Swallowed - Chapter 52

“You went to Hong Kong? Wow, that’s date material. Seeing Hanse’s heavy butt move like that.”

“Is my butt heavy?”

“Isn’t this your first trip? You’re such a homebody.”

“I am. But it wasn’t just the two of us. Jaeha’s cousins came too.”

“Are you already that close? If you’re family-approved, then get hitched before you go study abroad.”

“Get what?”

“Get married. If you’re already traveling with each other’s families, isn’t that the end of the discussion?”

“Marriage? No way.”

“You need to get something in writing. You can’t just leave the great Baek Jaeha hanging.”

Yoojung raised her voice as if it were her own problem, saying it was impossible, and Donghyun told her to be quiet from beside her. “I can be loud,” Yoojung grumbled, interrupting Donghyun’s game.

This semester, Donghyun had been spending a lot more time next to Yoojung. Park Yoojung was the only one who didn’t seem to notice. Daram had even nudged Donghyun to confess, but Donghyun was too dense, or maybe just too cautious, to express his feelings.

Seyoung could understand Donghyun’s feelings a little. Anyone could see that Yoojung wasn’t thinking about dating right now, so he was probably worried that confessing rashly would ruin their friendship.

“Seriously, aren’t you worried? Just letting such a great guy go like that. There’s always a chance something could happen.”

“Wouldn’t that be the same even if we got married? There’s no adultery law these days, so it doesn’t matter.”

“Ugh, Hanse, you’re so realistic.”

Yoojung stared at Seyoung, who was bringing up adultery laws, in disbelief, then shook her head and grabbed a cookie. Seyoung had brought them as a gift from Hong Kong, and she was already on her fifth.

“Still, it must suck to be separated when you’re at the best part of dating. You’re going to miss him.”

The saying that distance makes the heart grow fonder was a truth of life. Yoojung especially thought that saying was true. But looking at Baek Jaeha and Han Seyoung, it seemed like they wouldn’t change even if they were apart. It was just that the time spent apart would be hard.

More than halfway through the semester, as preparations for studying abroad became more serious, voices of concern like Yoojung’s began to be heard one by one. Some people were even looking for an opportunity. That’s how attractive Jaeha was.

For Seyoung, this time wasn’t easy either. The resolve she had built up so strongly crumbled like a sandcastle every day. Rebuilding it every time was a chore.

When she first brought up the idea of breaking up, Seyoung told Jaeha that she wanted to do everything she wanted to do so that she wouldn’t have any regrets. But Jaeha told her that he liked her more and more every day.

Seyoung felt the same way. The more memories she made with Jaeha, the more painful it became to think about breaking up. How could she have said that she could break up cleanly without any regrets? She knew it was impossible.

“Oh, are you sad already? Hey, I’m here for you.”

Yoojung saw Seyoung’s expression and hugged her tightly, patting her back. Seyoung wondered how strange her expression must have been for her to do this, so she quickly blinked away her sadness.

“You won’t be here either?”

“Waaah. Hanse, tell me quickly. Are you sad about being separated from Baek Jaeha, or are you sad about being separated from me?”

“You. I like hanging out with you and Daram.”

“That’s right. What am I supposed to do without you and Jjangdaram? Should I just take a leave of absence?”

Yoojung whined, hating even the thought of it, and Donghyun told her to shut up.

“If you take a leave of absence, you’ll be a junior when they come back.”

“Kwak Ddong, shut up.”

“Fuck you. Who was the one who said something stupid first?”

“This little punk.”

Kwak Ddong was Kwak Donghyun, and F*** you was Park Yoojung. They called each other by their least favorite nicknames, but it was like a term of endearment between them. Of course, the two of them denied that it was a term of endearment.

While they were bickering, Seyoung’s phone rang. As soon as she checked the caller ID, a beautiful flower bloomed on Seyoung’s face, and Yoojung rolled her eyes, saying it was cheesy.

“I’m going to go.”

“Okay. Thanks for the cookies. I’ll enjoy them.”

Donghyun added, “Even though I already ate most of them,” and got hit by Yoojung. Seyoung smiled and left the club room. Jaeha was just coming up to the front of the club room. He was on his way back from being called to the student council for festival preparations.

“Is there a lot of work?”

“We couldn’t decide how to promote the food stall. There were differing opinions between walking around with a food stall promotion sign and running a game in front of the food stall.”

The promotion policy this year was to attract customers using Baek Jaeha’s looks. Jaeha, being a freshman, didn’t have the right to refuse. Besides, he had agreed to take on the role of promotion staff in order to sit next to Seyoung when they went to the academic seminar last time, so he had to be proactive.

As they walked towards the subway, Seyoung showed interest. Today was the day she was going to Seyoung’s house to pack the necessary luggage.

“Games sound good. What kind of game?”

“We’re going to do something like rock-paper-scissors, charge a participation fee, and give coupons that can be used at the food stall to the winners.”

“Rock-paper-scissors isn’t fun. If you’re going to attract customers with your face anyway, then an eye-staring contest would be better.”

“An eye-staring contest?”

Seyoung took her eyes off her phone and looked at Jaeha. Jaeha was looking at Seyoung at the same time, so they naturally ended up looking into each other’s eyes like an eye-staring contest. Seyoung, judging that it was dangerous because they were walking, turned her gaze forward first.

“There aren’t many people who can last long in an eye-staring contest with you.”

Seyoung could guarantee it. There weren’t many people who could remain calm under that hot and intense gaze. Jaeha’s eyes were that powerful. He was young and didn’t smoke, so the whites of his eyes were clean and his pupils were very clear, making you feel like you were being sucked in when you looked at them.

“An eye-staring contest. It’s not bad, but if you keep doing it, your eyes will get tired and you’ll probably lose more and more.”

“Ah, that’s true. It’s not like you’re just doing it once or twice.”

“Then should we do a lottery? We can write down rock-paper-scissors, eye-staring contest, muk-jji-ppa, cham-cham-cham… and do whatever gets picked.”

Seyoung’s eyes lit up, saying that was a good idea. Jaeha couldn’t resist her cute expression and kissed Seyoung on the forehead.

“You were so cute just now. So you like this kind of thing, sunbae.”

Seyoung, who just wanted to be helpful to Jaeha rather than liking it, didn’t bother saying so and just smiled.

Once the idea was decided, Jaeha summarized the conversation he had with Seyoung and sent it to the other promotion staff. The decision would be made by the higher-ups, but since there was no better idea than this, it seemed likely to be adopted.

It was an awkward time, so the subway was empty. The two of them sat down and shared one earphone each, listening to music. They listened to a bunch of new songs, and there were a lot of refreshing and calm love songs that were appropriate for the season.

Jaeha clasped Seyoung’s hand in his, placed it on his leg, and stroked the back of her hand. Seeing Seyoung enjoying herself without knowing anything made his heart heavy. But he couldn’t just spend the rest of the semester as a fool without making any effort. He had to play a strong hand at least once.

When they arrived at the subway station and walked towards Seyoung’s house, Seyoung was suddenly filled with emotion. It had only been a couple of months since she started living at Jaeha’s house, but the way home felt unfamiliar. Even though it was a road she had passed every day for years.

That’s how different it was with and without Jaeha. To Seyoung, home was a space without any meaning. The traces of her father and mother that remained in the house were all just painful.

After being found not guilty, her mother took care of Seyoung with all her heart. She mourned her husband’s death and resented the society that treated her like a murderer. At the same time, she tried to show how much she cherished and loved her only daughter.

But that play ended the moment Seyoung mentioned the contents of the phone call and said that she would appoint her paternal grandmother as her special representative. When she realized that she couldn’t use Seyoung to get the insurance money, she revealed her true colors and left the house. Later, she found out that the property she would inherit from her father’s death was nothing compared to the insurance money. Even the house was in her grandparents’ name, so she couldn’t touch it.

When she lived in that house, she had terrible nightmares. But since she moved to Jaeha’s house, she gradually stopped having nightmares. It was amazing. Just having Jaeha next to her made her feel so comfortable.

“I’ll pack quickly and come out. Just wait a minute.”

Seyoung didn’t want to let people, especially Jaeha, into her house, so she asked Jaeha for his understanding like last time. She had already thought about what luggage she needed to pack, so it wouldn’t take that long.

But Jaeha didn’t let go of her hand. Seyoung, who was pulling her hand away to enter the password, looked up at him with a puzzled look and noticed his stiff expression.

“What’s wrong?”

He had been in a good mood until they arrived, so his darkened expression made even less sense. At the same time, an uneasy feeling began to creep up on her.

“Sunbae.”

Why was he hesitating so much to say something? Seyoung sensed that whatever he was going to say wasn’t good and didn’t want to hear it. She wanted to cover her ears, but her hand was being held tightly by Jaeha.

Jaeha, who was looking down at Seyoung with a heavy gaze, opened his mouth as if he had made up his mind.

“If your feelings haven’t changed, let’s end things here.”