2. What Are We?
2. What Are We?
Baek Serin sitting on the edge of the bed, and me sitting in the chair that had been pushed far back.
After a short denial phase of about 30 minutes, we skipped way ahead and moved straight into the acceptance phase.
We did talk about going to find the sender of the message first, but Baek Serin adamantly stopped that.
I don't know the exact reason.
Maybe she's wary of that girl.
She made up some vague excuses, but the main point was this:
"So, you'd rather die than go see her?"
"I'd rather die than see another bitch clinging to your side."
And out of habit, Serin tacked a curse word onto the end of her sentence.
Embarrassed by what she had just said, she roughly swept her bangs back and let out a long sigh.
The reason I didn't pry any further was simple.
On the contrary, this whole scene was so awkward it was driving me insane.
When someone you've been bickering with for well over ten years says something like that, of course you'd be close to a state of panic.
"So that's why you kept digging through my messenger app every day?"
"I'm struggling every single day just turning down confessions, and you get to date in peace?"
"Then accept one yourself."
"Ah, fuck's sake, seriously. Hey, the person I like is..."
Pausing for breath, Baek Serin, who was continuing to speak, swallowed her words once again.
Followed by another added sigh.
And just like that, we sank back into an uncomfortable silence.
It's not like I wasn't going crazy myself.
How on earth am I supposed to take that behavior?
It wasn't that I never had romantic feelings for her at all.
Like it or not, we had known each other for practically our entire lives.
Around middle school, I had even confessed to her once.
The other kids would constantly ask if we were dating, or how far we'd gone.
We stuck together so closely that those questions came without end.
And I still remember Serin's response to my confession back then.
'If we date, what changes from now?'
Back then, I thought that was a rejection.
Though not quite to the current extent, we were busy fighting all the time back then too.
Maybe it was from that moment that Baek Serin's complaining started happening more frequently.
Someone might say that sentence stems from the feeling of a long-term relationship.
Someone else might say it means she didn't see me as a member of the opposite sex.
And someone else might take it as a positive answer, just phrased indirectly.
The reason why I, the actual party involved, didn't know the answer was simple.
Because after that, I never asked about Baek Serin's true feelings even once.
Even after something like that happened, Baek Serin and I still always stuck together.
As if waking my head from deep thought, I broke the silence and let out my voice.
"Since when?"
"What?"
"Since when did you like me?"
"Fuck if I know. Since when does liking someone need a reason?"
She really is stupid.
...But then again, if she had thrown the same question back at me, I might have given the exact same answer.
We're both stupid. Resembling each other in such weird ways.
Come to think of it, there was no specific trigger for developing these feelings either.
Since we held each other in our eyes before we even formed a proper sense of self,
maybe we had become each other's standard without even realizing it.
If so, what on earth are romantic feelings?
What on earth are a fresh, brand-new couple thinking about?
"Do you remember the confession I made back in middle school?"
"On a rainy day. In front of my house."
"......."
Seeing how she remembers such specific details, it seems she hasn't forgotten.
For some reason, I couldn't bring myself to open my lips.
The question I wanted to ask remained vivid in my head.
Was it because the answer to the feelings I felt back then came out far too late?
Even if you say you like me,
this dull emotion that simply swallows it down with an 'Ah, I see.'
Could this really be called butterflies?
What on earth was that emotion I held back then?
"If we date, what changes? Compared to now."
This time, I brought up those exact same words.
Unlike me back then, who just took it purely as a rejection, I wondered what you think about it now.
What did those words you said to me back then...
...actually mean, I wondered.
As if trying to answer my question,
Baek Serin's tightly closed lips slowly parted.
"Hey, aren't we going to keep sticking together anyway?"
Subtle, yet unmistakable.
Serin's lips were trembling.
"I plan on staying by your side for the rest of my life, so what point is there in dating, of all things?"
"......."
Was that it?
Did it mean that?
The raw, unripened excitement of early romance had long since vanished.
Even upon hearing words like these, we were the type to brush them off immediately without searching for deeper meaning.
To us, who had become so accustomed to each other, filled only with hardened emotions...
...did that incomplete word, 'dating', really suit us?
The words you said to me back then...
...did they mean that?
.......
Sorting out the thoughts trapped in past memories, I caught my breath and spoke out loud.
"Then in your opinion, what are we to each other right now?"
What were our parallel lines, stretching out in completely opposite directions, drawing all this time?
Right now, there was only one thing that mattered to us.
How on earth should we look at each other?
Your lips, still trembling.
Yet your pupils, gazing right back at me with absolute clarity.
After a moment passed, a low, muttering voice leaked out.
"...I don't know. I don't fucking know, seriously, not a single thing... I don't fucking know."
"......."
Her softly muttering voice turned harsh almost instantly, as if overcome with emotion.
And then, reaching the end, it tied off into a faint murmur once more.
An unsettled, wavering tone.
Irregular breathing that changed speed as it pleased.
A voice fading soft like a dying ember.
I thought that even if I couldn't read anyone else, I understood every single meaning behind your expressions.
Angry, sad, or occasionally amused.
Excluding our parents, we had watched each other longer than anyone else.
...But why?
Just for this one time,
I couldn't read your face.
"...Hey, let me ask one thing too."
This time, Serin spoke first.
Her voice was still trembling.
Her pupils quivered.
Yet, staring at me clearly, she offered her question.
"What do you think of me?"
"......."
...It seems,
we might only know half of each other.
We know what questions will fluster the other.
We know what questions will leave the other speechless.
But precisely because of that, there were things we couldn't know.
Habits, expressions, speech mannerisms, hobbies, inclinations.
Even if we were confident that we had all of those mapped out inside out,
we didn't know a single thing about the actual feelings each of us held.
Because we had never answered, nor had we ever asked.
"...I don't know either."
Serin, whom I expected to be scowling,
was simply directing a sunken gaze toward me.
With calm eyes devoid of emotion.
As if she didn't know either.
We are alike.
Terribly so.
Letting out a long breath to steady my breathing, I posed the question to you once again.
"Are we friends?"
"Probably."
"Then are we lovers?"
"......I don't know."
"Then lastly."
Seueup—
"Baek Serin, what kind of relationship do you want?"
"......."
A repeat sign.
Earlier, I asked about our current state.
And now, I asked about her wish for the future.
If you truly can't tell a lie,
then this single answer will wrap up our conversation up to this point.
...We really took the long way around.
Baek Serin lets out a long breath as well.
And lifting her eyes, she looks at me.
"Sticking together for the rest of our lives. If that means marriage, then I'll marry you.
Even if it's not that, I'll still stick by you just like now."
"......Ha."
As if spilling out emotions she could no longer hold back,
Serin's voice, bursting forth in an instant, spins around and lingers as an echo in my head.
I don't know which answer is the right one.
We were always bickering, and I had never even thought about what kind of relationship we had.
We just lived like that because we were naturally taken for granted by each other.
Now, no longer flowing, we had stopped in each other's lives and settled in just like that.
Did you know these feelings of mine?
Or did you think the same way?
"Don't say it. Whatever you're thinking right now."
"As if you know what it is."
"Whatever it is, I don't wanna know, so shut up."
"Then what changes? Aren't you pissed off that you're the only one being honest?"
"Fuck, more than feeling wronged, it feels like I was the only one who thought that way, and that pisses me off even more."
Tearing at her hair, Serin vented her voice, brimming with emotion.
Even though I hadn't said anything yet.
Even though I knew what Serin's heightened voice implied,
a clear answer simply wouldn't come to mind.
"Haa... If I knew it'd turn out like this, I would've spoken properly back then."
"Even you think it's a bit late, right?"
"Shut up. Back then, that's what I thought. I thought you'd understand even if I phrased it like that. And I still think the exact same way now as I did back then."
"I don't hate you now, either."
"Which means you don't like me either."
If I had to pick one... well. I guess so.
Honestly, even if I tried to fix feelings that had already grown as dull as could be,
too much had been layered over them by now.
Even if the meanings we held were different, wouldn't the unexplainable reason be the same?
Emotions.
They aren't just a shell expressed in words.
"Whatever. You uselessly stubborn bastard."
"Thanks for the compliment."
"Agh, you dumbass, at times like this, you read the room and just say you like me."
"It's not like you're the kind of person who'd be thrilled hearing that anyway, right?"
"At least you know that much."
"Then try making the words 'I like you' come out of my mouth."
"......Haa."
Letting out a short breath, Serin immediately stood up from where she was sitting on the edge of the bed.
Staring sharply at me with narrowed eyes, she stepped toward the chair where I sat.
With a scowling face that looked angry.
Yet unable to hide her slightly flushed cheeks.
"Before that, let me say one thing."
It wasn't my intention to stop Baek Serin.
I already knew full well what she was going to do anyway.
I disliked answers that required a solution.
A lesson learned after enduring a bitterly painful past thanks to someone, you could say.
That's why I felt like I could understand right now.
Looking up at Baek Serin, who had stopped right in front of me, I added in a murmur:
"We have plenty of time."
Because we have grown far too much alike.
Even down to our strange ways of expressing ourselves.