I Became the Drug-Addicted Childhood Friend-Chapter 91

So everyone lived happily ever after.

The end.

...That would be a lie.

I invited Shihu to my home.

He still hadn’t disappeared.

"Welcome."

The house was spotless.

I had cleaned it, convinced by my own delusion that Shihu would come back.

I even had a spare pair of indoor slippers ready for him.

My delusion had become reality.

And yet, it still didn’t feel real.

On the desk—

A bottle of pills.

A syringe.

Prepared and ready to use at any time.

"Seo Ah, this..."

"Hm?"

"What kind of drug is this?"

Shihu asked.

"...Suicide? Euthanasia? Something like that."

I was pretending to live like a normal person.

But I was standing on the edge.

If Shihu had never come back, I would have used it.

I told myself I was quitting, but I knew the truth.

My body was already ruined.

Sooner or later, I would reach my limit.

Rather than suffer a long, painful death—

Wasn’t it better to just take the easy way out?

"Why are you making that face?"

I frowned.

"I haven’t even used it yet... You know that. I don’t even take that much anymore..."

Was he judging me?

Was he disappointed in me?

Did he think I was still just a drug addict?

Softly, he pulled me into an embrace.

"Oahh... H-heh..."

A weird sound escaped my mouth.

I was flustered.

But happy.

"Everything’s going to be okay."

"Mm."

I didn’t believe him.

Not at all.

I wasn’t even sure this was real.

There was always the chance that all of this—

Was just another hallucination.

If you climbed too high,

if you rode hope too far up—

It would hurt more when you fell.

"Shihu?"

"Yeah?"

How could he prove it?

That he was real?

That he existed?

"...You’re really Shihu, right?"

"I am."

But I still doubted him.

Shihu understood.

It made sense.

It was natural for me to distrust everything.

Too many terrible things had happened.

It was a miracle I was even pretending to be sane.

"If you’re not real, just tell me... If you’re messing with me, just say so... Stop pretending to be Shihu..."

There was no way something this good could be real.

There was no way something I had dreamed of for so long had actually happened.

I refused to believe it.

"I’m sorry. But I’m real."

There was nothing else he could say.

The only way to prove it—

Was through actions.

He would have to stay.

Not disappear.

Be by my side.

"You’re kind, Shihu."

I reached up and patted his head.

I must have looked unstable—

smiling, then looking like I was about to cry.

"I think… I can be happy again."

Shihu said it like it was an undeniable fact.

I smiled.

"Yeah."

I closed my eyes.

And soon, I drifted into sleep.

It had been a long day.

I could almost hear the doctor’s voice in my head.

"She won’t live long anyway."

"At least let her feel happiness before she goes."

Maybe—

Maybe I had already taken the drugs.

If this was euthanasia—

this moment was the perfect time.

I had felt warmth.

And then, peace.

The bottle on the desk—

Hadn’t it been empty?

Maybe I had taken them all.

Maybe I was just drifting away,

sinking into death,

one last moment of happiness before it all ended.

That made more sense, didn’t it?

The truth was—

I was alone.

The desperation for someone, anyone,

had just forced my mind to create an illusion.

Could I trust my brain?

The same brain that made up convenient explanations for everything I saw?

No.

I didn’t believe it.

Maybe, deep down, I knew—

I was taking my last breath.

There was no one else in the house.

And soon, there wouldn’t even be me.

When you think about the end,

it always feels lonely.

At the very least,

I wanted to do something meaningful before I left.

"Did I live a meaningful life?"

I asked myself.

Had I lived a life worth remembering?

Probably not.

This was the ending I deserved.

All the others from the slums had died long ago.

I had held on longer than most.

It was funny.

It was stupid to even doubt.

I already knew the truth.

I already knew this was fake.

I had seen enough hallucinations to know.

And yet, I still questioned it.

I still asked myself,

"Is this real?"

No.

I made my decision.

I chose to believe it was fake.

Because at least in death,

I could be honest with myself.

There was no such thing as a happy ending.

All my choices,

all my past actions,

had only ever led to bad endings.

That was the truth.

Maybe—

Maybe this was peace.

Maybe dying—

was the only real way to rest.

***

I should have died.

I wiped away the dried tears and sat up.

Crumpled blankets.

Shihu wasn’t there.

Had I finally woken up from the hallucination?

I grabbed the glass of water beside me and drank.

Warm water ran down my throat.

…Warm?

Follow current novels on freewebnσvel.cѳm.

That wasn’t right.

There shouldn’t have been warm water here.

I looked up.

Shihu was in the living room.

"...Is this heaven?"

Had I died and gone to heaven?

Did I even deserve to be here?

Then again, my life had already felt like hell, so maybe I could be happy after death.

"Uweh."

For some reason, there was a warm meal set out on the table.

Why?

"Aah, you’re up?"

I didn’t know why,

but I sat at the table, ate with Shihu, and had a conversation—

As if life had returned to normal.

Why?

Had I already taken the drugs today?

Did I wake up in the middle of the night and use them again?

There had been withdrawal symptoms.

But...

What was happening?

Strangely enough, I didn’t feel like taking anything today.

"...What is this?"

Could I really just… spend time with him?

With Shihu?

Could we really go to the playground together?

Could I sit and listen to him explain what had happened?

What was this?

"Is this real?"

I was more used to Shihu not existing than to him being here.

Having no one beside me was more familiar than having someone.

Shihu looked troubled.

We could be together.

He could do anything.

But I didn’t believe him.

He seemed oddly cautious.

We went to the playground, but he didn’t play properly.

He was worried—worried that I might get hurt.

Was this really Shihu?

"...Weird."

That was my impression.

I still couldn’t believe it.

If a hallucination lasted this long,

what was even the difference between it and reality?

But...

If I was happy,

did it really matter?

Shihu looked at me like he was thinking about what to say.

Like he was handling glass,

terrified that the wrong word might make me shatter.

But that wasn’t right.

If we kept acting like this,

things would never go back to the way they were.

Seo Ah hadn’t been so fragile before.

And Shihu,

you never treated me like I was fragile.

"Shihu?"

"Yeah?"

"It’s okay. You don’t have to be so careful with me."

I would believe that Shihu was really here.

What was the point of assuming this world was fake?

That would only make me anxious.

"I’m trying, you know. Even if I can’t be exactly the same as before..."

I couldn’t go back to the past.

I could pretend.

But I couldn’t truly go back.

"Even if I’m like this... if it’s still okay..."

Maybe the past didn’t hold all the answers.

Maybe the future wasn’t so bad.

"Can you stay with me? Can you protect me? Can you care about me? Can you think about me? Can you stay by my side without hating me?"

I asked.

Was it too selfish of a request?

"I—"

What if he asked, Why should I?

"Because I’ll protect you, too. Because I like you. Because I think about you. Because I never planned on leaving you. Because I never once hated you."

"I’ll do whatever I can."

Maybe—

Maybe a happy ending was possible.

Or maybe—

This wasn’t an ending at all.

Maybe this was a prologue.

Shihu smiled.

Thinking about it—

Wasn’t that more important?

That he smiled?

More than me forcing myself to smile awkwardly.

"I never wanted to go back to the past. If I did, I wouldn’t have come back."

"You like the me that’s here now?"

"Yeah."

It was embarrassingly cheesy.

Happiness was unfamiliar.

Maybe, at any moment, I would come crashing down again.

But for now, this was enough.

Even if everything after this was a tragedy—

For me, this was a happy ending.

So, everyone lived happily ever after.

The world was still a mess.

But who cared?

Not everyone was happy.

But so what?

That’s how the world was.

Actually, this wasn’t a happy ending.

I wouldn’t be happy all the time.

If I used drugs, I would be happy—

for a moment.

I would ride a high,

reach an extreme,

then drop dead at the peak.

Would that be the real happy ending?

No.

A happy ending felt too grand.

A normal ending would be enough.

How did I feel when I finished reading a book?

That was supposed to be a happy ending,

but why did it always feel so... unsettling?

Ah.

That’s right.

"The childhood friend was kind of pitiful."

That was what I had thought.

At the beginning of the story, she had mattered.

But at some point, she had been completely forgotten.

That was how things were meant to be.

But now—

Seo Ah existed.

That alone meant I had succeeded.

It wasn’t strange that I had never done anything significant.

I had tried.

I had failed.

But that wasn’t weird.

That was how things were meant to be.

But this time,

I had gone against fate.

A simple wish—

"I want to stay with you."

That was all it took.

So I held onto Shihu’s hand.

I wasn’t here to kill the Doctor.

I wasn’t here to save the world.

That wasn’t my goal.

All I had to do was stay here.

And that was enough.

I had won.

There were times when I questioned whether I should even be alive.

But in the end—

I lived.

"Ahat."

Then—

"Huha-hat."

I laughed.

For the first time in a long time—

I felt good without taking anything.

Maybe—

Maybe this was a happy ending.