An Unimaginable Identity
Once I stepped inside the house, I instinctively scanned her up and down, letting my eyes roam over her in a quiet, lingering sweep.
The weather had warmed a little, and she was wearing a pink short-sleeve tee with black dolphin shorts. It was the same outfit she'd had on when we ran into each other at the recycling station just moments ago, but back then I hadn't even registered what she was wearing.
Nothing fancy—just a simple look—but that only made her figure stand out more. Those full, rounded 70C breasts pushed faintly against the loose fabric of the short sleeves, the size of them impossible to hide.
"So… what's wrong with the computer?"
Afraid she'd catch me staring, I quickly looked away and changed the subject.
"Ah… well… the internet just doesn't seem to be working right…"
She spoke without much certainty, then led me into her room. I followed.
Inside, a dark monitor sat on the desk with the computer tower underneath.
"Ah… just a second."
Click.
Whirrrrr.
She pressed the power button on the tower. The fans spun up and the monitor flickered to life.
…
…
Silence stretched while the screen booted. An awkward quiet hung between us for a moment that felt far longer than it actually was—even though the boot time was barely a blink.
Ding! Ding!
The desktop appeared with a soft chime.
Sssssk. Skritch.
Click. Click.
"When I open this…"
The second it finished booting, Hyunji grabbed the mouse and double-clicked the browser. A white window popped open.
"Something weird keeps showing up."
"Here?"
She moved the pointer and pointed at a spot on the screen; my eyes followed automatically. Looks like she'd installed some junk add-on by mistake. For a total computer illiterate that was possible enough… but people like that still exist these days? Meeting a genuine tech-dummy after so long felt almost novel.
"Yeah… I don't really know computers… I just use the internet sometimes and do the bare minimum for work…!"
"Ah… that program's not needed, right?"
"Probably… I just need the websites to load…!"
"Hmm… want me to clean up the rest while I'm at it?"
Call it a neighborly service.
"Ah… yes. Please do. I feel bad asking for more when you're already busy…"
"Nah. Hahaha. It's fine. I've got nothing going on today anyway."
A little loneliness slipped into my voice without me meaning it to.
"Thank you…!"
She thanked me with real gratitude in her tone. Maybe I was being a sucker, but it still felt good.
Sssssk.
I grabbed the mouse, minimized the browser, and scanned the desktop. One icon caught my eye.
"…Huh? You do video editing?"
"Ah… that's just a hobby. Haha…"
A video editing program. Wait… she's a total computer illiterate but she edits videos? That felt a little off. And her answer sounded unsure, too.
…Then again, there was that pro gamer who was top-tier in Korea and still couldn't do online banking alone. The weird feeling hit me for a second, then a similar story floated up and I let it go.
"You run a YouTube channel or something? Haha."
"Ah… haha…"
She laughed awkwardly. Maybe I shouldn't have asked.
"Well… I'll go tidy up outside for a bit."
"Ah. Got it. Shouldn't take long!"
She stepped out of the room, maybe to give me space.
"Hoo…"
Deleting the add-on was nothing. Simple job, but being alone in a single woman's house still made me tense for some reason. I let out a deep breath and tried to relax.
Sssk.
Click.
I opened the browser settings.
"Installed a bunch of useless crap…"
A few junk programs were sitting there. I clicked them away one by one.
Click.
Click.
Back on the main browser screen, I tapped the search bar.
"Real computer illiterate, huh…. Wait??"
I was muttering to myself when the auto-filled URL stopped me cold. That address looked weirdly familiar.
"No way… no way…?"
Half-hoping, half-dreading, I glanced toward the open doorway. She was nowhere in sight. This URL… I was sure of it. Someone I knew flashed straight into my head.
I clicked the auto-completed address. The site loaded in a rush across the monitor.
"….Whoa…"
The word slipped out on its own—more shock than admiration, really. My mouth just stopped working.
That URL was Nabi's Blow page. The address itself was a mess of letters and numbers like some kind of cipher, but right at the front sat the Blow nickname I jerked off to every single day. That was why the beginning of the URL had felt so familiar.
"Whoa… haha… hahaha…"
A low laugh spilled out of me, packed with pure disbelief and surprise. Anyone in this situation would've had a hard time holding it in. Goosebumps raced over my skin; every hair on my body stood on end.
So… does this person jerk off to Nabi's videos too? Why the hell does she have Nabi's Blow…?
"…Huh??!"
I shouted without meaning to. Startled by my own voice, I whipped my head toward the door, terrified she'd heard. No one was there. Good.
I turned back to the monitor.
"What the hell… is this…"
The information on the screen had burned itself into my brain crystal clear, yet I still couldn't believe it. I asked myself again just to be sure.
Is this… is this real?? Can something like this even happen…?
The shock wouldn't settle. My heart kept hammering, thrashing around in my chest.
The Blow profile window on the screen showed Nabi's profile picture. Meaning I was looking at Blow logged in under Nabi's account. And that meant the owner of the house I'd come to fix a computer for—the woman I ran into now and then, exchanged greetings with, made small talk with—was…
Nabi.
Clack!
Beep. Beep. Beep-beep!
I walked into my own place with my head completely blank, no memory of what I'd even done. It should've been a five-minute fix, yet my mind felt like it had auto-formatted itself.
"Hoo…! Hoo…!"
I stood in the entryway without even taking off my shoes, breathing hard from the tension. My hands and feet were shaking. It felt like I'd opened a forbidden box I never should have found. Once you open that box and learn what you weren't supposed to know, everything looks different.
The girl next door no longer looked ordinary. The more I thought about her, the more her face started overlapping with Nabi's. The woman who smiled and made small talk at the recycling station. The total computer illiterate who came to me looking helpless and asked for help…
…was the famous absolute freak Sect girl, Nabi.
Felt like I'd been smacked in the back of the head. Cancel the "Nabi is a catfish" theory. Nabi was real. And at the same time, every image I'd built of the girl next door shattered into pieces. This feeling was impossible to put into words.
The provocative freak who posted that she'd let anyone who found her fuck her raw… lived right next door. And that offhand thought I'd had this morning about not being particularly drawn to her? Cancel that too. A freak like that? Impossible not to be interested. Hell, just yesterday I'd been watching her shove toys into her cunt while reading those filthy tweets and jerking off to it.
From the second I found out, even if I didn't show it on the outside, my everyday life had flipped 180 degrees.
Thud. Thud.
"Haa… why the hell did I even take this…"
I sighed, kicked off my shoes, and headed inside while pulling out my phone and opening the photo app. There it was—the screenshot of Nabi's Blow profile from just minutes ago. Instinct had made me whip out my phone and snap the screen. Even now I didn't know why. Some buried part of me had possessed me like a ghost and forced me to take the picture.
"Hooah… what do I do…"
Thump. Thump.
Looking at the photo set my heart racing all over again. Is this even legal…? That thought flooded my head. Of course it did. With just this one photo, if things went wrong I could end up in prison for blackmail.
"No… wait…"
A single idea suddenly flashed through my mind.
Creak.
I went into my room, sat in the chair, and started fleshing out that fleeting thought—something very, very dangerous.
The fact that this photo could land me in jail for blackmail also meant, flipped around, that I now held a weapon I could use for blackmail.
"Right… yesterday's tweet…"
Yesterday Nabi had posted something extremely provocative on Blow. Find me and fuck me. She'd made a promise. If you see me, fuck me. That was Nabi tying herself up with her own words. And I was the one holding the rope.
Maybe, flipped around, I'd just discovered a treasure chest no one else knew about. A pure eureka moment, all mine.
"Hoo… heheh…"
After the sigh, a dark, sly laugh curled at the corners of my mouth.
"Nice… so that's how it is…."