sorry earlier,’ the words rolled to the tip of his tongue, then were swallowed again. He had already apologized.

The increasingly long silence seemed to multiply the awkwardness.

Just as he felt his mouth growing dry, Doha first averted his gaze and turned his head. He went to the refrigerator, took out a can of beer. Pshhh. The sound of air escaping the can sounded unusually loud.

“Do you want some too?”

He asked, showing the can. Sana shook his head.

“You haven’t drunk it before, have you? You said you’re an adult.”

He seemed to be asking if he was really an adult.

“I never had occasion to drink beer. I’ve tried infused liquor.”

They used to make infused liquor to entertain occasional external guests at Muryeong.

“Infused liquor, huh… Truly strange in many ways…”

Doha said something, then frowned, trailing off.

“I’m going to sleep now. What about you?”

At Doha’s question, he looked at the clock and saw it was nearing midnight.

“I have to leave around 9 AM tomorrow too.”

Unlike before, he had woken up early today, so Doha rubbed the bridge of his nose with his finger, as if tired.

“Then go to sleep quickly.”

When Sana urged him to sleep quickly, Doha, who had emptied the can of beer in one gulp, turned back as he headed for the bedroom.

“You?”

He blinked, wondering what he was asking, then realized it was a question of whether he should sleep too.

“I kept waking up and sleeping during the day, so I’m not sleepy.”

He had been sleeping even before Doha arrived.

“You’re not Sleeping Beauty, why do you sleep so much…?”

This time too, Doha trailed off, only clicking his tongue.

He wasn’t sleeping because he was sleepy; he was intentionally trying to sleep, hoping to see it again in a dream, but Sana just smiled awkwardly instead of making excuses.

“Hey.”

Doha called Sana, holding the doorknob. Just as he was about to retort, ‘It’s Sana, not hey,’ he saw the corners of Doha’s lips subtly curl up.

“Want to sleep together?”

Unable to understand the intention of the question, he just stared blankly at him. He had just said he wasn’t sleepy, so why suggest sleeping together…?

“However, I can’t guarantee I won’t do what I did earlier.”

It took a moment for the words, delivered with a smirk, to reach his brain. A beat later, realizing what ‘what I did earlier’ meant, his face flushed again.

“That’s enough, just go to sleep!”

He got up from the sofa, approached Doha, and pushed his back into the room. Before he could say anything more, he personally closed the door. Fortunately, Doha didn’t add anything else.

Leaning against the closed door, only then did he feel his heart pounding. It was beating so fiercely it felt like it would burst through his ribs.

‘My heart feels crazy.’

He raised a hand and pressed hard on his chest, but the pounding didn’t subside easily. ‘Will it break down like this? Or am I perhaps suffering from some strange illness?’

It was all Choi Doha’s fault. Because he did things he never expected, and so casually massaged his privates, his body had become strange.

How long had it been since he woke up with the morning sun two days in a row and sat at the table to eat? Doha stared blankly at the stew and several seasoned vegetable side dishes laid out on the table.

After joining the organization, his life had turned upside down, and even before that, he often skipped breakfast.

But where on earth did that stew and seasoned vegetables come from? He belatedly wondered.

“The stew and vegetables, what are they?”

When he asked Sana, he tilted his head.

“Don’t they suit your taste? Does it taste strange?”

He seemed to have misunderstood Doha’s question.

“No, that’s not the problem; I’m asking where they came from.”

This time, Sana blinked his large eyes. His expression seemed to say, ‘Why are you asking such a thing?’

“They were selling them when I went to the mart, so I bought them. Yesterday morning, I only grilled fish because I was short on time.”

‘Did the mart near his house sell ready-made side dishes?’ Not according to Doha’s memory.

“You made it all yourself? The seasoned vegetables?”

He could believe the stew. You just put everything in and boil it. But seasoned vegetables were different. Blanching them properly and seasoning them correctly, though seemingly simple, was difficult for those unfamiliar with it.

The seasoned vegetables on the table now were comparable to side dishes served in a restaurant. It was hard to believe Sana made them himself.

“I guess seasoned vegetables are easier to get…”

Sana said, then made an ‘oh, right’ expression.

“He really must have lived in some remote mountain village.”

At Doha’s words, he neither affirmed nor denied it, just smiled awkwardly and turned his head. He seemed unaware that it made him look even more suspicious.

“Come to think of it, what money did you use to buy groceries?”

It probably didn’t cost a lot, but in Doha’s eyes, Sana was unemployed.

He didn’t seem to have a particular job, to the point where he readily did serving work at the club out of the blue. Although he said he was a shaman, he didn’t look like he would earn money anywhere. So, the fact that he used money to prepare side dishes bothered him.

“Card.”

This answer was also a bit off. Doha’s eyebrow subtly furrowed at the reply ‘card.’ It was perfectly normal to carry a card instead of cash in this day and age, but coming from Sana, who wore a hanbok and wandered through the heart of Gangnam, it felt somewhat discordant.

“It’s amazing you have a card. Did remote mountain villages have banks?”

Sana had no particular reaction to the repeated emphasis on ‘remote mountain village.’ He couldn’t tell if he was just dismissing it as teasing, or if it was actually true.

“I received it when I came to Seoul.”

“…”

As Doha remained silent, Sana finally stopped eating, raised his head, and looked at him.

Seeing his gaze, which had lost its humor and was now scrutinizing, Sana’s expression gradually stiffened, as if he realized he had made a mistake.

“Who?”

“…”

This time, Sana remained silent.

“Who gave you the card?”

When Doha made his question more specific, he saw Sana swallow dryly. Doha’s gaze, looking at Sana, sharpened even further.

A moment ago, Sana had clearly said that the card wasn’t something he made, but that it was ‘given’ to him. It meant there was someone who gave Sana the card. Why? What was the usual meaning when someone gave another person a card?

Yesterday, Park Jaemin had also thrown a card at Doha. It was because he thought Doha would be useful to him. Who thought Sana was useful? And useful in what sense?

“Are you saying it’s payment for fortune-telling?”

Since he said he was a shaman, that could be it. However, even that wasn’t a very convincing answer. Who would give a card as payment for fortune-telling?

He grew increasingly suspicious of Sana’s identity. Was he not just a simple shaman? Or was even being a shaman a lie?

“It’s not that…”

Sana shook his head. If he had said it was payment, it would have been truly suspicious, but Sana himself denied it. However, he couldn’t add a proper excuse. Doha, who had been quietly watching him, let out a long breath and put down the chopsticks he was holding.

“I have no intention of living in the same house with a suspicious person.”

He spoke deliberately coldly. Sana’s face twisted, perhaps thinking he was going to tell him to leave again.

“If you have no intention of clearly revealing who you are, then don’t meddle in my affairs unnecessarily either.”

He was aware that he was being unfair. Doha himself had no intention of revealing everything about himself, yet he was demanding that Sana reveal every detail.

Sana kept his mouth shut and lowered his gaze.

“I’m not forcing you to speak. But if you expect me to take the risk of keeping you here, then you should at least show that much sincerity. If you can’t tell me, then you can quit. You just have to leave here.”

“That’s…!”

At the command to leave, Sana flared up, looking at Doha, but couldn’t easily finish his sentence. Doha didn’t add any more words. He had given him a chance, so the choice was Sana’s.

“You said I could be your lover. I’ll do that.”

He let out a hollow laugh, hearing him give a different answer instead of telling the truth.

“It’s easy for someone who knows nothing to say that.”

He was convinced based on touching him last night. Sana clearly had no sexual experience whatsoever. To turn so crimson red just from being touched there a little. For kids these days, he was excessively innocent. The time it took him to climax was also short. That meant he had almost never touched himself.

For such a person to talk about being his lover. What did he think would happen for him to say such a thing?

“If I don’t know, you can teach me, can’t you?”

“…”

Did he even know what he was saying? Doha was trying to understand Sana’s words at his level of thinking. As a result, he couldn’t answer immediately and only remained silent, and Sana opened his mouth again.

“If it’s a problem because I don’t know, I’ll learn. Then it’ll be fine, right?”

Sana stood up from his seat. Doha, who suppressed a surging sigh, grabbed his arm, which was poised to leave immediately, and made him stop.