Chapter 261: Expressions of Love (2)
Bom tended to only tease Yu Jitae and Gyeoul.
Bom wanted Yu Jitae to become a human and among the conditions of becoming a human were being able to express emotions. To make Yu Jitae into a human that could express his romantic feelings, she was in the middle of teaching him such emotions through the ‘act of teasing’. Her own enjoyment was a byproduct.
And although Gyeoul was a mature child in the standards of humans, she sometimes acted like a child especially when facing her food preferences. In times like that, Bom had to act the role of a mother, but she couldn’t exactly scold her so she was teaching her in a mischievous way. After doing it for a long time, she started enjoying this as well.
“…”
Today’s victim / criminal. Yu Gyeoul.
Crime: Eating toothpaste.
“…”
Gyeoul, who maintained the cleanliness of her body with a cleansing spell, had never brushed her teeth before because simply using a spell would cleanse her teeth.
Therefore, she didn’t think much of it even though there was a squeezable food of some sort inside the bathroom. She saw Bom brushing her teeth with it sometimes but as all dragons were, she had limited interest in what other dragon races were doing.
It all changed when she received an ice cream that looked similar to it at her school. An extremely delicious ice cream that had to be squeezed…
After coming back home, Gyeoul carefully opened the lid of the toothpaste and squeezed it into her mouth. Surprisingly, it tasted good. It was sweet and tasted like fairy floss.
She would be caught if she ate too much of it, so she decided to eat only a little bit.
However, Bom was extremely quick at reading between the lines and Gyeoul was caught that very night.
Gyeoul was scolded by her.
She said that wasn’t meant to be eaten.
However, Gyeoul couldn’t accept her words.
Isn’t it fine as long as it was tasty? It’s not like she would get a stomachache from eating it so there appeared to be no reason why she wasn’t supposed to eat it. Therefore, Gyeoul decided to be stubborn one last time.
The next day, the colour of the toothpaste changed.
Into something that had the same colour as Bom-unni’s hair colour.
“…”
Since she couldn’t get caught, she hurriedly squeezed it into her mouth and that was the problem.
She was startled. Her nose started ringing as she continued sneezing non-stop. With tears flowing out of her eyes, she quickly escaped the bathroom in a fright.
It was wasabi.
On the way out, her eyes met with Bom’s who was sitting on the living room sofa, and saw her floating a teasing smile. In the end, her plans worked out and Gyeoul never ate toothpaste ever since.
But meanwhile Gyeoul, whose jar of gummies as well as toothpaste had been stolen away from her, realised that she couldn’t continue suffering a loss like this.
“What. Me?”
“…Yes.”
“You want me to help with your revenge?”
“…Yes.”
Since a successful revenge against Bom by herself would never be possible, Gyeoul came looking for Yu Jitae.
“…You can’tt?”
“Well. Not that I can’t, but what are the plans for your revenge.”
Gyeoul put her hands together in a cone shape and whispered into his ears.
‘…Unni, is doing homework, right now.’
Homework? She probably meant assignments.
‘So that’s why you came to me now.’
Gyeoul nodded in response with a bright smile.
‘…Please, distract her with me.’
As if they were plotting a secret conspiracy, Gyeoul appeared excited. Yu Jitae wasn’t sure if it would work out or not but the child was enjoying it, so he gave a nod back.
‘Alright.’
***
Bom was doing six assignments at once. Books alongside a laptop were on the table, on her lap or floating in mid-air.
It was because she lost all the remaining interest she had in studies after ruining the writing contest. Now she was just procrastinating at the last second so that she wouldn’t have to repeat the grade.
In the middle of her diligent work on the assignments, she felt a gaze from her sides. Turning around, she saw Yu Jitae and Gyeoul looking at a gaming console. Thinking that it must have been her imagination, she was about to concentrate back on the assignments but felt gazes again after a while. She immediately flicked her head to the side and found Gyeoul staring at her for a split second.
“…Lu, lulu ?”
Gyeoul suddenly started singing with an awkward voice. Bom stared at her for a long time before turning her gaze back to the assignments but soon started feeling the gazes again.
Just like that, Gyeoul was planning on doing revenge with her gaze. By glaring daggers at her and pretending otherwise whenever Bom looked her way.
Therefore, what happened next immediately made her flinch.
Bom raised her head. Thinking that she was about to look at her, Gyeoul turned nervous but Bom’s gaze headed to the laptop floating in mid-air making her feel relieved.
But that was when Gyeoul’s face suddenly appeared on the laptop.
The surprised look on Gyeoul’s face as well as the dull look on Yu Jitae’s face was being reflected on the laptop.
“What are you doing? Both of you.”
“…”
“Are you here to interfere with my assignments?”
How did she find out? It was way too quick.
In a fluster, Gyeoul turned towards Yu Jitae and asked with her eyes.
What do we do now?
Who knows.
But Yu Jitae didn’t have a decent plan either.
“You shouldn’t waste your own time. Just go. I’m busy.”
Seeing that Yu Jitae and Gyeoul were still persistent, Bom grinned murmuring, ‘Cute…’ before focusing her mind back on the assignments.
There was no more turning back. Yu Jitae went and sat next to Bom on the sofa and Gyeoul, having realised his intention, occupied the opposite side of the sofa.
“Like I said, it’s almost due and I’m busy…”
Bom softly mumbled that and concentrated on the assignments without even sparing them a glance. Their objective wasn’t to stop her from doing assignments and was to distract her a little. After some contemplation, Gyeoul repeatedly opened and closed her fist next to Bom in an attempt to make her look at it but it failed.
Gyeoul slowly brought her fist closer towards her. She opened and closed her fist right next to Bom’s shoulder but Bom did not move a single inch. Thus, Gyeoul softly nudged her on the shoulder. She repeated that several times but soon realised that she was being ignored.
“Nnn, do that as much as you want~”
“…”
It was instead Gyeoul herself who was being teased now.
Gyeoul gestured with her eyes at Yu Jitae who was sitting on the opposite side of the sofa, with her eyes asking, why aren’t you doing anything?
In response, Yu Jitae faintly shook his head, meaning what would I even do. Gyeoul shook her head even faster, telling him to do something at the very least.
Harassing other people… Thinking about it, he remembered how Yeorum was harassing Kaeul.
…No, that won’t do. That wasn’t harassing and was closer to simply inflicting pain.
He thought a bit more and remembered Bom’s pranks – how she harassed him from the side when he was driving the car. Carefully raising his hand, he touched her by the cheek.
“…”
Bom ignored him. Regardless, he continued tapping or caressing it and soon, her eyes widened into circles.
“Nn?”
Gyeoul shot her eyes wide open. Wasit working? Copying him, Gyeoul carefully tapped Bom on her cheek when she suddenly mumbled with a sigh.
“Ah… it was a group assessment…”
It wasn’t very effective…
“So annoying…”
Gyeoul was the one that flinched in the end…
That was when Yu Jitae remembered something else.
There were two types of Bom.
#1. Depending on the location.
Bom when she’s at home / Bom when she’s outside.
#2. Depending on her mood.
Bom when she’s pulling a prank / Bom when she’s serious.
When she’s at home, Bom didn’t show that much of a reaction no matter what prank Yu Jitae pulled on her. Even now was the same. Although he was touching her earlobes and slightly pulling her cheeks out, she ignored him.
Unable to hold back her frustration, Gyeoul tickled her on the sides and on her neck but Bom was still fully focused on her assignments.
If this was done to her outside the house, the result would have been different.
But Bom when she’s at home… The so-called ‘Home Bom’ was like an impregnable fortress.
“…”
Yu Jitae suddenly noticed that her attitude was the same as himself. When he was living a daily life and living a non-daily life, he had to live as a different person due to the different objectives he had in mind. Was he overthinking it to think that Bom was the same as him in that regard?
In any case, no matter how much they poked her on her cheeks and her sides, Bom looked as if no-one was even touching her so Gyeoul turned towards him with a crestfallen expression.
Did we fail? She seemed to be asking.
After some thought, Yu Jitae pointed somewhere. Gyeoul turned around and found her pencil case.
“…”
Wouldn’t this work for sure? With a bright look on her face, Gyeoul brought the pencil case and took out a brush and a permanent marker.
Gyeoul grabbed the marker while Yu Jitae took the brush.
Gyeoul gave an extremely innocent smile as she started drawing a picture on Bom’s cheek. She drew two dots and a line underneath. :> And thus a smiley face was born.
Next, she decided to draw an animal.
Meanwhile, Yu Jitae also started using the brush to carefully scrape at Bom’s ears, nose and her neck, like an archaeologist excavating the bones of a dinosaur. Although there was a funny tattoo on her face and her neck and a long tickling session…
“Aigo. What’s gotten into you guys…”
That was the only reaction Bom showed.
Yu Jitae stared deeply at her face. Then, he brought the tip of the brush, placing it near her nose. He slightly poked it into her nostrils but she remained still regardless.
Taking it outside, he poked her lips with it, like a child touching a mysterious bug with a piece of stick.
It was then. Her tongue poked out, looking like the tongue of a cat. She rotated it in a circle and slowly licked the tip of the brush, all the while focusing on her assignments as if nothing was happening.
Yu Jitae was the one that was feeling troubled now. There was still an expressionless look on his face, but he slowly pulled the brush out.
It all failed but there was still one thing he hadn’t done. Yesterday when they were inside the car, Bom put her lips next to his ears and made weird noises at the end.
But he just couldn’t make himself do the same thing.
“…”
So in the end, it was a fail.
The two of them weren’t able to distract the ‘Home Bom’.
“Please go somewhere else if you’re done. You too.”
Swish swish. Bom only said that to the two of them a long time after the two of them were done with their pranks. It was an astounding level of concentration.
Gyeoul was disheartened.
She remembered how painful it was after eating the wasabi, but Bom-unni didn’t care even though a picture was being drawn on her…
But she had been quite zealously indulged in her drawing. There was the likes of a crooked rabbit with sparkling eyes on Bom’s cheek and her neck.
Since she looked visibly disappointed, Yu Jitae decided to console the child.
“By the way, your drawing is really nice. It’s cute.”
“…Nn? Really?”
“Yeah. Very pretty.”
That was when Bom’s hand paused for a split second. It had stopped from time to time even when she was focused on her assignments so Yu Jitae didn’t think much of it.
“…I, tried my best.”
“Seems like it.”
“…Which parts, are pretty?”
What?
Her words made him speechless.
“…Nn?”
“…”
“…Nothing?”
Gyeoul was about to be depressed again.
He couldn’t think of anything to say. The crooked drawing was only pretty because Gyeoul was the one that drew it.
Deeply he contemplated. And looking at Bom’s cheeks, he thought a bit more. He suddenly realised that the sparkling eyes of the rabbit were probably what Gyeoul had spent the most time on.
“The eyes are pretty.”
Bom’s hand stopped once again.
“…Andd?”
“Hmm, the slant of the eyes is cute.”
“…Yes. Ah, there’s also hair on the head.”
She seemed to be in a good mood after hearing compliments.
The child was happy, so he started adding unmatching compliments to the crooked drawing of the child.
There were three strands of hair resembling a weed.
“Right. I would love to caress it.”
“…Nn nn. The entire body, is covered in fur.”
“Must be warm to hug.”
“…What if, hungry?”
“You mean the rabbit? Or me.”
“…Uumm, both.”
“Give it a carrot. Or eat it.”
Gyeoul chuckled out loud while Bom’s fingers twitched.
“…Is it delicious?”
“Huh?”
“…Rabbit meat. Is it delicious?”
“…”
But she didn’t take it as a joke. It was times like this that reminded him that Gyeoul was also a dragon.
“Who knows. But you worked hard on drawing it so don’t think about eating it. You need to treasure it.”
“…But, it will be gone anyway.”
“That’s a shame. Even though it’s so cute.”
“…Nn.”
Gyeoul nodded her head in sorrow, before asking again for the confirmation.
“…Is it, really cute?”
“Very cute.”
“…Would you treasure it?”
“Of course.”
That was when she threw a slightly philosophical question.
“…If it’s gone, it’ll be forgotten right…?”
Yu Jitae contemplated, before giving a response.
“It will remain in your memories though.”
“…Ah.”
“You especially won’t be able to even forget it.”
“…Yes. Then ahjussi, will you remember it as well?”
“Of course I can’t forget it. It’s so pretty.”
It was then.
Suddenly, Bom hurriedly took her books and the laptop and stealthily stood up from her seat. “…Aht,” exclaimed Gyeoul as she belatedly tried to catch her but Bom quickened her steps with an anxious look on her face. At a speed close to running away, she escaped.
Kung. The door closed behind her.
Standing in front of Bom’s room, Gyeoul turned towards him.
There was a question mark floating above her head.
***
There was a point Yu Jitae and Gyeoul hadn’t even considered.
It was that they just happened to be constantly looking at Bom’s cheek during their conversation.
Until one point in time, Bom was completely focused on her assignments that she couldn’t hear a single thing. It was as if the whole world was put on mute.
But her ears suddenly started picking up sound.
Since when was it?
– Very pretty.
It was after he called her cheeks pretty.
Something extremely strange started happening after that. It was that Bom’s ears had started picking up only the sound of Yu Jitae’s voice.
– The eyes are pretty.
– Hmm, the slant of the eyes is cute.
– Right. I would love to caress it.
A crack appeared in her expression. Assignment and concentration or whatever, she just couldn’t continue any longer, so Bom glared at the two villains that were disturbing her.
– Must be warm to hug.
– Of course.
But Yu Jitae, who was paying all his attention into pleasing Gyeoul, seemed unable to notice it. And that was when her malfunctioning ears picked up the final words
– Of course I can’t forget it. It’s so pretty.
Lying face-down on the bed, she buried her face into the pillow.
I must be crazy…
She knew he wasn’t talking about her. She knew he was talking about the rabbit drawn on her cheeks and yet hearing such words made her heart race and jumbled up her brain.
Bom heaved out a deep sigh.
She needed to keep herself in check.
At this point, it was an illness and a severe one at that.
*
[1418. But I still loved it…]
[Ahjussi Observation Diary ??]
*
After that, Yu Jitae bought a squeezable ice cream for Gyeoul.
She had fun with Yu Jitae, got complimented for her drawing, and was able to have ice cream… All those elements seemed to have bettered her mood by severalfold.
For him, it was a great turn of events. He had been lost for words when he was suddenly made to compliment the rabbit but…
All the things he had thought of when looking at Bom came in handy.