Unrequited Love Obsession Diary - Chapter 66

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 66

“What?”

“Never mind. If you didn’t hear it, forget it.”

The path to the building where their next class was held split in the middle.

Yeon-jae stopped walking. At almost the same timing, Dohan also stopped.

“I’m going this way.”

“Ah, okay.”

As Dohan, who had turned his back first, moved away, Yeon-jae also naturally headed in the opposite direction.

After taking a few steps completely alone, Yeon-jae belatedly recalled what Dohan had said earlier.

‘Your heart is somewhere else?’

She had definitely heard it, but no matter how much she mulled it over, it didn’t feel like it was about her at all.

Unable to understand it in the end, Dohan’s words quickly faded in Yeon-jae’s mind.

Instead, Hyeonoh’s confession, which came to mind constantly whenever she was alone, took its place.

“I like you.”

“When I came to my senses, I was already liking you.”

“That I like you enough to be jealous of Lee Do-han.”

That confession, which was straightforward like him but uncharacteristically immature, unlike him.

* * *

“Why didn’t I think of this sooner?”

“Right. We always met at the meeting place.”

“How stupid.”

The two people who always met at their meeting place went out together from home for the first time.

And currently, they were sitting side by side at an empty bus stop, waiting for the bus.

Yeon-jae was in a tense state.

It wasn’t just because of the fact that it was a date.

Yeon-jae had decided to confess today.

It was the last date she had promised with Hyeonoh.

The content of the bet wasn’t really important anymore.

But Hyeonoh had said it. To help him.

If this confession was the way to help Hyeonoh give up, then she had to confess to Dohan as soon as possible, even a day earlier.

And regardless of whatever had happened with Hyeonoh, Dohan was still Dohan.

Although she had been confused for a moment because of Hyeonoh’s confession, what was complicated was her mind, not her heart.

Yeon-jae’s feelings for Dohan remained the same.

She couldn’t even imagine herself liking someone other than Dohan. How could she dare to like someone else?

So today, Yeon-jae had made up her mind to confess as Hyeonoh had said.

It was good timing for everyone. Since it was their second date, there was no better moment to confess than now.

It was a matter that didn’t require hesitation.

‘But why do I keep feeling uneasy?’

It felt like she was missing something important.

Something very important and incredibly precious.

“Yeon-jae, what are you thinking about?”

“….”

“Yeon-jae?”

“Ah, senior. I was just spacing out.”

“You’ve been spacing out a lot lately.”

“Ah… have I?”

“Yeah. You have.”

Yeon-jae thought about how she must have appeared to others over the past few days.

Her train of thought naturally led to the cause that had made her so absent-minded.

‘Hyeonoh senior…’

And then, despite being in front of Dohan, whom she liked, she would become lost in thought again.

All of it was thoughts about Hyeonoh.

* * *

“Should we just walk around?”

Dohan asked when they arrived at the park.

It was the weather right before it would get hot.

The news had been going on about how this week would be the last good weather for outdoor activities before the real summer began.

The Han River was teeming with people.

Looking around at the surroundings, there wasn’t even space to spread out a mat.

“Yes, that sounds good.”

Yeon-jae nodded.

They walked avoiding the bicycle path. However, there were many people walking too. After bumping shoulders with passing pedestrians several times, Dohan wrapped his arm around Yeon-jae’s outer shoulder and pulled her inward.

The hand that had been holding her shoulder soon dropped.

Eventually, it moved to Yeon-jae’s hand.

“I felt like I might lose you if I didn’t do this.”

Dohan added like an excuse. Yeon-jae found this fact surprising.

Dohan had an image of someone who would never make excuses for anything.

Yeon-jae looked down at her hand held by Dohan with a reddened face.

Yeon-jae was on the right side, but Dohan was looking to the left. His right earlobe was similar in color to Yeon-jae’s face.

After walking for a while along the path where cars and bicycles were prohibited, there were indeed some spots along the Han River where people were sparse.

Only when it became sparse enough that their shoulders wouldn’t bump into passing pedestrians did Dohan let go of Yeon-jae’s hand.

Like the saying “you don’t know what you have until it’s gone,” the hand that Dohan’s warmth had touched and then left felt cool.

“Are you good at riding bicycles?”

“Yes. As much as others do. What about you, senior?”

“Me too, about that much.”

“Aren’t you being too modest? You seem to go to the gym almost every day, senior.”

“That’s exercise I do to survive.”

“I should exercise a bit too.”

“You’re still young. Take it slow.”

“…It’s only a two-year difference.”

“Two years is long. Two years ago, Seoul’s slogan wasn’t that.”

Dohan pointed to the slogan that read ‘Seoul My Soul’ in front of them.

Was that so? Yeon-jae had no memory of Seoul’s slogan from two years ago.

Suddenly, Yeon-jae carefully thought about what she had done during the past two years.

Age twenty.

She had printed and stuck a sticker with the logo of the university Dohan was attending on her desk and studied.

Age twenty-one.

She had somehow entered university, but Dohan had gone to the military and wasn’t there.

Naturally, her grand plan to proceed with the “dating Dohan project” had all come to nothing.

Excluding that, Yeon-jae, who had no other plans for university life, just did what was a student’s duty: studying.

‘What? I really lived such a boring life.’

And during those two years, Yeon-jae’s mind had been filled entirely with thoughts about Dohan.

There was no room for something like Seoul’s slogan to squeeze in.

‘How was this year.’

March, when I was filled with anticipation about finally taking classes with Dohan.

Right from the very beginning of the new semester, Hyeonoh caught me with a notebook where I had written down every little detail about Dohan.

And through Hyeonoh’s inexplicable goodwill, many things I had only dreamed of in my imagination since middle school became reality.

Eating together, watching movies, studying, taking walks, and even now I was with Dohan.

But was it really just Dohan alone?

No.

I had also become close with classmates including Si-eun.

I had eaten with Hyeonoh too, joked around, shared trivial reports, laughed and chatted….

It was when I was letting my shoulders droop with a troubled heart.

“Did I tell you specifically how Hyeonoh and I became friends?”

‘Hyeonoh’s’ name popped out of Dohan’s mouth as if it had been called incorrectly.

Yeon-jae was startled, thinking Dohan had read his thoughts.

“I only mentioned that I attended the language academy run by Senior Hyeonoh’s mother….”

“Ah. So you only told him that much.”

Even during this time, people continued to pass by them or walk in the same direction.

“I had a pretty bad personality back then, you know?”

“What? You did, senior?!”

“Yeah. I actually have a pretty bad personality.”

Dohan replied with a playful smile.

“Not at all! In my life… you’re the first person I’ve met with such a good personality, senior! And you’re wonderful too! So that’s absolutely not true…!”

“It’s nice that you see me that way though?”

Dohan only smiled with his mouth. His eyes remained the same.

“After classes at the language academy, I wouldn’t go straight home and would stay alone in an empty classroom for a long time. Then Kang Hyeon-o came to help his mother with cleaning and discovered me. So he opened the door and asked why I wasn’t going home. So what do you think I said.”

“Hmm, well. I’m not sure. I’m really not good at these kinds of guesses….”

Dohan shrugged and continued speaking.

Like someone who thought Yeon-jae wouldn’t be able to guess the right answer anyway.

“Get lost.”

“What?!”

“I told him not to talk to me and to get lost.”

Having said that much, Dohan laughed heartily as if quite pleased with the joke he had thrown out.

Yeon-jae, on the other hand, couldn’t believe there had been a time when Dohan was sharp enough to tell others to get lost.

“But that kid Kang Hyeon-o didn’t get lost, did he?”

Yeon-jae imagined young Hyeonoh who would have persistently tried to talk even after being told to get lost.

It suited him so well that he almost forgot about becoming awkward with Hyeonoh and nearly laughed.

“At that time I was doing a homestay, and back in Korea my mom and dad were in the middle of divorce mediation. Both of them said they couldn’t raise me, so I ended up going to Canada for language study for a while. In short, I was abandoned.”

Yeon-jae moved his mouth a couple of times, but in the end couldn’t say anything and closed it again.

“So I hated Canada, hated English, hated that kid who kept talking to me, it was that kind of period. I guess I went through puberty a bit early. Eventually dad ended up raising me, and even now he’s still feeling sorry about what happened back then.”

I had only heard that he lived alone with his father and was an only child, but this was the first time hearing such intimate details about Dohan’s family situation.

“Anyway, I ignored Kang Hyeon-o for almost 2 weeks, but one day on the way home from the academy, some white kids picked a fight with me. It wasn’t the first or second time experiencing racial discrimination, so I tried to ignore them and pass by as usual.”

“….”

“But suddenly Kang Hyeon-o butted in, pushed those guys away and started cursing at them. And as soon as those guys left, he got angry at me instead, asking why I just stood there. That was the first time I thought it might be good to be friends with a kid like this. He was completely different from me. So I went to Hyeonoh’s house to hang out that very day. That’s how we became friends.”

“….”

“I asked him later when I got a bit older, you know? Why he kept trying to talk to someone who clearly didn’t like it. Kang Hyeon-o said this.”

“….”

“Just because.”

“…Just because?”

“Yeah. Just because.”

“….”

“He said he was bored too. He really wanted to make a Korean friend his age. What a ridiculous excuse. He already had tons of friends regardless of race or nationality.”

Right now Dohan was the most talkative among all the sides of Dohan that Yeon-jae had seen.

Dohan was usually a man of few words.

But now, when he was rarely talking a lot, the protagonist of all those many stories was entirely Hyeonoh.

Yeon-jae thought he didn’t understand why Dohan was suddenly chattering about stories of Hyeonoh that he had never mentioned before.

Moreover, right now Dohan seemed like someone who needed to say those words at this very moment.

“Kang Hyeon-o could clearly see my situation too.”

“….”

“Honestly speaking, Kang Hyeon-o didn’t want to hurt me. He’s a good guy anyway.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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