After confirming the location of Jae Min and Ro Na, Yoo Gun skillfully changed his seat to a spot where he could see them well.

Chae Won crossed her legs while looking at them positioned diagonally.

Chae Won focused with her lips closed, fixing her gaze on the back of their heads.

‘Honey, I want popcorn!’

‘What flavor should I get you? Caramel? Garlic? Just tell me!’

‘I want caramel!’

‘Okay. Ah, open wide!’

‘Aah. Huh? What, it’s garlic!’

‘Just kidding!’

‘What, honey! Aw, you prankster!’

It seemed like this kind of conversation might be taking place.

Though the distance made it impossible to hear their exact words, she could roughly see whether they were facing each other or looking straight ahead, and how much they were giggling.

But without being able to take photos or recordings as evidence, Chae Won felt a bit frustrated just watching their affectionate display.

“I didn’t come here to comfortably watch a movie like this. Looks like I’ll be wasting unnecessary time.”

Yoo Gun, who had been looking at an advertisement featuring an actor from his company, turned his head at Chae Won’s words.

Yoo Gun, who had been watching Noh Jae Min and Go Ro Na’s playful behavior with indifferent eyes, slowly opened his lips.

“If you don’t want to see it, there are two options. Either I avoid it, or eliminate what you don’t want to see.”

Chae Won, who had been thinking while gently holding her chin, nodded slightly.

“I like the latter.”

“Then we should eliminate it.”

Meeting Yoo Gun’s eyes, Chae Won took out Hee Joo’s phone following his gesture.

The phone that had been unlocked using Hee Joo’s fingerprint now opened easily with the password Chae Won had set.

Leaning back in her chair, Chae Won looked at the back of Noh Jae Min’s head and called him.

“I’m going to make our little bean a celebrity. If they take after me, for sure! Ah, just a moment!”

Jae Min rummaged through his bag and took out his phone.

“Jae Min, you should set your phone to vibrate. Etiquette! Etiquette!”

“Oh, okay. Huh? It’s Kim Hee Joo?”

“What? Why is that woman calling?”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it. You’ll just get stressed.”

He put the phone back in his bag and turned his head back to Ro Na.

After they seemed to exchange a few words, laughter suddenly erupted from their seats.

Chae Won could still hear the dial tone in her ear.

“Ah, you’re not going to answer?”

Chae Won smirked and soon opened the message window to type a text.

“So do you know what I said?”

“What did you say?”

“Huh? Hold on.”

Jae Min, who had been giggling, took out his phone again to check the message.

Seeing Hee Joo’s name again.

He had tried not to check it out of consideration for Ro Na, but after two consecutive contacts, he became curious about the reason.

[Are you at the movie theater by any chance?]

As soon as he saw the message, Jae Min stiffened and turned his head left and right with tense shoulders.

“Honey, what’s wrong?”

“Shh!”

“Huh? Why are you acting like this?”

After looking around in a low posture, he soon grabbed his phone and left the theater alone.

“Honey, honey! Where are you going!”

Ro Na, left behind, stretched her neck in the direction Jae Min had gone, not knowing what was happening, while Chae Won stared intently at the two of them.

[Jae Min]

Shortly after Jae Min left, Hee Joo’s phone started vibrating loudly.

Chae Won showed the phone to Yoo Gun and shook it slightly.

“Now this time is more to my liking.”

Yoo Gun, who seemed to smile slightly, soon leaned his head back on the chair loosely as if to properly enjoy the movie that was about to start.

Chae Won pressed the call button while leaning back on the chair like Yoo Gun.

“Yes.”

− What, what are you? Where are you?

“Why are you stuttering like that?”

− Me? I’m not? Why would I, anyway, where are you?

“At a cafe.”

− What? But how did you, what did you see?

“Are you really at the movie theater? My friend who went down to Daegu yesterday said she might have seen you at the theater, so I asked.”

− Daegu?

A sigh of relief could be heard from Jae Min, who had heard a completely different location.

“What do you mean Daegu? I’m in Seoul right now. And of course I’m working at this hour. How could I be watching a movie so leisurely when I work even on weekends?”

− I see. I just thought I’d check.

Chae Won ended the call with a laugh, and Jae Min re-entered the theater a moment later.

Unlike when he left, he had a proud air about him, standing with his spine straight.

After sitting down, he said something to Ro Na, and then, forgetting his earlier tension, started laughing and joking around again.

“You’ve got a long way to go to come to your senses, Noh Jae Min.”

Chae Won muttered with her arms crossed, then picked up Hee Joo’s phone again.

[My friend says she’s not in Daegu now, but in Seoul. She says she’s near Taeseong-dong. Are you really not at the movie theater?]

Jae Min, who had been feeding popcorn to Ro Na, quickly scanned the message and froze in shock.

“Honey, what’s wrong again?”

Jae Min, who had tensed up, couldn’t even think to respond to Ro Na’s voice as he rolled his eyes.

“Honey, why are you acting like this?”

“Ah, stop with the ‘honey’ already!”

“What?”

Jae Min, who had snapped in an irritated voice, realized his mistake as he saw Ro Na’s face contorting.

“No, I mean, lower your voice, that’s what I’m saying.”

But now he didn’t have the luxury to care about her contorting expression.

“I’ll go out first. Ro Na, you come out a little later. Or just watch this to the end and go home!”

“What? What are you saying, you’re leaving and I should watch the movie alone?”

“Ah, come on! I said lower your voice!”

“Oh my, oh my.”

Ro Na blinked several times in surprise at Jae Min’s irritated behavior once again.

While she was about to confront him about how he could act like this, Jae Min was already going down the stairs with his body hunched low and taking small steps.

Ro Na, who couldn’t understand what he was doing at all, called out to Jae Min with a dumbfounded expression.

Jae Min, putting his finger to his lips in a hunched posture, begging her to please be quiet.

Watching the two of them, Chae Won turned to Yoo Gun with an expressionless face.

“I was going to train the mutt a bit more, but it ended faster than I expected.”

Yoo Gun, taking his eyes off the screen, looked at Ro Na, who was left alone and at a loss.

It was quite an impressive moment to see the awkward appearance of someone who wasn’t confident.

“That’s enough, let’s go now. You worked hard today, Choi Yoo Gun.”

As Chae Won rose lightly, the movie started and the view went dark.

The theater doors closed and the movie’s prologue began with a faint light.

Chae Won, looking around in confusion, realized that she was causing great inconvenience to the people behind her by standing there blankly.

“Oh.”

Soon, as Yoo Gun grabbed her arm, Chae Won turned her head towards him.

Seeing him gesture towards the seat while pulling her slightly, Chae Won quickly lowered her body and sat down.

“Um, even now.”

As Chae Won was about to suggest leaving, her face came close to Yoo Gun’s, who was also leaning in to whisper.

Chae Won was startled by the sudden proximity, which almost made their lips touch.

“…Uh, so.”

So, she was about to suggest quietly lowering their bodies and going outside, but Yoo Gun’s black eyes lingered on Chae Won’s face, slowly flowing down.

His gaze lingered long on her lips.

The more he did so, Chae Won, who had frozen unable to do anything, flinched and moved her neck when he suddenly approached by tilting his chin.

“Let’s go out a little later. Let’s not run into them by leaving now.”

When the voice whispering in her ear ended, Chae Won finally realized she had misunderstood and let out the breath she had been holding.

“Okay.”

Chae Won, still tense, answered with an awkward expression and fixed her gaze on the screen.

He, who had been watching, soon widened the distance and leaned back in his chair.

“Whew.”

Chae Won let out another long breath without Yoo Gun knowing, then looked at him gently.

Unlike her, he seemed to have quickly focused on the movie with a calm face.

It was indeed nothing, just whispering.

Concluding that it was strange of her to feel an odd feeling just because their faces happened to be close, Chae Won shook her head.

She stared straight ahead with a calm face like Yoo Gun’s expression.

But her heart, which had suddenly raced, didn’t easily subside, perhaps because it had been very surprised.

*

About an hour passed.

The movie was heading towards its climax, and 30 minutes ago, Ro Na, who had been left alone, had slipped out of the theater with her body lowered.

Yoo Gun turned his head towards Chae Won, thinking it would be good to leave now.

She, who had been watching the movie in an upright position without movement, was very earnestly dozing off.

Come to think of it, she must have been taking care of Kim Hee Joo all last night, and since she came out early this morning to do this, she must have been short on sleep.

‘…Uh, so.’

A little while ago, when their faces accidentally came close, Yoo Gun unconsciously looked blatantly at Chae Won’s slightly parted lips as she was flustered.

He had thought a few times before that it was an attractive part of her face, but being particularly close, he found himself examining it more.

Her plump, red lips, reminiscent of cherries, seemed like they might be soft, maybe moist.

At the moment he thought he’d like to touch them once, he barely came to his senses and whispered in her ear.

‘Let’s go out a little later. Let’s not run into that man by leaving now.’

If he had spoken just a little later, he might have been called a crazy bastard.

When he widened the distance, expecting her expression to be unpleasant, her face was completely different from what he had thought.

‘Okay.’

Kim Chae Won, who spoke in an awkward voice like a robot without meeting his gaze.

She rolled her eyes with a subtle expression as she turned her head towards the screen.

After always seeing her confident and bold appearance, to see her like this, unable to move.

That caught his eye again, and he looked at her frozen profile for a long time.

Nodding off.

Along with the loud sound heading towards the climax, Chae Won was also fighting hard against drowsiness.

Nodding off again after startling and straightening her neck.

Yoo Gun, bothered by her drooping head, caught her head as it fell once more and let it rest on his shoulder.

Despite her slight movement as if she had woken up, Yoo Gun still held her head so she could lean on his shoulder.

Her head resting on his shoulder became a bit lighter, as if she had fully woken up.

But she doesn’t get up.

It felt as if she was contemplating.

Pfft.

Suppressing the laughter that was about to come out, Yoo Gun removed his hand from Chae Won’s head and just left his shoulder as it was.

Whether she had decided to lean and sleep or had naturally fallen asleep, weight gradually settled on his shoulder.

Yoo Gun laughed silently.

He thought she was quite an interesting woman.