Temporary Rules
Our bodies had been swapped.
Compared to everything else that had changed, this might actually have been the lesser problem — but once the swap had happened, failing to respect the original owner's wishes could easily escalate into a fight.
The moment comfort and obligation started colliding, that was when things would fall apart.
What was allowed, and what wasn't?
If we never drew clear lines and just decided them on the fly based on mood, our judgment would get muddled. Something permitted one day and forbidden the next — eventually we might stop respecting those boundaries altogether.
So we wrote the rules down on paper, so they couldn't change.
That way, since each of us had written down exactly what we'd said, neither of us could back out later with some nonsense excuse.
Even better if we confirmed that we both understood and recognized the same things.
"I don't want you doing whatever you want with my body."
"Even if I say I won't?"
"Write it in the rules. What are you gonna do if you just say it out loud and then don't keep your word?"
"Alright, I'll write it down first. What should I put?"
"Stay in the living room except when sleeping? No — leave the bedroom door open."
"Even when sleeping?"
"Even when sleeping."
She was serious about this?
I hadn't been planning to do anything weird anyway, so there was nothing to refuse. Dragging my feet would only invite misunderstanding, so I wrote it down right away.
Leave the bedroom door open except when sleeping.
"No, wait. Leaving the door open is something we can keep doing all the time."
"…Ah, so you just want us to live without doors at all?"
"We're not going to lock them anyway, so what does it matter?"
1. Leave the bedroom door open.
I erased the first part. Now it was time to write number two.
"This way we'll know when the other is using the bathroom or shower since those are the ones off the living room, right? We don't need to write that separately?"
"Yeah."
"Then… clothes."
"Clothes should be the body owner's. I wear yours, you wear mine. Swapping clothes with each other is kind of weird."
"But my own clothes are more comfortable."
"Then buy new ones. You can't wear the ones you've been wearing."
Faced with that firm stance, I ended up writing it down.
2. Wear the body owner's clothes. If they're really uncomfortable, buy new ones.
"Add 2-1 under 2: Always wear underwear."
"Ah."
"What do you mean 'ah'? Hey. When we switch back, can you handle sagging breasts?"
"Okay."
2-1. Always wear underwear.
Already the rules were starting to reek of something weird.
It had been inevitable from the moment our bodies swapped, though.
"Alright. Is that enough for living inside the house? Next, let's decide how we handle going out."
I tapped the pen, then stared at the version of me sitting across the table.
She seemed to be thinking it over — nothing decided for sure on that front yet.
"Meeting each other's friends is hard, so no going out to meet acquaintances."
"Yeah, and swapping phones would be ridiculous too."
Even with swapped bodies, we couldn't just pick up each other's lives.
Plus we'd need to stay in contact when we went out, and carrying the wrong phone would be absurd.
"So going out would just be personal walks, then…"
Song Haneul's fingers tapped the table.
"We go out together too. We're only going out because being stuck inside is stifling, so if it's just for some fresh air, we can go together, right?"
We had to stick together even when going out?
Well, it wasn't like I'd have anything else to do anyway. Maybe I should just let it go.
3. Go out together.
"What if I want to go out and you don't, or you want to go out and I don't? What then?"
"…We each get to request it once, and the other has to come along. We take turns accommodating each other. If both of us are fine with it, it doesn't count. How's that?"
A decent proposal for once.
I'd thought she'd just throw a tantrum, but she wasn't like that.
Maybe I'd been underestimating her.
"Fine. I'll take it that way."
"Yeah. Anything else you want to write?"
"I… hmm."
I closed my eyes and thought.
What inconveniences were there right now?
"Can't I just use my own room? My room is more comfortable."
"No. I don't want to go into my room with this body. And the clothes are in our respective rooms anyway — you're not saying we should move all of those, are you?"
"It'd be inconvenient, but… never mind."
Thinking about it, having to go in and out of each other's rooms every time we grabbed clothes to shower didn't make sense. Even if we bought new clothes.
Having never been through anything like this, and never imagining we would, nothing was coming to mind easily.
I'd thought we'd write everything down in a flash, but the deliberation only dragged on. What I'd considered inconveniences amounted to just three lines once written down, and with no way to imagine what lay ahead, writing more wasn't easy.
"Should we wrap it up here for now? We can keep adding rules later."
I tapped the table with the pen and let out a sigh.
Song Haneul watched quietly, then held out a finger.
"If this goes on a long time, what about going back to school?"
"At this rate, going back is a pipe dream. You're not going to?"
"I… don't think I will. Or wait, should we at least graduate? With things like this, graduating seems hard for either of us."
We stared at each other.
Whether third year or second year, transferring into a major you'd never considered and picking up someone else's studies wasn't easy. I'd never thought it would be.
"So we both end up high school graduates."
"Mom and Dad are gonna lose it."
That made me burst out laughing before I could stop myself.
Not exactly the attitude to show parents who traveled abroad earning money for us.
"Let's end it here for now. Well, when stuff comes up, we'll figure it out somehow."
I didn't know how many more rules we'd end up writing, but three already felt like enough of a foundation.
"Okay."
"What about running out quickly to buy something?"
"That too — we go together."
"…Got it."
After settling even the minor details, we wrote out identical copies and split them into two sheets.
"We've confirmed they're the same, right? You understood properly?"
"I know."
After verifying that not a single character was off, we carefully folded them and put them away.
1. Leave the bedroom door open.
2. Wear the body owner's clothes. If they're really uncomfortable, buy new ones.
2-1. Always wear underwear.
3. Go out together.
The paper with the rules written on it. I mulled over the contents, examining them one by one.
Number one meant the end of privacy, but it wasn't as if there was anything that needed privacy protected in Song Haneul's room, so I didn't particularly mind.
Number two was to keep me from dressing however I pleased, and number three likewise seemed written out of fear that I'd go outside and do something strange. It looked more like she was simply worried about me leaving her sight at all.
Was it because I was a man?
As long as I didn't take her body out and completely wreck it somehow, I figured it would be fine.
Maybe I just didn't understand how a woman felt.
I didn't think much of it myself, but perhaps it was only natural to harbor wariness and anxiety about something like this right away.
"Either way."
I slipped the paper into a drawer and stood up from my seat.
When I came out into the living room, Song Haneul was there with the door thrown wide open, just as promised.
"What are you doing?"
"Portfolio."
"Do it in your room. Why out here?"
"This is my room now. And if Mom comes home and sees, it'll look weird."
"Right."
I'd been thinking of playing some games, but with Mom around there was no helping it. Starting tomorrow, except for sleeping, we could each go back to our rooms to do our own thing — I just had to put up with it for one day.
"Where are you going, though?"
"Bathroom."
"…Ha."
"You don't need to follow me."
"Just in case."
"Just in case of what?"
"There is something."
She didn't explain properly. She just stopped typing, stood up from her seat, and followed me all the way to the bathroom door.
"I get it now, too. When you're done, you wipe with toilet paper, right?"
"…Yeah."
Was she acknowledging that doing something without looking didn't make any sense?
At least she wasn't saying anything ridiculous like close your eyes or don't look, which was a relief.
Aside from the fact that I couldn't fully close the bathroom door.
"Come on. How am I supposed to go when you're making it this awkward?"
"I don't want to do this either."
"I know what you're worried about. But this is a bit much."
I let out a hollow laugh, but my sister's suspicion knew no end.
Given that until recently she'd been the one watching porn in the living room, I could understand her harboring fantasies — but the way she was confusing fantasy with reality was just disappointing.
To not trust family that much… it wasn't as if she'd been deceived her whole life.
"Yeah."
"Yeah."
She answered without understanding a thing, so I gave her an equally half-hearted reply.
I forced myself to ignore the glare-like stare and hung my head low.
"Ah, what are you doing."
"Ah, shit, there's nowhere to put my eyes. If I lift my head we make eye contact, if I look down you bitch about me looking. Should I turn around?"
"Don't do anything weird."
"I should try pissing without holding my dick and see what happens. You'll get sick of looking at it yourself — just not when it's me."
As I grumbled out my complaints, Song Haneul fell silent for a moment, then slammed the door shut.
"Go ahead and look all you want, you perverted bastard."
With that, she stomped away.
I worried for a second that she might come chasing after me from downstairs.
"…She could've just left me alone from the start."
With our bodies swapped, there was no helping it.
I couldn't not look, and I couldn't not touch.
It wasn't as if she was going to handle every bodily function for me — how far did she think her stubbornness would get her?
I left the bathroom feeling refreshed. Outside, Song Haneul was sitting on the sofa with a sullen look on her face.
If it had been a woman's face, maybe — but making that expression with a man's face looked goddamn awful.
It might have been a sexist thought, but that was just how it was. Maybe because it was my face.
"Hey."
"What."
"I'm going to buy clothes. You coming out?"
"When?"
"Now. So I can wear them starting tonight."
"Get ready. We're leaving right away."
I'd thought she'd ignore everything out of irritation with me, so this was a relief.