Baby Rashes | Kang Mira

"Okay. So peasants and thy queen; I request you for taking a seat on thy holy floor and allow me for having your cheap attention." Soobin barks at the fellows hiding behind me while gathering cushions around himself. "Yes, stupids. Get your butts down on the ground right now."

"We don't want to play your idiotic games!" Beomgyu barks back at him, earning a chuckle from me. "You and your boring foreign games, huh." he turns to Sarang, who was glaring at Soobin with her arms crossed on her chest. "Come on, Sarang. Let's go back to the garden!"

"Today's game will be fun." Soobin chatters through his clenched jaws, giving them a burning look. But Beomgyu and Sarang do not pay attention; they turn immediately to leave. Right at the moment, Soobin shouts. "Anyone who leaves the house right now will lose the chance to get a treat of Roseburst from me!"

They sit down on the floor instantly after hearing his words.

"Noona, come and play with us, too!" Soobin grins and motions me to join. I nod while closing the door, and walk toward him.

"What game are you playing?" I ask curiously as I take a seat on the floor. Arranging my gown, I look around. Sarang is still glaring at Soobin; mad for dragging them from their own game, and Beomgyu has made a twisted face which oddly resembles of an angry peacock.

"This one is learnt from my American friends." Soobin puts an empty bottle in the middle of us and explains. "It's called Truth Or Dare. When I spin the bottle, it will be directed at one of us. The selected person gets to choose an option- truth or dare." he smirks rather playfully. "If you choose Truth- trust me we are going to dig into your secrets and read them like an open book. And if you choose Dare..." he throws us an challenging look. "I assure you to do a plenty of hardwork, yes."

"Wow! Sounds suspicious and dangerous." Beomgyu leans close to the bottle with interest. "My type of game."

"Then let's start!" Soobin announces excitedly. "I spin it first!"

He swings the bottle on its spot, and the cork ends up getting pointed at the tea table beside Sarang. Soobin huffs and commands her to scoot closer to Beomgyu, which she follows with a fuming glare thrown back at him.

Soobin spins the bottle again. This time, it gets pointed at Beomgyu. We return to our senses real quick.

"Aha! Gyu, Gyu!" Soobin claps loudly and leans closer with a devilish smile plastered on his lips. "Truth or Dare?"

"Dare." Beomgyu answers, goggling and shrugging as if this is such a known fact.

"You see that lizard over there?" Soobin points his finger at the wall. "Take it and leave it inside the cooking pan in the kitchen."

"This much easy task?" Beomgyu shakes his head and gets up to his feet. Sarang sighs, looking like she is used to this chaos. But at the moment Beomgyu touches the lizard, I let out a terrified gasp.

"Take that away from me! Eww!"

Beomgyu laughs and swings the lizard in his fingers. I don't want to focus on it, but my eyes get glued to its nasty black skin, glinting eyes, slithering tongue and wiggling tail-

"Yaaks!" I shriek and hold Sarang's hand in defence. Still laughing his lungs off, Beomgyu leaves the room.

"Are you afraid of lizards, Noona?" Soobin asks in an innocent voice. I blink at him, about to nod- but that's when I realize what he is up to. 

"Don't you dare putting lizard on my bed!"

Soobin gives a high pitched laugh at my horrified face, rolling on the floor and clutching his stomach tightly.

Beomgyu reappears after two or three minutes with a grinning face.

"Did it!" he sits down and stretches his shoulders while sharing a secret look with his older brother, which doesn't get unnoticed by me. "Put it inside the cooking pan. The maids will be a screeching mess at dinner tonight!"

God knows what more he has done.

"Okay then, the third spin goes!" Soobin yells and rotates the bottle. After spinning, it stops before me.

"Oh ho." Soobin and Beomgyu erupt into a series of silent giggles- making me dumbfounded. Soobin arranges himself first and asks. "Noona! Truth or Dare?"

"Truth." I answer at once. I have understood what a level of dare can be by Beomgyu's turn.

"Hm." Soobin tilts his head, eyeing me skeptically. "Oh, you got me there. Since I don't know about you much, you thought that I will go easy on you, right?"

Yes?

"Tell me the name of the most embarrassing part of your body where you have a mole."

"W-what?"

"Most embarrassing part, yes. You have to tell the truth."

I swallow, thinking hard about what to answer. Soobin and Beomgyu is watching me with sheer curiosity, while Sarang silently judges us from a corner. With a sigh, I speak up.

"Right below my c-chest. Above my heart- BUT WHY ARE YOU ASKING THIS?"

"Calm down! This is just for fun!" Soobin laughs and motions me to sit back, because I have stood up on my spot from immense embarrassment.

"That's an unique spot for a mole." Beomgyu makes a sly remark. I glare at him furiously.

"Now, we don't tell that to Yeonjun Hyung, do we?" Soobin nudges Beomgyu, who nods.

"Yes, we don't." he turns to Sarang and makes a pouty face. "Hey, Sarang. You won't tell that to him, will you?"

"Yes? I'm just thinking I will tell him about the question you just asked to Mira-"

"Two grand sized glasses of Roseburst!" Soobin interrupts into their conversation, his eyes sparkling. Sarang stops saying whatever she is saying. My cheeks are fuming up.

"Okay, fourth spin then!" Soobin gets back to his seat and rotates the bottle again. "Oh, it's Sarang this time... Truth or Dare, stupid?"

.

After a heavy session of Truth of Dare all thorough the evening; which ended up with dares such as 'Burn Soobin's favourite underwear.' 'Drink a jug of water with three gulps.' 'Name the first fifty radicals of the periodic table.' and more horrifying things, the boys passed away on their beds at the second floor and Sarang went back to her house with a throbbing headache.

As I look through the open window, my eyes fall on her room which is at the exactly opposite direction of mine. The lights are off; I guess she has gone to sleep.

I tie my hair into a braid. While doing that, my mind wanders off and flashes the giggling face of Sarang in front of my eyes. I feel overwhelmed by the similarity she has with my lost sister, Aera. She was joyous and playful like her. Even their smiles matched a lot.

Staring at Sarang's dark room, I sigh. I turn back and start arranging my bed for sleep, too. The bedsheets are pearl white; much to my dismay. Back in Kyeon-ju, I never laid white sheets because of red day's problem.

But it's comfortable enough. Yeonjun has given me the keys of my own bedroom. It isn't as spacious as my old room, and I love it. I always got nightmares in that large room and felt awfully scared at countless midnights. I used to sleep alone in there.

 "Okay, then. Good bed of mine, please stay warm and don't start creaking at twelve of night." I mumble and pat the bedsheets. "Good night to me!"

BANG!

I leap down from the bed immediately, staring at the banging door through bursting eyes. Someone is hitting it with much force; each of the hit is stronger than the last one. Panic creeps into my veins as I my thoughts begin running wild.

Did smugglers get in?

Grabbing whatever is close to my hands- which turns out to be the comb I have been using on my hair, I take a deep breath, inch closer, point its sharp end toward the door and put my hand on the doorknob.

BANG!

I let the door swing open, and shout out a high pitched war cry. "You fuc-"

And the incident that happens after it, I'm betting my non existing love life on this- I haven't been prepared at all.

I'm not given much time to think; my body is sent staggering backward as Yeonjun throws his arms over my shoulders and clings onto me. Breaths are sucked from my lungs, my eyes try running out from their sockets by each gasps. I swear that I have heard a cracking sound of somewhere near of my hipbones.

"Spi- spi-" Yeonjun latches himself onto my stumbling body more and lets out a shriek of panic. "Sp- spi- spid-" he stutters in a wheezy voice. "There's a spi- spider on my b-bed. G-giant spider-"

He makes a loud, gurgling noise and faints.

Faints.

"Yeonjun?" panting and gasping for air, I poke on the man's shoulders, trying to wake him up. "H-hey? Yeonjun? Hello?"

He doesn't make any more noise.

"Shit." I curse under my breath and look around, wondering why anyone hasn't come rushing at the room for the sound of havoc. Yeonjun's heavy weight is now making me feel numb and even more breathless.

I was just going to sleep, now what is this?

With slow steps, I stagger backward, until I can find the bedsheets under my rummaging hands. I lean back as much as I can, with Yeonjun breathing heavily on my neck. Closing my eyes, I push aside his body from mine. He lands on the bed with a soft thud.

"Now, what's with this spider thing?" I stare at the unconscious male lying in front of me through robust eyes, putting hands on my hips. "Do all the drama always have to happen with me?"

I sigh and move closer. Half of his body is dangling down from the bed. I use all of my strength to lay his legs above the sheets.

"Mrs. Choi?"

I don't pay attention to the voice behind me and continue to cover Yeonjun with a blanket. Why are they calling for his mother in my room, anyway.

"Mrs. Choi!"

Then I realize that the call is actually meant for me.

"Yes?" I turn back to see Ms. Yena's embarrassed face. She is the head maid of this house, according to what Sarang has told me. We haven't talked before.

"Is young master already asleep?" she asks in a timid voice. The middle aged woman is hiding herself beside the door, only peeking at me.

"More like he lost sense. But what's all this about, Ms. Yena?"

"Oh, this is another silly prank of his brothers." the woman sighs, looking down at the floor. "If putting lizard inside the cooking pan wasn't enough. We were going to fry it nearly-"

"What did they do again?" I ask in an astonished voice. The brothers never not make me amazed.

"This." she smiles guiltily and brings out a jar beneath her robes. My eyes pierce into it. Climbing on the peak of horror, I see a handful of gigantic spiders crawling inside the jar; some with hairy legs and a lot bigger than normal ones. Shivers trail down to my spine; I gulp and step back in defence. 

"And young master already has a scandalous history with the spiders, so..."

"Don't tell me they put those on his bed." I mumble while eyeing the spiders inside the jar.

"Oh, they did that exactly." Ms. Yena puts away the jar from my horrified gaze. "Young master went to his bed after taking a shower, lifted the blanket and found these, I'm guessing."

"But he has fainted." I speak while looking at Yeonjun's unconscious state anxiously. "What do we do now?"

"Let him sleep there, I think, Mrs. Choi?" she suggests while scratching her nape. "He's such a heavy person to carry back to his room. And I mean- it's normal for a married couple, right?"

Oh, yes.

We are married.

"Or if you feel much uncomfortable, you can take his room." Ms. Yena chims in. "We have sorted out the spiders!"

"There isn't one left, is there?"

"I'm not very sure. But we took out the spiders which were visible to our eyes." she shrugs in a casual way. "If the brothers have put some under the bed or inside the slippers-"

"No, thank you." my shoulders tense up by the mere thought of it. "I will be fine in here."

Ms. Yena nods and disappears from my sight. I close the door swiftly and lean my back against it, still feeling as if I'm in the midst of chaos.

Oh no, what should I do now?

Mrs. Hyun also said it's normal for married couples to sleep together. I have no objection; but nevertheless, I'm frustrated to my bones. By thinking of sleeping beside a fully grown man for the rest of night, I can't stop getting panicked.

I peek at Yeonjun, who is fast asleep on the bed. My eyes get stuck on his hands. Multiple tiny red pimples have appeared on his fair skin.

Are those the rashes he was talking about in the hospital?

Yeonjun lifts his hand in his sleep and scratches his palms.

"Why do they always taunt you in this way?" I ask softly while gazing at his sleeping face. "Now you have rashes again."

Suddenly, an idea strikes my mind.

I have an ointment which Mrs. Hyun used to apply on my wounds after I went through my father's beatings. She must had packed it in my luggage before leaving. The cream worked fairly well on my skin. But his case is different, though. What if it doesn't suit him? Or makes even more rashes?

Yeonjun scratches his wrist and snuggles close to the pillow. I can't help pitying him.

Making up my decision, I walk toward the corner of the room and pull open the chain of one of my bags dropped over there. 

"Found it!" I exclaim in joy while going back to the bed. Silently climbing on top of it, I sit beside Yeonjun and reach out for his hands. For his scratching, the skin has turned blood red.

"I'm going to give Soobin and Beomgyu a loud scold tomorrow. Just wait for it." I mutter, my eyebrows knitted together in anger. "They shouldn't mess with you. No, never."

Yeonjun starts snoring in his sleep.

My eyes fall on the sequence of beautiful scars above his wrist, which are almost fading away. I hold his hands with utmost care, as if they are made of thin glass.

"And you, Yeonjun. Tell me about your secrets someday, okay?"

a. n. : a long chapter for you. do you like this story? is it going too fast paced? 

fun fact, the word count for this chapter is exactly 2521! 

12.08.2023.