Han Jisu

“Hey, what were you in such a hurry for on Saturday?” Jiwoo asked the moment she entered our classroom on Monday morning.

“Huh?” I said, raising my head from a particularly tricky math problem I spent the last ten minutes on.

She sat in the seat in front of me, since that student hadn’t come yet, and took a long look at me. “I’m talking about at your parents’ restaurant on Saturday. I’ve never seen you run that fast before, Han Jisu.”

“Hey, I didn’t run out…”

“Oh, come on. First, Kim Hajun left out of the blue, and a few minutes later, you rushed out, too. Did the two of you have some sort of secret meeting to attend?”

“W-What? Don’t be ridiculous. I just… had to take care of the laundry at home.”

She raised a suspicious brow at me. “You ran out to go take care of the laundry?”

“I told you I didn’t run out.” I knew that was completely the wrong thing to be focused on at the moment, but all I could think about was moving the conversation away from Saturday as quickly as possible. “Anyway, don’t forget that we have a short student council meeting during lunch today.”

Jiwoo grimaced. “Ugh, don’t remind me…”

Phew, that did the trick.

“It shouldn’t take that long.”

“It’s not the meeting that I’m dreading…”

“Then, what is it?”

Jiwoo slammed down a hand on my desk and leaned forward like she was preparing to tell me a big secret. “What are your thoughts on Kim Hyunwoo?”

He was Hajun’s close friend—No, that should not be the first thing to come to mind. Thank goodness I didn’t say that out loud…

“Uh, I don’t know. Just one of our fellow student council members? Why do you ask…?”

Jiwoo let out a deep sigh. “I just don’t know what to do about him.”

“What’s the matter?”

“Alright, back to Saturday.”

Oh, gosh… “Okay?”

“So, the reason you saw the four of us at the restaurant was that we were on a double date.”

“Huh?” I said, trying to sound as clueless as possible though Hajun had already told me all about it.

“Well, it was really just to help Hayun get closer to Kim Hajun.”

“Hayun likes Hajun?” I blurted out. He didn’t tell me that part.

“Yeah, but pretend you didn’t hear this. She’ll freak out if she finds out you of all people know about her current crush.”

“Uh, sure…”

I was well aware of how attractive Hajun was, but it was in moments like this when I wished he could only be good-looking in my eyes. I doubted Hayun was the only person who had a crush on him right now.

“Anyway, we’re getting off-topic,” Jiwoo said, snapping me out of my depressing thoughts. “So… I don’t know. It was never meant to be a date for Hyunwoo and me.”

“But he likes you, doesn’t he?”

“It’s pretty obvious to you too, huh?”

“I mean…”

“Right, I know he likes me. And that’s why this is even more of a dilemma.”

“Do you like him?”

Jiwoo’s eyes widened in shock as her cheeks started to blush. “Ew, no! Eh, well… I don’t hate him.”

I couldn’t help chuckling. This was the first time I got to see Jiwoo look so flustered over a boy. “Then, why don’t you give him a chance? You never know. People can turn out to be much different from your expectations when you start to date them.”

That sure was the case for Hajun—

“You sound like you’re speaking from experience, Han Jisu.”

“Huh?” Now I was the one getting flustered. “H-Hey, you know I’ve never dated anyone before…”

Jiwoo looked at me rather suspiciously. Who could blame her? I really needed to learn how to keep my mouth shut sometimes…

“Right, I know,” she said, though she didn’t sound completely convinced. To my relief, the owner of the seat she was in entered the classroom, prompting Jiwoo to stand up and head for hers. On the way, I could just overhear her murmur, “Hm, give him a chance then, huh?”

. . .

Kim Hajun

“I made a breakthrough with Jiwoo Noonim,” Hyunwoo said excitedly the moment he saw me. He hurried to the seat next to mine. “I got to walk her home after eating at that chicken place. We ran into her mom in front of her apartment building, but it was okay because I got to leave a good impression on her. Ha! They don’t call me Kim Hyunwoo the Mom Charmer for nothing.”

“No offense, but that sounds like you’re into older married women,” I said amusingly. “I wouldn’t go around bragging that nickname.”

“Hey, it was a joke, man! You’d better not go around telling Jiwoo Noonim about this.”

“I wasn’t planning to. Although, reverse psychology—”

“What happened on Saturday anyway?” Hyunwoo cut off, probably because he was both curious and wanted to move on to a different topic.

I filtered out my memories from the day. There was no way I could be too truthful. “I met a friend.”

Hyunwoo looked hurt. “You ditched our double date for another friend?”

“It was important,” I reasoned, though it only felt like I was being further cornered into a bad place. “She was a friend from middle school, okay? I haven’t seen her in a while.”

“She?”

“Yeah, a girl…” I wanted to stray away from every honest detail I could, even if that meant changing Jisu Hyung’s gender. I sent him a telepathic apology.

“Is she a close friend?”

“Yeah, you could say that.”

“How close?” I wasn’t liking how he was raising his brow at me.

“Just close friends, okay?”

“Alright, alright. I believe you. But you know, Hayun Seonbae was pretty sad to see you leave early. I think you left a good impression on her during the date.”

How? I wanted to ask. As far as I could remember, I hadn’t done anything remarkable during our time together. If anything, I had only tried to distance myself from her.

“Look, Hyunwoo. To be honest, I’m not really interested in Hayun Seonbae.”

“What? You’re kidding.”

I shook my head.

“But I thought you two got along pretty well.”

“Trust me, it was one-sided.”

“Well, fuck. How are you going to tell Hayun Seonbae?”

“That’s the thing…” I took Hyunwoo’s hand in both of mine with a pleading look. “Could you go tell Jiwoo Seonbae that I’m not interested in her friend?”

He jerked his hand away from me. “Are you telling me to go on a suicide mission?”

“Oh, come on. You’re overreacting.”

“No, I’m not. You weren’t there to see Jiwoo Noonim’s face when she first brought up the double date idea. The intimidation, man! Although not going to lie, it was kind of hot.”

“Then, this is your chance to fulfill that masochistic desire of yours. I’m trusting you, best friend.” I gave him a pat on the shoulder.

He scoffed. “I’m only your best friend when you need me to be, huh?”

“You know I love you.”

“Ugh,” Jiyoung said, turning around to face us with a glare. That put an end to our moment of bromance.

. . .

“So, how did it go?” I asked when Hyunwoo came back from the seonbaes’ classroom.

His mouth was at a hard line. He quietly went to his seat, avoiding my eyes.

“What happened?” I asked again. When he continued to say nothing, I shook him. “Kim Hyunwoo!”

“I couldn’t do it, man! I’m sorry!”

I threw my hands up. “I trusted you!”

“Well, you should have gone with me! Hell, you should just go and tell Hayun Seonbae yourself. You’ll have the chance to during lunch anyway.”

“Lunch?”

Hyunwoo scratched at his head. “I was supposed to have lunch with Jiwoo Noonim and Jisu Seonbae today for student council stuff. But now Jiwoo Noonim says she’s bringing Hayun Seonbae, and she wants me to bring you along, too.”

Hayun Seonbae, Jisu Hyung, and I at the same table— “Well, that’s fucking great.”

Hyunwoo noticed the displeasure on my face. “Hey, it’ll be okay. At least with the student council president around, Hayun Seonbae can’t attack you once you dump her.”

I glared at him. “I’m not dumping her. We’re not even dating.”

“Ah, whatever. My point is that it’ll be better for you to get your feelings out sooner rather than later, and you might as well be in a safe environment while you’re at it.”

A safe environment. If only Hyunwoo knew the irony of his words. Despite the hunger rising in my stomach, I was dreading eating lunch today.