Love, Love, Love
"Wooaah…."
Having changed her clothes, Hoeyeon let out a groan.
Even wearing them alone, she could tell with absolute certainty.
This outfit was mortifyingly embarrassing.
It barely covered more surface area than underwear to begin with, and even if it was only the four of them, stepping outside dressed like this felt somehow, intensely….
Embarrassing.
In the end, that was the only word for it. And when she thought of the three of them waiting side by side just beyond the door, her whole body trembled.
After shivering in front of the door for a while, Hoeyeon drew a deep breath and steeled herself.
This embarrassment wasn't something only she was feeling — they had all felt it. And since she was the last one, the others were already waiting in the exact same getup, which meant she was actually in the least embarrassing position of the four.
So she was going to freeze up and refuse to come out?
"Ugh!"
Hoeyeon straightened her back with forced dignity and stepped outside.
The faces of Gayul, Arang, and Yujeong, who had been standing in a row waiting for her, lit up at once.
"I-it's cold, so let's get in the water already…!"
The weather wasn't actually cold — it was only pleasantly cool. She had been the one to try the excuse, but when no one called out the flimsy pretext, Hoeyeon found herself thrown off.
Huh? I thought they'd grab me.
But if no one was going to stop her, there was no reason to linger. Hoeyeon walked straight past the three of them and sank into the steaming hot spring water.
"Huuuh…."
As Hoeyeon sat hugging her knees, trying to hide herself, the other three climbed into the bath one after another.
"…?"
No one said a word. They weren't speaking, yet they kept exchanging glances with one another — and the looks they sent Hoeyeon's way had a distinctly different quality….
They looked, somehow, like co-conspirators.
"Who should go first?"
"I shall yield to Yujeong."
"Ah… are you sure, Arang? Th-then, gratefully…."
As question marks practically floated above Hoeyeon's head, Gayul and Arang pressed in snugly against either side of her.
"…Girls?"
What was this?
"Stretch out your legs. There is no place to sit like that."
No place to sit? What was she talking about. They were already sitting perfectly well right next to her.
"Hyaat!?"
Arang tickled the backs of her knees, and Hoeyeon reflexively flattened her legs against the bottom of the bath.
And right on top of them, Yujeong climbed into her lap.
"…Girls?"
"Why so startled?"
Gayul spoke close against Hoeyeon's ear.
"Did I not say it just a moment ago? That the three of us would praise you until you melted."
"No, ah, that… l-like this!?"
"You don't like it?"
Yujeong asked, pouting.
"No, it's not that I don't… but we're doing it like this?"
Just to compliment her outfit, they were going this far?
"My dear."
Arang whispered against her ear. Sweetly.
"Back then in Geumdo, did you not bare your heart to the three of us?"
The words she had pressed to each of their lips one by one — that the four of them would be happy together. And her declaration of the future ahead.
"We were so, so happy then. Last night, after you fell asleep, eonni, the three of us talked, and everyone said how happy they'd been… everyone said they'd been so incredibly happy…."
Yujeong's words were taken up by Gayul this time.
"And yet we never repaid you, did we?"
Gayul whispered, pouring her whole heart into it.
"And so, for the feelings you gave us that day — this time, we mean to answer them."
Gayul glanced at Yujeong, who drew a deep breath and wrapped both arms around Hoeyeon's neck.
"!?"
Chest pressed to chest, and from those sensitive places a faint, sweet sensation began to spread.
"Hoeyeon eonni."
And from that distance, Yujeong's eyes looked straight into Hoeyeon's.
"I love you, eonni."
As if trying to send, through her gaze, every feeling words alone could never carry.
"At first I admired you. Because you're beautiful. Because you're stronger than anyone. Because no matter how hard I tried, you were someone I could never catch up to. But the admiration didn't last long. I realized you weren't some distant being from far away."
From hot breath to hot breath.
"And from then on, I started liking you."
The feelings burning in her chest, carried on her tongue.
"You're this pretty, but you don't know the first thing about dressing up. You really love delicious food, but you love sharing it with everyone even more. You're kind, and you pretend not to watch but you're actually always looking out for people… I really like that eonni. I love you."
The words, the words of love, the emotion, the heat — they set Hoeyeon's face ablaze. Her gaze went hazy as Yujeong's lips stole her own.
"You're next."
"My thanks."
A burning face, burning breath. The one beside her and the one astride her switched places.
"Hoeyeon."
Gayul. That beautiful face was right before her eyes.
Yujeong had looped her arms around her neck, but Gayul drew even closer than that.
She cradled Hoeyeon's head in her hands, pressed forehead to forehead. Then closed her eyes and whispered.
"I love you."
She whispered it — as if this voice were far too frail to hold every feeling she wished to pour into it.
"My feelings for you held me fast when I had lost all purpose in living, and freed me from the chains of duty and necessity that bound me."
Earnestly, bravely, she delivered it.
"You are so very lovely. Your heart is lovely. The strength that presses forward even when it hurts, and the frailty that sheds tears when it becomes too much to bear — how is it that you move the depths of my heart so tenderly? I wish to be the reason you can be strong, and the place you can lean when you are weak."
She conveyed her heart. She filled it with feeling. Hoping it would reach.
"You who taught me love, you who taught me the joy of living… stay by my side, always."
Gayul gently pressed her lips to Hoeyeon's.
Like a vow, like an oath, like a prayer.
Was this heartbeat about to burst her own, or Gayul's pressed so close against her — or was it the two of them overlapping, resonating as one?
"Last of all, it is this humble one's turn."
Once more the places switched, and Arang settled astride Hoeyeon.
"This one shall reverse the order."
And Arang stole Hoeyeon's lips.
She did not greedily devour them.
It was never an attempt to erase the two who had kissed her first.
It was only a little pout, meant to turn Hoeyeon's attention — still full of those two — entirely toward herself, just once.
"I shall speak honestly. At the start, this one was half in jest, half in curiosity."
Those eyes that always held a glint of mischief held the same mischief even now.
"It was no lie, and yet neither could it be called the full truth. But little by little, this one came to not want you taken away. Came to not want to leave your side."
But that mischief of Arang's was neither lightness nor falsehood.
"You were always so straightforward."
That mischief was Arang's serious face. It was the way Arang loved, and the attitude she took toward it.
"To this one, that quality of yours was dazzling. You walked straight into people's hearts without circling around, and this one knew not what to do with herself… and then, at some point, there was this one, heart burning with love for you."
Arang's way was mischievous. She would not deny it.
But if one was a fox, was that not only fair?
Was it not only natural to want to tease the one you loved, to draw out every side of them through that teasing, and to hold each and every one of those sides close in your heart?
"It may not suit me, and it is not this one's usual way — but this one shall try following your example, just once."
Rather, if one was a fox, that was precisely how it ought to be.
But being only mischievous could never make one truly mischievous. Anything repeated the same way forever would grow familiar and stale — that was true of everything.
Arang closed her eyes, then slowly, slowly opened them again.
Filling her gaze with nothing but affection, and love, and this burning feeling.
"I love you."
She delivered her honest heart, solemnly.
"I love you. I want to be with you forever."
And in the next instant, Arang was once more the fox who bewitched people, playfully pressing a kiss to Hoeyeon's forehead.
Stealing back the lips she had already claimed once — borrowing Yujeong's words — would have been cutting in line, after all.
"I… I…."
That promise to praise her until she melted.
Feeling with every fiber of her being that it had never been empty words, Hoeyeon cried.
Because the happiness, the joy, was simply too vast.
It felt as though she were truly melting away, flowing out as tears.
"Me… love me…."
Thank you.
Thank you for loving me.
Even as she wiped the tears, even as she wiped them again, they would not stop flowing.
"I love you."
Whenever it seemed the tears might stop.
"I love thee."
Again and again.
"I love you."
Pouring their hearts, their love, into her without end.
Kisses on her cheeks, kisses on her neck, kisses on her ears. Along with countless kisses.
As if melting. Simply as if melting.
Hoeyeon could not stop crying in that warmth.
And somewhere in the midst of her tears, Hoeyeon found herself holding the three of them.
Embracing three people with one person's arms was hard. But she held them as best she could with all she had, and when the remaining three pressed in close, somehow it became possible.
"Thank you."
And still like that, still sobbing openly, sniffling through her nose.
"I love you. Thank you… Gayul, Arang, I love you, Yujeong, I love you… thank you…."
Simply repeating those five things like a mantra — their three names, I love you, thank you — Hoeyeon was held gently and warmly by the three of them.
Forever. For as long as forever would last.