I'll Become the Woman You Love
Evening had gone dark. Rain was falling—and not a drizzle. A hard, driving rain.
Whether they were even running the pool was the first question. On a night like this, they usually weren't.
"Yes, sir. The pool is currently open."
I checked with the front desk, and they said it was. Because the weather had turned cold, they were even pumping in warmer water.
This was Jeju Island. An oceanic climate. People from the inland came here specifically to enjoy that, and the pool was no different. If you wanted to swim indoors, why bother coming all the way out here? That was why this resort had no indoor pool.
"The pool near the beach is currently closed due to high waves."
Right. That was how it should be.
The infinity pool on the roof of the main building is operating as usual. We hope you'll take full advantage of it.
And that was the problem.
The weather right now was no joke. It was bad enough that I couldn't even be sure tomorrow's flight would take off.
Wait. If the plane couldn't fly tomorrow, I was in serious trouble. I hadn't even told my daughter where I was going. My already tangled thoughts twisted tighter.
There was nothing to be done about the weather. The forecast called for rain through tomorrow, but the wind was supposed to die down, so the plane should still fly. Then again, island weather was notoriously fickle. Three days before we'd left, the forecast had promised four days of nothing but clear skies.
If I can't make it back by tomorrow, my daughter's going to be furious.
The lie I'd told her was about to come crashing down all at once. If I wanted to get ahead of it, I should call now and invent an excuse. Should I? Shouldn't I? Not calling was the best option. But if I didn't, and then I failed to make it home tomorrow—that would be the worst.
Fine. Let's put our faith in God.
Prayer's all I've got.
That was it. The only way. Pray that tomorrow's flight would take off. It was the best I could do right now.
Anyway... I still had to go swimming. Why was Ah-rin, who'd spent two days locked in her room, suddenly asking to go for a swim? In this weather?
I'd spent two days trying to get her to talk, and all I'd gotten back were copy-and-paste text replies. She was thoroughly pissed. And now that same person suddenly wanted to go swimming, of all the bland, unsexy things to ask for. Something felt off. I had a feeling that if we swam together, something was going to blow.
But I couldn't refuse her. After two days of silence, this was the first human contact I'd gotten from Ah-rin. And it was a request. If I wanted to keep this relationship from falling apart, I had to go.
Ah-rin was already at the pool. Of course she was. She'd known I would come.
I looked out the veranda window. Rain was lashing in even under the roof, a hard drumming against the glass. Heavy rain, strong wind. Outdoor swimming in this? And yet Ah-rin was already up at the rooftop pool—which also meant she didn't even want to walk down the hallway with me to get there.
What is she thinking? What is she even planning?
I packed my swimsuit, my mind racing through everything she might say. If I could just find the right words, maybe I could ease her heart even a little. But no matter how many times I turned it over, I had no clear answer. If anything, cramming for the expected questions only left you more panicked when something completely unexpected showed up on the exam—so I couldn't just walk in with rehearsed replies. Not that I had time to guess her questions or craft answers anyway.
The rain grew even heavier. The later I was, the worse the scolding I'd get. I grabbed my swimsuit and left the room.
It was Friday, but the resort felt desolate. Fine. Maybe that was for the better. Being the only miserable pair in a crowd of happy, bustling people would have been a truly ugly sight.
The pool locker room was empty. No—I was the only one there. That made sense. Anyone swimming in a storm like this was the weird one.
True to a luxury resort, the locker room came fully equipped: towels, showers, even a spin dryer. All of it included in the price, I supposed. The whole reason I'd booked this place was the infinity pool. The reviews raved about how it lined up perfectly with the coastline, making the pool and the ocean feel like one. The photos were stunning. I'd wanted to see it for myself.
I changed into swim trunks. I'd meant to ask if a cap was required, but there was no staff around—they'd probably figured nobody would show up to swim in this weather. Well... better without a cap anyway.
Forties. The age when you start worrying about hair loss. Caps clog the pores—fatal for thinning hair. I wasn't losing enough to really worry yet, but I had noticeably less than in my prime. That was why I used caffeine shampoo, the kind that's supposed to prevent hair loss, and took brewer's yeast.
...But was hair loss really that important right now? I was being way too relaxed about this. Yeah. I'd finally achieved enlightenment.
The truth was, I'd agonized over all of this before coming up to the pool. But there were no answers. Nothing I could do would satisfy her. In the end, this too was something I could only pray about. All I could do was prostrate myself before an angry Ah-rin and wait for her judgment.
I didn't want things to end badly between us. But accepting what she wanted was, realistically, difficult—because of how society would look at us, and because of my family. I just wanted us to stay as we used to be. Friends. Senior and junior. I just wanted us to get along like that.
If Ah-rin had been harboring feelings for me, she never would have come on this trip.
I'd been so painfully oblivious. I'd always prided myself on being sharp, on picking up on things. And yet I hadn't even known what was in the heart of my closest junior of over ten years. I was just a clueless idiot. Nothing more, nothing less.
I finished changing and walked through the shower area. Empty there, too.
I opened the door leading outside, and a wall of rain slammed into me. Everything was pitch dark. Only the indirect lighting along the pool's interior even hinted that this was a swimming pool.
The water was unmistakably warm. Steam was pouring off it. Of course, the rain and the steam teaming up to make it nearly impossible to see anything around me had become the biggest downside.
"...Huh?"
Even through the haze, something luminous was standing in the middle of the pool.
Straight hair falling to her shoulders. A full chest that wasn't overdone. A slender waist. Hips that looked even wider because of that waist. A woman in a bikini, visible with startling clarity even in this near-zero visibility.
Baek Ah-rin. It was her.
"Wh-what... Dr. Baek... you..."
I started to approach, but she held up a hand, telling me not to come closer. I had no choice but to stop.
Rain hammered against me. I'd expected it to be cold, but it wasn't as bad as I'd thought. She raised the hand that had stopped me even higher. And then—she slipped into the water.
She started swimming. Underwater. The strong lights set into the pool floor let me watch her as she glided beneath the surface.
Her body slid through the water with restrained, precise movements, like a monorail gliding along its track. The rain was pounding down. The frivolous, chaotic slap of raindrops against the pool was the complete opposite of her.
She reached the far side, surfaced just long enough to take a breath, then dove again.
Rain falling. Night. Hot steam rising from the pool. I couldn't see Ah-rin clearly as she swam. And yet her presence was so absolute that I couldn't look away.
Has Ah-rin always been this good a swimmer?
My vision was as blurred as it could get, and still I couldn't look away. Because she was beautiful. If the Little Mermaid had been reincarnated as a real person, would she look like that? I found myself wondering if a woman's body could even be this captivating.
If it hadn't been raining, it would have felt like watching someone stroll through a garden. I wanted to see her on a calm, rainless surface. But I hadn't brought goggles. Even if I dunked my face in the water, I wouldn't be able to see her any better than this.
She surfaced again, right where she'd first been standing. How many laps had she done? I'd been so transfixed I'd lost count. She'd gone back and forth quite a few times, and still she showed no sign of fatigue.
"Uh... hey... Dr.... Dr. Baek."
I approached her hesitantly. I couldn't just stand there staring.
"To you... am I forever just Dr. Baek?"
"Wh-what are you talking about?"
"I can't be anything more than that?"
She asked it quietly, like an accusation. Even through the chaotic slap of rain on the water, her voice came through with perfect clarity.
"N-no... that's not... Dr. Baek... I mean... Ah-rin..."
"I thought about it, and I concluded that the problem was with how I acted."
"No... there was nothing wrong with what you—"
"I'll show you now."
Her hands went to her back.
"From now on... so that you'll see me not as Dr. Baek, but as Baek Ah-rin..."
A flick. A snap. The beautiful line of her chest unfolded before my eyes—and her bikini top dropped beneath the surface of the pool.