Offense and Defense
"That doesn't mean we have to rush."
"You always shove the future at me, don't you?"
At Serin's blunt reply, I turned the words over for a moment. Maybe it wasn't that I wanted to change anything right away. Maybe I was only measuring out how long we'd need before this felt familiar. Nothing that seemed like the right answer came to me. She wouldn't want some cringeworthy line out of me anyway.
"There you go, thinking weird shit by yourself again. Forget it. I was thinking the same thing anyway."
"......Who are you?"
"...What was that, out of nowhere? Or do you actually—"
"Yeah. That's Baek Serin. Stop."
"...You crazy bastard. I swear."
......Fair enough. Even if I tried to deny it, that was the real Baek Serin. Looking only at where we were now, maybe I was the strange one. I was the only one still stuck in denial.
We'd spent all of a single day like this. Not understanding each other yet was probably inevitable. Then I'd have to change, slowly. What else was there to do?
As if setting down one of the burdens I'd been carrying inside, I got up without a word and climbed onto the bed where Serin lay. Her eyes followed me, rounding little by little.
"Wh-what are you doing, you crazy bastard—?!"
"...Wow. She tells me to come over, and she still swears at me when I do."
"......Even so, say something before you climb up. You scared me."
"It's my bed. I'm getting on it."
"......Our bed."
"......"
......Should I get back down? The burden I'd just set down felt like it had climbed right back onto my shoulders. I wasn't trying anything weird, and I wasn't blindly closing the distance either. I'd only remembered, for a moment, something from when we were little. And this was the only thing I could think of that I could do right now as if it were nothing.
"Hey. Turn your head. The other way."
"...What are you planning?"
I looked quietly down at one of Serin's faintly flushed cheeks. With our eyes at this height, the position was turning the mood strange.
"Just turn it."
"......Fine."
She let out a long sigh, and only then turned over. The hair she'd kept tucked behind her ear fell aside, and a faintly reddened earlobe showed. Only then did I shift a little closer and, still sitting, lift a hand over Serin's head without a word.
It must have been elementary school. We'd been playing at the Neighborhood Park when she scraped her knee and sobbed, and I'd soothed her. The posture, the mood, the intent—none of it was anything like now. Then and now, the fact that I was still beside her hadn't changed. We'd stuck together that long, and this was only the second time I'd ever stroked her hair.
I moved the hand that had been hovering and slowly swept her hair back. The sensation must have felt strange. Baek Serin flinched and gave a little shake. At the same time a small voice leaked out, as if it were crawling.
"Hey... wh-what is this, all of a sudden......"
"Why? Want me to stop?"
"......Do it... more."
Shff—
Soft hair swayed along its grain. Matching the habit she had of always tucking it behind one ear, I changed the direction of my hand and kept going for a while. It hadn't even been that long before Baek Serin shivered and let her voice slip.
"Hey, hey... this—this feels a little weird..."
"What's weird about it?"
"...Maybe because I can't see anything. I'm a little sensitive."
"......Sounds like an excuse."
"......Shut up."
My opinion didn't seem to matter much. As if she'd meant to all along, Baek Serin slowly turned herself around. Our eyes met at once. Like ripples spreading over still water, her light-brown pupils trembled again and again.
Had I ever looked into her eyes this closely?
Whether Baek Serin was thinking something similar, or whether it meant something else, for a while we simply held each other's faces in our eyes. A little late, I slowly moved the hand that had stopped.
Her faintly trembling eyes began to close, as if seeking calm. Even so, maybe she didn't want them fully shut. Through lids left barely open, she looked up at me.
"...Hey. Should I grow my hair out?"
"You've had a bob ever since second year of middle school."
"That's what I'm saaaaying. ...You remember that, though."
"You showed up to school one day with it cut short out of nowhere. I was pretty shocked."
I'd never asked why she cut it and came to school like that. I'd been surprised, but I hadn't thought any deeper than that. What mattered, anyway, was that even with her hair cut, Baek Serin was still Baek Serin.
"You told me I was pretty back then, remember?"
"What, was I supposed to tell a kid who'd just cut her hair that she looked ugly?"
"I kept the bob just because of that."
"There's another reason. Say that one first."
"...You're not falling for it anymore? Half of it's true, though."
At some point Baek Serin had closed her eyes. In their place, the corners of her mouth had begun to lift, faintly, as if she were comfortable in her own way.
"So? What was the reason?"
A brief silence. Maybe some hesitation was still left in her. She pouted, she mumbled, and only after a long while did she let her voice out.
"I wanted you to know it was me just from seeing my back."
"I'd know even without that."
"......And this way, I can see you better."
Serin's closed lids rose slowly. Right away her eyes drew a faint curve and smiled.
...I'd meant to offer some meaningless answer. For some reason my heart itched, and my voice didn't come out in time.
"Do you like it long, or do you like it like this?"
Before long, Baek Serin's question was circling at my ear again. I'd never paid much attention to hairstyles. Long or short—in the end, the person she was didn't change. So then...
"I like all of it."
"That's the same as saying whatever, and I really hate that."
"It's different. I like it because it's you."
"......"
The faint smile on Baek Serin's face collapsed all at once. Both cheeks began to burn red. The eyes that had been on me slipped away toward an empty corner, as if fleeing. Her lips parted and closed several times, and only after a little while seemed to remember their job. She let out a voice that was a bit curt.
"...Hey. Why didn't you talk to me like this back then?"
"I said you were pretty."
"......How was I supposed to know if you were just saying it?"
"From now on, if you ask, I'll say it."
"...That thing just now?"
"Well. Twice isn't as fun."
As if trying once more to measure what I meant, Baek Serin's gaze came back to me. Like a small ripple between the looks that held each other, the eyes that had been steadily watching me wavered.
"......I think it's fun."
"......Ha."
...What was I supposed to do with her?
The same girl who'd come at me earlier, attacking with how much she liked me, was now flushing hard just because I'd stroked her hair, blinking over and over like she had no idea what to do. She was much easier to handle than before. So why was my own face itching for no reason?
Trying to match this newly honest version of her, my own thinking must have gone hazy instead. We'd only been together a little while. I didn't have to start resembling her in this, too. Or had matching each other for nearly our whole lives turned even this into a habit?
"...Hey. Your hand stopped."
A small voice popped out of nowhere. She was that embarrassed, and she still pinpointed exactly what she wanted.
Shff—
I moved the hand that had stopped. I'd been sweeping naturally from the crown of her head down to the pillow, and I started to bring it forward, then stopped. A few strands of her bangs were stuck to her forehead by beads of sweat. A face going a little red shouldn't make someone sweat like this.
"Hey, Baek Serin."
"...What."
"......Why are you under the blanket?"
When I widened a view that had held only her face, the reason finally came into sight. She must have fidgeted the blanket I'd folded into that corner over with her feet and dragged it across, because she had it pulled up from below her navel. It wasn't hot enough for that yet, but it wasn't chilly enough to need a blanket either.
"...I don't know. I'm cold. I don't know."
"......A minute ago you were teasing me about liking you."
"Ugh. Who told you to climb onto the bed out of nowhere?"
"So you're saying don't come up from now on?"
"......Are you insane?"
She shot me a sharp look, as if she couldn't believe me. Maybe this was finally a little more like Baek Serin. I still had no idea what counted as her being back to normal.
"...But why didn't you do stuff like this before?"
"You never asked."
"So it's not that you didn't want to."
"Guess not."
"......I should've said it sooner."
It wasn't some act loaded with a grand reason. It wasn't something that took shaking hands and a great deal of courage, either. Then and now, the one thing we were hopeless at was setting a mood. It was probably just that a moment like this had never come along.
"What kind of confidence did you even have, asking to live together?"
"...Isn't it the other way around?"
Baek Serin's eyes, which had been aimed at the corner, met mine again. As if gauging what answer would come back, she looked straight at me through narrowed eyes. She pressed her lips shut for no good reason, then slowly let the tension go and let her voice out.
"......I asked to live together because I wanted it to turn out like this."
