The Same Room (4)
…Anyway, to summarize. One: Starting today, Friday, through Saturday and Sunday, Seo Woojin will be staying at our house. Two: During that time, he’ll be paying more attention to my sister than to me. Well, that’s always been the case, so it’s meaningless. Three: I should wait for the right moment and then… glare at my sister? That’s it?
“...Hmm.” Glaring at my sister probably means… I should express that I’m displeased in some way. Even if it’s not necessarily a glare, I could act annoyed… it wouldn’t make much of a difference. I get the gist. It’s the exact opposite of what we’ve been doing. The jealousy-inducing act I’ve been working so hard on, using the excuse of “Seo Woojin’s perverted tastes,” is now going to be reversed.
It’s not that I’ll feel superior and she’ll be jealous, but rather that she’ll feel superior and I’ll be the one who’s jealous. “...” Of course, my jealousy will just be an act to draw her in. I don’t really like the picture, though. I wanted to see her jealous. I wanted to see her with teary eyes, claiming he’s *her* boyfriend after I’ve stolen him away… something like that.
Well, anyway, I’ve accepted it up to this point. I guess he’s a man, after all; despite looking normal on the outside, he really loves the dirty stuff. He’s a total pervert. That’s just the impression I’ve added to him. But the last thing he said… that was hard to accept. That I’m like my sister? Where? The eyes? Sure. I’ll give him the eyes. Both she and I have the same dark green irises. But I don’t know about anything else. The hair? When I was young, I had the same black hair as her, but aside from a few gray strands, it’s long since turned white. The face is the same. As different as black and white. I don’t know what others think, but at least to my eyes, that’s how it is.
Compared to that, maybe our height and body size are a bit similar, but no one would call us alike just because of that. What’s left… personality? Habits? Tone of voice? I don’t know. Aside from the eyes, I don’t think I’m like her at all. …Hmm. Maybe it looks different to a man?
“What are you doing? It’s dangerous in front of the crosswalk.”
“...Ah.”
After cursing Seo Woojin for a while for brushing off my question about how we’re alike with a vague “this and that,” I was wandering aimlessly even though the light was red. A familiar hand blocked my path. It was my sister’s hand, as we were walking home together. I stopped at the edge of the sidewalk, stared at her, and took a step back.
“...Thank you.”
“...”
“*Sigh*… I guess I’m just tired…”
“...”
It was a high-level provocation, at least in my mind, implying that my hour with Seo Woojin yesterday was quite thrilling, or that I’d been secretly texting him all night behind her back. (I hadn’t.) But my sister just shifted her gaze toward the road without a word. …She could have at least replied. Maybe it’s because this is the first time it’s happened, but I’m the one who feels awkward now.
“...”
“...”
If I had to pick the biggest change since the provocation the night before last, it would be this: my sister’s word count has dropped significantly. There was no longer a sister who would chatter away, saying she liked the sound of rain when it rained, the crunching sound under her feet when it snowed, or just because the weather was nice when it was sunny. She was still bright and cheerful among her friends at the academy, but when she stood next to me, that was no longer the case.
…She wasn’t exactly angry, but she just stared straight ahead with a blank expression, as if she were taking a nap. “...” Seeing her with that expression, maybe, as Seo Woojin said, we really do look a bit alike?
“...Ah.”
I was lost in thought, remembering my own face that I’d occasionally check in the mirror, wondering if I had something on it. *Click.* The traffic light turned green.
“Carry the basket and follow me.”
“...Okay.”
There was no special reason we headed to the discount mart near our house without even changing our clothes. It was just because the fridge had emptied faster than expected since a man had been eating dinner with us lately. So, I was basically playing the role of a porter, but… considering my sister’s strength, couldn’t she have brought me along just to use me like a slave? Like a petty revenge?
It was a funny thought, but at the same time, knowing my sister, I let out a chuckle because it felt like something she might actually do. *Geez.* So petty. So petty. If I were in her shoes right now? I’d have a bright red cheek. …If it were me, I’d definitely have grabbed her by the other cheek and slapped her—*smack, smack*—until she apologized, saying, “You bitch, what are you doing to my boyfriend?”
Well, unlike me, my sister, with her kind heart, just bit her lip and turned away, muttering “crazy bitch.” …If that had really happened, I would have gone straight to Seo Woojin for treatment… and then… I would have come home hours late. Maybe she would have hit me again?
“...Is one enough? The basket?”
“Just one for now.”
Hmm. Is this a phantom pain? I lightly swept the inside of my cheek with the tip of my tongue and approached my sister with the black basket in quick strides.
“What are you going to buy?”
“I’ll look around while buying some vegetables first… and then I think I’ll stop by the butcher shop. The meat quality here isn’t that great.”
“Meat? You’ve got a lot of money, maybe because you haven’t been going to the hospital lately…”
“I’m not buying it because of Woojin.”
“...I haven’t even mentioned Woojin yet.”
“You were about to.”
“...That’s true.”
“*Sigh*… Meat went into the kimchi stew and soybean paste stew, too. You’re going to buy more than that today, right… but.”
“...Wait… why are you throwing the vegetables like that?”
“I threw them so they’d be easy to catch.”
“...I missed.”
“...*Ha*…”
Onions. Carrots. Green onions. Chili peppers. And tofu as a bonus. I followed her, trailing behind as I caught the vegetables my sister handed me from the front. I’d only ever been to convenience stores, so I had no idea where anything was in a discount mart like this. I followed her, staring at her ponytail.
“...”
As I watched the greens she put in the basket, I started to see a strange common denominator connecting them. Leeks. Cabbage. Asparagus. Walnuts. And oysters. …Aside from the representative menu item, eel, it’s all that. Foods good for… stamina.
“...One basket should be enough. Let’s go.”
“Ah, okay.”
What is this? Is she trying to mess with me? Does it mean that no matter how much I try to scratch at her, Lee Jiyoon, I’m ultimately destined to do the grunt work like this? …Hmm. I don’t know. My sister is so naive she’s stupid, so I don’t think she could even think of something like this. It must have just turned out this way while preparing food for Seo Woojin. My sister, who wears her heart on her sleeve, doing something so gloomy? No, no. If it were me, maybe, but it doesn’t suit my sister. My sister is just… what should I say, she just stomps her feet in frustration after getting robbed, and then… growls at my side. That suits her.
“...You said you were coming. Why are you standing there?”
“...I’m coming.”
When I lifted my gaze from the basket, all I saw was my sister’s back as she glanced at me and walked away cutely, as usual. I looked back and forth between her and the basket, let out a light sigh, and headed to the checkout counter.
I thought it was still a long way until the rainy season. It was mid-April, and the scent of winter had completely faded. My sister and I walked through the light, powdery rain. In one hand, a white plastic bag with the identity of a green onion sticking out. In the other, a black plastic bag containing meat—was it two *geun*? Three *geun*? Anyway, it was heavy.
“Let’s go quickly. It might be a downpour.”
“...”
Then, couldn’t my sister just take one of the things in my hand? It was just a suspicion until a moment ago, but now that we’re here, I’m sure it’s her own version of petty revenge… I held back the words I wanted to say, shifted the plastic bags into one hand, and rubbed my fingers. Perhaps because I hadn’t carried them in a while, my fingers were turning white from the pressure of the bags.
…Come to think of it, even if you add it all up, it wouldn’t even be 5kg. I guess it’s because I’ve been living a life where the strength to move a mouse was enough. Half the people had umbrellas. I walked on the damp sidewalk, mixed in with the other half. If I wasn’t careful, my shoes could have gotten soaked in the rainwater pooled in the cracks, but it didn’t matter. I was aiming for that in the first place. My sister is taking petty revenge like that, so why can’t I? Of course, if you ask who was wrong first, I’d have nothing to say. If I were going to nitpick like that, I wouldn’t have touched my sister’s boyfriend in the first place. Yeah. It was while the rainwater soaking my clothes was becoming increasingly unpleasant.
“Noona.”
“...Oh, Woojin?”
“...”
At the corner of the alleyway leading to our house, Seo Woojin appeared, holding an umbrella.
“Why are you here? I told you to go ahead earlier via text.”
“I ended up leaving later than I thought, and it just started raining. I had a feeling you wouldn’t have brought an umbrella.”
He approached my sister and smiled kindly, holding an umbrella that was black, heavy, and oversized—the kind an old man might use. He really is a master of acting. As the elders say, he’s like a slippery eel. If he weren’t a healing-type transcendental, he could have been an actor. To think he’s so kind in front of his prey, my sister, while inwardly thinking of nothing but eating both of us… …Anyway, I wish he’d hold the umbrella over me like he did for her. As I wiggled my way over to them with that thought, my eyes met his for a moment as he was talking to my sister.
“...Hi.”
“...Yeah.”
Naturally, there was no conversation. If you count a short greeting as a conversation, then there was one, but that was it. He shared a gaze with me for about a second, then held the umbrella over my sister and left the remaining space for me. A space where my head and one shoulder were covered, while the other shoulder was left to be soaked by the rain.
“...”
…Him paying more attention to my sister than to me. Like he said this morning, telling me to swallow my pride for a few days. I know it in my head. I know very well that this is the right thing to do. But still, it didn’t feel very good.