CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

What didn’t kill us makes us stronger

When he leaves his brother back at their usual café, he checks his phone and reread the text message that he received from Hoya a few hours back. Be it as it may, he knows that sooner or later that the two best friend would have come to know about their fight. And he at least hopes that it will be later.

He almost got a heart attack when he saw Sunggyu’s apartment keys in his convertible’s dashboard. And his breath hitched when he learned that Sunggyu has gotten sick and currently staying in his best friend’s house. 

Visiting the brunette right now means an inevitable meeting with Hoya. And that will lead to a not so subtle insult and a verbal argument between the two grown-up man with a mind as old as a freaking toddler. Sewon can make a run for his opinion at this point.

It will get worse if there’s no peacemaker between them.

“I should text Dongwoo to stay at home.” Woohyun almost facepalmed and buried himself deeper in his seat at the desperate idea. But hey, a desperate time called for desperate measure. And he’s so damn desperate.

Woohyun drives his Bentley at full speed, ignoring the traffic light and the speed trap at the other side of the road. He’s no stranger to the heavy traffic in Seoul and knows at full force, that he can get away from the authority with a simple play of their law. He has the best Lawyer in their country to defend him whenever he messed something up. 

And it has been a while since the last time he used their lawyer’s service. One would say that Kim Sunggyu is a good influence in his life. And who is Woohyun to deny the obvious truth?

“Goddamnit!” Woohyun cursed in his place and step on the accelerator when he saw the street and the first corner to Hoya’s Apartment complex. “Why the did he decide to visit me today?”

He has a full tendency to just drive his car straight to Nam’s residences and smack some sense into his father’s head. That old man keeps on burdening and pushing everyone around him without any consideration for their consent. 

Clearly, his empire’s success was purely based on ignorance and confidence, a very important aspect that he tried to lodge into Woohyun’s heart. How his mother manages to fall deeply in love with this guy is amazing. He can’t even stay still for one minute in the same room as his father without Sunggyu.

Perhaps, he should bring both Myungsoo and Sungyeol as well as Boohyun to discuss his future with his father over a dinner. He wants to stop being in denial. 
If losing Sunggyu is the sure thing to happen for the price of his power and status, he doesn’t even want to imagine it. It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. For sure, Mr. Nam wouldn’t want to lose another heir to inherit his company, right?

And Junhyung. God, that guy. If he learned one thing from his continuous motivational life advice from his brother, it’s that Junhyung is willing to do everything to win Sunggyu over. head, no way. 

When lust combines with love, feelings like dissatisfaction, lack of trust, lack of understanding, jealousy and possessiveness are produced. And he knows he’s the sole reason that Sunggyu was drowning in the pool of insecurities.

The raven drives straight to the Apartment’s parking lot after he gets an approval from Hoya to let his car through the security and proceeds to get into Hoya’s house. His apartment is a fancy middle-class complex located just fifteen minutes drives from Nam Corp. with his café just a few blocks down the road. They used to visit the café regularly when they first get into the relationship.

And over time, he has come to learn that Hoya can be a very good best friend (according to Sunggyu) and a very extreme nemesis (according to Woohyun) who has a superiority complex as good as The President itself. 

The elevator stops at the tenth floor and Woohyun quickly strode out of the elevator to the hallway that’s illuminated nicely with sunlight and enough ventilation to not felt suffocated before stopping in front of Hoya’s door, which is approximately ten steps away from the elevator.

To: Hoya
I’m here. Open the door.

And yes, five minutes later, there’s Hoya with the biggest frown decorating his face greet him in the doorway. He doesn’t make any gesture to invite Woohyun in but the simple click of his tongue and the way he moves away from the door bring Woohyun to step down his ego and walk into the comfort of Hoya’s house.

On contrary to Woohyun’s belief, his house didn’t look as dark and monochrome as his soul is. Bitter and cold. He knows from the start that the only thing that forces the slightly younger guy to tolerate his y self is Dongwoo and Sunggyu. Yeah, especially Dongwoo.

They didn’t agree on much. In fact, they didn’t agree on anything. They fought all the time and challenged each other every day. But despite their differences, they had one important thing in common. They were constant in Sunggyu’s life.

“I ing hate seeing you here, dude. You will only visit my house if you manage to up big time. What did you do this time?” Hoya asks when they safely arrived at his kitchen without murdering Woohyun at the first sight.

Woohyun shrugged and started to unpack the medicine that he got from the over-the-counter pharmacy as well as an isotonic drink and porridge for Sunggyu to eat when he woke up. “My dad makes a lovely visit today.”

Hoya groaned at the news. “Clearly age is a very high price to pay for maturity. Does your love life looks really pathetic before Sunggyu came that he needs to step up his game now?”

“Hey! I’m a victim here.”

“Stop talking before I punch you straight to the hell.” Hoya’s replied makes Woohyun gulped his saliva down his scratchy throat. “You know that you need to do something before he gets sick of you, right?”

Woohyun didn’t reply. He’s nothing special, of this he’s sure. He’s just a common man with common thoughts and a much much common life. Except that, he has more money and power than a common people. There are no monuments dedicated to him and his name will soon be forgotten, but he has loved another with all his heart and soul, and to him, that has always been enough. So how should he show it to Sunggyu? 

He was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and he did. He said, “I don’t know.”

“For someone that was so good in business, you’re stupid. Go meet your father and tell him about Sunggyu.”

“You know that’s a serious business.”

“Either you lost your job or you lose Sunggyu—or—oh God, Woohyun, Don’t give me that face. Two years is not a short amount of time. I’m surprised that Sunggyu didn’t leave your sorry yet.”

“Why are you so mean?”

“How is giving you an advice is being mean?”

Woohyun ruffled his hair in frustration. Someone needs to step into their argument before they start to throw some physical punch and more insults to each other in order to protect their dignity.

“Okay, fine. I’m sorry. And yes, I do plan to meet my dad soon.”

Hoya grinned his annoying smile that Woohyun wants to rip it off of his handsome face. He has enoug