I Don’t Want to be a Villainess

I know I should be happy when someone cares for me or looks out for me.

I’ve hardly ever encountered such situations, but I’ve often seen them around me.

Ah, of course, when I say “around me,” I mean physically, not psychologically. Even if I was treated as if I were invisible at school, I wasn’t truly nonexistent. There were students sitting next to, in front of, and behind me.

And, like the “invisible person” I was, the kids would often chat away without needing to move away from me.

They would worry about each other, congratulate each other, laugh and cry together.

I knew that all those feelings weren’t genuine. The place I was in was Hwayang Middle School, where people’s ranks were determined by money. Unless it was a special case like mine, it was clear that kids would distinguish and chew each other up based on how much money they had.

But even knowing that what I saw wasn’t genuine…

I was envious.

The only relationship I had was with my mom, and even that, I couldn’t be sure if it was real or fake.

It seemed those kids never had any intention of offering me such relationships.

Yeah, I was envious. I have been.

But strangely, the first emotion I felt when faced with such feelings wasn’t joy, but confusion.

“…”

After listening to Yoo Ha-neul’s story, I couldn’t speak for a while. Honestly, I didn’t even know what to say.

To thank her for sharing such a story seemed off, considering I’d only known her for a week. I could express it in words, but saying it was genuine felt a bit ambiguous. It was a kind and happy thing, but… it felt too far removed from me to truly grasp.

“Did that kid leave anything for me?”

I wasn’t sure how to express what had taken over my body for those three lost months, so I asked that. I said ‘me,’ but that person wasn’t really me. I didn’t feel like I was ‘me’ anymore.

Upon hearing my question, Yoo Ha-neul thought for a moment and then reluctantly shared.

“If ‘you’ come back and can’t meet yourself, could you still treat me as a friend like you did up until now…?”

Yeah.

So that’s how it was.

I still didn’t know what to say even after hearing that.

So it must be true that my feelings were difficult to comprehend.

I was someone who had given up everything, even my life.

I threw away my life just to get my mother’s attention, even once.

Being such a person, I couldn’t understand what it meant to sacrifice one’s life for another.

A person who had lived their entire life doubting everything around them could never comprehend someone choosing to die for themselves. I certainly would never have done such a thing.

…I put in every effort to sort out my surroundings. I found some way to convince the teachers and students who had been ignoring me to create a school environment where I could live normally. I made a friend who liked me a lot and turned a servant who didn’t have any particular feelings towards me onto my side.

I got a clear grasp of my assets, figured out what to do with them, and laid out plans for the future. I built a foundation to prevent my mother from harming me again.

And then I gave it all up.

All for just me.

Honestly, if you remove the part where I gave up for myself, I could almost understand the rest. If I had a personality that didn’t obsess over my mother like I did or if I was the sort to believe in others, it would have been reasonable to act like a rational person who could accurately grasp the cards in hand and use them effectively.

Unlike me, who simply gave up everything without doing anything, this person did what they could to escape from their situation.

Yet, they gave up everything they had built up for my sake.

As if they had prepared all of that from the start for me.

Ah, no way. My thoughts were looping back to square one.

“…I…”

As I stayed lost in thought for a while without saying anything, Yoo Ha-neul spoke up beside me.

“I, for that reason, tried to do as they said.”

“…”

Even without confidence, they asked me to keep being a friend to the different ‘me’ that had returned to this body.

Who knows if that could be called a last wish, but they had asked me such a favor.

That kid must have really liked that person.

She thought so differently of me that she considered me an entirely different being from that person.

“But… it didn’t work out.”

Hearing that she let out a sigh made me think, “What can you do?” I had no clue how this kid grew fond of that person. How did they become so close in such a short time? How did they come to understand each other so well in less than a month?

Having only vague memories of a proper friendship from my early childhood, I couldn’t quite recall those feelings.

“I’m sorry. I’m really sorry…”

Yoo Ha-neul said that as she crumbled.

“I tried to endure. I tried to think of you as the same person as that kid…”

But it must have been impossible.

I was an entirely different entity from that person.

While we shared the same body, I was a completely different person in terms of thought processes.

“But… I’m sorry.”

Kneeling on the hard floor, tears streaming down her face, she truly looked sorry.

She didn’t have to apologize that much.

“…”

I didn’t know what to do in this situation.

If it were me, or the me faintly rising in those memories, I wouldn’t just be staring blankly like this.

Suddenly, I became curious about what that person was like.

*

“Is there something wrong?”

In the past week of living like everyone else, I realized something. Ordinary people pick up on other people’s feelings much easier than I expected.

Having spent the last few years doubting everyone around me, I didn’t know how to recognize people’s true nature. The belief that everyone around me was bad and secretly after something of mine wasn’t easy to shake.

Even with all this attention on me, I still doubted these kids in a corner of my mind.

Two girls boldly living in my room with me.

…They definitely hadn’t been completely oblivious to my changes during the past week. While they didn’t perceive me as a ‘different person’ like Yoo Ha-neul did, they probably sensed that they understood something.

I got up from the bed without answering. I went over to the desk I usually used.

After recovering my memories, I hadn’t opened the last drawer of the desk.

Was my suicide note still there?

When my mother looked at me, she showed no signs of being different. Was it because she hadn’t shown any emotional change even after reading my note? Did she think it was nothing special just because she saw me alive?

The three kids who always stuck to my side probably knew the contents of that note.

Even if I pulled it out here, they wouldn’t be surprised.

Opening the third drawer, I saw the letter I had written.

A plain, unadorned white sheet folded neatly lay on top of the notebook I used.

There was no envelope. And no pill bottle.

There should have been at least half left.

…As expected.

When I turned around, I saw two kids looking at me with worried expressions.

“What’s going on?”

Shin So-hee asked me again.

“Nothing, just checking on something.”

I sat back down on the bed.

And then I tried to act as I normally would.

*

I couldn’t sleep.

What did I think about the past week?

Did I think of myself as ‘me’ when I lost my memories?

Maybe I thought a bit like that.

I sometimes thought that losing my memories was just due to some shock and that I had been trying my own way over these past three months after failing to commit suicide.

But no.

No matter how I think about it, I wasn’t the type of person to act that way.

Even seeing the four faces emitting light, I couldn’t muster the desire to change something.

No, maybe I tried?

…But I wasn’t sure if I could change just the parts that needed changing accurately.

“…”

Yeah, the last week was incredibly enjoyable. It wouldn’t be strange to call it the most amazing week of my life.

But.

Is this really my life?

Can I truly call this life built by someone else my own?

I’m not trying to get philosophical about the issues of identity or subjectivity.

Simply put, I wonder if it’s okay for me to enjoy this life as I please.

Yeah, even if that person made such a choice in the end.

It’s still a different life from the life that I ended.

I can’t say I have no regrets, but I also have no intention of continuing that life.

For the clueless two or for someone else longing for another, they’re all something I shouldn’t take for myself.

So, perhaps I could have.

If that day, I hadn’t taken those pills and laid down.

If I hadn’t given up on my life and thought there was another possibility.

If I had thought of changing another person and resolved to make new connections.

If I could have believed even one of the people around me.

My life could have been different.

Maybe I could have escaped from my mother’s bindings somehow.

Maybe I could have made new friends and not thought about an unhappy future.

But I didn’t.

And that choice is irreversible.

Yeah, this is not my life.

A different person’s life.

*

“…I’ve been thinking.”

The next day, I skipped class again.

The teacher no longer ignored me. It’s obvious it would affect my grades, too. But so what? I wouldn’t be able to write down the answers correctly anyway during the test.

So, I casually skipped class once more.

I felt a little guilty towards Shin So-hee, who was waiting by the rooftop entrance. I felt even more guilty after telling Yoo Ha-neul I’d spend time with her since I see her every day.

I felt like it was about time to believe in these three people.

Well, what could I do even if I didn’t believe them?

They believed me.

That’s what I thought.

I still haven’t found my memories, and I’m merely sensing things vaguely.

Yet, every time I see these three, I feel I want to believe.

This is probably a fragment of that person’s heart.

“I want to meet that person too.”

Yeah, that’s why I became curious.

The person who lived my life in my stead.

The one who could completely change my life in such a short time.

I wanted to meet that person.

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