The Secret of the Infirmary
"Well, I guess Jiyoon doesn't have a weird fetish after all!" I wanted to accept that thought purely, but it wasn't as easy as I’d hoped. My initial resolution had been simple: if Jiyoon said she didn't have that kind of taste, I’d just stop digging and believe her. But how should I put it... It felt like I’d asked, "It’s not you, right?" and she’d replied, "Yeah." And then I’d patted her on the back, saying, "Great! Let’s keep working hard!"
"Ugh..." I tried not to pay attention to it, but the thought 'What if?' kept popping its head up. Just as I tried to whack it down with a toy hammer, two more of the same thoughts would pop up elsewhere. In the end, I just found myself squeezing the life out of the juice box I’d just bought. I had to be careful with my grip, keeping it light so it wouldn't burst.
Honestly, who answers truthfully when someone asks about their porn preferences? If Jiyoon had asked me, "Unnie, what kind of porn do you watch?" I would have buried the answer—'Oh, I definitely prefer videos with huge dicks'—deep in my heart, and instead stammered out some nonsense about "romance" and "subtlety" while sweating bullets.
"Haaah..." Was it really that bad to ask about her porn taste point-blank? Maybe I should have just waited for the next time Jiyoon went to the PC bang with Woojin and snuck a look at her computer history. Now that I’d brought it up, she’d definitely make sure not to leave any records. Besides, the way she’d leaned into my ear and whispered earlier felt a bit... erotic. Now I felt like the pervert for still obsessing over this, but maybe it’s because she’s my younger sister. I’m going crazy thinking about it.
But if I asked her directly, 'Lee Jiyoon, are you a lesbian?!', I’d surely get that look—the one that says, 'Unnie, were you really thinking about that kind of stuff?'—a look that would make me feel like a bug for the next three hundred years. And in the truly, truly astronomical chance that she actually was hiding those feelings... what would I do then?
"I hate getting a headache..." What if Jiyoon, having had her true intentions exposed, started acting weird? What if she broke into my room in the middle of the night with nothing but a pillow? What if she asked if she could share my blanket, crawled in, stuck to me closer than necessary, and started reaching out with her hands, and then... Then I would... That... ... Ugh, gross... Just imagining it makes me want to puke.
"...What are you doing?"
"Huk!"
"Oh, you put the straw in backward. Why are you drinking it like that?"
While I was clutching my juice box and trembling, a friend who had just come back from the academy convenience store with me pulled up a chair and sat next to me. Her grades were mid-tier in theory and mid-high in practice. She was a pretty girl with decent, average grades. Her beauty was a bit... mature? Flashy? Because of that, there had been some gloomy rumors floating around—that she was involved in sugar dating, or that someone had seen her entering a motel with a guy... but that was probably just because people didn't know she’d been dating her childhood friend, a third-year senior, for nearly ten years. Rumors are just for fun, regardless of what the person involved thinks.
"Doesn't it feel uncomfortable drinking like that...? Anyway, why have you been acting like that since earlier, Hayoon?"
"...Did I look weird...?"
"Not weird, but, um... You were squirming around like, 'I have a problem, someone please listen to me.'"
"Aha..."
Squirming like an earthworm? I didn't really know, but if she’d come up to me saying that, I must have been looking pretty pathetic without realizing it. After a moment of hesitation, I gestured for her to come closer, and as she looked at me like I was a toy, I began to whisper.
"Hey, Dabin. You’ve been confessed to a lot, right? And you have a boyfriend, one year older than you."
"Oh, confessions... I did in high school, yeah. Why? Did you get confessed to recently?"
"No, it’s not that, but..."
"But?"
"...Just, just in case, I’m asking."
"Yeah."
"Have you ever... been confessed to by a girl?"
"...Aha."
She started wearing that playful smile I see so often, as if she were up to no good. Then, lowering her voice even more than before, she whispered with a smirk.
"Hayoon, you’re acting like this because a girl confessed to you, aren't you?"
"I told you it’s not that!"
"Your reaction is exactly that! Oh, I got confessed to by a girl. What do I do? What do I do?"
"Do, don't imitate me...! Your voice tone is completely different from mine anyway..."
"Hehe... Well, anyway, I have been confessed to like that exactly once~"
She was resting her chin on her hand, laughing playfully as if she were just teasing me, but... since it might actually be helpful, I swallowed my pride. I lowered my posture until I was almost slumped over the desk with her. Her long red hair brushed against me, making my cheek itch.
"Really? You’re not lying?"
"Was it sophomore year? Oh, it was junior year. A freshman girl dragged me out to see a movie."
"...And?"
"And? What do you mean... She confessed to me after the movie ended. Obviously, I turned her down nicely."
"Does she have any specific traits? Is it obvious she’s a lesbian?"
"Hmm? I don't think it was obvious..."
"Then, is she normal?"
"Yeah. Just a slightly closer junior? That’s about it?"
"Hmm..."
"So... which girl confessed to you?"
"She didn't!"
"Same academy? Someone you work part-time with? Or..."
"Ugh... No, it’s not that... And I like men too..."
"Men? What kind of men? Is he in Class A here?"
"Ughhh..."
"Maybe a freshman?"
"Grrr..."
Unfortunately, I didn't really get anything out of it.
Just because I’d become a bit closer to Han Su-a didn't mean my daily life had changed. I didn't get texts like 'Are you awake?' in the morning, and she didn't come looking for me in the infirmary when it was quiet. In fact, it felt so much like yesterday that I wondered if I’d had a dream. Well, considering all the photos of Yozora I’d taken were gone, at least that part didn't seem like a dream.
"Hoo..."
The whole story behind 'You’re more arousing than Yozora' was something I’d heard while washing up with her. If I understood correctly, she’d said it because it was less embarrassing to blame me than to say, 'I was afraid that if I kept doing this with you, I’d become a sex addict and only do it all day.' Instead, she’d said, 'You’re more arousing than Yozora. What if you aren't satisfied with Yozora anymore?'
When I heard it, and even now, I doubted whether this could be packaged as 'innocent.' Shouldn't this be considered stupid rather than innocent?
"...Well."
If Han Su-a were smart, she wouldn't have come to the academy; she would have gone to study business administration or something. I’m not exactly well-educated myself, so it’s hard for me to put others down based on intelligence, but seeing Han Su-a, who was even worse than me, boosted my self-esteem a bit. ...I was also looking forward to seeing just how far I could corrupt her, and what kind of delusions people who only saw the 'innocent' Han Su-a would have.
"..."
If I called Han Su-a now, would she come up with an excuse and come to the infirmary on her own? I leaned back comfortably in my chair and fiddled with my phone for a moment. Hearing a knock, I glanced at the clock, which read 10:17, and let out a long sigh.
"Come in."
It wasn't because a regular student had come in injured instead of Han Su-a. It was about two hours until lunch. It wasn't like I had time to kill, but there was nothing else to do during this dead time. Since the principal had dropped a hint about 'working the students harder,' there were students who sustained serious injuries during sparring that required me to go to them. Sometimes, when several classes held practical lessons at once, the infirmary would be packed with students for about an hour, but of course, that wasn't always the case; there were often times like this, lazy and uneventful.
Could I just call anyone into the infirmary and do something lewd? That was a bit ambiguous. The reason, of course, was that as the nameless student who just walked in proved, it was a place where it wouldn't be strange at all to be caught by someone at any time. Even if it was great for locking the door and having some fun occasionally, I worried about others' suspicions if I locked it too often.
"...Is this one wound on your forearm all there is?"
"Ah, yes."
In short, this was it. I wanted a space where I could slack off while pretending to be busy.
"Thank you, teacher."
"Don't mention it. It’s my job."
But would such a space even exist in the academy? I gave a forced smile to the male student leaving after his treatment, and as I stretched my stiff shoulder blades, I thought about the academy’s structure. Still, I was fairly familiar with the layout, thanks to wandering around drinking coffee and running around sweating to answer calls. That went for the central building, known as the 'Main Building' where I was, and the gym or training center where non-transcendentals—that is, regular infirmary teachers—waited to provide emergency treatment.
After roaming around those buildings, the only leftover spaces were the club rooms. But the picture would look a bit strange if I joined a club. To begin with, except for a few weird girls who wanted to be treated like older sisters, the trend was for everyone to treat me as an infirmary teacher, not a first-year student.
"...It’s also weird to bring a bed or something there."
Of course, if you don't have teeth, you use your gums—I could use the desks that were everywhere in the academy as a bed substitute, but I didn't want to go that far. Besides, it was incredibly uncomfortable compared to a bed, and the girls would complain that it hurt. Maybe I should just lock the infirmary door whenever it was appropriate. As for being bored, maybe I should start a mobile game. It was a ten-year-old game, so I wondered if it would be dated and boring.
As I continued my thoughts with a yawn, I heard a knock once again.
"Come in."
The person who peeked through the door was quite an unexpected figure.
"...Do you have a moment to talk?"
"...I do, but."
"Five minutes is enough. No, one minute."
"More than that, what is this about..."
"It’s about Yozora."
Blue-white hair grown long enough to reach her hips. Eyes painted in a similar color, looking strangely ill-tempered. A girl who left an impression of being strangely similar to Han Su-a. A girl who, like Han Su-a, had left behind a stupid impression.
"She’s been marked as an unexcused absence, and it came up to me."
"..."
"Do you know anything about this?"
Baek Seoyeon had come to the infirmary.