The Cruel Beast’s Desire - Chapter 35

“They look so pretty as a couple, mother and daughter using them together.”

It was a casual remark made by the employee while tidying up the merchandise. She probably hadn’t heard Ieum calling Hayeon “teacher.”

Ieum lowered her head, seemingly embarrassed.

Seeing her cheeks, already flushed from the sunlight, turn even redder, Hayeon felt a pang of sympathy. She took Ieum’s hand.

“Ieum-ah, we’re wearing Pinocchio hats, aren’t we?”

“Yes?”

“Let’s just be Pinocchios for today. Lying to our hearts’ content.”

“Is that okay?”

Ieum’s eyes sparkled with life.

“Did you buy a hat, Ieum?”

Yoonjae, who had gone to the convenience store to buy bottled water, entered the store, and the employee’s excessive flattery erupted once more.

“Dad’s here too. Don’t just buy hats for Mom and daughter, buy one for Dad too and match them as a family look.”

At the employee’s words, Ieum picked up another hat. She scurried over to her dad and gave him a serious command.

“Dad, bend your head down.”

Yoonjae, who had already seen Ieum and Hayeon wearing the same hats, obediently lowered his head.

“Today, we’re all becoming Pinocchios.”

“Does wearing this hat make us do that?”

“Yeah, we’ve decided it’s a day for lying to our hearts’ content.”

Matching Ieum’s seriousness, Yoonjae accepted it just as seriously.

“I’ve never lied.”

Hayeon couldn’t help but burst into laughter.

If lies had levels, what Yoonjae had just said was the highest level of lie. And he said it with such a serious face.

Suppressing her laughter, Hayeon joined in the Pinocchio-becoming atmosphere.

“Ieum-ah, Dad’s nose is going to grow the longest here.”

“That’s right.”

Wearing the same hats, the three of them looked at each other and laughed.

“They really suit you. Perfect as a family item.”

Even while paying, the souvenir shop employee’s sales talk continued.

Everywhere they went, people assumed they were a family, and none of the three denied it, willingly becoming Pinocchios.

It was an unspoken agreement between the three wearing the same hats that today was a day when that was okay.

As Madam Lee had requested, the three had dinner and then returned home. Only after entering her own accommodation could Hayeon finally have some time to herself.

“Haa…”

Taking off the hat she had been wearing, Hayeon let out a long, slow breath.

She had tried not to overexert herself so that Ieum wouldn’t be tired, but she had spent the whole day with a heavy heart, and fatigue washed over her.

She took a hot shower and lay down on the bed, but she couldn’t fall asleep easily and tossed and turned. When she closed her eyes, Yoonjae’s words from earlier echoed in her ears.

‘There was someone who liked bicycles. I learned to ride on purpose because I wanted to play with that person. I came here on our first ride. I was so nervous trying not to let on that I hadn’t been riding for very long, I didn’t even know if the food was going in my nose or my mouth. I had fun… I don’t know about that person.’

She tried to think that he was just answering Ieum’s question, but every time she thought of that moment, her heart kept pounding.

“Haa…”

Hayeon sighed and got out of bed. She didn’t think she would be able to sleep if she stayed in bed, so she went out to the living room.

Madam Lee’s wrist had been throbbing, and now it was raining outside. Feeling a bit chilly, Hayeon draped the shawl she had thrown on the sofa over her shoulders.

She made a warm cup of tea and stood by the living room window, looking outside. Reflected in the black glass was not the rainy scenery, but the troubled face of a woman.

“Let’s just think happy thoughts… happy thoughts.”

Hayeon forcibly tried to hypnotize herself.

When she thought of the moment when she was holding Ieum’s hand and taking a walk, a gentle smile appeared on Hayeon’s face. When they were having a lie battle wearing the Pinocchio hats, she had laughed so much that her stomach hurt.

When she thought of Yoonjae struggling to stop Ieum, who was insisting on learning to ride a bicycle starting tomorrow, her heart, which had finally become comfortable, became heavy again.

He was a father who was strict yet like a friend.

When he was playfully teasing, he was like a child the same age as Ieum, but he was very firm when it came to health issues.

The more Hayeon got used to seeing Yoonjae as Ieum’s father, the more it felt like she was seeing the family she had once dreamed of.

The more she tried not to think about it, the more Hayeon’s heart tried to settle into the good memories.

She could never go back to that time, but she kept harboring futile hopes.

“Haa…”

Another long sigh escaped her lips.

It seemed like she wouldn’t be able to fall asleep easily tonight. Hayeon stared blankly at the rain falling outside the window. As she drank the steaming tea, her eyes met the reflection in the window.

“Ieum?”

Hayeon turned around urgently. She thought she had seen wrong, but Ieum was really standing at the door.

“Ieum-ah.”

Putting down the cup she was holding, Hayeon rushed to Ieum. Ieum, wearing pajamas, was holding a doll in her arms.

“How did you get here?”

“Through there.”

Ieum pointed to the door behind her. It was the door connected to the swimming pool.

Hayeon took off the shawl she had around her shoulders and draped it around Ieum’s body.

“I woke up from a dream.”

Perhaps that was why Ieum’s voice was hoarse.

“I see. Let’s go, Teacher will take you back to your room.”

When Hayeon held out her hand, Ieum shook her head. Wondering if she might have a fever, she touched her forehead, but fortunately, she didn’t have a fever.

“I want to stay here.”

Ieum said, holding tightly to Hayeon’s sleeve.

She remembered Ieum clinging to her earlier, telling her not to go home, so she couldn’t just tell her that she had to go to her room.

“Ieum, you can’t sleep, can you?”

Ieum slowly nodded. She should have been tired from walking around all day, but Ieum hadn’t fallen asleep again and had walked all the way to Hayeon’s accommodation.

It was a short walk across the garden from the main house to Hayeon’s accommodation, but it was late at night and it was raining, so she had gone around through the path connected to the swimming pool instead of going outside.

Sending Ieum back like this seemed like it would disappoint her like before. Since she wasn’t sleepy either, Hayeon decided to spend time with Ieum.

“Teacher can’t sleep either, shall we talk all night?”

“Yes, that’s good.”

Hayeon and Ieum lay facing each other on the bed. When she brushed back the hair that had fallen over her round forehead, Ieum smiled brightly.

“Teacher, is that man your boyfriend?”

“Who are you talking about?”

“The man who was at Teacher’s house earlier.”

“Ah, Seon-woo.”

When she left the rooftop room and got into Yoonjae’s car, Ieum had also asked if Seon-woo was her boyfriend. She had thought it was just a child’s curiosity and brushed it off, but Ieum’s eyes were too serious.

Seeing her clear eyes shaking anxiously, she realized that she couldn’t just pass it off with silence like before.

“He’s not my boyfriend. Seon-woo is just a friend. Like Ji-hye, a friend I’ve known since I was little.”

Even after hearing the answer, Ieum didn’t show any particular reaction.

“Why were you curious about that?”

“……”

“It’s okay, you can tell me honestly.”

Ieum carefully opened her mouth after a long time.

“Teacher too… later, you’re going to marry someone you like and have children, right?”

Hayeon couldn’t speak easily at the unexpected words.

“Teacher’s real family…”

All day long, the three of them had been mistaken for a family everywhere they went. No one had denied that they were a family and had pretended not to notice.

Because today was the day the three of them had decided to become Pinocchios.

Ieum seemed to have felt something similar to the feeling she had felt every time a stranger casually called Hayeon “Mom.”

Just as she had thought about Tantan, Ieum must have wanted to see her real mom.

All Hayeon could do was stroke Ieum’s hair. Ieum, who had said she couldn’t sleep, slowly closed her eyes and soon fell asleep, breathing evenly.

Yoonjae came down to the kitchen with a bottle of pills.

It had already been three days since he had slept properly, even though he was trying not to rely on medication.

The longer he suffered from insomnia, the more irritable he became.

If he wanted to keep his promise to take Ieum to buy a bicycle tomorrow, he had to get some sleep today. Yoonjae took out a white pill, put it in his mouth, and swallowed it with water.

He had taken the medicine, so he would be able to sleep for a couple of hours today. Before the effects of the medicine spread, Yoonjae headed to Ieum’s room.

Ieum always kicked off her blanket, so Yoonjae always stopped by her room before going to bed. It had been Yoonjae’s bedtime routine for a long time to cover her with the blanket and look at the sleeping child’s face for a long time.

He carefully opened the door so as not to wake Ieum. Under the soft night light, the child’s bed was empty.

Perhaps Ieum had woken up in the middle of the night and gone to his bedroom looking for her dad, so he went there quickly, but Ieum was not in Yoonjae’s room either.

Cold sweat started to break out on his back.

“Ieum-ah, Tae Ieum!”

Yoonjae called out the child’s name and searched every corner of the house. Madam Lee rubbed her eyes and came out of her room at the untimely commotion.

“Ieum, is she in your room, Madam?”

“No, what are you talking about in the middle of the night? Why would Ieum be in my room? The executive director took her up and put her to bed earlier.”

“She’s not here, Ieum is not here.”

Yoonjae was already trembling, having lost his reason. Sweat was streaming down his forehead from how much he had been searching.

“Why would a child who was sleeping well disappear?”

“Ieum… I can’t see where she went. She’s not in her bed. She’s not in my room either.”

“Wait a minute, calm down, Executive Director. If she had gone outside, the alarm would have gone off… Since there was no sound, she didn’t go outside.”

Madam Lee’s gaze turned to the door connected to the swimming pool. It was always closed, but it was half open.

“Why is that door open?”

At Madam Lee’s words, Yoonjae ran quickly to the door. Madam Lee followed, but it was impossible for her to keep up with Yoonjae’s speed.

All sorts of thoughts ran through his head about why a child who was afraid of water would have gone to the swimming pool in the middle of the night.

“Ieum-ah!”

He turned on all the lights and searched the swimming pool and shower room, but he couldn’t see a single strand of the child’s hair.

“Oh, I’m out of breath… Haa haa.”

Madam Lee gasped for breath.

“Not here… haa… there…”

The place Madam Lee pointed to was the passage connected to Hayeon’s accommodation.

Yoonjae ran at full speed without hesitation.

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