At the habitual words, Chaegong bit his tongue. Feeling his heart pounding wildly, he swallowed down a shallow breath, and then a voice, a little softened, came to him.

“He’s my brother. My twin brother.”

Thinking of Hakjo, Chaegong asked on purpose in an astonished voice.

“You have a brother?”

“Yeah. Kwon Hakjo. A stiff, obnoxious jerk.”

He looked very much like Hyeonjo, but the atmosphere he gave off was definitely different. Remembering that, Chaegong nodded as if fascinated. Even though he was not speaking to Hyeonjo right in front of him, the absentminded nod made him feel a little embarrassed.

“He looks a bit like me, but I’m definitely better-looking.”

At the shameless joke, Chaegong let out a laugh, then raised his sharp eyes and asked again.

“If you’re brothers, then you must get along, right?”

Chaegong felt it instinctively. He had made a mistake. The heavy pheromones of a dominant alpha pressed down on his shoulders. He was holding a knife right now, so he should not be getting hit. It was dangerous. That was all he could think.

“…No. We don’t get along. I have no intention of getting close to that beta bastard.”

The low voice did not sound like he was about to hit him right away. Chaegong hurriedly finished slicing the onion and set the knife down. Only then did a sigh of relief escape him.

“Beta?”

“Yeah. My great-grandfather, grandfather, and father were all alphas, and he was the only beta. Proof he was a failure.”

Fortunately, Hyeonjo seemed to be in a good mood. In answer to Chaegong’s question, a cheerful voice flew back at him.

“Want me to tell you something funny? Since he was the eldest son and had to inherit the company, they made him live with our parents, while I was sent to my maternal grandparents so I wouldn’t get in his way. But even after he became a middle schooler, he still hadn’t manifested. So they had him tested, and guess what? He was a beta. So they hurriedly brought me to Seoul, didn’t they?”

That was why Hyeonjo hated his family. They had not cared about him at all, and the moment they found out he was a beta and Hyeonjo was an alpha, the way they treated him changed completely. Kwon Hakjo, who had lived all that time loved by everyone, became worthless in an instant.

It was satisfying, but even the moment the heir to lead the company changed to Hyeonjo, Hakjo did not alter his composed expression. He was past the age of craving love and attention from his family. His parents, too, were objects of hatred to Hyeonjo, so he had no interest in their love.

But Kwon Hakjo, who seemed unfazed even after having everything taken from him, only made him hate him more. It felt as if he were making Hyeonjo, who had struggled so desperately as a child to obtain it, look like a fool.

After thinking for a moment with narrowed eyes, Hyeonjo added.

“Just in case he comes looking for you, never open the door.”

“Mm-hmm. Got it.”

Chaegong’s heart pounded uneasily. He was afraid he might be found out that Hakjo had already come by, but fortunately Hyeonjo did not seem to notice. He said the dinner smelled good and that he was looking forward to it. At that gentle voice, Chaegong’s heart slowly began to settle.

“[I know you’re home. Please open the door.]”

The voice that boomed from the intercom was loud and clear. Thoroughly flustered, Chaegong eventually gave up pretending he was not there and opened the door. Hakjo, with his neat face, stepped in, took off his shoes, and entered the house as naturally as if he belonged there. It felt as though Hyeonjo might burst in at any second and explode at him for opening the door.

Hakjo did not do much. He only asked about Chaegong and whether he needed any help once more. Chaegong smiled and showed him his arm, where most of the bruises had faded, saying he was fine. Hakjo made a face that clearly said he was not satisfied, but soon nodded and said he understood. Just like before, Hakjo left before Hyeonjo came home.

Days like that went on for several days. He did not come every day, but he came at least once every three days. Every time, Chaegong pretended not to be home, and every time, Hakjo kept knocking stubbornly at the door. In the end, Chaegong would give in and quietly open the door, and Hakjo would come in with an untroubled expression.

His expressionless face all along somehow felt brazen. Chaegong timidly urged him to leave quickly before Hyeonjo came back, but Hakjo said he knew Hyeonjo’s schedule and stayed at least two hours before leaving.

Over the back of him rummaging through the refrigerator, a sharp gaze settled. Hakjo carefully examined Chaegong’s exposed skin, as if checking whether new injuries had appeared, whether his younger brother had once again laid hands on him.

He seemed to be making an effort not to show it, perhaps worried it might come across as pity, but even Chaegong, who was not particularly quick to catch on, could tell. For someone with such a firm, unreadable face, he was oddly naive.

By the time Hakjo had come and gone more than ten times, Chaegong opened the refrigerator and looked a little serious. There was nothing left to offer Hakjo anymore.

Hyeonjo only ate dinner now and then at best, and Chaegong was not the type to go looking for desserts or snacks on his own, so the refreshments fit for a guest had finally run out.

If he needed anything, he could call the servant saved in Chaegong’s phone, but Chaegong was not used to ordering people around. Besides, if Hyeonjo asked him about it, trouble would surely follow. It was as obvious as day.

In the end, Chaegong decided to go out for the first time in a very long while. He pulled out his own outfit for going out, grabbed a small wallet, and opened the front door.

The sky seen with his own eyes, not through a window, was very high and wide. Under a sky with hardly any clouds, Chaegong walked the street with his shoulders slightly hunched. Since Hyeonjo had not taken him out much lately, going outside felt very unfamiliar. He worried his clothes might not match the season, but it was a relief that the people around him seemed to pay him no mind.

But whenever his eyes accidentally met those of a passerby, Chaegong would, without realizing it, hold his breath and lower his gaze to the ground.

‘How am I supposed to go with you? It’s embarrassing.’

Suddenly, that voice brushed past his ear. He was afraid that other people might think the same thing. Lee Chaegong, who had once been asked by his own parents why he had been born, Lee Chaegong, that useless recessive omega, Lee Chaegong no different from a parasite, felt as if people would somehow know all about him.

I shouldn’t have come out. I should have just stayed home. For some reason, he felt suffocated. Chaegong, tormenting the tender flesh beneath his fingernails with hard, insistent presses, darted into an alley where there were almost no people.

After standing beside a parked car and catching his breath for a long while, Chaegong slowly looked down at his own arm. His eyes darted back and forth, checking whether there were bruises left behind, whether any wounds had been exposed. I shouldn’t have come out. Regret struck him again, and Chaegong lowered his head.

Chaegong knew it too. He knew better than anyone how pathetic and ordinary he was. But even so, he used to go out often. Was that because he had been so consumed by his own problems that he had no room to pay attention to other people? Or was it because, now that he had a place to sleep and no need to worry about meals, he had grown shameless enough to care about how others looked at him?

There was no way that someone as embarrassing to be seen with as Chaegong would suddenly become fine just because he was alone. What was he supposed to do? He wanted to go home like this, but for some reason, turning back the way he had so easily walked just moments ago felt strangely difficult.

He kept feeling like he was suffocating, but oddly enough, he couldn’t draw in a deep breath. Chaegong could only gasp in short bursts like some dying wild animal. It was then, while he bent his head and rubbed furiously at his eyes, unable to gather the tears that had finally spilled over.

“Mr. Chaegong?”

There was only one person in this world who called Chaegong that. A man with a face strikingly similar to Hyeonjo’s, a single mole dotted at the left corner of his mouth. Kwon Hakjo was approaching Chaegong in a neat shirt.

The moment he realized he had been caught, hiding miserably beside a car in a back alley and sobbing his eyes out, his mind went blank and a wave of tremendous shame crawled up from his toes. He was even Hyeonjo’s older brother. He was terrified that he might say something like, That kid at your house, that housekeeper. He was really pathetic.

If he said he had hidden because he was scared of people, maybe Hakjo would frown and let out a sigh. Chaegong wanted to stop crying at least, but for some reason he couldn’t manage it. His stomach churned.

“Are you all right?”

The hand that gripped his shoulder was terribly warm. He was Kwon Hakjo, but at first glance he looked like Kwon Hyeonjo, and for a moment it felt as though he had gone back to the day he first met him.

Lee Chaegong, whose pitiful, miserable state had once kept Hyeonjo from walking away, was the same even now. He had not changed at all.

Chaegong only wanted to hide this shameful version of himself. He hated being someone whose mere presence embarrassed other people. Why had he crawled out here in the first place.

With his face bowed low, Chaegong hurriedly wiped at his cheeks and kept nodding over and over. His voice, saying he was fine, was soaked through and trembling. As Hakjo quietly checked the skin exposed on Chaegong’s body so it wouldn’t show, he slowly reached out. When he rubbed Chaegong’s back, the shoulders that flinched under his hand looked so unsteady, so pitiable.

Hakjo had never once thought of himself as a person overflowing with sympathy. And yet, for reasons he did not know, whenever he stood before this man, he could not bear how pitiful he seemed.

Whether it was guilt over his younger brother’s cruelty, or simply sorrow for this pain that felt so vivid, Lee Chaegong was not, objectively speaking, the sort of man whose looks could capture everyone’s eyes.

And yet, whether tears had welled there or not, those always-wistful eyes, the lashes trembling so slightly, the pale lips that were forever being ground beneath his front teeth, kept drawing Hakjo’s gaze again and again.

So much so that Hakjo had split his tight schedule into pieces just to head to his troublesome younger brother’s house. So much so that, fearing it might reach Hyeonjo’s ears through his secretary, he had gone there with his own two feet. Chaegong’s pitiable air lingered in a corner of Hakjo’s heart.

✿ • ✿ • ✿