Yuri

“She was an upperclassman at my middle school until you two moved away. It’s nothing crazy.” It was the truth, but I felt like I was lying to Sarang by saying that. “She gave me advice when I really needed it.”

“That sounds just like her.” Sarang smiled. “What was the advice for?”

I told Sarang about Grandma and how she passed away. She tried to apologize for bringing the subject up, but I wasn’t about to let her feel guilty.

“I’m just glad I got to thank your sister for helping me out.” I thought I saw a worried look flash on Sarang’s face. It disappeared faster than I could catch it, so I decided to ignore it.

Sarang poked my nose. “And I’m grateful that you helped me out tonight. I usually don’t have attacks like that in front of others.” She tried to laugh it off. “The last thing I wanna do is make someone I care about worry for me.”

For some reason, hearing her say that irritated me. “I’d be a shitty friend if I didn’t worry about you. You don’t know how much I think about you.” Her eyes grew wide, and I realized what I said. “A-as a friend!”

Her cheeks flushed red as she grinned. “Sure you do!” She got up from the swing. “It’s getting late, so I’m gonna go home.”

I jumped out of the swing. “Want me to walk you there?”

Sarang nodded. “Of course!”

The walk was silent, and Sarang kept bumping into me while on the sidewalk. I retaliated by bumping her back. She puffed her cheeks, holding back a laugh as she did it.

After dropping her off at her home, I walked inside my house with the biggest smile on my face. Man, I like that girl!

My smile fell away when I saw Grandpa sitting at our dining table with his arms cross.

“So, did you get the milk?”

Ah shit.

“Hey Y-Yuri?” A stuttering girl I barely recognized approached me after school. “I wanted to apologize to you about something. Can we t-talk?”

“I guess?” I wasn’t in a hurry or anything. “What’s up?”

“I-it’s about what I said a few months ago. I’ve seen you and Nari talk normally in-between classes, and I was wondering if I could take you up on your offer from that day!” She shouted the last part, but I was still confused.

Have we ever talked before?

“Yeah, you’re gonna have to explain better than that. I don’t even know who you are.”

“S-sorry!” The girl led me to a bench, and the two of us sat down. “I’m Baek Hyejin, and we’re in the same class. I’m also Haru’s g…I’m dating your friend Haru!”

“Oh yeah!” I nodded, pretending like I remembered her.

What? She’s someone who obviously knows who I am. I’d look like a dick if I told the truth now!

Hyejin’s eyes lit up with happiness. “You remember!” Yup. Totally. “And I still don’t know what offer you’re talking about.”

“My fault! I should’ve said that part first!” She’s really awkward, and I can tell she’s not the best at talking to people. “I don’t know if you remember, but we talked the day you defended Clover in the classroom.”

I acted like I was thinking about it. “Go on…”

“And I said that guys and girls couldn’t be friends.”

Okay, now that I remember.

“Oh yeah! Then I asked you if you wanted to be my friend.” Wait, that really was a few months ago. “You seriously still remember that?”

“I do!” She started fumbling with her fingers. “You’re not the easiest guy to approach, but after seeing you talk more in class—especially to someone like Nari—I thought that maybe we could be friends!”

I wasn’t sure why, but something about Hyejin felt off to me. “Did Haru put you up to this or something?”

Her expression turned dark. “No, but I did wanna ask you about him, and…how he usually acts around other girls.”

Now that’s gonna be hard to talk about.

Hyejin continued. “I’ve been dating Haru for a while now, but lately he’s seemed really distant. I’ve asked him a few times if something was wrong. Each time, he smiles at me and says that it’s nothing. I’ve brought this up twice, and I’m scared that if I ask him again, he’ll think I’m clingy and annoying. That’s why I came to you instead! You’re his friend, so you might know something that can help me out!” Her eyes lit up, filled with hope.

What a dilemma!

I’m surprised that she doesn’t already know about Haru’s experience with girls. He’s a player that’s not afraid to hide the fact. I wanted to reiterate this to her but selling out my friend to the girl he’s dating just isn’t right. It’s not my place to mess with his relationship.

“Haru’s a good guy, but everyone’s got their faults.” But, I don’t want to lie to her. “He might open up to you eventually.” I don’t want to lie to her. “It’ll just take some time.”

Don’t do this to her, Yuri. She’s walking into a heartbreak and you know it.

“Dammit!” I got up from the bench, cursing at myself. “This is why I don’t do relationships. The drama is just too much!” I turned back to Hyejin. My sudden outburst must’ve scared her. “Listen, and I’m only gonna say this once.” She nodded nervously. “Haru’s cool and all. He probably likes you a little, or else he wouldn’t have gone out with you at all. You know Pinkie, right? I mean Nari? That is her brother. He’s a lot nicer than her, but he’s just as devious on the inside as she is, you got that?”

“B-but Haru’s the nicest boyfriend I’ve ever had! He feels like the first guy to really love me.” I didn’t plan on trying to crush her belief in him. I just didn’t wanna see another girl moping around on a Monday morning just because Haru got interested in another girl.

For all I know, he might already have another poor girl in his sights.

I looked at her in pity. I didn’t know anything about her, but I could probably feel her abandonment issues from miles away if I left her right now.

I said, “If he’s the nicest, then I’d hate to meet the meanest one.”

Hyejin broke eye contact. “He was a jerk. I hate that I still have to see him in the hallways here.”

I glanced at the school, then back to her. “He goes here?”

“Yeah, he does. We dated for a few months, then he broke up with me after seeing what I looked like without make up on. He said I looked like someone from that Japanese horror movie where a girl comes out of a TV.”

I tried to look mad for her, but I was laughing at that insult on the inside. Thinking back to middle school, I used to say stuff like that to my friends. “If it weren’t for him breaking up with you, I’d call that hilarious.”

Hyejin giggled. “I would’ve too!”

“Wow, Yuri! Now you’re trying to steal my girlfriend away from me?” I felt someone suddenly jump on my back, and I wrestled to try and get the laughing Haru off. “Woah there! You won’t get rid of me that easily!” After a minute of messing around, Haru asked, “So the two of you sure looked like you were enjoying yourselves here!” He looked at Hyejin, causing her face to flush red.

“W-we were just talking about my ex! I wanted to see what Yuri thought about something he said to me forever ago.”

Haru squinted his eyes in suspicion, then bursting into a wide smile. “Then it sounds like you went to the right guy!” He pat me on the back. “You’re pretty good when it comes to looking back at the past, aren’t you?” I sensed a hint of malice in his words. “I actually wanted to talk to you about something today!” He winked at Hyejin.

“O-oh! Then I’ll see the two of you later!” She quickly gave Haru a kiss on the cheek and left the school.

Now it was just Haru and I standing beside this bench near the front of the school.

“Yuri,” Haru started, “I’ve been thinking about a lot of stuff lately. I’ve said this before, but relationships usually get boring for me after the first two or three weeks. The love is there at first, then everything starts to settle into a boring routine where nothing new seems to happen. That’s why other than general attractiveness, I don’t have much of a standard when it comes to the girls I date.

“I’ve been approached for my looks, money, and a few other things before. I even thought that being used like that would bring some spice to my life!” Haru laughed, but he sounded like he was in pain. “What’s the point in being attractive or having all this money if I can’t attract a girl I can love and feel comfortable around?”

Out of guilt I asked, “What about Hyejin? I only talked to her today, but she seems pretty cool.”

“She’s alright. I only started dating her to find out what Sis was doing to Sarang.” Haru stopped talking to stare at me. “Oh wait, I think I forgot to tell you about that! My bad!” Haru gave a light bow for an apology. “Once I found out, I sent a text to Sora since at the time, I thought he’d be the perfect person to calm my sister down. Now I realize that I should’ve been paying more attention to what she was doing.”

Haru smirked. “If I don’t pay attention, you could end up being my brother before I know it!”

Now it was my turn to laugh. “As if. I don’t hate your sister. I just can’t imagine the two of us as a couple.”

“Fair! It’s probably hard for you to see her in a romantic way when you’ve already got a girl on your mind, right?” Haru bent his knees and used the light of the sun to make a butterfly shadow puppet on the ground. “You like Sarang, and there’s a tangible chance that she likes you back. Even so, why haven’t you asked her out yet?”

“Because—” I cut myself off. Whenever Haru would ask me why I was single in the past, I’d tell him that it had to do with my first crush and my fear of being left behind. Now that I’ve gotten to see Chunhwa again, I have to ask myself:

Why am I hesitating?

“As for my other question,” Haru continued. “You’re pretty close to Sis now, but what if you’d gotten close to her before meeting Sarang? Would you have considering going out with her then?” He’s seriously trying to probe me for an answer about his sister.

Might as well be honest about it.

“I still wouldn’t. I can see how messed up she is after getting rejected by Sora for the last time, and I wouldn’t wanna take advantage of her while she’s like this. Sure, it would be easy to just waltz on over to her and say that I wanna be in a relationship with her, but that’s not what I want.” I remembered how Chunhwa made me feel all those years ago, along with what I was able to do for Sarang that evening in the part. “I’d want a relationship where I can lean on someone if I need to. At the same time, I wanna be someone that can be trusted too.”

Haru slowly nodded at my words. “That’s really admirable. That side of you is part of why I respect you so much. On the other hand, there’s a non-zero chance that you might miss your shot at dating if you take too long to make up your mind. Take me for example. I may get into boring ass relationships, but I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve wondered what could have happened. If you take too long, Sarang could end up dating a different guy who asks her out.” He smirked. “It could be any guy. Even me.”

“Yuri, you there?” Reily’s worry for me was written all over her face on my phone. “You’re usually a little out of it when we’re studying, but this is a little more than usual.”

“Damn, sorry about that.” I’ve been distracted since my conversation with Haru earlier. He said he was “joking” about Sarang dating him. I don’t think he’d ask her out, but something was different about Haru today. “I’ve just got a lot on mind tonight.”

“Well, if you ever wanna talk about it, I’m here for you.”

“Thanks, Reily.” Unlike Haru, Reily felt like her usual self while we studied tonight. “That means a lot to me.”

“Actually!” Reily suddenly sounded excited. “Are you free this weekend?”

“Pretty much. I wasn’t gonna do anything besides go to the gym.”

“T-the gym, huh?” Reily’s eyes looked ready to pop out of her head. “Do you go often?”

“Yeah. Grandpa got me into the habit, and I just like staying in shape, y’know?”

“I see. I see.” Reily was hiding the bottom half of her face now. “Yuri, I have a very important question for you.”

“What’s up?”

“We’re friends, right?”

“Yup.”

“And friends should help each other out every now and then, right?”

“I’d agree, yeah.”

“Then for my pure, pure heart, I need to know how fit you are.”

“Oh, that’s it? I thought you were gonna ask something crazier.”

“Me? I’d never! It’s just a little casual curiosity. Nothing crazy!”

I pat my stomach. “It’s pretty rock solid.” I heard a slight squeal come from her. “Woah. I know you were worried about me just now, but are you okay?”

“I’m fine! Totally fine!” She tried to play off her weirdness. I pretended to think hard about it. “Okay! I’ll tell you what’s up.” Her eyes darted down. “As you probably know, you’re a pretty handsome guy. Your arms are toned, and I’ve even been distracted by them while we’ve talked before. W-what I’m saying is—I like talking to a guy with some meat on his bones!”

I was speechless, and Reily seemed surprised to not hear my usual comebacks. A lot of people don’t know this about me, but I’m very weak to compliments. Hearing rumors about myself is a completely different experience from hearing someone compliment me to my face. It feels more genuine that way.

I needed to compliment her back.

What would Haru say at a time like this? He’d just say the same compliment back, right?

“You’re handsome too.” Fuck, wait— “No, I meant to say that you’re beautiful!” Good job. Now…keep going! “You’re really smart, and I’m glad that you’re always willing to help a dumbass like me out with their homework.”

“You’re not a dumbass, Yuri! Well, maybe only half of the time.” We started laughing.

“Whatever you say, miss muscle fetish.”

“You listen here.” Reily puffed her cheeks in fake anger. “It’s not a fetish! I’m just a healthy girl with taste! If a man can’t throw me in the air like I’m an acrobat, then what’s the point?”

We spent the next few minutes laughing and making fun of each other. We laughed so much that I might need to skip the gym this weekend with how much my abs hurt.

After calming down, I said “I think we both need to get out more.”

“You’re so right about that.” Reily’s grey eyes seemed to glow with excitement. “In fact, I think we both need to get out this sometime this weekend. We could drop the studying and go see a movie or something.”

“Sounds good to me. I won’t make it to senior year if the Three Kingdoms are shoved down my throat every night.”

Reily giggled. “I didn’t know you were into that.”

I pretended to gasp. “Was that a dirty joke from Miss Reily? I thought girls were supposed to be pure!”

“Whoever told you that was a liar! Either way, it looks like I’m getting too comfortable around you.” She started to play with one of her braids. “That’s not exactly a bad thing, either.”

I liked the thought of having another female friend other than Pinkie that I could be myself around. “You’re right. I like it.”

Reily yawned. “I’m tired. The graphs can wait for another day. Good night, ab man!”

“Go to sleep, muscle girl!”

“You’re across from Sarang’s house, so I’ll come to you tomorrow!” She waved before ending the call.

Now to sleep—

Wait.

Did she just ask me out on a date?