PC Bang
After finishing that book the night before, I was itching to talk to someone—anyone—about it. I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt this restless.
The moment I stepped into the classroom that morning, I headed straight for Kim Seol-ah's desk. Her eyes went round when she saw me coming.
"I finished that book."
"Oh, you read it fast? So how was it?"
"You were right. I thought it was all over, but it really flipped everything one more time at the end."
Kim Seol-ah snorted a laugh, leaned back in her chair, and crossed her arms.
"See? What did I tell you. That's that author's specialty. The sucker punch in the last chapter. You really didn't see that twist coming at all?"
"Not even a little. Up through the middle I was only suspecting the other characters."
"That's exactly their trick. Make you suspect the wrong person, then hit you from behind."
The conversation that started like that didn't end easily. Kim Seol-ah went on and on, pointing out exactly where and how the story had flipped, which early setups had been foreshadowing all along, and I fired right back, excited, offering my own takes on what those moments must have meant. I could barely remember the last time I'd raised my voice with someone over a book like this.
The whole time, she kept glancing our way from her own seat. Her mouth was set in a pout from the moment morning started, as if something already rubbed her the wrong way. When our eyes met, she quickly looked somewhere else.
After the period change, lunch arrived. I headed to the cafeteria with Park So-yeon, who shared the same class. She came over with Kim Seol-ah from her own class, and the four of us ended up clustered around one table.
Park So-yeon and Kim Seol-ah were in different classes and had only run into each other a few times through me, so they weren't exactly close. Neither of them could quite manage to start a conversation with the other, which left the back-and-forth entirely to me.
"Did you finally finish that book yesterday?"
Park So-yeon asked, pausing mid-bite.
"Yeah. I finished it."
"You're late. I saw the ending first, heh."
The same bragging tone she'd used on the phone last night made Kim Seol-ah snort before she could stop herself.
The second her eyes met Park So-yeon's, though, she shut her mouth again. Even though it was a book she'd recommended, she seemed reluctant to jump in with someone from another class.
She just blinked, clearly curious about what book they meant, then turned her attention back to her own side dishes.
Once lunch was over we drifted apart naturally. Park So-yeon latched onto her, chattering as they headed one way, while Kim Seol-ah and I made for the library.
We claimed our usual corner seats, and Kim Seol-ah pulled a thin paper bag from her backpack and held it out.
"Here. The handkerchief."
I opened the bag and unfolded it. The handkerchief was pressed so crisp it looked like it had just come from the cleaners. It was hard to believe this was the same one she'd used to wipe her tears in the storage room not long ago.
"You didn't have to take something like this all the way to a laundry."
"What if I'd washed something that expensive at home and the colors ran? If I'm giving it back, I might as well do it properly."
Kim Seol-ah crossed her arms and answered more gruffly than necessary.
"You could've just kept it."
"No way. What kind of nerve would it take to just keep someone else's expensive stuff."
"I figured the free meal made us even."
"That's that, and this is this."
She cut it off cleanly, yet she still seemed to have the cost of that handkerchief lodged somewhere in the back of her mind. It was so like her—unable to just let something go, determined to settle every last debt.
"Anyway. It came in handy that day."
The short line she tacked on at the end somehow weighed heavier than the handkerchief itself. I quietly folded it and slipped it into my inner pocket.
After the final homeroom the four of us left through the school gate together. It was the same walk home I usually took with just her. Today Park So-yeon stuck right to my side, talking nonstop, while she held onto my other sleeve. Kim Seol-ah walked a step apart, alone.
She still wasn't comfortable enough with Park So-yeon to start a conversation, yet she never said she was heading off on her own either. She simply matched our pace in silence.
On any other day I would have been busy checking whether her steps were too slow or whether she was drifting toward the road; today Park So-yeon's chatter left me no room for that.
At the mouth of the alley Park So-yeon stopped and turned to me.
"Hey, it feels weird to just split up like this. Want to hit the PC Bang? Let's properly play that game from yesterday on a big screen."
"PC Bang?"
"Yeah. The game we played on our phones—today we do it on real monitors."
Before I could answer, she shot her hand straight up.
"Me too! I want to go too."
Park So-yeon seemed to freeze for a second. Then she shrugged as if there was nothing to be done about it, muttered a fine-by-me, and glanced sideways. She was already tugging my sleeve, excited. I looked at Kim Seol-ah standing next to us.
"You coming?"
Kim Seol-ah gave a short laugh.
"I've got stuff to do today. You guys go have fun."
She waved once and walked off down the opposite path. Her retreating back almost looked like someone who knew exactly what she was doing and was deliberately stepping aside. I decided that was probably just my imagination and followed Park So-yeon and her.
The PC Bang was a few blocks from school, down in a basement alley. Park So-yeon claimed three corner seats with the ease of someone walking into her own bedroom, then shoved me and her into the middle.
She'd already ordered ramen and cola on the way in and kept urging us to sit down already. The way she fitted headsets over our ears and powered on the screens was so smooth it was obvious she came here often.
Until yesterday I'd only played that game a few rounds on my phone. Even then the screen had been so small I was basically just swiping with my fingers. Sitting in front of a full keyboard, though, my hands had no idea which keys to hit and kept tangling.
When I tried to go forward I veered sideways; when I tried to attack I froze in place for no reason. On-screen my character kept slamming its head into walls of its own free will.
Beside me she was even worse. Keyboard controls clearly didn't sit well with her fingers; she poked at the keys one by one, feeling them out. Then she must have hit something wrong, because the screen suddenly flooded red. She yelped and grabbed my arm.
"Ji-an, what do I do?! Mine died. How do I revive this?!"
"...I just died too."
At that her face crumpled like the world had ended. It was so pitiful I barely managed to hold back a laugh.
"Ji-an, where am I right now? I can't see myself on the screen."
"In the middle. The one in blue is you."
"Oh, this one. But why does this one move so badly."
"Because you're mashing every direction key at once."
Only then did she lift her fingers one by one and try pressing carefully. A moment later she must have stepped on something else, because her character started spinning in place.
"Why is that one suddenly dancing."
Park So-yeon muttered, sounding thoroughly unimpressed. That did it—I finally burst out laughing.
We played a few more rounds, but she never really improved. After the same cycle repeated enough times she finally yanked off her headset.
"I'm not playing. My fingers just hurt."
Then she pulled up an anime on the computer. The second the animation started rolling across the screen, her face finally relaxed. She really did prefer that kind of thing over games.
With her out, it was just me and Park So-yeon left.
"Hey, let's try that boss we couldn't beat last time."
Park So-yeon's eyes lit up. There was one boss we'd thrown ourselves at on our phones for days without ever taking it down. With a big screen and proper keyboards, she figured today we actually stood a chance.
This time my hands were starting to remember the layout. When Park So-yeon dove in, I tanked out front for all I was worth. Block left, watch behind—my fingers moved on their own at the calls. Things that never registered on a phone screen were crystal clear on the big monitor.
After a long, grinding fight the boss's health finally bottomed out. The last hit landed and a huge CLEAR flashed across the screen.
"Yes! We did it!"
Park So-yeon shrieked and shook my shoulder hard. I found myself clenching a fist without thinking. After days of failing to get past it, finally clearing the thing left me weirdly, ridiculously satisfied.
We were still bouncing in our seats when I felt a presence beside us. I turned and saw she had paused the anime at some point and was staring straight at us. Her mouth was set in an even deeper pout than before.
"...Ji-an. Teach me that too."
"You said you weren't playing."
"Just... now I kind of want to try."
She picked up the headset she'd thrown aside. The sudden change of heart from someone who'd been complaining about sore fingers was unexpected. Whatever was bothering her, though, her face was still puffed up.
Before I could say anything Park So-yeon jumped in.
"I'm better at teaching. Learn games from me."
She dragged her chair over toward her and started pointing out the keys one by one. She pretended to listen half-heartedly, yet kept sneaking glances at me from the corner of her eye.
With Park So-yeon stuck to her side explaining, she gradually got better. She still veered off in random directions, but at least she wasn't dying the second a match started the way she had earlier. The three of us died and cleared and died again while staring at the screens, and time slipped by without us noticing.
Then all at once I realized I was hungry. Park So-yeon worked the screen and ordered a pile of ramen and fried rice.
The first bite of steaming ramen tasted strangely good. It was just ordinary instant noodles, nothing special, yet eating them here after gaming made them hit differently.
She was staring at that ramen.
"Want some?"
"...I'm not supposed to eat stuff like this."
She hemmed and hawed. On any other day these would have been exactly the things I stopped her from eating first—ramen, anything spicy, anything greasy. Today I didn't feel like stopping her.
"Eat today. One meal won't hurt."
I portioned some ramen into a bowl for her, and her face lit up at once. She blew on it, took a bite, and her eyes went wide.
"It's good."
She happily polished off the fried rice too. Watching her eat with that much enjoyment almost made me feel guilty for all the times I'd kept her from it.
Once our stomachs were full we played a few more rounds. By then she could hold on without dying most of the time, and every time she did she celebrated like it was her own personal victory.
We were deep in the screens when I finally looked up. The light filtering down the basement stairs had turned red without me noticing.
"Hey, it's already this late. We should go."
Park So-yeon stretched and stood. I rubbed my stiff shoulders and set the headset down.