Chapter 11 : Love is an experience

The lunch on the cruise ship was quite satisfying, as Theron Cox had said the chef was from a famous hotel.
There was still time before the reception party.
Selene and Evelyn decided to wait in the VIP room on the top floor of the cruise ship, drinking tea.
Selene silently looked down at the churning waves from the highest floor of the cabin.
Theron Cox, whom she had momentarily forgotten due to the excellent lunch, came to mind again.

“You need to experience various emotions to express the sound richly.”

More precisely, it was his words that remained in her memory.
At the time, she was briefly tempted by the completely new approach, but now, upon reflection, her thoughts had changed.
She began to wonder if her sensitivity to her own emotions could be enriched simply by observing someone in love.
“What are you thinking so hard about?”
Evelyn, who was putting three sugar cubes in a row into her coffee, blinked her long eyelashes and looked at Selene.
“About the emotion of love.”
Despite Selene’s calm tone, Evelyn jostled the coffee cup she was holding as if she had heard earth-shattering news.
“Selene, you and love? Loooove?”
“If you’re going to make such a fuss, I won’t say anything.”
At the firm warning, Evelyn calmly put down her coffee cup and tried to suppress the sparkle in her eyes.
“Did a man who stole our cold lady’s heart finally appear? Tell me in detail.”
“There’s no such person. I just said I was thinking about the emotion of love.”
It was a very disappointing answer for Evelyn.
“Why were you suddenly thinking about love?”
Selene remained silent for a moment.
“I was wondering if I could understand the emotion of love just by observing others, without experiencing it myself.”
“Really… that’s a very you-like concern.”
Evelyn, having lost interest, picked up the coffee cup she had set down again.
“Evelyn, what do you think? Whether I can understand love just by observing others.”
“Well. You might be able to understand it to some extent, but a deep understanding would be difficult, wouldn’t it?”
Selene asked with an expressionless face.
“What’s the basis for that assumption?”
“Look, Selene. Even if you see someone with a beet-red face shouting, the best you can do is think, ‘Something must be really making them angry.’ In the end, you can’t fully empathize unless you’ve experienced something that makes you that angry yourself. Wouldn’t it be the same with love? You’d have to experience love firsthand to know what that great emotion is that everyone goes on about.”
Evelyn’s argument was quite persuasive.
“So, don’t look at it like some strange creature, and try dating lightly and meeting men.”
At Evelyn’s attitude, as if saying, ‘What would a naive girl like you know,’ Selene’s eyebrows furrowed in displeasure.
“It’s not that I’ve never loved.”
In fact, there were countless kinds of love.
Love for family was also love, and not being able to pass by something pitiful was also love.
In that sense, the love Evelyn was talking about was too one-dimensional.
But Evelyn immediately refuted Selene’s claim.
“That’s not scarlet love. The kind of love you’re talking about is completely different from erotic love.”
Evelyn seemed to be a love doctor.
She began to swing her teaspoon boldly, as if she were standing on a podium.
“Erotic feelings are much more intense and stimulating than you imagine, Selene.”
At this point, Selene regretted confiding in Evelyn.
She hadn’t wanted to hear a lecture.
But looking at Evelyn’s sparkling eyes, it seemed too late to stop her now.
“Not only do you laugh and cry as if you’re going between heaven and hell because of one person, but you can’t think of anything but that person all day long, and you start looking for them everywhere.”
“That’s not because of love, it’s because you’re crazy.”
“Right. Love makes you lose your mind. Sometimes to the point where you want to give up your lifelong dream and your life for them.”
Selene was unimpressed.
If that was love, she didn’t want any part of it.
Still, Evelyn’s lecture was somewhat helpful in that she could now understand a little better that the male protagonist, the narrator of ‘The Age of Love and Romance,’ wasn’t just a foolish person who neglected his wife, but was actually out of his mind because of that love.
“Besides, the biggest change is the body.”
“The body?”
“Yes. Just thinking about that person makes your body heat up as if it’s broken. And then your thighs start to feel tingly, and you wish for the other person to quench this thirst.”
Evelyn’s slyly opened eyes gradually turned more mischievous.
“You’ve never rubbed your thighs hard when you’re alone, have you, Selene?”
Selene’s eyebrows twitched.
“What are you trying to say?”
“Ah, I asked something I shouldn’t have. Of course you haven’t. Our naive little lady probably doesn’t even know how babies are made between a man and a woman.”
“I know. But I’ve never done the act you’re talking about.”
Evelyn giggled.
“Then you wouldn’t know even if I told you. What a blissful experience it is to do it with a man you love.”
A hesitant Selene uttered the word she was reluctant to say.
“Are you talking about s*x?”
“Yes. The thing men go crazy for.”
Selene could hardly follow Evelyn’s words.
There was a big contradiction in what she was saying.
“Men sleep with women they don’t love. So, it means that even if emotions are absent, there’s no problem in experiencing pleasure.”
As Selene pointed this out with furrowed brows, a sneer followed.
“Oh, how dare you compare, you who have never even loved. It’s completely different. The difference between s*x with love and without.”
“…”
“If you’re curious, hurry up and grab someone, fall in love, and experience it once.”
It was absurd advice.
Dismissing it like that wasn’t just because Selene didn’t particularly like the male species.
Rather, Selene was willing to experience love at least once, no matter how much she disliked men, if it would help improve her piano skills.
She could experience crying and then laughing like a crazy person like others, and when she felt it was enough, she could cut it off cleanly.
Like wiping her mouth and throwing away a used napkin.
But for Selene, that was similar to falling in love with a stone one day.
Evelyn, being very sensitive and enjoying meeting people, had quickly fallen in love and even gotten engaged, but that wasn’t something anyone could do.
‘And it’s not something that can be done in a short time.’
As the long conversation failed to provide a clear answer to her questions, Selene once again began to consider whether she should keep that man, Theron Cox, close and observe him.
“Or, it wouldn’t be bad to find a handsome man and just go straight for a kiss. Who knows? Maybe you’ll magically fall in love because of it?”
Evelyn advised, sipping the rest of her coffee.
“Actually, I emphasized love because I’m a romantic, but there are not a few cases where people experience the body first and then give their hearts.”
“That’s what I hate the most.”
Selene’s gaze turned cold for a moment.
Those who sleep around with this woman and that woman without a sense of responsibility.
Wasn’t that the reason she had shot at Theron Cox so coolly?
“Who told you to sleep around with anyone? Of course, you have to carefully choose just one person. And the other person has to have feelings for you too.”
At Evelyn’s explanation, Selene’s narrowed eyes gradually returned to their original state.
Yes, with that kind of approach, Evelyn’s advice wasn’t wrong.
Love isn’t necessarily required for a physical relationship, but it’s often said that a physical relationship can’t be separated from love.
As long as it’s not with many people, lightly, and deceiving the other person.
But it still didn’t appeal to her.
It’s not easy to find a partner or to make up one’s mind.
“Oh my, it’s already this late? Selene, we should start heading down. The reception is about to start.”
Selene, breaking from her thoughts, followed suit and checked the clock on the wall.
She would have to stay on this lump of iron for at least two more hours.
Just as the thought inadvertently crossed her mind that if she hadn’t come here today, she could have practiced the piano for eight more hours, Evelyn stood up and pulled Selene’s wrist.
“Let’s go quickly!”

Still, the reception was much calmer than the launching ceremony because only those with invitations could attend.
Musicians played a waltz on the edge of the deck, and men and women danced to it in the center, while others enjoyed cocktails or light drinks around them.
As Selene and Evelyn took their places, the glances of men inevitably followed.
Evelyn smiled at their gazes and asked Selene,

“What are you going to do if someone asks you to dance? It’s not a casual party, so you’ll have to dance at least one song.”

“I’ll pretend to faint.”

Since she had attended the reception party quietly, her grandmother would probably understand that much even if she heard about today’s events later.
At Selene’s sincere answer, Evelyn’s laughter grew louder.
However, contrary to Selene’s wish that no one would approach her because it was a bother, the sound of a man’s heels grew closer in their direction.
Soon, a man stood before them, and Selene, who was sipping a soda with lemon, gave him a look.
“Would you do me the honor of a dance, Miss Selene?”
The first person to bravely extend a hand to Selene from among the glancing men was Theron Cox, who had changed into a much neater suit than before.