What Do You Want to Do With Me?
The afternoon after coming back from school. As always, I was hammering away at my keyboard, staring at a screen filled with English commands.
Luckily, my schedule this semester was pretty reasonable, so the early days of university life had been fairly relaxed. But as time went on, things started getting busy again.
Assignments piling up. Review sessions. Just handling all of that was enough to eat up an entire day.
“Ugh, damn it. Why is there another error? If you’re gonna tell me, at least point out exactly where it hurts!”
I swear, coding is the ultimate cure for low blood pressure. Errors popping up? Fine, I get it. Errors are basically a daily occurrence in coding. But when an error shows up, at least tell me which part is causing it.
It just says an error occurred at this location, but doesn’t tell me what exactly went wrong there. Every time this happens, I end up frantically digging through Google, and all I can do is sigh.
“The value is an integer, so using INT is correct. I properly assigned the value to the variable. So what the hell is wrong?!”
I let out a long sigh and leaned back in my chair. There was still a lot left to do, but staring at an error that refused to resolve made all my motivation vanish.
Whenever I’m living the university life, I often wonder if coding is really suited for me. Mom says it gets easy once you get the system down, but that system still hasn’t clicked for me yet.
Still, I want to see it through to the end. Since I’ve set grad school as my dream goal, I can’t give up over something like this.
Thinking I’d take a short break, I opened the writers’ group chat, only to find it buzzing with excitement over a new member joining.
Hajin told us to wait a moment, then brought the new member into the group chat. His name was Park Ji-sung. That name really sounds like someone who loves soccer and would be good at it.
With a new member joining, we focused on giving him a warm welcome. We went through the usual introductions, sharing a bit about ourselves and revealing our pen names.
—Viiiing!! Viiiing!!
While we were chatting in the group, my phone rang. It was Chae-yeon.
“Hello?”
What are you doing?
“I was living in a world made of zeros and ones, got pissed off, and escaped back to reality.”
You must’ve been coding. Is it hard?
“It’s insanely hard. Feels like my head’s about to explode.”
I’m dying over here because of this team project. These guys won’t listen to me!!
One of the best things about majoring in computer engineering is that there are no team projects. Since it’s way more efficient for one person to write code than a group, everything is done individually.
If there were a lot of group assignments… ugh, I couldn’t handle that. How am I supposed to work with people I don’t even know?
I won’t be able to come to Gwangju for a while. I’m way too busy…
“Come when you have some free time. That way you can actually enjoy it too.”
Next time I go to Gwangju, let’s really have fun. I feel like I need to blow off all this built-up stress.
“Is there something you want to do?”
I don’t have anything in mind right now. What about you?
Last time I hung out with Chae-yeon, I discovered how fun betting could be. Now that I’ve found this new source of entertainment, I wanted to try something we could bet on.
“Ah, that. I want to do that.”
What is it?
“You know… that thing…”
What? What exactly do you want to do with me?
“Ah!! Pool. Wanna go play pocket billiards?”
The way you’re saying that makes it sound like you’re pretty confident?
“I like pool. If it’s pool, I can beat you.”
Really? What are you gonna do if you lose?
“What are you gonna do if you lose to me again and have to beg, ‘Please, just one more game’?”
At least there’s no luck factor like in bowling. That won’t happen.
While talking to Chae-yeon on the phone, I glanced at the console window still open on my laptop. Maybe because I’d suddenly disappeared from the conversation, the writers’ group chat was now flooded with Kim Su-ho’s conspiracy theories.
I occasionally had to shut Su-ho down while continuing my call with Chae-yeon.
“I’ll beat you at pool with pure skill.”
What exactly are you basing all this confidence on?
“I’m actually not confident at pool. I’m confident I’ll lose.”
Then should we make the pool bet a wish coupon?
“Can you handle that? What if I wipe the floor with you?”
Yeah, that’s never gonna happen. I’m going to win.
Chae-yeon’s overflowing confidence made a laugh slip out of me. She sounded like an elementary school kid trying to act tough.
Oh, right. I just sent you a photo. Wanna see?
I pulled the phone away from my ear and looked at the pictures Chae-yeon had sent. They were photos of her wearing the bracelet I’d bought her when we went out together. It looked like she wore it often—there wasn’t just one picture, but several.
“You wear it all the time, huh?”
It’s so pretty I wear it every day. Thank you so much.
“Seeing you like it that much makes me glad I bought it.”
It’s magnetic so it’s super easy to put on too!!
I hadn’t originally planned on buying her a bracelet. But when I saw the longing in Chae-yeon’s eyes as she stared at it, my body moved before my brain could catch up. How could I not buy it when she was looking at it like that?
To be honest, she was pretty cute back then.
Chae-yeon kept talking nonstop about the day we’d hung out and played together. Listening to her bright, cheerful voice through the phone, I felt the corners of my mouth naturally lift into a smile.
Did you eat after getting back from school?
“Uh… if I say I didn’t, am I gonna get scolded?”
What do you think? If you say it clearly, I’ll know for sure.
“I didn’t eat. I got back from school and felt too tired.”
You have to eat!! Why didn’t you?!
I’d been enjoying her pleasant voice, but the sudden sharp tone made me yank the phone away from my ear. I thought my eardrum was going to burst.
You need to eat at least two meals a day. You probably just ate lunch half-heartedly too.
“Should we put some distance between us? You know me way too well.”
What if you collapse again? I heard from your aunt that you’ve passed out from low blood pressure before.
“I’m really fine now. My blood pressure is at normal levels.”
If you don’t eat, your blood pressure will drop. Hurry up and eat.
“Eating is such a hassle for me. I’ll eat properly tomorrow.”
You’re good at cooking, so why are you so lazy about eating?
“Even people who cook well eat sloppily when they’re alone.”
Even after I said that, Chae-yeon kept nagging me endlessly about eating. My own mom wasn’t even this bad.
Even when she worries about me, she knows how much stress I’m under, so she stops after giving moderate advice. But Chae-yeon doesn’t do that.
Maybe it’s because she doesn’t really know how hard those times were for me, but she wouldn’t stop scolding me. With no other choice, I left my room, fried some rice, took a photo, and sent it to her.
“There, happy? I’m eating now.”
Good. It’s great that you’re eating even if it’s like this. I’m gonna go prepare for my team project now.
“Please, just go. I’m begging you.”
I’m only saying this for your own good.
“Ugh, even my mom doesn’t say stuff like that to me anymore. Are you my mom?”
She says she’s always so worried about our Jung-woo.
“Just go prepare for your team project already.”
Okay. I’ll call you again later.
Even though I’d only talked to one person, I felt mentally drained like I’d just had conversations with a whole crowd. By the way, what the hell were these guys saying?
—Viiiing!!
Want to collect praise stickers? I’ll give you one every time you eat two proper meals a day.
“No thanks. What am I, an elementary schooler?”
If I don’t do it like this, it doesn’t seem like your habits will change.
It felt awkward having someone who wasn’t family show this kind of concern for me. Still, I didn’t find Chae-yeon’s nagging annoying or irritating at all. After all, it feels good to have someone care about you.