A small warmth touched my palm.
The foul stench that had tormented me moments ago faded beside a clean, refreshing scent.
So I…
I couldn’t help doing this.
“Sorry, Seolheon!”
Squeeze. I hauled him into a hug and rubbed my cheek all over his.
“You’ve had a rough time because of your useless Hyung!”
“Hyung. You’re smothering me.”
“Just let me hold you for a second!”
“I’m not a little kid anymore.”
“Okay, my nine-year-old puppy!”
“…”
Right.
For the last ten years, unlike the Geonho Baek in the novel, I never bullied my younger brother, never gaslit him, never got jealous.
The result of wrapping him in nothing but love:
“Hyung. Let go a sec.”
“Hm?”
“You said you lost your meds. I brought a spare from home.”
The kid I once mistook for obsessive-seme Baek Uheon grew up into a good boy who worries about his Hyung—my precious little brother, Seolheon Baek.
“My Seolheon! What am I going to do with you being this sweet?”
“Hyung, off. And take your meds.”
“Let me pet you a little more!”
I became a hopeless little-brother fool.
“…Then only a little.”
“Okay!”
Look at this pure kid, pouting and blushing.
Who could look at that face and call him a mad-dog seme?
Honest with his feelings,
naively cute the way a child his age should be,
and selfless enough to run to the hospital for his Hyung!
It hit me anew that the last nine years of teaching hadn’t been for nothing; pride swelled up in me.
“No one’s born hopeless, after all.”
Honestly, even without me, our doting adoptive parents would have raised him just fine with heaps of love. What unforgivable thing did the novel’s Geonho Baek do to dark-evolve him into an obsessive menace?
Whatever the case, contrary to my fears nine years ago, Seolheon has shot up like a bamboo sprout without major incident, and I couldn’t be prouder.
Thanks to him, I’m thoroughly enjoying this life.
…If you leave out the deranged worldbuilding where men can get pregnant, and my little condition.
“The smell…”
“Hm? A smell?”
“Yeah. Your smell.”
Cold sweat pricked me—was he bringing up pheromones? But a nine-year-old who hasn’t manifested yet can’t sense pheromones.
Maybe he meant body scent or something like that?
“But there’s a weird smell too.”
“Oh, crap!”
“Right—I puked and passed out!”
What about the scene back there? No—are my clothes okay? They look fine at a glance, but the smell?
“Seolheon. I’m going to wash up. Bathroom, just a—”
“It’s fine, Hyung.”
I tried to peel him off my lap in a hurry; instead he cinched his arms tighter around my waist.
“Because your smell is better… It’s fine.”
Then he burrowed his face deep into the crook of my neck.
A moment ago he’d been aloof like a cat; now he was a baby puppy rooting into its mother’s arms.
“You… adorable little brat!”
Is it legal for a boy to be this cute? With a face this handsome and pretty and cute, what if someone kidnaps him—I’ve escorted him home every day since kindergarten, terrified of that exact thing, and now I’m wondering if I’ll end up doing it for the rest of my life, right up until I die of old age.
“Why wonder? I can just do it. For life.”
I nodded to myself, ruffling the puppy’s head like crazy, when—
“How did you lose it?”
“Huh?”
Suddenly he eased out of my arms and looked straight at me.
“The meds.”
“Ah—yeah. The meds? Must’ve slipped out of my bag. They were just suddenly gone.”
“…”
“Sorry. Maybe it’s the student council keeping me too busy lately—I’ve been out of it. Mom’s going to scold me for this one. It’s pricey since it’s not covered.”
I smoothed it over with a quick smile.
No one but me knew about the Omega boy. From what Jaeuk said, I was “alone” when I was found, so that kid must have bolted already.
I didn’t want to worry friends or family; I planned to handle it quietly later…
“Who was it.”
A boy so handsome it could make you lose your mind spoke in a flat tone.
“The one who stole your meds.”
“…What?”
“Inside your bag, third pocket. You always keep them there. Someone like you, who always puts things back where they belong, wouldn’t lose them like a fool.”
Seolheon Baek is a very cute nine-year-old little brother.
He can be a bit blunt and clumsy in kid ways for his age, but…
Sometimes, he’s like this.
“Who was it. The one who bothered you.”
Eyes suddenly sharp, like an adult’s.
“…Seolheon. I told you I lost them. I really just spaced because I’ve been tired lately.”
“Don’t lie.”
“Seolheon Baek.”
I didn’t back down either.
“Throwing a fit won’t change what already happened.”
“…”
From birth he was a gifted child—no, a prodigy.
Unlike me, scraping by with past-life memories and tricks, Seolheon picked up one thing and understood a hundred; his insight could leave adults at a loss for words.
Maybe because of that, there was a time he couldn’t mingle with kids his age and chose to stay apart. But now he’s learned some social ease and gets along well with peers.
Because—
“Are you going to keep making things hard for Hyung?”
—I drilled him hard.
“What did I tell you before?”
“…Don’t force my thoughts on my friends.”
“Right. And you can’t do it to Hyung either.”
“…”
“Okay?”
I did feel a twinge of guilt, hiding a lie under the guise of discipline, but it was all for his sake.
I didn’t want to stress him with worry, and I wanted him to grow up kind and upright—a model citizen who wouldn’t have even a hint of “obsessive menace” in him.
He frowned, unhappy, but in the end he nodded.
Then, shff, he slid back into the bed, burrowed into my chest, and mumbled:
“If you say so, Hyung, okay.”
“Good boy. My little brother!”
Kids this age usually butt heads with siblings, yell, and act out—but he’s gentle to a fault!
I almost wanted to travel back and smack my past self for ever mistaking this angelic puppy for trash like Baek Uheon.
I gathered the small body that had climbed onto me, blanket and all.
“Hyung, don’t be sick.”
“I won’t.”
“When you’re sick, it scares me.”
“Yeah. Sorry. I’ll make sure nothing like this ever happens again.”
“Promise.”
“Promise.”
We hooked pinkies. When I tried to pull my finger away a moment later, he didn’t let go.
So we chatted with our fingers laced until they ached. As always, I lost to his adorable stubbornness.
“My good, good Seolheon…”
In my last life, shivering alone in the cold, I didn’t know.
I’d never had it—how warm “family” could be.
Feeling a child’s warmth, I drifted to sleep without realizing.
“…”
But—
Back then, I failed to notice.
In the darkened hospital room,
those navy-blue eyes gleaming eerily…
had been fixed on me the whole time.
“Hey, did you hear? Geonho got hospitalized.”
“For real? Why would the president?”
“They say he’s got… something. A condition.”
“No way, seriously?”
First day after the entrance ceremony.
News that the student council president was absent had the whole school buzzing.
“A friend who was in the same class as the president last year told me he takes a daily med. If he skips even a day his face goes pale.”
“Oh no! Is it something like a heart condition?”
“I hope he gets well quick and comes back…”
That was how big the presence of the student council president, Geonho Baek, was.
Sharp mind, neat looks, and high character!
There were a thousand words to describe the tall, handsome, top-ranked, mature, and kind Geonho Baek—but thanks to this incident, one more phrase planted itself in Sanok Middle’s collective brain:
“A beauty doomed to die young!”
While everyone was swallowing sobs in pity, shoulders quivering, a voice boomed down the corridor.
“Guys! Our president says it’s just a cold!”
It was Jaeuk Kim, a third-year almost as famous as Geonho himself.
Known far and wide as a soccer freak, a PC-café rat, a loafer—but even more famous as Geonho’s best friend.
“He says it could be contagious, so he’ll just take one day off.”
“Oh? So it’s not a big deal after all?”
“Would you prefer it to be a big deal?”
“N-no! That’s not what I meant!”
After some back-and-forth with his classmates, Jaeuk suddenly turned.
He addressed a boy sitting in the corner of the room.
“Hey. You.”
The gloomy-looking boy jumped and hunched his shoulders.
“You were the one spying from the corner when Geonho got carried out on entrance day, right?”
“Y-yeah…?”
“Why’d you go to the annex? There weren’t any clubs that day.”
“I-I… went to find something I forgot…”
“Uh-huh? Something you forgot?”
Jaeuk narrowed his eyes and continued.
“Did you find it?”
“Y-yeah…”
“Great. Then that’s that.”
He didn’t push it further and stepped back out into the hall.
At the same time, he opened his phone and started tapping out a message.
“I should tell Geonho to watch out for that kid. And then…”
“Screeeam!”
A shriek rang up from the floor below.
Thinking something had happened, Jaeuk froze mid-press and bounded down the stairs.
“You’re so, so pretty!”
“How old are you? Why’d you come to a middle school?”
Contrary to his expectations, the second- and third-years were clustered together, chattering merrily with flowers blooming on their faces.
At the clear eye of the storm in that crowd—
“I came to run an errand for my Hyung.”
—stood a boy.