What Does It Feel Like... to Be Short?
What Does It Feel Like... to Be Short?
Ever since I'd become aware of the world around me, I'd never once been short among my peers.
Not in elementary school, where we lined up by height for roll numbers. Not in middle or high school, during the adolescent growth spurt everyone goes through. Not even in the military. I was never the short one.
Currently 185 centimeters tall. Bigger than the guys barely scraping 180, smaller than 190 where life starts getting genuinely inconvenient. The kind of ideal, aspirational height that men dream of.
The elevated view that came with a superior stature filled me with more than my fair share of confidence. Always looking down at my peers from a higher vantage point, I naturally had no clue what short people felt or thought.
So... when I was reading a web novel for fun and the villain made a contract with a demon and killed someone because they mocked his insecurity complex about being short — wasn't it only natural that I couldn't relate?
No matter how much of a complex it was... to kill someone just because they made fun of your height? Even if it was a lifelong insecurity... to kill a person over something like that? I simply couldn't understand.
Unable to stomach the absurd plot contrivance, I left a short comment on that chapter.
-Still, killing someone over being mocked for your height is kinda forced, don't you think?
Right below it, a reply came from what appeared to be the author's username.
-You're tall, aren't you?
The razor-sharp response sent a shiver down my spine.
How did they figure out I was tall?
-Not that tall really... around average?
I hedged and said average, not knowing what might happen if I admitted I was genuinely tall.
The reply came back just as quickly the second time.
-You'll understand once you've experienced it yourself.
"Experience it? What's that supposed to mean?"
Those were the last words. That was where my memories as 'Seo Ji-hoon' ended.
Up until that moment, I had no idea.
No idea that I, who had only ever lived above 180 centimeters, would end up living below 150.