"Did I never tell you? I learned how to cook to make boys happy."

"Is that so. It serves this purpose, though, like, I might be imagining having to explain why exactly I was perpetuating this entire domestic arrangement here to a judge in the hypothetical where someone brings me up on charges about my 'wiggle room for espers'..."

"Well, Mr. Judge, you see, I am a man of habit, and I have this unshakeable habit of trying to make boys happy as a goal unto itself."

"Not that in particular, just, like. Mr. Swan, please explain to the jury at exactly what point in the process of having unsupervised custody of this smoking hot man you began to expect homecooked meals and daily oral sex."

"Well, Your Honour, I really enjoy cooking meals and giving blowjobs, I just kept offering and offering all the time, it's only to be expected eventually he'd get used to it."

"No jury would convict me." Nomf.

"I feel like it's just a win for all involved."

"The best kind of situation."

"—actually I've been curious about something. Did you never, ah... have guided sex before? You mentioned you'd tried it with non-espers and it was lackluster..."

"Oh, for a while I had a secondary in Vancouver, my father lives in B.C. and I'd like to do dungeons when I was visiting him occasionally, but me and Sparkler didn't get along that well and I haven't seen him in a couple years, there's an Ablinger marble between Vancouver and Toronto now."

"And that was it? Just him? Wow, uh. ...is it gauche for me to say you've really been missing out?"

"I also once as a one-off hooked up with a guy who'd teleported in from London for a really weird psychic dungeon but that actually managed to be worse. I don't know how gauche it is but it's correct, I was clearly deprived."

"Wow. I almost want to ask."

"What, how it managed to be worse? Obligate kink I wasn't into. Sparkler and I were not particularly well-matched in terms of what we liked doing but it was all off the same menu."

"I suppose that'd do it." Though clearly the menu they were ordering off was from some shitty fast food chain restaurant, so Jaeha is very happy to offer a proper gourmet meal, here.

"I coulda looked harder but it was never a priority."

Could not have been Jaeha. "That makes sense. I'm happy to be of service, anyway."

"Confusing though this may be to the hypothetical jury it is appreciated."

Ohhh he's so pretty. Jaeha knows espers all are but he's so pretty. And he thinks Jaeha is smoking hot, and he likes Jaeha's food, and he likes getting blowjobs from Jaeha, and he thinks Jaeha is interesting to talk to, and...

...Jaeha knows what he'd need to do to seduce Haru. It's really quite obvious. Haru was kind of hard to read at first, but Jaeha's not as stupid as he was when he first started dating Tae-gun, he's a lot better at reading people without his powers than he was then, and now that he understands the kind of person Haru is, now that he's let himself understand, it's obvious. He could do it, if he tried.

So he mustn't try. 

The problem, though, is that...

...the problem is that a big part of the way to seduce Haru is to become a kind of person Jaeha kind of does want to become. It's to be the kind of good that will be able to move past everything he did and grow from it. Become a better person, in deed and not just in word. Jaeha wants that. 

So he's in a bit of a pickle.

Haru takes a half an additional hotteok, gobbles it up, and waves as he teleports out. "See you later!"

Man.

Fine. Let's get that goddamn email out of the way.

the psychic esper Jaeha Kang

"Jaeha Kang". It sounds so entirely, completely wrong to read his name in that order.

the only reason I haven't donated money to this cause is that you don't need it

Well she could instead pick one of Haru's recommended charities and donate money to it.

...wow. What a response to have.

You may or may not be aware that I was the one who stopped him from committing suicide after his last foray into Nightmare.

Yeah. Yeah, he remembers. Very vividly.

I'd like to offer my professional services for therapeutic purposes towards Mr. Kang's mental health and wellbeing.

Does she really, really think that they could have a normal, professional relationship, after that? That he could look at her face and remember anything other than, than that?

The short explanation of what I think would be most useful in this case would be to use my empathy to eliminate unwanted emotional reactions to both long and short term memories

Well yes he supposes if she did that he would be able to look at her face and remember anything other than that. He'd kind of prefer not to be mind controlled out of his reactions? Thanks? He, like, kinda gets it for shit like being victimised by Nightmare, who is literally just fucking you up for no reason with no content, but he actually did those things he did. What "unwanted emotional reactions" would those even be?

(...he'll put a pin on that thought.)

is meant to be used in addition to therapy, not replacing it

Yeah no he is not going to be doing any therapy. As he said.

(...put a pin on that thought, too.)

I have sent several e-mails to Mr. Kang in the past, but I'm unsure if they made it to him, due to the circumstances of his incarceration and subsequent cutoff from the outside world.

Whyyyyyy would he have ever kept his old email address. No one wanting to reach Kang Jaeha after everything he did is someone he wants to talk to.

I understand if he would be uncomfortable interacting with me, because of the circumstances of our last meeting. However, I want to stress that I would be working with him in a professional capacity, and I put my patients' mental health needs above everything else.

Also there's the thing where Jaeha would rather set himself on fire than let Min Woo-young be causally downstream of any actions he ever takes again.

On a personal note, I'd like to thank you for stepping up to rehabilitate Mr. Kang. I have had some of your blog translated, and between its contents and your location in Canada, I do not think there is a more qualified person in the world for this task. You are doing excellent work.

...yeah. She's probably right, there. There isn't anyone else in the world as qualified as Haru is, for this. This is a problem Jaeha has been having, c.f. the feelings he's been developing. For his parole officer. Who is Haru.

This fucking sucks.

Circling back, though... why doesn't he want to do therapy? He originally thought it was because he didn't want people to spend taxpayer money on him when there were better targets for it but Haru has successfully argued that if he's worrying about taxpayer money going into worthy recipients then the fact that he can in fact save lives is good taxpayer money, and if therapy would help with that, that's a good use of it.

But he still doesn't want to. And he doesn't understand why.