# Chapter 65
No matter how complicated my mind was, I fell asleep easily on the warm, comfortable bed. I might have been tired from staying up late yesterday, but I felt awkward after waking up from such a good sleep.
With my arms still limp and lacking strength, I pulled back the blanket that was tightly wrapped around my body. I had even tucked the blanket between my legs while sleeping. Having completely forgotten that I was in the school infirmary, I checked the time after waking up and found that exactly one hour had passed.
“…An hour?”
Shouldn’t the soccer match be over by now? Then where’s Kwon Dojin?
Without any separate thought process, my mind went straight to Dojin. I looked for my shoes under the bed. I found my sneakers with the heels crushed, as if protesting being hastily slipped on earlier.
Even though they were misshapen, I didn’t care and slipped them on carelessly again as I headed to the window. There was only one reason why Dojin hadn’t come.
“As expected, it’s still going on.”
I opened the tightly closed window and looked outside. Figures that appeared to be Dojin and Baek Han were standing side by side. They were in the middle of a free kick, but both Baek Han and Dojin were standing apart as if they had nothing to do with each other. Was it because they knew things would never end if they both stepped up?
Regardless of my questions, the free kick proceeded in sequence. I hadn’t noticed until just now because I wasn’t fully awake, but it seemed to be an important moment as everyone was holding their breath.
It was hard to watch outside with my arms propped up. My elbows, which were supporting my body, started to tingle, so I straightened up. Out of habit, I sat on the windowsill to look outside when I suddenly remembered what Dojin had said and looked down at the floor.
‘What if you fall sitting dangerously on the windowsill?’
His unnecessarily anxious voice played in my head too. I didn’t know why I was thinking about this, but ignoring it felt like having a small thorn stuck in my finger.
“Oh, seriously.”
Just get down, get down!
Grumbling, I found my shoes that had come off again and put them on. After standing firmly on the floor with both feet, I closed the wide-open windows one by one. Of course, I didn’t forget to watch how far the soccer match had progressed.
“He’ll be here soon.”
I’m too lazy to move, so I’ll just go to the bed and use my phone. It’s obvious that Dojin will come anyway, and I didn’t want to go to the stands and be the center of attention.
I dived onto the messy bed and found a good position to use my phone. After roughly finding a pillow to rest my head on, I rolled half a turn and lay on my side.
With nothing particular to do on my phone, I just busily moved my innocent thumb. Should I watch something? But Dojin might come before I can properly start watching. Then maybe a webtoon? I’ve already seen everything there is to see.
Thinking some music would be nice in the quiet room, I opened a music app. Not wanting to choose carefully, I just played whatever was clicked from the playlist.
Rolling half a turn again, I lay on my back facing the ceiling and placed my phone on my chest. With my eyes closed, breathing evenly, I waited for someone to relieve this boredom.
Tap, tap. I could hear footsteps making their presence known through the music in the corridor. The neat sound that matched a steady beat was unwavering.
Every action, from completely lifting the foot to placing it back down on the floor, was repeated without the slightest deviation. The person who stopped in front of the infirmary door opened the locked door very familiarly and came in.
“Did you rest well?”
“Doesn’t my posture look like someone who was resting comfortably to anyone?”
Without opening my eyes to check, I could guess who it was, so I raised my arm and waved it gently. In response, Dojin laughed softly and approached with the same stride as before, sitting on the edge of the bed.
“Another draw this time?”
The ensuing silence revealed the outcome of the match. If he had lost, he would have shown a gloomy demeanor, and if he had won, he would have been wagging an imaginary tail while whispering about his victory.
“Yeah, a draw.”
“I see. So it ended in a draw again.”
His plain affirmation reminded me that the last match had also ended in a draw. I opened my closed eyes and looked up in Dojin’s direction. He was already looking at me, so our eyes met immediately.
“Looks like Baek Han’s class was determined too.”
“I heard they tried harder because they lost at basketball.”
“That makes sense. Wasn’t your honor at stake in that match?”
I couldn’t help but chuckle at the thought that the honor of these two depended on the outcome of a game at a high school sports festival. Dojin brushed my bangs up. The air touching my forehead, which was suddenly exposed, felt strange and gave me slight goosebumps.
“Why my bangs?”
“Just wondering if you’d look pretty like this too.”
With Dojin’s casual attitude, I only blinked calmly even when he came close. Then, suddenly realizing he was too close, I unconsciously swatted away his arm that was lifting my bangs.
It was a reflexive action, and it would seem strange to someone who had been accepting his touch so casually. Not knowing what to say to him, I just bit my lip and eventually missed the moment to speak.
“By the way, Habin.”
“What, what.”
Dojin’s serious attitude, combined with the embarrassment I had just felt, made me stutter. Regardless of my reaction, he focused on gently running his fingers through my hair.
“Where did you put the halo? Did you throw it away by chance?”
I thought he was going to say something serious—. Wondering when he would give up his obsession with that damn halo, I couldn’t help but sigh.
“How would I know?”
I hadn’t paid attention to that cumbersome headband. Come to think of it, despite grinding my teeth and saying I would throw it away, I didn’t remember taking it off. So the thought ‘where did it go’ briefly crossed my mind, but I didn’t show it.
“It was so cute—, hmm?”
I was about to pretend I didn’t hear him, knowing he would just express disappointment, when Dojin put his hand beside my head and bent his waist.
“Hey, what are you—”
At the sight of him approaching so close that he seemed about to pounce on me, I tightly closed my eyes. This was the first time something like this had happened, so I truly didn’t know how to react.
“I found it, Habin.”
A soft laugh came from above. When I slightly opened my tightly closed eyes, Dojin’s chest was right in front of me. Reflexively, I gripped my phone tightly.
“It must have come off while you were sleeping. Fortunately, it’s not damaged.”
His gentle voice swirled in his chest. Dojin, who still hadn’t withdrawn his arm propping up beside me, was busy chattering as if he had so much to say.
The deep black clothes filling my vision bothered me. Not knowing how long I would have to look at this, I bit my lip.
“Just a moment.”
Just when I thought he was finally going to get up, he slipped his arm under my back. I opened my eyes wide at the feeling of his firm forearm against my back.
Despite my reaction, he responded with a playful smile, curving the corners of his eyes, and used his arm supporting my back to make me sit up. And he did it without any effort, very naturally.
“There, done.”
Even though I was shorter and weighed less than Dojin, how could this make sense? Just like when he helped me down from the windowsill, incomprehensible things were happening again, and while I was stuttering in confusion, Dojin seemed to have finished what he had planned and removed his hands from me.
Wondering what on earth he had done, I felt around where his hands had been and felt a familiar sensation. Unknowingly, as I pressed the object, my expression automatically crumpled at the feeling of something tightening around the crown of my head.
“…This damn halo.”
For some reason, Dojin smiled brightly at my words, which I had spat out as if chewing each syllable.
* * *
At this moment, I am a defeated soldier. A thoroughly defeated soldier, at that.
“Didn’t you say you were going to throw that headband away?”
“Be quiet. Do you think I haven’t even tried?”
As I gritted my teeth, Baek Han snorted and flicked the halo. Dojin meticulously fixed the headband that had been disturbed by Baek Han’s touch.
“So the culprit who prevented me from throwing it away was right here.”
“I can’t let you throw this away. It’s the most important element.”
Dojin’s resolute attitude was frustrating, but since he wouldn’t let me take it off anyway, I decided to let it go.
“Anyway. What about your obstacle race?”
“We decided not to participate.”
“We’ll do the relay race later anyway.”
It seems they had agreed not to participate. No wonder there were so many people circling around them expressing disappointment. I sighed inwardly while eating the snack Dojin was feeding me.
“I should have objected when they first talked about the team shirts.”
“Now you say that?”
“Regret always comes late, you know.”
While I was lamenting with my face buried in my hands, I felt a light tapping on the back of my hand. When I reluctantly lowered my arms to look at the person, Dojin lightly shook an ionic drink.
“You want to drink, right?”
“Yeah.”
There’s nothing wrong with food and drink. I quickly took the drink from Dojin’s hand and drank it. I had been thirsty anyway.
“But you said the soccer match was a draw. What happens with the points? I heard they total them up later to decide the winning class for each grade and give prizes?”
“They’ll figure it out. It’s not my concern.”
“It’s not just soccer points that are added up.”
When I mentioned soccer, Baek Han frowned deeply. It must be because his pride was hurt by another draw, or he was frustrated for not winning a single event properly, or maybe both.
“Anyway, let’s go out for lunch.”
“Go out?”
“There probably aren’t any good places around here.”
Dojin and I had different reactions to the same words. Even though it was a sports festival, it wasn’t a day when you could just freely come and go from school, but neither Dojin nor Baek Han seemed to care about that.
“I heard there’s a good place that opened. They say it opened a week ago.”
“Well then—”
“Wait, wait!”
These guys, who normally couldn’t stand each other, were getting along so well at times like this. I raised my voice to stop them from proceeding without even listening to my opinion.
“What?”
“Is there a problem?”
“We’re getting school lunch anyway. It would be annoying to go back and forth, so let’s just stay here. We don’t even know when the relay will start.”
Neither Baek Han nor Dojin seemed very enthusiastic. Baek Han even casually suggested taking a taxi if we didn’t want to walk, even though it was a distance that would take less than 10 minutes to walk.
“We can go early and come back. As Baek Han said, if you really hate it, we can take a taxi.”
“No, why are you both so against it today? You usually went out just fine.”
I glared at the two of them, who were getting along so well, with sharp eyes. Moreover, I couldn’t help but laugh hollowly at Baek Han’s words asking why I was acting like this today. There was obviously only one reason why I was behaving this way.
“How can I go outside the school wearing these clothes!”
I can’t go out looking like this, absolutely not!
