Sudden Change
Lee Sae-ah spoke the words quietly, then looked at Ryuzaki. That face — the classic delinquent's mug. Every time she saw it, the memories came flooding back. Her gentle father. And the monstrous faces of the ones who had stolen him from her forever.
Whenever that recollection surfaced, her heart hammered like it wanted to break free of her chest. It was a distant past, and still it choked the air from her lungs.
"……"
Ryuzaki did not open his mouth right away. He would do what he always did — agonize over it for a long while, then painfully cough up an answer. That was simply how he was. Whenever a topic she was sensitive about came up, he would turn it over and over in his mind before he ever spoke.
Consideration was second nature to him. And that was precisely why she hated it even more. She had built a fortress of prejudice to keep herself safe, and he kept trying to smash it down. He made her wonder if maybe, with him, it would be all right. He made her harbor that kind of hope.
"Could you tell me what you mean by kindness, Senior?"
He didn't deny it. He simply turned another question back on her.
"Are you genuinely asking because you don't know?"
"Nothing in particular comes to mind, from my end. Haha."
Ryuzaki offered a wry smile. Lee Sae-ah said nothing, and looked into his eyes. They say the eyes are a mirror of the heart. She had always tried to read what lived in another person's gaze, and most of the time she could guess, however faintly, what sat behind it. But strangely, Ryuzaki's eyes were the one pair she could never read.
Don't tell me he actually doesn't know? Does this rough-looking idiot take his own kindness for granted?
A sound reached her ears — the sound of a crack splitting through her prejudice. Lee Sae-ah let out a long breath and forced the fissure shut. Then she began to list, one by one, every kindness he had ever shown her.
"Saving me today."
"Helping without a word of complaint every time I dump a mountain of paperwork on you."
"Always being the first to step up when there's heavy equipment to move."
"Handing me a canned drink now and then, telling me to hang in there."
"Choosing every single word so carefully that I never get hurt."
She paused to steady her breath, then went on quietly.
"And... even though you must be struggling yourself, always smiling for me."
Every one of those things was gentle kindness. No one on earth knew that better than Lee Sae-ah herself.
"Junior. Listen carefully."
"……"
"I am not as decent a person as you believe me to be."
She could not accept another person's goodwill as it was. She only suspected it, endlessly, under the noble-sounding pretext of protecting herself.
"I am merely wearing a mask. What lies beneath has long since festered."
She was still suspicious even now. Wondering if Ryuzaki, too, might suddenly turn on her one day. The way people always did. The way those people had, back then.
"I am a gloomy, pathetic person who looks at the world with boundless pessimism."
That was why she knew better than anyone. She — Lee Sae-ah — did not deserve his gentle kindness. She was someone who could neither accept it nor give it back.
"I am not a good enough person to receive your kindness, Junior. So... please stop."
She said it looking straight into Ryuzaki's eyes. Those inscrutable eyes she could never see even an inch into.
She was short of breath. She hadn't even said that much. Pushing away the only person who treated her kindly was more painful than she had imagined. But she had to do it. Just as she did not want to be hurt, she did not want to hurt him either.
"……"
Once again, he kept his silence. What was going through the mind of this boy who practiced consideration even now? There was no answer waiting in his eyes.
Then Ryuzaki, who had been sitting so still, slowly opened his mouth.
"First of all... I'm truly sorry about what you went through in the past, Senior."
She hadn't said a single word about her past. And even at a moment like this, this idiot was worrying about someone else's feelings? He ought to have been angry, if anything.
"So what you're saying is that you don't think you deserve kindness. Is that right?"
"It is."
"If that's how you feel... then I guess I'm the same."
The same? Lee Sae-ah tilted her head at the words she couldn't make sense of.
"I'm not exactly a pure-hearted person either, you know."
He said it with a bitter smile.
"...I'm scared of other people too."
He's scared?
"Even when someone smiles, I'm afraid they might be wearing a completely different expression on the inside."
"……"
"I end up suspecting them without meaning to. This thought just keeps coming — that this person might betray me."
Similar. No. The same.
"It doesn't get better no matter how hard I try. So I wear a mask too. Because I don't have the courage to show people this ugly inside of mine."
The face behind the mask that Ryuzaki had just peeled back for her was endlessly dark. Just like hers.
"So... aren't we even? You showed kindness to me even though I'm this dark on the inside, Senior."
"When did I ever—"
Ryuzaki said nothing. He simply pointed at his own arm. The wound she had so carefully treated only a little while ago sat there in plain view.
...That's right. Why had she treated his wound herself? Showing kindness to someone. That was something the usual her would never have done.
Ryuzaki pointed at her.
"Senior."
"...Yes."
"You're beyond saving."
"……"
He huffed a quiet laugh, and this time pointed at himself.
"And I'm beyond saving too."
"……"
"We're the same kind of hopeless case. Isn't it a little strange to start talking about who deserves what?"
He didn't deny the ugliness inside her. He accepted even that — and said he was the same.
"So wouldn't it be all right to just keep going like this? The way we have been."
The same situation. ...Is that it. Now, at last, she felt she understood a little. Why only Ryuzaki had been different. Why he had always felt special. Because he was the same kind of person she was. Because he hated hurting others just as much as he hated being hurt himself. So that's why he'd gotten under her skin so much.
The dark weight that had been pressing on her chest began, slowly, to scatter. She was relieved — relieved that she did not have to lose his kindness.
"...Is that so."
Lee Sae-ah nodded, just slightly.
"So that's how it is."
Today, her prejudice did not crumble. Just as it always had, it stood firmly in its place. But today, one person stepped across that prejudice and into her world. Her world had been still, and lonely. And now an outsider by the name of Ryuzaki had walked into it.
"A relationship of mutual suspicion... that has a rather nice ring to it."
"Junior."
"Yes."
"It's a little early, but would you like to have lunch together?"
She didn't know how long he would stay. But a little while... that would be all right.
The conflict with Lee Sae-ah got resolved well enough. Well — calling it a conflict is kind of a stretch, honestly. She found the courage first. She took off her mask and showed me who she actually was, because she didn't want me to get hurt. So I found a little courage of my own. I peeled my mask back, just a bit, and faced her as I was.
Having seen each other's real faces, we arrived at a single conclusion. We would remain a pair who suspected each other. For the time being, that was where we left it.
It was one-thirty in the afternoon. I'd been treated to lunch at her place, and between the food and the conversation the hours had simply vanished.
It really was good.
Lee Sae-ah's cooking was excellent. Comparing it to a certain someone who heated up a microwave meal and then insisted she'd made it from scratch would have been an insult to the concept of food.
"……"
I glanced down at the smartphone in my hand. A pink, talisman-shaped keyring that hadn't been there this morning dangled from it — a gift Lee Sae-ah had pressed on me, saying we hopeless cases ought to look after each other. A matching pair. One for her, one for me.
A gift, huh.
This made twice that someone had given me a present. I hadn't thrown the torn workbook away. I'd brought it home with me.
"What will you do with this? Are you going to throw it out?"
"No. I'll take it with me. It's precious."
Torn or not, I couldn't bring myself to toss it. The fact that it was a gift from my first friend didn't change.
The front door creaked as I stepped inside. My body, still flushed from the summer heat, cooled almost at once in the wash of the air conditioner. I could hear the television, which meant Beatrice was up—
"Where have you been wandering off to all by yourself?"
"...You scared me."
"Did I? Good. That makes the wait worthwhile."
Beatrice had materialized at my side out of nowhere. I am not exaggerating — I nearly fell over. I clutched my chest and glared at her, then had to look away just as fast.
"Hmm? What? Why are you looking away all of a sudden?"
"...Isn't that my shirt?"
"It is, yeah."
She was wearing a dress shirt. More precisely, she was wearing my school dress shirt. The thing was so oversized on her that the hem hung all the way down to her thighs.
"Well? Falling for me yet?"
No bottoms in sight. I had absolutely no idea where to put my eyes.
"……"
"Heehee. Getting all shy. Don't worry — I'm wearing proper underwear underneath, so..."
That was when her voice died in her throat. At the same instant, the air in the room went ice-cold. Sensing something was wrong, I looked at her face at once.
"...Hey."
Her expression had gone rigidly hard. Harder than I had ever seen it. Was she angry? No. This was something else.
Beatrice closed the distance in long, purposeful strides.