CH 177

“Should I begin the treasure hunt?” she said to herself as she entered his study.

She headed straight for the drawer in his desk, not even thinking of looking anywhere else.

She opened the drawer as she laughed loudly. “Who was calling me simple-minded? He’s even worse than I am!”

Contrary to her expectations of it being locked, the drawer slid open with any resistance. Yiyoung’s eyes sparkled as she spotted the familiar-looking diary. “What happened, Muyeol? You seem so easy…”

Yiyoung picked up the diary, her mouth wide open. She didn’t know how Muyeol had made a mistake like this, knew that once he found out, he would immediately regret it. “If he’d hidden it in one of the bookshelves, I wouldn’t have been able to find it.”

She didn’t have to go far. Yiyoung sat down on the couch inside the study, and opened the diary. “Hmm… Should I read it?”

Muyeol had started writing his diary when he was ten, and aside from the dates, there were only comments on the weather. There was nothing else inside, giving the impression that his days had been… empty.

Yiyoung was beginning to choke up, so she cleared her throat. Then, she kept flipping through the pages, and eventually came across Muyeol’s writing.

‘The class got a transfer student today. A tiny, badly tanned girl with no style. It’s almost like she absorbed all the sunlight in the world. Everything about her looks poor. The teacher said she is a brilliant kid, but she doesn’t look like one. She looks more like an idiot who can’t stop smiling. Darn it, her seat is next to mine. This is not a good start to the year. Well, it’s never been good anyway, but it feels like it’s going to get worse, somehow…’

Yiyoung’s eyes widened as she realized the diary entry was about her. “What is this? He left all these pages blank, and his first entry starts with talking ill about me?”

Yiyoung continued reading as she complained. Muyeol had written in the diary everyday after that point, and she was shocked to find that every page was about her.

‘Her hair was in pigtails today. She’s trying so hard to look cute. And yes, she made it work. She looks cute, but only a little bit.’

Yiyoung felt good about the entries now.

‘I had a headache since early in the morning, but it’s afternoon now, and I feel fine. I probably forgot about the pain after hearing Shitty Yoon’s noise all day. She made me lose my mind…’

Yiyoung’s eyes turned serious. She picked up the reading pace, and turned to another page in the diary.

‘My prediction that Shitty Yoon would bring me bad luck was right. I heard my step-brother is going to live with us. I was aware I had a step-brother, but I never expected I’d have to live with him. The change won’t be drastic, but still, things will become complicated. Shitty Yoon was more than enough, and now there’s this problem, too.’

Her hand traced the drawing in the diary. Yiyoung had once asked him to draw her, but she now realized she didn’t have to do that. In every page of the diary, her presence remained. She hadn’t even realized when her eyes had become teary, but she wiped her face with the back of her hand and continued reading.

‘I never expected someone to be jealous of me. Jaeho had said that he wished I would die. I was a bit jealous of him because at the very least, there was something he wanted to have, but I don’t have anything like that. I wonder how it would feel to have something I desperately wanted. Would I really become desperate if I yearn for something so badly? I can’t even imagine it. And I feel like it’s impossible for me to be like that. Anyway, Shitty Yoon was complaining about how she could only have lunch once, and not twice…’

Her name was on each page, and it continued on even when they were in junior high school.

‘I went to see my teacher. I’ve never asked my teacher for anything before, I did this time. I told him I wanted to graduate without any problems. And the moment I said that, the teacher looked at me as if I was crazy. Yes, I am crazy. I don’t like anyone else sitting next to me. It has to be Shitty Yoon. She has to sit next to me, so I….’

Yiyoung suddenly raised her head and looked for a tissue. During junior high school, she was in the same class as him, and sat next to him for all three years. And it was now she learned how she had been able to do that. She had never expected to read such things about herself when she first opened the diary. They were love stories that made her heart fall in love, too.