Chapter 101:Why This? (5)

Every time I have a conversation like this with her, it feels a little ticklish.  

We’re not officially dating yet. There were still too many hurdles to overcome before we could call ourselves a couple.  

I don’t think I’m confused about my feelings, but at the same time, I wonder if things are like this, is there really any difference between us and a couple?  

She once said that she used to like the old me. And now, she sees the present me overlapping with who I was in the past.  

Even though I’ve changed, she still sees traces of the old Cha Shihyun in me.  

To her, I’m still just a stand-in for him.  

But I’m sure of one thing she wouldn’t abandon me. I already asked her to see me as me, and she promised she would. Given enough time, she’ll eventually accept me for who I am.  

Maybe that’s why she’s being so forward with me.  

If it were just guilt, she wouldn’t be hugging me, holding my hand, or asking me to go out for drinks.  

If she believes that she can accept me someday, then maybe she thinks there’s no harm in moving forward now.  

Watching her smile at her phone screen, I let my thoughts drift.  

She had a movie theater app open.  

This wasn’t an area where real estate prices were particularly high, nor was it a neighborhood bustling with people. But there was a movie theater not too far from here, so we decided to go there.  

Well, saying decided might not be entirely accurate.  

“Would this movie be okay?”  

She showed me her screen. It was an action-packed film. Unfortunately, no romance movies were out yet. Given the time of year, at least one should have been released by now.  

Then again, considering the season, even if there was one, it might not have been the best choice. Fall and winter romance movies often had a strange tendency to end with the main couple breaking up. And since we weren’t even officially dating yet, watching a breakup movie together didn’t seem like the best idea.  

“Yeah.”  

“And what about the time?”  

She tilted her phone towards me.

The showtime was about 30 minutes after we finished work. It wouldn’t be hard to get to the theater in time it was just one subway stop away, and even by bus, it wouldn’t take too long.  

“Yeah.”  

“And… what about the seats? This movie seems pretty popular. A lot of seats are already taken. As long as we can sit together, does it matter where?”  

I wasn’t someone who went to the movies often. I liked watching them, but I wasn’t a hardcore fan. I had never really cared much about seating arrangements before.  

But since I was going with her, I did want us to sit together. Though honestly, as long as we were next to each other, I didn’t really mind.  

“Yeah.”  

“…..”  

She looked at me for a moment, then suddenly

poke.  

Her finger jabbed my forehead.  

“Ah.”  

Blinking in surprise, I met her gaze. She shot me a slight glare.  

“Are you even listening?”  

Ah.  

She must have thought I wasn’t paying attention since I had been staring at her face the whole time.  

“I heard everything.”  

“Are you sure?”  

It was true I had been staring at her. But I had also been listening. I knew exactly what movie we were watching, what time, and which seats we were taking.  

When I repeated everything back to her word for word, she blinked in surprise.

“Uh, uh…….”

I guess she didn’t think I’d remember.

After all, the phone she was holding up was in my line of sight, and I could hear her voice, so there was no reason to be confused.

“Oh, that’s right………….”

She said, blushing.

“…..”

“…..”

And when I stared at her after the conversation broke off, she fidgeted, still blushing.

Both of her hands were still clutching her phone, making it a little awkward to sneak up on her like I had done earlier in the morning.

Instead, I sneaked a step to her side.

I wasn’t close enough to touch her shoulder, but I was close enough that I could feel her scantily clad body.

“Sis.”

After a moment of silence, I called out to her.

I don’t know whether to say she’s bold or not.

When she sets her mind to something, she does it without thinking. For example, when she took me to the Bongan Hall on my birthday, or when she held my hand outside and told me that she and Shihyeon often did this………… Unlike me, who just stood next to her, scared and unwilling to do anything, she tried to advance the relationship every now and then.

But strangely, she was often incredibly shy.

It’s not that I didn’t like it. She was always a few steps ahead of me, and I liked that she saw a side of me that I didn’t see.

They say that people often become disillusioned with their significant others because of the first things they notice about them, but that wasn’t the case for me. On the contrary, I was happy to see a new side of her that I hadn’t seen in all those years, and it made me feel closer to her than before.

“You said before, we used to walk around holding hands all the time.”

I spoke slowly and carefully.

I knew that for her, the memory of me before would be both a memory and a sad, painful memory.

“Uh, yeah.”

Fortunately, she didn’t reject it, and I felt a little relieved, so I continued cautiously.

“Is there anything else, besides that, that you did together?”

I was very close to my sister.

Some people say we’re like siblings, and I realize that there aren’t many siblings in the world who hold hands all the time.

If you think about it, we were closer than most siblings.

So, as Yuri used to say, ‘It’s weird that they’re not together’.

At the time, I was red-faced and couldn’t say anything, but now that I think about it, I wonder why I didn’t take it a step further.

…..Well, actually, all we did was walk hand-in-hand and sometimes arm-in-arm.

It wasn’t like we were in a relationship because we were making out a lot, it was just that we looked that close.

Yeah, I knew that. We liked each other, but we couldn’t quite get the words out to each other, and so the amount of making out we did never went beyond the level of a college boy and girl flirting.

But even so-

‘She was the only one’ who knew about it.

I don’t know how close my sister and I were in the past, or more accurately, I shouldn’t know, because I’m not the same Shihyun, I’m Shihyun, a woman one year younger than Shihyun.

She may have superimposed me on the past me, but she doesn’t think of me as that past me.

So, if she’s ‘tricking’ me we can always be more than that.

…..And it would mean that I have moved further forward than the past me.

It’s a cowardly way to go, I know.

At least, it’s not something a former warrior would do.

But…… even so. I wanted to move forward, even if it was a little cowardly.

“We need to….”

My sister hesitates a bit.

For all the things we didn’t do, we could have done more. Surely, she wants to.

I’m the same as her. If she wanted to kiss me, I wanted to kiss her. If she wanted to go out with me, I wanted to go out with her. If she confessed to me, I would have taken it right then and there, and I would have thought about it more.

“Go, but only sometimes.”

She stuttered a little.

“We hug each other, sometimes.”

….Well, that wasn’t a lie.

We did hug.

But not often. It was never on a daily basis, a cuddle here and there, sharing body heat, a light kiss, the way lovers do.

Just on good days, on days worth celebrating. It was a warm hug, like the kind of hug you share with your family, like the kind of hug you share with your mom and the kind of hug you share with your sister.

My sister’s words were full of omissions, but they weren’t lies, not even close.

“……..”

But, I was happy.

Slowly, I lifted my hand and placed it gently on her back. Her body trembled slightly.

Her waist was thin.

Slowly, I tightened my grip and pressed my body against hers.

She held her smartphone, and her body was pressed against my side.

It was more like a hug, but with a slightly different posture.

“Like this?”

I asked softly, and she was silent for a moment.

And then.

“A little.”

I said softly.

“A little more, harder.”