“No matter how much she started hanging out with Leda’s group, there must be comfort that only an old friend can give. I’m too confused inside right now…… Can I ask you a favor instead?”
“Yeah, I’m confused too but you must be much more so. Leave Sophia to me. I’ll probably be pushed aside by Leda and stand there like a decoration though.”
Virgil hurriedly left to find Sophia, and I wandered around for a bit then entered Leda’s beach house. But there was no one in the beach house living room.
Where are you?
When I asked for his location via DM, Liam killed time by writing and erasing messages for a long time. Then he belatedly informed me that he was in a room located on the second floor. I deliberately walked slowly toward where Liam was, and before he could say anything upon seeing me, I opened my mouth first.
“……Did I do something wrong?”
“What did you do wrong?”
“Telling you to act like yourself. I’m thinking that if I hadn’t said such things, it wouldn’t have come to this.”
“That would have been the case for now.”
Liam answered ambiguously and held out his hand. It seems like he wants me to hold it, but I just looked at it without readily holding it.
“Are you disappointed in me?”
“Honestly, quite a lot. Because you went there after hearing what I said. To Alice.”
Saying that, I borrowed the words Virgil said earlier and told Liam.
“I know that most people in the world are in between completely good or bad people. You must be like that too. Until now I thought you were a completely good person, but that was simply my misunderstanding, and this incident just revealed your hidden bad parts. That’s what I think with my head. But I think the way people get along is, if they can tolerate each other’s bad parts they get along, and if not, they don’t. But if you’re someone who can hurt other people or use their hearts and be nonchalant about it…… I don’t think I can handle you.”
“……Right.”
While swallowing rising tears in a very small voice, Liam spoke.
“Huh?”
“You’re in the way.”
Looking at me with eyes rapidly reddened from tears, Liam said.
**Episode 5+**
From around the time I started seeing Cheick until now, Alice has done an excellent job being in the way. So even now I don’t feel sorry for her.
I just feel regret.
For using Sophia like a chess piece to screw over Alice just because of things like openly talking about selling meal tickets or hearing words like ‘pathetic.’
Of course, if the result hadn’t been this bad, I wouldn’t have regretted it. Whether it’s Alice or Sophia, I don’t really want to care whether their hearts get hurt or not.
I hate Alice Miller. Even before I liked Cheick, I didn’t like her. It’s a kind of self-hatred, but she absolutely never lets go of someone she has a grudge against. Moreover, when she retaliates, rather than solving it simply with fists like Aiden, she uses much more cunning methods.
Sophia Hernandez is also a difficult person to have goodwill toward. She’s kind and has a good heart, but it’s burdensome that she writes a diary about me, and above all I hate the affection Cheick shows only to her.
“Whether Alice intended it or not, she interferes with my business. Sophia’s very existence touches your guilt. So she’s in the way.”
“……”
Cheick didn’t answer anything to my words. The way he’s been looking at me is unfamiliar. So unfamiliar and I can’t adjust to it, I want to cry.
“Won’t you hold my hand?”
When I asked while waving my hand as if begging, Cheick tried to reach out his hand but returned it to its original position. Then he said the people I should be talking with right now are Sophia or Alice, not him. No. I have nothing to say to them, nothing I want to say.
After pleading with Cheick not to leave for now, I confessed everything about that day. That I told Alice I asked to raise the price of meal tickets I sold to Olivia because I honestly couldn’t reveal what I said to her, that it’s true I sometimes complain about wanting to raise the price I sell meal tickets to Olivia for, that I didn’t feel good when Alice called that pathetic…….
“You know, I really get unnecessarily angry when someone calls me pathetic when I’m so poor.”
“Right…… But even considering that, you were too much. You even dragged in innocent Sophia.”
“Is Sophia really innocent?”
I questioned Cheick and recited Sophia’s sins one after another.
“After becoming close with Leda and other kids, you’re not even on her radar, and whenever she gets a chance she acts coy and schemes toward me, but you keep treasuring and trying to protect her as if she’s something special. That’s why I hate it. Yeah, I really hate her. Since you and Leda like her I tried to hold back my words, but honestly, that’s the truth.”
“Liam.”
“And Sophia is the biggest risk factor to me. What if you try to protect her and want to break up with me? I sometimes worry about that.”
“You’re making excuses using your emotions as a shield right now. Whatever emotions you feel toward them, what you did wrong doesn’t change. So……”
When I said I’d apologize if you tell me to, Cheick’s expression hardened even more coldly.
“I’m not telling you to apologize for me. You, can’t you feel even a bit of guilt about this?”
“It doesn’t seem like the time to lie right now, so I’ll be honest. I don’t feel it at all. I just regret that I shouldn’t have done such a thing because you’re disappointed in me.”
“You……”
“Please Cheick, I’ll do whatever you say, so please just hold my hand. If you don’t, I think I’ll go crazy from anxiety.”
I held out my hand for the third time already, but Cheick didn’t hold my hand this time either. He just said his head hurt so much it felt like it would split, painfully.
“I’m not a perfect person at all. I’m disappointed in you or…… I doubt I’m qualified to say such things. But still…… Right, this isn’t disappointment. I’m scared of you. I think one of the basic humanities that should be there, in my opinion, is missing in you.”
Cheick said he had things to do first and needed time to organize his thoughts alone, and tried to leave with such reasons. My heart urgent, I immediately grabbed and pulled his arm.
“Please, please, Cheick…… You can have time alone as much as you want, but please don’t say let’s break up. Promise just that here and go.”
“Sorry, in my current state I don’t think I can promise you anything.”
Cheick said that and tried to touch my cheek but withdrew his hand. Then he shook off my hand and went out of the room. Only after a long time had passed since he left could I realize that I had been crying like crazy the entire time I was dealing with him.
**Episode 6**
Kingston, Jamaica.
The place where Mom and Dad were born and like a second hometown to me.
Since this World Athletics U20 Championships was being held here, I wanted to achieve better results. I wanted to win a shining medal in the place where Mom and Dad were born and return to make them proud. But I couldn’t do that.
Until today after returning from Leda’s beach house, I couldn’t exchange a single word with Liam. Because I avoided him.
Until right before leaving to prepare for the competition, Liam kept hovering around me. For the first while after the incident, he tried to at least greet me and start a conversation, but after I awkwardly pushed him away a few times, from some point on he just orbited around me like a satellite.
I told Liam to speak and act as his complete self, at least in front of me. Looking back now, that was a really arrogant proposal. So, I arbitrarily judged that the him not greatly different from the Liam Blake I knew was himself, and easily spat out such words.
To make an excuse for my reckless self, I didn’t know. I didn’t know Liam was a person outside the category I could embrace.
Jealousy, inferiority complex, anyone can be momentarily submerged in such emotions and make mistakes. If Liam had admitted his wrongdoing and truly felt remorse for committing a sin, I would have willingly comforted him. But he didn’t know how to feel remorse even after scratching others’ hearts, and I cannot embrace such a person.
I cannot embrace him. So I can’t see him anymore.
……That should be the conclusion, but I still think about Liam from that day. The appearance of him begging me to hold his hand while crying until his face was a mess. Thinking about that appearance, I couldn’t even obtain the glory in Kingston that I had so desperately wished for.
“Welcome back, Cheick. We’re proud just that you ran on the Kingston stage.”
“That’s right. There are plenty of opportunities in the future, so don’t be too disappointed.”
When I returned home, both Mom and Dad welcomed me so warmly that I almost burst into tears like a child, but I barely held back. After that, while resting in my room after showering, Virgil, who confirmed my return first, ran all the way here in one breath.
“I just checked the competition results. Even if the results didn’t meet expectations, don’t be too disappointed. Even the great Homer sometimes nods off. Rather than that, let’s go to Peggy’s Diner and eat the ice cream sundae you like. I’ll treat you specially.”
Virgil even quoted a proverb that didn’t suit my level to comfort me. To think I’d be compared to Homer. Living life brings such glory too. Anyway, ice cream sundae.
“No. Let’s just stay here.”
“Why? Let’s go out and change your mood. Right, how about Randy’s? You like the donuts there.”
“……I don’t really want to eat sweet food today.”
Peggy’s Diner followed by Randy’s. Why does Virgil want to go there among all those places?
After things went wrong with Liam, I didn’t go to Peggy’s Diner or Randy’s. Just thinking about the ice cream sundae or pink donuts there makes me feel too strange.
For a while, Virgil proposed all sorts of things to me. Strangely, all of them reminded me of Liam. Virgil just suggested doing things I like, but it was my fault for unnecessarily connecting Liam to them.
“If it’s too painful, how about just forgiving Liam?”
When I refused his suggestions in succession, Virgil cautiously asked while watching my reaction.
