Chapter 32

“Ah, no. I have to go now…”

Danbi instinctively took a few steps backward.

Hae-il looked her up and down, taking in her drenched, trembling appearance, then sighed.

“Where are you going looking like that? Even a taxi driver wouldn’t want to take you. What are you going to do about school tomorrow if you catch a cold? Come inside first and dry yourself off.”

His words were undeniably reasonable.

But the biggest problem was the person standing right in front of her—Hae-il.

Entering his house felt like voluntarily walking into a tiger’s den.

When Danbi hesitated, he swung the front door wide open, clearing the way for her.

It was an unspoken pressure to come inside.

“Then… I’ll just borrow a towel.”

In the end, Danbi gave up resisting and stepped helplessly into his house, like a piece of metal being drawn toward a magnet.

Click.

When the door closed behind her with a heavy sound, the rain that had been blanketing the outside world suddenly seemed to disappear as if it had never existed.

A cool silence settled over the spacious interior, and the only scent lingering in the air was his.

“Wait here for a second.”

Leaving those words behind, Hae-il disappeared farther down the hallway.

Left alone, Danbi awkwardly stood near the entrance and glanced once more at the pile of gifts she had seen through the doorway earlier.

The flashy wrapping paper and luxury-brand shopping bags seemed to mock her shabby circumstances.

A moment later, Hae-il returned carrying a large, fluffy-looking towel and casually tossed it over Danbi’s head.

“Dry yourself first.”

While Danbi rubbed her wet hair with the towel, his gaze swept over her from head to toe.

“Your uniform is completely soaked… A towel isn’t going to be enough. Just take a shower.”

“…What?”

“You’re not going to keep wearing those wet clothes, are you? You’ll catch a cold.”

“No, it’s okay. I’m going home in a little while anyway…”

“In my house, you listen to me.”

He cut her off firmly and grabbed her wrist, pulling her along.

Before she had any chance to resist, Danbi kicked off her sneakers haphazardly in the entrance and was led farther inside.

“But don’t you usually have academy at this time?”

He checked the time on the digital clock hanging on the living-room wall before asking.

Somehow, he seemed to know Danbi’s schedule by heart.

“You’re not going to the academy today?”

She couldn’t possibly tell him that she was supposed to go, but had ended up missing it because she had come to retrieve the present.

Danbi awkwardly nodded.

“Yeah…”

“Then eat dinner before you go.”

“No, it’s okay. I’ll just…”

“I have to eat dinner anyway. Perfect. I’m going to order pizza. That okay?”

Before Danbi could even process what was happening, everything proceeded in rapid succession exactly as Hae-il directed.

He pulled out an oversized T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants and handed them to her, then practically pushed her toward the bathroom.

By the time Danbi came to her senses, she was standing alone inside Hae-il’s bathroom.

Just like the rest of the house, it was decorated entirely in sophisticated, neutral colors, and there was a pleasant fragrance in the air.

What exactly is happening right now?

She was still dazed by the bewildering turn of events when his voice came from outside the door.

“Take off your uniform and give it to me. I’ll put it in the dryer.”

Danbi held her breath.

His voice was unbelievably casual, but what those words implied was anything but ordinary.

He was waiting right outside this thin door.

Waiting for her to take off her clothes.

Her drenched uniform was heavy and cold, making her entire body shiver.

Now that she had come all the way into the bathroom, there was no way to refuse anymore.

With trembling hands, Danbi began unbuttoning the blouse clinging to her body.

After removing all her damp clothes, she caught sight of herself in the mirror, dressed only in her undergarments.

Danbi hung her uniform over one arm and hid herself behind the bathroom door.

Then she carefully grasped the doorknob and opened it just enough for one arm to slip through without making a sound.

She cautiously extended the arm holding her uniform through the gap.

“…Here.”

There was no response from outside.

He had to be standing right there.

The silence was suffocating, as though time itself had stopped.

The weight of his silence was harder to bear than the weight of her wet clothes.

“Hae-il…?”

That was when it happened.

Danbi suddenly felt a heat like a burn against the back of her hand and froze.

His fingers slowly brushed across her cold hand as he took the clothes from her.

At the unexpected contact, all the blood in Danbi’s body rushed to her face.

She yanked her arm back with a startled cry, hurriedly slammed the door shut, and locked it.

Bang.

The closed door once again divided their worlds.

She couldn’t hear anything from outside, but she knew he was still standing right there.

Danbi leaned her back against the cold door and buried her face in both hands.

Her cheeks felt as hot as a ball of fire against her palms.

The sensation his touch had left on the back of her hand refused to disappear.

Then his quiet voice came from outside the door.

“Hurry up and shower. Before the pizza gets here.”

Only after his footsteps began moving away did Danbi’s tense legs finally give out.

She sank onto the floor and let out a long breath.

The chill of the cold tiles seeped upward through her body, but the warmth left behind by his touch stubbornly refused to fade.

Her heart was still racing wildly out of control.

You’re crazy, Lee Danbi. Why did you even come crawling in here…?

She was beating herself up over it when she suddenly remembered something a moment too late.

The letter she had stuffed into her skirt pocket.

For an instant, her mind went completely blank.

She could feel the blood draining from her face.

Given how meticulous Hae-il was, there was no way he would put her uniform into the dryer without checking the pockets first.

If that happened, then all the desperate struggle she had just gone through would have been for nothing.

It would be like handing him the remains of her own heart with her own hands all over again.

No.

Absolutely not.

Without giving herself time to think, Danbi flung open the bathroom door.

“Wait…!”

Her desperate cry never reached its end.

Hae-il turned around only a few steps away.

In his hands was Danbi’s wet school uniform.

His eyes widened at the sight of her suddenly appearing after throwing open the door.

Their gazes collided in midair.

Hae-il’s eyes lingered briefly on Danbi’s flustered face before sliding downward.

Only then did Danbi realize that she was still wearing only her undergarments.

Hae-il stared at her blankly for a moment before suddenly jerking his head away.

“Damn… You scared me…”

He covered his mouth as he muttered under his breath.

But Danbi was far more worried that he might find her letter than embarrassed about being seen like this.

She quickly hid herself behind the door again and poked only her head out.

“Wait… Come here for a second.”

“Why, why… What…?”

His ears bright red, Hae-il reluctantly approached the bathroom while keeping his gaze elsewhere.

As he came closer, Danbi reached an arm through the gap in the door and snatched the skirt from his hand.

Then, with trembling fingers, she searched through the pocket and finally managed to grasp the damp, crumpled ball of paper.

Thank goodness.

The relief lasted only a moment.

Her eyes fell on her mismatched underwear, and another wave of embarrassment washed over her.

“Here…”

Danbi held the skirt out to him again.

For some reason, Hae-il said nothing as he accepted it.

Danbi had been wondering what she would say if he asked about it, but he didn’t ask a single question.

His silence only made her face burn even hotter.

“Did you… see?”

At the question with no subject, Hae-il remained silent for a moment, as though thinking.

Then he answered honestly.

“…Yeah.”

Hae-il’s greatest strength—and perhaps his greatest weakness—was that he never lied.

Not only had she entered someone else’s house and taken a shower, she had even ended up being seen in her undergarments.

She felt utterly mortified.

“You were surprised… I’m sorry…”

“No, you don’t… have to apologize…”

“Sorry…”

After that final apology, Danbi hurriedly closed the door again, as though she were trying to hide inside a mouse hole.

She silently knocked her forehead against the door again and again, overwhelmed with regret.

If I’d known this would happen, I should have run away when he told me to come inside.

No, I should have refused to take a shower until the very end.

No, at the very least, I should have worn matching underwear.

So consumed by her own embarrassment, Danbi failed to notice something.

The footsteps outside the door did not immediately move away.

She didn’t realize that Hae-il had remained standing there, completely still, for a very long time.