“Hey, what kind of password is 0111? Isn’t that way too easy?”
The moment the front door opened, a familiar voice barged in. Footsteps followed, filling the room.
Thud, thud, thud—
“Ugh, that chestnut-blossom stink! Clean up a little, would you?”
Normally, I would have fired back without thinking, but right now, all I could do was bury myself under the blanket and hold my breath.
I could feel heat rising to my face.
His voice came from beyond the blanket. Avoiding this any longer was impossible.
“Even if you never go outside, you should at least take care of yourself.”
Siu sniffed and grumbled. I heard the rustle of plastic bags.
“I buy diffusers for my place, I work out, you know? I take care of myself. At this rate, you’re seriously gonna die alone.”
Siu strode into the room without hesitation and plopped himself down in the computer chair.
“Anyway, why did you tell me to let myself in? You could’ve just opened the door.”
“……”
“So what is it? Why are you all wrapped up in the blanket… Hey, say something.”
“……”
“Why aren’t you answering?”
I sensed him approaching the bedside. I gripped the edge of the blanket tightly.
My fingers slipped out from under it, and I felt the cold air.
“W-wait a second…”
I still hadn’t prepared myself, but Siu grabbed the end of the blanket without hesitation and tried to flip it back.
“Let me see. At least your face…”
“Ah… wait…!”
But no matter how tightly I held on, I couldn’t stop Siu’s strength.
With a whoosh, the only barrier between me and Siu—the blanket—was heartlessly pulled away.
“Let’s… see…?”
Cold air rushed over my body in an instant. It happened in a blink.
“Uh……?”
“Ah……”
A brief silence passed. It was a strange sensation, as if every sound in the world had been paused.
Siu and I met each other’s eyes and blinked two or three times.
I couldn’t tell what kind of expression my face was making.
Siu’s eyes slowly widened. The drink bottle in his hand dropped weakly to the floor.
The bottle bounced lightly once, then flopped over onto its side.
And at the same time.
“U-uuugh?!”
That day, I learned for the first time that people falling backward when they’re too shocked wasn’t just a cartoon exaggeration.
Siu, who had been staring holes through me, toppled backward as if someone had kicked him, letting out a bizarre scream.
The sound of him landing on his backside echoed through the room.
“……Hey.”
When I finally managed to speak, Siu was already in a panic.
“No… This is a cr— no…”
He clutched his head and muttered to himself in a voice so small even I couldn’t hear it, then began crawling around the floor, urgently looking everywhere.
Like a madman, Siu flung open the bathroom door, rummaged through the closet, and even checked under the bed where I had been lying just moments ago.
“Hah… Hah…”
His ragged breathing filled the room. It seemed his head was already full of the worst possible scenarios.
Siu spat out the words.
“Ha, and this is what you meant by telling me not to freak out…?”
He dragged a hand down one cheek, let out a huge sigh, then grabbed both my shoulders.
It hurt a little.
“Are you okay? Y-you’re okay, right? Nothing happened to you, right?”
“No…”
“Y-you weren’t kidnapped or anything, were you?!”
“I said no…”
Siu let go of me and shouted into thin air. I sat on the bed, staring blankly at the sight.
“That crazy bastard finally went and did it! Hey! Baek Eunhae! Get out here! You’re not coming out right now?!”
Suddenly, it occurred to me that his yelling might leak outside.
I raised my index finger and brought it to my lips, trying to stop him, but Siu didn’t listen at all.
“B-be quiet—! Shh, shhh!”
“You crazy bastard—!!!”
“No, it’s me…! Please be quiet…!”
“Ah, right. Do you know where the person who brought you here went?!”
Even while cursing me, Siu kept glancing at me from time to time with worried eyes.
I was starting to get irritated. I clamped a hand over Siu’s mouth as he made a scene.
“It’s me, me. You fucking bastard!! Shut your mouth for a second!”
Perhaps shocked by the curse that burst out of my small, thin voice, Siu froze and stared at me.
“It’s me…!”
Siu’s gaze lingered on my face for a long while before he removed the hand covering his mouth with one of his own.
“……?”
“I’m Eunhae… Baek Eunhae.”
Only now did Siu seem to sense that something was seriously wrong.
He still looked like he couldn’t believe it, but he no longer caused a commotion like before.
The bags, lunch boxes, and drink bottle he had thrown around carelessly were scattered across the room—
And though the smell of seasoning from the lunch box that had popped open slightly from the impact stung my nose, we faced each other without saying a word for a while.
A strange air hung in the room.
* * *
Siu sighed and scratched his head.
“Okay, okay… So what you’re saying is, you woke up and suddenly ended up, uh, like that, right?”
“Yeah…”
“You think I’d believe that?”
“Then what am I, standing in front of you right now?”
Siu pinched his cheek several times, wore a dumbfounded expression for a while, then shifted his gaze and began staring at me intently.
“…What, what is this?”
“Fair enough.”
He propped his chin on his hand and observed me carefully, then suddenly began grinning.
“Man, man, this reminds me of a bunch of stories. Ah— I’m jealous—”
“……What? What did you—”
Siu cut me off and continued excitedly.
“Anyway. Isn’t this a total reversal of fortune? I’m jealous, man. If it were me, I’d say thank you, bow down, and live like that.”
Siu’s mouth didn’t stop.
“You’re pretty, too. Honestly, I was kind of shocked from the moment I saw you. Oh, right. Right. Did you try it? You know, the thing people always do in these situations—”
I felt uneasy. I had a feeling I knew what he was going to say next.
“What?”
“What else? Masturbating, obviously. Right after your body changed—”
In that instant, I heard something snap deep inside my chest.
“Hey…”
The friend I thought would be the only one who might understand me.
The one person I thought might share even a little of this hellish fear and despair I was going through.
I really was grateful that he believed me, but in Siu’s eyes, I was simply in an enviable situation.
How he would react, how much I had agonized, how terrified I had been.
All the time I had spent over the past few days looking in the mirror, agonizing, hesitating, trembling at the sensation that my very existence was being denied—
All of it had been denied by a single careless affirmation from Siu.
If he was going to believe me this easily, then why had I suffered so much?
Was I the strange one for not being able to take it lightly?
The back of my neck felt hot. When I clenched my fist hard, I heard a grinding sound.
“……Cut it out…”
“Hm?”
I tried to snap back confidently, as if nothing was wrong. But my throat wouldn’t let me.
It was tightening far more strongly than I expected. Even when I tried to release the tension in my throat, it wouldn’t obey me.
This sensation I felt like I was about to get used to now—I was about to burst into tears.
My heartbeat echoed all the way to the tips of my ears, dragging my emotions upward on its own.
I felt like I was going to cry.
“I-I didn’t call you here for this…”
My lips trembled. The more desperately I tried to suppress it, the stronger the trembling became, like a rebound.
“Does this… look enviable to you? Does this look… good to you? Do you know how much I…”
I bit my lip hard, determined not to cry in front of someone else, but it was useless.
In my head, I kept shouting at myself to calm down, but my body wouldn’t move the way I wanted.
The hot droplets gathered in my eyes and fell down my cheeks.
Had all the anguish I’d gone through while holed up in my studio apartment been meaningless?
Had my worries been so trivial that they could be consumed as nothing more than a light joke?
“…Huh? Hey, hey… Eunhae?”
I heard his flustered voice. The playful look on his face quickly vanished.
Siu came closer to me.
“Hey, what’s wrong… Did I go too far? Sorry, I just…”
A shadow fell over me. From the closer distance came the smell of cigarettes.
That smell, which had never bothered me before, was now so disgusting it felt like it was stabbing my lungs.
I tried to hold back my sobs.
Because I knew how weak and fragile the crying that came from this body would sound.
I already knew, and even imagining it made my skin crawl.
The tears I was shedding now were so stupid.
Things hadn’t gone the way I feared, either.
He hadn’t rejected me, denied me, found me repulsive, or tried to touch my body.
Rather, just as I had wanted, he was treating the current me like the me from before.
So why?
Why did my stomach feel like it was turning inside out, and why did I want to scream and run away right this second?
‘What was it that I wanted?’
But this small, delicate body was pouring out sorrow far more honestly than my reason.
My vision blurred with tears, and my breathing quickened.
“Uuuuu……”
“Hey, I-I’m sorry… I was just joking like usual. I’m really sorry…”
Siu’s hand cautiously came to rest on my shoulder.
I knew it was a hand placed there to comfort me—but his frame, which looked so much bigger than before, and the heavy weight of his palm made my body flinch.
And the first words I barely managed to force out were.
“……I’m scared.”