Chapter 6
Chapter 6
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 6
Chapter Title: Sharing My Luck
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My high school sophomore year.
There was a girl named Do-yeon Woo in our class.
Do-yeon was beautiful.
She'd gone to a different middle school from me, but even kids at my school knew of her existence.
Some guys even signed up for the academy she attended just to see her.
"I'm in the same class as Do-yeon Woo now."
"Is she pretty?"
"Yeah. Fucking gorgeous."
Do-yeon came from a wealthy family too.
Her dad, with his neatly combed-back hair and luxury car, would often drop her off in front of the school in that ride.
Her uniform and shoes were always impeccable, and her belongings were brand new.
She was great at studying too, earning all the teachers' favoritism.
"Shall Do-yeon read the next sentence? Wow, her pronunciation is perfect. You lived in New Zealand as a kid, right?"
"Yeah, Do-yeon. You pick up the class materials."
The elderly male geography teacher openly favored her, giving errands to her over the class president.
The boys made excuses left and right just to talk to her, while some girls resented it.
That resentment peaked when the boys ranked the girls in our grade by looks, placing Do-yeon first.
"Do-yeon number one and Han Ji-su second? No way."
"Is Do-yeon even that pretty? I don't get it."
Shouldn't they be mad at the boys for ranking girls by looks? Why vent elsewhere?
To make excuses, it was because this was the past.
The kids hadn't updated their mindsets yet.
"I think Ji-su is prettier."
"Me too. Ji-su's got that pure, elegant beauty, while Do-yeon... honestly, kinda."
"There's a word for it, but I can't say it~?"
"Do-yeon's family is loaded. What if we get sued?"
That was definitely jealousy.
Do-yeon was pretty, smart, rich, and popular.
Ji-su was the same, but to tear down the utterly hateable Do-yeon, they needed Ji-su as the "her who's better."
Even so, it could have ended there.
Not all the girls had lost their minds to jealousy.
She could've just gotten trashed behind her back by a few and been done with it.
The problem was Do-yeon's personality—quite cold.
"Do-yeon, are these Sunnule? They're so pretty. Can I try them on just once?"
"No."
"Huh?"
"I said no. If you want to wear them, buy your own."
"...What a bitch! Treating me like trash."
"Heh... Why try to wear someone else's shoes then?"
"Ugh, I was just curious and asked!"
The boys who defended Do-yeon against some girls turned on her when she treated them just as coldly.
"Ungrateful."
"She needs to get hurt once to wise up."
That's how countless kids ended up resenting Do-yeon.
Then the rumors started.
"Hey, you know that thing about Do-yeon having no friends? Apparently, back in middle school, she went to Neverland alone with her friend's boyfriend and got caught."
"Crazy?"
"Knew it. She seemed boy-crazy."
"Isn't she still like that? Pretending not to while going after guys..."
The rumor started as her seducing a friend's boyfriend but grew more elaborate.
A boy from her class in freshman year went to her house for a project evaluation, and she was lying on the bed patting the spot next to her.
She's dating the early-thirties history teacher who got married last year.
She screamed at him in crowded Yeouido Yunun-ro, "When the hell are you getting divorced?!"
I know.
All bullshit.
But as kids, we believed it.
"At this point, didn't she seduce the geography teacher first?"
"So geography and history fighting over Do-yeon?"
"Ugh, gross."
From then on, Do-yeon was the school's public enemy.
Whether she heard or not—no, like they wanted her to—they mocked and sneered at her openly.
Every time geography favored her in class or clueless history talked to her, the exchanged glances and silence among the kids.
So what was the end?
Do-yeon endured all the mockery and insults calmly until one day, she opened a classroom window and jumped.
Only then did the kids who'd trashed her pile letters on her desk saying "We miss our pretty Do-yeon," but...
Do-yeon never came back alive.
And now.
"Hey, Do-yeon. Share the secret? How to seduce old men. Maybe I can hook the geography teacher for test questions."
"Look at her pretending not to hear."
"She was in the nurse's office all morning, right? Comes for food despite being sick?"
"Bet it's not sickness. Date with geography left her hungry."
"Eww!"
"What are you thinking, pervert?"
"Pfft!"
"Hey, Do-yeon! Deaf or what?"
"Hey, hey!"
In the past, I ignored Do-yeon.
Poor family without money for workbooks, precarious grades amid kids with tutoring and academies, my crush on Seo Jae-kyeom... My head was exploding with my own issues,
and honestly, I was scared.
I didn't want to step up for Do-yeon, who wasn't even close to me, and become a target too.
It bothered me seeing her bullied, but I forgot it quick once I turned away.
I might've even laughed along once or twice when others joked about her.
But.
"After living to twenty-nine once, I get it."
Things that felt like the whole world back then?
They're nothing in hindsight.
Just two years later, in college, you lose touch with high school friends and live fine.
No one knows what you were like in high school unless you tell them.
This is really nothing.
Yet someone died over this nothing.
"Hey, Do-yeon, can't hear? Hey!"
"Damn, ignoring even after getting hit with walnut pastry."
"Hey, throw some kimchi, kimchi."
"Ugh, then I'd have to touch it with my hands."
"Just pick it with chopsticks and throw!"
"It's too far?"
Now that I've returned to the past, I'm happier than ever.
But this isn't because I did something great.
The regressor could've been Do-yeon or Jeong Eun-seong. Me winning was pure luck.
I just got luckier than Do-yeon.
If I'm enjoying a second chance because of luck, but Do-yeon can't, the world's too unfair.
So I'm doing what Do-yeon would've surely done for herself if she'd been the regressor.
Q. Didn't you say you'd just study?
A. I meant to... I really did.
I'm an adult now too—how could I sleep soundly ignoring that mess? My conscience wouldn't let me.
Lack of sleep kills studying anyway.
To study, you need a good atmosphere too.
How can you study when someone's singled out and tormented?
"Yeah, might as well share this luck I got. It doesn't wear out."
"Ji-su."
I turned to Ji-su, who stood beside me holding her tray with an anxious look.
"Sorry, can't eat together today. There's a spot next to Seo Jae-kyeom, so sit with him just this once."
Don't get splashed by fallout from being with me.
"Really sorry, I'll buy you chocolate milk after math?"
I headed to Do-yeon's table without waiting for a reply.
Thud.
In the quiet cafeteria, the sound of my tray hitting the table rang out loud.
The gang at the next table over, who had been giggling while picking up kimchi with chopsticks, shut up and stared at me.
I pulled out a chair casually and sat across from Do-yeon.
Do-yeon, who had been steadfastly eating, looked up at me.
"Kang Da-hye, what are you doing?"
Song Yeo-reum from the next table, who had been holding a walnut pastry to throw at Do-yeon, called out to me.
For reference, Song Yeo-reum was one of the few high school classmates I still remembered, even after forgetting most.
We went to the same middle school, and she'd been infamous as a bully since then.
The petty cash she'd shaken down from kids with "Just a thousand won," "Ten thousand won," "How much you got? No cash? Can't you withdraw from the ATM?" probably exceeded a million won.
In eighth grade, we were in the same class. When I said I had no money, she went "Really?" and patted my uniform skirt pocket.
To check if there were bills.
She once locked my foreign language high school friend in a janitor's closet and beat her, and asked me to help her cheat on an English test.
"Back then, I was really scared of you."
I glanced at her hair, styled with a curling iron plugged into the hand dryer outlet in the school bathroom, and her uniform with only the skirt properly worn.
"Hey, Kang Da-hye. What the hell are you doing?"
"...Sharing my luck."
"What?"
"Oh, might be bad luck for you."
"What bullshit... Kyaa!"
The red bean butter walnut pastry I threw landed perfectly in Song Yeo-reum's soup bowl. She screamed as broth splashed onto her hoodie.
I grinned at Do-yeon, whose eyes had widened.
With this luck, I'm happier than ever, so I want others to be too.