This is exactly why a soap opera is a soap opera.

When a situation that makes no sense at all opens up out of nowhere, that is a soap opera.

Right now is exactly that.

“Y-Ye-rin sunbae!”

Why are my lips shaking?

I hadn’t done a thing, and I was reading Ye-rin sunbae’s face as she came in.

The feeling of being caught by your girlfriend while you’re out at a club?

Why the thought came to me was a question to me too.

But the picture wasn’t a good one.

Seo-ryeon’s soft, slender hand was still resting on my forehead.

I moved it away gently with my own hand.

Ye-rin sunbae’s eyes were fixed on that hand.

A flower garden is a flower garden… but this is not what I meant!

Ye-rin sunbae had flowers in her hand too.

A plain bunch of baby’s breath with three roses mixed into it.

The bouquet Seo-ryeon had brought was a straight bunch of red roses.

You could see the two of them in the flowers.

And the two of them together, Ye-rin on the right and Seo-ryeon on the left, made a matched set dazzling with beauty on another level.

This was certainly another blessing handed to me for coming back.

But when blessings overflow they turn into disaster.

Crackle, crackle.

You couldn’t see it in the hospital room, but sparks were flying.

Honestly… how nice would it have been if they had come at different times!

“Are you all right? They said you were hurt?”

“Yes? Y-yes…”

“You came, sunbae~. The entrance exam is right around the corner and you carved out precious time for me~.”

“Of course. However busy I am, Tae-san is hurt, so I had to come~. What’s an entrance exam next to that.”

Wow… how can she send a look that vicious while she’s smiling?

I broke a sweat at the sparking standoff between the two women.

I am guilty of nothing.

I came back and I was kind to the girl I loved from a distance, that is all.

And then Seo-ryeon fixed on me and the whole thing blew up.

This was where I should be judging coldly, and even that felt unfair.

The post of my official girlfriend was still vacant.

Therefore I am provisionally single.

“Sit down, both of you. Leave the flowers on the table. I’ll put them in water in a minute. There are drinks in the refrigerator. Take a can each, whatever you like.”

I settled the mood.

The situation was funny and it was interesting.

The body is a high schooler’s, but the accumulated life experience is in its thirties.

Laughing at high school girls competing in a shower of sparks was the normal response.

I’m an old dude! I’m an old dude!

I put a spell on myself.

Without it there was no way to get through this problem.

The two women, no, the two girls, went to the refrigerator at my word and took out drinks to their own taste.

Ye-rin on the right took an orange juice; Seo-ryeon on the left took a sharp Coca-Cola.

But who buys cola for a patient’s room?

“Tae-san, what about you?”

“I’ve had mine.”

Ye-rin’s consideration score rose by one point.

“Thank you both for carving time out of your schedules to come and see me.”

I was a patient.

I lay on the bed and watched the two of them calmly.

If I got excited on top of it, this really would become a soap opera.

“Of course I have to come when oppa’s hurt~ you know that~.”

“Yes. It’s the natural thing to do.”

Ye-rin sunbae answered calmly.

It stood in contrast to Seo-ryeon, laying the charm on thick.

The uniforms made a clear comparison too.

Even in the same school’s uniform, the air the two of them gave off was completely different.

Seo-ryeon’s uniform, short and riding dangerously above the knee, emphasized her sexiness.

Her chest and her height, both developed beyond the ordinary, were too much for a uniform to cover.

Ye-rin sunbae’s uniform, against that, was like a two-piece suit.

Neat and crisp, like a career woman’s outfit.

“Seo-ryeon, isn’t it about time you left for Seoul? Have you not signed with an agency yet?”

“Huh! Oppa, how do you know? Did I tell you???”

Seo-ryeon was startled.

“Word gets around.”

“Ah!”

Around this time Seo-ryeon settles on an agency and throws herself into the entertainment industry for real.

I know she transfers to a school in Seoul too.

“Sunbae, is the entrance exam prep going well? You applied for early admission, didn’t you? Have the results come out?”

I threw questions evenly, without leaning to one side.

“Mm… I just have to keep doing what I’ve been doing. I passed the second-semester early admission, but the essay exam is the problem.” (TL Note: Korean universities admit two ways. 수시, early admission, judges school grades and records and is decided before the national 수능 entrance exam; many places then require 논술, a written essay exam set by the university itself. A student can pass early admission and still be rejected on the essay.)

Ye-rin sunbae had a student record stuffed full, from her school grades to a term as student council president.

Of course she would pass early admission and then some.

But the problem was the essay exam.

In 2007 I never saw a banner at Jangju Girls’ High announcing Ye-rin sunbae’s acceptance.

“Which department did you apply for?”

“…The law department.”

Sunbae answered as though she were embarrassed.

“Ooh! That’s impressive!”

“Pff, sunbae, does that make you a judge or a prosecutor?”

Seo-ryeon threw out an innocent question, the way somebody who knows nothing of the world does.

The law department at Hanguk University and the bar exam are as far apart as heaven and earth.

Even if you pass the exam, your scores have to be good to be appointed a judge or a prosecutor.

Looking at Ye-rin sunbae’s character and her academic record, she looks likely to pass the exam without trouble.

Then why did she fail?

Sunbae is outstanding enough to pass early admission to the law department at Hanguk University.

The problem must have come up in the essay exam.

And I know the solution.

It’s material I saw while preparing for the essay exam in my repeat year.

Do I tell her this?

I was torn.

Even for Ye-rin sunbae, my one-sided love and my first love, it was an important moment.

If a secret of heaven got out…

What secret of heaven! Somebody like Ye-rin sunbae should be a judge or a prosecutor!

Since when have I cared about the secrets of heaven, to be worrying about it now?

A man ought to know how to show his first love that much generosity.

If a secret of heaven can be shaken by something like this, it isn’t a secret of heaven.

“Sunbae, I’m preparing for the essay exam myself, and there’s something I’d like to ask.”

I changed the subject naturally.

“The essay exam already?”

“Yes. I’m greedy.”

“All right… ask. I’ll answer within what I know.”

Sunbae. Do you know what kind of tutoring this is and what it costs?

I laughed inside and kept a serious face on the outside.

If I opened a secret essay-exam academy with this, I could take at least a hundred million won a head.

That is the position Hanguk University holds in this country.

Pass and your standing in life changes.

And I won’t be able to see her for a while, so this is just right.

I didn’t know when I would meet Ye-rin sunbae again.

Once the entrance exam was over she would obviously go to a Seoul prep academy for the essay exam.

Until the interview was done and the final acceptance notice came, this was the last time I would see her.

That is why I was giving away what I had.

It was repayment for the kindness of taking time to come and see me even at the most important stretch of her life.

“Prince Hodong destroyed the kingdom of Nangnang, and when he came back he was resented by his stepmother, the king’s principal wife. She framed him for not treating her with the proper courtesy, and the king moved to punish his son. Hodong said that if he cleared himself his mother would be made a criminal, which would be a failure of filial duty, and that it would trouble his father the king, so he killed himself.”

“What? Prince Hodong was that stupid? Why die! Become king somehow and throw the stepmother out!”

Seo-ryeon, drinking her cola, threw out a bouncing answer.

That fighting streak of hers is why she survived in the entertainment industry.

“But later Kim Bu-sik criticized Hodong in the Samguk Sagi. He said that true filial duty means exposing a parent’s great wrongdoing, and that this is the greater cause. Sunbae, if these two things are in conflict, what essay would you write?”

“Kim Bu-sik was a smart man. That’s how a man should be.”

Seo-ryeon nodded, as though Kim Bu-sik’s criticism was to her taste.

I felt the same way Seo-ryeon did.

To know the stepmother’s plot and kill yourself anyway was a crime against his own mother and his father.

“Hmm… that’s a hard one. Filial duty, 孝, and righteousness, 義, look like the core subjects…”

Ye-rin sunbae was as sharp as I expected.

She caught the key words immediately, without even having to think about it.

“Which teacher set that question? The difficulty level is high.”

She was startled at the same time.

“Somebody I know set it for me.”

“You have to work it out by setting Prince Hodong against Kim Bu-sik’s position, right? In that case… you need a common subject to explain them both by…”

Ye-rin sunbae fell into thought.

“Hmm…”

The sight of her was painfully cute.

Just being in the same room with her cleared my heart.

That purity only a girl in her teens can give off.

One bottle of lotion was all her clear skin needed.

She was exactly the young heroine of a novel, sixteen and in bloom.

“The common subject is obvious, isn’t it.”

Just then Seo-ryeon spoke without hesitation.

The voice she said it in was full of confidence.

“Seo-ryeon, what do you think the common subject is?”

I asked, prompted by how confident Seo-ryeon sounded.

Surely not, I thought.

Seo-ryeon was still a first-year in high school.

A girl who dreamed of being an entertainer, at that.

She would certainly be weak at an essay question like this.

“What do you mean, what is it. The core is whether the thing was worth doing, isn’t it. Oppa thinks I’m an idiot! Hnngh~.”

Whoa… amazing!

I hadn’t known Seo-ryeon was that smart.

Her instincts were outstanding.

She had put her finger on the core of the 2007 second-semester Hanguk University essay question.

“Worth?”

“Yes! You have to ask whether Prince Hodong’s act was a valuable one. The question is whether this thing was really worth killing yourself over. If it were me, I’d say Grandpa Kim Bu-sik’s opinion is right in this situation. If filial duty and righteousness are in conflict, don’t you need the wisdom to judge exactly what each is worth? Is a stepmother’s scheming worth laying down your life for? My answer is nope~!”

Seo-ryeon’s answer was crisp.

She answered Ye-rin sunbae’s question point by point.

And it was close to the correct one.

Clap clap clap.

I applauded hard, and I meant it.

Seo-ryeon looked different to me now.

She isn’t the tomboy who got a feeling at the pizza place and marked me.

Her instinct for driving straight through to the core was exceptional.

This is something you have to be born with.

“Yes… it’s a question of worth. The worth you weigh against a death.”

Ye-rin sunbae caught the core too.

Ye-rin sunbae, thinking it over once more and nodding.

She will probably be shocked when she gets the essay question.

The legendary cram tutor couldn’t have kept up with me.

Am I built to be a tutor?

Tutoring was easier than I expected.

For me, knowing the answers already, this was easier than chewing gum.

“Oppa, I think I got the question right. Isn’t there a present?”

“A present?”

“Hnnngh! I’m hungry~.”

Not even my twin sisters could lay the charm on me the way Seo-ryeon did.

Seo-ryeon with her cheeks slightly puffed out was cute.

“Should we get pizza? Sunbae, how about it?”

“Yes. That’s fine with me.”

“Then wait outside for a moment. I’ll change and come out.”

“Oppa~ we’re close enough, just change here.”

Seo-ryeon looked at me with a loaded expression.

That look… was not a girl’s.

No! In this life my soul is still pure!

“Let’s go out.”

Ye-rin sunbae took Seo-ryeon’s hand.

“Sunbae, aren’t you curious about Tae-san oppa’s body? One look and you can tell it’s quite something~.”

“…”

At Seo-ryeon’s words, Ye-rin sunbae’s cheeks went red.

Seo-ryeon… you think you’re the only one who’s curious?

I’m curious too!

(End of Chapter 31)