Coarse hair brushed against my palm. My fingertips caught on damp, wet flesh. The part of me I had only ever touched when washing rubbed this way and that against the tip of my middle finger. My heart pounded, thud, thud, hard enough to make my ribs ache.

I replayed the video I had been watching. It was a scene of a man hugging a woman from behind and stimulating her. The sticky sound of clear fluid and fingers rubbing together rang clearly through my earphones.

“Hng.”

Imitating the movement of the man’s fingers, I gave myself a slow stroke. A jolt of pleasure, sharp enough to make my hips arch upward, raced through my entire body. It was a sensation incomparable to anything I had ever experienced.

Once I figured out how to do it, I moved my fingers as I pleased. My breathing rose beyond my control. Afraid a moan would slip out, I pressed my lips tightly together. I had thought everyone in those videos was exaggerating, but it seemed at least some of it had been sincere.

I didn’t need to watch the video anymore. I closed my eyes and focused only on my fingertips and the sensation. In my mind, Kang Euihyun looked at me and smiled, then his expression stiffened, and he reached out his arms to embrace me. My thighs trembled, and my lower abdomen tightened. Unable to keep my hips still, I lifted them into the air.

After my vision, even my mind turned black. My lips, which I had been clamping shut, parted on their own. The stimulation struck like lightning, pounding against the crown of my head. The inside of the blanket, where the air conditioner’s breeze couldn’t reach, grew scorching hot.

“Haa… ugh…”

My head tilted back. My limbs, now beyond my control, shuddered. I wasn’t sure if sounds had escaped my lips. The first climax of my life swept violently through my entire body.

I recalled the textbook term: orgasm. When I connected it to the symptoms I had just experienced, goosebumps prickled across my spine. A word I had never once consciously thought of had now become mine.

The video had already moved on to the next one, and louder moans flowed out, but I couldn’t hear them at all. I lay panting under the blanket, absorbed in savoring the feeling I had just experienced. The worries about how to give up on Kang Euihyun, the concern for my dead mother, and the hatred for Yoo Dokyeom all vanished, leaving only the excitement heating my body. Rather than a moral judgment that I was dirty for masturbating, I felt a light sense of relief, as if the inside of me had been cleanly emptied.

That was why, even when the blanket was suddenly lifted and my face was exposed, I just blinked blankly. Kang Euihyun was looking down at me with an expressionless face, but it didn’t feel real.

“I thought you were crying.”

The woman’s whimpering moans overlapped with Kang Euihyun’s murmur. His gaze shifted to the phone that had fallen beside my pillow.

“But I guess not.”

Only then did my focus snap into place. The moment my eyes met Kang Euihyun’s, it felt as if hundreds of ice cubes had fallen on top of my head. The realization hit me far too late: I had been caught by Kang Euihyun while still panting, with my left hand tucked inside my underwear.

I hurriedly pulled my hand out and bolted upright. One of my wireless earphones tumbled out of my ear. I tried to pick up the phone, the culprit of this disaster, to end the video, but my fingers were frozen and wouldn’t move as intended. I managed to turn off the screen first and hide it under the pillow.

“What the…? Why did you just come in?”

“I told you. I thought you were crying.”

Kang Euihyun answered nonchalantly and suddenly snatched my left hand. He held my wrist still and looked at my fingers one by one, as if inspecting them. Realizing where his gaze was lingering, I tried to quickly clench my fist, but his hand was one step faster.

Holding my left hand with both of his, Kang Euihyun’s eyes were fixed on my slightly wrinkled middle finger. Then, he placed his thumb and index finger against my damp finger and rubbed them back and forth. The sticky fluid transferred to his fingertips.

His fingers glistened clearly under the white light of the lamp.

I froze, unable to even tell him to stop. It was dirty. No, that wasn’t the problem. Since I was covered by the blanket, I could have just brushed it off by saying I watched the video out of curiosity, but I had been caught red-handed with undeniable evidence.

“Is this something you usually do?”

While my mind was bleached white and unable to find an escape route, the question Kang Euihyun tossed out so casually was nothing short of appalling.

“…What?”

“I asked if you usually do this. Or did you start recently?”

“W-why are you asking that?”

I was so flustered that I ended up stuttering like a fool. I twisted my wrist to pull my captured hand away, but Kang Euihyun did not let go easily.

“Because my attitude will change depending on your answer.”

It was the scariest thing I had heard recently. Thus, without a moment to calculate, I gave an answer immediately.

“It’s my first time today.”

I had started watching the videos a few days ago, but it really was the first time I had put my hand between my thighs today. Perhaps if I said it was the first time, Kang Euihyun would pretend not to know and let it slide. After all, courts usually give leniency to first-time offenders.

Regardless, I am an adult; why should I be trembling before Kang Euihyun just because I masturbated once? If it’s just embarrassing, fine, but there’s no reason to feel guilty, right? Such a question crossed my mind, but because I was intimidated by Kang Euihyun’s expressionless face, my shoulders instinctively hunched.

“Why did you do it?”

Contrary to my hopes, the man didn’t seem inclined to let it go. He seemed determined to interrogate me on everything: when I started, why I did it, and even how I did it.

“Why else? I just wanted to.”

I glared at him and raised my voice.

“This is really embarrassing, so can’t you just pretend you didn’t see anything and leave? Women do it too. You do it too, Oppa. Why are you picking on me?”

“What was the trigger that suddenly made you want to?”

However, Kang Euihyun persisted, all while rubbing the tips of his thumb and index finger, which were stained with my fluids, without taking his eyes off my face.

“Maybe I just hit puberty late. What do you expect me to do about having those urges?”

Until a moment ago, I had been telling the truth, but this time I covered it with a lie. I was acutely aware of the trigger that suddenly made me want to. After Kang Euihyun had held me while sleeping and proudly displayed his morning erection, I had fallen into the world of messy algorithms.

“Did wanting to date make you want to have sex too?”

Kang Euihyun cornered me by openly bringing up such an explicit word. I had only been enjoying myself alone, yet being scolded so harshly made even resentment well up inside me. It was not as if I had called a man over and done it in front of him. Was this really something I deserved to be interrogated about to this extent?

I had once told him that I wanted to date. To be exact, I had meant that I wanted to date Kang Euihyun. Of course, Kang Euihyun himself knew perfectly well that there was a name hidden inside that sentence.

“I don’t know. Stop talking about it now.”

“Do you want to do it with Han Jio?”

But the man in question brought up a completely different person. Goosebumps rose on my arms at the sudden mention of the name. Is this man crazy? Who is he talking about right now?

“What—”

I reacted reflexively, then hurriedly shut my mouth. The resolution I had been repeating to myself so diligently over the past few days grabbed me by the back of the neck. I had vowed so fervently to give up on Kang Euihyun and grow fond of Han Jio, so what was I going to argue here? That I wanted to have sex with Oppa, not Han Jio? The one who was crazy wasn’t Kang Euihyun, but me.

I chose to remain silent. I couldn’t bring myself to sell out Han Jio’s name with my own mouth. I hoped Kang Euihyun would interpret the silence as an affirmation.

“Is that so?”

Kang Euihyun asked again as if confirming. This time, too, I didn’t part my lips.

“Our Chaewon is all grown up.”

There was a clear tone of sarcasm in his voice. I only glared fiercely at him and didn’t snap back. I couldn’t beat Kang Euihyun with words anyway.

“I guess I was the only one who thought you were young.”

But now, I couldn’t stand it.

“I’ve told you so many times! I told you I’m an adult, that I can order alcohol, but you didn’t listen to a word!”

“I suppose so. That’s a bit unfair.”

I saw it, Kang Euihyun’s gaze turning cold.

“Go wash your face. And change your underwear.”