Ding

Unlike Juhan's surprisingly simple room, Yuni's space was so cramped with all kinds of belongings that it was difficult for three people to move around at once. On top of that, a uniquely restless energy drifted through the air, the particular disorder left behind by someone about to leave.

Saying they could take whatever they needed, Yuni had invited Juhan and Yeehyeon into her room before the real drinking began. Most of what filled the space was clothes and books.

Watching Juhan's back as he rummaged enthusiastically through a two-tiered clothing rack that was already about half empty — likely sorted through once already — picking out things to his taste, Yeehyeon tried to focus on what Yuni was saying.

"They told me to do whatever I want. As if I ever needed their permission in the first place."

Yuni, sitting on the edge of the single bed cluttered with books of various sizes, magazines, and printed materials, gave a wry smile and took a sip of beer before continuing.

"And?"

Juhan, who had been digging through a box under the rack and struggling to pull out a sweater, stopped and turned around. Unlike him — who clicked his tongue in disbelief — Yuni just shrugged once, aimlessly flipping through a magazine within reach.

"I told them I didn't come to ask for permission. That I got a job overseas, and since I don't know when I'll be back, I thought I should at least tell them. That's why I went."

She said she had met with her family earlier that afternoon. Though she had exchanged a few brief calls since leaving home, this was the first time they had actually seen each other in person — and even if he didn't show it, Yeehyeon had been genuinely surprised.

As far as he knew, she had been gone for at least four years. He was surprised once by the fact that she hadn't seen her family at all during that time, and surprised again by her decision to break the long silence and go to them herself.

Inertia worked on relationships between people too. Once distance formed, it wasn't easy to reverse it. But leaving things alone and simply watching required no effort or resistance at all. That was far easier. Despite having plenty of reasons to avoid it, she had chosen the harder path.

"I told you to just say it over the phone."

Thinking of the hurt she must have received, Juhan grumbled at her back. Yuni looked down at him and let out a faint laugh.

"Whatever my parents have to say, it's not the kind of thing you say over the phone between parents and their child."

She had been delivering news over the phone — news they weren't curious about, or at least hadn't welcomed — for years now. There must have been her own reason for insisting on a face-to-face meeting this time. If all her previous choices had been secondary consequences of her initial decision to leave, then this one carried a different weight: a turning point, the moment her life entered a new phase. It wasn't just about her address changing from domestic to overseas.

Tilting her head back as if tired and rubbing the back of her neck, Yuni murmured toward the ceiling.

"They told me to come home, prepare for the college entrance exam again, and apply to an education college. They're still saying that. It means they have no intention of acknowledging anything I've built for myself since leaving. That I'm just acting out against them, deliberately going off course. Even now... the fact that they still think that..."

Unable to finish, Yuni shook her head slightly and snapped the magazine she'd been flipping through shut.

"Before, I at least thought it was for my sake. Getting a stable job and settling down. By their standards that's a good life, so I told myself they were being firm because they wanted me to live well. But seeing how they still say those things without trying to understand my life now, or the future I'm working toward... I don't know anymore."

Faced with Yuni's frustration at being denied once again by the very people she most wanted recognition from — as she actually was — neither Yeehyeon nor Juhan could offer easy comfort.

"Even if it's hard, even if it's not stable, I'm happier this way... so why do they keep saying I'll regret it later? Even if we're connected by blood as parents and child, even if siblings are raised by the same people — can't the conditions for happiness be different for everyone? Can't they?"

She stretched her legs out and pressed them against Juhan's back, coaxing his agreement. Yeehyeon watched her profile and quietly turned his head away from the pressure rising inside him. Then he mechanically swallowed a mouthful of beer that had tasted like nothing from the start. It felt like the only thing his powerless self could do right now.

"Even the four of us in my own family don't share the same taste in food. How could something as tricky as the conditions for happiness possibly be the same?"

There was an unmistakable weariness in Yuni's voice. Not physical exhaustion — something closer to resignation, the realization that it was finally time to sever the thin thread of lingering attachment she hadn't been able to fully let go of.

She hadn't gotten the result she wanted. But at least she hadn't run from the problem, hadn't piled up excuses to justify running. She had walked into a situation that was bound to be awkward and painful, of her own will.

Her family's house. The house that should have been the most comfortable place in the world. Yeehyeon could easily imagine how long she must have hesitated at that door.

Even while living under the same roof, it had never been easy for him to say a single word to his father. He had rationalized his avoidance with the excuse that there was no point — he wouldn't get an answer anyway. Compared to the pain of speaking and being met with silence, avoidance had been so much simpler.

But Yuni had not turned back at the door, even knowing what reaction was coming. She did what she had to do, said what she needed to say. What happened after that was no longer her responsibility.

Tilting the bottle silently, Yuni seemed to remember something and quickly pulled it away from her lips.

"Ah, actually — my family does have something in common with me."

"......"

"This stubbornness that makes my mom and dad groan, wondering who on earth I take after? I probably inherited it straight from them."

As she said it, she even smiled. It was a smile she forced to block out the complicated emotions — but having decided not to expect any more understanding from her parents, she also looked, somehow, relieved. She had confirmed once and for all that there was no room left for lingering hopes. Before moving on to the next chapter of her life, she was already separating what she would leave behind from what she would keep.

Everyone was using their own choices as fuel to move forward somewhere. The regrets to leave behind, the ties to cut loose, even mistakes and remorse — it felt like everyone was choosing their own.

Yeehyeon felt like he alone was a coward who had never collided with anything.

Was this retribution? For not digging into his problems, not pushing through toward any kind of breakthrough. For retreating, taking detours, feigning ignorance, relying on a cowardly peace built on silence. Was even his own body — the most tangibly his own thing he possessed — being altered by someone else part of that price?

To stop his thoughts from drifting somewhere too sentimental, too self-condemning, Yeehyeon drank more beer. This wasn't the right moment to be thinking about anything.

Yuni stood up from the bed, set the empty bottle on the sink, pulled a fresh one from the refrigerator, and nudged Yeehyeon's shoulder. He'd been leaning against the counter in a daze.

"Why are you so quiet today?"

"......"

It wasn't a question he could answer. That his head right now was more of a mess than your room. That he felt like an ant crushed beneath a problem so enormous he couldn't even take it all in at once — couldn't even scream. He couldn't say it.

Even if he had the nerve to open up, he wouldn't know where or how to start. It was impossible to explain to someone else a problem he himself hadn't yet properly grasped.

Meeting Yuni's worried gaze, Yeehyeon bit down hard on his lower lip. She reached out and lightly ruffled the back of his head, then gave him a faint smile.

"What, are you sad about us parting?"

Juhan sprang up from his spot, eyes gleaming, and gripped Yeehyeon's shoulder firmly.

"Seo Yeehyeon, then you tell the Director. Tell him we're not going to New York."

He was promptly smacked lightly on the back of the head by Yuni.

"Ah, why'd you hit me?"

"Yeehyeon, he knows he's talking nonsense and he's just blurting it out anyway, so don't pay attention to him."

Watching the two of them bicker over something trivial, same as always, Yeehyeon tried desperately to focus on this last time the three of them could spend together.

The problem of his body being changed into an Omega by Liu felt like someone else's story — as remote from reality as an internet gossip article. Yet even without being able to feel it as real, the shock had taken its toll. The shell encasing him was shaking, everything inside slipping out of place, falling, breaking, mixing together — and still he couldn't truly feel that it was happening to his own body.

So he wanted to shove that problem somewhere out of sight, the kind he couldn't do anything about right now, and focus on what was in front of him. Avoiding and burying things was his specialty, after all. Even if the New York trip with Liu fell through, Yuni would still leave for Paris. He didn't want to treat his farewell with her carelessly.

"This guy's head is really somewhere else completely, isn't it?"

Juhan waved a hand in front of his face. Yeehyeon tried to muster something resembling a smile — but it was useless. His specialty wouldn't come through at the precise moment he needed it most.

Yeehyeon rubbed his face several times with his palm.

"What is it? What's wrong?"

Yuni carefully pulled his hand down and asked. Facing her worried expression, Yeehyeon felt the urge to unload this shock onto someone — anyone. It felt like he had to disperse the impact onto another person, had to, or his body and mind would rupture.

"Actually... I'm not feeling very well...."

If what Shushu had said was true, the thought that saying he wasn't feeling well might not be entirely a lie sent a hollow laugh slipping out.

"Your complexion is bad. Your lips are completely pale."

Only then did Juhan seem genuinely concerned as he examined Yeehyeon's face closely. Yuni took the beer bottle from his hand and set it on the sink.

"You should go home and rest. You're not the type to say you're unwell over just a slight dip."

"......"

Yeehyeon didn't move, his expression reluctant. Yuni ruffled his hair gently, her tone coaxing.

"It's not like we'll never see each other again. I'm going to the Director's place on Friday, we'll see each other then."

According to the plan, Yeehyeon and Liu were scheduled to leave on Saturday. That was why they had arranged to finish early at Phantom on Friday and all have dinner together.

It wasn't just dinner that was uncertain. The New York trip might be canceled entirely. In a single instant, everything had been pushed into an abyss where not even the next step was visible.

Swallowing the desperate impulse to confess everything and throw it down in front of them, Yeehyeon slowly nodded. Then he picked up the backpack he'd left unopened in the corner by the bed. It felt heavier now than when he'd packed it.

"Thanks for the gift."

At the light squeeze on his shoulder, he turned. Yuni was smiling bitterly. She meant the travel souvenir that no one had taken last time — the one Yeehyeon had brought today.

"I just brought it over... Director bought it, though..."

"Right. Director gave it...."

Murmuring that, Yuni seemed to be counting the long list of opportunities and considerations Liu had given her. Even if Manager Han had told her it wasn't a betrayal, it wouldn't put her mind at ease so easily. But Yeehyeon was certain that Liu hadn't provided all those opportunities simply to bind Yuni's or Juhan's labor to Phantom.

No. At this point he could no longer speak as if he knew Liu that way. More than that, Liu had been pushed far away into a distant, blurry existence — belonging to the most unknowable chaos, the most uncharted territory.

After persuading Juhan and Yuni for quite some time that he didn't need them to drive him home, Yeehyeon finally left the officetel. The thought crossed his mind that they might contact Liu, or that Liu might contact them, but a reckless kind of whatever happens boldly cut off that concern.

He had no room to limit his actions out of consideration that someone might worry about him. Even without properly grasping the situation, a faint resentment toward Liu was already rising, and whether he worried or not, Yeehyeon only wanted to think about himself right now.

The night air, approaching October, was chilly. The wind racing between the massive high-rises made him hunch his shoulders. He didn't even think to put on the jacket in his hand.

After parting with Yuni and Juhan and becoming alone, it was time to face the problem. He had to become properly aware of what had happened and understand it. This wasn't a matter of perspective on life or passive attitude. It was happening to his body. He couldn't pretend not to know.

Haaa....

Yeehyeon sat on the tall planter in front of the officetel, let out a sigh heavy with confusion, and covered his face with both hands. After rubbing it hard enough to make his skin sting, he took out his phone from his jeans pocket.

Who should he contact? There was no need to think long. The meager contact list saved on his phone didn't even reach ten numbers.

He stared blankly at the name saved as "Awi" — previously "Director" — and rubbed his thumb over it for a long time. Whether he was tracing the memories represented by that name, or wishing for them to be erased, Yeehyeon himself didn't know.