Divorce Contract C151

Chapter 151

A low voice wavered through the room, thick with trembling apologies. Seo Dohyeon held the small hand, pressing his forehead to its lukewarm back. His words, too soft to reach the sleeping Go Igyeol, echoed like a confession spoken in an empty sanctuary.

“…I ruined everything. Can we ever… go back? Can you really become happy again, Igyeol-ah? I… I don’t know. I thought your suffering was mine to shoulder, but now I’m terrified that isn’t the case. That your unhappiness never left you, that it was always yours alone. And that while you remained trapped in sorrow, I mistook the happiness meant for you as my burden instead.”

“……”

“…I have no right.”

The slow, wavering voice halted. When Igyeol’s slack fingers suddenly tightened around his, Seo Dohyeon lifted his face, heavy with helpless despair. Seeing him on the verge of tears, Go Igyeol frowned faintly.

“…You finally realized?”

“……”

“You said you destroyed everything. So then… you could have treated me better. If you were only going to regret it like this.”

At the tired voice, Seo Dohyeon lowered his gaze, guilt dragging his eyes down. No answer felt right—any words risked sounding like deceit. As he tried to withdraw his hand with a bitter smile, Go Igyeol grasped it firmly again.

“But that’s why… we chose to begin again.”

“……”

“I don’t want to return to the past like you do. I wasn’t happy then. I don’t want to live mistaking your gentle pity for affection. I don’t want to love you alone anymore.”

His voice, deeper and roughened from sleeping an entire day, carried a faint metallic rasp. He spoke calmly, plainly, as though reciting long-held truths. His vision swam for a moment—likely the lingering effects of the medication—before clearing as he resumed.

“I honestly can’t imagine myself being happy. So I’m curious. I want to become happy—if only out of indignation. I wonder what it would feel like, me being happy. Us being happy together.”

“Igyeol.”

“We will probably… struggle for a long time. I will hurt often. You will keep regretting. But I don’t think… that version of us is so bad. When I get upset, unlike before, you will notice quickly. And when I tell you how I feel… I think I’ll recover. Like shaking off a short fever.”

A faint smile touched Go Igyeol’s face. As though praying for that future, he closed his eyes and drew a slow, steadying breath. Then he pushed himself upright. The room tilted briefly—then righted itself.

“Regret it—the past where you hurt me. I will not forgive you. Instead, I will watch you change, and through that, I will comfort the cruel, miserable past version of myself.”

“And if you chose wrongly? If because of me, you can’t be happy…?”

“I’ll become happy out of pure resentment if I must. Even if it takes a very long time.”

“…I worry for you. Speaking calmly doesn’t mean you’re unhurt. I know your wounds are festering. Every time I touch them, it feels like I’m reopening them and making you bleed.”

Seo Dohyeon did not want to accept it. He did not want to face the truth—that choosing each other might have been the wrong decision. Only after the second heat broke did he understand: Go Igyeol had not healed, not even a little. If being together only bred pain… wouldn’t parting be kinder? The thought twisted his features into anguish.

“I thought… we were okay. I thought we would be okay.”

“We were wrong. We aren’t okay at all. I still… fear you.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Igyeol.”

“When I remember how your hands touched me, I get scared.”

Go Igyeol knew Seo Dohyeon had been shaken by his reaction before the heat fully took hold—how instinct and rejection warred in him, how violently his body refused even as it sought him.

“…I know. Every time I touch you, you remember those horrible moments. You will keep suffering because of me. Everything is my fault, and in the end, you will blame yourself and be unhappy.”

“You’re right. It is all because of you.”

“I can’t even want to go back anymore. Like you said—you weren’t happy then. Even if time rewound, your unhappiness would repeat. What drives me mad is that I only understood that today, because you told me. How can someone like me, like this—how can we ever be happy? Now what am I supposed to do? I don’t know, Igyeol. I don’t know.”

Breath stuttered in his chest like panic. Tremors spread from his fingertips through his body. As he struggled to breathe, Go Igyeol reached out, brushing trembling lashes with his fingertips before speaking slowly.

“When the heat starts, I lose reason. That’s why… I believed we shouldn’t be intimate like that.”

“……”

“It wasn’t that I hated it. I was scared. Not of the terrible memories, but of being swept up by heat and pheromones. When I’m like that, you can’t tell whether I’m frightened or hurting. And you don’t know. What if—like then—you think I want it? What if you believe I like it?”

Seo Dohyeon knew exactly what “then” referred to. The day he forced pheromones on him. The day his words became sharpened knives.

“Igyeol.”

“…I was terrified then too. But you insisted I liked it. You said I wanted it.”

Avoiding his gaze, Go Igyeol bowed his head, tears falling one by one. Seo Dohyeon felt as if struck by something unseen. He wished he could vanish. No—return to a time before he ever met Go Igyeol.

“Hh… ngh…”

Covering his mouth with a trembling hand marbled by pale veins, Igyeol wept. Seo Dohyeon approached, reaching out with shaking fingers. Wiping the corner of his eye left his skin damp. There was no answer—none. It felt like wandering a maze in darkness.

“How could someone like me wound you so deeply? What am I, to have hurt you like this?”

“……”

“I’m sorry. I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’m not asking you to understand. I just… I’m sorry.”

“…I’m not okay.”

The answer fit like a lock clicking shut. Seo Dohyeon took his hand gently, bowing his head. Inhaling his pheromone-scented presence only deepened his guilt. As he stroked his back lightly, Go Igyeol lifted his head.

“I don’t know any other way but you.”

For the first time, Go Igyeol leaned in and kissed him. Dry, cracked lips pressed and lifted, again, and again. Gentle kisses deepened slowly. When Seo Dohyeon pushed his tongue forward, Igyeol’s lips parted. Teeth brushed. Tongues touched. Heat bled through him. When Seo Dohyeon licked the roof of his mouth, Igyeol shivered.

He lifted his eyelids, fingers clutching Seo Dohyeon’s clothes. Instinctively his left arm moved—the IV line tugged, stinging.

“Ah…”

At his soft gasp, Seo Dohyeon pulled away. Pressing his own lips tight, he freed Igyeol from his arms and followed his gaze.

“…The tube… it’s uncomfortable.”

“You still need to finish the IV.”

It would take about an hour. As Seo Dohyeon shifted back, Igyeol grabbed him again, face flushed, eyes unable to meet his yet refusing to let go.

“Igyeol.”

“…Could you release… just a little pheromone…?”

He knew Seo Dohyeon wouldn’t refuse, yet tension stiffened his limbs. Before words could form, Seo Dohyeon opened his pheromones.

“Haa…”

Igyeol’s lashes fluttered, chin tipping as pleasure stirred through him, long-suppressed senses waking. His lips parted—and Seo Dohyeon kissed him fiercely. Tongue plunging deep, pheromones saturating every heated curve of flesh. Supporting his limp head, he devoured his mouth, sucking his tongue and tugging it outward. The friction made Igyeol shudder before he finally released him, kissing his swollen lips again and again, trailing along the sharp jawline. Pressing teeth into the pale neck—Igyeol released his grip and covered his own mouth.

“Let me hear you.”

“Hhn… ha… It feels… strange.”