Chapter 39: Yugalyeon

Unni,

You know, I hate my hair. It feels like it’s dying, somehow. It’s just so… faint.

How can I explain it… ah, yes. I think it was when I was in high school. Anyway, I went to the bathroom in the morning to wash my face, and when I glanced in the mirror, I saw my colorless hair just hanging there, limp and lifeless. It looked like something you’d see on a dying old woman.

Thinking that just drained all the energy out of me. As if I had really become an old woman. But I was still a vibrant high school student. I’ve avoided mirrors ever since.

The next thing I hate is my eyes. Unlike my hair, they’re too assertive.
Everything from my hair to my eyebrows is pale, but my eyes just float there, as if they’re something special. The fact that they’re a deep blue probably makes it worse.

And then… no, I think I misspoke. It’s not that I hate my hair. I just hate my face.
Looking at it just makes something unpleasant well up inside me. I’m so jealous. So incredibly jealous of this face.

And for good reason. Everywhere I go, it’s all about my face.

It’s like no one is interested in the person named Yu Garyeon. Or maybe they can’t see me because I’m hidden.
The only thing that was certain was that I hated it as a child. I wanted to draw the attention that had been stolen away, back to me.

But it didn’t work out.

They told me to get lost, you old ghost. I’m a living person, but because of this stupid face, I really became a ghost.
It’s not like I wanted to be like this. I hated it so much that I struggled desperately. Really, I did everything. I tried to start conversations, I tried to win them over with snacks…

Eventually, I did manage to shed my ghost status. Thanks to my amazing hair pulling through for me again.

They said it was pretty. The hair they used to tease me about, calling it strange, they suddenly said it was pretty.
The reason… I don’t know. Maybe it was because a lot of brightly dyed idols started appearing on TV around that time, or maybe their values and perspectives just changed.

Anyway, I didn’t do anything. No, if anything, the more I tried, the more I hit rock bottom…

You know, if I was a ghost in kindergarten, and a goddess around the fifth grade, what’s next?

Maybe there’ll be a news report about a silver-haired mixed-race person committing murder, and me and my family will be treated as potential criminals.
Or maybe a movie featuring an actress with hair similar to mine will become a huge hit, and I’ll be treated as the same person as the character she played… Actually, I’ve experienced both of those.

The deciding factors are the pale hair and the strikingly blue eyes. The person named Yu Garyeon comes after that.

I hate it, I hate it. The moment I realized that, all the energy drained out of me. So much so that I even worried I might actually be turning into an old woman.

I think that’s why I fell for you, unni.
Well, it’s a bit of a cliché reason, so it’s a little embarrassing to say… but you were the first. The first person who was interested in me as a person, not my face.

I liked talking with you while eating convenience store lunch boxes during the summer special lectures. I liked listening to you talk about movies on the bus ride home.
When you told me my fingers, which had become rough and ugly from drawing all the time, were pretty, I felt a jolt of electricity run through my body.

It didn’t matter what other people said, because I had you. No, I even wished everyone else would just disappear.
Yes, it’s better if they disappear. The people of this world who don’t know your worth just because you’re plain.

Those bad guys who make you cry, not knowing their place…

But when someone like that actually appeared, I was scared.
When I saw an expression I didn’t recognize on your face as you looked at him, I thought for the first time that I wanted someone to die.

I had never had such wicked thoughts before… I hated him that much, enough to die.

But then.
It really was like that, unni.

I think I like him.
No, I do like him. Maybe even more than you.

I’m sorry for hiding it until now. No, it would be more accurate to say that I’ve been pretending not to know. You probably already knew. Yes, if I had hidden it, things wouldn’t have turned out this way. I thought I was hiding it well, but where did I slip up…

I won’t pretend not to know anymore. I’ll tell you everything, without leaving anything out…
Please, unni, don’t pretend not to know either.

****

I’ve never told you this, unni, but actually, I knew him before you introduced him to me. I met him in our freshman year, in our first semester’s Introduction to Film Studies class.

You know, the class I originally signed up for to take with you, but ended up taking alone because you messed up your course registration.

What’s the point of succeeding in course registration if you’re not there? So I was about to drop it, but you stopped me.

You said you wanted to know the lecture content as soon as possible, so you told me to just take it and tell you about it. The professor was a famous director from a certain studio, and he was supposed to be replaced the next semester, I think.

But to think I would meet him there… Life is really strange.
I should have just ignored you and dropped the class.

Well, it’s not like we talked much, just a little during the group project at the beginning of the semester.

“Hello, my name is Pyeon Suhee. I’m a freshman in the Mechanical Engineering department. This is my first group project, but I’ll do my best!”
“Ah, I’m Lee Seonwoo, a sophomore in the Early Childhood Education department. I look forward to working with you for the rest of the semester.”

It was my first group project in college, so I was a little nervous, but I was relieved to find that everyone was really nice.

“I’m Yu Garyeon, a freshman in the Visual Design department. P-Please take care of me.”
“Oh, design! At least we don’t have to worry about making the PPT. That’s a relief.”
“Ah, yes…”

Except for one person, that is.

“…I’m Yu Dojin, a sophomore in the Visual Design department.”

As soon as I heard his voice, goosebumps ran down my spine. It felt like a hundred spiders were crawling into my ears and swarming over my eardrums.
When I came to my senses, everyone was staring at him. They were probably just as surprised as I was.

His hair was a tangled mess, like a long-neglected weed patch. His dull eyes, peeking through the mess, seemed to have lost all confidence and were on the verge of rolling out of their sockets. And his skin was so pale it looked like it could rot away at any moment.

This person is a corpse. He’s a corpse, so it’s only natural that he has such a voice. He was so unpleasant and gloomy that I found myself unconsciously accepting it.

“Ah, ah, uh, I see. So… another design student! And you have the same surname as Garyeon-ssi. Are you related by any chance? Like cousins or something.”

I was immediately in a bad mood. Of course, I knew he was just trying to salvage the awkward atmosphere, but the thought of being associated with someone like that was just annoying.
It was like he was saying, ‘You look similar too.’ We just have the same major and surname!

Now that I think about it, I think I was secretly offended.

“I’m a Yu (兪).”
“…I’m a Ryu (柳).”

It was a relief. If we had the same surname and clan, I wouldn’t have been able to sleep that night.

At the same time, I was a little curious. I had never paid much attention to people’s names before.
In fact, I disliked them. What right do meaningless letters have to represent me?

But that person… he was really like a willow tree. Like a willow tree that sways uncontrollably in a light breeze, he seemed to be trembling.
So much so that I even thought it was inevitable for him to be like that, having been born with such a surname.

“I-I see. Anyway, since we have two design students, the PPT should be amazing. Hahaha…”

The thought of having to work with such an unpleasant person made my future seem bleak, but fortunately, I didn’t have to interact with him after that. It was a group project in name only, it was actually an individual assignment.

What was it? We had to choose a movie, write a review individually, and then compile a summary into a PPT for a presentation.
The idea was to show that even with the same movie, people’s impressions could vary depending on their values and personality.

We didn’t even have to meet up, we just shared our reviews through messaging, I made the PPT, he wrote the script, and the other two presented it in halves. And just like that, it was over.

Looking back, it was a truly unremarkable first encounter.

The reason I remember that unremarkable event so vividly to this day was because of the review he wrote.

‘…Therefore, to me, the entire “Mary Port” series feels like a denial of an individual’s existence. No one in the work is interested in Mary as a person. All they care about is Mary Port, the son of a famous wizard, and so they force him to change. This probably applies to the director who created this work, the original author, and the world in which such things become popular.’

Then this isn’t a movie. It’s just a low-quality propaganda film…

No, it’s Mary Port. Mary Port. You know, unni, right? It’s a movie about kids who go to a magic school and get into all sorts of trouble. The atmosphere is incredibly bright.
I wondered what kind of person would write such a review for a movie I chose just to get it over with.

Yes, I was so surprised it gave me goosebumps. Because I also hated that movie for the same reason.

So the moment I read that review, I felt a little, a really little.
Reassured, maybe.

So…

“Ah, hello. I’m Yu Dojin, a sophomore in the Visual Design department. I’ve decided to join the film club starting today. Please take care of me.”
“Take care of you? We’re disbanding next week anyway. Everyone’s getting jobs.”
“Yeah, cheer up. Anyone would think we’re going to eat you.”

I might have been even more disappointed.