50 — Su Ah Gazes into the Abyss

It's been about three days since I last talked to Su Ah. I wasn't ignoring her per se. It's just that, we had both agreed not to talk about it or mention it to anyone. And I think she's taken that as not speaking at all. Obviously, she would feel weird, considering the circumstances, so I was trying to make it easier by pretending nothing had changed, and just letting her take the time to come around.

She didn't.

Not in three days, anyway.

She was avoiding me. And not even in a very discreet way, either. The only times she would actually acknowledge my existence were during meals.

I wish I had enough patience to wait it out, but I was a man with limited resources and a short lifespan, not some monk.

I didn't have a thousand years to waste waiting for a girl's hormones and emotions to stabilize.

Honestly, I didn't know what led me to her room.

Well, technically, I did.

Being more mature than the rest meant having the moral responsibility of fixing the situation when one of them got stuck in their head. So there I stood, in front of her door, hand raised, fist curled, as if to knock.

I wasn't nervous, nor was I embarrassed. But the fact that there were still a few, fleeting, memories of the kiss in the back of my mind, made the situation a little awkward. Still, I knocked, knowing fully well that, had it not been for me, Su Ah might not have ever moved on.

And that was not the kind of person I was.

"Yes?" I heard from behind the door. There was an obvious, hesitant pause, as Su Ah waited, expecting it to be either Mia or Eun Ha, and then she spoke again. "Who is it?"

"Jae-il." I replied, calmly.

"Ah… come in." Her voice sounded a bit nervous. It made me sigh. She really needed to stop acting like she'd committed a grave sin.

I entered her room, softly closing the door behind us.

She was sitting cross-legged on her bed. A tank top and black, dolphin shorts. For some reason, Korean women loved wearing dolphin shorts. Mia wore them regularly, as did Dae Hee last time I saw her. Su Ah, clearly, was also part of that cult. As cute as it was, for well-developed women like them, it was a bit inappropriate, in my opinion.

"What do you want?" Her voice had an edge to it that made her question seem like an accusation rather than a simple query. It made me sigh again. "Can you stop doing that?!" She snapped, glaring.

"Stop what?"

"The… sighing!" Her eyebrows twitched. I could see she was getting increasingly more irritated.

I was about to sigh again, but stopped myself before the air could come out.

She looked away, pursing her lips, clearly upset about something.

"Alright, no more sighing, but that means I'll have to go straight to the point, and you won't like it one bit, Noona." I said, razor sharp, as I sat down on her well-curated writing setup. "Do you really hate kissing me so much that you'll avoid me for the next ten years?"

She glared. "That's not why!" She blurted, as if the mere idea was offensive to her.

"In that case, can you talk to me, Noona? I don't like this air between us, and it's coming mostly from you. Now, my biggest mistake in this whole situation was probably indulging you in the first place, but if we're going to make this right and move past this, then we both need to talk it out." I explained, looking up at her.

She looked down. "I just… don't want things to change between us."

"You're the only one changing things. I haven't moved a bit, Noona."

"Right..." Su Ah huffed; a sarcastic chuckle that had me raise my eyebrows. "I forgot. You're 'mature', and you don't have any 'stupid thoughts' in your mind. Well, good for you, I'm glad that you didn't get to experience the 'horrible' sensation of kissing your sister."

"Hey..." I said, softly, leaning over. "I thought the same thing as you. It was just a kiss. Between siblings. It was not that big of a deal, and it wasn't going to go anywhere. I was just thinking of you and your story, that's all. That's all it was." I narrowed my eyes, almost feeling sick at the words that came next. "Did it mean something more to you?"

Please don't let it be the case...

It was stupid, unbelievable, and outright ridiculous to believe your own sister could have feelings for you, but Mia had been the first to put the seed in my mind, and Su Ah was only feeding the beast by acting so weirdly. If it was indeed that, then...

"No! Absolutely not! No!" She looked at me like I'd grown two heads. "Are you kidding?!"

I stared, waiting for her to elaborate.

"That's what's weirding me out!" She exclaimed, exasperatedly.

I heaved a sigh of relief. "Oops. Sorry." I chuckled.

"It's okay!" She waved a hand. "You can sigh, I know I'm being a bit too much..."

"That's probably the understatement of the century." I smiled.

She huffed, rolling her eyes. "I guess I feel a little guilty... for doing something like that... to you, of all people. It's like I took advantage of you."

I laughed. "You? Taking advantage of me? No way."

"What's that supposed to mean?!" She crossed her arms.

"Exactly what I said. You're not taking advantage of me." I shook my head. "I was the one who made the choice of helping you, that day, because I didn't think much of it. And it's still true. We both made a choice, and there's no victim or culprit in this story, merely a moral conundrum. We're not doing any more damage by not talking about it and acting like nothing has happened. It's okay to feel guilty, I do too. But you're treating a simple cause-and-effect as if it were a moral catastrophe, when it isn't."

"Yes, but it was your first kiss..."

I shrugged.

"What? Don't you feel like you wasted it?"

"No. Because I don't care."

"But what if, later on, you regret not giving your first kiss to your girlfriend?"

I snorted. "I'm not a sentimental fool."

"But—!"

"No. Stop. We're not doing that." I interrupted. "Look, Noona. I know this whole thing is a bit weird and maybe you feel bad, but it didn't mean anything for me, and nor did it for you. It was a fully consensual exchange of help. If you're so concerned about it, I'm giving you my full consent right now, in advance and retroactively. So please. Let's just... move on, and forget about this."

She stared at me for a long time, before sighing and looking away, as if to think over my words. She nodded. "Fine. Okay. Fine. Let's move on."

I stood up, feeling a lot lighter now that this conversation was out of the way. I turned to leave. "Okay. Then we're fine. We're back to being normal. Nothing happened, nothing will happen, and we're all good."

She nodded, though there was still a shadow of doubt on her face.

I opened the door and stepped outside. Before closing it, however, I paused. "Ah, and, Noona."

Su Ah looked up. "Yes?"

"If you really do feel bad for taking away my first kiss, don't. You didn't."

"What?"

"I've already had my first kiss." I said, simply.

"Huh?"

"See?" I chuckled. "You didn't do anything bad at all."

I left, closing the door behind me, leaving a bewildered Su Ah alone in her room.

xXx

Su Ah's POV:

Wait...

What did he mean by that?

Su Ah's eyes widened as the realization hit her. Did Jae-il just say he had already had his first kiss?

With who?! When?! How?!

Su Ah sank back against her pillows, letting out a long breath. Relief washed over her like cool water.

And yet, that relief didn't feel clean.

In a way, she didn't feel clean, not with herself or her thoughts. Because under the light of this revelation, she felt a restless frustration that had her more scared than the kiss itself.

She had spent days replaying that scene with Jae-il, and each day, it felt like she was losing herself in it. She spent time, analyzing, breaking it down, trying to understand why it hadn't felt… abnormal or disgusting. Clearly, it should've been.

That'd have been a normal reaction. Maybe it was the purpose behind it?

She didn't know—she had nothing to go by, nothing to compare it to.

Her feelings were a swamp. She couldn't distinguish what was clear water or dark sludge anymore.

She tossed around, curling her knees up.

Why did it matter to her that Jae-il already had his first kiss?

It didn't make any sense. They'd shared meals, holidays, laughter; she had even once held him when he was a babe.

And he had a first kiss. And Su Ah was... upset. Why was she so upset about it? She didn't understand. She was supposed to be happy that she hadn't been the one to ruin it for him. She had no right to feel anything.

Su Ah's heart pounded, and she closed her eyes, trying to push away the confusion and jealousy. It didn't work. It just made it worse.

She buried her face in her pillow, not even caring that it made it harder to breathe.

She shouldn't care.

She shouldn't feel like she'd lost a chance.

She should've been relieved.

And she was.

And she hated it.

Her nails dug into her pillow, before, in a burst of frustration, she threw it across the room.

Rolling around in a sitting position, Su Ah grabbed her phone and checked Jae-il's Kakao account. Surely, at 15 years old, the list of potential partners was not that big. And she would've noticed something, too. Perhaps it happened at school; he didn't seem the type to do it with a stranger, not with how mature it was.

It was pure curiosity.

Su Ah merely wanted to know for research. And for Jae-il's sake.

She had to.

She didn't even know why, but the curiosity was killing her from the inside. It was a mystery she couldn't leave unresolved. If she didn't get answers right there and then, she wouldn't sleep.

Asking him outright would be too invasive, so she decided to scroll through his followers.

However, when she saw the staggering number, she realized the task wouldn't be easy. His followers ranged in the tens of thousands, with an obvious majority being female. Of course.

Su Ah gulped, her hands trembling.

Damn Jae-il. He really had to relieve her of a burden, just to throw her another. It would've been easier to ask him directly.

Still, this... dark curiosity pushed her to do it anyway. She might've been gazing into an abyss there was no coming back from.

And she hated herself for it.