MS Ch 8 part 2

After a while, she finally saw Ki Taeju leaning against a bench in an area where the lamps couldn’t reach.

“Uh, since when…”

“From the beginning?”

He answered softly before straightening up.

The wind rustled his black hair. The light from the lamps seemed to slide over him as he stepped forward. The terrace, which had felt spacious just a moment ago, suddenly felt cramped due to his sudden appearance.

Ki Taeju stepped out onto a bright spot on the path and stood right in front of her.

“Give me one.”

He said as he looked at the cigarette in Euncho’s mouth.

Euncho hid her candid embarrassment a moment later and put the cigarette between her fingers.

“I’m sorry. This is my last one.”

“Then I guess you can give that to me.”

With that, Ki Taeju brazenly snatched the cigarette from her fingers.

Before she could make a sound, the cigarette was already between his fingers. Under the flickering lights, she could see the stain from her lipstick on the filter.

Ki Taeju looked at the lipstick stain before covering the filter with his own lips as if it were nothing.

The red mark was promptly hidden by his lips. Seeing this caused a shiver to run down Euncho’s spine.

Ki Taeju slowly sucked in a breath as he gazed at Euncho. Then his eyes became half-lidded as he exhaled, smoke flowing out from between his teeth.

“Are you going somewhere?”

“……”

“You put more lipstick on today.”

“I’m going on a date.”

“Is that so?”

Even though she said it to get on his nerves, Ki Taeju merely laughed.

“Who’s the bastard?”

As expected, the words that followed were void of any laughter.

Ki Taeju raised his chin and looked up. The pointed roof of Eatons Hotel was visible in the clear sky. The man scanned it with his eyes, his gaze dark and calm like the night sky.

“Does he work in this hotel?”

For a moment, Euncho thought she’d misheard, but that was not the case.

“Well, that’s not important.”

“……”

“What is important is figuring out what it takes to get him to leave.”

Ki Taeju was letting his displeasure seep out.

Ha, Euncho scoffed.

“How is that any of your business?”

“Of course it’s my business.”

Tap.

He took a step towards her.

“How did you end up…”

A second step.

“…eating something nasty you picked up off the floor?”

His wide chest blocked her like a wall.

Euncho frowned as she listened to his curt tone that sounded closer to a threat. This was the first time her professional mask of an employee had completely come off in front of him. Having noticed this, Ki Taeju’s smile widened.

Had it been like this in the past as well?

Had it always been this difficult to face him?

Euncho turned her face away as she felt the strange sensation she had been feeling since their reunion. Ki Taeju took another step closer. He was already close enough. In order to keep a safe distance between them, Euncho had to take steps back.

As she continued to retreat, something touched her back. Startled, she turned around and saw that it was the back of a bench.

She couldn’t go any further.

“…Wait.”

He leaned down towards Euncho, the cigarette still between his fingers. His muscles bulged inside his sleeves as his arm grasped the bench at Euncho’s side, trapping her.

His face drew closer to hers, almost as if he were going to kiss her.

“Move.”

Euncho spoke in a curt tone.

She scowled to add some intensity behind her warning. Ki Taeju’s hand holding the cigarette rose and slowly rubbed the furrow on her brow.

He was messing with her heart again.

She recalled the way he had wiped her tear-stained cheeks when they were arguing about his relationship with Heejin-unnie.

Euncho pushed his hand away and asked.

“What do you know about Kyujin-sunbae?”

“I probably know more than you.”

“……”

“Even a proper one wouldn’t have been good enough, but you had to go and pick someone like him.”

His wording was specific as if he really knew something.

Euncho moved her tongue inside her dry mouth. She tried to force herself to relax and pushed against the chest that was trapping her.

“Don’t talk badly about Sunbae.”

“Now that you’ve grown up a bit, you don’t glare at me anymore.”

When they first reunited, he used formal speech and kept distance between them, so Euncho thought that he’d become more polite with age. But it was all an illusion.

Yeah, where else could that fiery nature have gone?

On the contrary, this side of him was very familiar to Euncho. Because of this, she couldn’t help but glare at him.

“Just focus on taking care of your girlfriend.”

“My girlfriend?”

“Yeah. Kang Seora-ssi.”

Euncho’s voice turned sharp.

The word ‘girlfriend’ awkwardly rolled off her tongue. It was a word that implied countless emotional connections between the couple.

Euncho observed Ki Taeju’s reaction.

He took another deep drag of the cigarette and smiled bitterly. A smile that showed neither positive nor negative emotion. His ambiguous behavior reminded Euncho of his strange relationship with Heejin.

Even though they weren’t dating, he kept coming to see her to have sex with her.

Seven years have passed. But Euncho felt as if the same thing was repeating itself once again, causing her head to spin. Feeling as if she were stuck in a vicious cycle, she felt nauseous as if she had motion sickness.

But she also knew that this was an opportunity.

For the first time in a long time, it was only the two of them.

And the topic of Kang Seora, his girlfriend, had just come up. It couldn’t have been a more appropriate time to ask the question that had tormented Euncho for years.

Even though she knew this, she couldn’t bring herself to open her mouth.

Why? 

Why can’t I ask?

I need to ask him.

About Heejin-unnie.

I know I need to ask him.

Unlike the shrill voice inside her head, her mouth and tongue grew stiff. It was the first time her body and her mind were not in one accord.

…Is it the first time?

No.

This had happened before.

Yes, it had happened in front of Heejin-unnie. She should have asked Heejin-unnie about her relationship with Ki Taeju, but she had kept putting it off as if she were choosing to ignore the flow of time.

I wonder why I did that.

The question began to sprout like a seed, and Euncho had a sudden realization.

Ah, could it be…

Am I scared right now?

Because I’m scared of what will come out of Ki Taeju’s mouth?

Because I’m afraid that the yearning, waiting, regret, disappointment, and dejection I’ve held onto for the past seven years will crumble away like dust.

I’m afraid that the layers of sorrow and hatred that has piled up on Ki Taeju’s name will eventually turn into raw resentment.

The contradiction of suspecting him but wishing it wasn’t true. These conflicting emotions kept her mouth glued shut.

Suddenly, a chime of a bell rang in the air.

Euncho suddenly came to her senses and hurriedly took her phone out of her pocket.

[B/O Lim Kyujin-sunbae]

When Ki Taeju saw the screen of her phone, he scoffed. He was brazenly looking down at Euncho’s phone. The phone illuminated his gleaming eyes, and she could see something strange flash through them.

Euncho automatically hid her phone behind her back. Seeing this, Ki Taeju smoked the cigarette as he scoffed in disbelief.

“I’m not going to snatch it from you.”

“……”

“I can’t take it away because you might cry.”

“Why do you care whether I cry or not?”

“Because when Park Euncho cries, my heart rips to shreds.”

He spoke so well for someone without an ounce of sincerity on his face.

Euncho glared at him and brought her phone out from behind her back.

Meanwhile, the call had disconnected. Just as she was about to text him that she’d be down soon, a large hand appeared and covered the screen. It didn’t stop there. Ki Taeju then grabbed Euncho’s hand that was holding the phone.

“Get rid of him before you run into trouble.”

“……”

“Becuase he’s really dirty.”

“…And how would you know that?”

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

There was a gleam in his eyes. But why did his pupils still look like infinitely black matte glass? The man still had a bad habit of being vague.

Euncho observed Ki Taeju and then brushed his hand away.

Then she turned around and exited the terrace.

Her head kept wanting to turn back, and she struggled to keep her head fixed forward.

She didn’t know how she managed to pack her purse and come down after that. She walked to Lim Kyujin as he waved at her from the parking lot behind the hotel.

They chatted as they left the parking lot.

Since the hotel was situated in the center of the city, there were many restaurants nearby. After having a quick meal at a Korean restaurant that was well-known among the hotel staff, they walked to a nice cafe a few minutes away.

“…’cho. Euncho?”

“Yes?”

“What are you thinking about so seriously? I called you several times, but you couldn’t even hear me.”

Lim Kyujin asked with a pleasant smile. Euncho smiled apologetically back at him and shook her head.

“I’m sorry. I guess I’m not feeling very well today.”

“Really? Oh no. I guess I picked the wrong day to hang out. What should we do? Do you want to go home early?”

And this person was supposedly nasty?

Even as Lim Kyujin showed concern for her wellbeing, all Euncho could think about was Ki Taeju’s warning.

Lim Kyujin was so popular at work that many of his juniors had a crush on him. It wasn’t just the female employees who liked him. He also had a good reputation among the male employees. The fact that he was popular with both men and women was clearly due to his good personality.

Yet this man didn’t even think about enjoying his popularity and was busy chasing after her romantically.

For example, he was sincere without being overbearing.

‘How did you end up eating something nasty you picked up off the floor?’

What about this man was nasty?

Euncho rubbed the back of her sore neck. He just said whatever came to mind, but it continued to plague her.

‘You’ll find out soon enough.’

Find out what?

Her head began to throb even more. She felt like going home early today. But it would be rude to leave early, so she took out her phone to check the time.

The LCD screen was bright. There was an incoming call from Hyunji, who was from the same F/O department as her.

“Sunbae, I’m going to take a quick call.”

Euncho said apologetically as she answered her phone.

“Yes?”

— Euncho-ssi, where are you right now?

“I’m out. Is something wrong?”

— Have you seen the company bulletin board?

“No…?”

— Hurry… I think it’ll be in your best interest to see it quickly.

That was all Hyunji said.

Euncho tilted her head in confusion and went online. After a few taps, she entered the company bulletin board and saw that something had been posted.

She clicked on it without thinking. The post only consisted of a video without any other explanation or context.

Euncho pressed the ‘play’ button.

Euncho didn’t move a muscle while the video played out on the small screen of her phone. First, she was surprised to see that the location of the video looked familiar. And then… she was surprised to see the person who showed up on the recording.

“Sunbae.”

“Yeah?”

Lim Kyujin was looking out the window when Euncho called him. He thought Euncho was done with whatever business she had to take care of and turned his head to her. The eyes that she thought were sincere and clear now seemed different to her.

Suddenly, she felt chilled at the thought of his eyes looking at her.

“This…”

Euncho turned her phone so that he could see what was on her screen.

“Is this you?”

The video was simple.

It showed Lim Kyujin searching through the female employees’ locker room as he installed hidden cameras.