Chapter 51
Feeling like I couldn’t stay outside any longer, I walked aimlessly towards the main street to take the subway. I also didn’t have the confidence to face Kwon-oh’s cold attitude anymore.
Honestly, I thought he would follow me and ask why I was acting this way. Even if his interest in me had cooled, I thought he would at least ask that much.
However, even after walking for a while, I didn’t hear Kwon-oh following me.
Feeling something was off, I turned my head, but I couldn’t see him anywhere on the wide sidewalk. Even if he were among the crowd, he should be easy to spot with his tall stature, but as I looked around, Kwon-oh was nowhere to be seen.
“Ah…”
That’s too much. Did he really just leave like that?
I couldn’t believe this situation. And I felt terribly miserable.
Why? Did I act that selfishly today? Enough for him to turn away without even saying goodbye?
I rubbed my damp eyes and paced in place. Then I bumped shoulders with a passerby and staggered. Come to think of it, there were too many people on the sidewalk. The noise from the cars on the road was also too loud, making me want to go somewhere, anywhere else.
I forced strength into my wobbly legs and walked quickly towards the subway station.
I was being stubborn for no reason. I shouldn’t have done that. Should I apologize even now?
I took out my phone to call Kwon-oh. Just as I was about to press the call button, someone grabbed my wrist.
“Jeong-ha! If you’re going, take a taxi.”
It was Kwon-oh. I was so surprised that I forgot to ask where he had been, and just alternately looked at my captured wrist and his face. He definitely wasn’t there until just now.
“I bought cold medicine, so take it as soon as you get home.”
Kwon-oh thrust a pharmacy bag at me.
“…Weren’t you gone?”
“I told you I was going to buy medicine at the pharmacy in front. Why did you come all the way out here when I told you to wait there?”
…Did he say that? Honestly, because of my nauseous stomach, I don’t even remember clearly what Kwon-oh said last.
“Why did you insist on not going home?”
“…”
“I’m not angry. I was worried because I could see you were struggling and sick, but you kept being stubborn.”
Kwon-oh’s voice was still more brusque than usual, so I didn’t trust his claim that he wasn’t angry.
“You looked angry though.”
“…”
“You were angry…”
At my words, this time Kwon-oh pressed his lips tightly together.
A few seconds later, he spoke in an even more rigid tone than before.
“…You wouldn’t let me touch you. You kept obviously avoiding me. How do you think that made me feel?”
“…”
Even in my confused state, I tried to understand what Kwon-oh was saying.
Thinking about it carefully, from Kwon-oh’s perspective, my behavior today must have seemed strange.
“Haa, anyway, I’ll take you home so you can rest. We’ll talk about the rest after your fever goes down.”
In the meantime, Kwon-oh had hailed a taxi and gave the driver the address of my apartment. Somehow having completely lost my will to resist, I quietly got into the taxi with Kwon-oh.
Then I leaned my face on his shoulder and breathed heavily. My head seemed to hurt more and more as time passed.
I thought I had just closed my eyes for a moment and opened them, but the taxi had already arrived in front of my apartment. Kwon-oh kept trying to support me, but although I was a bit slow, I had no problem walking on my own.
As soon as we entered the apartment, Kwon-oh pulled back the bed covers and made me lie down inside.
Only after lying in bed did I feel my strength completely drain away, while at the same time I felt chills from the body aches. Only now did I properly realize that my body was burning with a high fever. My head felt hot, as if a ball of fire was sitting on it.
To think I tried to keep acting normal outside in this state. I must have been half out of my mind.
Seeing me like this, Kwon-oh told me to wait for a moment and then went to buy porridge from a nearby shop. He also bought a lot of new medicine from the pharmacy for various symptoms.
To waste our Wednesday date so pathetically like this. Not even eating properly, not drinking coffee, and not talking about any of the fun things that happened this week.
It’s because I acted like a fool. I ended up being too greedy, unlike what I had initially planned.
The key to our relationship was entirely in Kwon-oh’s hands. I shouldn’t forget that fact and try to take control.
“Kwon-oh, I’m sorry.”
“You don’t need to be.”
“Still…”
Because my body felt so heavy, the words I wanted to say to him didn’t come together easily, contrary to my will. I felt like if I opened my mouth now, I would just end up rambling nonsense.
I shouldn’t say anything now. When my fever goes down and I’m in my right mind, I should explain to Kwon-oh in detail why I acted that way today. And I should also thank him for staying by my side even when I was acting strange. Definitely.
“…”
“…”
I racked my burning brain, organizing the things I needed to say to Kwon-oh later. My perspective, my excuses, what I saw and heard at the library, and the emotions I felt then.
“Are you going to sleep? Eat the porridge I bought. You barely ate any meat earlier too.”
Kwon-oh said, sitting beside the bed.
“Actually, I don’t feel well. I’ll eat it when I wake up later, sorry.”
“Stop saying you’re sorry.”
“…Okay. Ah, you can go now.”
“Do you want me to go home?”
“It, it must be uncomfortable for you to stay here.”
“…”
Kwon-oh silently gazed down at me for a while.
Did I say something wrong? Should I not have told him to go home?
“Jeong-ha. Don’t you have anything to say to me?”
“…”
“You know. Something you want to say.”
After a while, Kwon-oh spoke in a confident voice. I couldn’t help but be surprised, as I had been summarizing what I needed to say to Kwon-oh once I felt better.
“Ah. How… did you know?”
“It’s all over your face, how could I not know?”
Kwon-oh furrowed his brow and spoke after a long pause.
“If you’ve decided you don’t want to see me anymore, just say it honestly. You don’t need to feel sorry.”
“Uh… what?”
Wait. What is he saying? I doubted my ears for a moment.
Why would I stop seeing Kwon-oh?
“You said from the beginning that it would be difficult to date. I told you to just say it without worrying if you really couldn’t even meet three times.”
I couldn’t follow the context and just listened blankly to what Kwon-oh was saying.
“I don’t want to force someone who doesn’t want to.”
“…”
“…Still, I’d like you to decide after meeting three times as we initially said. You said you’re sorry, right? If you’re really sorry to me, do that.”
“What, what are you talking about? Why would I dislike you?”
I pushed off the blanket I was under and looked up at Kwon-oh with my eyes as wide as possible.
Could it be that I was so sick that I lost consciousness and babbled nonsense about disliking Kwon-oh? If not that, I was dumbfounded as to how such words could come out of Kwon-oh’s mouth.
“I don’t know why you think that way… but… when I said I was sorry, it was because I kept acting like a foolish idiot to you today.”
“You were sorry because of that?”
“Yes.”
Kwon-oh still stared at me with a gaze that couldn’t erase his doubts.
“W-what other reason could there possibly be… besides that?”
“Then why did you keep avoiding eye contact and not letting me touch you?”
“That’s…”
“Isn’t it because you don’t want to see me anymore?”
When I couldn’t give a proper answer, Kwon-oh’s voice became more certain.
“I wasn’t going to mention this, but a few days ago, I also saw you pretending not to see me at the library and just leaving.”
“The, the library?”
The central library?
“You came to return a book and left without even greeting me, right?”
Kwon-oh saw me that day? That can’t be possible.
“No, I…”
“…”
“…”
“See? I’m right.”
Kwon-oh smiled bitterly. I felt urgent and sat up in bed.
“That, that day… It’s true I saw you and left without greeting… But you were exchanging numbers with a girl. I saw everything.”
“Exchanging numbers?”
At this point, I realized that we were talking about the same day and the same place, but we had seen completely different things from each other.
I still didn’t know exactly what he was talking about, and he didn’t understand what I was trying to say either. But anyway, it was clear that we had some misunderstanding about the same day.
“With a girl in light blue clothes… I saw you exchanging numbers… I also heard her say she was going to hang out with you on Wednesday, today…”
Kwon-oh, who seemed to be thinking for a moment, soon realized what scene I was talking about and put his hand to his forehead.
“Ah, that.”
“That’s why I pretended not to see you. I, I originally went there to see you…”
As I spoke, the situation at that time came back so vividly that I felt upset. I couldn’t feel my sickness at all, only the vivid pain constricting my chest.
“I also heard you telling your friends that what you said before about having someone you like… it was all a joke…”
“You heard that? How did you… Ah, shit.”
“…”
I could see Kwon-oh’s face instantly turn to shock.
He seemed to be organizing in his mind the story he had just heard from me for a few seconds, then rubbed between his eyebrows and looked at me.
“That absolutely wasn’t said sincerely. Haa, damn…”
His voice was full of unprocessed confusion.
I was so taken aback, not knowing what was what, that all the tears that had welled up dried up completely.
“I know it’s understandable to misunderstand. The level at which those bastards there think about dating women is filthy. I didn’t want to bring up talk about you to them, so I made that up.”
“…”
“I usually don’t hide things like this, and I’m not making excuses. I swear that was the only reason. If I said I had someone I like, they would make disgusting jokes about it.”
“What about giving your number to that girl?”
