Intimacy (5)
Anyway, since the radio had told us the date we'd be summoning the Chairman, we made our own preparations in turn.
We spent a week rechecking our circuits. With Cherry's help, the magical girls' Hope Circuits could now be used free of any threat of being tracked, and apparently, while she had those components off, she'd gone ahead and dismantled them, repurposing the pieces into various other circuits.
Embarrassing as it is to admit, my Hope Circuit ran on Hayun.
That was no joke, and no misunderstanding. Honestly, I wanted to deny it too, but whenever Hayun pressed herself against my side and flashed me a smile, the circuit spun that much harder. What's more, for as long as my heart kept pounding, the output even held steady to a degree.
Not that the circuit display glowing white made any of it less mortifying.
Right — now that she'd caught on, even if I had the feature removed, Hayun would just smile at me every single time she looked my way.
For her part, simply being close to me again seemed to be satisfaction enough.
My own attitude, meanwhile, was shifting little by little to follow the expression on Hayun's face. Whatever our past held, the simple truth was that I had always liked Hayun. No one could ask me to change that feeling now — and even if they did, I couldn't.
Still, the clinging, sludgy emotions remained. I couldn't say precisely what that sticky black mass in the depths of my heart was, but one thing I did know: jealousy and inferiority were tangled up inside it in a hopeless mess.
...I keep feelings like that hidden as best I can. Simply letting them show feels dangerous, even now.
After all, we shared a bathtub, and we slept in the same tent.
Hayun still strode into that tent without a shred of hesitation.
We still hadn't taken the tent down. I couldn't bring myself to show the other girls what positions we actually slept in.
Hayun, I was sure, would cling to me without sparing a single thought for who might be watching...
Back in our school days, nothing like this had ever happened — and it wasn't as if we'd never been on a school trip.
It was true Hayun thought of me as a close friend, but she'd never been the type to cling like this.
Had she felt something like the shock I did, nearly losing me? Maybe she'd decided it was fine to let the others see her like this. She'd always shied away from getting that close to her classmates, but her feelings toward the magical girls were another matter entirely.
And—
"..."
Lately, our night-walk party had gained one more member.
"Jua."
Hayun called out to her. Standing at my right, Hayun had my arm locked tight in her embrace.
Honestly? It was incredibly awkward. Every time we walked, my arm wanted to swing on pure instinct, and with Hayun wrapped around it, I strained with everything I had to keep it still. If it so much as twitched, it would be prime material for one misunderstanding after another...
As long as Hayun was attached like this, she probably wouldn't make anything of it — but all the same, it felt like the sort of thing a decent person simply shouldn't do.
"What is it?"
Whether I thought that or not, Hayun and Jua carried on talking.
"...When did you two get so close?"
I couldn't say why, but the question frightened me a little. It wasn't as if Hayun could feel something like jealousy over me... could she? Jua was her comrade, after all — the partner she'd fought beside, matching her rhythm, all this time. The conversation was just easy to misread. No — that was me reading it that way, one-sidedly. In reality it couldn't be anything of the sort.
"..."
At Hayun's words, Jua said nothing for a moment.
Unlike Hayun, she wasn't pressed against my side. Instead, she had a tight grip on my sleeve. Honestly, I felt like asking Hayun's exact same question.
The problem was, it would be a disaster if that question came from me.
Just imagine it. There's a friend you thought you were close with, and one day, mid-walk, they suddenly ask, "Were we ever actually that close?"
You'd be hurt — and you'd probably never speak to them again.
No, honestly, that would be straight-up bullying.
Rather than answer Hayun directly, Jua looked up at me instead. It had the feel of a silent say something, anything.
I weighed it for a moment, then spoke.
"...You do remember I used to be a combatant, right?"
Hayun blinked at that.
I wasn't asking because I thought she didn't know, or had forgotten. I was asking to make a point.
"Yeah... that's right."
"Jua was the one I crossed paths with most often back then. We even had our share of what you might call banter."
"R-right... I see..."
Hayun's face twisted into an incredibly awkward expression.
And Jua — the very person I'd been describing — wore much the same look.
Why? You asked for an explanation, and I gave you one.
...
Ah. Right.
I'd gotten hurt in those fights. And Jua was hardly the only one who'd hurt me back in my combatant days. Hayun, Rose, Dalia, Delphinium — every last one of them had put me out of action at least once.
I understand it was an unavoidable situation. And I'd be lying if I claimed I held no bitterness over it. The reason the inferiority complex inside me still hasn't faded is, in the end, that I keep those days stored away in my heart's deepest corner, exactly as they were.
But, yes. To stress it one more time: it couldn't be helped. Back then, me getting captured alive was the far bigger problem.
That was when I was fighting tooth and nail to keep Hayun from finding out what I was — so much so that I once deliberately provoked Jua and let her beam send me flying into the distance.
And it's not as if I never swung a blade their way or threw a punch or two myself.
Just as pointing a gun at an American police officer and expecting not to get shot is profoundly stupid, in a battle between combatants and magical girls, someone getting hurt was simply a matter of course.
I never broke anyone's arm or leg — but honestly speaking, I never held back my strength to keep from breaking them, either.
Anyway. Thinking about why the two of them were making such awkward faces now, the answer was dead simple: they'd both beaten me black and blue, and now here they were clinging to me. Of course it looked strange.
And yet, awkward faces and all, neither of them let go. Truly, magical girls. What mental fortitude.
"...If I may add one thing," Jua said, in a tone that sounded almost defensive. "Back then, you were the only one who ever had the nerve to provoke me to my face, Jieun."
"And that was reason enough to become friends?"
"Hearts aren't something you can just read at a glance, you know. People fight and fight, and before they know it, they've grown close — it happens more often than you'd think. Apparently that's what happened with me."
"..."
Was that how it worked? ...Come to think of it, maybe it was. I was fighting for my life, sure, but looking back at the Jua of those days, her attitude toward me did seem oddly light-hearted.
Having heard Jua out, Hayun put on a thoughtful expression again. Watching the two of them sink into silence, I found myself out of things to say as well.
No, wait. We're supposed to be on a walk right now.
Refreshing... isn't quite the word, since spring air isn't exactly pristine — but still. We came out to get some fresh air, and how on earth did it come to this? We could simply all agree to be friends and be done with it. What was the point of a conversation like this?
...Though I suppose that's rich, coming from me. Until only recently, I was the one spouting lines like "I'm the king here — you do exactly as I say." Not to mention shoving the girl beside me against a wall and growling, "Anything, right?"
"Jieun!?"
My knee buckled, and Hayun cried out in alarm. But I let go of her hand and dropped into a squat right there on the spot.
"..."
Back then, I'd been trying, in my own way, to show that I was angry — but looking back on it now, it had been an incredibly irrational thing to do. No, forget irrational. It was just plain humiliating. What on earth had I even done? I wanted to tear my hair out.
And yet, strangely, my circuit refused to tip over into despair. I still couldn't tell whether this circuit had truly been converted completely, the way James said, or what.
Maybe these days I simply couldn't bring myself to despair over something as small as embarrassment. Not with Hayun right beside me. Which only made me more embarrassed. This time, it was the embarrassment on the inside.
"Jieun, are you okay?"
Hayun squatted down beside me. Even crouched, she kept a light hold on my arm.
Jua, meanwhile, was still on her feet, studying my condition intently. Please, stop. The look on her face was oddly grave — she genuinely seemed worried about me.
Could I maybe just go back to my despairing days? At least then I wouldn't have to feel embarrassment. ...I'm kidding. Even I know this state is the better one.
"..."
"Um, Jua?"
Hayun addressed Jua, who was staring holes through us. Jua's usually sharp eyes had narrowed into a glare. She was watching the two of us with deep suspicion... no, "suspicion" wasn't quite the word, was it? Call it a very, very strange look.
Hayun and I were sitting inside the tent; Jua was outside it. Normally this would have been the time to zip things up and settle in for the night, but with Jua crouched outside peering in, we couldn't bring ourselves to lie back down like always.
Hold on. Didn't that mean we both knew perfectly well how our little arrangement would look to other people? And yet we still wrapped around each other and lay down, bold as brass? Granted, the "wrapping" was entirely my doing — I was the one who'd turned over toward Hayun.
"Is there something you wanted to tell us?" Hayun asked, a little carefully.
Even after that, Jua stared at us for a few seconds before she opened her mouth.
"It's not fair."
"Hm?"
"I know this tent is yours, Jieun. If you say you're sleeping in it, I can't exactly object." Before Hayun could get out a "So?", Jua hurried the conversation along. "But it's a little unfair that Hayun is the only one sleeping in there. It's rather cold out here."
Cold, was it? I'd slept outside exactly once myself, and I didn't remember it being all that bad. Well, weather is never the same two days running — maybe it had turned abruptly chilly, or maybe, conversely, that one night had simply been unusually warm. Then again, even in spring, announcing you'd sleep outside with no tent would get you treated like a madwoman.
"So you're saying we should take turns sleeping in there?"
"That's how we do baths, isn't it?"
We'd only ever actually swapped bath partners by lottery once. And come to think of it, the person I'd bathed with that time had been Jua, too. Also just the once. Not that I'd ever considered it a missed opportunity.
"So you're saying who sleeps in the tent should be decided by drawing lots, too?" Hayun asked, in a voice thick with disbelief. And hearing it, I found myself a little dumbfounded as well.
I mean — it's not as if Hayun started sleeping in there because of some fair set of rules, is it? She just suddenly climbed in one night and has been at it ever since, hasn't she? More than that, I couldn't fathom why Jua wanted to sleep in there at all. Sharing a bed with me would only be awkward for her. The two of us were... well, since Hayun unilaterally clung to me in her sleep, space wasn't exactly scarce, but...
I caught myself picturing Jua sleeping beside me the way Hayun did, and hastily shook my head to scrub the image away. Was I losing it? I wasn't some pubescent boy fantasizing about every girl around him.
"Whether it's drawing lots or setting up a rotation, I believe some measure is necessary."
"I pass," said Rose, who'd been listening quietly, raising one hand.
Well, of course — that's the normal reaction. Sleeping in there meant either chasing me out or sleeping with me, one or the other. The former sat a little wrong with me, given that front of mine that was, more or less, being respected; the latter would turn things unbearably awkward. Judging by the way Dalia and Delphinium shook their heads, they had no intention of it either.
Hayun's and Jua's eyes met. Jua's gaze was no different from usual; Hayun, on the other hand, looked a touch bewildered. I probably did too.
...Didn't you once take my arm and then run off? What's with this all of a sudden—
As I studied Jua's face with that thought, I noticed it was a little red.
"Are you feeling sick? Body aches?"
It could have been a cold, I supposed, but she showed hardly any of the telltale signs. No runny nose, no coughing, as far as I could tell. In that case, maybe the rough living had finally caught up with her. When built-up fatigue bears down on the body all at once, it can turn into a proper fever-and-chills cold.
"...I think it might be," Jua admitted without protest.
I sank into thought for a moment, then scratched my head and got to my feet. Hayun's and Jua's faces followed me up.
"Then sleep in the tent. I'll take outside, so the two of you can have it."
"Huh?" The sound slipped out of Hayun. "That's... no, there's really no need for that."
"If it's a feverish cold, that means you've been pushing through it since earlier, doesn't it?"
Come to think of it, that would explain why Jua's face had been red. Her strange behavior, too... if her head was throbbing and she was moving on autopilot, it made sense. Maybe she'd even gone outside because she didn't want the others to see her under the weather. And then, when it became truly unbearable, she might have decided she wanted to sleep somewhere warm for once.
But Jua is proud. Probably the proudest of all the magical girls. So naturally, begging to sleep inside at this point would be mortifying for her. Which would leave her with exactly this move: proposing a lottery.
"..."
I thought I finally understood a little of why Jua had always felt strangely familiar to me. She might get angry if I said it out loud, but she gave off the faint scent of a kindred spirit. The type who can't be honest — who needlessly hides what she's thinking, puts off saying it while second-guessing herself, and ends up fumbling the whole matter.
...I once pulled exactly the same stunt, all in the name of pushing Hayun away. And then I ended up taking a bath with Jua.
"Hold on, Jieun." Hayun rose to her feet after me. "Then I'll sleep outside too."
"...Outside?" When I said it, half in surprise, Hayun looked at me and broke into a smile from ear to ear.
"Yep!"
Even sleeping outside, she'd no doubt curl up right beside me — and who knew, she might drift off in a back hug again. ...Was it really fine for the others to see us like that?
But... my face burning, I looked over at Jua, who was gazing up at me with a somewhat deflated expression.
In just a few days, we'd be heading out to face the Chairman. If her condition was poor when that moment came, trouble would follow immediately. There was no telling how many Kaijin might be lying in wait. Naturally, the Chairman would be braced for us to come at him. Staying in the best possible shape was good for all of us.
"..."
When we left Jua inside the tent, she watched the two of us go with an oddly conflicted look on her face. For some reason, Rose was wearing the expression of someone about to burst out laughing at me again. Was my face really that entertaining? I consider myself a rather pretty girl, you know.
Hayun, exactly as I'd predicted, followed me out at once. And the moment I lay down on the ground and pulled the vinyl sheet over myself, she slipped in beneath it.
Anything I said at this point would be far too late. So instead, I answered by yanking the covering all the way over my head. I heard Hayun giggling behind my back, and did my best to pay it no mind.
The next morning. I woke to find myself holding Hayun in my arms.
And this time I hadn't woken halfway through the night and done it on purpose. If ever there was a moment for the "it just happened while I was asleep" excuse, this was surely it.
Hayun herself was sleeping soundly in my embrace. I was seriously weighing whether it was safe to move at all when I noticed my back felt strangely damp. As if I'd broken into a sweat.
"..."
Someone was behind me. Someone who had pressed their forehead — or the top of their head — against my back and was curled into a ball, breathing soft, even breaths in their sleep. Hayun was the only one who'd ever come over and attached herself to me like this, so the breathing alone told me nothing...
And yet, somehow, I knew instinctively who it was. I had no real basis for it.
Taking care not to wake Hayun, I turned my head just enough to check. All I could see was the crown of a head. But there was no forgetting that vivid purple hair.
The girl curled up against my back, forehead pressed to me and fast asleep, was none other than Jua.
Hadn't she been sleeping in the tent? Had she come out halfway through and slipped under the covering? There was a sleeping bag in that tent, you know.
Maybe she'd gotten too hot inside the sleeping bag and crawled out. Once the cold sweats start, everything feels stifling — it really could happen, I thought. Say she was half-asleep, still groggy from feeling unwell, and grabbed the wrong blanket on her way in. Say that in the cold morning air, she'd latched onto whichever side was warmer. It was a perfectly plausible story.
The only problem was that it left me stuck there at dawn, agonizing over how I was supposed to get up. If Jua woke first, she'd see Hayun and me wrapped around each other. If I moved first, I'd wake Hayun.
And with no evidence whatsoever, I had a feeling Hayun wouldn't be too pleased to find Jua clinging to my back like that.
Honestly, why am I the one walking on eggshells around these two?