The Narrow Gate (11)
No matter that she was Yu Ha-eun, she had no intention of quietly enduring something like this.
Someone else was right beside her—close enough that their shoulders nearly touched. What on earth was she thinking, doing this now?
Yu Ha-eun immediately reached out and seized the hand that had been groping her thigh, stopping it cold.
Yoon Seo-a abruptly pulled free, then laced their fingers together instead. Ha-eun stared at her with an expression of pure disbelief at the unexpected move, only for Yoon Seo-a to calmly tip her head and rest it against her shoulder.
She considered jerking her shoulder to shake her off, but the thought crossed her mind that if letting her stay like this would keep her quiet, it might actually be better.
Yu Ha-eun exhaled a long breath through her nose and, hands still clasped, allowed Yoon Seo-a to do as she pleased.
But perhaps stillness had been taken for permission. The hand that had been quietly interlocking fingers loosened again and resumed its exploration of her thigh.
It wasn’t as if she were some outright pervert—why she insisted on doing this right in front of another person was beyond all understanding.
Yu Ha-eun snatched the wrist that was trying to slip between her legs and spoke in a low voice to the girl leaning against her.
“Seriously, stop it. This is your last warning.”
“Last warning, is it? How frightening. Might I ask what happens if I disregard that warning?”
At Yoon Seo-a’s words, Yu Ha-eun drew a sharp breath.
If she ignored the warning? Honestly, even Ha-eun herself had no clear idea what she could do.
Threatening to cut ties would be a terrible move. Maintaining even this superficial friendship rested entirely on Yoon Seo-a’s will.
Denying that might deal her a real emotional blow, but the aftermath made it something she simply could not risk.
Still, having gone so far as to issue a warning, saying nothing at all would only embolden her further. So Ha-eun forced the words out.
“If you ignore it… I’ll hate you.”
“How amusing. That’s already the case now, isn’t it?”
That was true enough. Yoon Seo-a watched Ha-eun click her tongue with a reluctant face and smiled sweetly.
“I truly don’t understand why Ha-eun is resisting this much. After all, there’s nothing you can do. The fact that you can hate me, that you can even resist like this—it all stems from my goodwill, and you know that better than anyone, don’t you?”
As if she had read her mind, Yoon Seo-a laid it out one point after another, and Ha-eun could find no answer.
Feeling the grip on her wrist gradually weaken, Yoon Seo-a moved her hand and continued.
“Just accept me. Enjoy these moments that will keep coming, and accept the pleasure—the happiness—I give you from now on.”
“Nngh…”
“Then both Ha-eun and I—and everyone—will be better for it.”
The hand that had slipped inside the bath towel bumped against the wall. Searching as if looking for something, it found a crevice between the walls and then smoothly stroked upward.
“Yu Ha-eun, a-are you all right?”
“O-of course! I’m fine, really.”
Hearing the suppressed moan, Shin So-hye spoke with concern, and Yu Ha-eun startled and cried out.
Startled for a moment by the sudden loud voice, Shin So-hye soon showed a hesitant look and slowly spoke again.
“S-since it’s just us… there’s something I want to say. Is it all right if I do…?”
“Something you want to say?”
Even in the midst of this, enduring the hand that kept teasing the crevice, Yu Ha-eun managed to ask back with difficulty.
She wanted to shout that she had no room for conversation right now, but the words she herself had spoken to Shin So-hye earlier rose in her mind and stopped her.
She had no choice but to grit her teeth and answer Shin So-hye’s words as sincerely as she could.
This reaction… Yoon Seo-a must definitely be tormenting Ha-eun right now…
And Shin So-hye had long since noticed the situation Yu Ha-eun was in.
Even if she had always been told she couldn’t read the room, with prior warning it would have been absurd not to notice even this.
Moreover, Shin So-hye was already filming Yu Ha-eun’s body underwater. Of course she couldn’t check in real time what scenes were being captured, but judging solely by Ha-eun’s reactions, something tremendous was clearly taking place.
Anyway, separately from secretly moving her hand to keep filming, Shin So-hye voiced what she had been thinking for some time.
“Yu Ha-eun… you didn’t really like me much, did you?”
“W-what?! What do you mean by that…!”
“Oh my, is that so?”
Along with that question, the finger that began digging inward drew a high, almost screaming sound from Yu Ha-eun.
In contrast, Yoon Seo-a’s face as she asked back was utterly composed. Ha-eun gritted her teeth, enduring the pleasure, and asked Shin So-hye with a slightly frowning face.
“M-me not liking Shin So-hye… what do you mean by that?”
“Ah, um… t-to be honest, Yu Ha-eun was kind to me. And you often comforted me gently, too…”
“Th-then… why would you think that…?”
“How should I put it… th-there’s that kind of thing, right? Looking kind, but somehow giving off an uncomfortable atmosphere…”
Even as Shin So-hye spoke, the finger that had dug in showed no intention of resting.
Even when she belatedly grabbed the hand and tried to pull it free with force, pressing hard on her weak point made her strength give out on its own.
Yu Ha-eun consciously controlled her gradually roughening breath and spoke.
“N-no. I’ve never… done that?”
But even as she said it, Yu Ha-eun knew the truth inwardly.
People like Shin So-hye—timid and lacking any self-esteem—rejoiced at small kindnesses, yet at the same time tended to grow suspicious.
They also wondered whether the kindness in another person’s words truly held positive meaning.
Shin So-hye would be the same. In the conversations they had often shared as classmates sitting side by side, she would have felt that the kindness directed at her hid sympathy, regret, and a faint contempt.
Yu Ha-eun too had been a similar existence in the past, so she could know it intuitively.
A timid human with not a speck of self-love. Unlike Shin So-hye, who could look like a beauty with just a little care, she had possessed an appearance that made it hard to win people’s favor.
Because of that past, from the first time she met Shin So-hye sitting in the corner of the classroom with that gloomy air, Yu Ha-eun had found her unpleasant.
She was someone who reminded her of her old self. If they had been in different classes, if Shin So-hye had never been bullied, she would surely have simply pretended not to know her and gone on with her life.
“Hmm, so you thought of Shin So-hye that way, Ha-eun?”
“Th-there’s no way…!”
Even with the sensation of poking hard at the protruding bud that had risen on the crevice, Yu Ha-eun desperately held onto her senses and made excuses.
Yoon Seo-a chuckled and, with the finger already inside the crevice, bent it like a hook and lightly scraped the inner flesh.
“Hiiit…!”
“You always call me the bad person, but actually Ha-eun is quite the bad person herself.”
“O-of course! It’s just my misunderstanding, and today Yu Ha-eun approached me first. So I don’t really mind!”
At Shin So-hye’s bright voice, Yu Ha-eun felt a faint guilt even while floundering in pleasure.
The reason she had proposed becoming friends to Shin So-hye today was solely because, unlike Hong Su-ryeon and Yeon Chae-rin, she did not want to feel the alienation of calling Shin So-hye by her full name alone (of course Yoon Seo-a was the same, but still).
So it was not that she had spoken up because she truly wanted to be friends with Shin So-hye.
“I-I’m sorry, Shin So-hye.”
“Huh? N-no. It’s not something Yu Ha-eun needs to apologize for. It might just be my misunderstanding… and besides, as I said earlier, in the end Yu Ha-eun proposed to me first…”
Shin So-hye said it with a shy smile.
“That’s enough for me.”
“Haa… hngh…!”
“…Yu Ha-eun?”
Yu Ha-eun could no longer hold back her rough breathing and let it out.
Guilt toward Shin So-hye, the merciless pleasure Yoon Seo-a kept sending. And the heat of the water made her head begin to spin.
Her consciousness was gradually clouding; she felt the limit approaching. The impulse to let things fall as they may collided with the reason screaming that it was still too soon.
In that moment, Yu Ha-eun dunking her head into the water was purely impulsive. The single-minded determination not to scream unsightly made her bury her face underwater.
“Y-Yu Ha-eun?!”
Shin So-hye’s startled voice was buried and scattered beneath the surface, and Ha-eun reached her limit. From the tingling pleasure that pierced her body, countless air bubbles poured from her mouth.
And through the bubbling spheres a lens with a red dot was faintly visible, but Yu Ha-eun had no room left to care about it.
Soon her vision blacked out, and Yu Ha-eun lost consciousness.
“W-what do we do?! S-she didn’t notice, right…!”
“Calm down, Shin So-hye.”
The moment they laid the fainted Yu Ha-eun on the floor lined with bath towels, Shin So-hye spoke urgently.
“But Yoon Seo-a, you saw it too…! Yu Ha-eun putting her head in the water!”
“She probably didn’t have the composure to see properly. More importantly—did you film the video properly?”
“Th-that I’ll have to check, but… a-I think I filmed it well…”
“Then that’s fine. Ah, but.”
“Yes?”
Receiving the camera, Yoon Seo-a continued as if something had just occurred to her.
“What you said earlier—how much of it was real?”
“H-how much was real…! It’s all true!”
“Hmm… I thought for sure Shin So-hye said that to plant guilt in Ha-eun.”
“What?! Th-there’s no way!”
“But you said things like finding her unpleasant, looking at her uncomfortably, without holding anything back, didn’t you?”
“Th-that was just because I wanted an honest conversation…”
Moreover, that was also the emotion Shin So-hye had actually felt.
While thinking they were having a pleasant conversation, on the other hand she had sensed in the words Yu Ha-eun’s feelings of not regarding her very well.
But now it no longer mattered. No matter how she had thought of her in the past, from this moment on she too had become someone who could call Yu Ha-eun a friend.
From now on I can call Ha-eun “Ha-eun”…!
Rejoicing that she no longer had to call her that only in her heart, she heard Yoon Seo-a speak again.
“Ah, come to think of it, Shin So-hye. You wanted to try kissing Ha-eun, didn’t you?”
“K-kissing all of a sudden…!”
“But when we talked last time, you said so, didn’t you? That you wanted to try the things I had done. Since Ha-eun is unconscious right now, won’t you try it?”
Shin So-hye’s mouth dropped open at Yoon Seo-a casually saying such a thing, but soon she directed her gaze to the fallen Yu Ha-eun.
Staring for a long time at the figure lying naked on the towel, she soon shook her head vigorously and cried out.
“I-I also want to do it when Ha-eun is fine, like Yoon Seo-a did…!”
“Hmm, is that so.”
That’s a bit of a shame. Yoon Seo-a, who had been filming the two with the camera, muttered as she put it away.
There might have been a good scene to capture. It was a regrettable matter, all in all.