Matching Outfits
For Seong A-rin, making plans had never been something that made her nervous. And why would it? Most of her plans amounted to nothing more than casually hanging out with friends.
Usually, when the others called, she'd lounge around at home until it was almost time, throw on whatever was nearby, and head out. That was the extent of it. The plans themselves were rarely anything special. Typically, one friend would drop a PC bang? in the group chat, someone would fire back a simple go, and that was the whole arrangement.
Nothing worth getting worked up over. They'd been hanging out since they were kids, comfortable with each other to the point of no return. They'd even gone to the bathhouse together and seen each other naked. They could swap dirty jokes without a second thought. You could call them clit-friends, I suppose.
So being a few minutes late never mattered for shit, and there was even less reason to dress up.
Which is why the situation she found herself in now felt so unbearably awkward.
Ugh...
Saturday, twelve-thirty in the afternoon. She was standing on a downtown street, waiting for Lee Se-won. There were still thirty minutes until their meeting time, and yet she'd come out early anyway, soaking in the awkwardness with her whole body.
Thump, thump. She could hear her own heart hammering in her ears. For the first time in her life, she was realizing that making plans could be this nerve-wracking.
It was strange. On the surface, it didn't look all that different from the plans she'd always made. They'd shared their naked bodies, and even if it hadn't been intentional... they'd traded dirty talk a few times, too. And yet the tension was somehow several times worse than usual.
She knew the reason well enough. The problem was who she was meeting. This time, it wasn't a familiar girl — it was a guy she'd only seen twice.
People naturally get tense when they face something they have no experience with. It had been like that on her first day of a part-time job. It had been like that as a freshman in college. First times were supposed to be nerve-wracking. That was just how it worked.
In that sense, meeting Lee Se-won this time was uncharted territory. Sure, this was their second meeting... but last time she'd basically just been dragged along. Psychologically and physically.
This time was different. This wasn't a meetup he'd initiated — she'd volunteered to take the lead herself. They hadn't gathered for a simple conversation. This was a plan they'd made to laugh and talk and hang out together. In other words, it was a date.
And so excitement and worry kept bubbling up in succession.
She thought back to two days ago.
Kyaaaaah!! You crazy bitch!!!!
Right after she'd sent that pathetic, groveling text to Lee Se-won. The moment the little "1" vanished from her freshly fired-off message, and then two full minutes passed with no reply.
In that empty stretch of time, she'd felt every emotion imaginable. At first, she'd grabbed her little sister by the shoulders and shaken her, consumed by rage over how she was going to murder this fucking bitch. Around the thirty-second mark, worry and anticipation split fifty-fifty over what kind of reply might come. And for the remaining time, all she could feel was the thought I'm fucked and a spreading sadness.
By the end, her head was mostly filled with negative thoughts — had he read it and ignored her? Was this it? Was it over?
Which is why she couldn't even describe how grateful she felt when the reply finally arrived two minutes later.
A single cool reply had made her feel like she owned the world. Emotions work like that — the bigger the drop, the bigger the difference you feel. Just seconds earlier she'd been racing through hell, so the joy that bloomed afterward hit her that much harder.
Ah. A person can feel every shade of human emotion in the span of just two minutes.
Thanks to that, she'd been able to use that joy as fuel to even plan out a whole date course. Now all that was left was to meet Lee Se-won and laugh and talk together. ...Whether things would actually go according to plan was another matter.
Can I even do this...?
What if nothing but awkward silence filled the air? Did she look okay right now? Worries piled up one after another.
She lifted her phone for a moment and checked her appearance. A pure white blouse, a black skirt that seemed to contrast against it, and a small crossbody bag for her wallet and phone. Looking back at her was a version of herself in a thoroughly inoffensive, clean combination.
It was an outfit her little sister had recommended. According to her sister, for a meeting like this, clean and simple beat standing out. Whether that was actually true, she had no idea — but for now, she was thinking it wasn't.
"......"
She glanced around. The downtown streets on a weekend were packed with nothing but social butterflies. Everyone was dressed to impress, wearing bright smiles as they laughed and chatted with their partners while walking past. Unlike those other girls who radiated confidence, she just kept shrinking into herself.
There was a difference in class. Yeah — this was the insurmountable, innate wall between loners and socialites. Unlike those people who strolled downtown every day, she only occasionally went to the neighborhood PC bang. This place was far too unfamiliar.
Just as the thought crossed her mind that maybe she'd come to the wrong place...
Ding!
A small notification sound, and a text arrived.
Looks like he'd finished getting ready and arrived. Seong A-rin hurriedly straightened her clothes and shot back a reply.
She was so nervous that formal speech came out naturally. She'd been told over and over to just talk casually... but it still wasn't sticking. Even if they were the same age, dropping formalities with someone you still felt awkward around wasn't easy.
She stood there blaming herself for a bit, and then, among the dense crowd, she spotted a man walking toward her.
Even among all those socialites, his looks didn't fade in the slightest. In contrast to the laughing, chatting people around him, here came a man with a blank, sharp expression. A calm atmosphere seemed to radiate from him, standing against the lively downtown. The black boxy t-shirt he wore on top only seemed to add a layer of cold to that vibe.
The difficult air around him made it feel like the space in his immediate vicinity existed separately from everything else.
She froze in that hard-to-approach atmosphere for a moment, and then Lee Se-won spotted her. Her figure settled into those black eyes.
And at the same time, a smile formed on his face. Those sharp eyes curved into thin crescents, and a hint of laughter entered what had been a blank expression. Then he parted his lips and spoke.
"It's been a while, A-rin."
And strangely enough, the cold atmosphere around him seemed to thin out. At that, she found herself staring at him as if spellbound.
But only for a moment — she got embarrassed for no reason and turned her head. The gaze that had been on him dropped downward. Her cheeks felt hot.
She managed to get words out anyway, but they came out small, almost swallowed.
"It's been a while..."
Her mind was completely blank. She'd definitely thought of all sorts of things to say before they met, but now it felt like all of it had been wiped clean. Awkwardness had taken over her entire body.
No, you idiot, what are you doing...
She scolded herself inwardly. She'd been the one to invite him, and now she was the one getting awkward first? She couldn't even make proper eye contact — how was she supposed to hang out? Seong A-rin gathered her courage and lifted her gaze again.
And then she could see him properly.
He was wearing colors opposite to hers. A boxy t-shirt in a deep black that seemed to swallow light, and immaculate white jeans. It was a simple monochrome combination, but that only made his looks stand out more. In particular, the dark shirt seemed to complement Lee Se-won's distinctive atmosphere perfectly.
He seemed to be looking at her outfit too — his gaze traveled from bottom to top. His eyes moved a few times, and then he spoke.
"Nice outfit. It looks good on you."
At those words, her face went red all over again.
"Th-thanks... It looks good on you too."
A simple exchange of compliments. The other person didn't seem nervous at all — he'd just been smiling brightly from the moment he saw her. The smiling face definitely suited him, but the thought that she was the only one nervous made her feel a little indignant.
They needed to start moving. Standing around like this would only make her more awkward. She took a deep breath and said to him,
"There's still time before the movie. M-maybe we could walk around downtown until then?"
"Fine by me."
Thank goodness. She put strength into her locked-up legs and started taking steps, one at a time. For now, they'd just walk around. Something would come up. There was a claw machine shop nearby — if they played some crane games, maybe time would pass faster. That was the idea.
Just as she started walking with that thought, a voice came from behind her.
"Oh, now that I look at it, our outfits are pretty similar."
A white blouse and a black boxy tee. A black skirt and clean white jeans. As if they'd aimed for a color contrast. They hadn't planned it, but there was something oddly matching about the combination of their clothes.
Looking at that, Lee Se-won continued in a voice mixed with playfulness.
"Looking at it this way, it's like we're wearing couple tees. Don't you think?"
The moment she heard that, Seong A-rin resolved to buy her little sister fried chicken.