Chapter 6
B Side ◀◀
I know Ji Yeon-seo.
Considering the various nuances embedded in the verb “know,” it would be most accurate to say that I possessed knowledge or information about Ji Yeon-seo. Even that, however, was largely incidental—things I came to know not by choice, but by circumstance.
The first time I saw Ji Yeon-seo was one December, when my transfer had been confirmed and I was looking for a new home with my older brother.
It was a time when the year-end holidays or Christmas were of no concern to me. My brother, with eyes swollen from crying all night, would somehow manage to smile in front of me the next day as if nothing had happened.
“Let’s pick a clean, new place.”
What did it matter if it was a bit messy or risky for two guys living together? My brother insisted and went to great lengths to find a home.
I was barely eighteen, and the only cards I held were all undeveloped, leaving me bitter at my own impotence. Bitter as I was, I caught sight of her on the way out of the real estate office.
“New unni, I like cocoa in white milk the best.”
A little girl wearing glasses and dressed as a Christmas tree was holding a strawberry milk in one hand and speaking to a girl she called “new unni.”
“That’s because your taste buds aren’t fully developed yet. The best flavors are always the ones that come straight from nature. Strawberry milk is made from real strawberries, so it’s naturally less rich than chocolate milk.”
Strawberry milk, of course, was a processed product, loaded with additives.
The little girl with glasses nodded in understanding while sipping her chocolate milk. The girl who had corrected her misperception looked quietly pleased and slurped the straw from the strawberry milk carton.
She drank it so sweetly that even my own bitter mouth seemed to taste a faint sweetness.
The second time I saw Ji Yeon-seo was at the end of February, just before the new semester, on the way back from buying my new school uniform.
At home, my brother lay passed out from having consumed an entire bottle of soju he hadn’t even touched before. My steps quickened, and she suddenly appeared in my line of sight.
She looked as if she had just emerged from a hot bath, her skin clear and luminous, her face radiant. She held a bath basket in one hand, arm-in-arm with her mother, hurrying along, strawberry milk in the other hand.
Ji Yeon-seo liked strawberry milk.
That was the first piece of information I learned about her unintentionally.
On the first day at the new school, my impression was simple: it was noisy. Girls peeking into hallways or whispering in small groups—these were no different from what I had seen at my previous school. Nothing felt unfamiliar or special.
What annoyed me was that I would have to endure the same kind of disturbances I had worked hard to keep quiet in my old school.
Making friends was never difficult if I gave brief, casual responses to those who approached. I was accustomed to kindness. My past experiences had shaped me into someone who could still maintain social skills, as if through a habit born of courtesy.
Be kind to others, especially girls. Mind your manners. Since you have advantages, it’s your duty, Seokyung. This was how I had been educated, ingrained into me like second nature.
Even while making friends, attending class, eating meals, or walking along the streets, my thoughts were elsewhere.
I constantly thought about betrayal.
The power of a few to overturn the many, the force of decades undone in mere months. Did betrayal shape people, or did people’s actions attach those meanings to the word? How those who betrayed and were betrayed would systematically destroy their surroundings.
“How can they do that? How…” That was what my brother said most often at the time.
It was during a brief rest on the stairs beneath the basketball court shade when one of the group pointed and spoke. At the tip of his finger was a girl.
“Who’s that?”
I didn’t know her name, but I knew her face. I knew she attended the same school; I saw her every morning passing by the main gate in our school uniform.
But without a name, I couldn’t claim to know her.
“Ji Yeon-seo. Kim Eun-ho’s ex-girlfriend.”
“She broke up before winter break, didn’t she?”
“Didn’t you see Kim Eun-ho kneeling down begging her to get back together?”
“Didn’t you notice Ji Yeon-seo throwing a fit?”
“You don’t get it, man. No girl would really say no to someone like Kim Eun-ho. Apparently, they just had a minor love quarrel. She’s picky, always testing him. That guy… I don’t get why he likes her, ugh…”
I recalled a boy who had scrutinized her with contempt on my first day. Was that Kim Eun-ho? Even if we were in the same class, I had no thought or patience to learn names, so I guessed.
“I thought Kim Eun-ho was just shallowly handsome, but seeing him cling to Ji Yeon-seo changed my mind. The kid has loyalty or pure love or something. Crying in front of someone you like… I couldn’t do that even if my pride demanded it.”
“Why? I get it with Ji Yeon-seo. She’s the—”
The boys’ lively chatter abruptly stopped, as if a taboo word hung in the air, their eyes shifting nervously.
“Anyway, Seokyung, you just transferred, so watch out for her. Forget everything else; if you get involved, it’ll be a headache. Everyone in the school knows how obsessed Kim Eun-ho is.”
“Seokyung? That kid’s no match for you.”
Laughter erupted among them.
“Still, she’s not the kind of girl you’d like, Ji Yeon-seo.”
I turned to see Ji Yeon-seo climbing the stairs to the playground, earbuds in, long lashes blinking as if lost in thought. Her pale skin shimmered in the spring sunlight, ephemeral as if she could vanish at any moment.
“I’m not interested in girls like that.”
And that lack of interest wasn’t limited to Ji Yeon-seo alone.
Other girls were the same. Random introductions, bold declarations of affection—they left no impression on me. I couldn’t recall whether their hair was tied or loose, long or short, what year they were in, or even the names they proudly announced. Even if one of them shaved her head, I wouldn’t have felt anything remarkable.
I had little interest in the opposite sex, and I certainly had no desire to waste time on romance. That wasn’t why I transferred. I had no intention of playing along with childish confession games.
At that time, I was completely hollow.
My emptiness contained nothing but resentment and incomprehension, amorphous feelings that drifted and became hollow breaths. I didn’t feel as if I could take a full breath. No matter how deeply I inhaled and exhaled, it was never satisfying.
I had no goals, will, desires, or hunger. Nothing stirred inside me, like a frozen sea.
When awake, I moved deliberately; when not, I slept for long stretches. Despite unprecedented sleep, my body felt as if it hadn’t rested, numb.
Ji Yeon-seo’s presence in my field of vision was less a coincidence than a matter of inevitability.
It wasn’t specifically about her. Things like this always caught the eye: misery, conspicuous isolation.
Only her pitiful figure registered with a kind of radar in my vision.
“Why is she always alone?” I muttered, surprised at my own question. How much did I really know her?
All I had were glimpses on the way to school, a few fleeting encounters at school, maybe five times at lunch buying strawberry milk instead of eating in the cafeteria.
Every time, Ji Yeon-seo was alone. Without exception.
“Why? Because she’s annoying,” I answered aloud, and fortunately, someone found it interesting enough to respond.
“You know JSB Entertainment? That idol company, August. Her dad’s the CEO.”
Because she was rich? It seemed childish to despise someone for that.
Besides, Myeongwon High, where I transferred thanks to my brother and mother’s insistence, was far from a low-level school. Tuition was two to three times higher than public schools.
Most students there likely weren’t struggling. Why bother resenting someone over it?
“She probably had friends in first grade. But she pissed off all the girls.”
“Because she’s pretty?”
I nearly surprised myself with my answer before someone else interjected incredulously.
“Ji Yeon-seo trained as a trainee at her dad’s agency in middle school. She quit after some incident. Girls were jealous, obviously.”
“She can be a bit rude too. She’s always doing annoying stuff. Gossip about her is all terrible. But with boys she likes, she’s sweet behind their backs. That’s how she seduced Kim Eun-ho. Acts indifferent in front of everyone. Damn.”
“Too bad she doesn’t do that to you? Then she’d think you were handsome.”
“Ah, whatever. She’s brazen.”
All trivial reasons. Nothing to pity, nothing worth noticing.
“Even you think she’s pretty, right?”
I wanted to ask the boy back: who would ever disagree? Whenever she appeared on the playground, hallway, or stairs, boys noticed her. They pretended not to, but their eyes always followed her.
And they couldn’t help it because…
“I get it with Ji Yeon-seo. She’s the—”
I didn’t need to hear the rest.
Ji Yeon-seo was beautiful.
Even without bias, she was undeniably attractive. Her fair skin, delicate features, long limbs, upright posture—all harmonized inescapably.
Aesthetic beauty, nothing more.
The reason she irritated some students became clear later.
A flower too bright closes its petals to hide from predators. If you are always conspicuous, you instinctively shrink.
She had no caution. She drew attention wherever she went, standing out like a protruding stone.
Even when I bought strawberry milk I barely liked, or threw balls on the playground, she caught my eye. On rainy days, when she left an umbrella behind or wore a plaster on her face, I had to go back and scold her.
She irritated me at every turn.
And yet, she made no effort to hide her presence.
Her pale skin, red lips, flushed cheeks. Her brown hair shining in sunlight, thin calves, long arms. The faint smile forming dimples, the sharp glance that could kill immature boys—all drew attention.
She seemed to know exactly how to command it.
Even when I took up badminton because no one else would, she looked at me, surprised. There must have been thirty boys who wanted to play with her.
Did she not notice? Or was she pretending not to?
She never shied away from disapproving stares or curses. She didn’t conceal her presence. She followed the shuttlecock, aware of everyone’s gaze, yet unbothered. She knew how to amplify interest.
When our eyes met, I remembered my face reflected in her brown, wet, earnest eyes, a plea for help in their wavering gaze.
Her pitiful, forlorn expression seemed deliberately designed to draw a hand from me. She seemed like someone who knew how to attract attention through misfortune, like someone I had known.
So I asked.
“Is that just how you are?”
Seeing pure anger flare in her bright eyes was, for some reason, satisfying.
“Hey, Cha Seokyung. You know me?”
Do you know me.
You like strawberry milk, you were the official outcast of Myeongwon High, and undeniably, you were beautiful. Perhaps naturally skilled at drawing attention, sometimes even enjoying it.
But that was all. I despised attention-seekers like Ji Yeon-seo. I already had two such people in my life.
I didn’t want to know her any more, truly.
