.
Shortly after, he showed up with two steaming-hot mugs of tea.
“Here,” he said, carefully putting them on the living room table.
“Thank you, oppa.”
Then at the moment, a loud car sound came from outside. SCREEEEEECH––the ear-splitting brake noise pierced the air.
I hunched my shoulders, but there was no car crashing sounds. After I listened with strained ears, things seemed fine, so I turned my head back. Yeo Dan oppa’s face was there in the dimly lit space.
Fastening his gaze at my hand, he asked, “Why are you outside the room, instead of in bed?”
“Oh, I couldn’t sleep, so I was thinking about texting my friends.” Raising my head, I asked, “What about you? Why are you in the kitchen, drinking tea?”
“Yeah…”
“Eh, what’s going on?”
He sounded somehow unusual. I lifted my hand and lightly tapped him on his arm. His following words then burst me into small laughter.
“Maybe I was trying to bump into you.”
“Come on, you don’t sound like yourself.”
He was the type of person who always spoke frank like putting all his heart in a heavy bowling ball and throwing a strike. That Yeo Dan oppa was now dropping a remark that sounded like those cheesy lines in a TV drama. It didn’t sound like him at all.
When I laughed hard, putting my hand on his shoulder, he gently helped me by holding my arms.
“… Does it sound that weird?” he questioned.
“Not really, but I can’t believe that you could talk like that.”
Those words don’t belong to you––the moment I tried to blurt that out, I changed my mind as Yeo Dan oppa’s face was right in front of me. ‘Hmm, well, he seems to look good, talking like that…’
I fell into thought for a second. A scene of Yeo Dan oppa, who became a college student after a few years, standing against the school entrance and being asked by his girlfriend, ‘What are you doing here?’ flashed through my head. Pointing a finger gun at her, he might respond, ‘Maybe I was trying to bump into you…’
Ugh, I sank my head on my chest.
“Ah, no, no, no,” I blurted out.
Yeo Dan oppa showed me his suspicious eyes. Looking at him, I wiped out my tears of laughter.
“Oppa, you shouldn’t talk like that especially outside unless you want to get casted in a movie.”
He replied, “How did you know that it’s from a film?”
“What?”
After a minute of silence, I, once again, laughed like a drain. To prevent my laughter from sweeping the house, I tried hard to cover my mouth.
‘Come on, Yeo Ryung’s parents are in their room. Her parents…!’ I repeated to myself and barely stopped laughing. Finding it hard to catch my breath, I threw him a question, half sobbing.
“Why did you decide to follow a movie out of the blue?”
Instead of returning a response, Yeo Dan oppa averted his eyes from mine. Eh? Another question arose in my head. His behavior right now looked quite unusual as well.
“To think of it, Yoo Chun Young also changed a lot after diving into his acting career,” I uttered.
“Really?”
“Uh-huh, I ran into him on my way back home. I told him about the conversation I had with my parents today…”
“I see.”
“You know, my phone was broken since I went outside without getting myself sorted out. Then I met Yoo Chun Young. We had a short chat, but he… wow, I can’t believe he could turn into such a smiley person…” I added, “It seemed like I was with someone else.”
Then I became silent all of a sudden as Yeo Dan oppa came into my view. It was my first time to see him looking so complicated and confused.
When our eyes almost met, I quickly cast down my gaze and wondered, ‘What was that? Did I just make a mistake, talking to him?’
As there was a long silence between us, I could feel him staring at me with mixed feelings. No matter how hard I tried to think, my words indeed paused at an odd moment, so he could definitely cast me a doubtful eye. But, how could I finish my sentence…?
“… So… he seemed to have become close with the staff on the set. Well, although Yoo Chun Young seldom smiles, once we get to know him, he is sweet and warmhearted, so…”
Not knowing how to conclude, I just dropped my gaze to the floor.
I continued, “You know, they talk about this in the theory of relativity that a week here can be compatible to three years on another planet. Those came to my mind. Plus, we seemed to haven’t seen each other for just a week, but it felt like I was seeing him in a class reunion.” I murmured evasively, “That’s how I felt…”
That was when Yeo Dan oppa slightly loosened up the strained atmosphere on his face.
“I get it. So, you want me to watch action-thriller movies, instead of romcoms, huh?” he replied, throwing a sweet glance.
I roared with laughter again. “Oppa, you’re trying to do something else?”
‘Geez, why does he keep acting silly and cute these days? Is it because he’s now in his senior year?’ I asked in my thoughts.
Laughing too hard, tapping his shoulders, I wasn’t able to notice one of his parents coming out of their room. There was then a footstep followed by a door opening sound. The two of us flinched in surprise and jumped into the enclosed balcony.
Running into the place so quickly, I banged the back of my head against the nail in the wall. I moaned in pain, falling to the floor. Thankfully, I didn’t bump into it so hard, if not, I would have had to worry about getting tetanus.
As if Yeo Dan oppa was also concerned about the same thing, he touched the back of my head amid the forced silence and tried to check if I got any wounds. Shaking my head aside as a gesture to say I was fine, I soon paid attention to the situation in the living room. Yeo Ryung’s father glanced around the space and was tilting his head in wonder.
“Strange, I heard some noise here…”
Then there was a rattling sound as if he was holding up a mug.
Yikes, we should have brought our mugs too. Opening my eyes wide, I was frozen at the spot. What if Yeo Ryung’s father threw a glance to the enclosed balcony, noticing that the tea was still warm?
I began to regret it. Instead of running away, we should have acted like we had accidentally met each other in the living room and were just having a short conversation. Raising my hand nonchalantly, I should have said, ‘Hi, Mr. Ban.’
Hold on, that’s too rude to say to a friend’s father in the middle of the night, isn’t it? While my mind was drowning in a whirlpool of chaos, Yeo Ryung’s father yawned and went back to his room, opportunely, as if he decided to stop searching.
Once his footsteps receded away and the door closed with a gentle thud, I was able to heave a sigh of relief. I felt the aches hitting me hard on the back of my head again. The cold air from the tiled floor also crawled up my bare feet.
I sat, crouching down, then felt my tension decrease. I barely blurted out, “Well, at times like this, life itself is just a movie…”
The words just slipped out of my mouth, but for some reason, Yeo Dan oppa chuckled from beside me. Throwing a glance at his parents’ room, Yeo Dan oppa stopped laughing, then went to the kitchen, telling me that he would bring the first-aid kit.
I still hid behind the balcony wall, waiting for him to come back. Suddenly, I asked myself why I was acting like a spy right now when his father already went back to his room.
Anyway, Yeo Dan oppa treated my wound, sitting on the cold balcony floor, instead of doing it in the living room. I told him I was fine, but Yeo Dan oppa proceeded it anyway so that I wouldn’t be infected with tetanus.
But there was a problem. I couldn’t figure out which part of my head was banged against the nail. Pressing me here and there, Yeo Dan oppa asked me where the painful spot was. It finally had me rolling in the aisles.
I chortled, “Ah, stop. Cut it out.”
“Come on, what if it really causes tetanus…?” said Yeo Dan oppa concernedly, then he turned his head.
As he twitched the corners of his lips, I noticed that he might have insisted to treat my wound in order to tease me.
