Dressing the Dog
Like a cat toying with a mouse, Do-hee kept murmuring under her breath—her tastes supposedly didn't matter, but somehow, some way, she was determined to turn him into a dog in heat.
"Shame. This side isn't my type either."
The playful look on her face cooled to frost.
Woo Tae-kyung had no intention of causing an incident on day one and ending up as a corpse, so he simply shrugged—concluding, all the while, that Lee Do-hee's goal was clearly either to drown him in the Han River or kill him by any means necessary.
"Follow me. Ah—no, wait. First we need to do something about your clothes."
Phone in hand and nothing else, Do-hee looked him up and down, biting down on one corner of her lip as she did whatever thinking her small little head was capable of. It didn't take her long to settle on a destination, and she gazed at him with satisfaction in the meantime.
She took him to a private designer's shop in Cheongdam-dong.
The moment she walked in, the entire second floor emptied out, and a single employee along with the owner—a man who was apparently the designer himself—greeted her warmly.
"My, it's been far too long! Our Do-hee has such great style these days."
"Teacher, did you not see the news? Or are you just pretending not to know?"
Do-hee smiled, the kind of smile that would look positively adorable to anyone watching. But the designer, who apparently already knew the reason for her visit, faltered ever so slightly. Do-hee, who never let a pleasantry slide past without driving straight through it, sauntered over and planted herself squarely in the middle of the sofa.
She crossed her pale legs, propped one arm on the exposed line of her thigh, and rested her chin on it.
"See? I told you he was huge. I doubt anywhere else in the world carries clothes that fit Woo Tae-kyung."
Seeing the designer scrambling for a response, Do-hee laughed and smoothly changed the subject.
"Wow, he really does have an amazing body. There's a piece I have in mind—let me go grab it."
Sensing his escape route, the designer showered Tae-kyung with extravagant praise and hurried downstairs to the first-floor showroom.
On the second floor, not only were the displayed clothes hidden from outside view—even the glass was opaque, and the lighting sat a touch too dim. Having already noted the entrance he'd come through, Tae-kyung approached the only other thing on the floor that looked like a door, opened it, and checked inside for no particular reason.
It was a storeroom stacked with merchandise, and beside it stood a separate door marked with an emergency exit sign.
"Woo Tae-kyung. What are you doing?"
Do-hee called him out for opening another establishment's door without permission. When he shut it and came back, she gave her crossed leg a little shake. Her black heel must have been slightly loose at the back, because each time she swung her foot, it slipped further off until now it dangled, barely clinging to her toes.
"Take your clothes off."
It was a shop that sold clothes and accessories, so it wasn't hard to guess what she wanted. Without a word, Tae-kyung pulled his t-shirt up from the waist and over his head—and the scar-honest body beneath was laid bare under the dim lights. The lighting was low, but the scars were darker still, standing out in sharp relief, and Do-hee's eyes widened just a little.
She ran her tongue over her red lips once.
Under the lights, her lips glistened too.
By the time Tae-kyung had stripped off his shirt and dragged his jogger pants down past his hips, the designer and the employee had come back up, and they froze for a moment, flustered. But they were both men, and they recovered quickly, smiling politely as they hung clothes on a rack.
Do-hee frowned.
She'd been so absorbed in Tae-kyung that she hadn't even sensed their approach, and the intrusion sent a spike of irritation up her spine.
"Try this shirt on, please. It's our largest size. Ah—your shoulders are so broad, it's going to fit beautifully."
The designer ran his hands briefly over Tae-kyung's bare shoulders as he spoke, looking thoroughly pleased with himself. He'd startled at the scars, but this time he kept it off his face like a professional. Tae-kyung put on the black shirt and began fastening the buttons, then accepted the black slacks the designer handed over.
The jogger pants that had been hanging around his hips dropped to the floor with a soft thump.
"Take off your underwear too," Do-hee said lightly.
The designer looked at her, momentarily stunned.
Leaning back against the sofa, she tilted her head sideways and curled the corner of her mouth upward.
"Woo Tae-kyung, I'm buying every single thing you own, down to your last pair of underwear. From now on, you only wear what I buy you."
"Do-hee, we don't actually sell under—"
"Then I guess he goes commando today."
Do-hee's impossible logic left both the designer and the employee completely at a loss. Tae-kyung let out a short laugh—and then, without a flicker of hesitation, stripped off the drawers he was wearing.
Thump.
Something heavy dropped, and the fabric slapped against his bare thigh with a sharp snick—and because the shop's background music happened to be between tracks at that exact moment, it rang out with painful clarity. The employee's eyes drifted toward Tae-kyung of their own accord, and his mouth fell open. Even the designer froze for a beat at the sight of the same sex's genitals hanging slack and unaroused before him.
Do-hee had been watching Tae-kyung strip with blatant interest, and when the underwear dropped for that brief instant, revealing the dark, massive flesh the lighting made look even more imposing, her eyes went wide. But before she could get a proper look, the designer interrupted, frozen mid-handoff of another garment.
"Ah—TEACHER!!"
Do-hee shouted.
"Ah... ah, hahaha..."
Realizing he'd been utterly oblivious, the designer stepped aside with an awkward laugh—but Tae-kyung had already zipped up the slacks. Do-hee bit her lip nearly hard enough to draw blood. Holding her gaze the entire time, Tae-kyung checked the size of the shoes the employee had brought to match the slacks, then slid his feet in with room to spare.
The shirt, stretched tight across his chest, made his ribcage stand out even more. When he bent down to put on the shoes, the seams of the shirt pulled apart along the muscles of his back, throwing sharp shadows under the dimmed lights. If the fabric had been any less forgiving, he would have split it clean down the middle with the way he moved his body like it was nothing.
He rolled his shoulders to check whether the fit was comfortable, whether it would restrict his movement in a pinch.
"Done?"
"H-he doesn't need to try the rest, I can tell they'll fit. Right, Do-hee? Shall we box everything up for you?"
Do-hee shot Tae-kyung a glare and gave nothing but a curt nod.
With her grand declaration that she'd buy it all, the clothes began disappearing into packing boxes—but before that could happen, Tae-kyung picked up a thin summer jacket hanging on a rack and draped it over one wrist.
In the t-shirt he'd looked almost boyish at a glance, but the moment he switched to the shirt, his presence sharpened and his frame seemed to swell even larger. When a man like that walked with measured steps straight toward her, Do-hee had to crane her neck back just to see his face.
The designer and employee scurried downstairs, clutching the clothes they'd brought up.
Once the second floor went quiet as the dead, Tae-kyung slipped his jacket-draped hand into the pocket of his slacks and let out a soft laugh—thanks to Do-hee, who was straining so hard to look up at him without standing that her neck looked about to snap off.
"What's with that disappointed look now?"
He'd thought she was tall, but maybe she was smaller than he'd realized. It dawned on Tae-kyung that her seated height, with her head tilted all the way up, landed just below his waist—and the amusement drained from his face. She lifted her chin with an expression he'd never seen on her before, defiant to the end, glaring up at him and down at him all at once.
Looking down on someone while seated—it was practically a talent in its own right. He almost wanted to applaud it.
"You're going to lose that head of yours."
As Tae-kyung said it, he tapped the back of her neck lightly with a finger, and her head dropped forward, limp. The sudden sting shooting up from her neck made Do-hee swing her arm with her whole shoulder to knock his hand away, but Tae-kyung didn't budge an inch.
"Ow! I said it hurts!"
"Tense much, are we?"
He gave it a real feel, and sure enough, the back of her neck had gone rigid as a board. Tae-kyung pressed into the knotted spot with his fingertips, deftly dodging every punch she threw. He let a couple of blows land loosely, and kept up the steady pressure on the neck of the shrieking Do-hee without ever letting go.
Whump.
The strength drained from Tae-kyung's hand all at once. His torso pitched forward slightly as he ground a curse between his teeth.
He'd sneered at the fist she'd swung—and taken it square in the sweet spot between his legs. No matter that it was just a fist; that was no place to take a hit. While Tae-kyung spent a while swallowing down the string of profanity that kept rising out of him, Do-hee—freed from his grip—looked back and forth between her own fist and him.
"You're—you're filthy."
"Hey."
"My hand, that was just in my—mmph! Mmph!"
"Shut your mouth, will you?"
Just before Do-hee could start shrieking, her fist trembling all the while, Tae-kyung clamped his palm over her mouth. His lower half throbbed dully, and Do-hee was spitting mad. The moment her mouth was covered, she flicked her tongue out, licked at his fingers, and lathered them with saliva out of pure spite.