Into The Thrill

Haewon, lost in a daze, was watched closely. He dodged an advancing kiss by turning his head and looked past Hyun Woojin's shoulder. Hyun Woojin forcibly turned his face, forcing Haewon to look at him again, their eyes inevitably meeting.

The closeness of the dark forest was gapless.
It was an eye that had devoured darkness, an eye that engulfed all surrounding light, the man before him was more than Haewon could handle, a carnivore. Hyun Woojin whispered soothingly.
"I'll buy you bread."

"…Will you let me go?"
"That, I can't."
"Let me go. I'll tell them to tax you more, just let me go."

"Tax isn't my jurisdiction."
"Let me go."
Haewon pleaded directly into his eyes, imploring him to release him. Haewon could work and survive on his own, perhaps even give up the violin. But his young sister Ha-jeong, only six years old, needed her mother whether she was good or bad. Haewon couldn't take care of her, nor could a nanny.

The fear of being relied upon by such a young child terrified Haewon. The weight and warmth that radiated from the small body when he held her were frightening. Haewon's own immaturity was insufficient to help a mere six-year-old understand the loss of a mother.
Unable to beg further, Haewon just stared at Hyun Woojin's trembling lips. Hyun Woojin then took out the phone he had put in his back pocket.
Haewon placed his hand on his shoulder as he made a call. Hyun Woojin held his black phone to his ear while looking at Haewon's hand on his shoulder.

"It's me. How's the investigation on Moon Woo-sik? Yeah. Who's handling it now? Stop it and let him go. It doesn't make sense, I know. Just release him. Now. Why do you care who complained? It's my order. Yes. Release him immediately and make sure he gets home. Report back when it's done."
Hyun Woojin commanded the person on the other end with a tone much harsher than usual before hanging up. He placed the phone on a nearby shelf.
"Your father's name is Moon Woo-sik, right?"

Haewon nodded.
"He'll be released now."
"You said it wasn't possible earlier. Even if the president came, you said it wasn't possible."

"You know it’s not possible, so what does this mean?"
Hyun Woojin gestured at Haewon's hand on his shoulder. Haewon wrapped his arms around Hyun Woojin's neck and overlapped their lips, whispering.
"You said you’d buy me bread…"
They kissed passionately. Hyun Woojin stumbled a few steps back before collapsing onto a dining chair. Haewon climbed onto his lap. He grasped Hyun Woojin's cheeks and their lips brushed against each other, their breaths mingling hotly.

He teased and sucked on the tea-infused tongue, their hands trailing over each other’s bodies with urgency. Their breaths became more entangled than the mess they were already in. The long wait at his apartment door that night wasn’t for his father's release but for the kisses they shared.
The heartbeat driving blood felt like a drumbeat. Haewon caressed the sharp line of Hyun Woojin's jaw and neck. It was firm and strong. Hyun Woojin sucked on Haewon's lower lip vigorously.
"Uh… Huh…"

The soft flesh swept across his lips. He pulled Haewon’s tongue into his mouth and sucked on it lewdly.
Haewon’s consciousness and subconscious were wholly sold to their kissing. His hand slipped inside the clothing, caressing bare skin. Haewon abruptly broke the kiss, gasping as he looked down at him.
"What are you doing?"

"Huh? I put my hand inside."
"Don't touch."
"How am I supposed to touch without hands?"

"Just don’t. Don’t put your hands in."
"So, how far can I go?"
"Don’t touch at all."

"Alright, fine."
He withdrew his hand that had ventured inside the clothing, showing a gesture of surrender. His arms flopped down beside the chair.
The problem was his warm hands. His palms could incubate an abandoned egg with their comforting warmth. Such hands touching bare skin made emotions uncontrollable, beyond collection.

Promising not to touch, he let his arms hang loose, and Haewon grabbed his cheek and overlapped their lips again. They clicked into place at a precise angle, heat penetrating to the bone. They rubbed and licked each other’s tingling skin, and he swallowed the breath he exhaled. Haewon caressed beneath his jaw, a spot cats enjoy, lazily licking the roof of his mouth and the damp mucosa. After a long session of kissing, Hyun Woojin opened his eyes.
His eyes narrowed unsatisfactorily, looking as if they were drawn on. Haewon watched intently, trying to touch his eyelid, but he spoke. Haewon’s hand ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) paused.
“I’m not a minor.”

Whether he was criticizing the baby-like kisses or talking about his hands restrained below was unclear.
“Either escalate it or let my arms go.”
“Don’t escalate anything, and don’t touch.”

"What confidence. How far do you think I'll let you go?"
"Then stop. Your subordinate must have released my father by now."
As Haewon attempted to dismount his legs, Hyun Woojin abruptly grabbed his waist, stopping him.

"Alright. I understand."
"……"
"I said I understand."

He removed his hand. His arms stretched out lazily on the floor as he watched Haewon.
Haewon sat on his thigh and looked down at Hyun Woojin’s face anew, as if seeing it up close for the first time. Although Taeshin had said many things about his appearance, he hadn’t rated his eyes. Perhaps Haewon had carelessly missed it.
Thinking back to the art museum catalogues he had seen in the library during school days, he recalled a portrait from about five hundred years ago. Despite the centuries, something vast and alive seemed to bleed from the eyes of the portrait.

The depth of centuries was vivid right now. Staring into his eyes felt like being sucked into a descent, an overwhelming sensation of vertigo. He slowly slid his hand down his cheek. Fortunately, the skin wasn't as warm as the hands.
"Don't drag it out. You can look at my face all you want later."
His low voice spoke indifferently.

"I'm not handsome enough to look at."
"Don’t stare like you’re lost, then."
"……Annoying."

"I know. I'm annoying."
Raising his eyebrows, Hyun Woojin received a tilted head from Haewon. He captured his lips. The hands dangling under the chair clenched into fists as if restraining himself. Led by Haewon, he grabbed the back of his head and swallowed his breath.
Haewon opened his tired eyes. His eyelids were sore.

He blinked slowly, struggling to keep his eyes open.
Where is this…?
He slowly sat up. His body was lying on a bed. The bedspread, as immaculate as a hotel’s, covered him, and through the window, the midday sun was visible.

It was Hyun Woojin’s apartment. He recalled last night. Sitting on his legs, he had kissed Hyun Woojin. Holding his face for a long time, quite a long time, perhaps an hour or more, indeterminable, they had kissed.
His lips were slightly swollen, as if to prove that the memory wasn't exaggerated or false. It felt like a burn. When he touched them, a warm heat and pain spread through his fingers.
He had lost all strength while kissing and slumped against Hyun Woojin's legs. Even though Haewon had told him not to touch him, Hyun Woojin had lifted him up and held him. Even as he moved, he didn't take his lips away. He didn't want to. And it seemed Hyun Woojin felt the same, because as soon as he laid Haewon on the bed and pulled away for a moment, he immediately pressed their lips back together.

He hadn’t touched Haewon's body. Haewon vaguely remembered the shape of the man supporting his weight on his elbows above him. They had spent a long time licking into each other’s mouths in a teasing kiss, and at some point, they had fallen asleep just like that.
It was the first time he had kissed someone for so long. And it was the first time he had spent the night with someone, kissing but doing nothing else.
Haewon got out of bed. Hyun Woojin was nowhere to be seen. The clock on the wall pointed to eleven in the morning. He washed his face and grabbed the coat draped over the dining chair.

Something had been placed on the table that had been empty last night. A sandwich, likely bought from the convenience store on the first floor of the building. A single peanut cream sandwich, left alone. Haewon picked it up and walked out of Hyun Woojin's officetel.
He called his father. His father was with his lawyer, claiming he had been politically used. His father was an old friend of an opposition party lawmaker and had donated large amounts of political funds. He had been sent home last night without an explanation, but he didn't know when he would be called in again. He told Haewon not to go outside, to come home instead because he was worried.
After ending the call, Haewon hailed a taxi. Sitting in the back seat, he unwrapped the packaging and bit into the cheap peanut cream sandwich. Every time his lips pressed together, a dull pain throbbed.

∞ ∞ ∞
Haewon sat on his bed, watching TV. A wildlife documentary. A snake coiled tightly around a small rodent, suffocating it before swallowing it whole. The crunch of bones and flesh echoed through the screen. The rodent's swallowed body bulged beneath the snake’s head. It was gruesome, but it was an undeniable law of nature, and Haewon's vacant eyes watched it without reaction.
There was no survival more raw and unfiltered than carnivorous survival. Something had to die in order to fill an empty stomach. If something didn’t die, then he had to starve instead. Should he condemn it or encourage it? Haewon didn’t know.

The phone rang. His eyes flicked to the screen—Hyun Woojin. He didn't touch it. Didn't even give it a glance. He just kept staring blankly at the snake slowly devouring its prey. The ringing stopped. A few minutes later, the doorbell rang.
His head turned. The door was tightly shut. The bell rang again. Only then did Haewon stand up, unlock the door, and open it. It was past midnight.
Hyun Woojin stood outside. He casually lifted a paper bag in his hand. It was from the same nearby bakery that Choi had bought from before.

"Pick up your phone. Didn’t you agree to listen to me from now on?"
"I don’t answer calls after midnight."
"But you open the door for people who show up after midnight?"

Haewon left the door open and turned away. He grabbed the remote and turned off the TV, cutting off the last lingering sounds, leaving only silence.
Hyun Woojin stepped inside, tossing the bag onto the dining table. He shrugged off his jacket, hung it over the chair, and grabbed Haewon’s arm as he tried to step away. His grip was firm but not painful. Haewon let himself be pulled along.
Hyun Woojin sat down heavily on the bed, looking up at Haewon, who was awkwardly caught in his grasp.

"What’s your door code?"
"Why are you asking for someone else’s door code?"
"I told you, I’m six years older than you."

"I already heard that last time. No need to repeat it."
"Are you going to keep talking informally?"
"I’m six years younger than you. You talk informally to me too."

"Looks like I need to teach you some manners."
He grabbed Haewon and pushed him down onto the bed in an instant, pressing down as if to take control. His movements were sharp and decisive, without hesitation or uncertainty.
Straddling him, Hyun Woojin smoothed Haewon’s disheveled hair back, revealing his forehead.

"What’s your code?"
"Why do you want to know someone else’s door code?"
"So I don’t have to wake you up when I come in."

That meant he planned to come over at this hour regularly. Whenever he wanted, whenever it suited him.
"Eight-six-five-two-three."
Haewon gave it up easily. Only one digit was different from his previous code. Hyun Woojin had already known the last one, so the moment he heard it, his expression twisted slightly.

"What’s yours?"
Haewon asked for his officetel’s passcode in return.
"Eight-six-five-two-three."

"……."
It was exactly the same as his.
Haewon looked at him in surprise, and the corners of Hyun Woojin’s lips curved into a smirk.

"I’ll change it to match yours. Come whenever you want. Just call first. I’m barely home, so don’t waste a trip."
"You think I’d come?"
"Yeah, don’t come. I’ll come instead. Just stay here and wait for me every day like this."

A playboy. That was what he thought of him.
Saying he’d change his door code to match Haewon's—it sounded sincere. Haewon wondered if he said such sweet words to everyone.
His indifferent kindness must have been absolute torture for those who loved him. His generosity was poison, and his goodwill was a whip against raw, exposed flesh. It must have been especially unbearable for Taeshin.

Haewon gazed at him blankly. Hyun Woojin had never explicitly said anything, but Haewon knew a lot about him.
"I saw you at the hotel."
Hyun Woojin stared at him as if wondering what he was talking about.

"What hotel?"
"A while ago. In the summer."
"……."

A slight crease formed in Hyun Woojin’s brow as he searched his memory. That time, when he had been with a woman at the hotel, he had also been seeing Taeshin. He hadn’t seemed sincere with either. He was too successful, too arrogant—treating others as beneath him came naturally, and those subjected to it seemed to accept it just as naturally.
"Oh, that tiny swimsuit."
Hyun Woojin finally recalled and looked at Haewon with new interest, as if finding something amusing.

"If you had kicked just a little harder, it would have come off."
Haewon almost mentioned seeing him with a woman but held back.
Hyun Woojin hadn’t denied his relationship with Taeshin. He hadn’t bothered to explain either.

His fiancée had committed suicide five years ago. And Haewon’s friend, who had loved him, had also committed suicide. It was an unpleasant coincidence. Everyone who had loved him had left by the time he was twenty-nine. Like the rodent swallowed by the snake earlier, they had been consumed by him.
Maybe it was because he had lost his fiancée that way.
Hyun Woojin wandered through life recklessly, refusing to settle down anywhere. Refusing to belong to anyone.

Haewon knew that he was just another temporary presence in his life. Hyun Woojin only spent time on him because he didn’t like being ignored. His kindness was nothing more than a tool for his own ends.
Haewon could use him the same way. He was sure he could.
But it was the first time. The first time he had spent the night with someone without doing anything. The first time he had kissed, just kissed, for so long.

And the weight of that first time felt eerily ominous.
Hyun Woojin lowered his head, pressing their lips together. The bruised skin, sucked raw the night before, throbbed sharply. Haewon wrapped his arms around Hyun Woojin’s firm neck, pulling him in. The short-cropped hair at Hyun Woojin’s nape tickled his fingers. A languid sigh slipped past his lips.
As their kisses deepened, Hyun Woojin’s hand wandered lower. He lifted Haewon's sweater, sliding his palm up the bare skin beneath. He traced along his ribs, over his chest. When his fingers brushed against a nipple, Haewon, who had remained unresponsive until then, suddenly trembled.

Hyun Woojin pulled back abruptly.
Haewon swallowed the taste of him lingering in his mouth.