[TOMORROW X TOGETHER Beomgyu] To the point of aching

Episode 3. A strange face, a familiar smile

"Does it suit your taste?"

 

The heroine set down the bowl of porridge and asked.

Beomgyu had just taken a spoonful when he lightly furrowed his brow.

 

"...I think you may have left a bit of salt out."

"Huh?"

 

Seeing the heroine’s flustered face, Beomgyu soon let out a small laugh.

"I’m kidding. It’s very delicious."

"Sir, are you making fun of me right now?"

"How could this humble one dare make fun of you, miss?"

 

Even as he said that, his eyes were still smiling.

So he’d lost his memory, but it seemed he hadn’t lost even a bit of his slick tongue.

It was hard to believe he was the same person who, just days ago, had worn such a pitiful face and done nothing but moan in pain.

 

"Even with your body in such a state, you’re quite good at joking around."

"I’m quite good at smiling, if nothing else."

 

Before she knew it, the heroine let out a small laugh too. It was a face she couldn’t bring herself to dislike.

 

 

 

*

 

 

 

And so, day by day, meals mixed with laughter piled up.

After a few days, Beomgyu had recovered enough to sit up on his own.

Like someone who couldn’t stand lying still, he went out to the yard whenever he had a spare moment and helped with odd chores.

 

"Your body still isn’t fully healed, so please just rest."

"If I sit still, I start getting antsy."

 

While chopping firewood, he even hurt his hand; while carrying water jars by the well, he soaked his clothes through.

Even so, without showing the slightest sign of dislike, he only laughed along when he saw the heroine laughing at him.

 

He was clumsy, yet somehow earnest. He never did anything halfway.

Once, he spent half a day fussing over a squeaky hinge on the side gate, insisting he’d fix it.

 

"You could just leave it alone."

"If I start something and leave it half-done, it doesn’t sit right with me."

 

In the end, after wrestling with it until the sun was sinking low, the gate opened and closed silently, as if by magic.

Watching him smile with satisfaction, his face damp with sweat, the heroine felt a strange ache in one corner of her heart.

Dani, who had been watching, slipped in a quiet comment.

 

"That guy’s surprisingly hardworking. I was worried at first just looking at how he was dressed."

"Yeah."

"Even the old man hasn’t been showing the least bit of annoyance lately. Maybe it’s because the miss has been taking such good care of him."

 

The heroine only smiled instead of answering. Even she didn’t know the exact reason.

He was definitely a stranger, and yet there was something familiar about even the way he moved his hands, the way he insisted on things.

 

 

 

*

 

 

 

That evening, while strolling through the yard, the heroine happened to catch sight of his profile as he sat there resting.

 

Just before the sun fully set, beneath the red glow of dusk, his face sat alone without a trace of a smile.

 

The heroine was newly surprised to realize that someone who had been so bright during the day could make such an expression too.

When Beomgyu felt her presence, he looked back, then smiled again as if nothing had happened.

 

 

"Miss, what brings you here?"

"Oh, nothing... you just seemed to be in a bad mood."

"What worries could a fellow with no memory possibly have?"

 

He said it like a joke, but the heroine could faintly sense that something was hidden behind that smile.

That unexplained sense of familiarity had been tugging at her heart more and more lately.

 

 

 

*

 

 

At night, Beomgyu would sit alone on the wooden porch and look up at the moon.

The things he had forgotten while laughing and chatting through the day would gradually come back to life at night.

 

He suddenly turned his gaze toward the heroine’s room. Seeing that the light was still on, it seemed she couldn’t sleep either.

As he stared blankly at that light, one memory he had thought was gone surfaced on its own.

 

It was the day young Beomgyu, running around the yard trying to catch fireflies, tripped over a stone and fell.

Seeing blood seep from his knee, Beomgyu began to sniffle; the heroine smiled as she bandaged the wound with the ribbon she had untied from her hair.

 

"It’s okay, I’ll make sure it doesn’t hurt at all."

 

It was absurd, but with just that one line, Beomgyu had stopped crying at once.

Back then, he had thought the world was only that kind.

 

*

 

But soon the memory slipped somewhere else.

 

When he opened his eyes, the ribbon he had clutched so tightly in his hand was burning in the fire

Flames surging up over the roof, acrid smoke, the soldiers’ shouts as they dragged his father away.

And his mother’s back as she shielded him, took an arrow, and fell.

 

 

His chest suddenly tightened. It felt like even if he inhaled, the air wouldn’t reach his lungs.

His fingertips trembled and his vision blurred. His heart thudded so loudly it seemed to ring in his ears.

 

Without thinking, Beomgyu reached into his robes and clutched the jade pendant.

As the cold, smooth touch met his fingertips, his senses slowly returned.

He took a deep breath, then let it out very slowly.

 

Once, twice, three times.

 

The mountain path from that day, the day he had even had to abandon his name, gradually receded into the distance, and he returned to this wooden porch again.

Every time he told a lie, it felt as though a little more of his heart wore away.

 

And yet he had no regrets.

He had never imagined that in this house, before this face, he’d have time to smile like this at all.

 

For the first time in ten years, Beomgyu found himself looking forward to tomorrow.

He didn’t bother naming what that feeling was.

 

He still didn’t have the courage to keep this lie going tomorrow, or the day after that.

For now, all he wanted was for this peace to remain unbroken for just one more day.