I Don’t Want to be a Villainess

Sarah doesn’t wake up easily once she falls asleep. This is a fact that the three people present have all experienced firsthand. Even if they climb on top of sleeping Sarah, she merely lets out a little groan of discomfort without waking up, and rustling noises next to her or something sticking to her wouldn’t rouse her either.

Thus, the three of them could sneak out of the room, leaving Sarah to sleep on the floor.

“What should we do now?”

The first to speak was Yoo Ha-neul.

“Don’t you think it’s a problem for Sarah to be sleeping on the floor like this?”

As she spoke with an incredibly serious expression,

“Yeah, in the end, it was our fault, but Sarah shouldn’t be on the floor like this.”

Shin So-hee also nodded seriously.

“…Should we put Sarah back on the bed?”

“But if Sarah wakes up, she’s definitely going to get mad again…”

In response to So-hee’s words, Lee Soo-ah mumbled, looking uneasy.

Silence.

All three of them fell into a deep silence.

In truth, they all wanted to sleep next to Sarah like usual. Clinging to her arms or holding her waist tightly… They thought they hadn’t crossed any lines in their own way, but that line was actually a dark line. If Sarah found out even once, she might really be disappointed in them.

…The very worry about that line proved that it was useless, but they couldn’t focus on that just yet.

“In this case, there’s only one way to go, right?”

Finally breaking the deep silence, Ha-neul spoke up.

“…Let’s put Sarah on So-hee’s bed, and the three of us will sleep on Sarah’s bed.”

“…”

“…”

In reality, it wasn’t that the three of them hadn’t thought about this option at all.

That was the only way for Sarah to sleep in the bed in the current situation. If they put Sarah back on the bed and she fell asleep like usual, she would surely wake up in the morning and be extremely disappointed in all three of them.

And none of them wanted that.

“Will it be okay?”

After another long silence, So-hee asked.

“…”

Right. This is a completely different story.

Even before ‘Sarah’ exposed their feelings, the three of them didn’t necessarily hide the fact that they liked her. They just didn’t want Sarah to find out.

However, they were also friends after all. They didn’t want to destroy their relationship. More than anything, they knew very well that they didn’t want Sarah to end up hurt.

The reason they didn’t force Sarah to give an answer when confessing this time was also because of that.

They couldn’t suppress their feelings, but they didn’t want their friendship to break.

And this was the result.

The trust they had built with Sarah so far… Well, not everything, but a significant portion had crumbled.

…That part of their built-up trust was somewhat based on lies and acting to accumulate what they could, but the three of them weren’t in a relaxed situation enough to think that far.

Anyway, in this situation, recovering the trust lost with Sarah was their top priority.

Nobody wanted to end up in a situation worse than the one before they confessed.

In truth, the reason they slept in the same bed was ultimately because of Sarah. If Sarah hadn’t been there on that big bed, they probably wouldn’t have insisted on sleeping in the same bed at all.

Yoo Ha-neul and Lee Soo-ah were bisexual. Even without ever liking another girl before.

Until then, they thought they liked boys, and whenever they saw a handsome male celebrity on TV, they felt attracted. It wasn’t that they liked Sarah because she was a girl. They just happened to fall for Sarah, who happened to be female.

So, engaging in excessive affection acts, like sleeping in the same bed with another girl, felt quite awkward. Of course, one couldn’t really call it ‘acts of affection’ in this situation, but it still gave them a somewhat uncomfortable feeling.

Except for the fact that they had unexpectedly come to like the same sex, the two were no different from other girls of the same age range.

Shin So-hee was a lesbian. In fact, having pretty girls around made her feel good. However, that didn’t mean she wanted to do something with any girl other than Sarah. If Sarah were to dislike and reject her, she might keep her distance, but if not, she wanted to experience various things solely with Sarah.

So-hee was practically an innocent type. Although she wasn’t in a relationship with Sarah yet, it felt strange to sleep with another girl.

Anyway, while it might seem like a situation to express with ‘now that it’s come to this,’ all three of them had a strange reluctance about sleeping in the same bed with each other.

They were friends who didn’t want to break their bond but simultaneously had romantic feelings for each other.

“…What can we do?”

Still, Yoo Ha-neul answered So-hee thus.

“Anyway, I can’t let Sarah sleep on the floor. That goes against my principles. If I marry Sarah, she won’t have to lift a finger!”

“While I don’t particularly like your assumption about marrying Sarah, I agree. I don’t want to make Sarah suffer more.”

“…Isn’t it natural for whoever marries Sarah not to have even a drop of water on their hands? There’s no reason for her to do the dishes herself, to begin with…”

Lee Soo-ah remarked with a point there, but ultimately all three of their opinions converged like that.

They decided to carry Sarah in her sleeping bag to So-hee’s bed while the remaining three would sleep on Sarah’s bed.

…At the very least, they just hoped that Sarah would understand this decision.

*

Ugh.

Is it just me or has sleeping on this hard floor after so long made my back hurt?

…No, that’s not it. It’s not just my back that hurts.

My legs weren’t hurting, but they felt like they couldn’t move, as if they were tightly bound—Ah, right, I remember. I had crawled into the sleeping bag.

Last night, I was so tired and annoyed with thinking that I didn’t even ask Yang Hye-in to prepare another blanket; instead, I just crawled into So-hee’s sleeping bag and fell asleep. Since I didn’t even lay down a blanket on the floor, I ended up in the sleeping bag like a cocoon.

So… of course, until I unzip the one in front of me, I can’t move my legs properly.

I think I had more leeway last night, but maybe that was just my imagination. I’ve only used sleeping bags since my military days, after all.

But bizarrely enough, I couldn’t move my arms either.

Sleeping bag manufacturers surely weren’t stupid, so they wouldn’t create bags that left you unable to move your limbs when zipped up. At least, they would make it so you can unzip it yourself.

Now that I think about it, it was pitch black in front of me. Not just dark; something soft was pressed up against my face. It was uncomfortable because of the warmth I felt, but I could breathe fine.

More than anything, it was strange that even though I was clearly sleeping on a hard floor, my body was somehow sunk into something.

And that sunk-in part felt soft and warm.

“…”

I roughly understood the situation.

I struggled against whatever was wrapping around my body. Something that had been around my legs loosened a bit.

But the things that were still around me didn’t budge.

“Ugh!”

As I opened my mouth to speak, I was blocked by something soft in front of me, so my words didn’t come out clearly.

In the end, the only way I managed to escape from that situation was when my friends, who had been holding me tightly on all sides, woke up.

*

“…”

“…”

On the bed.

Three people were kneeling in front of me.

Of course, it was Ha-neul, Soo-ah, and So-hee. The three hadn’t even changed out of the clothes they usually wore to sleep.

…To explain the situation when I woke up, I had been sleeping on So-hee’s bed. It seemed my friends couldn’t bear to see me sleep on the floor and moved me.

Well, that part was fine. It was also very thoughtful of the three of them to decide to sleep together on the remaining big bed.

The problem was that eventually, during the sleep, they all climbed onto So-hee’s bed, and all four of us ended up clinging together like some kind of cocoons.

So-hee was blocking my face as I turned to the side. The soft, squishy thing that had been covering my face turned out to be So-hee’s chest.

Ha-neul was hugging me tightly from behind.

And finally, the last one to snuggle in, Soo-ah, was clinging to my legs all curled up.

“…I’m sorry, I didn’t do anything.”

“““We’re so sorry…”””

The three of them chorused in unison.

“…We broke the rules on the first night.”

“…”

Well, then again, they were my friends. I couldn’t just lash out at them recklessly.

…I also had a lot going on with Sarah in my dreams.

This should definitely be a secret.

I’ll protect it with my life.

…No, I shouldn’t say it that seriously.

---