chapter 1
1. An Ordinary Day
It was an ordinary day.
It was a pleasant day with clear weather and not a single cloud in sight.
“······Mom.”
“Huh? Did you call?”
“Why didn’t you wake me up?”
An ordinary, ordinary day when I overslept even though I had classes from the first period.
“Isn’t it past the age for mom to wake you up, son?”
“····.”
“I’m not some kind of middle school student. I’m going to have to get up on my own now, right?”
I am very angry, but I have nothing to say.
I don’t know who made it, but it was a well-made word.
A grown man cannot get up without his mother’s help.
If a passer-by sees this situation, it’s a situation that makes them laugh out loud.
Even when I think about it, it’s to the point where I think ‘this is a bit much’, so I really had nothing to say.
“······I set 4 alarms.”
“It was noisy, so my mom turned it off.”
“I even bought an alarm clock because I thought a cell phone alarm wouldn’t be enough.”
“Didn’t you throw it away yesterday when you said it was going to get in the way?”
Um. Was it
Now that I think about it, I think it was like that.
Suddenly, memories of yesterday passed by.
Yesterday, I went straight to the separate collection point for my apartment because I was so stressed by the alarm clock ringing even though it was the weekend.
Actually, Seo Ah Han, who was passing by, saw that and said, “What kind of stupid thing is that?” She laughed and laughed, maybe.
······Still nothing to say.
“Breakfast? Are you going to eat breakfast, son?”
“What time is it?”
“Well, what time do you think it will be?”
“······Mom, you’re just kidding me.”
“If I don’t make fun of my son, who will?”
“····.”
It was clear that my mother, who turned 42 this year, was still living the fun of teasing her son.
There’s no way you’d bother me like this otherwise.
Anyway, I’m going to go to the middle of the day.
I didn’t have time to play around like this.
“······It’s 8:30.”
“Why would a mother lie to you?”
The text of 8:30 on the screen of my smartphone was enough to make my heart beat faster.
Ah, of course it’s not for a romantic reason like the thrill of love.
Because of the fear of not knowing the reason that comes from the terrifying act of being late.
Weing-
If it’s small, the sound of the hair dryer echoed in the small room.
The structure of our house is a typical apartment structure with 3 rooms attached to the living room.
It’s not that I live well, but it’s not that I can’t live at all.
Should I say that it feels a bit like that?
I tidied up a little bit of my hair that stretched out from sleeping comfortably, and roughly changed my clothes.
“What about Han Seo-ah?”
“Seo-ah? Seo-ah came around 8 o’clock earlier and saw you sleeping and left.”
“······Really?”
Why did this lovely friend leave the sleeping person alone?
I did my best to wake you up and go with you when you overslept last time.
“Yes, I told you to go after breakfast, but you said you had already eaten, so you just went?”
“······He ate breakfast?”
You might think that she was making a fuss about just having breakfast, but that was only possible when she didn’t know a person named Seo Ah Han.
It was none other than Han Seo-ah.
An amazing person who has never had breakfast at home for three years of high school.
I can’t remember what the reason was.
Did you say that homemade food is not tasty?
But Han Seo-ah’s mother’s cooking skills are better than my mother’s.
“······Siwoo Lee. I think you just thought of something very rude?”
“hahahaha, that can’t be the case. Mother.”
“Is that so? Mom believes in Siu.”
“If my mother doesn’t believe in me, who will believe in me?”
“····.”
“I’ll be back.”
“Okay, have a good day.”
Anyway, except for the issue that Han Seo-ah ate breakfast alone, it was an ordinary day no different from usual.
“Son? Don’t you bring your laptop?”
“Oh, that’s right.”
It was perfect even for me to skip my laptop.
***
It was about seven bus stops from my apartment to the university I was attending.
If it’s close, it’s close, but if it’s far, it’s a distance that can be said to be far.
Tee-Ring-
As I got on the bus that arrived, I was greeted by a familiar voice from the card reader.
I slowly walked inside and grabbed the doorknob closest to the exit door.
It was right to throw away the hope of being able to sit in the seat.
Because it’s obvious that college students in a similar situation to me have already occupied the seats, and even if they are empty, most of them will be seats for the elderly.
I think I saw somewhere that you can sit in the seats for the elderly if there is no one to sit.
Well, is there really no one to sit on the bus in the terrible morning hours?
I’d rather just stand there and go.
As I said before, it only takes seven stops.
He held the handle with his left hand and held his smartphone with his right hand.
Looks like a role model for modern people who can often be seen on the way to and from work.
As usual, I would have read game broadcasts or webtoons that kindly tell me what day of the week it is.
There was something I had to do today.
—
[Hey] – Me
[? Why] – Seoah Han
[Why did I leave?] – I
[Did I abandon you?? You woke up late] – Han Seo-ah
[No, I woke you up last time] – Me
[Yes, I know that my mother woke me up and told me to go] – Han Seo-ah
[Anyway, didn’t I wake you up?] – Me
[If you have time to chat, come to school. You’ll be late.] – Seoah Han
[‘Emoticon of a cat squeaking’] – Me
[‘Laughing rabbit emoticon’] – Seoah Han
—
“····.”
I touched it for nothing, but I couldn’t even find it.
You never thought you would know the truth behind what I woke you up the other day.
Still, I felt unfair.
No, does it matter who ordered it?
First of all, the fact that I woke him up from his troubled trip to the land of dreams is important.
“······· Haa.”
“····.”
I mumbled with an unfair heart.
The only thing that came back was the uncomfortable look from the person sitting in front of me.
Ah, embarrassing.
From now on, I will never wake you up.
***
Fortunately, there was no mishap that the 20-minute distance was extended to 40 minutes because the bus was blocked.
This is really fortunate.
Last time I was blocked and was almost late by two minutes.
I still get dizzy when I think of that time.
The terrible situation of meeting a professor at the door of a classroom.
In such a terrible situation, all a poor student like me could do was smile awkwardly and say hello.
Anyway.
It was important that no such misfortune occurred this time around.
“Hey. I wasn’t late today.”
“Of course. I almost went through something the other day.”
As I finally arrived at my seat with a tired body, I heard the voice of my friend from college next to me.
“It’s a waste. To be honest, I hoped you’d be late.”
“Thank you so much for your concern, lord.”
“No, that’s why it’s not the lord, it’s the lord.”
“The lord or the lord.”
“······So, what about your girlfriend?”
“Huh?”
I tilted my head at the sudden sound I heard.
Girlfriend? What kind of girl are you suddenly?
“Why, you have a girlfriend who always comes with you…”
“Does our lord know that people can die if their mouths are carelessly teased?”
“······Sorry, brother.”
“Yes, yes.”
I wondered what he was saying out of nowhere, but it was Han Seo-ah.
“······But aren’t you really dating?”
“I’m not dating.”
“No, really…”
“Oh. I’m not really dating.”
Actually, it is true that it is a misunderstanding that is received a lot.
No, I couldn’t help but be misunderstood.
The two of us always come together when we come, and we always go together when we go.
It’s true that most of the classes even overlap.
I would have believed that even if I was in the position of someone who didn’t know the circumstances, we were dating.
However, this is only the position of someone who does not know the circumstances.
It was impossible for anyone who knew everything about the situation to misunderstand.
Real brother and sister.
There was no word that could better describe the relationship between me and Han Seo-ah.
You’ve known someone for so long that you’re just annoyed when you see their face.
It has become much closer to a family-like relationship than a relationship between a man and a woman.
A relationship like that.
FYI, that spacing was absolutely not a mistake.
We really had a family-like relationship.
“Here you just arrived. Your girlfriend.”
“······Our lord is good at telling us that he wants to die in the refreshing morning?”
“From what I’ve seen, you guys are really dating. How can the reaction be the same?”
“What, did Siwoo Lee say this too?”
“It was exactly the same, not a single word wrong.”
“······Feeling bad.”
[To think that Siu and I had the same thoughts. Are you in a good mood this morning?]
“······· Huh?”
Until a really weird anomaly started happening to me.
Until I see strange letters from childhood friends who are like real siblings who have lived like family all their lives.
“What, why is he like this again?”
“I was almost late for the series and then I went crazy. It’s so Lee Siu-like, I’m not surprised.”
[What happened all of a sudden? Siwoo doesn’t seem to be in very good shape… Should I ask if you’re okay right now?]
“····.”
That day in the classroom, I realized.
I don’t know what the problem is, but something is definitely wrong.
Something was so wrong that I even had the illusion that I might have gone mad.
It was an ordinary day, no different from usual.