The Reason I Like You
After that tumultuous day, the final exams passed by in a blur. With everything that had happened, the tests themselves felt almost trivial. Above all, the most terrifying item on the schedule still lay ahead.
“Unni, a monokini would look amazing on you.”
“Eek… That’s way too much…”
“No way, Unni. With a body like yours, you’re seriously going to wear a full-coverage swimsuit?”
Right. The dreaded swimsuit shopping for our beach trip.
“Arang, what are you going to wear?”
“Something with zero skin showing.”
“…Even a rash guard?”
“That works.”
I don’t see why I should have to show my bare skin to other people.
“Oh my god. In that case, hand over that body and skin!”
“Take it if you can.”
Half of that was sincere. Honestly, these lumps of fat were seriously inconvenient.
“No way! I’m picking the swimsuits for both of you!”
“Why do you get to decide?”
“Don’t you want to show Maru oppa something pretty?”
“…Why is Maru suddenly part of this?”
I should have said, Why do I have to show him anything? but…
“…”
“I’ll take that as agreement~.”
I couldn’t argue. If I wore a swimsuit, he would obviously see it. Since it was a rare beach trip, I might as well pick something nice. While I was lost in thought, she had already moved on to pressuring Unni.
“What are you thinking about now?”
“Nothing.”
Then Maru showed up. Even though I had dragged him along and he’d claimed he would just stay tucked in a corner, he was wandering around comfortably. Was he used to being around women? It had definitely been his first time back then too, so maybe because of me… No. Better not think about it.
“Ahem… Is there a swimsuit you want to see?”
“A string bikini.”
“…”
This guy was too honest. Maybe I should hit him with a golden axe.
“Kidding. You should wear whatever’s comfortable.”
“That’s the hardest order you could give.”
“You look pretty in anything.”
How could he say something like that so effortlessly?
“Aren’t you buying a swimsuit? I told you I’d get it for you.”
“I already bought one. It’s not like they cost that much.”
“That’s not money you earned yourself. Spend it more carefully.”
“If we’re keeping score, isn’t the money you’re using money I didn’t earn either?”
If he was just going to buy it, I could have said thank you and accepted. Why did he have to make it so complicated? Since he knew who I really was, he had to know how much money I had.
“Arang! Try this one…”
“Yeah. Thanks.”
“…?”
We had been chatting casually when Kim Chaeeun brought over a swimsuit. Slightly sulking, I took it from her.
“Haaa…”
It looked like a normal conversation, but I was actually pretty tense. Ever since I’d cried openly in front of him that day, facing him properly had become a little difficult. So I didn’t even check the suit before taking it and stepping into the fitting room.
“I’ll just change… Huh?”
Wait. This is…?!
***
“Oppa, did something happen with Arang?”
With clear suspicion, I glared at Cheon Maru, the guy who was a year older than me. I’d expected him to deny it, but he admitted it surprisingly easily.
“Yeah, a few things happened.”
“What exactly?”
“It’s a national secret.”
National secret, my ass. Just say it’s a secret.
“You didn’t fight, right?”
“Nope.”
“Was it a good thing or a bad thing? Just tell me that much.”
“Both. A lot went down.”
It didn’t seem like he’d say more no matter how much I asked. I decided to change the subject.
“But why did you come all the way here? Were you actually trying to watch girls pick out swimsuits?”
“Arang dragged me here, remember?”
“Still, if you’d said you didn’t want to… Arang?”
“Yeah. Arang. Why?”
“You called her by name? You used to avoid her name or add her last name.”
Now that he mentioned it, Arang hadn’t used his last name either. Something really must have happened between them. I was dying to know.
“…Please take good care of Arang.”
“Out of nowhere?”
I’d always sensed something strange in the air between them, but watching them grow closer lately left me with complicated feelings. Arang kept denying it, but whenever she saw Maru oppa her eyes would change and her voice would lift a little. Above all, the way she arrived first at every study session so they could hang out together made it impossible to deny.
“Arang was supposed to be mine…”
“She says she doesn’t like me. She told me herself.”
“And you seriously believe that?”
Then your radar is completely broken. Honestly, these days it looked like honey was dripping from Arang’s eyes every time she looked at him.
“For now, that’s what she says.”
“Sigh… Anyway, please really look after her.”
“But can I ask you something?”
“What?”
“Why do you take care of Arang so much? From what I hear, you haven’t even known each other for half a year.”
There wasn’t any grand reason. From the very beginning, my eyes had kept drifting toward her. Her looks that glasses couldn’t hide and that pure aura. I had simply approached her, drawn by that charm.
But we clicked better than I expected, and it was fun. A person whose outside was beautiful and whose inside was even more beautiful. That’s why I looked after her. Not just because she was pretty, but because the person named Baek Arang was genuinely captivating.
“Arang takes care of me too, so I take care of her. If no one pays attention to her, she’ll never take care of herself.”
“That’s true.”
“What about you, oppa? Why do you like Arang?”
“I don’t remember saying I like her.”
“Stop with the obvious lie.”
This oppa had just as much honey dripping from his eyes as Arang did. Where did he get off lying?
“Hmm…”
After a brief moment of thought, he gave his answer.
“Because she looks anxious.”
“…Pardon?”
“How should I put it… She’s definitely strong, but she also looks exhausted. Like if no one helps her, she’ll collapse without a sound and just disappear.”
***
The first impression had clearly not been great. She was rough and fierce. Our proper first meeting had been her suddenly threatening me.
But as we spent time together, I saw many different sides of her. The powerful strength paired with eyes that looked somehow weary. The gaze that sought affection even from the person she was threatening.
She was stronger than me, yet I wanted to protect her. That mixture of strength and fragility looked so anxious. So I approached her first, doing my best to ignore my initial fear.
-If you keep eating only delivery food, won’t your stomach get ruined?-
-What could you possibly be lacking to say something like that?-
Once we grew close, she turned out to be an even better person than I’d thought. Someone who liked taking care of others. A little gruff on the surface, but deeply warm inside.
“So I wanted to get closer. I wanted to know more about Arang.”
The more I learned about her, the more captivating she became. Good at cooking, fond of children, incredibly shy, and always ready with a prank. A person who was practically made of charm.
“As you know, she’s incredibly kind. Arang is hard to get close to, but once you do, she takes care of you like crazy. How many people in this world still look at others with pure eyes?”
“You’re right. The world these days is pretty cold.”
It was a world that judged people by wealth and status. If word got out that Baekwol had threatened an awakened she happened to meet? Most citizens in Korea would hunt down the awakened who’d been threatened and try to kill him, assuming he must have done something wrong first. After the X-rank gate and the North Korean monster incident, Baekwol held an almost divine position.
“That was what I found charming. The way she made you want to protect her. And the way she looked at people with pure eyes.”
Even so, she carried guilt over the fact that she had threatened me. She felt sorry toward someone she could crush at any time with authority or power. It was proof that she could see people as people, without judging them by money or position.
-Do you think you’re on the same level as me? At your level?-
Because she knew people who discarded others based on money and family background, she shone even brighter. Arang would judge me after seeing the life I had lived. If she rejected me, I thought I would be able to accept that it had been my own fault.
“That’s unexpected.”
“What is?”
“I thought you were a bit of a shallow person, oppa.”
“That’s harsh.”
Where would you find someone more serious than me?
“How should I say it… You seem used to women? You always look so relaxed when dealing with them.”
“Well, I did have a girlfriend once. Only once, though.”
She was someone I didn’t even want to remember anymore. But the bigger influence was probably my older sister and younger sister.
“But isn’t this taking too long?”
“Yeah. Does she not know how to put it on?”
“Just what kind of swimsuit did you give her?”
“A black string bikini.”
“?”
Hadn’t she said she wanted to take care of her? Yet she completely ignored the person’s own opinion? Arang had clearly said she hated showing skin.
“I was just planning to tease her a little… Arang’s face turns bright red the moment anything slightly naughty comes up.”
“And she just took it inside without checking?”
“Yes. She didn’t even look at it.”
“You repaid trust with betrayal. Then why don’t you go in and check? She might be struggling.”
“That’s… Huh? She’s coming out.”
She poked her head out from the fitting room. Looked like she had managed to put it on.
“What’s wrong? Is there a problem?”
“No, um… Is it okay to come out wearing this?”
“It’s fine here. Check yourself in the full-length mirror.”
She stepped out of the fitting room with slightly awkward, timid movements. The moment I saw her, I forgot how to breathe.
