A Ball-less Balls Buddy
I slumped down right there as if resigning myself to it all.
Staring blankly at the clear tear stains Hari had left on my chest, I let out a bitter smile.
"Haha…… hahahaha…… hahahahaha."
I felt like such a pathetic piece of shit.
A complete fucking idiot.
What the hell was I even doing here?
Hiding behind the flimsy excuse of it being an act, I'd torn to shreds the sincere feelings of a girl who had confessed she liked me—all just to win the heart of the woman I liked.
Hari must have been so hurt…… It was all my fault……
How long did I sit there muttering to myself, hitting rock bottom?
Thud!
"Ah!"
Something dull smacked into the back of my head.
Checking what had rolled onto the floor, it was a nicely ripened red apple.
"Ah, shit, what now……"
Irritated, with my swollen red eyes, I turned around.
It was Ha Seonyu.
I had no idea when she'd come to the Cultivation Area, but Seonyu had pushed aside the tomato vines and stood with one leg cocked, snickering as she looked my way.
"You fucking dumbass. What are you doing holed up in a corner by yourself…… huh?"
Seonyu's voice, which had been about to mock me thoroughly, cut off abruptly.
Her obsidian-like eyes widened in shock as they took in my mess of a face and the tear stains.
"Huh? Hey. You…… what's wrong?"
Seonyu approached awkwardly, clumsily lowering the hand she'd been pointing with.
But soon, finding my appearance too pathetic, she burst into laughter again.
"Pfft— You're actually crying. You dumbass. Puhahaha— Why are you sniveling like that?"
Normally I would have jumped up and fired back, but right now I didn't even have the energy left for that.
"……So what."
When I replied weakly in a dying voice, the playfulness vanished completely from Seonyu's expression.
She tapped the empty fertilizer barrel next to me with her foot a few times, then plopped down on top of it.
"Hey, what happened."
Seonyu's voice had grown much lower and more serious.
Her gaze quietly explored the wet tear stains on my shirt and my hollow eyes.
Just… with this girl.
With this buddy I was always fighting with like a balls friend, it felt like it would be okay to show her my absolute bottom.
After roughly wiping my face dry once, I parted my lips.
"Hoo… Something like this happened…"
How Hari had first proposed the breeding act and confessed to me in the basement yesterday. How I'd gently rejected it using Haru Nuna as an excuse. And then the crazy fake act I'd put on in Woohee Nuna's room today to provoke Haru Nuna's jealousy, and how Hari had overheard it all outside the door, misunderstood, and fallen into despair.
Leaving out only the sexual details of shoving my thing into Woohee Nuna's mouth and cumming… I poured out every truth at Seonyu's feet.
"…………."
While listening to my pathetic and terrible confession, Seonyu never once interrupted me.
She just stared into space with a fairly serious look and silently listened to my story.
When the story was all over, a heavy silence settled over the Cultivation Area.
Only the humid air of the Cultivation Area swirled between us.
Seonyu, arms crossed, was gently rolling the red apple that had hit the back of my head and fallen earlier with the tip of her foot.
"Haa……."
A very long, deep sigh escaped from between Seonyu's lips.
"You really do all sorts of shit, Jin Woohyun."
Instead of her usual thorny mockery, her voice carried fatigue and disbelief.
"You're too impatient. Your thinking is ridiculously short. What are you, a monkey?"
Seonyu turned her head and looked straight at me.
"That Woohee Unnie is also completely insane. Playing around with people's hearts like solving some logic puzzle? But the biggest idiot is you for falling for it hook, line, and sinker and playing along."
Seonyu's blunt criticism hit me to the bone.
"Women don't think as simply as you, punching numbers into a calculator."
Seonyu said, grinding the dirt floor with her heel.
"Provoking Haru Unnie's jealousy? Sure, Unnie's insides must have been rotting. The guy who only liked her going off and flirting with someone else, so she probably got a bit jealous. But do you think Unnie would hold it in and hold it in until she explodes and throws herself into your arms?"
"………."
"Haru Unnie is someone trapped in a shell of responsibility far, far more than you think. If she thinks you're sleeping with another woman… she'll consider it fortunate for the greenhouse, and even while shedding tears of blood inside, she'll push you away."
It was an accurate point.
Yesterday in the kitchen… Haru Nuna's voice murmuring It's not that kind of thing, Seonyu while brushing the dirt off my back came back to my ears.
"And Min Hari."
Seonyu's voice trembled slightly.
"That timid, scared girl, even after seeing all those disgusting pictures in the basement, was the one who stepped up first to do it with you. You have no idea how much courage that took."
"……I know. Knowing that makes me even more crazy."
I clutched my head with both hands and groaned.
"But you put that courage on hold, and within a day you pretended to be rolling around in another woman's room. From Hari's perspective, she must have felt like she was less than a bug."
Seonyu lightly kicked my side with the tip of her foot.
It wasn't meant to really hurt… more like a light stimulus to snap me out of it.
"Haa…… You probably don't get it yet, but sometimes you have to leave time to heal emotions. Girls need time."
Seonyu propped her chin and looked up at the sky's lighting.
"Even if you chase after her right now and beg and explain it was a misunderstanding, nothing will reach Hari's ears. Whether you fucked Woohee Unnie or not isn't what's important."
"…Is that really true?"
"Yeah, because she was hurt by the fact itself that you ignored her feelings and cooked up that low-class act."
Seonyu's words were cold but perfectly logical.
This girl who always charged in without thinking front or back was showing surprisingly mature insight when it came to girls' emotional issues.
"……Thanks, Seonyu."
I said weakly, roughly rubbing my reddened eyes with my sleeve.
"Still, dumping it all on you like this makes me feel a bit better. If I'd held it all alone, I might have really suffocated to death."
At my honest reply… Seonyu's obsidian-like eyes wavered slightly.
Flinch—!
Seonyu hurriedly averted her gaze and kept clearing her throat.
"W-who said I wanted to listen?! You were looking so pathetic sniveling that I just stayed by your side!"
Her ears had flushed red like tomatoes.
To hide her awkwardness, Seonyu snatched up the apple at her feet, roughly wiped it on her clothes, and took a big bite.
Crunch!
"Hey, get up."
Seonyu, chewing the apple, roughly grabbed my forearm and pulled.
"How long are you going to hole up here sniveling? Haru Unnie told us to go look for you outside because you suddenly disappeared."
"Haru Nuna?"
"Yeah! Even though Unnie's insides are burning up, as the head of the family she just holds it in and only worries about you. Unnie really is a saint."
Pulled by Seonyu's grip, I staggered to my feet.
My legs felt like they might cramp, but I forced strength into my knees.
"Go wash your face first. Your face is covered in dirt, tears, and snot… you look exactly like a shitty puppy abandoned in a trash corner."
Seonyu clicked her tongue and gestured toward the water pipe in the corner of the Cultivation Area.
I walked without complaint to where she pointed.
Turning the faucet valve, cold groundwater poured out through the old pipe.
Whoosh—
I gathered water in both hands and scrubbed my face mercilessly.
The cold water temperature cooled my heated skin and seemed to somewhat calm the tangled heat in my head.
I roughly washed the dirt from my neck and forearms too, then shut off the water.
"Here."
Thud.
As I lifted my head with my vision blocked, Seonyu threw the small towel she'd had around her neck onto my face.
"Oh, thanks."
A faint scent of Seonyu's body and grass smell wafted from the towel.
Wiping the moisture from my face with the towel, I brushed my bangs back.
When I lowered the towel, my eyes met Seonyu's, who was standing with one leg cocked next to the water pipe.
"…………."
Seonyu was staring straight at me.
Her gaze started from my wet hair and slid down to my bare chest between the shirt buttons that had come undone by three or four while washing my face.
It didn't seem like Seonyu's usual tomboyish look.
That look was… ah… I can't explain it well.
Anyway, it was a different look from usual.
"Hey, Ha Seonyu. What's up?"
I smiled awkwardly and tried to button up my shirt collar.
"Huh?! Ah, no!"
Seonyu startled and stepped back one pace.
Her face had flushed much redder than when she'd bitten the apple earlier.
"Just hurry up and dry off and come out! Why are you all unbuttoned like that, you're gonna ruin my eyes!"
Seonyu snapped irritably and hurriedly turned her body.
But because she turned her head so quickly, Seonyu's long black hair brushed past my shoulder with a whoosh.
Sway—
If that brush left a strange ripple… it was probably just my imagination.
Yeah, that must be it.