2: New World
After finishing my second year of university, I took a two-year leave of absence and worked part-time loading and unloading deliveries. When I returned to school two years later, there were many seniors I hadn’t seen before, and Hae-joon sunbae was one of them. Hae-joon sunbae was the kind of person who naturally drew attention—first, because of his strikingly handsome face, and second, because of his outstanding academic performance.
I had always wondered why he had taken not only military leave but also an additional two years of personal leave. Even though I usually didn’t care much about others, the rumors surrounding him had piqued my curiosity more than once. I had witnessed things.
Hae-joon sunbae and I had known each other for a long time, but our interactions had never gone beyond casual greetings. Yet, suddenly, he started to openly despise me. The reason? I had caught him in an intimate moment. I was infamous in our department for being a homophobe, and he had been kissing another man in the very spot where I had been napping. It was the worst luck imaginable. But I swear, I never spread the word that he was gay.
Regardless of my personal feelings, he was someone who had nothing to do with me. I had no intention of meddling in his life like that.
I don’t know where the rumors started, but the news that he was gay spread like wildfire. Hae-joon sunbae seemed to think I was the source.
If possible, I wanted to keep pretending I didn’t know anything.
It would have been possible—if it weren’t for the mechanical engineering class where we had to meet regularly.
“Connect terminal A to port B,” the professor instructed.
I struggled to focus on connecting terminal A to port B, my forehead beading with sweat. I could feel someone’s piercing gaze and slowly lifted my head to meet it. Hae-joon sunbae was staring right at me. Even after I caught him looking, he didn’t avert his eyes.
After the rumors about him being gay started, the amount of time he spent staring at me for no reason had increased. It might not have meant anything, but his gaze felt accusatory, and I decided I needed to clear things up.
While the professor was demonstrating something to the other students, I slipped a white note onto Hae-joon sunbae’s desk and headed to the restroom. I intended to tell him I wasn’t the one who spread the rumors. But as soon as I finished my business and stepped out, he was waiting for me against the right wall of the restroom.
“Hey.”
I hadn’t noticed him leaning against the wall and turned toward the left corridor, but Hae-joon sunbae called me back. His voice was rough.
“You said you had something to say. Do it now.”
“I was going to talk to you after class.”
“Now is better. There are more people around after class. And you might screw me over.”
I was notorious among my peers for being a homophobe. Once, I had even vomited in front of everyone after seeing an explicit BL manga a female classmate had brought. Even the professors knew about it.
So, I understood why he was acting this way. I shook my head and replied, “I wouldn’t do that.”
“But you are a homophobe, right?”
“……That’s a misunderstanding.”
“What is?”
“I do hate them, but I didn’t spread the rumors. I don’t even care about that stuff.”
“You don’t care at all, huh?”
His tone sounded sarcastic, and I furrowed my brows. No matter what I said, he still seemed suspicious of me.
I met his gaze directly, and he raised an eyebrow before saying, “Then how about this.”
“Huh?”
“Let’s be partners in the advanced mechanical engineering class.”
“……What?”
“You’re a homophobe, right? If you’re seen with someone who hates gays, the rumors about me being gay will disappear, and you’ll stop looking at me like that.”
“……”
I never expected him to openly declare he was using me like this. I blinked slowly, dumbfounded, and repeated, “You want to be partners… with me?”
“Didn’t you get a C in the basic mechanical engineering class?”
“……”
“The advanced class isn’t that different. I’m at the top of our department. If you’re with me, you’ll get an A+ as long as you don’t skip class. What do you say? If you didn’t spread the rumors, you have no reason to refuse, right?”
“……How did you know I got a C in that class? That was last semester.”
He smirked. “Just a hunch.”
I had no response. If I refused, my GPA this year would plummet below 3.0.
I was already receiving a professor’s recommendation scholarship under the pretense of being from a single-parent household (technically, my aunt), and my grades in the classes taught by my advisor were consistently mediocre. His offer was tempting.
“A, then.”
“If you don’t believe me, should I recite my GPA?”
“……What is it?”
“4.32.”
Wow. That meant he had almost all A+s, with maybe a few As. Hearing such an unrealistic GPA made him seem almost inhuman.
Since I still hadn’t answered, he turned away with a “see, I knew it” expression. “A homophobe wouldn’t partner with a gay guy.”
“Wait. I told you I don’t care about that stuff.”
“Then what’s your answer? Hurry up. We need to get back to class.”
“I’ll do it. But, uh, I’m not interested in guys.”
“……”
He looked at me as if I were ridiculous, and I flinched. His brows twitched in displeasure before he turned and walked back to the lab. I followed him. For the rest of the advanced mechanical engineering class, we sat together as partners.
The whispers grew louder. Even my close friends messaged me on KakaoTalk, asking what was going on between Hae-joon sunbae and me. I replied that we were just friends, as he wanted, and had to face their wide, shocked eyes.
Some even bluntly told me, “You might not know, but that sunbae is gay.” Each time, I shook my head.
I had known him for a long time, and as far as I knew, he was definitely not gay. The rumors were just spreading strangely. After about a week, the rumors that Hae-joon sunbae was gay actually started to die down.
I realized I was a surprisingly effective talisman.
Getting an A in exchange for dispelling the rumors about him being gay was a huge advantage.
For that reason, we started seeing each other’s faces more often, even without a specific reason. And as I continued to meet him as his junior, some of my preconceived notions about gay people began to change.
First, gay people weren’t mentally ill. They didn’t get aroused by just any man, nor did they have a particular interest in cross-dressing. I had worried they might have strange ideologies, but when I saw him clicking his tongue at the news of a politician’s corruption, his political views seemed no different from those of ordinary people.
Today, I was sitting in the university’s central park, known as the “place of encounters,” waiting for Hae-joon sunbae. It was time to discuss the midterm project we had been anticipating. As I lifted my head from my phone and looked across the park, I saw him in the distance. There was someone else with him.
Hae-joon sunbae was tall, but the person next to him was even taller. Having developed a habit of noticing heights from playing basketball, I frowned.
“Sunbae!”
I greeted him a little earlier than usual. I was curious about the person next to him. Hae-joon sunbae turned toward me, and the man beside him looked at me as well. I recognized him instantly—he was the man I had seen Hae-joon sunbae kissing. I hadn’t realized he was so tall because I had been lying down when I saw them.
Now that I thought about it, he had been taller than Hae-joon sunbae even then. As I regretted greeting them, Hae-joon sunbae approached me with a strangely ambiguous smile, and the tall man followed.
“I thought you were coming alone……”
“You saw us that time, right?”
“……Yeah.”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
