Nuna's All Wet
Park Ah-young kept fanning herself with her hand, her gaze still fixed on the two of us. Under that stare, Park Eun-ji slowly slid sideways, putting some distance between us. With an awkward expression, she started fanning herself too, copying her sister.
“…Haa, it’s hot. So hot. There’s a fan in the room, right?”
A pink flush spread across Park Ah-young’s face, making her look like a ripe peach. Her clear, translucent skin only made the color on her cheeks stand out more. Combined with her still-damp, bright yellow hair, she gave off a strangely captivating vibe. The bleached blonde should have looked ridiculous on her, but somehow it suited her perfectly—like a custom outfit made just for her body. It was a far cry from the black hair I used to know, yet the difference didn’t bother me at all.
“…What? What are you looking at? Did I… say something? I just got out of the shower.”
She ran a hand over her face, as if she could feel my lingering gaze. Her skin was flawless, her expression soft and innocent without a trace of makeup.
“Ah, wait a second.”
I stood up. It was a sudden impulse, just like when Park Eun-ji had bolted out of my room earlier.
“Uh, uhh…”
Park Ah-young looked flustered. I met her eyes and tried to stay calm, then reached out and brushed my fingers near her face for no real reason.
“Here. There’s some hair stuck.”
I pretended to pluck something away, then quickly brushed my hands together to get rid of the nonexistent evidence.
“…There. All done.”
“Oh, okay. Thanks.”
“…What the hell are you doing?”
“Huh?”
“I asked what you two are doing.”
Park Eun-ji’s glare was anything but friendly. True to her earlier threat about killing me if I laid a hand on her sister, her reaction was fiery.
“I was just getting some hair off her face. That’s all.”
“……”
She had nothing to say to that. Complaining about someone removing hair stuck to a face would’ve made her look insane.
“Haa…”
Park Eun-ji let out a small sigh and shot me a sharp look.
“Ha, haha…”
She was the one who didn’t know her place, yet she was getting even more worked up over my casual touch.
“Are you seriously picking a fight over something this small again?”
“…A fight? You call this a fight?”
“Yeah. You’ve always been dying to tear into Do-hyun.”
“…Haa, unni. You really don’t get it, do you? That bastard—!”
She couldn’t hold back her anger. It felt like watching someone with rage issues. But I simply waved my phone in front of her like I was dangling catnip in front of a kitten.
“Haa, huu… haaa…”
“…Why Do-hyun?”
Park Ah-young’s eyes were full of confusion as she looked back and forth between us.
“…Forget it. Just don’t get too friendly with that bastard.”
“Friendly? We live right next door! How could we not be?”
Park Eun-ji and I weren’t exactly childhood friends with a warm, ticklish relationship. If anything, it was a clear master-servant dynamic. To outsiders it might look different, but to me it was obvious which one it was.
Because of that, Park Ah-young had always looked at me with pity. Sympathy… It was a little pathetic, but the way she gazed at me was undeniably sympathetic. She must have found me pitiful and pathetic, because she’d looked after me more than once. And she was doing it again now, glancing at my face with that same sympathetic look.
She parted her lips a few times while staring at her sister.
“…So where’s Mom?”
“She went to work.”
“Ah, right. So why did you call Do-hyun over?”
“…Me? I called him…?”
Park Eun-ji shot me a glare that screamed “What the hell are you talking about?”
“You said you needed help with the recycling…”
“……I did?”
“Yeah. You asked.”
I made something up on the spot. It would’ve been weirder if I’d come over without any reason at all.
“Stop making Do-hyun do your chores. You’re so lazy.”
“…You’re not really in a position to say that, unni.”
“Why not?”
“Because you didn’t do it on time, so I had to make him do it instead.”
“Then you should’ve just done it yourself! And… I thought you said you’d handle it…”
“Now you’re even rewriting your own memories?”
“…What? I really did say that…?”
Honestly, they were both pretty similar. Neither had the right to lecture the other. The only real difference was that Park Eun-ji had used violence on me, while Park Ah-young never had.
“Ah, whatever… I’m hot right now. I’ll go grab the fan.”
She still looked flushed, like the heat hadn’t left her body. Watching her walk away stirred up all sorts of thoughts in me.
……If it were the old me, I never would’ve had thoughts like this…
Park Ah-young’s flushed face kept making me think dirty things.
“Uh, uh! W-wait, where are you going?!”
She was heading straight for Park Eun-ji’s room. Park Eun-ji rushed to block her.
“…What? I’m just borrowing the fan.”
“No, the living room AC is plenty cool. Why do you suddenly need a fan…?”
“Are AC and a fan the same thing? They have different purposes.”
Park Ah-young lifted her wet hair to show her point.
“Ah, fine. There’s a hair dryer in your room too, right?”
“…Why are you being like this? Uh, uhh… Ow. Don’t grab so hard.”
Park Eun-ji’s reaction was obviously suspicious. She was extremely reluctant to let her sister into her room. Her strange behavior piqued my interest. I didn’t know exactly why she was acting that way, but the more she resisted, the more I wanted to force the issue.
“Nuna.”
“Ah, uh… yeah?”
I made a bold move. I went around to Park Eun-ji’s other side and grabbed Park Ah-young’s wrist. It was the first time I’d touched her like this—real skinship. Maybe I was reading too much into it, but first times always stuck in your memory somehow. Her cheeks seemed to grow even redder.
Park Eun-ji’s eyes widened at my touch.
“…You. What are you doing?”
“What?”
“Why the hell are you holding my sister’s hand?”
Her reaction was even more extreme than I’d expected. She was frowning hard, completely ignoring the fact that Park Ah-young was right there.
“Nuna’s all wet. She’ll catch a cold at this rate.”
She flinched at the word “wet.”
“…What does it matter to you if she catches a cold or not?”
“Don’t say it like that…”
Park Ah-young let out a small complaint, caught between us. I gently pulled her wrist closer to me.
“Let go. Unless you want to die.”
“Park Eun-ji! What the hell is wrong with you… My wrist actually hurts!”
“Ah…”
She yanked Park Ah-young into her arms, but Park Ah-young pushed back against the embrace.
“Ah, shit… Didn’t you hear me say it hurts?”
Park Eun-ji looked shocked. And no wonder—Park Ah-young was now pressed right up against my side.
“…You two are weird… Are you filming some kind of hidden camera prank…?”
Park Ah-young eyed us both suspiciously. I gave an awkward laugh, took her wrist again, and started walking.
“Ah, where are we going?”
“To dry your hair, nuna.”
“Huuung…”
“Hey, stop right there…! Haa, seriously…”
I left Park Eun-ji’s irritated voice behind and slowly made my way toward her room.
“…She’s acting even weirder than usual today… She wasn’t like this before.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. She’s always been snappy, but not this bad…”
Park Ah-young really had no idea what was going on with her sister. I smirked to myself and stepped into the room despite Park Eun-ji’s continued protests.
“There’s the fan.”
It sat beside the vanity. Park Ah-young quickly sat down on the chair and turned the fan toward her face.
“Huuung… That feels nice.”
“Ah, shit… Just bring it out with you… Why are you making a scene in my room…?”
Park Eun-ji followed us in, still looking thoroughly annoyed. The sweet scent of shampoo carried on the fan’s breeze tickled my nose.
“…Sniff, sniff.”
It was a bright, fruity smell—several fruits mixed together, hard to pin down exactly. But there was something else blended in with it.
“…Does it smell like something in here?”
It was faint. If you weren’t paying attention, you might not notice it at all. But to me, it was oddly familiar.
Every time Park Ah-young turned her head, Park Eun-ji’s face flushed on its own.
“Wh-what smell?!”
“No, it’s not like the room smells bad or anything… It’s just a scent I’ve never smelled before, so I got curious… Sniff, sniff.”
“Ah, stop it! Why are you sniffing around in someone else’s room?!”
Park Eun-ji looked horrified, but Park Ah-young seemed amused by the reaction, the corner of her mouth twitching slightly.
“Ah, I know what it is.”
“Hey!”
“You know what it is?”
Of course I did. The heat from that day still hadn’t faded. And traces of it seemed to linger in every corner of Park Eun-ji’s room. The memories of what happened that day were still vivid in my mind.
“What is it? I… sniff. I feel like I should know, but I can’t quite place it.”
It was the kind of scent only a man and woman who’d been together would recognize. Park Eun-ji’s room was still full of our traces.