Chapter 50
Chapter 50
After a very brief standoff, Yu Ha-neul secured the black t-shirt she had chosen for Sara, the one hanging in the closet. Ha-neul hugged the shirt tight so it couldn't be taken away and spoke.
"......Was this your goal the whole time?"
"What exactly do you mean by 'this'?"
Shin So-hee didn't spare Ha-neul a glance and kept picking clothes from the closet.
"I, I mean......"
Faced with So-hee's question, Ha-neul found herself at a loss for words.
Yu Ha-neul liked Sara. Of course, it wasn't exactly full-fledged romantic feelings or a desire to become lovers, not yet. She had never dated anyone, and her notion of romance was that you date someone you love.
She still questioned whether what she felt for Sara could be called love. Physical contact felt nice, and seeing Sara flustered by her own actions was cute. She liked Sara's beautiful face and her secretly warm personality. But she didn't yet have the courage to ask her out.
So... if she had to define what Ha-neul felt for Sara right now, it was possessiveness. She wasn't sure if it was love or just liking her, but she wanted to be the person closest to Sara. That dark, possessive feeling was something she still lacked the nerve to put into words for anyone, no matter how close she'd gotten to them.
Shin So-hee glanced at Ha-neul once, then pulled a shirt from the closet. It was Sara's school uniform blouse. No matter how she looked at it, the blouse was several sizes too small for So-hee to wear.
So-hee buried her face in the uniform blouse and inhaled immediately.
"Haa, smells nice. What kind of fabric softener does she use?"
Ha-neul's jaw dropped.
"Ahh!"
"Since I've got it out, I'll just wear this."
So-hee said that and buried her face in the blouse once more.
"That! That thing you're doing right now! That's exactly why you came!"
Yu Ha-neul pointed a finger at So-hee and yelled.
Then she clamped a hand over her own mouth with an 'ah.'
All three turned toward the bathroom at the same time. Fortunately, only the sound of pouring water could still be heard from inside. The noise hadn't carried in there.
"Yeah. I came for this. Got a problem?"
So-hee used the height difference to look down at Ha-neul as she answered.
.......
A brief silence.
"......Huh?"
As if she hadn't quite processed So-hee's words, Ha-neul cocked her head and let out that sound.
"I mean, I came here for this. Because I want to get closer to her in all sorts of ways. Didn't you notice when I hugged her arm earlier, after getting her permission? Even though you've been clinging to her all day at school."
"Ah, well, I—I'm just, you know, a friend."
"Ha."
So-hee let out a short laugh.
"So being just a friend means you can cling to her arm all the time, casually feed her food, and go out together on the weekend rubbing up against her arm while wearing a dress?"
"I wasn't rubbing......! I—I mean, and that was because Sara bought it for me!"
When she heard 'Sara bought it for me,' So-hee's eyes narrowed further. She glared at Ha-neul and spoke.
"......Not clothes that you picked out?"
"......."
Of course she had picked it out herself.
Honestly, she'd chosen it with a date in mind, so she had no excuse.
Sara in boyish clothes was incredibly attractive. Wouldn't she look perfect no matter what you put her in? Ha-neul thought so.
......But she couldn't say that here. It would put her at a disadvantage instantly.
"I, I mean......."
But she didn't exactly have a good answer ready.
After a moment's hesitation, Yu Ha-neul just decided to throw caution to the wind and shouted.
"I came here to protect Sara from you!"
"Right, and thanks to you, the mood is completely ruined. I'm seriously annoyed."
So-hee shot that back immediately, and Ha-neul's jaw dropped open once more.
"You, you......."
"Yeah, I was planning to do all sorts of things. Just the two of us, in this room, on that bed."
It was a lie.
Shin So-hee didn't have the nerve to pounce on a girl she liked just because they were alone in a room together for the first time. If she had that kind of courage, she would've confessed to one of the girls around her and gotten a girlfriend ages ago.
More than anything, So-hee harbored a fantasy that contrasted with how fierce everyone said she looked. If possible, she wanted her first romance to be sweet and innocent.
Like the leads in the romance novels she'd read as a child. After they started dating, they'd walk apart on their first date, accidentally brush shoulders and flinch, then reach hesitantly for each other's fingertips, finally hold hands, link arms......
And their first kiss would be purely lips touching lips......
......Anyway, she had steps she wanted to climb in her own way. She had absolutely no desire to barrel in with a confession like some femme fatale within a week and immediately toss Sara onto the bed.
That was how it was. Even though So-hee was a free spirit who unbuttoned her shirt because her chest felt stuffy and paid zero attention to how men looked at her, which was partly because she felt sexual attraction only toward women, when it came to romance, she'd been surprisingly fastidious since childhood. She didn't much care whether her partner had been with someone else before; she just wanted the feelings they discovered together for the first time to unfold like a first love.
She would've taken her time if it weren't for two people who, over a single weekend, hadn't been apart for even two full days and were racing ahead like a high-speed train.
......She might have considered sleeping while hugging tight, but anyway.
Even this behavior now, burying her face in the clothes and sniffing, took all the nerve she could muster, pushing past the embarrassment.
Since she attended a different school, she had fewer chances to get close to Sara than the other two. She had to make as much progress as she could outside of school.
So obviously, she had no intention of having her first experience just because she said she was sleeping over at a friend's.
Though she had no need to explain all that in detail to Yu Ha-neul, of course.
"......What do you think of Sara, really?"
Eventually, Ha-neul asked that question.
"I like her?"
.......
.............
Silence.
The declaration was too bold, and it left Ha-neul and Lee Su-a dazed.
Naturally, from So-hee's perspective, it was a complete bluff.
She didn't have the courage to make that kind of declaration in front of Sara. She might get rejected, and Sara might genuinely be heterosexual with no interest in women. Besides, she'd already heard that the arm-linking with Yu Ha-neul and Lee Su-a was part of a plan to break the current situation.
But if it wasn't to the person herself—
At least in front of a potential rival, she could boldly say it like that.
"S-So, I mean, is that a heterosexual kind of feeling?"
"Why bring heterosexual into this? Sara and I are both women. A woman liking a woman, how could that be from a heterosexual perspective? I'm just a homosexual."
Following that string of bombshell declarations, Ha-neul was at a loss for words again.
No, one wrong word here and it's a one-way trip to the bottom.
No matter how openly homosexuality was practiced in this world, occasionally even scandals broke out within idol groups, there were still definitely people who saw it as strange. And those people usually skewed hard to one extreme, ideologically speaking.
And people like that generally weren't welcomed in society, no matter how few there were.
More than anything, the three people here were all girls who felt something beyond ordinary goodwill toward Sara. Though only one was certain of her own feelings, if the other two crossed that line too, they wouldn't be so different from So-hee anyway.
"......I, I see."
Ha-neul, at a complete loss for words, could only mumble that.
"Then I'll take this—"
"......Ah, now that I think about it, I need to borrow some. I don't have any underwear."
So-hee had been about to declare her claim boldly, but Ha-neul suddenly said that, knelt down, and opened the drawer below the closet. Laid out in neat colors inside were undergarments that looked like they belonged to Sara.
Seeing Ha-neul reach for the drawer without a second thought, So-hee freaked out and spoke.
"Hey, still, borrowing underwear—"
"It's fine. We're same-gender friends."
"No, even if you're friends—"
"It's fine. Because we're 'same-gender friends.'"
Hearing the exact same phrase repeated twice, So-hee lost her words.
This kid isn't normal either.
She reminded So-hee of herself not long ago. Though unlike So-hee, who had taken time to grapple with her own sexual identity, it seemed Ha-neul still hadn't fully accepted it.
......And that probably made her even more reckless in some ways.
Watching this, So-hee grew a little impatient.
Even so, she didn't have the nerve to insist on wearing Sara's underwear too. More than anything, it definitely wouldn't fit. Ha-neul and Sara had similar builds, so maybe it could work, but for So-hee it would probably stop somewhere around her thighs and never go higher.
Just as she was mulling it over—
Click. The sound of the door lock opening reached them.
The bathroom door opened, and Sara stepped out cautiously. Since she had taken her clothes in with her, Sara came out already changed into her pajamas. So-hee had secretly been hoping she might come out in a bathrobe or something, and she let out a small sigh. Well, not all rich people acted like the rich in movies and dramas.
Towel-drying her long hair firmly, Sara stopped walking when she saw the two people rifling through her closet without permission.
"Uh......"
Seeing Shin So-hee boldly holding a blouse and Yu Ha-neul boldly opening her underwear drawer, Sara's face went slightly red.
"Ah, Sara!"
Lee Su-a, who until then had stayed out of the other two's argument, called to Sara as if she'd been waiting for exactly this moment.
A hairdryer was in her right hand, and a brush was in her left.
"I'll dry your hair for you!"
!!!
Invisible exclamation marks appeared over the heads of Shin So-hee and Yu Ha-neul.
"Oh, uh, okay......."
Sara, who had been struck speechless seeing the two of them, quickly walked over to Su-a.
Lee Su-a smiled sweetly at So-hee and Ha-neul.
"......."
......Just because someone looks gentle doesn't mean they actually are.
Looking at Lee Su-a, the two of them engraved that thought firmly in their minds.