If You Want Me - Episode 84
<Episode 84>
Seo-won asked his mother in the living room if it was okay to let Do-gyeom in for a bit. Fortunately, his mother said she was preparing to go grocery shopping, so they could comfortably talk inside without worrying about her. She took her shopping basket and left.
I hope she didn’t leave because of me…? Seo-won looked at the front door his mother left through with an apologetic face, then went into the room with Do-gyeom.
If it was a story that had to be told where there were no people, he thought it could be done in Do-gyeom’s car. He was suspicious of Do-gyeom’s intention to come into the house to talk. However, if he was planning to make a move on Seo-won, it would have been better to take him to the car rather than the house.
Even though his thoughts reached that point, his guard against Do-gyeom didn’t come down. Seo-won still looked at him with suspicious eyes and asked,
“So what do you want to say? What misunderstanding are you talking about?”
“…Actually, there’s something I couldn’t tell you.”
When Seo-won asked in a flat, hard voice, Do-gyeom hesitated and opened his mouth.
Yesterday, from the moment Seo-won brought up Seo Chaeyeon’s name, he knew Do-gyeom’s reaction was subtly strange. So he was convinced she was his omega partner.
Do-gyeom embracing someone other than me. He didn’t even want to imagine it and didn’t want to hear it, but if he said this much that it was a misunderstanding, could it be for another reason…? He wanted to believe Do-gyeom. In the end, it was because he still couldn’t cut the string of lingering attachment.
The only fortunate thing was that if he heard about the omega partner from Do-gyeom’s mouth this time, he felt he could uproot his expectations for him.
Thinking this was really the last time, Seo-won prepared himself mentally and coldly replied,
“What is it?”
“…”
Do-gyeom acted like he wanted to clear up the misunderstanding right away, but hesitated again at the decisive moment.
What on earth was he trying to say that he was dragging out time like this? Seo-won was also tense with strength in his back, and Do-gyeom let out a small sigh and continued in a nervous voice.
“Seo Chaeyeon, who you mentioned. She’s my half-sister.”
“…What?”
Seo-won blinked stupidly at Do-gyeom’s words.
What did I just hear? If she’s his half-sister…, does that mean siblings with different mothers?
Come to think of it, both Seo Chaeyeon and Seo Do-gyeom had the same last name. It also explained why he, who avoided letting other people into his house, let her in, and why she left clothes at his house, and why their conversation was a bit light. If that was the reason, it made sense.
If this was true, it fit perfectly as if he finally realized what he had been missing. There was no reason for him to lie about such an important matter, so it seemed to be true, but… it was hard to believe.
“Half-sister? I’ve never heard that before…”
Even though he had been by Do-gyeom’s side for a long time, he had never heard anything about a half-sister. If he had heard it even in passing, he wouldn’t have forgotten it because it was such a big issue…
Moreover, even though Seo Chaeyeon was quite a famous actress, he had never seen an article about her being involved with Seo Do-gyeom. There must have been rumors about her being an illegitimate child, so how did he not know? Does that even make sense?
As he muttered in disbelief, Do-gyeom replied as if he expected it, as if lamenting.
“Because it was never made known to anyone. It’s also something that’s hushed up in the family.”
“…”
“That’s why I asked to talk about it at home. Because it’s something no one should overhear.”
Although it was hard to believe a story about a chaebol family’s half-sister that would come out in a makjang drama, Do-gyeom wasn’t the type to tell a lie that crossed the line.
So does that mean it’s true…? The reason it wasn’t known elsewhere was because it was kept secret by hushing it up?
His face heated up with embarrassment that he had greatly misunderstood. No, even if they had the same last name, how many people would think she was his half-sister when he had never heard of him having a half-sister?
It was shameful and humiliating to trace back the dark history of misunderstanding and doing bad things to him. As his face gradually turned towards the floor like ripening rice, a sudden thought occurred to Seo-won and he raised his head to ask Do-gyeom.
“But when I asked yesterday, you said you weren’t particularly close with Seo Chaeyeon, right?”
“It’s not a very good story, so I didn’t think I needed to explain it. It was also a secret.”
“…”
Certainly… it’s not a good story. If this fact were to be known to the public, it would lead to quite a big hit to the company’s image.
His department store had a pretty good corporate image through various donation activities. If an extramarital affair scandal broke out in such a place, the repercussions would be big, so it seemed to be hushed up.
He seemed to understand the reason he never heard the story of Do-gyeom’s half-sister even while being closest to him. While understanding Do-gyeom’s attitude of trying to gloss over it yesterday, Seo-won also wondered if this was okay.
“But is it okay to tell me such an important secret?”
“Isn’t it better than not being able to see you because of a misunderstanding? You don’t seem like you would tell anyone else either.”
“…”
“Are you going to tell?”
“Ah, no! I, I would never do that…”
At Do-gyeom’s question, Seo-won shook his head in a hurry as if burned by fire. Of course, he wouldn’t tell anyone else. He had no one to tell and no reason to tell…
But if our relationship were to go awry, he could use this as a weakness and expose it… Does that mean he trusts me that much? While he liked that Do-gyeom trusted him, it felt burdensome and heavy that he now had a secret he had to keep for the rest of his life.
He misunderstood and spent money lavishly, completely making Do-gyeom out to be a bad person. He became uncomfortable as if sitting on a thorny cushion and wanted to apologize. As he was about to apologize for misunderstanding, Do-gyeom opened his mouth faster than that.
“You probably know since you lived in our house when you were young too… My father wasn’t very family-oriented.”
“…”
The story he brought up this time was from the past.
He could stop explaining now… While thinking that, Seo-won naturally recalled Do-gyeom’s father whom he had seen before at his words.
Seo-won had stayed in the duty room of Do-gyeom’s house from the age of five until he graduated high school at twenty. Even though he stayed there for such a long time, he had only seen Do-gyeom’s father a handful of times that he could count on both hands.
He rarely encountered him, and since the condition was to live like a ghost, Seo-won had never had a conversation with Do-gyeom’s father. So he had no idea what kind of personality his father had, but he vaguely knew that he didn’t pay much attention to his family just by the fact that he came home only a few times.
As Seo-won was recalling the large stature of Do-gyeom’s father that he remembered, Do-gyeom continued.
“Father didn’t pay attention to me or to Mother. I thought it was because Father was the head of our family and was busy.”
“…”
“But I found out later. Father had no interest in family. He was busy meeting other omegas besides Mother.”
His expression looked indifferent as if talking about someone else’s story, but a strange sense of disappointment was felt in his voice.
After looking into the air for a moment as if reminiscing, he met Seo-won’s eyes again as if he hadn’t brought it up just to gossip.
“I also found out by chance that I had half-siblings when I met Chaeyeon while using her as a promotional model for our company.”
“Then it must have been… recent.”
It hadn’t been that long since Seo Chaeyeon took on the role of promotional model for Do-gyeom’s company. He knew it had been less than a year. When Seo-won remembered that point and spoke, Do-gyeom nodded his head in agreement.
“That’s right. As is common with chaebol families, Mother and Father met as business partners and had a marriage. Because that’s how they could legally combine and amass money.”
“…”
“So maybe that’s why, even when I found out that Father’s infidelity had led to a half-sibling, Mother forced me to go on matchmaking dates. Even after showing such an appearance, she emphasized to me that I could only be happy if I lived like them. How absurd it was… From the beginning, there was no such thing as love between the two of them.”
“…So that’s why you haven’t gone on any matchmaking dates until now.”
He could have gone on a matchmaking date first and liked someone, but the matchmaking sessions his mother brought him to weren’t for such pure intentions. They were sessions demanding a marriage like the business partners he spoke of. Of course, love could blossom even in such sessions, but he didn’t seem to think that far.
Seo-won had only thought that he simply disliked artificial meetings and rejected matchmaking dates. But it wasn’t that, it seemed he was sick and tired of matchmaking sessions and rejected them because he had seen the bad precedent of his parents. He didn’t want to form a loveless family like his parents.
As Seo-won nodded his head and understood the previous situation, Do-gyeom spoke with a small smile, loosening his stiff face.
“There’s that, and I must have unconsciously liked you too, so I didn’t want to meet other omegas.”
“…”
He casually brought up that he had liked him for a long time.
When he first heard those words from him, he only thought it was sweet talk, but now it felt different from then. As he emphasized it several times and the situation overlapped, his heart gradually leaned towards ‘Maybe he didn’t like me as much as I did, but he did have favorable feelings’.
Thinking that way, he couldn’t cut it off like last time. Not knowing what to say in response, he wandered his gaze in vain, and Do-gyeom reached out and grabbed one of Seo-won’s hands.
At the sudden contact, Seo-won unconsciously looked at him. Then Do-gyeom opened his mouth as if he had been waiting.
“The one I like is you. Seo-won.”
“…”
As if saying he would tell him again if he didn’t know, he confessed his true feelings and brought the hand he was holding to Seo-won’s white hand, kissing the back of it.
Smack. With a light sound, his soft lips gently touched and left the back of his hand. It was a very gentle and careful kiss, as if handling something easily damaged.
“Eup…”
It wasn’t the first time he showed skinship or confessed to him.
But maybe it was because the misunderstanding that made his heart ache was resolved. Or maybe it was because it hit him that he really liked him. The feeling that hit him the moment he heard his confession was different.
At the warm feeling spreading in his chest, hot tears flowed down his eyes without a moment to think about anything.