After getting diagnosed with a rare, terminal illness and being forced right out of his perfectly normal life, Jeon Jeongguk lost all his faith in living. Just six more months and he'll be dead. Gone. Forgotten. However, when a new hospital friendsh...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
"You look happy today," Sae commented when Jeongguk came into the kitchen, a towel over his shoulders, hair still freshly damp from his shower.
"I look happy?" Jeongguk asked, taking the towel and rubbing the cloth behind his ear. He slid onto the stool, watching as Sae cooked them dinner.
"Yeah, I noticed. You're carrying yourself different," San gestured at him with her free hand. "Like, you're not dragging yourself around. It's like you're floating."
He snorted. "Floating?" He didn't know what to say to that. Sae nodded enthusiastically.
"Yes! Don't get me wrong, nothing's bad about that. It's nice that someone's able to make you smile like that," She reasoned. With her chin, she gestured for him to pass her the salt. With a raised eyebrow directed at her, Jeongguk did as he was asked.
"I'm what now?" It was as if on cue his lips folded into a scowl, and at that, Sae merely rolled her eyes. Although, he couldn't miss the teasing smirk on her dainty features.
"Ever since Taehyung dropped you off, you were smiling to yourself. Don't think I didn't notice. It's pretty wonderful, you know, seeing you smile like that." Wait what?
"Pardon?" Jeongguk asked, his gaze narrowing. Sae whipped her head up from her cooking, the mischievousness he mistook for gentleness was stretched across her red lips in a smirk.
"I'm glad you had a good day," Sae said, ignoring him. "You look handsome when you smile, Gguk. I'm sure others could say the same." Others?
Jeongguk didn't say anything, only sparing his aunt a glare, seeing that her weird behavior didn't feel deserving of a sentence from him just yet. Or well, to be more specific he just didn't know what to say, and he surely didn't want to say something that would crush her pleasant mood.
Talking to Sae was always a gamble. Some days she was willing to take his cynical sarcasm and sometimes fight back with her own bluntness. On others, she would do the thing where she inhaled loudly and pinch the bridge of her nose, refusing to look at Jeongguk until her breathing could calm down.
In short, those were the times where he made her cry. Jeongguk hated making people cry. Crying was messy and ugly, not just for the person crying but for the person who has to watch them cry. However, he especially hated seeing Sae sad.
And so, he was careful, most of the time, to cut her some slack. But right now? God, he just wanted to say something, to tell her it wasn't like that. That he wasn't smiling because someone was making him happy. Nobody was making him happy, it was just the circumstances that led to a smile.
