At Fourteen, We Slowly Begin to Realize Our Feelings (1)
Fourteen years old. The purely young and innocent elementary school days had passed. Now that we had grown a little and shed our childish ways, Aki and I no longer interacted as freely and closely as we had when we were younger──.
“Wooju-chan, say ah~”
“Huh? Here…?”
“Hurry, my arm’s getting tired~”
“Ah, uh, yeah….”
──Or so one might think. But that wasn’t the case at all. The only real changes were that we now wore school uniforms instead of casual clothes and took the bus instead of walking to school. Over the past four years, the bond between Aki and me hadn’t shifted in the slightest. If anything, we had grown even closer than before, so the idea that we had become distant was ridiculous.
Our parents, watching us play together, would often remark, “Don’t those two seem like a married couple?” and “Seriously, sometimes they look even closer than my husband and me.”
“How is it, Wooju-chan? Delicious?”
“Yeah, it’s good. Thanks, Aki.”
The environment surrounding us had changed in subtle ways, however. Take our parents’ relationship, for instance—more specifically, the friendship between my mom, dad, and Aki’s mother. Until four years ago, they had simply known of each other’s existence. But after Aki’s mother visited our house to express her gratitude, the three of them became close at an astonishing speed.
This was partly because their children were so close, and partly because my parents could speak six languages, not just three, eliminating any communication barriers. But beyond that, they simply liked one another as people. My parents had always been rather meddlesome, and Aki’s mother, being French by birth, possessed an affinity for others that far exceeded the norm. A friendly, beautiful woman who loved making new connections meeting a couple who enjoyed inserting themselves into other people’s business—how could they not grow close while chatting about their children? It would have been far stranger if they had drifted apart.
Anyway, our parents gradually grew closer with every meeting. Now, four years later, they were comfortable enough to speak to each other casually.
“What? So you’re not going back to Japan at all now? You’re staying in Korea for good?”
“That’s right. We’ve earned plenty, and my husband needs to keep helping his father. I’ll just stay here and support the family.”
“Oh, really? That’s wonderful. Aki must be thrilled.”
“She was. I told her yesterday and she lit up. What did she say again? Oh, right—‘Really? For real, for real? Mom, I love you~!’ I thought she was all grown up, but she’s still such a baby.”
“Daughters really are good at expressing affection. I’m jealous. Wooju used to tell me he loved me all the time when he was little, but now that he’s older he gets embarrassed and won’t say it anymore. He barely even hugs me. Must be puberty kicking in.”
“Right? Now that both Wooju and Aki are fourteen, they’re at that sensitive age. Boys are usually a bit reserved about that sort of thing anyway, aren’t they? Especially compared to girls.”
“This is why I should have had a daughter along with a son. Ugh, I should have tried harder and given birth to one more when I had Wooju…”
Once our parents became close like that, I no longer felt burdened visiting Aki’s house, where only her father had lived before. What had once been a visit every two months before I turned ten gradually increased after Aki began living with her mother: once a month, once every two weeks, once a week, and eventually every three or four days. I came and went as if it were my own home.
I visited so often that Aki’s mother eventually joked, “Wooju, why don’t you just become our son?” That alone should tell you how frequent my visits were.
“But Eunhye, Wooju really has grown handsome, hasn’t he?”
“Hm? Why, did something happen?”
“I had some business near the school Wooju and Aki attend the other day. I thought it would only take an hour, but it ended up taking three. By the time I checked my watch, it was two-thirty in the afternoon. Middle school usually lets out around then, right? So I figured I might as well wait and walk home with Aki, and…”
“And?”
“I saw a boy who looked just like Wooju walking out with a girl. I wasn’t sure at first, so I moved closer, and sure enough, it was him. Naturally I assumed the girl beside him was Aki, but oh my. It wasn’t her at all—it was some other girl.”
“……?!”
At Aki’s mother’s casual remark from the living room sofa, Aki’s eyes flew wide open. Those already large eyes grew enormous as she stared at me, silently demanding to know if it was true.
…When on earth did she see that?
I couldn’t deny it, so the words stuck in my throat.
“Another girl? Who? Who was it?”
“She was quite pretty, with hair that reached all the way down her back. I don’t know her name. But they looked awfully close. They were practically glued together while walking. Anyone who didn’t know them might have assumed they were dating.”
“Oh my, oh my…!”
“…….”
“…….”
“Is Wooju cheating on her?”
“No way. That can’t be it. We all know how much Wooju adores our Aki…. Oh my, were you two there the whole time?”
“Wooju-chan.”
“Yeah?”
“…Come with me for a second.”
“Ah, okay…”
After school, once homeroom ended.
The other students in our class gathered in groups of three or five and headed off to their various destinations. Jaehyun and I, who had been assigned cleaning duty today after getting caught chatting during class, stayed behind to mop the classroom floor.
“Hey, Ju Wooju. Let’s hit the coin karaoke after we finish cleaning.”
“Sorry, I can’t today. I have to take supplementary lessons with Aki later.”
“Again? Dude, why do you always only hang out with Aki?”
“I don’t only hang out with Aki. I spend time with you and the other guys too. And it’s not hanging out—it’s actually lessons.”
“It’s not lessons, it’s a date. You two are totally dating.”
We weren’t dating, and it wasn’t a date. It really was just supplementary lessons. But there was no point in arguing, so I kept my mouth shut. Jaehyun had been watching the relationship between Aki and me for eight years. No matter how many times I insisted we weren’t together, he had reached a point where he simply refused to believe it.
It was a long, stubborn connection. Whether by coincidence or fate, when we entered middle school I ended up in the same class as Jaehyun, but Aki was placed in a different one. I was in Class 1-2, Aki in Class 1-3. They were right next door, so you would think it wouldn’t matter, but as anyone who has experienced it knows, the gap between classes can feel enormous. Exaggerating only slightly, it was possible to go an entire semester without once seeing the face of a student from the neighboring class.
Of course, since Aki and I continued meeting consistently outside of school, that never happened to us. The point was simply that students from different classes tended to maintain a certain distance.
“So when are you leaving? Can’t you even go for a little while?”
“The lesson starts in an hour, so I need to finish cleaning quickly, wait for the homeroom in the next class to end, and take her right away.”
“Sigh. Abandoning your friend to go on a date with your girlfriend. Fine, go on then. Get out of here.”
Jaehyun waved his hand dismissively, then suddenly paused as if something had occurred to him.
“Oh, right. Wooju. Did something happen between you and Aki… I mean, Fujiwara-san?”
“I told you, you can call her Aki when it’s just the two of us.”
“No, it’s fine. Your girlfriend is way too scary…”
Jaehyun actually shivered, as if he genuinely found her frightening. I tilted my head, watching him.
…What exactly is he scared of?
No matter how you looked at her, she was nothing but cute.
“Really? Then I guess there’s nothing I can do about it. But why are you suddenly asking?”
“That girl who comes to our class every single break didn’t show up once today. I saw her during the class change earlier and she wasn’t absent, so naturally I figured something must have happened between you two, right?”
“…Ah.”
He had a point. Since Aki and I sought each other out every day, it was an easy assumption to make.
“Be honest. Something did happen, didn’t it? Did you two fight?”
“No, we didn’t fight…”
“The fact that you can’t say it outright means you did fight. You fought, didn’t you?”
“I said we didn’t. It’s not like that. It’s just…”
“So not a fight, but something did happen?”
“…….”
Struck right where it hurt, I stopped mopping. Jaehyun must have noticed something in my expression, because he approached with a slightly mischievous grin.
“What is it? Tell me what happened.”
“Um…”
Should I tell him or not? As Jaehyun said, something had happened, but it wasn’t exactly the kind of thing I wanted to announce proudly. I hesitated for a moment. Jaehyun patted my shoulder.
“I won’t tell the other guys, so just let it out. I’m practically an expert at listening to romance troubles, you know?”
“Expert at romance my ass. You’ve never even had a girlfriend…”
“Hey, when did I claim to be an expert at romance? I said I’m an expert at listening to romance stories.”
“I don’t know if I can trust you… You won’t go around telling everyone, will you?”
“Ju Wooju, have you ever seen me spreading other people’s business around?”
“Well… no, I haven’t.”
“Exactly. I never do that kind of thing. Besides, you want to talk about it anyway. The fact that you’re hesitating right now is proof.”
“Ugh……”
His logic was annoyingly sound. I had no rebuttal. I knew better than anyone, after eight years of friendship, that Jaehyun was surprisingly tight-lipped. And it was true that I wanted to share my worries with someone. After a brief pause, I slowly resumed mopping and began to speak.
“Okay, Jaehyun. You really, really can’t tell anyone else. Got it?”
“Yeah, yeah. I won’t say a word. So what is it?”
“It’s like this…”
I explained the whole situation to Jaehyun. It was a long story, but to summarize: About a week ago, I saw the class president struggling with a heavy load in the hallway and helped her carry it. She offered to treat me after school as thanks, but I turned her down because Aki was waiting. Even after I refused, she kept saying it would make her uncomfortable if I didn’t accept, so I compromised by agreeing to let her buy me tteokbokki. Unfortunately, Aki somehow found out about the whole thing by chance.
“That’s what happened.”
“Hmm.”
Jaehyun nodded along as he listened, then summed it up in a single sentence.
“So you’re trash. You went and hung out with another girl behind your girlfriend’s back.”
“I didn’t hang out with her. We literally just ate tteokbokki and went our separate ways. That’s it.”
“Did you tell her the same thing?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Wow… This is worse than I thought.”
Jaehyun rested his chin on the handle of the mop.
“Hey, Ju Wooju. Imagine if Fujiwara-san had promised to hang out with you, but before meeting you she went and ate something with another guy.”
“What? Who is this guy? Is it you?”
I turned to him with a completely straight face. Jaehyun sighed.
“What are you talking about? I said imagine. It’s hypothetical. I’m asking what you would do if that happened.”
“First I’d find out exactly who the guy was and warn him never to even think about doing anything with Aki again. After that—”
“…I thought only Fujiwara was like that, but you’re pretty weird too.”
“Huh? What did you say?”
“Nothing. Never mind. So how did you get caught, anyway?”
“To be exact, Aki didn’t catch me herself. Her mother apparently saw me going to eat tteokbokki with the class president. She mentioned it last time when I was over at their house.”
“Whoa, you got caught by her mom of all people? Then you can’t even try to deny it to your girlfriend.”
“Yeah… Even if I could have denied it, I probably wouldn’t have. I promised Aki I would never lie to her.”
“Oh, is that so? Then why did such a devoted boyfriend go eat tteokbokki with another girl?”
“…That’s because it was my mistake. I have nothing to say.”
“I’m just teasing. Anyway, the answer’s obvious from what you’ve told me. Just go apologize first. Tell her you’re sorry and that you’ll never eat with another girl again.”
“I did apologize. But she didn’t accept it easily. What did she say…? Something like, ‘Wooju-chan, I trusted you! You traitor!’ I think…”
“Dude, if she forgave you after one apology when she caught you with another girl, she’d be a saint. It’s only natural to keep apologizing until she accepts it. Put yourself in her position. If you caught Aki playing with some other guy and she apologized, could you forgive her right away?”
Aki playing with another guy instead of me, then apologizing for it. I swear I had never imagined such a thing even once. But if that unimaginable scenario actually happened… If it happened…
“…….”
“See? You couldn’t, right?”
Jaehyun smirked at me as if he had expected exactly that reaction. For some reason his smile irritated me, so I pursed my lips slightly and kept mopping.
“What are you talking about? Aki would never do that.”
“Why are you so sure? You never know what people might do.”
“No, she wouldn’t.”
“I’m asking why she wouldn’t. Who knows? Maybe Aki actually wants to hang out with other guys besides you. But since you keep clinging to her, even if it’s annoying she has no choice but to—”
“…….”
“…….”
Only then did I realize how loud my voice had been.
“Ah, sorry. I got a little worked up… I’m really sorry.”
I apologized immediately, but Jaehyun simply stared at me without saying a word. Worried that I had upset him by yelling, I took an awkward step closer.
“…Jaehyun?”
Jaehyun jerked his chin, gesturing behind me—toward the back door of the classroom, which I had been standing in front of with my back turned. I turned around instinctively.
And there, half-hidden in the narrow gap of the slightly open door, was Aki.