My Platinum-Blonde Childhood Friend is Too Pretty - Chapter 78

WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

◈ My Platinum-Blonde Childhood Friend Is Too Pretty ◈

Chapter 78: 30. Preparing to Move In Together -2

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I couldn't help being completely giddy.

The CSAT had gone well, the sweet little everyday moments with Elli were still going strong, and soon we'd be living together, just the two of us.

Of course my head was turning pink day by day. That was only natural.

Which was exactly why I'd started thinking about it seriously, for the first time.

'A bed... the bigger the better... and... well, sturdy is important too, right?'

I understood that the answer to "what matters most when you're living with your girlfriend" being "the bed" was a mild piece of innuendo the three of them had lobbed my way, my mom and the aunt next door and my girlfriend.

I tried not to think too hard about that part.

I'd known since I was little that women got like this when they ganged up.

Still. Coming to a furniture store and having.

"Ooh, this one is so fluffy~ But would too fluffy be a problem?"

"It needs to be just right. Some give, but with the right amount of bounce. Better for sleeping, and for everything else too."

"That kind tends to cost a bit more~"

Both my mom and my girlfriend's mom mulling over my and my girlfriend's nighttime arrangements together was a little... not a little. It was full-on torture.

If it had stayed a joke like before I could have managed, but the fact that they were thinking it through so seriously made it so much worse.

My face kept getting hotter and hotter, though I seemed to be the only one.

"I want a good one. Expensive is fine. Lee Do-yoon sleeps badly if the bed isn't right."

"Our son does tend to be like that... but Elli, how do you know that?"

"I've watched him sleep plenty of times. On family trips too."

"...That's true. We've all sat around watching Do-yoon nap before..."

"Now I'll be watching every day."

"......"

"Look at you, already getting along with your mother-in-law~ Mommy's jealous~"

Elli was having this quietly embarrassing conversation with her future mother-in-law, completely unfazed.

My platinum-blonde girlfriend, who had been squaring off against my mom just a moment ago, soon turned her gaze back to the beds at various price points with serious eyes.

She pressed them with her hands, sat on them, lay down on them.

Then she called me over.

"...Is this one a little firm? Lee Do-yoon. Come sit here."

"Okay."

-thud

"What do you think. Be honest."

"Like you said, it does feel a touch firm. I'd want something a bit softer than this."

She had me sit beside her and asked what I thought.

It was a little embarrassing, being so openly obvious that we were looking for a bed we'd share, but I also felt a swell of pride that the beautiful girl sitting next to me was my girlfriend.

My lips curved up without meaning to, and I looked over at Elli, and.

"......"

Right then Elli looked at me too, and our eyes met.

It wasn't the first or second time we'd sat on the same bed together, but it felt completely different from those times.

Sitting on "my bed" or "Elli's bed" together versus sitting on "our bed" together.

Of course it was different.

My chest went light and my smile deepened, and Elli's cheeks slowly started to flush red.

Just like that.

Looking into Elli's blue eyes, I wanted to kiss those red lips of hers.

"That's far enough."

But Mom cut in before I could.

"The nerve, trying to bewitch my son right in front of me... aren't you supposed to be picking a bed?"

"......tch."

Even without the interruption I wouldn't have actually kissed her in such an open place, but.

I still felt a little robbed.

Even though we kissed countless times every day, missing this one.

Was genuinely disappointing.

Anyway, we kept browsing beds after that.

In the end, the one we tentatively settled on was.

"Let's go with Seamons. The one we saw earlier, I think that was good."

The bed from a well-known brand that Elli had liked best, the one with that soft yet properly springy feel, the kind of modern-wood look that would suit the apartment we'd seen today.

When I sat and lay down on it I liked that balanced softness too, and Mom and the aunt both seemed to think it was fine.

The one issue was.

"It's a bit pricey, but... if our daughter wants it, Mommy will do her best~"

The price. Not even the top-tier model, and it still came to around two million won.

I felt a quiet pang of guilt. Our parents were already finding us a place to live, and here we were being spoiled on top of that.

Elli seemed to feel the same, because after hearing her mom say that, she spoke up.

"I'll buy this one. With my own money."

She'd buy it herself.

"No~ What money do you have to buy something like this? If you've saved anything, put it in savings~"

"I'm the one buying my son's bed, thank you very much. Little fox, step aside."

Mom and the aunt jumped right in with their teasing.

Elli is the type who, at least in front of the parents, doesn't push back too hard, so usually after hearing something like that she'd take a step back.

Today was different.

"I'll buy it."

She held her ground, chin up.

"I'm going to let you all help with everything else, but this one thing I want to buy myself. I've barely spent anything this year so I've saved up a lot..."

Her cheeks went a little pink as she said it.

"...Just this, and the blanket, and the pillow."

"......"

Elli holding firm. Mom and the aunt watching her.

I stayed quiet and watched the standoff.

We'd made a promise not to interfere with money either of us spent on the other, on us. And wanting to take even a little of the burden off our parents was something I felt the exact same way about.

From Mom and the aunt's perspective, they might say we were kids talking nonsense. But the feeling was unavoidable.

We were family.

Then Mom's brow creased.

I thought she might be upset, but that wasn't it.

"You might as well say you'll buy my Do-yoon's underwear too while you're at it."

"Elli takes after Mark, that possessive streak, that need to own things~ Cut her some slack~"

"Good grief... I can see it already. Whatever we buy, that little fox is going to swap it all out one by one with things she bought herself."

"Heh, isn't it adorable?"

"Adorable... fine. Do as you like then."

The two of them had this odd little exchange, and.

"......"

Elli, hearing every word, went even redder.

I didn't follow the full meaning of that conversation, but I understood enough to know Elli had said something endearing and Mom had let it go.

Either way it had worked out nicely, and I was watching with a contented smile when.

-snap

Elli suddenly turned her head and fixed her glare on me.

Cheeks burning red, eyebrows raised, she looked like a cute little white tiger.

She was so much prettier now, more beautiful, with a better figure than the first time I'd told her she looked like a white tiger at the zoo, but.

That's still how she looked to me.

Except.

The heat slowly rising in those glaring eyes.

"......"

Hmm.

Maybe more like a wild predator after all...?

* * *

We spent a good while like that, looking at apartments and browsing beds, but nothing got decided a full hundred percent. About eighty, maybe.

Things that had only existed as plans were slowly inching toward reality, and I went back to my ordinary days with my chest pleasantly restless.

"Enjoy the meal."

"Goodness, how do I thank our daughter-in-law every single morning? This looks delicious again today."

"The house next door is crying."

"Should we tell Mark to come eat here too?"

"I sent half of what I made over to their place."

"Oh? But then why is Mark crying?"

"The food went over but his daughter is still here."

"Ah~ Well, nothing to be done about that. She's our daughter-in-law."

"Really... she's got my son wrapped around her finger, and my husband too... still, the jjigae turned out well today."

Elli was putting even more care into breakfast than before and working to score points with my mom and dad.

It wasn't really in Elli's nature to lay on the charm too openly, but with my dad at least, his eyes were practically dripping honey, as if there could be no finer daughter-in-law.

Then before we left for school together, back in my room.

"haup... smooch..."

Elli went for my lips like she wanted to eat me alive, and we held each other close and kissed deep.

"hah... Wait for me in the classroom after school. If you go anywhere, I'll kill you."

"Where would I go without you. I'll wait right there."

We nailed down the after-school plans we'd barely managed to make since third year started, then headed to school.

By now my girlfriend didn't really feel like a high schooler anymore. She looked genuinely like a grown adult model, and walking into the classroom hand in hand with her.

"Is my score just barely enough for that school?"

"Cram it in and see. You said your third choice is a sure thing anyway."

"That's true, but... man, the first choice is brutal."

Everyone was talking about universities, the way you do right after the CSAT ends.

Most of them were figuring out which school they'd get into, and those who had a rough sense of where they'd land were.

"Elli, Do-yoon! Hey! So the place you sent photos of, how much is the rent?"

Busy looking into apartments.

"We're searching too, but the cheap ones are dumps and the nice ones are too expensive. It's rough."

"I know! But I don't want to commute from home either. It's too far."

"Round trip for me is almost three hours if I'm being generous. Absolutely not."

Lee So-yeon and Joo Hye-ryeong both looked stressed about it. There was a good chance both of them would end up at Seoyeon University with me, and the distance meant living away from home was basically a given.

Elli had come to our classroom before even stopping by her own, as if this was exactly the conversation she'd been looking for, and dove right in.

"Same with the place we found. The apartment itself is decent but the deposit is steep and the rent is high. What makes it doable is splitting it between us."

"Oh, right~ If there are two of you splitting the rent, then... yeah, that's actually pretty manageable."

"Lucky you. Having a boyfriend so you split it fifty-fifty."

"Nice, isn't it. Sounds rough being single and paying the whole thing yourself."

"......"

"Hmph."

"There they go again... oh? Wait, wait... Hye-ryeong?"

"What?"

Lee So-yeon had been sighing at the two of them bickering again when something seemed to occur to her and she called out to Joo Hye-ryeong in a bright voice.

"You don't have a boyfriend. Do-yoon's obviously off-limits."

"......so you're on her side after all, is that it? You want to fight me?"

"No, that's not it. Do you want to split the rent with me?"

"Split the rent?"

"We split it between the two of us. Wouldn't that work?"

"......"

"It's a lot to ask from home, so the expensive places are out, but I don't want somewhere tiny or a semi-basement either. Same for you, right? So the two of us... what do you think?"

"...Not bad."

"Maybe not quite as nice as the place Elli sent photos of, but something close to that would be perfect, right?"

"True... yeah. Might be worth talking to my parents about."

"Right, right?"

Just like that, the two of them suddenly banded together on a room share.

Living together as friends wouldn't be without its problems, but there would be plenty of ways it worked out well for both of them.

I was grinning at how nicely it had come together, but Elli's face had gone pouty.

Was she just annoyed at being left out?

"Elli."

"...What."

"You and I get to have fun just the two of us. Don't be like that."

"......"