The story was gradually approaching me. It was hard to meet Cha Jeonghan’s eyes, and meeting his eyes was hard too, making my stomach churn and my head ache like it would split.
“There doesn’t seem to be any reason for them to lie about something like that…. The problem is there was no one there, but I have memories.”
“……”
“No matter how much I think about it, the only person it could be is you, Yuhyeon.”
The moment I heard my name, all the surrounding sounds disappeared for a moment. Cha Jeonghan’s lips were moving but I couldn’t hear any sound for a while, and my vision went white before slowly regaining its colors one by one.
“But that doesn’t make sense. It can’t be you.”
From the words that it didn’t make sense and that it couldn’t be me, I could guess what scene Cha Jeonghan was remembering. Cha Jeonghan shook his head with a small laugh like a breath, as if even thinking about it again made no sense.
“It must have been a dream. I really need to drink in moderation. How much did I drink and how out of it was I to have such a dream. I can’t even tell you what kind of dream it was.”
“That wasn’t a dream.”
Only after seeing Cha Jeonghan stop his movement while drinking water and look at me did I realize I’d spoken those words aloud to him.
“What wasn’t?”
I had one last chance left. Even now, I met eyes with the one opportunity to vaguely brush this off and escape this situation. But what I wanted to say wasn’t words that could avoid this situation as if it were nothing. Would the future me regret this moment right now? Unable to guess, I decided to go to the future myself and think about it. I wanted to tell Cha Jeonghan, who said it couldn’t be me, that it was me, at least once.
“That person you remember… it’s me.”
Cha Jeonghan put down the glass he was holding with a face that said he had no idea what I was talking about. Though he looked bewildered, there was still a smile remaining on his face.
“What do you think I remember that you’re saying such things. If you heard what it was, you’d really run away.”
“…We kissed.”
The smile completely disappeared from his face. Cha Jeonghan looked at me with slightly surprised eyes as if asking how I knew that, opened his mouth to say something, then closed it without being able to say anything. And after some time passed, he barely managed to open his mouth.
“How do you know that.”
“…Because I did it with you.”
“What?”
“I don’t know how much you remember, but yeah. Everything you remember is right.”
“…Everything’s right?”
Whether fortunate or unfortunate, it seemed that simply kissing wasn’t the only thing remaining in his memory. When I nodded, Cha Jeonghan looked at me with an unbelieving face and froze. It seemed like his thoughts had stopped. I could understand Cha Jeonghan. If it was true that he’d kissed his friend of 13 years who’d been stuck to him like glue and had skinship even more than that, the Cha Jeonghan I knew would be swept up in such a huge shock right now that he couldn’t think anything.
“……”
“……”
The heaviest silence that had ever existed between us descended. It would be a lie to say I had no regret about wishing I hadn’t said it, but I also thought it was fortunate that I’d told him one of the various secrets I’d made.
“…Then you being sick the next day, leaving home like that… distinguishing between public and private matters, treating me like we’d grown distant, all of that… was it because of that?”
“It’s true it was because of that… but that’s not the whole reason.”
“To you, ah…. I’m really going crazy. I shouldn’t be asking you this kind of thing right now, but I don’t remember exactly. That day I did such an absurd thing to you…. I have no face to show you. Not even knowing that, I wondered why you were suddenly acting like this…. What else happened that day? What did I do to you.”
The more I heard Cha Jeonghan’s all-too-natural reaction, the more I thought I really shouldn’t torture him anymore. My love, my long love that I thought had done nothing wrong, was shaking our relationship and tormenting Cha Jeonghan. My heart that had been quite solid crumbled like a fool at his face that had turned pale because of the secret I’d made and at Cha Jeonghan’s voice pouring out full of apology in his shocked state.
“…We promised to tell each other everything…. There’s something I couldn’t tell you. I tried not to, but not being able to say one thing kept creating secrets.”
“……”
For 13 years, I had to say words I’d never once voiced aloud toward Cha Jeonghan. Even though thoughts can’t be heard so it’s fine to think them as much as I want, it was so surreal that I had to voice those words that I’d tried to suppress the whole time, feeling sorry even for those thoughts.
“Jeonghan-ah.”
“Yeah.”
“…I.”
“……”
I’d never held the word love before Cha Jeonghan as words directed at him, so the sound didn’t come out easily. Like someone who hadn’t learned the word love, I just held in my mouth the very sweet and also very bitter words lingering on the tip of my tongue, unable to spit them out or swallow them.
“Yuhyeon-ah. Tell me everything. I should naturally know. What on earth did I do to you.”
“…I love you.”
“Huh…?”
“…I love you.”
The words that had been hiding for too long and couldn’t cross the threshold of my lips stumbled over that boundary. It was a sound neither too small nor too large. The love I’d clearly spoken still remained on my lips.
“……”
“……”
Cha Jeonghan just quietly looked at me. In his looking eyes were emotions that couldn’t be expressed in words, all mixed together. Shock and surprise, bewilderment, denial…. I felt like I’d face a sense of betrayal in his emotions, so I quickly lowered my gaze.
“Yuhyeon-ah. You right now……”
“…I’m sorry.”
“Now you’re sorry? I really don’t understand what you’re saying right now. Say it again clearly. So I can understand.”
“I… love you, Jeonghan-ah.”
“……”
“I hoped you wouldn’t know. Until the end… I wanted to stay with you for a long, long time as a good friend without saying it. I thought I could do that. This is after all a one-sided emotion that only I have, so I just… if only I did well, that would be enough, right. So I thought I could do well. They say even between friends, if you’re too close and intimate, you can have those kinds of feelings, and I thought after some time passes, I’d just think ‘I was like that back then’… I thought I could get past it like that.”
Seeing Cha Jeonghan’s hardened face scared me. I didn’t know what I was saying right now, and I didn’t know what I should do. I’d expected this to some degree, but thought and reality were too different. Reality was much more frightening than my expectations.
“But… it’s not working well anymore….”
“……”
“…I like you so much….”
“……”
“I keep wanting things from you….”
I learned for the first time that being able to tell the person you love that you love them, that you like them so much, could be such a selfishly joyful thing. I know that my first confession in life is destroying everything, but still, I was so selfishly, truly happy.
“I must have really gone crazy…. I feel like I can live now. I’m so… happy to have told you.”
I was so happy to have told Cha Jeonghan about my love, but I was also so sad thinking it was really all over now. I was so happy, and also so hurt that tears came flooding out. I had no strength to hold them back, so I cried like a fool in front of Cha Jeonghan.
“…If you’re happy, why are you crying.”
“I was… deceiving you. Creating secrets alone, hiding all my emotions… I’m so… terrible for relieving myself by telling you like this.”
“……”
“I’m sorry…. I’m sorry, Jeonghan-ah…. Sorry for deceiving you…. I shouldn’t do this to you….”
“Don’t cry. Even if you cry, I’m so out of it right now that I can’t do anything, so don’t cry.”
I pressed my lips tightly shut trying not to cry, but my chin and lips kept trembling. Even trying not to cry, tears kept flowing down my cheeks. Not wanting to show him such a sight, I lowered my head. Tears dripped onto my pants that were wrinkled from gripping them tightly.
“…I really wanted to stay together for a long, long time as a good friend….”
“……”
“I even promised you I wouldn’t betray you….”
“……”
“I’m sorry… for not keeping my promise.”
“……”
I got up from in front of him, whose very existence I must have made uncomfortable, and left the room. Knowing with what heart Cha Jeonghan had brought me here, my footsteps leaving alone after ruining everything were heavy. I was scared and hurt to see his hardened face, so I was still so terrible, leaving alone as if running away.
I bowed to the staff member opening the elevator door without being able to lift my head and watched the closing door. Strength kept draining from my legs, so I held onto the safety bar attached to the wall and closed my eyes, dizzy. I kept feeling nauseous, hating myself for throwing a bomb at Cha Jeonghan and running away here alone trying to save only myself. If I could, I wanted to vomit out all of this terribleness and duplicity of mine.
