CHAPTER 8
Time passed quickly, and before she knew it, Harin was facing the CSAT.
Classes with the prickly Jaehyuk had honestly never been easy. A natural genius, he simply could not understand the foolishness of someone who struggled with studying.
Whenever she so much as whined, he would hit her with a brutally sharp remark and assign her an enormous amount of homework. Then again, sometimes his unnecessary kindness was the real problem.
After finishing their final lesson, Jaehyuk handed her something.
“Here. Chocolate.”
“The CSAT is still a little way off. You’re giving it to me already?”
“You need to eat plenty and grow big and strong if you want to do well on the exam.”
“Wow, Teacher! I’m touched!”
He smiled at being called “Teacher” for once, but Harin couldn’t smile.
Choi Jaehyuk looked far too wonderful standing before her.
So breathtakingly beautiful that it made her heart feel as though it might burst.
Harin rubbed the tip of her tingling nose with her index finger before asking,
“Once the CSAT is over and I go to college, I’ll officially be an adult, right?”
“Pretty much. When did that little snot-nosed kid grow up this much?”
“When that happens, I’ll be an adult like you too. Right?”
She had made him confirm it several times.
Once she became an adult, she was determined to confess her feelings to him, no matter what happened.
And then, on a winter day when snow was falling, the day of her confession arrived as though it had been ordained by fate.
It was the day the students could calculate their preliminary CSAT scores.
Her score was nowhere near high enough for medical school, and she ended up fighting with her father.
Perhaps worried because Harin had locked herself in her room and refused to come out, her mother sent her outside on an errand.
She was told to stop by her eldest brother’s officetel and pick up some containers of side dishes.
After forcing herself to move her feet, Harin finally arrived at her brother’s place.
But no matter how many times she pressed the doorbell, there was no answer.
Nothing seemed to be going right for her these days.
“If you’re not coming out, I’m just going in, okay?”
She knew the passcode, but was wondering whether she should knock one more time when the door suddenly clicked open.
“What’s all the noise about?”
“Eek! Oh, my gosh!”
Harin instinctively called out for her mother, then merely blinked.
Standing behind the wide-open door was Jaehyuk.
He was wearing nothing but a pair of pants.
Apparently he had just gotten out of the shower, because his entire upper body was bare.
“O-Oppa!”
She was supposed to look away from his naked body.
But she simply couldn’t.
A drop of water fell from his hair and slid down his firm chest muscles.
Her gaze followed it lower, across his abs, sculpted into neat ridges like pieces of chocolate.
She had seen her brothers walking around the house shirtless countless times, but she had never seen anything like this.
Jaehyuk’s body was so beautiful that she almost felt guilty even comparing him to her brothers.
Harin stood there in a daze, staring at him for a long while.
She had even forgotten that she had been depressed after fighting with her father over her grades.
Jaehyuk shook out his wet hair and grumbled.
“I figured it would be Kang Harin.”
“W-Why are you here, Jaehyuk-oppa?”
“Could you stop staring? You’re going to burn a hole through me.”
Only then did Harin hurriedly cover her eyes with both hands.
As though utterly dumbfounded, Jaehyuk ruffled her bangs.
“You’ve already seen everything there is to see. Why bother covering your eyes now?”
“Then why are you standing there without a shirt?”
“I came back from playing basketball and took a shower. I had the day off today.”
“No, I mean, why are you at my brother’s place?”
“Because it’s close to the hospital?”
Jaehyuk answered casually and crossed his arms to pull a T-shirt over his head.
Even though she had her eyes covered, the image of Jaehyuk she had just seen continued to flicker in her mind.
His broad shoulders.
The firm muscles of his chest.
His deeply defined abs.
And the lines of his hips beneath them……
Harin didn’t know what to do with herself as she tried to cool her burning cheeks.
Then Jaehyuk suddenly stepped closer and whispered,
“Why don’t you stop imagining things and sit down first?”
“I’m not imagining anything!”
She answered irritably, but still couldn’t bring herself to look up.
She kept her eyes fixed on her toes as she walked and finally managed to sit down on the sofa.
“Ice cream? Or should I make you some hot chocolate?”
“Ice cream, obviously.”
“You’re going to freeze to death one of these days, kid.”
Jaehyuk opened the refrigerator as though it were his own home and took out a chocolate ice cream for her.
It was her favorite brand, so she ate it without complaint, but she still couldn’t raise her head.
“You’re bright red right now.”
“Who told you to stand there naked?”
“What’s the big deal? It’s just between us.”
“What exactly is ‘between us’?”
“Teacher and student? And your brother’s little sister.”
His answer was only natural, yet it weighed heavily on her heart.
Without realizing it, Harin lowered her head even further.
Jaehyuk studied her expression.
“Why do you look like the world just ended? Is it because of your CSAT score?”
“I guess so.”
The worry over her score, which she had momentarily forgotten thanks to Jaehyuk’s devastating muscle attack, came rushing back.
And naturally, she began to worry about what he would think.
During their tutoring sessions, he had been a terrifyingly strict teacher with absolutely no mercy, so she was afraid he would scold her once he learned her score.
“Didn’t you get the score you expected?”
“I’m sorry. You taught me so hard……”
As Harin bowed her head deeply in apology, an unexpectedly gentle hand began stroking her hair.
“Why are you bowing your head over a stupid test score?”
“……”
“You worked hard. Whatever the result, no one has the right to blame Kang Harin.”
“Oppa.”
“You did your best. Maybe other people don’t know, but I do. I was the one who taught you.”
His words were warmer than she had expected.
Tears welled up in Harin’s eyes.
“I did my best, and that’s why it hurts even more. There’s nothing more I could have done.”
“Harin.”
“Dad says I should repeat the year until I get into medical school, or go abroad and major in piano. But can just anyone play the piano?”
“……”
“I’m not good at studying, and I don’t have any talent. I feel so useless that it’s driving me crazy.”
The more she spoke, the more emotional she became, and her eyes reddened.
Jaehyuk gently stroked her hair and met her gaze.
“So even someone with as many strengths as you have thinks that way?”
“Strengths?”
“You’re diligent and kind. You have a lot of friends, don’t you?”
“I guess I do.”
“Are doctor and pianist the only careers in the world? There are countless options out there where you can make use of your strengths.”
“Oppa.”
“Forget what your parents want for a moment and ask yourself what you actually want to do. You’re still young. Is there really anything you can’t do yet?”
For a moment, Harin was stunned, as though someone had struck her over the head.
Had she ever thought about her future without taking her parents into consideration?
She stared at Jaehyuk as though under a spell.
“Oppa…… There’s something I want to tell you.”
The confession burst out of her like a sneeze before she could stop it.
His comforting words had softened her heart enough to give her courage.
That’s right.
If I’m going to say something I should and shouldn’t say anyway, then I might as well confess now.
Just do it.
“What is it? You can tell me comfortably.”
Even at this very moment, Jaehyuk looked so incredible that her heart was pounding wildly.
There seemed to be no cure for how hopelessly she was in love with him.
Harin swallowed hard and steeled herself to confess once more.
“I like you, Oppa.”
“What?”
“I said I like you, Jaehyuk-oppa. Is it okay if I keep liking you?”
“No.”
No.
Those two short syllables, uttered without hesitation, seemed to float endlessly around her ears.
The warm, rosy fantasy surrounding Jaehyuk shattered in an instant, bringing her brutally back to reality.
His warm words had merely been kindness toward a student he had taught.
But even so, how could he reject her so easily?
She had hesitated for years.
She had wanted this so desperately.
And yet she had been rejected just like that?
Harin stared at him blankly.
Jaehyuk repeated himself clearly.
“I said no, kid.”
It was an unmistakable and resolute rejection.
Hearing him call her a kid made her heart hurt even more.
Well, of course.
In the eyes of the promising doctor Choi Jaehyuk, how young must someone like her seem when she was struggling over nothing more than her grades?
Harin desperately held back her tears.
If she cried now, she would become nothing more than a crybaby little kid in his eyes.
Doing her best to remain composed, she asked,
“Why? Why can’t I?”
“Harin.”
Jaehyuk opened his mouth as though he was about to explain, but then his phone began ringing loudly.
[Yoon Gahee♡]
Oh.
Gahee-unni.
There’s a heart next to her name.
It was the name of Gahee, whom Harin had always thought of as nothing more than Jaehyuk and Hajun’s best friend.
Her vision went dark, and her mind turned completely white.
The cute little emoji, so unlike the normally stoic Choi Jaehyuk, looked strangely painful to her.
Why had she never even considered the possibility that Choi Jaehyuk might have a girlfriend?
Regret came crashing over her all at once.
“Sorry. It’s a call from the hospital.”
It’s from the hospital, yet there’s a heart next to her name.
Harin wanted to make a sarcastic remark, but she swallowed it.
If she said anything more ridiculous now, she would only embarrass herself further.
Jaehyuk turned his back to her and answered Gahee’s call.
As he spoke with her, his voice grew quieter.
Harin couldn’t bear to listen anymore.
The half-eaten chocolate ice cream sat on the table, melted into a sticky mess.
It looked just like her feelings, shabby and worn down after being stacked away for so long.
Her heart ached.
Harin snatched up the ice cream container and stood.
There were so many things she had kept bottled up inside for years, but she couldn’t say a single one of them.
No.
Two short syllables had brutally crushed her one-sided love.
It was a humiliating memory she never wanted to remember again.
Harin woke from a dream containing every last unpleasant memory of her past and found herself deeply troubled.
How did I ever manage to forget Choi Jaehyuk?
How hard did I try to hate him?
So why are you showing up everywhere now, in my dreams and in reality, and stirring up my heart all over again? Why?!
Trying to calm her noisy heart, she forced her heavy body upright.
It was her first day off in a long time, and she had decided to use the opportunity to visit the grandmother whose life she had saved with her first CPR.
“Grandma!”
“Oh, my goodness! Harin’s here!”
The moment Harin entered the hospital room, a wrinkled hand reached out and clasped hers.
“I’m so, so glad you’re doing this well.”
“I know. The social worker couldn’t stop praising you, saying I was alive thanks to you.”
“I only did what anyone should have done.”
“Oh, my! Grandma’s excited. Is she your granddaughter?”
The patient in the bed beside them spoke up, and the grandmother briefly fell silent.
Knowing that the old woman had no family, Harin answered without hesitation.
“Yes. I’m Kang Harin, Grandma’s granddaughter!”
“My, my. You’re lucky, Grandma. You have such a pretty granddaughter.”
The grandmother puffed out her chest proudly and began bragging about Harin.
“She’s a 119 emergency medical technician. She even saved me this time.”
“Then she’s certainly an essential young talent. And she’s so polite, too. Not like the young people these days.”
The patient in the next bed continued, looking at Harin.
“Come to think of it, my grandson just passed the exam to become a prosecutor. Would you like me to introduce you two?”
“A prosecutor?”
“My grandson is handsome and well put-together. How about it? Would you like to meet him?”
“I’ll make my rounds now.”
At that moment, a dry voice cut through the cheerful atmosphere of the hospital room.
