The Young Lady's Predicament (4)
Whoosh—the swirling water carried away every last scrap of filth, then rose again. I clung to the toilet, gasping for breath, before finally collapsing onto the floor in a limp heap.
The monkey bone—I'd managed to eat every last bit of it. Forced down with a sauce that felt more scalding than spicy, it had somehow gone in. Of course, I'd just emptied my stomach completely, so there was nothing left inside me now.
All that remained was a raw, burning throat and stomach. No more spicy food for a while, I told myself. I sat there dazed on the cold floor, then checked the time on my phone.
Five minutes until lunch ended. I already knew where the calligraphy classroom was for the afternoon period. If I moved quickly from here, I could still make it on time.
And yet I didn't want to get up. Just a little longer—I wanted to stay alone like this.
"…Still, you have to get up, young lady."
Being late on the very first day would definitely cost me points for attitude. And it wouldn't look good in the other young ladies' eyes, either.
I groaned as I pushed myself up—then a hollow laugh slipped out of me.
I was already being bullied in Class 1-D. Caring what the young ladies from other classes thought of me suddenly felt ridiculous.
Yoon Seo-a's hangers-on were probably already whispering and spreading rumors behind my back. What difference would it make if I tried my hardest?
Even so, my body moved diligently on its own. I washed the hand that had been gripping the toilet clean, tossed the soiled handkerchief into the trash, and pulled out the spare I'd prepared to dry my hands.
Then my eyes met those of the girl in the mirror. Bloodshot and slightly swollen from how much I'd cried—anyone who looked would know at a glance that I'd been weeping. I dampened the handkerchief with cold water.
I wrung it out thoroughly and gently massaged the skin around my eyes. After a few repetitions, the puffiness subsided a little. The redness couldn't be helped, but it was better than before. Now someone would have to look closely to tell I'd been crying.
Once my ruined face had calmed somewhat, my expression came into view. Lips pressed into a hard line, eyes rigid. Far too stiff a face for a young lady.
"…Smile."
Always at ease, as if the feeling of panic didn't exist. I took both corners of my mouth with my fingers and lifted them.
There—that was more like a proper young lady. Not a powerless little girl.
Because of the time I'd spent in the bathroom, I inevitably arrived late to the afternoon class.
Fortunately, it being the first day, I wasn't scolded. Just a quiet reminder not to be late again, and I was allowed to find the seat with my name on it and sit down.
Yoon Seo-a's followers, who shared the class with me, snickered at the sight—but I ignored them and focused on the lesson.
Calligraphy class was held seated formally on a floor covered in Japanese-style tatami mats. Judging by the way the calligraphy instructor was dressed in traditional Japanese clothing, the classroom's atmosphere seemed to be a matter of her personal taste.
The class itself proceeded smoothly enough. The young ladies who had already studied at home listened to the instructor's explanation and immediately produced the assigned verse in elegant, flowing strokes. The others, too, after a few trials, showed soft, refined handwriting—proof they hadn't entered Private Acacia Academy for nothing.
I had spent a long time teaching myself calligraphy on the computer at home, so I could produce something roughly on par with those who had been properly taught.
Though it still fell short in the instructor's eyes, it seemed.
"Miss Yu Ha-eun? Your writing is very neat. Almost as if it had just come off a printer."
"I will continue to refine it."
It might have sounded like praise at first glance, but it was a polite way of saying my style was rigid and formulaic. Calligraphy pursued beauty, not the precision of something measured with a ruler.
Of course, I wasn't the only one who received a comment. Most of the young ladies got one of their own—even those who looked as though they'd studied at home weren't exempt. The calligraphy instructor was that exacting.
But even she reserved nothing but praise for one person alone.
"This… this is truly art."
"Thank you."
The writing produced by a young lady named Yeon Chae-rin was beautiful even to my untrained eye.
Splendid without being gaudy—an ordered kind of beauty, perhaps. I wasn't the only one who felt it; murmurs of admiration rose from the surroundings as well.
The instructor seemed thoroughly pleased. She examined the piece several times, then brought it forward and began explaining.
She went on and on about how extraordinary the brushwork was where the stroke ended, and so on—honestly, most of it went over my head.
I'd studied it, but calligraphy had never really been my preference. Still, half-listening would only invite harsher criticism later, so I paid as close attention as I could.
Yeon Chae-rin, though. The name didn't feel entirely unfamiliar. No—not her given name, but the family name. That was the part that rang a bell.
Had there been a Yeon among the heroines of Astra of the Blue Sky, the original of this world? I couldn't quite remember, but I thought her hair had been a pale violet.
Yeon Chae-rin's hair was pale violet as well. She was probably that heroine's sister.
I couldn't recall whether the heroine had a younger sister. I'd seen the home-visit event, I thought—there had been parents then, but no other family.
Well, if she'd been enrolled at Private Acacia, it would make sense that she wasn't mentioned.
Should I try talking to her later? I wondered, looking at the pale-violet back of her head, hair tied in twin tails.
I'd enrolled at Private Acacia precisely to stay away from the original cast—but that didn't mean I had no interest in them at all. The male protagonist held zero appeal for me, of course, but I'd wanted to meet the heroines at least once.
The problem was that meeting the heroines almost inevitably meant getting tangled up with the protagonist as well. So I hadn't.
But a heroine's younger sister who wasn't even mentioned in the original? That might be fine, right?
After the instructor had finished gushing over Yeon Chae-rin's writing and returned to the lesson for a while, the bell finally rang to mark the end of the afternoon class.
Small sighs escaped here and there after two unbroken hours of calligraphy.
I was no exception—I rubbed my calves, which were buzzing with pins and needles. Two full hours of formal kneeling. That alone was reason enough never to take calligraphy as an afternoon class again.
I quickly tidied my seat and looked around. The hangers-on who had tormented me alongside Yoon Seo-a seemed to have lost interest; they were already gone.
Maybe bullying me at lunch was enough for one day. I let out a small breath of relief, smoothed a hand over my chest, and turned toward Yeon Chae-rin.
She was carefully rolling up the calligraphy paper she'd written on and placing it into a box the instructor had given her. The instructor had asked to show it to the upperclassmen who took the class as well.
Just how much had that instructor liked it? Anyway—the fact that she hadn't left the classroom yet was good news for me. I took a small breath and approached Yeon Chae-rin.
I didn't try to hide my footsteps, so when she finished closing the box with the calligraphy paper inside, Yeon Chae-rin turned her head and looked at me. I smiled, gave a slight nod, and greeted her.
"May I trouble you for a moment?"
"…What is it?"
"I didn't come with any particular business. I simply… wanted to speak with you."
I placed a hand over my chest as I spoke.
"I'm Yu Ha-eun, from Class 1-D."
"Yu Ha-eun… Hong Su-ryeon's friend?"
"You know of me?"
That was a little unexpected. I hadn't imagined Yeon Chae-rin would already know who I was. When I looked at her with mildly surprised eyes, she nodded and replied.
"She mentioned she had a commoner friend of her own. So that was you."
A commoner friend, huh. So that's how you thought of me, Su-ryeon.
I didn't know what expression to make, so I just offered a vague smile. Yeon Chae-rin raised a hand in a similar gesture and spoke.
"I got sidetracked and forgot to introduce myself. I'm Yeon Chae-rin, Class 1-B. Though after the way the instructor carried on, I doubt anyone here doesn't know."
"Ahaha… She was a bit over the top, wasn't she."
"Of course I know my calligraphy is exceptional, but it hardly warranted that much fuss."
The way Yeon Chae-rin casually praised herself, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, made me blink.
She didn't look the type, but she was the kind who showed off. I stared at her, momentarily at a loss for words, until she spoke again.
"Anyway, it's nice to meet you, Miss Yu Ha-eun. I didn't expect you to approach me first, though."
"Well… the truth is, I didn't come over for no reason."
At my words, Yeon Chae-rin's eyes narrowed.
"…Meaning?"
"Ah—nothing serious, I promise. It's just… I'd like to be friends with you, Miss Yeon Chae-rin."
"Friends…?"
"Ahaha…"
Yeon Chae-rin's eyes went wide, as if she might have misheard. I laughed awkwardly.
Young ladies never said things straight. Whether through metaphor or careful circumlocution, they thoroughly concealed their true intentions when they spoke. That was the norm.
I knew that. I could manage it when being hostile or making ordinary conversation—but "I want to be friends" was hard to dress up in roundabout language.
How was I supposed to invent a reason when there wasn't one?
"…That's rather sudden. We've only just met, and you're already proposing friendship."
"I'm sorry. I'm not very good at speaking indirectly about things like this."
"But… well. All right. Let's be friends."
"Oh—really?"
"For one thing, both of us are among the few commoner-born students here, aren't we? Even a small alliance means we can pool our strength and handle whatever comes our way."
I'd simply wanted to be friends. Yeon Chae-rin, on the other hand, seemed to be calculating something as she accepted—and that left me a little disappointed, my lips almost pouting.
But her next words let me break into a bright smile again.
"Besides, you're the first person who's ever asked me to be friends so directly. It's a little unfamiliar… but I like it."
"Miss Chae-rin…!"
"Now that we're friends, let's not be so stiff with the family names. Miss Ha-eun."
"Yes, Miss Chae-rin!"
The joy rising in my chest was enough to make everything that had happened at lunch feel like a fleeting nightmare. I nodded so hard my head might have fallen off.