The Odd Doctor Out | A Drama | S. 2

280 🩺 Manly Chats & Grave Sacrifices

Sitting at a table in the mess hall, Yunho flipped his penlight in his fingers idly as he stared into the bottom of his untouched soup bowl. He may have looked calm from the outside, but on the inside, there was a serious conversation taking place.

Let's think about this seriously, then. If, you do like him... And that's an if-

Ya we already established this-

Just- Just humour me. If you like him, then great. But you're a mess, and Mingi is fine. He knows what he wants. But you know nothing. So even if you like him, are you prepared to take a closer step?

What sort of step? Jesus Yunho, stop getting ahead of yourself. He's seeing Underpants Man for Christ Sake. You shouldn't have even kissed him in the first place.

Well I didn't know he was seeing him-

You knew he was seeing him. Don't try to pull that prick move-

'Uh, Yunho? Hello?'

Yunho startled so significantly that he dropped his pen torch and just about jumped off of his seat. Eyes wide, he pushed his lunch onto the table further, before glancing up.

'Oh, Seonghwa, hi. Sorry. Did you, uh, did you say something?'

The older narrowed his eyes, before putting his lunch tray down opposite him and sitting down. 'No... What the hell were you thinking about? You haven't moved from the moment I walked into the hall ten minutes ago, to now. You right?'

Yunho sighed heavily, sitting back, running his hands through his hair before snapping his chopsticks apart and picking them up. 'I guess I just dazed off for a moment... How's shift?'

Seonghwa frowned at him, before apparently letting it go. 'Honestly, I think I've learned that it's hard coming back to work after being away...'

Yunho nodded. 'San mentioned you were having some time off.'

'I was sick.'

Yunho raised an eyebrow at him, looking him up and down. 'Sick?' He felt the corner of his mouth smirk up.

And Seonghwa's guilty, yet unapologetic smirk followed. 'How's your shift?'

Yunho rolled his eyes.

'Not good I take it. How long left on your placement?'

'Two weeks.' Yunho swore he could have rejoiced, if not for the fact that he had a grand total of zero faith in the hospital's ability not to create some other problem between now and his last shift.

He saw Seonghwa nod. 'How's your neck? I heard you got shanked the other night...'

Yunho nodded, reaching up tenderly and touching the skin to the side of the dressing. 'Bit inflamed but not too bad.'

'Hurt?'

'Fucking oath.'

A manly silence fell between them, one that didn't seem particularly uncomfortable, yet not entirely friendly either. Having run out of things to talk about, it naturally just felt like the end of the road...

Until...

'You don't really like me, do you?' Yunho suddenly asked, zero forethought.

Seonghwa choked on his lettuce, suddenly looking up. 'Uh, what?'

Yunho shrugged, pulling a slice of pork from his soup and putting it in his mouth.

Seonghwa took a deep breath, sitting back in his seat and considering him. 'It's not that I don't like you...'

Just then, movement far off to the side of their table caught Yunho's attention, and he wasn't at all surprised when he realised it was Mingi, paying for his lunch.

And Yunho's chest ached. All he could think about was how badly he'd missed him, and how much it hurt to know that he was pulling away...

But as much as he wanted to stay, Yunho couldn't hurt him. He wouldn't hurt him. He just couldn't bring himself to do that to him.

And so as Yunho tore his eyes from that brown head of hair, he took a deep breath. Picking up his tray, he slipped out of the bench seat and nodded. 'It's just that I hurt your friends. Got it. For what it's worth, I'm not trying to hurt them...'

And with that, he nodded respectfully, before taking his lunch with him away to have in a corridor somewhere by himself.

Every step away was agonising, but the pain came with relief, and with the comfort that Mingi would be able to enjoy a lunch with his friend, and not be pained by him.

-

But little did Yunho know, that as Mingi had brought his tray up to sit with his friend, Seonghwa had sighed, nodding in his direction. 'Min, he's trying...'

'Who's trying?'

'Yunho... I think he really cares about you...'

And despite Yunho having cut him off, Seonghwa couldn't help but feel guilty that he hadn't gotten to say what he wanted...

I won't forget the way you dropped everything for him that day Min was sick...

You care, it's obvious, so how could I dislike you?

~~~