CHAPTER 9
Harin immediately recognized the owner of the voice and cautiously raised her head.
Just as she’d feared, Choi Jaehyuk was looking straight at her.
His expression was impassive, carrying that unmistakable arrogance that was uniquely his.
Damn. I should’ve just said hello and left.
Harin, who had wrapped her face tightly in a red scarf, tried to back away.
At that moment, Jaehyuk’s sharp gaze pinned her in place.
“Guardian, you need to hear about the patient’s progress.”
“I’ll listen. Yes, of course.”
Reluctantly, she dragged over a chair and sat back down.
Keeping his eyes fixed on Harin, Jaehyuk began explaining in his usual calm tone.
“The fixation at the femoral fracture site is holding well, and there are still no signs of bleeding or infection around the surgical site. The pain also appears to be gradually decreasing compared to immediately after the operation. Are you uncomfortable?”
“I feel much better. I hear you’re famous for being one of the best doctors among the best. Thank you.”
“I’m glad to hear that.”
Jaehyuk examined the injured area with practiced ease before adding casually,
“Captain Kang Harin’s quick first aid made the surgery possible.”
At those words, Harin lifted her head.
Choi Jaehyuk had always been stingy with praise, even when she was taking lessons from him. And now he was actually complimenting her?
Before she could even process it, Grandma clasped Harin’s hand tightly.
“Then Harin is my lifesaver. Even before I collapsed, she came to my house and got an old woman like me, who was lying there with depression, back on her feet.”
“Did she?”
Jaehyuk, who had been looking at the chart, turned his gaze toward Harin.
Feeling inexplicably embarrassed under his eyes, Harin hurriedly answered.
“Grandma, why are you bringing that up? If you’re done with your rounds, I’ll be going now.”
“Are you? You’ll come again, right?”
“Of course. I’ll come pick you up when you’re discharged. Make sure you take good care of yourself!”
After squeezing Grandma’s hand, Harin quickly got to her feet.
She couldn’t take any more of Jaehyuk’s oppressive gaze.
She hurried down the hall and stopped in front of the elevator, fanning her face with one hand.
In the elevator’s mirror, she saw a woman with bright red cheeks staring back at her.
Is this because I dreamed about what happened back then this morning?
It seemed like her old disease of turning beet-red whenever she was around Choi Jaehyuk had returned.
Just like when she was young.
When she saw the elevator crawling down from the top floor, Harin grew increasingly impatient.
She didn’t want him to see that her face was already as red as her scarf.
She pressed the button again.
Then a low voice cut through her ears.
“Want to take the exam?”
“Huh?”
Jaehyuk had already emerged and was walking toward her.
Harin peeked her face out from behind her scarf and blinked.
The group of residents who had been following him earlier was nowhere to be seen.
“What about the others?”
“I sent them ahead.”
“Oh my gosh, you’ve already finished your rounds?”
“Because I’m competent.”
As expected of Choi Jaehyuk, he delivered the arrogant remark without the slightest hesitation and came to stand beside her.
Harin instinctively tensed, nervously twisting her fingertips.
Jaehyuk opened his mouth again, emphasizing his words.
“I’m asking again. Do you want to take the exam with me?”
“What exam are you talking about, Professor?”
“You weren’t getting introduced to men by the patients earlier? I heard something about an exam.”
Oh.
Harin’s lips parted slightly.
He must have overheard what the grandmother beside her had said.
Harin frowned and answered carelessly.
“The elderly ladies were just saying things.”
“For someone who didn’t mean anything by it, you looked pretty excited.”
“I’ve thought this for a while, but Professor, you really do have sharp ears.”
“Professor again. Still, I guess you’re starting to remember how things used to be.”
He stared at Harin and let out a low laugh.
Tilting his gaze at an angle, Jaehyuk added in a whisper,
“Nice to see you, kiddo.”
“Not the kiddo thing again.”
“You’re still as chatty as ever for someone so tiny.”
“Oh, seriously. Oppa!”
She had actually said it.
She’d really called him oppa out loud.
Only then did Jaehyuk seem satisfied, the corners of his mouth lifting lazily.
Unable to meet that smile head-on, Harin steadied her breathing.
Tap, tap.
Jaehyuk lightly tapped her bangs before waving and walking away.
Harin couldn’t lift her head as she watched his shadow disappear.
She buried her flushed face in the bright red scarf and stood there frozen.
By then, he had already disappeared around the end of the corridor.
“Ah, seriously! Choi Jaehyuk!”
The moment she got home, Harin spent a long while tossing and turning before finally turning on the cold water and taking a shower despite it being winter.
Even the freezing water couldn’t cool the heat burning in her face.
“It’s because I’m angry. That’s right. Kang Harin, you’re angry.”
Everything she’d tried to pretend she didn’t care about until now had come crashing down.
Choi Jaehyuk had gotten under her skin and made her call him oppa in the end.
That was why her face was this red!
Harin stared at herself in the mirror, making what even she knew was an absurd excuse.
Through the fogged-up mirror, the reflection of a red-cheeked teenage girl seemed to overlap with her own.
The sight was so ridiculous that she stood there staring at herself for a long time.
Kang Harin, what are you even going to do with yourself?
A sigh escaped her.
Years had passed, yet her heart was pounding as naturally as though she’d seen him just yesterday.
[Yoon Gahee ♡]
The miserable memory of that day came rushing back—the day she’d seen the utterly inappropriate, unbelievably obnoxious heart emoji attached to Choi Jaehyuk’s name.
Like a needle and thread that always belonged together, the two of them had been inseparable from medical school through residency and even fellowship.
A moment later, something hot surged up from inside her.
She felt so nauseous she could almost throw up.
“I should’ve gotten a boyfriend before Choi Jaehyuk showed up. Should I just close my eyes and date some prosecutor or judge?”
It was all Choi Jaehyuk’s fault.
After that day, Harin graduated from high school, left home despite her father’s opposition, and became independent.
And the more satisfied she became with the life she was building day by day, the more she thought of Jaehyuk—the very person who had opened the path for her.
That was why she had to try even harder to forget him.
But still, wasn’t it all because of that unbearably handsome first love of hers that she’d become so hopelessly picky that her standards were practically stuck on the top of her head, leaving her single all these years?
Grumbling, she roughly dried herself off.
Even as she dried her hair with a hair dryer, irritation kept bubbling up inside her.
He still treated her like a little kid, exactly as he had during her adolescence, and yet her heart was still pounding like this.
It was downright pathetic.
“Argh! Kang Harin, get a grip!”
She buried her head in her pillow and screamed.
Even that didn’t feel like enough.
“Could you keep it down a little? Please?”
“Sorry.”
The studio apartment complex had terrible soundproofing.
She desperately wanted to scream at the top of her lungs to vent her frustration, but there was no way to do that.
In the end, as an act of repentance, she went out for a walk along the Han River despite the cold.
She figured that the cool breeze might at least calm her hopelessly racing heart.
But reality was even colder.
The razor-sharp December wind sliced into her chest, whipping her hair in every direction like her confused heart.
She hadn’t even finished drying her hair, so she felt like she was going to freeze to death.
“Still, fighting fire with fire and all… Should I have a cold beer? Ugh, it’s freezing.”
There was no way she was going to fall asleep tonight.
She decided to have a quick drink and pass out.
Complaining that Choi Jaehyuk was going to turn her into an alcoholic, Harin plopped herself down on a random bench and cracked open a can of beer.
She had just taken a sip when a dark figure in a hoodie approached.
“I don’t give out my number. I have a boyfriend.”
For some reason, men seemed to think she looked easy to approach whenever she came to the Han River, so they were always asking for her number.
Annoyed, she answered automatically and raised her beer again.
But the dark figure dropped down onto the bench beside her.
He was big. Tall, too.
His build was perfectly respectable, just like someone’s she knew, but his face was hidden behind a mask, so she couldn’t see—
Choi Jaehyuk?
The faint scent of his body mixed with soap was unmistakably familiar.
Harin’s eyes widened as she stared at the man beside her.
“So you really do have a boyfriend?”
Jaehyuk pulled down his hood with one hand.
Under the yellow streetlight, his handsome face slowly emerged.
“Why do you keep popping up everywhere?”
“I was about to ask you the same thing. Why do you keep showing up in front of me?”
“I had the day off, so I came out for a walk for the first time in a while.”
“I was out for a run after work.”
Jaehyuk answered casually before nodding toward the beer can in Harin’s hand.
“You like drinking? Every time I see you outside, you’re drinking.”
“Professor.”
“Professor again. Alcohol is a Group 1 carcinogen. Why don’t you drink in moderation?”
With an unhurried movement, Jaehyuk snatched the beer from Harin’s hand.
Then he tipped it straight into his own mouth.
“Why do you keep stealing my alcohol?”
“Let’s continue what we were talking about.”
“What were we talking about?”
They hadn’t exactly been having a conversation in the first place.
Harin blinked in confusion, but Jaehyuk held out his phone.
“I felt a little offended when you said you didn’t give your number to people who hadn’t even asked. So give me your phone number.”
“What?”
This professor, seriously.
Her oblivious heart began pounding violently again, but she straightened her back with a prim expression.
Harin deliberately spoke in a stiff, precise tone.
“I shared the contact information for our team members. Please check it.”
“I mean your personal number, not your work number.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Do you really have a boyfriend?”
“Yes.”
“Liar.”
Liar?
What? Do I look that unattractive?
Wow. This professor is really crossing the line again.
Harin pressed her lips together and shook her head.
“I do have a boyfriend, okay? I’m telling the truth.”
“Who?”
Jaehyuk tilted his head.
“Choi Jaehyuk?”
Harin’s heart, which had been racing wildly on its own, suddenly dropped straight to the floor.
