While Jun-hyuk gulped down the water, Yuri quietly looked around the room. The freezing space was stacked with clothes she and her mother no longer wore, alongside old books from her father’s study. Jun-hyuk was lying down on a thin mattress covered with a flimsy blanket, using his long padded coat as a makeshift quilt. The room was biting cold, enough for his breath to turn into white mist.

Yuri felt a pang of pity. As long as he didn’t dare talk back to her mother, and as long as he didn’t move his belongings into a room as spacious and comfortable as hers, Yuri could afford to be gentle and warm to this poor boy with pale skin and flushed cheeks.

Because her own things were safe.

"It must be so cold. What should we do?"

At Yuri’s words, Jun-hyuk clenched his fists tightly and bit his lip.

"Who do you think is to blame for this...? Did you come here to mock me? Just leave."

Yuri stared at him without a word, prompting Jun-hyuk to raise his voice.

"Please, just leave! Just go!"

Unluckily, he burst into a pathetic fit of coughing. He already had a looming cold, and drinking the water too quickly had caused him to choke. The coughing wouldn't stop.

"I’ll get you more water," Yuri said, heading back upstairs. Jun-hyuk tried to tell her it wasn't necessary, but the coughing swallowed his voice.

Returning from the first floor, Yuri handed him the water. Jun-hyuk’s face was flushed red and his eyes were bloodshot from coughing so violently. Yuri then handed him a heat pack. On her way to the refrigerator, she had stopped by her room to grab a heat pack, a coat, and a blanket.

Jun-hyuk was too freezing and his throat was too sore to refuse. He silently took what she offered and drank the water.

He wanted to ask why on earth she had framed him with such a filthy lie, but he was simply too exhausted. He had to wake up and head to school in three hours. Lying down on the mattress, he clutched the heat pack. The warmth in his hands coaxed him toward sleep. Then, Yuri lay down right beside him. What do you think you’re doing? Get away! But Yuri merely held him from behind, gently patting his back.

Yuri’s body heat was warm.

Jun-hyuk’s mother had passed away when he was a child, and he had never met anyone who patted him so tenderly. This room was too cold for him to maintain his rationality. Like heavy cotton soaking up water and sinking, fatigue overwhelmed his body. Regardless of her actions or her character, he leaned into the warmth provided by another person and fell fast asleep. Covered by the coat, Yuri also fell into a peaceful slumber in the freezing cold.

In the dim light of dawn, Jun-hyuk woke up to a strange sensation. Opening his eyes in a haze, he saw Yuri sitting beside him, leaning close and quietly poking his cheek with her finger. Her eyes gleamed with curiosity. After poking his cheek, her touch brushed over his thick eyebrows, his forehead, and then his lips.

"What are you..."

Jun-hyuk was half-asleep. Already perpetually exhausted from relying on caffeine to study, he couldn't even properly rouse himself after someone tickled him awake from the sleep he had barely managed to catch after 3 a.m.

"Incredible. You look exactly like Dad."

Yuri liked being with Jun-hyuk. The boy’s face closely resembled her father’s—the kind of pretty face men often disliked, calling it effeminate. His skin was pale and soft with a slight rosy blush, and his beautiful, double-lidded eyes were framed by long eyelashes. It was a face that didn't resemble her own. Yet, she didn't feel a sense of family. Was it because they had lived apart for so long? She realized that compared to the imprint-like bond between parent and child, the bond between siblings was fragile.

Yuri had never had a boyfriend. Thus, this boy sleeping in such a vulnerable state brought her a strange sense of tension and curiosity.

What would a kiss feel like—the thing her classmates said they had all tried at least once?

Yuri overlapped her lips onto the lips of the boy who couldn't fight off his drowsiness. It was a subtle, unfamiliar sensation, as soft as moist jellies touching. It didn't feel good or bad; it was just a strange feeling because it was her first time. The contact was so brief and cautious that it was embarrassing to even call it a kiss.

In that instant, Jun-hyuk inhaled sharply and pushed Yuri away with all his might. Yuri’s body stumbled backward, and the rattling sound of a plastic container dropping echoed from the hallway outside the room.

When Yuri caught her breath and turned her head, Jun-hyuk was frozen solid. His face was deathly pale, and his gaze was fixed, as if pinned to the window on the door. Following his line of sight, Yuri turned her head too.

Beyond the square glass pane in the middle of the door— She saw her mother’s face, drained of color.

After her conversation with Kang-hoon, the warnings from Yuri’s childhood psychiatrist and homeroom teacher had kept weighing heavily on her mind. She had been worried about Jun-hyuk, and had come down to the basement intending to leave some ointment for his bruised cheek. As the medicine box fell, the ointment and bandages scattered across the cold marble floor with a sharp, shattering noise.

"Mom...?"

Before Yuri could finish her sentence, the door slammed open with a bang.

"What do you think you're doing!"

Her mother’s palm struck Yuri’s cheek with all her might. Yuri saw stars, and her cheek stung as if it were burning. Her mother’s fingertips trembled, and her breathing was ragged. She screamed as if her throat would burst.

"How far do you have to push him to be satisfied!"

Yuri felt a paralyzing terror, as if the ground beneath her feet was giving way. It was a fear incomparable to when Jun-hyuk had ranked first in the entire school.

"You even did something like that just to kick him out of the house! Still, I took your side! Because you’re my daughter! Because I trusted you!"

Clutching her stinging cheek, Yuri stared at her mother with frozen eyes.

"Mom, it's a mistake. He started it! He threatened me!"

"Shut up!"

Her mother grabbed her own hair with both hands and shrieked.

"I saw everything! Just how much of an idiot are you going to make out of me!"

And then, her mother screamed until her voice went hoarse.

"You crazy bitch! You psycho! Get out! Get out of this house right now! Don't do your filthy deeds here, and get the hell out of my sight!"

-Part 1 fin-