“Do you think we got a bit closer?”
Instead of answering my question, Cha Hyunwoo smiled. I watched the process without missing it until the dimples formed on Cha Hyunwoo’s cheeks and disappeared again.
***
Time passed quickly. It felt like only a day or two had passed since I went to Cha Hyunwoo’s house, but almost a week had gone by. During that time, messages from Eun Haejin came occasionally, but they didn’t continue at length. Contact with Jung Yoonseo also continued sporadically, just enough not to be cut off.
During that time, I clung entirely to my thesis except for days I went to part-time work, and thanks to receiving very substantial help from Cha Hyunwoo, I passed the professor’s examination. Actually, I felt like he didn’t pass me because I did well, but because he thought I was a bit pitiful, but so what. In any case, I was someone who wrote a thesis despite not taking four years of the department.
As contact with both Eun Haejin and Jung Yoonseo became sparse in parallel, I became closer than imaginable with Cha Hyunwoo, who was almost the only person I saw frequently. Cha Hyunwoo now responded quite shamelessly even to my jokes. With my old friends, I used to stop joking around when they got used to my jokes, but this time I was happy just to have that kind of banter continue.
I was rolling around on my blanket trying to enjoy my day off after a long time when suddenly a call came. The caller was unexpectedly Eun Haejin, who hadn’t answered calls or texts for the past several days. After not answering calls or texting, I felt myself suddenly getting nervous before answering this sudden call. Wait, I’m getting nervous answering a friend’s call? It was funny even to myself, but I quickly answered the call before more time passed and it disconnected.
“Long time no see?”
[I texted you.]
“You call that a text?”
Eun Haejin was silent for a moment at my words, then said casually:
[Want to have a drink today?]
“Drinks? Suddenly?”
[It’s not sudden.]
“No, it’s fucking sudden… You need to explain why you didn’t answer contact all this time.”
[Don’t you think about when you didn’t answer?]
“Hyung did it all for your own good…”
[Ah, stop.]
I burst into laughter at Eun Haejin’s words, but I also kind of understood the contact issue Eun Haejin had been making a big deal about for so long. Certainly, having a friend suddenly cut off contact wasn’t a pleasant feeling.
“So why drinks? Did something happen that made you want to drink?”
[No. But something happened that I need to buy drinks for.]
“Something to buy drinks for?”
[I got in.]
“What?”
[I said I got into Company J.]
For a moment, I didn’t quite understand Eun Haejin’s words. Eun Haejin’s words were recognized by me very slowly. Without realizing it, I’d been fixated only on Eun Haejin’s absence of contact, and had been indifferent to the actual original work development I’d really been concerned about.
That’s why my feelings were strange. Even though the first button flowing as originally had been fastened.
“…But if it’s congratulatory drinks, shouldn’t I be the one buying?”
[Why would you buy it? I’m the one who got in.]
“Self-congratulation is a bit weird though.”
[Forget it. Do you have time today?]
“If our Haejin calls, of course I’ll come running right away…”
When I deliberately dragged out my words, I heard Eun Haejin chuckle.
[Then I’ll come to your place this evening.]
“Where are you now?”
[School. Because of my thesis. The professor said you submitted your thesis, how did you do it? You said you couldn’t.]
“Ah… I got some help with that.”
At my words, Eun Haejin asked in a puzzled voice:
[From who?]
“Boss majored in business. Somehow I got invited to boss’s house, and I brazenly begged him to look at my thesis.”
[…Boss?]
“Yeah. But as expected, a graduate and actual business operator is different. I was so moved I almost went crazy.”
Eun Haejin, who had been silent for a moment at my story, turned the conversation elsewhere:
[Anyway… I’ll come to your place later.]
“If you’re near school, wouldn’t it be better if I came there? There’s a restaurant nearby.”
[Today I just want to drink at home. I don’t want to be surrounded by people outside either.]
“Really?”
[Yeah.]
“Got it. Then I’ll wait? Contact me when you’re coming later. How long will it take?”
[I’ll come a bit later? About an hour.]
Considering travel time, he’s probably finishing up and coming out now? I roughly drew out the route in my head.
“Okay. Contact me later.”
[Yeah.]
“Hey. And fucking congratulations! Our big company employee!”
[I told you to stop that shit.]
With those words, Eun Haejin hung up. However, I could tell there was a subtle laugh mixed in Eun Haejin’s last words. Even though his tone was blunt.
In the original work, Eun Haejin joining Company J comes out in almost the very first chapters. Because that’s where the full-fledged story begins. Well, in a romance genre, stories where the protagonists don’t appear weren’t really important parts.
…So strictly speaking, the story is starting now. Until now, it wasn’t a very important part. The feeling was strange somehow. It wasn’t simply because I knew the full-fledged story had started.
I just hadn’t been able to think of it as a story for a while, so it was because of the feeling of watching alone as it became a ‘development.’ There was a time when I’d read indiscriminately across genres while adapting web novels into scenarios. At that time, there was more content about entering someone’s body in a book than I expected, and I vaguely thought that if I entered a book, it would be useful to know overall knowledge about other characters as a reader.
Of course, back then I’d never have to experience all this, so I’d never thought about it seriously, so I couldn’t think of more specific impressions or anything like that, but at least I thought it wouldn’t be this kind of feeling.
I felt like I wasn’t floating somewhere in a book, but just living reality. Even though I came from Kang Seojin to Lee Hyun’s body, that was just another reality. But now that the story had finally started, I felt strongly alienated.
There was no specialness that came from being the only one who wasn’t a character in the book. Rather, the loneliness that no one would believe me even if I told this story was a bit greater.
Loneliness. That word seemed appropriate.
I tried to control the strange emotion that suddenly washed over me and looked out the window. Outside the window, sudden rain was falling.
Did Eun Haejin bring an umbrella?
I called to ask Eun Haejin if he’d brought an umbrella. However, the call soon went to missed call. I hesitated for a moment, then grabbed an umbrella and left the house. Since I could get to school with just one bus, it wasn’t particularly difficult.
***
When I arrived at school, I suddenly realized I didn’t know where Eun Haejin was on campus. I just vaguely wandered around the supervising professor’s office and the department office and called Eun Haejin about two more times, but Eun Haejin didn’t answer either time. So I just decided to wait at the bus stop. He’d take the bus anyway, right?
And I felt like Eun Haejin would just run if he didn’t have an umbrella by the time he came to take the bus. He was someone who would think running was a bit better than the option of buying an umbrella at a convenience store.
When I’d waited about 20 minutes, I saw a familiar figure in the distance. Oh, he really didn’t bring an umbrella? Seeing Eun Haejin running to the bus stop with his outerwear over his head, I suddenly couldn’t hold back my laughter.
Eun Haejin ran near the bus stop, then walked slowly after discovering me.
Seeing his face full of confusion was honestly funny too.
“Why did you come?”
I held out one of the umbrellas I’d brought to Eun Haejin.
“Hyung thought you wouldn’t bring an umbrella, so I came to pick you up?”
Eun Haejin took the umbrella I handed him but had no intention of opening it, just standing in the rain. I tilted the umbrella slightly to cover Eun Haejin.
“Why? Are you fucking moved?”
At my words, Eun Haejin’s expression contorted. Eun Haejin seemed both upset and just confused. Eun Haejin was silent for a long time, then just opened the umbrella.
“Fuck… It was really fucking meaningless.”
“What was?”
I asked back at Eun Haejin’s random words, but Eun Haejin didn’t answer.
“Why? Didn’t things go well today? Your thesis?”
“No. The thesis was fine.”
“Then why?”
Eun Haejin closed his mouth with a complicated face.
“Is it a strange feeling now that you got into the company?”
“That’s part of it. Honestly.”
