“Especially those.”
A beat.
Then, quieter:
“You look beautiful, Sky.”
Haneul blinked. Looked away.
“…Don’t start that again.”
But he didn’t pull back.
??????
Later, at the corporate seafood dinner...
He shouldn’t have been surprised. But he was.
Haneul walked in like sin wrapped in silk—hair slicked back, braid pinned with silver clasps, his long legs sharp in tailored trousers, and the ash-grey jacket sitting on his frame like it had been sculpted from intention and cheekbone.
The room fell silent for a beat.
One executive cleared his throat.
Another shifted in his seat.
Even the vice president's wife did a visible double-take.
Haneul just grinned—devilish and unapologetic.
Then sauntered to the table, dropped into the seat next to Seungho, and in the middle of the polite small talk, he cut in:
“So,” he said, loud enough to reach half the table. “What’s the ratio of shellfish to slimeballs in this place?”
Seungho choked on his wine.
??????
The air was thick with music.
Not polished club bass or moody lounge jazz—just raw, open chords spilling from rusty speakers, underscored by the clink of bottles and the salt-stung crash of distant waves. Lanterns swung in the breeze, casting patches of light over tangled limbs and sloppy kisses, over laughter too loud to be fake and shoes kicked into the sand.
Haneul hated the sea.
Still hated it.
But this bar? The one Haneul dragged Seungho to before the executive dinner had the chance to die its slow, suffocating death?
It had promise.
He leaned against the faded wooden railing of the deck, sipping his second glass of sweet makgeolli, cheeks flushed from the sugar and the heat and maybe Seungho's stare—steady, hot, unreadable from across the table. A cigarette dangled between two fingers but remained unlit. The breeze had curled strands of hair loose from his braid, and they stuck to his lips like ink strokes.
Seungho was sipping slowly from a beer bottle, sleeves rolled up, eyes tracking Haneul’s every move like the rest of the world had faded.
And then that song started.
A strange, aching voice filled the bar—some indie band, clearly Western, but the words didn’t matter. Not really.
