Didn't You Say You Were Just Friends? (3)
“Seo Ye-ji.”
“Huh? What’s up? Are you two done talking?”
“Yeah, pretty much.”
When I stepped into the department room and called her name, Seo Ye-ji looked startled. She set her phone down in a hurry, clearly flustered. It was only natural. The person who was supposed to walk in hadn’t shown up, and instead some strange guy had entered.
“Where’s Chae-ryeong?”
“She’s probably still outside. Anyway, I have something to tell you.”
“......You? To me?”
“Yeah.”
She hadn’t done anything wrong, yet her face was tense with nerves. This must be what people mean when they say a crush is obvious. Whenever I spoke to her, she reacted like this. It would have been harder not to notice.
“W-what is it?”
“I know you like me.”
“What? What are you…?”
Her face flushed scarlet in an instant. She stammered, voice trembling, and hung her head like someone struck in a vital spot. She was avoiding my eyes. Probably. But she didn’t deny it. She already understood that denying it now would be pointless.
“And Chae-ryeong gave me the rough version. About what you two talked about in here before I arrived.”
“...She told you?”
“She didn’t have any bad intentions. Yoo Chae-ryeong felt really guilty toward you. Because she’s dating me.”
“...”
“You’ve probably seen the channel, so I’ll be honest. Yes, Yoo Chae-ryeong and I are dating. We haven’t told anyone else, though.”
“.....So it really was true.”
Seo Ye-ji’s expression turned bitter at my words. Still, I had to say it. Even if it hurt her, the fact that we were together needed to be out in the open. Only then could we keep filming our couple vlog smoothly, without any more misunderstandings.
“But it seems there’s a misunderstanding between you two, so I wanted to clear it up.”
“Misunderstanding?”
“Chae-ryeong told you we were just friends up until the start of the semester, right?”
“....Ah, yeah. She did.”
“I don’t know how you’ll take this, but she was telling the truth back then. Until that point, Chae-ryeong and I really were just friends.”
“...”
“Chae-ryeong never saw me as a guy. Because even then, I was the only one who liked her.”
That was the heart of the issue. The part where Chae-ryeong had claimed we were just friends. It hadn’t been a lie at the time, but now that we were dating, it must have looked like one to Seo Ye-ji. So I had only one job: make her words true. That way, Seo Ye-ji’s sense of betrayal would lose its target.
If she tried to explain it herself, it would sound like an excuse. It was far better for me to do it.
“Not long ago I couldn’t hold back anymore and confessed. She even turned me down the first time.”
It was all a lie except for the one-sided crush. Adding the rejection made it more believable—the fact that she had only seen me as a friend.
“In the end I kept pushing until she had no choice but to accept.”
“...”
“So don’t misunderstand. Chae-ryeong didn’t do anything wrong. She never tried to seduce me or showed any interest.”
Seo Ye-ji looked completely at a loss. Of course she did. Now Chae-ryeong had become the victim too. It turned out Seo Ye-ji’s suspicions had been wrong, and she had painted her own friend as the villain. Naturally her gaze drifted behind me.
At some point, Yoo Chae-ryeong had been standing behind the open door of the department room.
......I told her not to follow me in. I hadn’t expected her to listen, but she really never does what she’s told.
“......Is that how it happened? Chae-ryeong?”
At Seo Ye-ji’s careful question, Yoo Chae-ryeong glanced at my face. What are you doing? Are you trying to undo everything I just did? When I shot her that look, she finally nodded.
“It’s true. I was going to tell you earlier too… but explaining it myself felt weird… because if I were in your shoes, I probably wouldn’t believe me either.”
“Ah…”
“I’m sorry, Ye-ji. Somehow I ended up dating him… even though I knew you liked Yoon Taeo…”
At Chae-ryeong’s heartfelt apology, Seo Ye-ji only looked more flustered. Saying she should have backed off if she knew would have been pointless now—after all, I had already been rejected once. There was enough justification. She understood that relationships, especially love, don’t always go the way you want. Seo Ye-ji wasn’t shameless enough to demand that someone keep rejecting a persistent suitor until the very end.
“N-no, it’s okay, Chae-ryeong. Actually I’m the one who’s sorry. I think I misunderstood. I knew you weren’t that kind of person… but I was blinded by my feelings… I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine, I understand. I would have felt the same. It’s about the person you like getting involved with someone else, right? As a fellow girl, I know you can’t help but get sensitive.”
Before we knew it the power dynamic had completely flipped. Seo Ye-ji was the one apologizing, and Chae-ryeong was graciously accepting. Once the scene I wanted had been set, I quietly slipped out of the department room. The rest was up to the two of them—whether they fought, made up, hugged, or whatever.
......I’d set the table. They could feed themselves from here, couldn’t they?
I stepped outside and gently closed the department room door so the two of them could have a proper, heartfelt reconciliation. Very quietly.
Not long after, Yoo Chae-ryeong emerged from the department room with a much brighter face. Her expression gave everything away; I didn’t even need to ask whether they’d made up.
“All done talking?”
“...Yeah. Thanks to you.”
“Then let’s go eat. You said you were hungry.”
I spoke first and started walking ahead. Chae-ryeong trailed after me, then fell into step beside me. She glanced at my face cautiously.
“Yoon Taeo.”
“Yeah?”
“......I’m glad things worked out with Ye-ji. But are you okay?”
“With what?”
“I mean… you still have your pride… Because of me you ended up as the guy who had a one-sided crush, got rejected, and then kept clinging desperately… I feel kind of bad…”
“If I hadn’t said all that, this wouldn’t have resolved so easily, you know?”
“......Still. It bothers me. In a way it’s not even your problem.”
Yoo Chae-ryeong looked genuinely sorry. When did you get so considerate? The guilt on her face was so strong it triggered every protective instinct I had.
“Since when did you start worrying about my pride so much? Seriously. I’m speechless.”
“Hey, I’m trying to be thoughtful here. Why do you have to phrase it like that? It hurts my feelings…”
“It’s fine. If my pride takes a small hit and this is the result, I’m satisfied. What are friends for?”
Friends. It sounded nice when wrapped up in that word, but if we were really just friends I wouldn’t have gone this far. Do you know? That because I like you, I can lie, act, and throw away my pride without hesitation. That as long as you can be happy, none of it matters much to me anymore.
...At this rate I’m worried I might actually commit a crime because of Yoo Chae-ryeong. I feel like I really could.
So stop looking at me with that guilty face.
“If you feel that sorry, you can buy me lunch today.”
“Should I? Will that make us even?”
“Only if I order the most expensive thing. Hmm, what’s the priciest restaurant near campus? Doesn’t VIPS have a location around here?”
“Hey, no steak! I already gave you the contract money and now my living expenses are tight…”
“I don’t know anything about your wallet situation~ Anyway, I’m ordering the most expensive thing. Muhahaha.”
Let’s just keep laughing and talking nonsense like we always do.
“Can’t we do ribs or pork belly instead of steak? Or beef? How about beef? I know a good place.”
“Beef? That would still be too expensive, wouldn’t it? I’m ordering all the special cuts, you know?”
“Uwaaa… Have mercy… Yoon Taeo… I don’t want to live on ramen for a whole month…”
Because you’re the prettiest when you smile like that.
Just stay by my side, always bright and cheerful like always, Chae-ryeong.
“Um… you know… Yoon Taeo.”
“What now?”
“Thanks for helping me today. I’m really glad… that you’re my friend.”
Yeah. That’s right.
Two days later I dragged myself out of bed in the late afternoon.
“Ughhh… free periods are heaven… college students live for free periods…”
I savored the bliss of a weekday with no classes and slowly rose from bed. Since I’d spent the entire morning messing around on my phone, maybe I should do something productive in the afternoon.
“I don’t feel like studying… Guess I’ll edit…”
Schoolwork still wasn’t fun, so these days I spent my time editing interesting YouTube videos instead. There weren’t any new clips, so I was cutting up the raw footage and turning it into Shorts.
Uploading videos had somehow become more fun than gaming.
“I’m running out of source material. I need to tell Chae-ryeong we should film soon.”
While I was deep in editor mode, my phone buzzed. I checked the KakaoTalk notification, thinking it might be from Chae-ryeong.
......Seo Ye-ji. She had a looser mouth than I thought. You.