“Haneul,” he hissed under his breath.
“What?” Haneul said, all innocence, piling his plate with strawberries and a croissant the size of his face. “I’m glowing. You’re limping. Why hide it?”
“You’re not glowing,” Seungho growled, dabbing coffee off his lapel. “You’re radiating threats to national stability. And you are a man for the love of—”
From the next table, one junior associate leaned over to whisper, “CEO Yeol… you’re up late.”
And Haneul—without pause, without shame—flashed them a radiant smile and said:
“That’s because some of us were up being thoroughly reorganized.”
Seungho choked.
The table fell into stunned silence—then a few nervous coughs and shifting of cutlery.
Haneul took a bite of pineapple like a saint.
??????
Ten minutes later, Seungho dragged Haneul to the beach.
It was meant to be a treat.
Instead—
The moment they stepped onto the sand, Haneul froze.
Sniffed.
Wrinkled his nose.
“What is that putrid smell again?”
“That,” Seungho said patiently, “is the ocean.”
Haneul stared at the sand. “I want to die.”
Seungho chuckled and kept walking.
A gull screamed overhead.
Haneul flinched like it’d fired a gun.
The wind tore at his linen pants. A fleck of wet sand hit his ankle.
“WHAT THE FUCK—” he screamed, slapping at himself. “IS THAT—AN INSECT??”
“It’s sand.”
“NO IT BIT ME.”
A tiny dark speck skittered past his foot.
Haneul howled, grabbed a slipper, and chased it across the beach like a war. People watched. Children pointed. One tourist recorded it.
Seungho’s phone buzzed. Jaewan.
He answered, stepping out of splash range. “Yeah?”
