Chapter 10
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The next day, I went to school looking like a wreck and collapsed onto my desk as soon as I arrived. I desperately prayed that this time, at least, I would wake up in reality.
“Ha…”
I was still a high school student trapped inside this damn novel. And a first-year at that, with three whole years left until graduation.
“Hellooo.”
I heard a voice greeting me from behind, and with the sound of someone settling into the seat beside me, Cha Yihan dropped down into his chair.
I had been planning to stay slumped over and just glance at him to give a halfhearted greeting, but the moment I saw what he had in his mouth, I shot upright.
“You…!”
At my words, Cha Yihan widened his eyes and looked at me.
“Hm?”
I stared intently at the stick between his lips. A red bead briefly caught my eye between them.
“Ah.”
It was candy. I let out a short exclamation mixed with emptiness.
Well, of course.
Who would openly smoke something like that at school? Unless they were dying to be dragged to the police station.
It’s only realistic in moments like this. So annoying.
I flopped back down onto my desk. From day one of quitting smoking, I was already seeing things. Maybe it was because I could not smoke that it made me want it even more.
“Why, Yeon-ah?”
“It’s nothing…”
But even knowing perfectly well that it was candy.
That face staring at me looked so… much like the kind that would be loitering delinquently in an alleyway, so obviously troublemaking, that I kept mistaking the candy for something else.
I folded my hands on top of the desk, rested my forehead on them, and began banging my head.
Get it together. Get it together.
Tap.
The next thing my forehead hit was not the back of my hand. It was Cha Yihan’s palm. His hand pressed gently against my forehead.
“What are you doing. That hurts.”
“It doesn’t hurt. I’m trying to get myself together.”
“Get yourself together? You still half asleep?”
“Yeah…”
“Let’s have some candy.”
With his large hand, Cha Yihan carefully pried apart my interlocked fingers one by one and placed a strawberry candy on top.
“It’s my favorite, but I’m giving it to you.”
The way he smiled softly looked more harmful than smoking.
I averted my gaze and nodded.
“Thanks.”
I tried my best not to look at his face as I unwrapped the candy in my hand.
“…Yeon-ah.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeon-ah?”
“Yeah!”
I answered energetically, keeping my eyes fixed on the candy.
Rip.
At the same time, the wrapper tore open, Cha Yihan’s face suddenly appeared right in front of mine.
I flinched and reflexively leaned back.
“Why won’t you look at me?”
“Huh?”
His face was so handsome that I could not even process what he had just said. I frowned and asked again, and he stared at me silently before turning back to his seat.
“……”
Cha Yihan looked down with a strangely sullen expression. His lips were subtly sticking out.
Is he sulking because I didn’t look at him when he called me?
Kids were all the same, after all.
For a moment, I considered just ignoring him like this and letting our relationship sour.
But I remembered how Kang Sunwoo and Cha Yihan had reacted so sensitively whenever I did that before, and I abandoned the thought.
“I’m sorry, Yihan-ah. I didn’t hear you. What did you say?”
“You keep trying not to look at my face.”
“Did I?”
Honestly, I had. Seeing that face kept reminding me of something I could not have, so I had been avoiding it, but it seemed I had made it too obvious.
Cha Yihan looked up as if retracing his thoughts, then glanced at me and muttered, “You ran away in the cafeteria too…?”
“……”
Wow, if I were really a high school student, I would have been so intimidated that I might have cried.
That expression is no joke…
The slightly pissed-off look on his face was the highlight. Even so, his visuals were handsome in a different way.
“I-I had my reasons.”
At my words, Cha Yihan stared straight into my face and asked, “It’s not because you hate me?”
“It’s not that I hate you… It’s just that right now, you’re a little scary.”
“Scary? Me? Why?”
“Your expression.”
The moment he heard that, Cha Yihan immediately curved his lips into a smile and began grinning brightly.
“Like this~?”
Watching him instantly switch to his usual gentle smile with an aegyo-laced tone, I was impressed.
“I thought I was watching some kind of play just now.”
As if it were a lie, he did not seem scary at all anymore. I gave him a thumbs up.
“Yeah? Then I should keep smiling in front of Yeon.”
With a smile in his eyes, Cha Yihan crunched the candy in his mouth.
I let the strawberry candy melt on my tongue, easing the emptiness in my mouth.
Yeah, let’s live healthily…
Study hard, get healthy. Killing two birds with one stone.
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“That’s it for the announcements. The bell rang, so sit down and rest. First period is self-study.”
I can’t do this. I felt like I was going crazy with resentment as I covered my face with both hands.
If someone told you not to eat chicken for three years, could you do it? Could you?
When people were told not to do something, they thought about it more and wanted it even more, until it drove them insane. That was human psychology.
Remembering that this novel was an over-the-top melodramatic story overflowing with all kinds of provocative elements, I glanced at Cha Yihan.
Maybe, just maybe. No, there has to be something, right?
Should I talk to him, or not?
Part of me thought there was no need to start a conversation with the male leads over something like this, but what I was feeling right now was too miserable.
“Hey, Cha Yihan.”
My better judgment gave way, and I spoke impulsively. He looked at me and corrected my words.
“Yihan.”
“…Yihan-ah?”
“Yeah! Why?”
“Do you really like eating candy that much? Or are you trying to quit something else… so you’re eating it, like that.”
As I tried to phrase it indirectly, my words came out haltingly.
I glanced at the pile of candy stacked in one corner of Cha Yihan’s desk and subtly tested him. He tilted his head.
“Quit? Quit what?”
I looked at Cha Yihan, who asked back with innocent eyes, with a gaze full of suspicion. With a face like that, was he really just innocently sucking on candy?
“No, it’s nothing…”
Still, he was a high school student. It did not feel right to ask something like that so openly. Just as I was about to drop the subject, he twitched his eyebrows and let out an “Ah,” smiling.
“Cigarettess~?”
I whipped my head back toward him again, my eyes sparkling as I nodded eagerly.
“Yeah, yeah.”
"I've never smoked one before."
The faint smile lingering on my lips shattered instantly.
“What?”
That was a lie. That could not be true. It could not be. If it were, then I would be a person with no dreams and no hope.
“Why? Do I look like I’d do something like that?”
“Uh… um, no… well…”
Sorry, but honestly, he did look like it. At my answer, Cha Yihan covered his face with his blanket and made a tearful expression. He looked like he was about to mime wiping away tears.
“I’m not that kind of kid…”
“Uh, okay. S-sorry. It’s not that I was thinking badly of you.”
Flustered, I patted his shoulder a couple of times to comfort him, and Cha Yihan revealed his face from inside the blanket and lightly rested it against my shoulder.
“I hate the smell of cigarettes, and I hate bitter things. I don’t do weird stuff.”
“Y-yeah. Got it. I’m sorry.”
I nodded vigorously and pushed Cha Yihan’s shoulder away from me. The face staring at me while leaning on me was seriously no joke.
The soft texture of the blanket brushed past my fingertips. Pushed back by my hand, Cha Yihan looked at it with a dissatisfied expression.
“But why cigarettes?”
The candy in Cha Yihan’s mouth cracked with a sharp sound.
“Huh? Well…”
“Who said I bought it? Who told you that?”
“No! No? It’s not like that… It’s not… Just…”
Under his pitying gaze, as if he were looking at a kid getting shaken down for money, I fumbled before speaking.
“I just got a liiittle curious…?”
“Hm? No.”
“Huh?”
“Don’t get curious. Cigarettes are bad for your body.”
“That’s… true…”
From a student's perspective, you could not even buy them, so yeah, they were bad.
But I was twenty-six. Even if my body was seventeen, my mind was twenty-six.
“Yeah, they’re bad for your health, so you shouldn’t do it. Got it~?”
After crunching the candy like it was a snack, he soon finished it and began chewing on the leftover stick.
With tears welling in my eyes, I nodded.
Maintaining direct eye contact with me, Cha Yihan stopped chewing on the stick, smiled, and reached out his hand.
“Want another candy?”
When his finger lightly poked my cheek, my inner old-fashioned instincts almost burst out with a ‘Where do you think you are touching?’ but I held it back.
“…Do you have chocolate flavor?”
Because I was the one whose mouth felt unbearably restless.
“Chocolate flavor?”
With the candy stick still between his teeth, Cha Yihan began rummaging through his pocket.
Inside his school uniform pocket were loads of sweet snacks like caramel, chocolate, and candy.
“…You really like sweets, huh.”
“Yeah, I always have something sweet in my mouth.”
How could he live so innocently, just sucking on candy, with a face that looked like such a delinquent?
In my current state of dissatisfaction with everything being restricted, everything about him seemed annoying.
“Here.”
A chocolate-flavored candy dropped onto my palm.
“Want me to unwrap it for you?”
Seeing his hand move as if to take it back, I tightened my grip on the candy and shook my head. I was not a child.
“No, I’ll unwrap it.”
I answered firmly, peeled off the wrapper, and immediately put it in my mouth. He looked at me and smiled as if he found me amusing.
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