Worse Than Strangers (7)
The next day, Seoa didn't come to school either.
She must have been really sick. I had no idea whether she'd even taken the medicine I'd bought for her.
I was sitting there with those ordinary, human concerns — the kind of worry that comes from basic decency — when it hit me.
I'd been feeling it since yesterday. Why did Seoa's friends keep looking at me so strangely?
By now they were staring at me like I was some kind of villain.
Even when I tried not to notice, I could feel their eyes on me. Maybe they wanted me to feel it.
They whispered openly right nearby. They glared at me without even trying to hide it.
And before long, those whispers started reaching my ears.
No — it almost felt like they wanted me to hear. The voices were too loud to be real whispering.
"I never would have thought… He called Seoa a slut for seeing a guy, and then he went out drinking with some other girl and made a total scene."
"For real? He did that? Absolute legend…"
"Acting all innocent by himself…"
"Isn't that why Seoa's not coming to school?"
"I don't know. Apparently he treated Seoa like a whore."
"He said that? Even to a friend, that's pretty harsh, isn't it?"
"Yeah, 'slut' is a bit much. And then he goes drinking with some other girl? Doesn't that make him a slut too?"
"If someone said that to me, I wouldn't be able to show my face at school either. How is she supposed to sit through class with him after hearing that?"
This had to be a joke.
What I'd just heard.
This had to be a joke, right?
Why were they suddenly looking at me like that?
Could they stop staring at me with that contemptuous expression?
Because the things they'd been whispering were starting to feel real.
I wished they wouldn't look at me like I was garbage.
It felt like they were shredding the part of me that desperately wanted to laugh it off — to tell myself I'd misheard, that it was just a cruel prank.
Since when had they started looking at me that way?
They didn't know me. They didn't know a thing about me.
How could they look at me like that when they knew nothing?
Those words they'd just spat out… were they really talking about me?
I was reeling.
As I sat there alone, turning it over in my head, the kids' voices started to sound like they were ringing, echoing. The same words seemed to loop over and over, then suddenly cut like a sharp noise.
I couldn't tell what to focus on. A nasty, tingling sensation started between my eyebrows, and I could barely keep my eyes focused.
It felt like I'd fallen into a dark space all by myself.
Then one of them walked up and spoke to me, and I managed to pull free of that strange feeling.
It was like a balloon popping right next to my ear — and then my mind snapped back into place.
What pushed its way into my slowly blurring vision was one of Seoa's friends.
I'd seen her face a few times, so I recognized her.
"Minjae… it's not true, right? Honestly, I just can't believe it…"
Surely she hadn't come over with bad intentions. I knew that much.
Maybe she really was asking because she didn't think I was that kind of person.
But I was in no condition to take it kindly.
If anything… it felt like she was trying to finish me off. Like she was trying to kill me, cruelly and completely.
Yeah. Right then, it felt like everyone had turned their backs on me.
That question she'd asked, pretending to be so pure, looked like she wanted me to nail the rumor shut with my own mouth — to confirm as fact the story that had only been gossip until now.
Vicious bitches.
Every last one of them the same.
Was this how women worked? Getting swept up so easily in someone else's story, deciding things however they liked without even checking whether it was true?
Fuck… even if I said it wasn't true, would they just believe me?
Right. Seoa's friends were all exactly like her — birds of a feather.
Even if I told the truth right here, they'd just decide I was lying to their faces, shamelessly.
It was obvious.
You people only ever listen to Seoa's side of the story.
You never cared whether the rumor was true in the first place. The rumor itself was just entertainment.
"Think whatever you want."
I forced the words out through clenched teeth.
At first I'd considered explaining myself. I'd almost started groveling, laying everything out, trying to clear my name.
But I couldn't.
Why?
Because Han Seoa — that vicious bitch — had built a rumor that, on the surface, was entirely true.
The starting point was that Seoa had started seeing a guy and I'd gotten jealous. That much was right.
And it was also true that I'd gone drinking with Sebin noona.
If you looked at it that way, nothing they'd said was completely wrong.
Of course, I'd never called her a slut. I'd never treated her that way either.
That was the only part that was completely false.
And even that was enough to choke the breath out of me.
Because even I didn't have the confidence to explain it properly.
How was someone like me supposed to convince these people? I couldn't even convince myself.
I couldn't stay there any longer, so I just walked out of the lecture hall.
Of course I did. Who would want to sit there listening to that kind of whispering?
It was revolting.
It made me sick.
Nausea rose in my throat.
My stomach twisted like I'd eaten something that wouldn't go down.
Fine. Good riddance. I'd never managed to find a group for this class anyway, and the professor had been stuck dealing with it.
I'd been uncomfortable too. I'd been irritated. So fine.
Just… quit.
Honestly, what did it matter? Dropping one class wouldn't kill me.
No… just drop everything.
I couldn't do this anymore.
It wasn't just this class. Because I'd matched my schedule to Seoa's, I was going to keep dealing with this forever.
I didn't have it in me to endure that.
Han Seoa. Fine. You win.
Spreading a rumor like this meant you couldn't even stand the sight of me walking around campus like nothing was wrong. It meant stay the hell out of my face.
Fine. If that's what you wanted, you win.
Just like you hoped — I can't come here anymore either.
Still reeling, I fled the school and ran home like I was escaping something.
I thought I was going to lose my mind.
I couldn't calm down. My hands were shaking, and my heart was hammering so hard I couldn't settle.
I tried to steady myself with deep breaths.
But even the air I drew in deep and tried to push back out through my nose wouldn't come out straight — my chest was trembling too hard.
Anger?
I couldn't even feel anger. The shock was too big, the disorientation too overwhelming, for anger to fit.
The unfairness of it was driving me insane. More than angry, I was just sad.
I hated people.
I hated Han Seoa.
Not with hatred, exactly… it was just so sad that she would go this far.
Had I really done something that wrong? Did Seoa hate me that much?
Without any say from me, my face crumpled on its own, and the tears came pouring out.
I must have been sobbing.
The harder I tried to shove it down, the louder it burst out.
Watching myself try to bottle it up was so pathetic that it only made me cry harder.
Fuck…
I'd even gone and bought her medicine because she said she was sick.
How could she do this to me?
And the rest of you — you don't even know any of that, so what gives you the right to run your mouths?
When I'd gone to drop off the medicine, standing outside her door, I'd even thought for a second that maybe we could still make up. What an idiot I'd been.
No — going to drop off the medicine at all made me an idiot.
Bringing up humanity and morality and all those fine words, getting swept up by whatever scraps of old affection were still left — that whole pathetic performance of mine was idiotic.
Do you not have a single scrap of that affection left for me?
Can't you even treat me like a person?
Was I that unbearable to look at?
Just because I said one thing to your boyfriend — was your childhood friend that disgusting to you?
What the hell kind of person are you, that you want me this miserable?
I cried for a long time.
A really long time.
Eventually I didn't even have the strength left to cry, so I lay on the bed and stared blankly at the ceiling.
I felt hollowed out.
How had it come to this?
The thought drifted through me.
It felt like I'd walked too far.
After that day, I'd thought there was nothing left that could exhaust me, nothing left to grieve, nothing left to get angry about.
And then another day like this showed up.
I'd finally started to feel like my life was moving again.
I'd finally felt clear-headed enough to smile at a happiness that felt real and whole.
It hurt.
I didn't think I could do anything anymore. That hollow, lifeless feeling started to take over.
I stared at the same old ceiling, opening and closing my eyes over and over.
Then the phone buried in the bedsheets vibrated.
Without moving my eyes, I groped around by feel until I found it.
A short buzz and then nothing — so not a call.
Found it.
I picked up the phone and checked the screen.
Ah… Sebin noona. Come to think of it, it had already been two days since I'd last shown up at the club.
I kept meaning to message her and kept forgetting.
I sent it.
Honestly, I wasn't sure I could keep the promise in that message. I had no confidence at all.
Still… I had to try. Sebin noona hadn't done anything wrong.
At the very least, I figured I should say a proper goodbye to her before I left school for good.
She was probably thinking I was strange too.
Right when she must have thought we'd gotten close — eating together, drinking together, even dropping the formal speech — I'd stopped showing up at the club starting the very next day.
She might even be worrying that she'd done something wrong and that was why I wasn't coming.
Or maybe I just looked like a weirdo.
I didn't want that to be the image of me she was left with. Even if I didn't go to class tomorrow, I would go to the club.
I made that resolution, then went back to opening and closing my eyes.
If I ran out of strength even for this meaningless little motion, I'd fall asleep.
I wanted to fall asleep like that.
Without making any special effort to sleep — just opening and closing my eyes until, without my noticing, they stayed shut and I drifted off.