The Great Savior of the College Exams
Han Sooyoung has always been a whore for attention. Who would hate attention? Not Han Sooyoung, of course! Who was she to reject the spotlights flashing towards a queen like herself? She would be a fool. But the situation beheld in front of her sight made her want to retract her initial thoughts.
“Sooyoung, you’re my savior! You know that, right?” A four-eyed girl was clinging to her like a sloth and Han Sooyoung was the tree.
“Gee… who would’ve thought?” she replied, hands still trying to break their hug. For a midget, she was unfairly strong. She herself wasn’t the most towering woman to ever exist, but it is almost comical how a girl ten centimeters shorter could womanhandle her effortlessly.
“No, I really mean it, Sooyoung!” She nudged her head to her shoulder.
Jesus, thanks for saying that, Han Sooyoung thought. I would’ve failed to understand all that thanking for the past half an hour now, if it weren’t for the clarification. Saved from future misunderstandings!
It wasn’t uncommon for her to have annoying customers with eccentric ways of showing their gratitude for her humble service. Some had given her bouquets, some introduced her to some not-so-bad-looking guys, and some even gave her drugs. It was only a one-time thing but the incident was wild to have occurred once that it still made her wonder if it all was just a big stupid fever dream and she was hallucinating the whole experience.
No fucking way a guy just went, “Hey, thanks for helping me, man. You really saved my ass back then. By the way, here’s some cocaine that I happen to bring with me in my pockets anywhere. Thank me later.”
She sold it of course. Guess her job wasn’t so bad after all. If strangers gave her weird stuff, she could sell it back, easy. Call that double profit. Some part of her wished more people would give her drugs for her to resell. The money from last time helped pay half of her tuition that year, after all.
No, who am I kidding? I can land myself behind bars and tuition would be the least of my concerns. Then again, she doubted the service she was selling was in any way legal. She would most likely end up with her writs chained either way.
“You’re truly an angel descended from heaven, Sooyoung-ah!” The girl doesn’t seem to budge even when her buns are all messy from the nudging.
In normal circumstances, she would indulge in the compliment. Even shamelessly fishing for more. But the girl was informally speaking to her.
Don’t ‘Sooyoung-ah’ me, you bitch. We barely know each other. Only she got to call others insolently and not the other way around. No one could use the same trick against her.
The most troublesome thing about the four-eyed was that she was clingy, too clingy. Well, Han Sooyoung hated clingy people to begin with. Or touchy people. Or touches by anyone unless she was the initiator.
Physical contact overwhelmed her. Ever since she hit puberty during middle school, she has been avoiding touches from others. It was because she discovered that she had magic powers. Her powers allowed her to peek into people’s memories via skin contact.
The first time she was aware of her powers was when she was working with a boy from her class on a school project in middle school. When their hands brushed against each other, a scene flooded her mind. Like a movie, she saw a boy writing a letter almost resembling a poem. It took her a while to recognize the boy’s face to be the same boy from her school project. It took her longer time to realize what she saw wasn’t imagining things.
She had been avoiding the boy after that incident, thinking she’d gone insane. Until one day the boy approached her. They talked, resulting in the boy confessing to her and handing her the neatly packed love letter.
Han Sooyoung was bold and reckless, but the boy got balls. She didn’t think she was brave enough to pull such a stunt. Nevertheless, kids were kids. She ran away before the boy was finished like the coward she was. They never spoke again ever since.
That trauma taught her to avoid any unwanted physical contact. Han Sooyoung had made it clear to her customers not to touch her unless necessary. All that and there were still going to be those bastards like the four-eyed.
Han Sooyoung fought hard to retain her consciousness while endless memories of the four-eyed girl crashed inside her brain.
There were different memories for every touch. One was about the times she endured abuse from her parents, being called a failure of the family. Another was about her crying in a secluded public bathroom, a failed test result paper in her hand. There was another memory of her smiling radiantly during family dinner, relatives praising her while raising their glass of wine.
When Han Sooyoung dived into another person’s memories, she also dived into their state of mind. She would feel every one of their emotions. She cried with them, she laughed with them, and she loved with them. She hadn’t expected to experience strong emotions from the girl.
Constant headache struck her as she winced from the pain.
Being able to read into people’s memories wasn’t always convenient. Accidental memory intrusion would cause a serious shock to her. If she was careless enough to let her guard down, the unsought memories could leave her head ringing for an annoying period of time.
“Can you not? You’re annoying me.” She tried pulling away only for the woman to embrace her back.
“Oh, you’re so cute sometimes, Sooyoung-ah!”
Why the fuck is her voice so high-pitched like an anime girl?
“What do you want?”
Han Sooyoung had tried every method, either civil or hostile, to get rid of the girl. All attempts failed, of course, that’s why she was stuck in the current situation. However, she noticed she never really asked her what the four-eyed wanted.
“Nothing! Just… wanted to thank you, you know?”
Never mind, she did try that too. The four-eyed sure was persistent. No wonder she’s emotionally unstable. An idea stunned her. Maybe I can try that. She grinned.
“Was the test really that hard?” Han Sooyoung questioned, there was a hint of her usual dramatic tone. “I don’t see how anyone could struggle with a test that easy.”
“It was really hard, Sooyoung-ah! Maybe it was easy for you, but it made me almost reconsider my major if it weren’t for your help,” she whined.
“Well, good thing I could be of help!” Han Sooyoung faked a chuckle. She didn’t know if it was convincing enough. Fortunately, the four-eyed seemed to be buying anything.
“I’m really grateful for you, Sooyoung-ah!”
The girl was like a robot whose program was only her saying praises to Han Sooyoung while sticking up to her.
“How accurate was my answer from the real thing?”
“Oh, very! I got a perfect score!”
“Perfect! Now can you let go of me now? We no longer have ties with each other. You did send me the money, right?”
She laughed. “You are so funny sometimes, Sooyoung-ah.”
Han Sooyoung surveyed the area around her.
The campus was as crowded as it normally was. Students running with books between their arms, with a high risk of bumping into another hurried student. Or maybe they were simply doing schoolwork, gaze unwavering from their laptop. It wasn’t uncommon either to find couples struggling to take their eyes off of each other—among them were the infamous jock and emo guys who she knew had something going on between them.
Han Sooyoung’s peering eyes stopped at a walking man in his mid-thirties, hair slicked back, wearing a fancy extravagant suit that she knew cost more than her annual tuition.
“Professor Han!” Han Sooyoung shouted, legs moving with urgency as she attempted to catch up with the man.
Right, this was the reason she was here at the economics department despite her being a Korean literature major. She had business with the man. And she wasn’t going to let a certain four-eyed bitch ruin that for her.
“Ah, you,” Professor Han remarked while fixing his glasses. The unpleasant look on his face indicated that he viewed her as a nuisance. Either because he knew who she was or the ‘oh, you’ were just another way of saying ‘oh, who are you?’ covered in fabricated formality.
Both were a negative response.
“What is it? I’m in a hurry so make it quick.” He glanced at his golden watch then at Han Sooyoung in front of him.
“Yeah, Sooyoung-ah. What do you want with him?”
“No, no, this will be quick,” Han Sooyoung attempted her most polite tone, ignoring the girl who was still clinging to her. “A friend of mine said she might not be able to make it for the test next week.”
“Then whoever she is, she can send me her absence via email.”
It seemed like Han Sooyoung had underestimated how indifferent the man was. He didn’t bother learning her friend’s name nor did he care to press further about the anomaly of Han Sooyoung, a non-economics major, being involved with an economics professor. There was no room for a natural physical touch scenario if her opponent was already disinterested from the start.
“Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go.” He spun on his heel and left her.
“Woah,” the four-eyed commented.
“Professor Han!” She reached to grab the man’s shoulder when he suddenly stopped. For a second, Han Sooyoung was confused before she followed his vision.
In front of Professor Han was a knockout woman in a white blouse under a cider brown suit and trousers of the same color. Her brunette hair flew with the wind as she tucked the hair blocking her face behind her ear. The woman who was almost ten centimetres taller than her looked between Professor Han and Han Sooyoung with probing eyes.
What is Yoo Sangah doing here?
Han Sooyoung felt her feet heavy as she dragged her steps through the dorm hallway. She tracked her hand through the rough texture of the walls like a blind person trying to read into the secret braille written in the texture.
What was Yoo Sangah doing there?
The question echoed in her head like a curse since their unplanned meeting minutes before Han Sooyoung abruptly bolted away. Now that she was much calmer and her breathing had steadied—though, her heart rate was still unstable—she was able to acknowledge her own stupidity.
Why did I do that? She thought to herself. Oh my god, why did I run away?
Her subjective fear of the entity named Yoo Sangah clouded her judgment and fuelled her irrational decision to quickly flee from the scene. On a first consideration, it may have been a good idea. But if she were to use her brain and think it through, it wasn’t a good idea in the long run.
She cussed her way as she passed the doors.
It was a poorly calculated move on her part. Now, her sudden leave could add to Yoo Sangah’s (possible initial) suspicions. Han Sooyoung hasn’t confirmed whether or not that woman had put a bounty on her head. There was a chance Yoo Sangah didn’t know about Han Sooyoung’s dealings—though it’s hard to believe—and Han Sooyoung had just dug a deeper hole for herself.
The angel Han Sooyoung was telling her that the model student Yoo Sangah would be too much of a sweetheart to do anything hasty to her. Said angel also told her that at least she got away from the four-eyed girl. But she shook off those thoughts knowing they were just to patch up her broken ego.
Meanwhile, the devil Han Sooyoung whispered in her ear, trapping her into an infinite spiral of overthinking doom. She had left her there with Professor Han, the main target she was aiming for. She won’t be able to go back and ask him the same question because of her foolishness. She had lost the opportunity and Professor Han’s patience, apparently. He much rather paid attention to the gorgeous flawless Yoo Sangah everyone loved.
Yeah, right. ‘Flawless’ my ass. If Yoo Sangah had no haters, she volunteered to be the first to change history.
When she arrived at the door she was all too familiar with, her stiff hand reached for her pocket. After fumbling the keys a few times, she managed to unlock the door and pushed inside.
Her chaotic state of mind was mirrored by the blaring of shooting sound effects coming from her roommate’s computer. She sat on her desk, eyes focused on the glowing screen while her hand on the mouse was moving at a worrying rate.
“Master, behind you!” she cried.
“I can handle this fine,” said a deep restrained voice of an adult male from the speaker. “Worry about yourself.”
A series of ear-tearing screams were heard.
Han Sooyoung tried persuading her to wear headphones to minimize the damage of her gaming hobby to her. The ones with their own mic could even facilitate her experience. It’s a win-win! In other words, she was being too loud and it was pissing her off. But of course, kids like her didn’t know how to control their manners towards the elderly. She disliked the idea of having headphones on because the sounds would surprise her and disturb her focus on the game, not realizing she sacrificed Han Sooyoung’s focus in exchange.
The ungrateful brat acted like it wasn’t Han Sooyoung who helped her with her SAT not long ago. Her roommate was fresh out of high school. It’s not like she was a senior who could act all mighty with her.
“Lee Jihye, turn down the volume. Some of us need some peace and quiet.” Han Sooyoung dropped to her bed.
She expected a protest from her roommate—a classic ‘fuck you’ or ‘shut up’—only for Lee Jihye to respond to her with silence. Not that she complained.
Unfortunately, the peace and quiet didn’t last long. After a few more clicking sounds, Lee Jihye got up from her chair, cursing and kicking the wall.
Han Sooyoung didn’t need to ask to know what happened when she spotted her roommate’s computer screen omitting a static red light.
“Quit acting so immature. It’s just a game.” Han Sooyoung picked at her ear.
“Just a game?” She glared at her. “Ya, I didn’t work my ass off just to lose in this ‘just a game’.”
“Sounds like a you problem.”
“Ha! Give me a break.” She sat back on her chair. She had a gaming chair that could be spun around, contrasting Han Sooyoung’s wooden chair opposite from hers. “Anyways, how’s your progress with the test answer?”
Han Sooyoung stiffened. “What test answer?”
“Don’t play dumb with me.” Lee Jihye crossed her arms. “I know you were getting the test answers today. I don’t know how you get your hands on those answers, but Professor Han is free at this hour every Thursday after all.”
Han Sooyoung had forgotten that she chased after Professor Han for her roommate.
“About that... I might need to postpone.”
“Postpone? The test is in next week.”
“Exactly. Which means I have more time to prepare getting your test answer.”
“You mean you haven’t had it now?”
“Why does it matter anyway? It’s in a week, yeah?”
“Yes, but I need that right now. I’m going to be busy this week.”
“Like what? Grinding or playing with that ‘Master’ of yours?”
“Do you have my commissioned test answer or not? If not, then get out.”
Han Sooyoung rose. “You want me to get out? You can’t just kick me, can you?”
Lee Jihye got up towards the bathroom before she was back with Han Sooyoung’s shower equipment. Dropping them to the ground, she then opened the closet. A few of Han Sooyoung’s clothes were thrown senselessly to accompany the shower equipment already on the floor.
“What are you doing?”
“Helping you pack, what else?”
“Hey, put these back to where they belong or else—”
“Or else what?” Her roommate turned to face her. “A freshman or a sophomore who’s been selling test answers for years?”
Han Sooyoung gritted her teeth. “You think they’re going to believe you? Someone who cheated during the college entrance exam?”
“Get out.”
“No.”
“I said, get out!” Lee Jihye dragged her across the room and outside, closing the door behind her. A few seconds later, the door opened for her roommate to shove her belongings.
“Wait! Are you sure I can’t have another chance?”
Lee Jihye stared down at her with her judging eyes. “Nu-uh. Goodbye.” She slammed the door right at her face.
This is going to be a long night.