Lecture Time
After graduating high school, I hadn’t kept in touch with Lee Yebin all that much.
At most we saw each other twice a week; beyond that we simply didn’t meet. COVID had hit so hard that both of us had sealed ourselves indoors and barely stepped outside.
Of course we still chatted plenty over KakaoTalk.
Which might raise another question: normally, when people start hanging out less often, they drift apart. So why were we still this close?
If someone asked, I could answer it like this.
“Gyeong-ah~”
“Yes, Mom.”
“I got a really good watermelon this time. Take it over to Yebin’s place.”
Our moms were ridiculously close too.
Our dads went fishing together, washed their cars together, and watched soccer together like it was nothing.
On top of that, Yeon had even gotten math tutoring from Lee Yebin over KakaoTalk.
Thanks to all of that, it was structurally impossible for us not to stay friendly. Even if we tried to keep things casual, our families were so tight that we had no choice but to remain close. That was the current state of me and Lee Yebin.
And so, about a week later, I found myself heading to Yebin’s house with a watermelon in my arms.
Why had I gone the week before? Because her dad had come back from a business trip with bread and wanted to send some over.
You can tell from the phrasing “wanted to send some over” that I ended up being the one who went to pick it up. Mom had ordered me to go myself instead of making the women of the house run errands. Quietly. No arguments.
Anyway, I pressed the doorbell at Yebin’s place with the watermelon, and her mom opened the door right away.
“Oh my, Gyeong’s here? What’s the occasion?”
“Mom told me to bring this over. Here.”
I showed her the watermelon and started to head inside; she opened the door for me as naturally as breathing.
“You don’t have to carry it all the way in.”
“Come on, how am I supposed to make you hold this, Auntie? Of course I’ll bring it in.”
“Such a gentleman, our Gyeong~”
“Haha, thank you.”
I walked into the house like I owned the place, set the watermelon down in the kitchen, and was about to leave again.
That was when it happened.
Creak—
Lee Yebin’s door opened.
“Mooom… who’s he—…”
The moment our eyes met, she froze for a solid three seconds, then bolted straight back into her room.
Naturally I grabbed her before she could disappear.
“Hey, Miss Lee Yebin.”
“W-why are you in my house?!”
“Brought over a watermelon.”
“A watermelon…?”
“Yeah. But…”
The reason she ran wasn’t simple embarrassment. She had no reason to feel shy around me in the first place. Her pajamas? If anything, I was the one who wanted to look away.
She’d shown up on my stream yesterday in those same pajamas. What was there left to be embarrassed about?
So why had she tried to escape? The reason was painfully simple.
“Open the door.”
“No! You pervert…!”
“I’m gonna force it open.”
“Using force on a girl? Worst! Trash! Degenerate!!”
She was throwing every insult she could think of, but I had a reliable ally on my side.
“Yebin-ah, open the door for us, will you~?”
“Ah… u-uh… Mom…!”
“Open the door, daughter.”
Faced with that threat that wasn’t quite a threat, Yebin quietly opened the door. Auntie and I got a full view of the carnage.
Clothes and plushies strewn everywhere. Total disaster zone.
“Haaaah… Daughter, you only skip maintenance for two days and it turns into this?”
“I-it’s three days…”
“Three days or two, what’s the difference?!”
Auntie immediately charged over and started smacking Yebin’s back with sharp whacks, and Yebin took off running.
“Ow! That hurts! It hurts! I’ll clean! I’ll cleeean…!”
“Clean it right this second, you little brat!”
“Okayyyyy…!”
Yebin fled wildly while Auntie chased her down to the bitter end, attacking without mercy.
Sometimes I thought Yebin’s destructive combat power came from taking after her mom.
“Look at Do Gyeong! He keeps his room spotless every single day!”
“Th-that’s just him…!”
I merely shrugged.
“Well then, I’ll be heading out.”
“Alright, Gyeong, take care~”
“Hey! Heeey! Help me clean!”
Should I really listen when she just blurts out a demand for cleaning help?
“What’s in it for me?”
“You materialistic jerk! Your friend asked for help! Your pretty childhood friend asked for help!!”
“Gyeong-ah, don’t listen to my daughter’s nonsense. Just go take care of your own business.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Yaaaah…! Hey, Wish Coupon! I’ll give you one Wish Coupon!”
…Wish Coupon?
“What am I even gonna use a Wish Coupon from you for?”
“You’re so meeean…!”
“Tsk. Sheesh.”
How desperate did she have to be to ask me for help, even pulling out a Wish Coupon as a last-ditch move?
I’d let her off the hook just this once.
“One Wish Coupon. Deal.”
“Thaaank you….”
“Gyeong-ah, you shouldn’t give in to Yebin’s tantrums too easily, you know?”
“I need to teach her just how terrifying a Wish Coupon can be.”
“That’s right. Make sure she learns. She doesn’t know a thing.”
Auntie patted me on the shoulder. I nodded and stepped into Yebin’s room.
It was a pigsty in the truest sense of the word. The description fit perfectly.
“Excuse me, Miss Lee Yebin.”
“Yes…”
“How about cleaning once in a while, yeah?”
“I-I’ve been busy streaming…”
“So busy streaming that a towel’s hanging over there?”
For reference, “there” meant the top of her computer desk. Why was it hanging there of all places?
“No, that one… I spilled a drink once…”
“…Then you should’ve washed the mousepad too.”
“I-it already soaked all the way in…!”
“You wanna die? Hey, move.”
I shoved Yebin roughly to the side and picked up the mousepad from her desk.
Schlick—
The sticky sugar sound was unmistakable. Under my stare, Yebin started looking anywhere but at me.
“Hey. Come here.”
“W… why.”
Bonk!
“Eeek!”
I gave her head a light smack and she let out a weird shriek, like a pig getting its throat cut.
“You seriously gonna live like this? Huh? Just because you stream you get to live like a total slob?”
“Shiiit… it’s really not that bad…”
“The hell it isn’t.”
I dropped a proper curse and started helping her tidy the room roughly.
Thankfully, other than that mousepad, nothing was actually disgusting to look at.
Well… if you had to stretch it…
“Hey, Lee Yebin.”
“Huh… what.”
“…Did you really have to show me even this?”
“You crazy pervert bastard…!”
Her underwear, that is.
Honestly, I didn’t even have any particular thoughts about it. It just reconfirmed how filthy this girl was.
“Pervert bastard, pervert bastard, pervert bastard…!”
She started kicking me, but at least she seemed to know it was her own fault this time—she wasn’t hitting all that hard.
If she’d had zero conscience and gone all out, I would’ve summoned Auntie. She’d be dead meat.
Anyway, once we finished cleaning everything, her room finally looked somewhat like a human being’s room.
“Lee Yebin, bring the vacuum.”
“Can’t we just use the robot vacuum?”
“You think that thing’s more thorough than me?”
“Well… no, yeah.”
“Get movin’.”
“Yes.”
The dialect slipped out without me noticing, but Yebin understood immediately and brought the vacuum.
“You actually got that.”
“You’ve been dropping dialect around me since we were kids. Eventually I just started understanding it.”
The way she said it so proudly was a little annoying, but it also made me think that yeah, she really was my closest friend.
My other friends never understood when I used dialect, yet she picked it up just fine.
While I vacuumed for her, Yebin used a wet cloth to wipe down her desk, bed, and the rest.
See? When she actually tries, she’s good at this. So why does she live like such a mess?
I ran the vacuum over everything, then wiped the floor with a mop afterward. Only then did her room fully become a human space. Before that it had been a close contest with a pigpen.
“Cleaning’s done.”
“Good work, thank youuuu…”
Yebin flopped onto the bed and started laughing like an idiot. I looked down at her and asked,
“Hey, Lee Yebin.”
“What, what is it.”
“You gave me one Wish Coupon, right?”
Flinch!
Only then did she seem to realize she’d put something as weird as a Wish Coupon on the line. Too late now, idiot.
Then she curled up and started glaring at me.
“You lecher, pervert, trash…! What kind of wish are you gonna make…!”
“What are you even talking about, you crazy girl.”
I stared right back at her and spoke completely calmly.
“Later on stream, do a horror game.”
“…What?”
“I said do a horror game. Collab.”
“You crazy bastard, for real?”
“Or you wanna do something else? I’m already being pretty generous here.”
“Uuuuugh…!”
She looked seriously pissed, but she had nothing left to argue with and couldn’t push back anymore.
“…You’ll do it with me, right?”
“Me? Why?”
“Scared?”
“Yes! I’m freaking terrified!”
“You crazy bastard?”
Crazy bastard? I’m being perfectly rational here.
Of course I’ll play with her. When I can watch a terrified Yebin right next to me, why would I let an opportunity like that slip away?