The Day My Heart Shattered

It was never strange for Oh Jaeyeol and Ahn Seonwoo to be close.

One was Haeyoon’s longtime friend, and the other was Haeyoon’s longtime partner.
As time went on, it was only natural that the time the three of them spent together also increased.
Some people cautiously warned Haeyoon.
After all, Oh Jaeyeol was an Alpha and Ahn Seonwoo was an Omega, so wouldn’t it be better if those two didn’t get too close?
The sentence they couldn’t quite bring themselves to utter was, ‘Haeyoon, you’re just a Beta, though.’

Whether true friendship was possible between an Alpha and an Omega was an age-old debate among people.
One side argued that they were human beings, so how could something like pheromones prevent friendship, if they had any self-control.
The other side argued that while temporary friendship might be possible, if they grew close over a long period, intimacy would inevitably lead to s*x.
The two positions were sharply divided.
Haeyoon was in the former camp.
Perhaps it was partly because he himself was a Beta.
The idea of ‘the effect of pheromones that completely shatters reason and makes one lose control of oneself’ didn’t resonate much with Haeyoon, a Beta.
If such people existed, he thought it wasn’t because they were ‘manifestors,’ but simply because they were that kind of person.
There were plenty of Betas who had affairs, got drunk, and made one-night mistakes.
To Haeyoon’s eyes, they were all the same.
They were just that kind of person.

So Haeyoon didn’t take his friends’ advice to heart.
Strangers who didn’t know them well might worry, placing emphasis on the fact that Oh Jaeyeol was an Alpha, Seo Haeyoon was a Beta, and Ahn Seonwoo was an Omega.
But Haeyoon knew them, so he wasn’t anxious.
Frankly, how would you even know if they were spraying pheromones at each other right in front of you?
Haeyoon just laughed off such comments too.
If they were that selfish and awful, he thought, preventing them from meeting wouldn’t solve the problem anyway.
Most importantly, Jaeyeol and Seonwoo were absolutely not the kind of people who would do that to him.
…That’s what Haeyoon believed.

The memory of that day tormented Haeyoon for a very long time.
The memory of frantically running down a street under the blazing midsummer sun upon hearing that Jaeyeol seemed sick was vivid.
If he were that sick, he’d call, Haeyoon thought.
He felt sorry and tender-hearted for Jaeyeol, who probably locked himself at home without making a fuss to avoid worrying him unnecessarily.
Yet, he was also grateful for the heart that always put him first above all else.
Even as he opened the door to Jaeyeol’s apartment and stepped into the living room, Haeyoon knew nothing.
Because he was a Beta.
Because he was a non-manifestor who couldn’t sense things like pheromones.
Just as he wouldn’t have noticed if Oh Jaeyeol and Ahn Seonwoo had been spraying pheromones at each other right in front of him, Haeyoon didn’t sense at all the sexual pheromones of an Alpha and Omega vibrating within that space.

‘Hyung, are you okay……?’
Haeyoon’s words, spoken as he opened the bedroom door, abruptly cut off.
Two people, moving frantically on the bed, pulling the covers over themselves, swayed chaotically before his eyes.
The bag of medicine he’d bought out of worry for his lover fell to the floor with a thud.
Even though he was seeing it with his own two eyes, it was hard to understand what he was seeing.
The two people before him were definitely faces Haeyoon knew.
Faces he knew too well.
They were the most precious people, who held immense significance in Haeyoon’s life.

‘Ha, Haeyoon-ah, why are you here… how….’
A flustered Jaeyeol, not knowing what to do, stammered.
Haeyoon found that question ridiculous.
This was the officetel of Jaeyeol, Haeyoon’s lover.
A space Haeyoon had visited countless times, more familiar to him than anywhere else.
And yet, Jaeyeol was asking Haeyoon.
Why are you here?

Haeyoon’s lips twitched.
He wanted to say that was what he wanted to ask, but no sound came out.
Haeyoon’s gaze swept over Oh Jaeyeol and Ahn Seonwoo, who were sitting naked side by side under the same blanket.
Why are you here?
How could the two of you be like this here?
Those were the questions Haeyoon should have been asking.

‘I’m sorry… I’m really, really sorry, Haeyoon-ah…. Sob…!’
The one who broke the silence with a burst of tears was Ahn Seonwoo.
Just moments ago, he had been kissing his friend’s lover while naked, yet now, as if he were the tragic heroine of a melodrama, Seonwoo let out a pitiful wail.

‘I… Hic…! I shouldn’t have done this to you… I’m sorry… Sob… I’m really sorry…!’
Seonwoo cried, shedding big, ugly tears one after another.
Haeyoon just stared blankly at that sight.
Asking questions and crying were things Haeyoon should have been doing.
The person who wanted to cry more than anyone right now was Seo Haeyoon.
But they were doing all the asking and all the crying, so Haeyoon had nothing left to do.

‘You… you’re the one who told me to come see him, Seonwoo-yah.’
After a long while, Haeyoon finally managed to speak.
He truly couldn’t grasp the situation.
It was Ahn Seonwoo who had sent Haeyoon a message while he was at the studio, saying Jaeyeol had left work sick and didn’t look good, so Haeyoon should go check on him.
Jaeyeol and Seonwoo worked at the same company, and Haeyoon had even felt grateful to Seonwoo for looking out for him and Jaeyeol.
Wondering how bad it must be for Jaeyeol to have left work unfinished, Haeyoon stopped eating, bought medicine, and came to see him.
He didn’t know how worried he’d been when Jaeyeol didn’t answer his calls.
He felt both annoyed and loving at Jaeyeol’s foolishness in not saying anything even when so sick, just to avoid worrying him.
He was always a considerate lover like that.
So why was Ahn Seonwoo here, rolling around with Oh Jaeyeol? Haeyoon truly couldn’t understand.

Unfortunately, Haeyoon’s words didn’t reach them.
Haeyoon’s small voice, more like a moan, was drowned out by Seonwoo’s pouring sobs.
The pale face, the expression of not knowing what to do with all the apologies, the tears streaming down the cheeks—Ahn Seonwoo’s pitiful appearance, enough to make anyone want to comfort him, was imprinted on Haeyoon’s pupils.
The one truly in pain was Seo Haeyoon.
Seo Haeyoon couldn’t even breathe properly right now.
Yet, in front of that Haeyoon, Ahn Seonwoo was crying sorrowfully.
The one who tenderly wrapped an arm around Seonwoo’s bare shoulder was Oh Jaeyeol, who was shamelessly still sitting on that bed even as things had come to this.

‘He might faint like this. Haeyoon-ah, can you go home for now? Hyung will contact you soon.’
The surprising thing was that Oh Jaeyeol seemed quite composed.
His attitude was nonchalant, as if he’d never been stammering and flustered.
However, he was worried about Seonwoo.
Despite Seo Haeyoon, trembling as if about to collapse right in front of him.
Despite the lover he used to whisper was the one he loved most in the world.
As if the shock and pain Haeyoon must have felt were nothing.
As if they were of no concern at all.
As if Ahn Seonwoo was the only precious one.
And so, Seo Haeyoon lost the person he loved most and his best friend on the same day.
That was three months ago.

* * * *

“Ugh…! Ughk!”
Haeyoon sat holding onto the toilet in his apartment bathroom, repeatedly retching.
He had vomited up everything he’d eaten, so there was nothing left, but he couldn’t stop the nausea.
It was no wonder his stomach was turning after downing soju he wasn’t used to drinking.
Or perhaps it had nothing to do with the alcohol.
The memory of that day, resurfaced by the thunderbolt of the marriage news, was tearing his insides apart once more.
Any wound was supposed to heal with time, but it seemed three months was nowhere near enough for this one.
Even though he had tried to act okay in front of his friends, Haeyoon’s heart felt torn into a thousand, ten thousand pieces all over again.

“Haa… Hoo…”
Haeyoon, having barely calmed his stomach, staggered to his feet and turned on the shower.
As the sudden cold water poured down on the cool late-autumn night, a chilling coldness assaulted his entire body.
Unfazed, Haeyoon stood under the water, then soon took off his top and began scrubbing his body roughly with a washcloth.
He scrubbed so hard that his fair skin quickly turned red.
It was the same back then, too.
On the day he discovered Oh Jaeyeol and Ahn Seonwoo entangled, Haeyoon returned home and scrubbed his body over and over until it bled.
He did it because he feared their pheromones might still be on him.
He feared that the scent he, as a Beta, could never have detected—the disgusting air that must have filled that space—might have clung to him.
He feared that, just as he’d been a fool not to know his lover and friend were having an affair behind his back, he might still be carrying that stench without knowing.
For fear of that, Haeyoon scrubbed his body over and over until his skin felt raw.

“Sob…! Hic…!”
Finally, Haeyoon broke down.
Sitting slumped on the cold bathroom floor under the icy spray, he buried his face in his knees and sobbed.
He wanted to be okay.
He thought he could be okay, but it seemed he wasn’t there yet.
‘We said we’d talk later, Seo Haeyoon.’
The image of Oh Jaeyeol coldly retorting to his own silent question—’How could you do this to me?’—rose in his mind.
It seemed it really hadn’t been a momentary mistake.
They really were in love, those two.
Enough to decide on marriage this quickly.