episode_0004
by fnovelpiaShin Yu-jin’s hand habit of pressing his thumb with his index finger several times caught my eye.
Even while drinking coffee and when putting the coffee cup on the tray to tidy up the space.
That hand habit caught my eye several times.
Could it be that Shin Yu-jin, like me, returned 14 years ago?
If not for that assumption, Shin Yujin’s current hand habits cannot be explained.
“Yoo-chan.”
“Uh, yes. Why?”
“Now let’s get up.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
With the question still in my mind, I cleaned up the place and walked out of the cafe.
Considering the current atmosphere, Kim Ye-rim and Hojin are expected to spend time alone.
So, will I get to spend time with Shin Yujin?
If I hadn’t seen Shin Yu-jin’s hand habits, we would have spent time normally and then broken up like we did 14 years ago.
Now that I’ve seen those hand habits, it’s impossible to spend time thinking of myself as 20-year-old Shin Yujin.
“Me and Yerim are going to spend some time separately, but what are you going to do with Yujin and Yuchan?”
“Huh? what… ”
While she was thinking for a moment, Kim Ye-rim approached Shin Yu-jin and whispered something.
It seemed like Kim Ye-rim was trying to show her refusal by rebutting what she whispered, but Kim Ye-rim was constantly busy encouraging Shin Yu-jin.
So, Shin Yu-jin and I ended up spending time together walking along the street.
“If it’s uncomfortable, should we all go home?”
“… are you okay. But since we met like this, we walked for a bit and talked.”
“Ugh, yes. Yes.”
“Aren’t you uncomfortable, Mr. Yu-chan?”
“Yes, it’s not particularly uncomfortable.”
As the short silence came, no one tried to be the first to break it.
In my memory, it was 23-year-old me who guided the hesitant Shin Yu-jin through the time we spent together.
It made the atmosphere lighter and made the unfamiliar Shin Yu-jin smile.
Should we do the same now? Even though I know that Shin Yu-jin came back 14 years ago with me?
I wanted to ask directly, but the atmosphere and situation held me back in case my guess was wrong.
“This is my first time on a dating show, so I think it feels a little unfamiliar.”
“That’s possible. I was like that at first too.”
“Have you ever tried dating?”
“I tried it once or twice when I was 20.”
“Then this is the third time. You won’t be very unfamiliar with Yu-chan.”
“If you think you are meeting people and expanding your network, it is taken lightly.”
Shin Yujin’s voice in my ear was so unfamiliar.
Was your voice this calm? The more you listen to it, the more you fall in love with it.
It seems like not only our relationship has changed over the past 14 years, but many other things have also changed.
I remember when I was dating, I was similar to Shin Yu-jin now.
After ending the relationship and getting married, as time passed, Shin Yujin gradually changed into the person I was familiar with.
A voice that is no longer sweet and always cracking, white hair appearing here and there in the long brown hair, and wrinkles starting to appear on the face.
I’ve been thinking about since when many things have changed between us.
I can’t remember the exact moment.
At some point, the gears that had been engaged began to shift, and as I was touching them to re-engage them.
It was worn out.
“Does Eugene have a favorite food?”
“I like omurice. Yuchan, you like tteokgalbi, right?”
“Huh? Have I ever said what food I like?”
“Ah… I think it’s something like that. There are very few people who don’t like tteokgalbi.”
“Definitely so. I like Tteokgalbi the best.”
“My mom makes tteokgalbi so well.”
Of course, this is a story you know.
I loved tteokgalbi so much that I went to restaurants to find famous tteokgalbi restaurants, and when my mother-in-law made tteokgalbi, I could easily eat three bowls.
Shin Yu-jin loves omurice so much that she liked the omurice I made the most.
Whenever I went somewhere to eat, I always ordered omelet rice in restaurants that had omelet rice on the menu.
Before I could say my favorite food, Shin Yujin mentioned tteokgalbi.
It’s the same situation as when I told Shin Yu-jin before he even said what coffee he likes.
Gradually, the doubts in my head began to settle into certainty.
As we walked down the street together, we sat down on a bench nearby.
“The weather is warm. I guess it’s because it’s almost May.”
“That’s right. It’s going to get hot soon. What is your favorite season?”
“I like winter. What about Yuchan?”
“I am summer. The weather we both like is completely different.”
He is very similar to the 20-year-old Shin Yujin I know.
If there’s anything else, it’s Shin Yujin’s hand gesture that still catches my attention every now and then.
The hand gestures constantly caught my eye, so I asked a direct question.
“Eujin has been pressing her index finger with her thumb earlier. Is this a hand habit?”
“Yes?! This, this? This is… ”
An expression of extreme embarrassment that I have never seen before.
He looked down at his hands and looked like he was thinking about something.
There was silence for a while in response to this question, and what broke the silence was Shin Yu-jin’s words.
“Uh, I broke my finger when I was young. It’s a habit I developed after that.”
“Oh, really? Even if the broken part has healed, isn’t it a bad thing to do that?”
“What… That’s right, but it’s a habit.”
“Habits don’t go away easily.”
I wanted to know something about Shin Yujin that I didn’t know, so I thought of many questions, but I couldn’t think of anything.
In some ways, I know so much about Shin Yujin that I feel like I know better than him.
The reason I like winter is because it’s nice to see pure white snow.
I even like hearing and seeing the sounds that are made every time I step on the accumulated snow and the footprints that are left behind.
Thinking about it this way, I wondered if Shin Yujin knew as much about me as I did.
“What do you do after this? Do you have any other plans?”
“I’m going to go home and finish my assignment and rest. I have a lot of assignments.”
“Do first year students have a lot of homework? I guess I chose the wrong professor.”
“I signed up for the course because I heard that it was taught well, but I had no idea there would be so many assignments.”
“What assignments do you usually give?”
“They give you something like a report, English passage interpretation, or composition.”
It’s a large amount, so it’s not a very difficult task for Shin Yujin.
Even if the report takes a little time, it will take about an hour to complete all the assignments.
Of course, as I am good at English, my midterm and final grades are also excellent, excluding assignments.
“Yoo-chan, you’re in your second year right now, right?”
“Yes, I went to the military at age 21, got discharged, and went back to school.”
“I heard that computer engineering students have been very busy since their second year.”
“It’s a lot different from when I was in first grade, but coding is still fun. It’s worth doing.”
“Really? It’s not easy to enjoy your major.”
“Isn’t your major fun, Yujin?”
“That’s right. I like English so much that my major is fun. I’m still in my first year, so I don’t have anything to call a major.”
As it seems, Shin Yu-jin and I were an odd couple who loved their major more than anyone else.
People around me often made fun of me, saying I was a different species.
It’s not common to see men or women even liking their major, but they both like their major.
How strange it must have looked.
“Are you coming back from MT or participating in a club?”
“No. I didn’t participate in those activities because I didn’t like them that much.”
“It’s fun to expand your network and get to know people while doing that.”
While looking closely at Shin Yu-jin’s face, I once again discovered something different from the present moment I knew.
That was Shin Yujin’s expression.
This is obviously Shin Yu-jin’s first date since she turned 20.
I don’t really like this type of position, so of course I’ve never done anything similar.
However, familiarity seemed to be visible in Shin Yu-jin’s face.
A face that said this situation was not unfamiliar at all and was very familiar, as if it had been experienced before.
When I saw that face, the vague confidence in my mind became firmly established.
“Shall we get up now? Because a lot of time has passed.”
“Ah, yes. Then.”
We stood up together, looked back on the path we had walked, and started walking slowly again.
In order to make the confidence that is now in my head a little stronger, I have to ask questions.
If this is what I thought when I asked this question, it is correct to say that Shin Yu-jin went back to 14 years ago, just like me.
But what if.
What if Shin Yu-jin has not regressed?
What if something I don’t know about has changed through regression?
How should I react if I see Shin Yujin accepting my question in an unfamiliar way?
“Yujin.”
“Yes, Yu-chan.”
A strange feeling of anxiety held me back.
I couldn’t suppress my body.
“Are you transported back 14 years like me?
And I threw out the question that had remained in my mind until the end.
0 Comments