4. Deciding to Leave Some Blank Space
I still remember the day I first stumbled onto Jihye's secret.
My grandfather had sent me on an errand, and that was why I'd ended up walking into the run-down PC bang in our neighborhood.
The savory smell of instant ramen, the clamor of noise, and the faint undertone of cigarette smoke. I couldn't for the life of me understand why people paid money to come to a place like this.
Well, it didn't really matter. Seoyeon and I had plans to eat malatang together, so I needed to hurry up and finish the errand.
I was on my way to find the owner when—
"You crazy son of a—!"
A familiar voice rang out, and my feet carried me toward it on instinct.
Twin-tails, a headset clamped over them. It was Jihye, no question about it.
By that point, Jihye and I were on speaking terms—enough to exchange a few words here and there—so I couldn't have imagined her cursing like that. It made it all the more shocking, since the Jihye I knew was a bright, endearing girl.
Of course, it wasn't any of my business. Everybody swears sometimes. Even Seoyeon did, on occasion.
Then Jihye began hammering furiously at her keyboard. I stole a glance at her monitor.
Hm. Why was she suddenly looking for someone's mother?
Whatever it was, the decent thing to do was pretend I hadn't seen it. But the moment I turned my back, my eyes met Seoyeon's as she came through the entrance.
"Siwoo! What took you so long?"
I stole a glance behind me. Jihye's hands were trembling violently, and a single bead of sweat was rolling down her snow-white neck. Her eyes met mine, too.
I kept my voice perfectly even.
"The owner wasn't here."
"Then couldn't you just leave a note on the counter?"
"Yeah, I guess I should have."
"Hehehe, if it weren't for me, you'd have been stuck here forever. See? My Watson simply can't function without his Holmes."
Jihye swallowed hard, a visible gulp. I watched her for a moment, then walked over to Seoyeon.
"Let's go."
"Yeah. Oh, did you know? They say malatang is super spicy, but it's this weird kind of spicy that actually hurts? It's called hwayu, apparently—some kind of Chinese spice, and—"
Silence hung between us.
Jihye was shaking like a criminal caught red-handed, swallowing hard just as she had back then.
"W-wait, you were here?"
"Yep."
You really don't have to be so worked up about it, I thought. I'd told her the same thing back then, too.
To me, Jihye had always been nothing more than Seoyeon's friend. That was the full extent of my impression of her, so I'd genuinely thought nothing of it.
And yet, at some point, she started avoiding me. Whatever little conversation we used to manage came to a complete stop. Not exactly comfortable company, the two of us. That's what we were.
"If I make you uncomfortable, should we go somewhere else?"
"...No, no. That'd just be awkward at this point. I'd feel like I was making a fuss over nothing."
"I told you before—I really don't care."
"...Well, I'm the one who cares."
She heaved a deep sigh and buried her face in both hands.
"Ugh, why does it have to be you who catches me every time? It's never been anyone else. Not once."
"It wasn't on purpose."
"...I'm sure it wasn't. Whatever—come on. Lunch break's almost over."
Without so much as a glance in my direction, Jihye started walking ahead of me. I followed her into an L-shaped nook around the corner.
"About what just happened—"
"I'll keep it secret."
"You know, sometimes you really don't let people finish their sentences."
"You're the one who said lunch break's almost over."
"Well. Fair point."
Jihye crossed her arms and leaned against the wall. Her tone had turned blunt. Then again, whenever no one else was around to see, this was always how she talked.
"So, you—how long are you planning to keep going like this with Seoyeon?"
She'd brought it up first. Something like an earthworm was wriggling through a corner of my chest. An unpleasant feeling—one that had been surfacing constantly ever since the fake engagement ended.
"Going like what?"
"News update just dropped during break. Word is, you went over to wake her up again this morning?"
"Because we're friends."
"......"
At my answer, Jihye's head wavered, unable to settle. She seemed to be debating whether or not to look at me. Meanwhile, I'd been idly staring at her twin-tails swaying freely back and forth.
At last, those blue eyes glared at me. They were still trembling, but this time she didn't look away.
"You heard everything, didn't you. You've liked her since forever ago, so what's with this 'we're friends' act all of a sudden?"
"...Was I that obvious?"
"Yeah. Painfully."
She scuffed lightly at the ground.
"I don't get it. Doesn't it make you angry?"
"It makes me sad, I guess."
"...Good grief, what a pushover."
Jihye clicked her tongue like she was angrier than I was.
"Seoyeon's still my friend, so I'm not dragging her just to badmouth her. But there's one thing I want to say."
I tilted my head, and Jihye spoke carefully.
"Seoyeon wants to go back to how things used to be."
At those words, I felt my heart sink.
Jihye went on.
"Ordinary friends aren't that close. There's a line between guys and girls, you know? And you two crossed it a long, long time ago. ...Siwoo, can you really keep this up?"
For a moment, I hallucinated it—a line drawn inside a painting, darkening stroke by stroke.
Honestly, I already knew. The fact that I hadn't noticed sooner was the strange part. I'd never felt it before, but after years of fielding misunderstanding after misunderstanding, there was no way not to.
In other words, the line I'd imagined was only as faint as my lingering attachment. That was exactly why my heart dropped like this.
The realization struck me: we would never go back to the way we used to be. Never again.
Accepting it was so unbearable that my hands clenched into fists without my permission.
Jihye glanced down at my trembling hands, then gritted her teeth.
"And Seoyeon—she's something else, too. What does 'go back to how things were' even mean? After everything she's said about you? Honestly, it's so damn annoy— hoo."
She let out a long breath.
"Forget I said that. It just slipped out."
"It's fine."
"...You really are something."
"It's fine, Jihye."
I gave a faint smile.
"Things like this—you just ease them out little by little."
Beginners learning to paint, more often than not, try desperately to fill every last inch of the canvas, working without a single gap.
But with enough practice, you learn the technique of expanding the empty space instead—letting the emptiness itself emphasize your subject. It's called negative space.
In other words, I was simply still clumsy in this regard. I'd crammed the canvas far too full, that was all.
Give it a little time, and I would be able to widen that blank space—and then, at last, with room to breathe, I could stand before Seoyeon as nothing more than a friend. That was what I believed.
"......"
Jihye's lips parted slightly. It seemed like she had something she wanted to say, but in the end, she never opened her mouth.
And so, without either of us deciding who would go first, we started walking side by side. That was when we ran into Seoyeon.
Jihye's footsteps stopped. Mine too—and Seoyeon's. Not one of us moved a single step. A strange, brittle air drifted between the three of us.
Seoyeon's eyes flicked between me and Jihye before she spoke slowly.
"...Where did you two come from?"
Jihye looked flustered for a beat, then let out an awkward laugh.
"Seoyeon, we just bumped into each other while out walking and chatted for a bit. Eesh, you're not mad, are you? I swear I wasn't stealing your boyfriend or anything!"
"...It's really not like that with Siwoo. I was just... curious about something."
Seoyeon wiggled her fingers, as if she couldn't quite understand herself. There it was again. She was lost in thought over something right now.
Then the tension left her hands, and she clapped.
"Oh, right—Jihye, there's actually something I wanted to ask you."
"Mm? What is it?"
Jihye flashed a cheerful smile and stepped toward her.
"Um... do you think you could switch seats with someone?"
"Seats?"
"Yeah. Siwoo said not to ask some stranger, since it'd be a bother. But you're a friend, so... that's okay, right, Siwoo?"
Like hell it was okay.
Jihye turned her head, narrowed her eyes at me, then tossed her gaze back to Seoyeon.
"Hmm... you're not going to get chewed out by the teacher again over this?"
"Th-that's...! I-I mean, it's a little scary, but I'll ask her really, really nicely."
I could feel the situation spiraling somewhere strange. Keep this up, and it was obvious I'd end up sitting next to Seoyeon, no way around it.
"Seoyeon."
So I cut in. This was a moment that needed blank space—so that we could all breathe, even a little.
"I want to try getting closer to Jihye. I feel like we've gotten way too awkward with each other."
"...What?!"
The one who reacted explosively was Seoyeon—
—or rather, it was Jihye.
Her entire body froze solid, twin-tails whipping through the air from the force of it. Seoyeon, oddly enough, showed no reaction at all. She just stared at me with a dazed expression.
"Ahh... yeah. That's true, isn't it. You and Jihye did get all of a sudden awkward with each other. Yeah. Right. Okay, got it."
She wiggled her fingers again, then said,
"...But I'm a little hurt, you know. Watson's supposed to be by Holmes's side. You're the one who said that, back in the day."
She rattled the words off in a stream, then turned to look at Jihye.
"That secret you mentioned—it's not about this, is it? Because if it is, there's no need to hide it from me. After all, you're my one and only best friend, Jihye. So..."
Jihye's gaze and Seoyeon's tangled in the empty air.
"Seoyeon, you..."
Jihye dragged both hands down her face. Seoyeon still couldn't seem to leave her hands alone, fidgeting with them helplessly. Jihye stared at those restless hands for a moment—then her expression changed in an instant.
The bright, everyday smile snapped back into place, like it had never left.
"What're we gonna do about this mood? Forget it—let's hurry up and head in together. The bell's gonna ring at this rate? Baek Siwoo, you too. Move it."
"Yeah, yeah."
"Okay."
Seoyeon and I both nodded. I watched Seoyeon's restless hands, and stopped myself just short of saying something.
This was how I would do it—one patch of blank space at a time.