Won Seojin. (2)
"I'm planning to do this for real. I don't think I can write that."
Won Seojin's fingertips, which had been tapping the record sheet, went still.
I considered dressing it up. That we had to fill a certain number of sessions on paper, that a teacher would check. If I wanted an excuse, I could have found one easily enough.
But I didn't want to. Starting counseling on a foundation of lies was no different from writing the words No issues in the first place.
Won Seojin's brow twitched.
"......What?"
"I said I'm going to take this seriously. This counseling."
Strangely, I wasn't nervous. Once the decision was made, I actually felt lighter. Then again, I was the guy who'd gotten the problem kids in my class laughing about soccer within a month. There was no reason to get shaky over one old friend.
"It's not that you look fine, so I won't write anything. I don't know yet whether you've got a problem or not. I don't know a thing. Writing that you don't when I don't know is just a lie."
Silence settled over the room.
Won Seojin stared at me. The look that said she must have misheard shifted, before long, into one that asked if I meant it.
"Haa......"
At last she let out a long breath. She pushed herself up from the chair back, glanced once at the ceiling, then looked at me.
"Yeah. You were always like that."
"Like what."
"Once you say you're doing something, you never back down. That hasn't changed one bit."
I almost shot back that I'd never been like that, then shut my mouth. I wanted to deny it, but a few incidents came to mind.
Like the group project in eighth grade. The night before the presentation, all three of my teammates had gone dark, and I'd stayed up until morning doing their parts myself. I still remembered what Won Seojin had said the next day, after she'd heard about it, her face a picture of disbelief.
Your stubbornness is honestly something else.
The same thing she'd just said. Two years later, and the way she sized me up hadn't changed at all. It was funny, and it itched in a strange way.
Won Seojin dropped back into the chair, sinking even deeper than before.
"So. What now. You gonna listen to my problems or something?"
"Yeah. Whenever you want. As much as you want."
"......Ha. Unbelievable."
The tone was sarcastic. Strangely, it didn't bother me.
It was because of that you were always like that. It meant she remembered who I'd been two years ago. Not the haircut or the surface stuff — who I actually was. It was also proof that the old memories were still sitting there, intact, inside this Won Seojin whose appearance had been completely overturned.
"But why go that far. It's not like you get anything out of it."
"I get plenty."
I folded my fingers down one by one as I counted.
"It goes on my student record. The key to this counseling room is mine. I'm exempt from turning in my phone. The school promised to cover for most incidents, and later they'll even write me recommendation letters from the principal and the vice principal."
"......Wow. You really milked them."
"Right? I was surprised when I counted it out myself."
Won Seojin looked at me like I was ridiculous. I shrugged and went on.
"But leaving all that aside."
"What."
"I can't stop thinking about you. I couldn't just let it slide."
Won Seojin's mouth closed. She glared at me for a few seconds, then her gaze snapped away toward the window.
"......What are you even saying. Seriously."
The end of her voice wavered, just a little, unlike before.
......No. That isn't what matters right now.
I pulled myself together.
Be honest. Up until a moment ago, I'd been kidding myself. That we already had rapport because we knew each other. That I was starting from an advantage.
Wrong.
The person I'd built rapport with was the Won Seojin from two years ago. The one who'd worn those big glasses and made error-correction notebooks. I didn't know a single thing about the blonde sitting in front of me. How she'd spent the last two years, why she'd come to this school, how she'd gotten to the point of tossing around the word disciplinary action like it was nothing.
Which meant this girl was, for all practical purposes, someone I was meeting for the first time. And I didn't need a textbook to know what happened if you started digging into someone who'd been dragged here against their will on day one. The more you knock, the more they lock the door from the inside.
If this was a first meeting, there was only one answer. Building rapport. The stage that supposedly takes several sessions just to get someone to open the door — the process they said was half of counseling. I just had to walk it from the beginning, same as anyone else.
All right. Then start with what you do at a first meeting.
"I'm not saying I'll listen to your problems. Not yet."
"......What is that supposed to mean."
"You didn't want to come today. You only showed up because of the disciplinary action."
Won Seojin's eyes narrowed.
"If you knew that, then why."
"That's why I'm not going to force you to talk. I won't ask anything you don't want to say. And if I do ask and you don't feel like answering, you don't have to."
"......"
"I'll wait until you're ready to talk."
"Oh, and nothing that comes up in here leaves this room. Even to the teachers, I only report that counseling happened. Not the contents."
"You report? Report what?"
"Just the fact that it happened. The date, and which session number we completed. That's all that goes up."
"......You really don't write down the contents?"
"Yeah. I'll promise you that."
It was what I'd been taught. The Confidentiality Principle. What you hear in the counseling room stays in the counseling room.
Won Seojin studied me with her arms folded, a look that was half caught off guard and half trying to read my angle.
"So you won't pry, and I don't have to talk?"
"Yeah."
"Then what's the point of counseling."
"Yeah. Why would we."
"......Are you messing with me right now?"
"No. I mean it. For now, let's just... see each other. Faces."
"What?"
"Let's just meet. Here. If you feel like talking, talk. If you don't, don't. But meeting is meeting. I have to report that much to the adults as results."
"How is just looking at each other's faces counseling."
"Well, it brings back middle school. It's nice."
"......"
Won Seojin started to fire something back, then gave it up and turned her eyes to the window.
Now that I'd said it out loud, I meant it. Counseling or not, I just wanted to see her again. She was an old friend I hadn't faced in two years. Rapport and proper sequence could come after that.
She looked at me like she couldn't believe what she was hearing, then let out a short laugh — half scoff, half the real thing.
"So. How often are we doing this."
"Every day."
"Are you insane?"
Rejected in half a second.
"You wanna see me every day after school?"
"Yeah. The more we meet, the more sessions I log."
"......Look at you, all about the numbers."
Won Seojin snorted. It sounded like the snort of someone who'd tried to tease me and missed.
"Then three times a week."
"Why would I."
"Twice a week. I can't go lower than that. I told you, I need the sessions on record."
"......Haa. Fine, fine. Twice a week."
Won Seojin waved a hand like the whole thing exhausted her. The gesture looked so much like a market vendor closing a haggle that I almost laughed.
"After school, here. Same time as today."
"Yeah. Fine."
"Just so you know."
She planted a finger on the desk and looked me straight in the eye.
"I'm not gonna talk. I'm just gonna sit here and leave."
"That's fine."
"......"
"Even if you just sit there, a session is still a session."
Won Seojin's mouth opened for a second, then closed. Whatever she'd been about to say, she let it go.
"Weirdo."
That was what finally came out. I decided to take it as a compliment. Better for my mental health that way.
"You said I don't have to talk. Starting now."
And she really did shut her mouth. She pulled out her phone and started treating me like I wasn't there.
Silence stretched.
Five minutes. Ten.
My mouth itched. The urge to ask something — anything, even the weather — climbed all the way to my throat and sank back down, over and over. When I thought about it, the specialty that had gotten me on speaking terms with every kid in my class in a month was this mouth of mine. Sitting here with that specialty sealed away was torture, plain and simple.
I held out anyway. Don't push. Don't pry.
The sun outside the window tipped a little further down. Orange light spilled into the counseling room and soaked into Won Seojin's blonde hair. For a moment the old window seat in our middle school classroom overlaid itself on top of this one. Light brown hair that used to glitter when the sun hit it. The color had changed completely, but the way the light soaked in was strangely the same.
I must have been staring for a while without realizing it. Won Seojin spoke without taking her eyes off her phone.
"Don't stare. You'll wear me out."
"I was looking because the sunset on it was interesting. Why."
"......You're ridiculous, seriously."
She whipped her head away. The tips of her ears looked faintly red, though whether that was the sunset or not, I couldn't tell.
Before long she darkened her phone, checked the time, grabbed her bag, and stood. She walked toward the door with the same heavily put-upon stride she'd come in with. Every one of those movements was unfamiliar — and yet the back view that stopped in front of the door overlapped, somehow, with a silhouette from memory.
She took the doorknob. I thought she was going to walk out just like that.
"......The day after tomorrow."
"Huh?"
"Twice a week means the day after tomorrow. Don't be late."
That was all she left behind before she stepped out of the counseling room.
Yeah. Right. The answer only came after the door had already closed. I hadn't expected a don't be late, and I'd missed my timing completely.
I let my back fall against the chair. The strength ran out of me all at once. It had only been thirty minutes, give or take, and it felt like I'd burned through a whole day's worth of energy. The orange outside the window had deepened another shade. The pack chasing a ball across the field was gone. An empty counseling room, and me alone in it. Maybe this was how a new hire felt after finishing their first day on the job.
And yet.
Turning don't be late over in my mouth, I felt the corner of it lift on its own. The girl who'd said she was just going to sit there and leave had walked out already looking after the next appointment.
I pulled the record sheet across the desk toward me.
I picked up the pen and sat there thinking for a long time. Where was I even supposed to start with today. I couldn't write that her hair had gone blonde, and I didn't want to write that there was nothing wrong. After turning it over, the first line I put down was this.
Session 1 completed. Next counseling appointment scheduled.
In the end, I never did write the words No issues.
Below that, my pen circled the remarks column for a long time. The things I'd seen today. The face that had gone stiff in the doorway. The hand tugging down the hem of her skirt. I left it blank. Those weren't things to put on a form. Those were things I needed to remember myself.
The record sheet said Session 1, but I had a different honest summary of the day.
The day I decided to meet an old friend again after two years.
Counseling could be the excuse. That was fine. If we kept meeting, a story would come out eventually, and when it did, I would listen then.
Don't rush. A door can't be opened from the outside. Waiting without knocking until it opens from within — that was the first rule I set for myself today.