New Beginning (3)
……Ah, things have really gotten out of hand lately.
With Jeong Jaeha’s sudden appearance and the news that class was about to start, the atmosphere fizzled out. Baek Seolah stepped out of the building where the lecture hall was and wandered across campus, awkwardly tracing her lips with her fingers.
What if Jeong Jaeha hadn’t suddenly opened the classroom door? Or even if he had, what if she hadn’t raised her voice for no reason? Baek Seolah mulled over those possibilities but couldn’t bring herself to answer. She simply couldn’t be sure. If the mood hadn’t been broken by Jeong Jaeha, how far would she have gone?
‘We would’ve kissed, at least.’
That much she could say with certainty. Their lips had been on the verge of touching. She had even stuck her tongue out first, brushing it against Han Taeyang’s lips for a fleeting moment. Without Jeong Jaeha, Baek Seolah would definitely have shared a deep kiss with him right then and there……despite having been the one to set the rule that kissing was off-limits.
“Haa……”
It was undeniably contradictory. Still, Baek Seolah wasn’t entirely without an excuse. The contradiction she’d shown today wasn’t quite the same as plain hypocrisy. It wasn’t a case of “Han Taeyang can’t, but I can.” At the very least, she had genuinely intended to treat kissing as an absolute taboo—not just with Han Taeyang, but for herself as well.
Like most couples, Baek Seolah placed meaning on kisses and other forms of lip contact. Even if she slept with Han Taeyang as part of their netorase play, even if she sometimes gave him a handjob or even went down on him……she had sworn she would only allow kissing with her boyfriend. She had meant it sincerely, and until now she had kept that rule.
Whenever Han Taeyang got worked up and pushed for more, she was always the one to hold onto her reason and stop him.
‘……I’ve held back just fine until now.’
Why? Why today, of all days, had she tried to break the rule she herself had set?
Seo Ahyeon’s appearance? It had certainly been sudden. Completely unexpected. But did that mean she was so easy that simple jealousy over a “sex partner” was enough to make her offer her lips— no, to try to give them first?
“……”
The thought left Baek Seolah feeling a little depressed. She had never once doubted her own single-minded devotion.
‘……Maybe I really am a huge pervert……?’
Step by step. Crossing the campus with listless strides, Baek Seolah brooded gloomily, her lips jutting out in a timid pout. She was aware that resisting her own desires had been getting harder lately, but even so, she didn’t want to become some wanton woman. No matter how much she cooperated with the NTS play, she was supposed to know when to hit the brakes.
‘Why do I always lose my composure whenever it’s Han Taeyang……? I almost crossed the line again.’
Just as Baek Seolah’s faint shame and doubt began to stir up more turmoil inside her—
Thud!
“Ugh.”
“……Baek Seolah?”
Perhaps because she had been walking while lost in thought, Baek Seolah suddenly felt a sharp pain in her forehead. She had been strolling along without watching where she was going and had run straight into the back of the person walking ahead of her. The impact was so solid it felt like hitting a wall. She groaned and clutched her forehead.
“Ow…… What? Why’d you stop all of a sudden?”
“No, um. Why’d I stop, you ask……”
When Baek Seolah looked up, blinking away tears, Han Taeyang answered with an awkward smile, gesturing with his eyes toward the building beside them.
“I’ve got my next class, and Jeong Jaeha said he’s got over four hours free so he’s going to meet his girlfriend. Time for us to go our separate ways.”
“……Ah.”
Only then did Baek Seolah realize how far they had walked. From the Magic Hall where the liberal arts class had been held all the way to the Martial Arts Hall for the physical-type students. She looked away with an embarrassed expression. When she turned her head, her other companion was still there—Jeong Jaeha, who had so rudely (?) witnessed her and Han Taeyang’s intimate moment in the classroom earlier.
“……Why are you looking at me like that?”
“……”
Baek Seolah found herself frowning without meaning to. Lately, this acquaintance had become rather unpleasant. The last time she’d been caught grabbing Han Taeyang’s thing, that had been their own carelessness, but today’s interruption had come at an especially bad time.
‘Because of him, we didn’t even get to finish.’
That was exactly why Baek Seolah was glaring at Jeong Jaeha with such obvious displeasure. She was already shaken by the fact that she had almost kissed Han Taeyang, and now they hadn’t even finished? Her own twisted logic only doubled her agitation.
Feeling deeply wronged on Jeong Jaeha’s behalf, Baek Seolah spoke up.
“……Jeong Jaeha, why did you come into that classroom earlier? You said you had a free period starting now.”
“Huh?”
The question was reasonable enough, though laced with plenty of suspicion. After all, according to Han Taeyang, Jeong Jaeha supposedly had four hours free. So why had he bothered opening the door to an empty classroom where the next class was about to begin? It was highly suspicious.
Baek Seolah fixed Jeong Jaeha with a sharp, detective-like gaze.
“Don’t tell me……you used class as an excuse and just happened to spot us on your way by, so you deliberately came in? Thinking maybe if you barged in, we’d let you join?”
“……What, what? No, what the hell are you talking about—”
Of course, Jeong Jaeha, already feeling wronged, only grew more indignant. He hurriedly pulled out his smartphone and showed her the lock screen.
“Hey, shit. Look at this before you talk. I really did have my next class in that room, okay? I just went in early and ran into you two by chance.”
“……?”
Jeong Jaeha had never been more relieved that he’d set his lock screen to his first-semester timetable. Thanks to that, he was able to quickly dispel Baek Seolah’s dangerous suspicion. She narrowed her eyes and checked the timetable he showed her. Sure enough, the class he’d mentioned was listed there.
This time she turned to Han Taeyang with a strange expression.
“Didn’t you say he had a free period?”
Her gaze clearly demanded an explanation—hadn’t he told her Jeong Jaeha had four hours free? But it wasn’t Han Taeyang who answered. It was Jeong Jaeha, who had already put his phone away.
“I do have a free period. More precisely, the class I was supposed to be in right now got canceled on its own.”
“Huh……?”
“……How the hell am I supposed to focus on class after seeing that? I was so messed up I just decided to skip.”
Jeong Jaeha ruffled his own hair with a genuinely troubled look. Baek Seolah stared at him in confusion for a moment before—
“Aha.”
She casually swept her gaze over his entire body and muttered as if she understood.
“I see. No wonder your pants have been looking weirdly tight since earlier. Jeong Jaeha, you……”
“……”
“Seriously, are you lusting after me again? Should I just tell Chaeeun everything?”
It was only a few short sentences, but the conversation was dizzying enough to make anyone’s mind short-circuit. Han Taeyang, who had been standing awkwardly to the side, immediately looked off into the distance and pretended not to hear. Jeong Jaeha shrank back as if Baek Seolah’s frosty stare had dealt him a massive blow—probably also trying to hide the abnormal reaction in his lower half.
In any case, Jeong Jaeha finally snapped at Baek Seolah’s indifferent, almost pitying remark.
“……This is your fault for messing around in the classroom in the first place! Why does an innocent bystander like me have to get treated like some horny beast?!”
Shouting “Just get lost already, I’m going to see Chaeeun!” he bolted away. In that final moment, Han Taeyang clearly saw tears welling up in his eyes.
After watching Jeong Jaeha’s retreating figure with a rather sympathetic expression, Han Taeyang spoke.
“……Well, I’ve got my next class, so I’ll be going.”
He quickly turned away before Baek Seolah, who was rubbing the back of her neck with an awkward look, could grab him. He had a solid excuse—second period was right around the corner.
But—
Grab!
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“……”
Baek Seolah had grabbed his wrist without hesitation. Han Taeyang felt the world go dark. He was terrified her earlier hysteria toward Jeong Jaeha might now be directed at him, but—
“……Han Taeyang, do you have any plans this weekend?”
“?”
Unexpectedly, what came out of Baek Seolah’s mouth was nothing like what he had anticipated. He blinked and looked back at her.
“No, it’s nothing special, really. I was just……”
Baek Seolah had returned to the thought she’d been having right before she bumped into Han Taeyang’s back. She felt nothing toward Jeong Jaeha’s lustful thoughts about her—only pity—yet when it came to Han Taeyang, everything felt different. That discrepancy left her with a legitimate question. So she glanced at him with an unusually demure expression and gaze.
She gently tucked her snow-white hair behind her ear and asked in a suggestive tone.
“If you don’t have any plans or anything to do……I was wondering if you’d like to go into the city and hang out with me.”
“……Yep?”
In other words, a line so shocking that even Han Taeyang was left flustered enough to slip into formal speech. A line that would make anyone who heard it widen their eyes—spoken as casually as if it were nothing.
……All because she was determined to figure out exactly what these fluctuating feelings she had toward Han Taeyang really were.
“I-it’s not a date or anything, okay? We’re not really like that, are we?”
“……”
“……Though it would just be the two of us hanging out.”
As if to ward off any misunderstanding, she tacked on words that no one could possibly find convincing, all while failing to notice that her own face had turned faintly red. She smiled awkwardly.