Chapter 48
“……Ouch.”
Stare─.
“……Seol-ah. Seol-ah?”
Staaare──.
“Hey, Baek Seol-ah!”
“……Huh.”
Having stared blankly into empty space for a long while, Baek Seol-ah responded to the person calling her—not half a beat or one beat late, but three beats late.
The Class A classroom was relatively quiet in the early morning, with an hour still remaining until class began.
Baek Seol-ah had simply sat there with her chin propped in her hand, staring out the window the whole time, before turning her head.
Then she gave an awkward smile to the female student standing beside her with her arms folded and an annoyed look on her face.
“Ah……. Sorry, Eun-bi. Um, what were you saying?”
“……You, seriously.”
The girl’s distinctive dark-navy bob swayed lightly with the movement of her head.
Her gaze, as she stood beside the desk and looked intently down at Baek Seol-ah, was filled with displeasure.
“What could you possibly be thinking about so hard that you couldn’t even hear me calling you? Why have you gotten so spacey?”
“W-what do you mean, spacey? You’re being awfully harsh just because I lost focus for a moment.”
“Oh, really? Do you know how many times I called you?”
A female student in the same Class A, and someone with whom Baek Seol-ah had maintained an unusually long-standing connection at Cheongwoon Academy. Her name was Yoo Eun-bi.
Their parents had known each other from early on, so they had been acquainted since childhood; put simply, they were something like childhood friends.
Baek Seol-ah flinched at Yoo Eun-bi’s narrowed, bluish eyes and answered timidly.
“……Uh, ahaha. Sorry.”
“Forget the apology. What were you so lost in thought about?”
But Baek Seol-ah couldn’t just give an answer to Yoo Eun-bi’s added prodding.
Baek Seol-ah flinched again and let her eyes dart around, naturally causing Yoo Eun-bi’s gaze to sharpen as well.
As if she absolutely had to hear the story, she smacked Baek Seol-ah’s desk with a ‘Thump!’ and leaned forward.
“I usually try not to meddle where I’m not wanted, but this is getting ridiculous. You’re going to keep your mouth shut until the very end if I don’t interrogate you, aren’t you?”
“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about…….”
“Han Taeyang.”
“…….”
Baek Seol-ah’s attempt to play dumb until the very end quickly failed.
Naturally, that was because of the name of a male student Yoo Eun-bi uttered the very next moment.
Baek Seol-ah’s expression visibly stiffened, and upon seeing that reaction, Yoo Eun-bi snorted and continued as though she had expected exactly that.
“See? Your expression changed just from me mentioning three syllables. Do you still not know what I’m talking about?”
“…….”
“Even if you look at me with such a troubled expression, I’m not letting you off today. I’ve waited long enough.”
“……Ugh.”
Baek Seol-ah briefly tried to draw out sympathy with a pitiful look. But even that was meaningless.
Had she been dealing with a male student, perhaps it would have worked, but Yoo Eun-bi was someone bound to her by a relationship spanning more than ten years.
An emotional appeal wouldn’t work on someone like this.
Baek Seol-ah ruefully knit her brows and let out a small groan.
Around then, Yoo Eun-bi also seemed to realize the conversation would take a while, so she dragged over the chair from the desk in front of Baek Seol-ah and plopped down opposite her.
Baek Seol-ah looked crestfallen at that aggressive attitude, her discomfort plainly evident.
“Come on, spill everything. You little brat. What on earth happened over these past few months?”
Yoo Eun-bi didn’t back down easily, either. Her eyes were sharp, and the emotion within them was unmistakably concern for Baek Seol-ah.
She had seen enough as both her classmate and a friend who had known her since childhood.
Until last year, Baek Seol-ah had clearly been enjoying a sweet relationship without any major conflicts.
Yoo Eun-bi knew how much she liked Lee Hyeonseong, and how much Lee Hyeonseong liked her.
That was precisely why, naturally…… she couldn’t make sense of what she had been seeing over the past few months.
‘There definitely seems to be something going on beneath the surface.’
Yoo Eun-bi’s expression grew even more serious. As mentioned earlier, she had intended to wait as a friend until Baek Seol-ah opened her mouth first.
But she couldn’t do that anymore. Her patience had run out. Today’s sight had finally made the decision for her.
First of all, there were several possibilities worth considering from a third party’s perspective.
Generally speaking, one of them was far more likely than the others.
Most likely, it was Baek Seol-ah’s affair─. In other words, she had cheated by choosing Han Taeyang over Lee Hyeonseong.
But Yoo Eun-bi prided herself on knowing Baek Seol-ah—the girl in question—as well as her boyfriend did.
‘Cheating, my ass.’
No matter what rumors circulated around school or what idiots hiding behind the anonymity of online communities said about her, Yoo Eun-bi didn’t waver.
She had personally seen Baek Seol-ah and Han Taeyang spending plenty of time close together, so she didn’t think the rumors were entirely baseless.
But she went a step further and guessed that there had to be some hidden circumstance the others didn’t know about.
Baek Seol-ah simply wasn’t the kind of person who could bear the guilt of cheating entirely by her own choice.
That was why she was going at her like this, intent on hearing the story directly from the person involved.
Because she firmly believed that only by hearing the circumstances straight from Baek Seol-ah could she make a proper judgment.
“You’ll tell me, right? Seol-ah.”
Yoo Eun-bi smiled at her, thinking that given the history between her and Baek Seol-ah, surely she could confide even things she couldn’t tell other people.
“……I’m sorry, Eun-bi. This one thing, I can’t tell you. Not even you.”
“……”
And unfortunately.
Crack-
With that smile still on her face, Yoo Eun-bi froze like a statue as she felt the years they had built together, and their trust, collapse.
*****
Giving Yoo Eun-bi a guilty sidelong glance as she left the classroom looking deeply wounded,
‘I’m really sorry, Eun-bi. I believe the day will come when you’ll understand.’
Even so, Baek Seol-ah didn’t regret her choice and let out a long, stifled sigh.
It would have been a lie to say that Yoo Eun-bi’s pressing hadn’t secretly made her want to reveal the secret.
From Baek Seol-ah’s perspective, there were few acquaintances she could trust as much as Yoo Eun-bi, and until now, they had always been each other’s first choice when they needed advice.
But this time, she couldn’t receive Yoo Eun-bi’s help, no matter how much her heart wavered.
Baek Seol-ah squeezed her eyes shut and recited inwardly the fundamental reason she had made this decision.
‘……Even so, I can’t turn you into a murderer, Eun-bi. Right?’
It was a thought that might seem quite grim, or even like she was taking things too far.
But Baek Seol-ah was sincere. She slowly opened her eyes and shivered at the eerie chill that ran through her.
What if, by some chance, she confessed to Yoo Eun-bi about the NTR scenario involving Lee Hyeonseong and Han Taeyang?
She knew it for certain. She could stake her life on it.
Lee Hyeonseong would be murdered by Yoo Eun-bi that very day…….
At the very least, he would end up in the intensive care unit.
Asking your girlfriend to let another man hold her was that insane.
Just as Baek Seol-ah cherished Yoo Eun-bi as a friend, the same held true in reverse.
No, one could even say it was more than that. Put simply, in the friendship between the two girls, Yoo Eun-bi usually played the role of the ‘mother,’ while Baek Seol-ah played the role of the ‘daughter.’
“Haa.”
Baek Seol-ah pressed a hand to her chest and let out another deep sigh, troubled and conflicted.
Did Lee Hyeonseong know that she had protected him with such self-sacrificing resolve?
‘……Well, the real problem is something else, though…….’
Baek Seol-ah’s wistful golden gaze turned toward the window once more.
The early morning sky was truly blue and clear.
Whether she agonized over the ‘emotion’ she had only just realized and the guilt that came with it,
or fretted over Han Taeyang and then agonized all over again when thinking about Lee Hyeonseong─.
The sky remained bright and cloudless.
As if it knew nothing of what was going on inside Baek Seol-ah.
*****
And Baek Seol-ah had no idea.
“Shh, be quiet.”
“……Mm.”
“You know what happens if you scream, right? You’ll be stabbed straight through.”
She didn’t know that the silence she had stubbornly maintained in order to save Lee Hyeonseong’s life had ultimately brought about the exact same result, merely with a different target.
‘What the fuck.’
It was an ordinary, peaceful Monday morning walk to school, just like always.
Han Taeyang was drenched in cold sweat and had no choice but to put his hands up at the sharp point he felt against his back.
One of the countless paths across campus, before he had even reached the main building.
He had just been strolling along that path, leisurely yawning, when─.
Suddenly, a shadow rippled up from beneath his feet, and a figure sprang out of it.
And on top of that, the moment he was caught from behind with knife-like precision, something sharp was thrust against his back…….
It was probably a dagger. Han Taeyang knew whose signature technique this approach through shadows was.
Even so, he couldn’t exactly hide his stunned look.
He awkwardly glanced back and asked.
“……So, have I ever done anything to you that warrants getting stabbed? Yoo Eun-bi.”
“…….”
Although no answer came back, it was obviously not a reassuring response.
Though he had put it that way, Han Taeyang himself knew better than anyone.
Something worthy of getting stabbed by ‘that’ Yoo Eun-bi, Baek Seol-ah’s longtime acquaintance and best friend?
‘Fuck, what is this.’
In reality, there couldn’t be just one or two such things.
Strictly speaking, the fact that he had no way of knowing exactly which one she had caught him for was what made Han Taeyang most anxious at that moment. Sadly.