Drifting Apart (6)
"I... I don't think I can keep accommodating you like this anymore. This audition is unavoidable, but still."
The moment those words left my mouth, Ahyeon's lips trembled unnaturally.
I'd known her long enough to recognize that face—the one she made when she had no idea how she was supposed to act. Even when she was performing, she could nail lines where the emotion was clearly spelled out, but in situations where she had to figure out the character on her own... she wore that expression a lot. Even someone like me, who didn't know much about acting, could tell.
"Oh, is that so...?"
"Yeah. We're high schoolers now, so I need to focus on my own stuff too."
"I see...."
Ahyeon still looked unsettled. She brushed her long hair back with one hand, seeming to glance at me for a reaction. Or maybe she had something she wanted to say but couldn't bring herself to say it.
"And I can't stick around like this forever, you know. If this audition goes well for you, you might end up ridiculously busy instead."
I said that as I slowly prepared to leave. I stood up from the chair and casually walked toward the kitchen.
Sure enough, the sink was piled with dirty dishes. And the fact that there were dishes meant she'd eaten the food I'd brought over.
"Is there... any food left?"
"Yeah, a little. But I ate most of it."
Ahyeon had already trailed after me as she answered. When I changed the subject so casually, it felt like she'd gotten swept along with it.
"Alright, I'll bring more next time."
I didn't bother looking at her as I said it, just staring at the sink. It bothered me, seeing them there. Normally... I would have just washed those dishes without a word while I was here. I wasn't the kind of person who could see something like that and pretend I hadn't.
"Okay. When next time?"
"I don't know. As soon as I can. Anyway, good work today. I'm heading out now."
I tore my gaze from the sink and walked toward the front door.
Yeah, it would be pretty ridiculous if I started doing the dishes right now. I had to erase, one by one, all the things I'd always done as a matter of course. Starting from the distant edges and slowly working inward toward the center. That was how I cleaned up a long relationship.
Because it had been a long relationship, it seemed like the cleanup would take a long time too. Probably because there was so much to sort through. And maybe this was just a one-sided cleanup on my part. I had no idea what Choi Ahyeon was thinking, but I was just planning to let this relationship go.
Getting angry, figuring out who was right and wrong, apologizing, making up—those were all things you did when you intended to keep a relationship going. They only meant something when you actually wanted to improve it. But I had no such intention. I'd already been hurt too deeply for that. An irreversible wound.
So without blaming anyone, I was just going to distance myself from that place. I had no desire to have my wounds healed by the person who'd inflicted them, nor did I want them to scab over. Yeah, I'd closed the door to my heart.
Some people might think that cleaning up a relationship this way—unilaterally, without a word—was selfish, petty, and childish. But... I was someone who'd already been subjected to far worse. Because of that, I no longer needed to take those kinds of things into consideration.
The next morning, 6:15 a.m.
I'd already deleted the alarm that used to go off precisely at 6:00. That had been an alarm I'd set a little earlier solely for Choi Ahyeon's sake. I had to wake up then so I could call and wake her, so our run afterward would go smoothly. But... there was no need for that anymore. And now, the habit of picking up my phone and fidgeting with Choi Ahyeon's contact while fretting over whether to call her was gone too.
A text had arrived first from Choi Ahyeon. She was getting up fine even without me waking her. In other words, she was breaking free of the habit too, just like me. I thought that was a relief.
After exchanging those brief texts, I headed out on time so I wouldn't be late.
.
.
.
"Hi...!"
"Hi. You got up fine today."
"Yeah. But it wasn't easy. I'm seriously so tired."
We'd met at the midpoint and were walking toward the course.
"How much weight are you trying to lose?"
"Um... 43?"
43, huh.
Wasn't that too skinny? As far as I knew, she was 165 cm tall. Even now, she didn't look like she'd put on any weight at all. And... even the few times she'd started dieting under the pretense of "managing her weight," she'd never set a goal as low as 43. Usually it was 45.
"Alright, you can do it. Let's go."
But those thoughts stayed in my head; I didn't bother saying them out loud. I just let it slide.
"Is 43 maybe too much to lose?"
But after saying it herself, she was the one having doubts about her own words. Just like I'd thought, maybe she knew it was unreasonable too.
"Well... setting a high goal is a good thing, right?"
"Yeah...."
Ahyeon left another uncertain response to that. We walked side by side for a while, then stopped briefly in front of a convenience store.
"If you didn't buy water, let's grab some together now."
I stepped into the convenience store first as I said that to Ahyeon. I needed to buy water myself, and looking at her, it seemed she hadn't prepared any either. So we each picked out something to drink.
After coming out of the store, right before starting our actual run—
"Here...."
Ahyeon habitually held out the drink she was holding toward me. Yeah, it was probably an action that came out without any conscious thought on her part. Something she did because she genuinely didn't know better, without any malice. She'd never actually run while holding something like this herself, after all.
"Sure."
I just took the drink. I mean, I had no intention of being petty about something this small.
"Alright, you loosened up a bit?"
"Yeah. I think we can start running!"
Then we started running like before. Once I started running, my mind felt at ease. That comfort of not feeling like I was thinking about anything. Like I'd temporarily removed my brain, maybe. And maybe that pace of mine was a little faster than usual.
"Haa, haa, Jinho... wait up... too fast."
I could hear Ahyeon's urgent call from behind as she tried to catch up. The fact that even her voice reached me only faintly told me the distance between us had grown quite large.
"Ah, sorry."
I stood still for a moment and waited for Ahyeon.
"Ugh. I'm too tired... I want to stop here today."
Apparently, trying to keep up with my pace instead of her usual one had taken a pretty big toll on her stamina. We stopped at the 2.5 km mark. That was half of what we usually ran. Wasn't that way too little? For cardio to even be effective, you'd need at least....
"Slowly..."
The words almost left my mouth before I stopped myself short. Yeah, I'd been about to suggest we try going a little farther, slowly. There was no need for me to do that anymore.
"Yeah...? Haa, hoo."
"Never mind. Let's head back for today. Drink some water first. Here."
I held out the drink I'd been running with to Ahyeon.
"Haa... Still, I must be losing weight, right?"
"Yeah. Seems like it."
"Then that's a relief."
"Alright, we're going to start the performance evaluation soon. For the practical music students... hmm... how about we try groups of three?"
At school, I had to hear that bolt-from-the-blue announcement first thing in the morning. My image at school was already at rock bottom as it was. And now group work on top of that. A performance evaluation, no less.
"The criteria for this evaluation aren't just about singing ability or instrumental skill, but how well you communicate with others, exchange musical ideas, and work in harmony. So don't worry too much about the skill side of things."
From my perspective, that was currently the biggest obstacle of all.
I'd rather do it alone if I could. If not that, the only escape route I had... was pairing up with Junyong.
"We'll draw numbers randomly."
But even that didn't look like it would work out easily. If it was random... well, the odds weren't something I could count on.
.
.
.
In the end....
I ended up in a group with two girls I didn't know.
"Hey hey, Yena."
In the moment the teacher gave us to check who was in our groups, one of the girls in my group, after seeing me, urgently called over the other girl in our group—Yena—and seemed to whisper something. Then she pulled out her phone and started tapping away at the screen as if she was going to show her something. At that, Yena also took out her phone and looked at the screen for a moment.
I had to pretend I hadn't seen any of it. Because that... seemed better for my mental health.
"Ah..."
That sound came from Yena's mouth. A sound that carried the nuance of realizing something. I had a rough idea of what would come next, but I still felt a little tense. Just because I'd already been deeply wounded once didn't mean that sensation had dulled at all. No matter how many times you got stabbed, coughing up blood each time was only natural.
"Is that him?"
Yena said, staring at me blankly. That gaze made me shrink a little.
"Yeah...!"
"But what does that matter?"
"Huh? I-I just mean..."
Huh.
What was she saying right now....
"He didn't do anything to me, so I don't really care. But... if anything, you guys seem like the nasty ones. Wasn't he the victim of some Punishment Game or whatever in the first place? Is the world pranking me with a hidden camera or something?"