111. Not Bad -2
“······.”
“······.”
“Why are you staring at me like that···?”
Looking at Jiu, who had come out after putting on the clothes and was standing there awkwardly, I was at a loss for words for a moment.
Uh··· well.
Wait a second.
“What. Is it no good···?”
When I just blankly stared, Jiu furrowed her brows and scratched her head···
No, it’s just, I mean.
I’m flustered.
It was my first time seeing Jiu dressed like that··· I suppose they don’t say “clothes are wings” for nothing.
What Jiu had come out wearing was black··· a one-piece, is that what you call it.
A sleeveless dress with the skirt coming down to the knees.
It wasn’t particularly flashy or anything; a simple design without a single pattern.
If I had to classify it, it was a neat style, but because her shoulders were completely exposed, it was completely different from the image of Jiu I’d known until now.
How do I put it.
Kind of··· like a girl, I guess.
Well, I mean, Jiu is obviously a girl, not a guy, so that sounds a bit weird.
But that was exactly the feeling I got.
“Feminine” and “Gim Jiu” were words that normally couldn’t coexist.
This was no different from saying a goalkeeper had scored a goal.
But··· expensive clothes really do make a difference, it seems.
They actually made that possible.
“Hey, you perv. Stop staring holes into me and say something!”
“Uh··· ah, ah.”
···Ah.
I guess the shock made me space out without even realizing it.
At Jiu, who was speaking with her arms crossed, I suddenly snapped to my senses and turned my head away.
I was me, but for some reason, Jiu’s face was flushed red too.
“S-so, how is it. If it’s weird, say it’s weird.”
So··· what should I say.
It was really unfamiliar, but if I had to pick a side, it wasn’t the weird kind.
Rather··· hm.
No, I mean, what do I even call this.
“···”
While urgently searching for the right words, my eyes met the staff member behind Jiu.
Then, as if reminding me of what she’d said earlier, the staff member winked and gave a thumbs-up.
What had she said?
Ah, she’d told me to say she was pretty no matter what.
Th··· pr··· pretty···
“···It’s not bad.”
Ugh.
Words different from my thoughts slipped out of my unwilling mouth.
I couldn’t bring myself to say that. It wasn’t like we were even that close; telling Jiu she was pretty? My hands and feet might curl up until I turned into a squid.
“Not bad” was the best I could do, and Jiu snorted, needlessly smoothing out her dress.
“···Hmph. Not bad?”
“Yeah. Well··· not bad.”
“Then fine, I guess. Not bad is fine. Yeah, hm. Okay.”
Jiu seemed to be just as awkward.
Flustered by the words “not bad,” she stammered, not knowing what to do with herself, and her face grew even redder.
It was my first time seeing Jiu embarrassed like that.
So she did know what embarrassment felt like after all.
Anyway, Jiu nodded, saying she’d buy it, and I too shot up and held out my card to the staff member.
“I-I’ll pay for it, so go change back.”
“Y-yeah. I’ll go change.”
Jiu hurried into the changing room, and I, having handed my card to the staff member, turned around and sighed.
Phew.
Why am I so out of it. Like I got hit on the back of the head.
“···”
Scratching my head with a strange feeling, the image of Jiu in the dress suddenly surfaced before my eyes again.
I couldn’t say it directly to her, but··· yeah.
Honestly, she had been pretty.
“···I-I mean, the clothes.”
The clothes were pretty. The clothes.
* * *
“W-wait. Do we have to go in there too?”
“It looks like it···”
“M-me too? I have to go in there too?”
“···Wouldn’t we? Then where else would we go?”
Having arrived at the Press Center where the awards ceremony was being held, while waiting in the car for a moment.
Jiu looked out the window, then clutched her head with an expression of utter mental shock.
“I’m doomed···”
And no wonder, because from the entrance of the Press Center, it was incredibly noisy and boisterous.
For starters, an absurd red carpet was laid out in full, and countless cameras were lined up beside it.
The players who had arrived first were stepping on the red carpet and passing by; it seemed they even had to strike poses in front of all those cameras before going in.
···It was a sight that made my stomach churn.
Dozens of cameras were still more uncomfortable than tens of thousands of spectators, so my hands began to sweat too.
“What do I do. I shouldn’t have come. I’m so nervous.”
“What’re you nervous about. What’s there to be nervous about.”
But I sat with my legs crossed, pretending to be relaxed.
It wasn’t that I was putting on airs because it was Jiu; Jiu just seemed so nervous that if I showed I was nervous too, she might get even more nervous. That was why.
No, Jiu was so nervous you could practically see her eyes shaking.
How strange. The Jiu I know is good at presenting in front of kids and isn’t someone who gets nervous easily.
“Hey, can’t I just not go?”
“What are you talking about. We came all the way here.”
“Ha, I’m going crazy. I can’t go out···”
What had gotten into her.
Stuck to the window like a squirrel, Jiu made a face like she was about to cry as she watched those entering ahead of us.
Of course the players, but also the players’ family members in gorgeous dresses were all walking the red carpet leisurely, as if they had been waiting for just this day.
As our turn approached, Jiu looked at me with an expression saying this was impossible and shook her head.
“Hey, I don’t think I can go out.”
“Ah, why.”
“I’m too nervous. How am I supposed to go out there!”
“Just follow behind me.”
“Ah, I’m seriously going crazy.”
So anxious that her legs were shaking, Jiu suddenly took out a mirror from her bag and began fixing her makeup. Then she alternated between looking out the window and the mirror, making a tearful face again.
“I really don’t think this is going to work.”
“What isn’t going to work.”
“I want to go home.”
“Why.”
“Well, it’s just···”
Jiu made an expression like she might burst into tears at any moment. Unaccustomed to this side of her I’d never seen before, I couldn’t quite adjust.
“I’m scared to go out.”
“What’s scary. I told you it’s fine.”
Until now, if there was something scary, I was the one who got scared, and Jiu was the one who said it was fine, asked what was so scary, and led the way.
With the roles reversed, I simply couldn’t get used to it.
I was looking at Jiu, who was making a tearful face, when I turned my head at the sound of tapping on the window.
Before I knew it, our turn to get out had arrived.
“It’s okay. Let’s go.”
“Ugh···”
“We bought clothes and prepared all day to come here, right?”
Even when the car door was about to open, Jiu still wore a hesitant expression, so I had no choice but to sigh and make up my mind.
I got out of the car first, then held out my hand to Jiu.
“Here. Let’s go.”
What could I do if she was too scared to go?
I had to grab her and drag her if need be.
When I held out my hand as if telling her to take it, Jiu looked at my hand, fretted anxiously··· then soon gulped and grasped my hand.
In that moment, Jiu looked like she wasn’t herself, but the instant our hands met, I too felt like I lost my senses.
It felt like Jiu’s feelings were being conveyed to me entirely through our hands.
“Let’s go. Just follow behind me.”
“Hoo, hoo. Okay.”
The two of us held hands like that, breathing deeply together to steel ourselves.
Someone might laugh and ask if it was really something to steel ourselves over so much, but we couldn’t help it.
Anyway, just as I was about to lead Jiu toward the red carpet.
“···Jian.”
I turned my head at the voice coming from inside the car.
It was Dad’s voice. Dad, who had sat quietly without saying a word until now, suddenly held out his hand and spoke.
“Hold my hand too.”
“···Huh?”
“I’m too nervous to go out.”
“···Ah. Good grief.”
What was with Jiu and Dad today.
I shook my head and held out my hand to Dad, and only after taking my hand did he get out of the car and take a deep breath.
To think the people who always led me and gave me courage were relying on me.
It felt very strange, but the more it happened, the more I pretended like nothing was wrong.
“Let’s go. Come on.”
“Y-yeah.”
“Ugh··· okay.”
Anyway, thanks to the two of them getting nervous so ill-suited to them.
The three of us held hands side by side and headed for the red carpet.
It was probably a baffling sight for the reporters holding cameras.
*
“······Next, the following award category is the Serie B Best Player. First, the nominees······”
On stage, the host was continuing the ceremony; in the audience, the players and their families were clapping elegantly with dignified expressions.
I Jian was sitting in the front row among them, in the seat closest to the stage.
Perhaps because it was an overwhelmingly burdensome position in many ways, her face looked quite tense.
Gim Jiu and I Wonhun, sitting on either side of her, looked even more frozen.
In particular, Gim Jiu was so docile that just looking at her now, it was hard to imagine her usual self.
Sitting primly, she only darted her eyes about here and there, restless.
The truth was, while waiting in the car earlier.
Gim Jiu had prepared all day long to come here, but when it actually came time to get out, she couldn’t muster any courage at all.
Standing before countless cameras was nerve-wracking, but what made Gim Jiu even more dispirited than that··· was the partners entering while holding the players’ hands.
That is to say··· they were all nothing but pretty older sisters.
All of them had model-like figures, and their faces were celebrity-level beauties to boot.
Seeing the pretty older sisters in gorgeous dresses, she suddenly felt like going home.
How do I put it.
A feeling of becoming shabby for no reason, maybe.
Suddenly, the clothes she had loved just moments ago seemed strange, and she felt like her makeup had turned out weird too.
That was why she simply couldn’t set foot out of the car.
“···.”
Gim Jiu subtly turned only her eyes and glanced at I Jian sitting beside her.
I Jian was looking only at the stage with slightly sleepy-looking eyes.
Earlier, if I Jian hadn’t held out her hand, she probably wouldn’t have been able to get out of the car.
But she suddenly held out her hand··· and in a daze, Gim Jiu took that hand and got out.
At that time, she was so out of it that she hadn’t had room for any other thoughts, but thinking about it now, her heart was suddenly thumping.
Well, anyway.
Somehow or other, she had gotten inside.
But she was still just as dispirited.
Whether she turned her head left, right, or back, all she could see were tall, pretty older sisters.
Even the woman standing on stage was a model.
···It felt like she was being compared for no reason.
All the other players had come with pretty older sisters, but it felt like Jian had only come with a weird little kid, so she even felt self-conscious.
She didn’t know why, but it kept bothering her.
Every time Jian turned her eyes, it felt like she was looking at the pretty older sisters.
Even while dispirited, Gim Jiu was very bothered by that.
“···What?”
“···Huh?”
While furtively glancing at I Jian as if checking her mood, when I Jian felt her gaze and looked at Gim Jiu and asked, Gim Jiu scratched her head.
“What, you need to go to the bathroom?”
“Ah, no.”
“Then why do you keep looking around.”
“M-me? Did I··· do that. Haha.”
When Gim Jiu scratched her head and laughed awkwardly, I Jian tilted her head as if asking why.
To this, Gim Jiu asked in a needlessly playful voice.
“Hey. There are a ton of pretty older sisters here, right?”
“···?”
“There are so many pretty older sisters that your eyes are spinning, right? Don’t I look really ugly today? Huh?”
She was asking playfully for no reason, but perhaps because she was actually serious.
The corners of Gim Jiu’s awkwardly smiling lips trembled.
I Jian looked at such a Gim Jiu, shrugged her shoulders, then faced forward again and spoke.
“What’re you talking about. You’re pr··· prettier today.”
“···What?”
“Ah, I said you’re prettier. Of course. You bought clothes and spent an hour on makeup. It’d be weird if you looked worse than usual.”
It was I Jian, speaking with her lips pursed.
At those words from I Jian, Gim Jiu··· looked at her with wide eyes.
What did she just say?
“···Pretty?”
“···Ah, yeah. Pretty.”
“Who? Me? Or those older sisters?”
“You. You.”
“Don’t lie. Compared to those older sisters, I’m totally ugly.”
She laughed awkwardly for no reason and tapped I Jian’s shoulder, but I Jian suddenly put on a serious expression and spoke.
“I said you’re the prettiest here. So be quiet. Everyone can hear.”
“······Ah, uh.”
At I Jian’s grumbling words, Gim Jiu nodded docilely, uncharacteristically, and faced forward again.
Gim Jiu suddenly felt as though tears and a smile might come out at the same time.