Chapter 127: Chapter 127
.
Yi Ruda then replied leisurely while blinking her blue eyes.
“I’m a boy, and she’s a girl. Is there a problem with playing the game?
“Shooooot… Eun Hyung, we shouldn’t lose.”
“Okay.”
Kwon Eun Hyung smiled softly after hearing her words then raised his green eyes to look at us. When I showed a vague smile at him, he turned his head to the front.
Under the lights, hundreds of colorfully s.h.i.+ning eyes were piercing through the stage.
Yoon Jung In then held the paper he was holding up high and yelled, “Get set, go!”
At the same time, Yi Ruda gently bent her knees and held me up in her arms. I suddenly felt dizzy, and my eyes grew blurry; thus, I hugged her neck tightly amid my fright. Her hair entwined between my fingers. As if she found me funny, her quiet laughter rang in my ears.
Screams and shouts soon burst out from everywhere. Within a second, a boy beside us collapsed with a roar. Yoon Jung In’s voice resounded from the speaker.
“Cla.s.s 1-3 is out! The first to be on stage is Cla.s.s 1-3!”
Meanwhile, I managed to find the time to enjoy the game, so I took my arms out of Yi Ruda’s neck and looked around. Frankly speaking, Yi Ruda’s posture, while holding me up like a princess, felt so comfortable. She didn’t waver at all while carrying me in her arms.
I mean, how could a girl like her be this strong? I must have been as heavy as two rice sacks; however, while I was hanging in her arms like this, I felt like I was lighter than Styrofoam. As I looked up at her slyly, our eyes met. She then grinned.
“What?”
Her golden hair melted into the light and shone warmly like honey. Furrowing my brows, I spoke as I felt my delicate heart wavering.
“It’s so comfy.”
“Oh, yeah?”
Yi Ruda replied nonchalantly, then, for some reason, she suddenly threw me up. It wasn’t that high; it was maybe just about 2~3 cm high. Still, it sent chills down my spine, making me hug her neck tightly. Yi Ruda burst out a peal of minute laughter.
“I just thought you’re too bored.”
“No, I’m not!”
“Okay, then.”
We then maintained our posture like that for a while. The twinkling gazes directed towards us, Yoon Jung In’s voice, and the orange lights pouring to the auditorium all seemed like a distant future that would never come.
There is this moment sometimes when I realize that this scene would be etched within my memory into a clear image. As I bit my lips while letting myself fall upon the pit of my distant feeling, I heard Yoon Jung In’s voice from aside, and it seemed like it was coming from a distant dream.
“The second is Cla.s.s 1-6, the third 1-7, fourth 1-4, fifth 1-2… Oh my G.o.d! Cla.s.s 1-5, you were close. Wow, only three teams left now.”
His words returned my consciousness back to reality.
I raised my head to look beside me. I then saw that Kwon Eun Hyung was also holding Ban Yeo Ryung in his arms naturally and comfortably. It seemed like they were just having a leisurely time in their furniture. His posture didn’t show any signs of stress or burden.
Ban Yeo Ryung, who was looking up at the ceiling as if she was bored while laying on Kwon Eun Hyung’s arms, moved her gaze toward us. She then scowled at Yi Ruda. It made me giggle.
At that moment, the couple from Cla.s.s 1-5, who was shaking in an unsettling posture between Ban Yeo Ryung and us, collapsed at last. As soon as the girl jumped to the floor tactfully, Yoon Jung In shouted on the mic.
“Cla.s.s 1-5 is the sixth! Now, only two cla.s.ses are left here… why are these guys so determined?”
Yoon Jung In’s question made people burst into laughter. Kwon Eun Hyung perked the corners of his lips up slightly to show his unique, gentle smile. Meanwhile, Yi Ruda was staring at me with the same naughtiness she had on her eyes as she did before.
Yi Ruda asked me again, “Aren’t you bored?”
I shook my head crazily. Yi Ruda laughed again. Then I heard Yoon Jung In speaking through the mic.
“Cla.s.s 1-8, you guys aren’t here to date. Both must look in front of you.”
“Bahaha!”
Yi Ruda now laughed out loud, and, at the same time, I heard kids giggling boisterously while blowing whistles at us.
I was at a loss for words when I looked at Ban Yeo Ryung and Kwon Eun Hyung. Ban Yeo Ryung, who freed herself comfortably out of Kwon Eun Hyung’s arms with a languid expression, looked as if she was a sculpted masterpiece. A few kids dwelled upon her appearance with a wistful and yearning glance.
After quite a while, nothing changed still. Ban Yeo Ryung then pulled Kwon Eun Hyung’s arms towards her. When Kwon Eun Hyung hung his head down to get closer to her ears, she whispered something to him. At the next moment, Kwon Eun Hyung nodded before carefully putting Ban Yeo Ryung down. ‘Tap,’ as her sneakers touched the floor, it released a rhythmical sound.
‘What?’ Both Cla.s.s 1-1 and 1-8 watched the scene with widened eyes.
Kwon Eun Hyung then said, “This is not gonna end. We’ll let them take the 1st place. Taking the 2nd place is not bad for Cla.s.s 1-1, right?”
“Yeah!”
“Hurrah, our cla.s.s president!”
“Kwon Eun Hyung, I love you!”
As soon as Eun Hyung said those words to the audience, other youngsters showed an enthusiastic response. Eun Hyung, who could lead people, surely received great support from his cla.s.s as usual. While listening to their joyful shouts, I descended from Yi Ruda’s arms.
Yoon Jung In said, “Cool. Both partic.i.p.ants, please shake each other’s hands before going down.”
“What’s this about a handshake?!”
“We don’t have any prizes for the winners, so take it as a reward.”
‘Oh, boy! Yoon Jung In, so funny!’ While kids shouted something like those words and laughed out loud, Kwon Eun Hyung went to our side with a smile. As I adjusted my hair, Eun Hyung, who came close to me, spoke in a low voice.
“If we didn’t say we lost, will you be hugging him forever?”
“Huh?”
Once I tried to strike a retort to his question, Eun Hyung removed the rigor in his eyes before reverting into his generous everyday look.
“Yeo Ryung said that. She wanted me to deliver it to you.”
“…”
‘Oh, my Ban Yeo Ryung…’ As I turned back to look at her, I noticed that she had already gone back to her cla.s.s. She then stuck her tongue out towards us. Obviously, she was targeting Yi Ruda.
Yi Ruda smiled ambiguously before responding, “I’m sad.”
“…”
‘Come on, if you say things like that, then the others will misunderstand us!’ When I raised my eyes to glance at Eun Hyung, his face did not show a sign of joy. ‘Oh, lord…’ I pulled Yi Ruda’s sleeves to tell her that we should return to Cla.s.s 1-8. While walking towards my cla.s.smates, I heard them yelling.
“You guys look so good together!”
“Go, Yi Ruda!”
Clear whistling sounds popped out of the roaring crowds. As I sat on my seat in exhaustion, s.h.i.+n Suh Hyun and the Kim twins, who were sitting in front, complimented me. I smiled back and looked in front while thinking, ‘Our cla.s.s is taking the last stage then.’
The lighting above our heads slowly darkened with a thud. Soon, a bright white spotlight shed over Yoon Jung In’s head.
As the youngsters in front of me had predicted, dance performances filled most of the stages. However, contrary to my expectations of seeing the typical dance steps, we saw a series of shocking acts on the first stage.
When the lights opened, I bent my waist and laughed out loud while looking at the stage. In front of me, Kim Hye Hill burst into laughter while grabbing her brother’s shoulder.
Wearing big cat ear headbands on their heads, four bulky boys were on the stage with their hands on their waists. The song that came out then was ‘Shy Boy.’
Once they finally danced softly with wavy steps alongside the ‘dubap, dubap’ lyric, the others burst into laughter. When I looked around, I saw that everyone was about to puke from laughing so hard. Yoon Jung In, who was crouching on the corner of the stage, was now tearing up after laughing so hard that he could die.
The climax was when they stopped the deadly cute moves and began to sing along the chorus.
“Shy, shy, shy boy! Oh, oh, oh, my boy!”
“Not that handsome but a warmhearted guy!”
“Ahhhhhh!!!!!”
They threw the entire audience into a ma.s.sive outbreak. While everyone was feeling that their sides were splitting, the performance on stage came to a close.
The bright light went on again, and Yoon Jung In, who had dry tears around his eyes, quickly ran to the stage while holding a mic and stood next to the boys. They were already taking off the headbands at that time. Their faces all looked miserable. Yoon Jung In then asked with the mic pointed at his lips.
“Why are you guys taking off the headbands?”
“Are you blind or what?”
The one who answered was the boy standing all the way on the left. The whole auditorium fell into an uproar again.
The next stage performance was a play that had Power Rangers as its motif. When the Power Rangers left the girl alone and ran away from the strong monsters, the audience sent up rousing cheers and applause.
On the third stage, two girls came out and sang a ballad. This was then followed by a dance performance and a remake of a trending TV comedy show on the air. As time went by smoothly, it was Cla.s.s 1-1’s turn at last.
I exhaled out of nervousness. When I looked around, I realized that I wasn’t the only one who felt the tension. The others stiffened as they gazed at the stage with high expectations.