Chapter 127
Chapter 127
Ha-neul lay with her arms spread wide open.
If she'd taken that pose sitting or standing, it would've looked like someone was holding her at gunpoint.
Which meant... Ha-neul was telling me to climb on top of her.
And it also meant pressing our faces and bodies together, right up to the point before lips met lips.
"......Hey, Ha-neul."
I spoke as I wiped a hand down my face.
"Even so, do we really have to go that far?"
"Yeah. I think we do."
Ha-neul's answer was firm.
"We need intense memories, right? And the intensity of a memory wears off the more you repeat it. So I think we have to keep raising the intensity little by little."
'Little by little?'
Did she just say 'little by little'?
I couldn't begin to grasp how enormous the gap was between my idea of 'a little' and Ha-neul's idea of 'a little.'
Sure, it's just an unquantifiable sense, so it can differ from person to person—
"Also, I think we're already past this stage."
Ha-neul spoke without moving from where she lay.
"Back in the observation car. Don't you remember?"
"......."
Ah, right.
At the time we'd been reversed top to bottom, but the position had been pretty similar to what Ha-neul was doing now.
Although back then we hadn't been on a bed, and Ha-neul had been the one on top.
.......
I could feel the Sara inside me boiling up furiously.
But the fact that she wasn't saying anything meant even she couldn't bring herself to argue with that point.
We really had gone through that kind of situation once before, so we did need something more intense than that.
Besides, we didn't have time to fight about it right now. Su-a was in the shower and So-hee was getting ready for work, but both of them would be back before long. So-hee especially might come back a little early.
"......Fine."
I nodded at last.
"Hup."
I let out a breath as if psyching myself up, then slapped both cheeks with my hands.
What we were about to do wasn't for personal reasons; it was out of necessity. This was unavoidable. I muttered that a few times inside my head and moved.
The bed drew closer. I could see Ha-neul's legs bent at the edge of the mattress.
......There didn't seem to be any way to climb on top of Ha-neul without touching those legs. Which made sense, since the whole point was pressing our bodies together.
I set my right knee down next to Ha-neul's left thigh. Moving slowly, as if crawling onto the bed, I shifted my body.
Thankfully, both Ha-neul and I were still in our pajamas, so no skin touched skin.
There wasn't any skin contact, but—
Pajamas were made to be comfortable for sleeping, so the fabric was soft and thin, more than enough to let body heat pass through.
Ha-neul's body heat, faintly seeping through the soft cotton.
My heart pounded wildly. I couldn't tell if it was racing because of me or because of Sara. Maybe both of us were feeling our hearts hammer away. Boy or girl, this situation was embarrassing and overwhelming.
Ha-neul stayed perfectly still, not moving a muscle even as I crawled onto her body.
Both my knees were now up on the bed.
I was on top of Ha-neul, in a position that looked like I was lying prone over her. Our stomachs and chests weren't touching yet, but even this was already staggeringly awkward.
Wasn't this enough?
Couldn't I just lean my face in closer from here? My mind was hazy. I couldn't tell if it was because in my past life I'd had no resistance to women, or because the Sara inside me was about to burst out.
Ha-neul was looking up at me without averting her eyes.
"Hold my hands."
Ha-neul whispered quietly.
I tore my gaze away from Ha-neul's flushed face and looked at her hands.
Yes, I looked up at them.
Ha-neul was still keeping both hands slightly out, just beside her own face, which meant if I wanted to take them, I'd have to raise my arms and spread them a little too.
I could guarantee that doing that in Sara's body would make the whole posture collapse. I'd probably end up looking like a cat stretching out.
......Hoo, let's be calm about this.
......Wait, I'm not supposed to be calm, am I?
We needed a state so overwhelmingly intense that my consciousness would switch over. If I held on with my reason, that would defeat the point.
......Ah, forget it.
I laid my right hand over Ha-neul's right hand.
My palm settled on top of her slightly damp palm.
......Then Ha-neul shifted her fingers, slipping them in between mine.
And squeezed tight.
Our right hands were now fully interlaced.
"Hold them."
......Well, I hadn't curled my fingers yet, so it was more like Ha-neul was gripping my hand all on her own.
Her saying to hold them probably meant she wanted me to lace our fingers together the same way.
......Alright, stay calm.
......No, I shouldn't stay calm.
Two impulses were crashing into each other inside me.
If I'm being honest, Ha-neul was cute. She was pretty. She had a fit body. If there'd been any boys in our class, she probably would've gotten as many looks as Sara. Maybe she would've been popular regardless of her family situation. There's no way a girl with a good personality, who's nice and pretty, wouldn't be popular.
So... no matter how much I told myself I didn't have any ulterior motives, that had to be a lie.
I knew I wasn't supposed to think that way. Ha-neul was purely helping me as a friend, and I was just receiving her help.
I shouldn't be using this to indulge those feelings.
Even so, I couldn't quite hide the small joy blooming in a corner of my heart.
"The other hand too."
"......."
On a human level I felt like I really shouldn't, but some part of me kept thinking, 'Ha-neul gave permission.'
......I'd even decided recently to put a little distance between us because I'd become aware of those feelings.
Wasn't this situation completely unavoidable? The version of me inside my head kept whispering that.
I slowly raised my left hand. My right arm was trembling from the strain, so I hurriedly placed my left hand over Ha-neul's hand.
Immediately, Ha-neul interlaced her fingers with my left hand too. Now I was in a state where I couldn't easily pull away.
With my arms spread that far apart, Ha-neul's face and mine drew even closer.
My arms were already quivering. Sara's body still didn't have the stamina to hold a pose like this perfectly.
"......."
"......."
My eyes and Ha-neul's tangled together at a dangerously close distance.
My breathing quickened, and the moment I realized it, I sucked in a breath.
Because if I breathed heavily, my breath would hit Ha-neul's face. Would that bother her?
But Ha-neul's expression didn't change much.
It wasn't a displeased look.
If anything, she was smiling brightly. Face flushed, her hair let down loose.
Right, Ha-neul still hadn't tied her hair back. It was Sunday morning, and nobody had washed up yet.
Ha-neul's chestnut-brown hair, a sight you rarely saw, was scattered across the bed.
Maybe because three of us had been sleeping side by side in the bed, and at some point So-hee had squeezed in too, but it must've gotten a little warm. Ha-neul's face was faintly wet with sweat.
A few strands of hair were clinging to that face.
She looked bewitching, a stark contrast to the bright and energetic Ha-neul I usually saw.
"Now, just come in slowly."
At those words from Ha-neul, my body followed before I could think.
I was already nearly right in front of her. I lowered my face slowly. We drew close enough that Ha-neul's face wouldn't fit entirely in my field of view, closer than an inch away, close enough that the slightest movement would make our noses touch.
......My consciousness still hadn't switched.
Just how much closer did we have to—
That thought was interrupted by a sound: the rattle-scrape of a door.
Rattle... scraaape......?
Only when I heard it did my head finally go completely blank.
Ah, right, of course.
It wasn't just me and Ha-neul here. Without noticing, I'd let myself get swept up in the mood and lost all awareness of my surroundings.
No, it wasn't that I'd lost awareness; it was that I hadn't been thinking at all—
That's right—
*
"Hwaht—!"
Sara's eyes, which had been slowly closing as if she were passing out, flew open wide.
Then she whipped her head to the side, as if determined not to lose consciousness.
With a soft flump, Sara's face dropped down entirely.
......Onto the bed, that is. Not onto Yu Ha-neul's face.
Sara had collapsed forward, burying her face into the bedding right next to Ha-neul's head.
"......."
So-hee was watching this from the side.
"......Uh......."
So-hee stood frozen for a second, then jolted to her senses, mouth opening wide in delayed horror.
"W-w-w-w-w-w-wait a sec! What the hell are you two doing!?"
So-hee shouted that, but no answer came.
Because there was one person who was deeply, deeply disappointed.
That person was obviously Ha-neul, who was still pinned under Sara, who'd just blacked out and collapsed on top of her.
Still gripping Sara's hands tight, Ha-neul wore an expression that said, 'Ah, it was almost perfect.'