Boyfriends

“Next time, I’ll come to your place.”

“What? You don’t have to. I can come to yours.”

I stopped walking and stared up at Han Gangun.

He halted mid-step and turned to look at me.

“What?”

“You used to do this with your girlfriends all the time.”

“Huh?”

Han Gangun looked caught off guard.

“You’d walk them home.
Then you’d go to their house in the morning so you could walk to school together.
Isn’t that what you always did with your girlfriends?”

“…You’re not wrong.”

I looked at Han Gangun for a moment before starting to walk again.

I passed him.

“I’m not your girlfriend.”

“…”

“We’ll take turns walking each other to school.”

I could feel his gaze burning into my back.

The farther we walked downhill, the more students in the same school uniform filled the streets.

The road grew busier.

The morning sun was already warm.

A moment later, Han Gangun caught up behind me.

He lightly bumped my shoulder.

“So…
you do like walking to school together.”

“…Of course I don’t mind.”

“Then what are you?”

“Huh?”

“What are you to me?”

The thoughts drifting lazily through my head came to an abrupt stop.

Han Gangun walked past me, then turned around to face me while walking backward.

Tilting his head, he asked again.

“What are you to me?”

“…A friend.”

“A friend?”

“I don’t know. Why are you asking?”

“Come on. What are you?”

One awkward word immediately came to mind.

“…Your boyfriend.”

The moment I said it, I walked past him again.

A soft laugh drifted from behind me.

Han Gangun hurried after me.

He slung an arm around my shoulders, pulling me against his side.

It made walking awkward, but I didn’t complain.

I simply stayed tucked against him and kept walking.

“Man…

This is making my heart race.”

“…”

“It’s my first time having a boyfriend.”

Still talking, we reached the crosswalk and waited for the light.

When it turned green, we crossed shoulder to shoulder with the crowd of students.

It still didn’t feel real.

Maybe this was what people meant when they said something felt like a dream.

The unrealness of the morning left me strangely disoriented.

It felt surreal having Han Gangun walking beside me.

He smiled brightly at me after saying,

“It’s my first time having a boyfriend.”

And just like that…

My relationship with Han Gangun began.

[Today’s lunch is f*cking awful.]

A folded note landed on my desk during English class.

I discreetly looked up.

The teacher was writing on the board.

Leaning slightly behind the student sitting in front of me, I picked up my pen.

[What is it?]

I passed the note back.

Just as I was about to place my hand back on my desk, someone grabbed it.

Warm fingers completely wrapped around my hand.

Han Gangun kneaded my hand playfully.

Only after his fingertips brushed mine did he take the note back.

I absentmindedly rubbed the hand his warmth had lingered on.

Holding my pen, I idly scribbled English words in the corner of my textbook.

When the teacher told us to repeat after him, I read the vocabulary written on the board.

The back of my neck burned.

[Grilled mackerel.]

[That smell is brutal.]

[LOL I need to make a good impression on Seo Ijae.]

[I can’t go around smelling like fish.]

The change that had happened overnight felt strange.

Yesterday, Han Gangun had pretended not to know me.

He’d barely spoken to me.

Then overnight…

we’d started dating.

Was this what dating was like?

Dating.

Han Gangun.

My heart suddenly began pounding.

It beat so hard my stomach fluttered.

Hunching over my desk, I reread every word he’d written.

“…”

But then…

A memory suddenly flashed through my mind.

The Gucci shopping bag Han Gangun had been carrying.

The box of chocolates in his hand.

The confession he’d said he’d received.

What had happened with all of that?

I’d been so caught up in everything happening to me that I’d completely forgotten about it.

But now…

it might’ve been one of the most important questions between us.

[I heard some senior confessed to you.]

[What happened with that?]

I hurriedly scribbled the question onto the note and passed it back.

This time, I carefully placed it on the edge of the desk, making sure our hands didn’t touch.

Without thinking, I started picking at my fingernail.

I bit at the edge until the skin split.

I fiddled with the loose piece of skin.

What would he write back?

While my foot bounced nervously beneath the desk, the note slid back to me.

It slipped down my shoulder and landed in my lap.

I quickly unfolded it.

[I got confessed to. That’s all.]

“Hey…”

Before I realized what I was doing, I turned around and called out to Han Gangun.

Startled, he looked back at me.

The English teacher stopped reading from the textbook and looked up.

The classroom fell silent as though a ghost had just walked through it.

“You two in the back. Stand up.”

The teacher slapped his textbook down on the podium.

I squeezed my eyes shut.

“Ijae. Han Gangun. Stand up.”

“Yes, sir.”

The scrape of a chair echoed behind me.

Han Gangun stood first.

I reluctantly stood after him.

I crumpled the note tightly in my hand and stuffed it into my pocket.

The teacher tapped his pointer against the podium.

“You two have been making noise this whole time, haven’t you?”

“…I’m not sure.”

“What do you mean you’re not sure?”

The teacher shot back immediately.

“You’ve been disrupting class.”

“…”

“Both of you. Out into the hallway.”

The classroom was silent.

Han Gangun cleared his throat.

Near my ear, I heard a whisper.

“Let’s go.”

After whispering that, Han Gangun walked out first.

I’d never imagined I’d be scolded for causing a disturbance during class.

Something like that was never supposed to happen to someone like me.

Keeping my head lowered, I followed him out.

Click.

The classroom door closed.

Now it was just the two of us in the long hallway.

The corridor was quiet, broken only by muffled sounds drifting out from the surrounding classrooms.

Han Gangun looked at me standing there blankly and let out a snort.

I turned to him with an incredulous look.

His fingertip lightly poked my cheek.

“What?”

“Seriously, you…”

“You two. Even out there.”

The classroom door slid open again.

The English teacher stuck his head out into the hallway.

Holding his pointer, he pointed at us…

then at the floor by the shoe lockers.

He was telling us to kneel.

While I quietly knelt down, Han Gangun did the same, though he made no effort to hide the grin spreading across his face.

“Three demerit points each.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Hands up.”

“Yes, sir.”

Han Gangun answered louder than I did.

I squeezed my eyes shut and raised my hands.

No one was even watching us, yet I still felt embarrassed.

I never thought I’d be receiving the same punishment I’d gotten back in elementary school…

now that I was in high school.

“Hands down.”

Once the teacher went back inside, we were alone again.

Han Gangun gently grabbed my wrist and lowered my arm.

I shook my head and lightly brushed his hand away.

Then I raised my arm again.

Han Gangun started chuckling.

“What are you laughing at?”

“Because it’s funny.”

“What’s funny?”

“This.”

He stretched his neck toward the far end of the hallway to make sure no one was coming.

Then, in a whisper only I could hear, he said,

“So…
I got confessed to?”

Han Gangun, who’d been absentmindedly running a hand through his bangs, glanced over at me.

The corner of his mouth twitched upward.

Lowering his voice to match mine, he replied,

“I did.”

“…”

“But so what?
It’s not like I said yes.”

The words he’d written—

I got confessed to. That’s all.

—crossed my mind.

“That’s what I meant.”

“…Hey.”

“I gave the Gucci wallet back.”

“…”

“So that should’ve answered her, right?”

I could feel Han Gangun watching me out of the corner of his eye.

When I finally looked up, he met my gaze with half-lidded eyes, amusement dancing in them.

“I’m not that much of a jerk.”

“…”

“Man…
this is hilarious.”

He started laughing quietly again.

His muffled laughter made me fight back a smile of my own.

“So that’s why you got so worked up?
Because of that?”

“I didn’t say it that loudly.”

“You totally did.”

Whatever was so funny, Han Gangun couldn’t stop smiling.

Eventually, I started laughing too.

At some point, the arm I’d been holding up had already fallen halfway.

“Han Gangun.”

“Yeah?”

“Why do you like me?”

The question escaped me before I could stop it.

I’d wanted to know for so long.

It was only natural that I liked Han Gangun.

But there was nothing natural about Han Gangun liking me.

Why?

Why would he like someone like me?

What was there to like?

Buried beneath the question was a quiet trace of self-loathing.

Disbelief.

Confusion.

Han Gangun stayed silent for a long while.

Still looking ahead, he finally spoke.

“Because you’re different.”

His gaze shifted toward me.

He looked straight into my eyes.

“You just…

make me want to touch you.”

“…”

“Your cheeks.

Your jaw.

Your arms.

Your hands.”

His dark eyes slowly traveled downward, starting from the top of my head.

They swept over my face.

Paused on my nose and lips.

Moved to my jaw…

Then my cheeks.

Then my earlobe.

His gaze slid down the line of my neck…

all the way to my legs…

before slowly returning to my face.

“Even now.”