How Am I Supposed to Be Friends With You
That boy and I—we were like incompatible elements, forever circling each other without ever mixing. We could not stand each other. We could not understand each other.
I had always believed I was the sort of person who could get along with anyone. That was pure arrogance.
There really were relationships that simply did not work. And that was exactly what we were—Kwon Hyun-jin and me.
Sniffling, I walked aimlessly through the glittering night streets. Then, out of nowhere, Kwon Hyun-jin appeared from behind and planted himself in front of me.
“Lee Na-hee.”
I did not answer. I did not even meet his eyes. When I tried to slip past him on the left, he blocked me a step faster. When I tried the right, he cut that off too.
Wasn’t he embarrassed, acting this childish in the middle of the street? I glared at him on reflex, only for Kwon Hyun-jin to huff and snap at me instead.
“Hey. How the hell am I supposed to be friends with you.”
“…….”
“With someone like you hovering right in front of my face, how the fuck am I supposed to…!”
Exhaustion crashed over me. I no longer had the energy to keep sparring. I would never win anyway. He was the kind of boy whose energy boiled over like a blast furnace. I simply could not handle him.
“Just leave me alone so I can go home…….”
“How am I supposed to think of you as a friend when you’re so fucking pretty!”
Kwon Hyun-jin shouted as if the frustration were killing him.
“Cute, fuck. Adorable!”
“…….”
Dumbfounded, I could only stare at him with my lips parted stupidly.
What did I just hear……?
Blazing neon signs. Glances from people brushing past us. Kwon Hyun-jin standing right in front of me, red all the way to his neck, yelling as if he were about to explode.
“You’re so pretty it’s driving me insane, Lee Na-hee…….”
“…….”
Everything felt unreal.
Even after throwing the words out himself, he seemed unable to handle them; Kwon Hyun-jin turned tomato-red. He scrubbed his face dry over and over, as if using the motion to escape my startled gaze.
Pretty. It was such a common word. The kind of compliment you heard all the time.
And yet…… what on earth was this?
The frozen street seemed to melt away in an instant.
He was a problem for sulking this long only to offer an excuse that lame. And I was a problem for being simple enough to thaw at something so small.
“Haa…….”
A weary sigh slipped out. I quietly watched his hair stir in the breeze.
Once he had calmed a little, Kwon Hyun-jin took my arm.
“……Let’s go. I’ll take you to Hannam-dong.”
“I have to make sure you get into your apartment first…….”
“Am I a three-year-old? I can get into my own place myself.”
His face was still flushed as he snapped back.
But by his own logic, there was no reason I could not go home alone either.
“I can get there on my own too. If I take the bus here it’s a single ride…….”
“Ah, just come on already. Lee Na-hee!”
I’m dying of embarrassment here!
Muttering fiercely, Kwon Hyun-jin kept hold of my arm as if I might bolt and flagged down a taxi.
“I should call Driver Kim…….”
“Fuck, just get in.”
Not a single word passed between us until we crossed the Gangnam Bridge. Kwon Hyun-jin kept his face fixed on the window and the night view of the Han River, never once glancing my way.
Outside, sleet was swirling. Autumn was ending.
“Please stop in front of the art museum in Hannam-dong.”
“Go all the way to the house.”
“I feel queasy. I want to walk a little.”
Having said that, I sank deep into the seatback. I had just closed my eyes when it happened.
An unfamiliar sensation brushed the hand I had left carelessly on the seat.
The tips of his long fingers were resting against the back of mine.
As if not moving at all, Kwon Hyun-jin’s fingertips shifted with the faintest, most fragile tremor, tickling the edge of my heart. Even though the only place he was secretly touching me was the back of my hand.
I thought his reddened neck looked a little cute. And that face of his, too—pretending to stare out the window while secretly watching my reflection in the glass.
I did not pull away the hand the annoying little thief beside me was so carefully stealing.
For the twenty-minute walk from the museum to the chairman’s residence, silence held between us. Beside me, as I hurried along with my usual short steps, Kwon Hyun-jin simply climbed the hill slowly, matching my pace.
After I reached my room and finished washing up, a single text was waiting.
Unit 3501. A photo of a familiar front door, a hand wearing a watch pressing a card key to the lock.
What a ridiculous boy. Imagining Kwon Hyun-jin taking that picture just to show me made a helpless little laugh slip out.
No message saying he’d arrived, no note that he was home—just the one photo. And even that curt single shot was so completely Kwon Hyun-jin.
A little. Just a very little…… he was cute.
I think the me of a few days ago who found Kwon Hyun-jin cute must have been briefly out of her mind. Even Misery would have been less relentless than him.
“No…… how many times are you going to ask.”
“Just go. I’ll call Manager Lee right now.”
“I already said no…….”
Every time we met, Kwon Hyun-jin brought up my plans for December 31st.
“The second you turn twenty you went drinking with some weird dickhead. Overnight at the bowling alley. I’ll tell her everything.”
Inside that head of his, today was already December 31st and I was already drinking beer and bowling with Kim Chang-jin.
Sparks looked ready to fly from those blazing eyes.
“You’re seriously obsessive as hell…….”
With him chanting it like a mantra, I wouldn’t go even out of sheer exhaustion.
His anxiety was absurd, too. Given that I was living under the roof of the Kwon family’s main house, an overnight stay was completely out of the question. Even coming home late made me feel self-conscious—overnight? Impossible.
“Then what are you doing. On December 31st, where are you and what are you doing.”
“……That day’s a Saturday.”
Saturdays had long been established as the day I ran errands to Kwon Hyun-jin’s apartment.
“You gonna stay with me?”
His expression suddenly lit up. Embarrassed, I kept folding the wrapping cloth that had done nothing wrong and asked,
“You…… don’t have any plans?”
“None.”
“Not going out?”
“Go out my ass. I’m staying home.”
“Then…… I guess we’ll run into each other. Since I’m coming to your place too.”
At that he beamed from ear to ear. It reminded me of the first time he had pressed movie tickets into my hands.
“Can’t we stay up all night that day?”
“You’re crazy.”
“No, outside. Let’s stay out and play all night.”
“You said you were going to stay home…….”
“Then what do you want to do at home? Watch movies till dawn?”
“What part of everything I just said did you hear. No.”
In truth, the Hannam-dong family, including Chairman Kwon, all had external events. They would be holding a grand year-end gathering with the affiliate presidents and would not return until late. That night I could have stayed past midnight without issue, but I did not bother explaining the details.
“Lee Na-hee, you really promised? To be with me that day.”
“I said I got it. Is there anything you want to eat? Since it’s the end of the year they’ll pack lots of delicious things.”
“Forget that.”
I had been thinking of asking Mom to put together a special meal for him, but Kwon Hyun-jin seemed to have other plans.
“Let’s go see the bell ringing.”
“No…… You’ll get crushed to death if you go there.”
The bell-ringing ceremony at Jonggak Station was something you watched on TV, not something you went to in person.
“And I already said I can’t stay that late.”
“Then what time do you have to be back?”
“Around eight……?”
“You kidding me? That’s the same as usual.”
“Then nine……?”
As if glaring solved everything. Whenever something failed to go his way, Kwon Hyun-jin expressed his discontent exactly like that.
“You’re not going to eat the soy-braised tilefish, right?”
I separated the side dishes Kwon Hyun-jin would eat from the ones he would not and stocked the refrigerator.