NOVEL NEXT Chapter 39
After that, the teacher called Yoo Ha-neul to come forward several times.
It seemed like they were trying to stop our attention-seeking antics somehow, but it only ended up backfiring spectacularly.
Every time Yoo Ha-neul went up to the front and came back, her expression softened. Or rather, it would be more accurate to say she appeared ‘bursting with confidence.’ At first, she walked stiffly, tense like a statue, but gradually her strides grew bolder, and she wrote answers on the board faster too.
Yoo Ha-neul’s answers never went wrong… Well, since she didn’t get any wrong, the teacher must have just let her go, right?
Anyway, the fact that the teacher kept calling Yoo Ha-neul forward without a care meant—
“Uh, um, Ha-neul.”
I said, looking at Yoo Ha-neul’s face.
Yeah, I was ‘looking at her face.’
Not at her profile, but head-on.
…Our seated position was much more provocative than before.
That, how should I say it…
I was sitting facing Yoo Ha-neul… It felt like we were hugging.
Thank goodness I had my back against the desk, trying to lean away as much as possible, but I still wondered how Yoo Ha-neul could study in this position.
“……”
Meanwhile, Yoo Ha-neul only flashed a confident smile at me.
You were the one who suggested this first!
It felt like she was saying that.
No.
No.
What, um…
So, I did say I’d start things first, but even after thinking it over, would friends of the same sex really get into a position like this? Even as a joke? Did she really come up with this crazy attention-seeking posture to help me?
Of course, this position had incredible power.
No matter how much the kids around us pretended to ignore us, their gazes seemed glued to us. Of course, they were pretending not to look, but it was way too obvious how their eyes darted our way every few seconds.
So… the effect was remarkable.
Remarkable but…
This is a position that even I, who vowed to be an attention seeker, found terribly embarrassing.
You could literally feel each other’s breath in this posture.
“Y-Yoo Ha-neul!”
The teacher at the front called out to Yoo Ha-neul again.
“Come up and solve this problem!”
The pitch in their voice was oddly off, clearly flustered.
“……”
As I silently stood up to move aside, Yoo Ha-neul shot up from her seat.
“Ugh!”
Naturally, I tumbled backward thanks to her shoving. Sure, there was a heavy desk, but no matter how you looked at it, I couldn’t handle her weight.
As I flailed my arms backward, a firm hand supported my waist.
…It was Yoo Ha-neul.
Without meaning to, I ended up leaning into her, my forward flailing just enough to brush against her shoulder.
As I regained my senses in the pouring light, Yoo Ha-neul’s face was alarmingly close.
My breaths mixed with hers.
There was nothing else in my ears except for Yoo Ha-neul’s breathing.
My heart raced madly, pumping blood like crazy. My face must have been burning bright red from all that blood rush.
Yoo Ha-neul stared intently at my face.
“Yoo Ha-neul!”
The frozen time was shattered by the teacher in front. They seemed really angry, but since they couldn’t exactly say anything about our actions, they only called Yoo Ha-neul in the sternest voice they could manage.
Yoo Ha-neul’s grip tightened slightly. I stiffened in panic, but she just pulled me back up, steadying me.
After giving me a sly smile, she confidently walked toward the teacher.
“……”
What was that?
I felt like I had gained something.
No, more than anything, it felt like I had lost something. I had no idea what I lost, though.
…For some reason, I didn’t want to think about it any further.
*
I could roughly guess what Sara was thinking. She probably acted weird with Yoo Ha-neul because she believed that if they were both openly ignored at school, people wouldn’t be able to ignore them together. Though I had no solid proof, that was my assumption.
Of course, that thought changed the moment Yoo Ha-neul sat on Sara’s lap.
Yoo Ha-neul had always aimed to act with dignity, but honestly, she couldn’t maintain that vibe this time. It was embarrassing, and somehow sitting on top of Sara just felt so wrong. Especially since the one below was Sara, who was fragile and couldn’t even eat well.
After enduring the class in that pose, when she heard the teacher calling her name, she felt like she had just survived. Honestly, being close to Sara wasn’t so bad. But then again, it felt really off. No matter how much people treated Sara like a ghost, she was still there, physically.
Knowing Sara was there only made her act that way.
To the other kids and the teacher in front, Yoo Ha-neul sitting on top of Sara was likely crystal clear.
As she wrote answers on the board with chalk, Yoo Ha-neul began to calm her racing heart. After her heartbeat slowed down, her brain started functioning normally again.
…Why did Sara suddenly start acting like this today?
If she really wanted to change how people treated her, she could have asked as soon as we became friends.
Was she thinking she couldn’t trust anyone before?
…Or did she really misunderstand the ‘intimacy with friends’ scope I mentioned earlier? Like, was she trying to show how close they had become?
Or did she think she was ‘this close’ to Yoo Ha-neul?
No, of course, for Yoo Ha-neul, this wasn’t bad at all. Sara was pretty. And she wanted to get closer to her. No, honestly speaking, she wanted to be ‘even closer.’
But somehow, the sudden shift in distance brought an uncomfortable feeling that something wasn’t right.
Yoo Ha-neul set the chalk down.
“Y-yeah, great.”
Even though she didn’t attend cram school or tutoring, Yoo Ha-neul always prepared thoroughly with her revisions. There was no way she’d get a basic textbook question wrong.
Turning her body, she began walking toward Sara’s spot.
Sara, who sat back in her seat, gazed up at her.
She wore a pure, questioning expression, looking as if she knew absolutely nothing. For someone who had just been sitting on her lap, she appeared surprisingly calm.
“……”
It felt oddly infuriating.
That wasn’t Sara’s fault. She had been isolated from the world since childhood, confined in a cage. The only knowledge about sexual matters she likely had was what school taught her, which left her completely in the dark about anything else.
Plus, there was also the wrong information planted by Yoo Ha-neul last weekend.
So, this wasn’t Sara’s fault.
But still, at the back of my mind, something didn’t sit well.
So, here’s the thing.
What if Sara continued living with this twisted sense of distance? What if she learned to act freely with someone she thought of as a friend?
No matter what Sara thought, the other person could think entirely different.
What if a misunderstanding caused them to act on that misapprehension?
“……”
Yoo Ha-neul stared down at Sara quietly. Her legs were so slim they could almost be described as thin. Despite wearing winter uniforms, her body looked emaciated.
Clearly, if someone tried to use force on Sara, she wouldn’t even be able to resist properly.
Yeah, how this developed was Yoo Ha-neul’s responsibility.
So, it was also Yoo Ha-neul’s duty to instill proper sexual awareness in Sara.
That was the approach of someone who took responsibility!
Thinking that, Yoo Ha-neul quickly grabbed Sara’s wrist and pulled her up. Just as expected, Sara stood up easily, pulled along by Yoo Ha-neul’s hold.
Then, she sat down and pulled Sara back onto her lap.
“Eep?”
Sara emitted her signature sound, getting drawn back into Yoo Ha-neul’s embrace once again.
It was almost like a princess embrace while sitting.
Sara’s face flushed bright red in an instant. Finally, she had begun to learn about ‘the sense of distance.’
How does it feel? Embarrassing, right?
Later, I’ll let her know not to act so shamefully after class.
…For now, let’s just focus quietly on class.
So, throughout the class, every time the teacher called her name, Yoo Ha-neul stood up. And each time she sat down, she placed Sara in a different position on her lap. With each instance, Sara’s face turned redder and redder.
And by the time class finally ended, Sara was left frozen, unable to make a sound, her face flushed bright red, encircled in Yoo Ha-neul’s grasp.
…I won.
I don’t even know what I fought to win, but looking at Sara made me feel that way.
…And at the same time, I felt like I lost something.
*
“……”
“……”
After the first class ended, the first break arrived.
As soon as the bell rang, the teacher bolted out of the classroom.
The classroom was still absolute silence. Not even a single breath could be heard.
I returned to my seat while Yoo Ha-neul settled down in hers.
…I couldn’t look at her face.
Yeah, if you think about it, this was my fault to begin with. I had the unspoken agreement to use my relationship with Yoo Ha-neul without her consent, so I was the one who caused all of this.
…But still!
Was there some change in the atmosphere from the middle? Yoo Ha-neul was practically toying with me, making me sit here and there!
Scary, the heroine. As expected, she had the charm to captivate everyone, regardless of gender. I didn’t realize it could be this destructive when it was a choice made out of one’s own will, not just what someone else chose for you. In the game, I might have been the one restraining her.
…Could it be she developed feelings for me? Did she really think about taking our friendship to a romantic level? I had been suspicious of that ever since she hugged my waist earlier.
No, there’s nothing wrong with that.
But if that were the case, things might end up spiraling out of control much more than I anticipated…
About a minute passed as I stared blankly at the desk, and then there came the sound of someone dragging something on the floor beside me. I turned my head slightly to see Yoo Ha-neul pulling her chair over next to me.
“How was it?”
Yoo Ha-neul asked me.
How was it… well, it was way more embarrassing than I ever imagined.
Indeed, it was more ’embarrassing’ than ‘shameful.’ These two words were subtly different. The former was a feeling that would make you kick your blanket out of bed all night if you remembered it, while the latter was a feeling that would flush your face red and make it hard to sleep. Of course, if I had to choose one, the latter felt better.
While I preferred the latter,
“It was embarrassing, right?”
Yoo Ha-neul spoke gently, treating me like a little kid.
Since I didn’t respond, Yoo Ha-neul continued.
“No matter how much we’re friends, the sense of distance is important. If we’re too close, the other might feel uncomfortable or misunderstand…”
She started giving a lecture about personal space.
“……”
Listening to those words, I felt my red face slowly cool down.
Ah, now I understand what’s been going on.
Yoo Ha-neul thinks I’ve miscalculated the sense of distance with people.
So she acted this way to demonstrate it to me.
“……”
While I listened to Yoo Ha-neul’s continued explanation, I poked her side.
“Ow.”
Yoo Ha-neul’s words stopped abruptly. As she looked at me, flustered, I extended my hand.
“Phone.”
“Huh? Oh, okay.”
Flustered by my sudden request, Yoo Ha-neul readily handed over her smartphone.
I searched for my name in the search bar. Thankfully, the article was still up and hadn’t disappeared.
Selecting the article, I showed her the enlarged photo of us together.
“……”
Yoo Ha-neul had a moment of confusion, not understanding what I was showing her, but then she exclaimed, “Wait!?” in shock.
It seems she was seeing this article for the first time.
“……”
Seeing that reaction, I slapped my forehead.