"Huh? Nothing," I said quickly.
Jane gave me a look for a moment, but didn't press further.
I zipped up my bag and slung it over my shoulder.
Well… it's not that bizarre. I thought.
I already somehow traveled back in time. Compared to that, a world with slightly different social rules wasn't exactly impossible.
I hesitated for a second.
Maybe I should test it.
"So… Can we make out?" I asked as my first test.
"Huh?"
Jane turned and stared at me. I couldn't tell if she hadn't heard me or just couldn't believe what I'd said.
So I repeated it.
"I said, can we make out?"
"No, we cannot," she replied flatly, not even bothering to look at me as she continued packing her bag.
Huh.
She wasn't angry. She didn't yell. She just rejected it like it was a normal question.
My little experiment hadn't really told me anything.
Still curious, I decided to push it a bit further.
"So can I at least see your panties?"
The moment the words left my mouth, I thought, *Yeah… I probably pushed that too far.*
I was half-ready to get slapped.
But instead Jane looked at me and said, "Why?"
I blinked.
*Why?*
Not a slap. Not a "creep" or "weirdo." Just… Why?
"Well… why not?" I said, realizing immediately that it was a terrible reason.
Jane actually paused and thought about it.
Then she shrugged slightly.
"Well… why not?"
Before I could process what she meant, she shifted her backpack on her shoulders and lifted the hem of her skirt.
For a moment my brain stopped working.
She raised it just enough to reveal smooth fair thighs and a glimpse of her striped underwear.
I stared, completely dumbfounded.
This… was actually happening?
"That's enough," Jane said a second later, lowering her skirt again. "You've already made me late going home."
She turned and walked out of the lab like nothing unusual had happened.
I stood there for a moment.
Did that really just happen?
'Did I really end up in a different world… or had Jane always been this kind of girl?'
No. I was pretty sure she hadn't been.
At the end of this year I had actually asked her out once.
She'd turned me down.
So there was no way she would casually show me something like that… right?
Unless…
Did she secretly like me back then and I just never realized it? Some kind of girl logic that guys could never understand?
My head was spinning.
"Jane, wait," I called, hurrying after her.
She didn't even slow down.
"I'm not showing you my panties again," she said flatly. "I want to go home."
Well… that was disappointing.
"No, that's not it," I said quickly, catching up to her. "I just wanted to ask you something."
She kept walking.
When I finally caught up beside her, I asked, "Do you… like me? You know… romantically?"
That made her stop.
Jane turned her head and looked at me.
"No," she said.
And she said it loud enough that there was absolutely no room for misunderstanding.
That was a fast rejection.
Exactly the same as last time.
Then she looked at me and asked, "Do you?"
"No," I replied. "I don't either."
'I used to,' I added silently in my head.
Hearing my answer, a look of relief crossed her face, which I didn't understand at all.
"Then why did you show me your panties?" I asked.
"Because you asked me to, dummy," Jane replied. "Are you sure you didn't hit your head or something?"
She looked at me with a mix of confusion and mild concern.
"No, no, I didn't," I said quickly. "I was just… thinking about stuff."
Jane studied me for another moment, clearly not convinced.
"Let's meet tomorrow," she said finally. "And drink some water or something. You might be dehydrated or something."
With that, she turned and headed toward the exit.
'Well… isn't she a nice friend.'
I watched her leave, still trying to make sense of everything.
'Fuck,' I thought. 'I'm still not sure if this is a different world… or if I just never understood the female mind at all.'
Either way, my head was starting to hurt.
'Let's just go home.'
And the moment I thought of the word home, something clicked in my mind.
'Right home.'
I reached my house… or *home*.
The word still felt strange.
I unlocked the door and stepped inside. The house was quiet, just like it had been for the past few months.
My parents had passed away just before senior year of academy started, which was now.
So now it was just me.
I was already eighteen, so there was no talk of moving in with relatives or anything like that. Back then, I had thought I was lucky.
The house would be mine.
At least, that's what I believed.
About a month later, I learned the truth.
My parents had taken out a loan and used the house as collateral.
Soon the notices started arriving. Late payments. Warnings. Deadlines.
That was when everything began to fall apart.
I got a job, trying to save the house. I stopped focusing on my studies. I stopped hanging out with people. My last year at the acadmey—something that should have been fun—turned into constant stress.
And in the end…
I still didn't earn enough to keep the house.
That was where the mess my life really started.
I sat down on the sofa.
I had already grieved for my parents once, years ago. I'd gone through the shock, the anger, the quiet emptiness that followed.
But being back here again… it still stirred something in my chest.
The house felt the same.
Too quiet.
"Well," I muttered to myself, leaning back. "It's not like I can bring them back."
If I had regressed a few months earlier… maybe things would have been different.
But I hadn't.
So there was no point thinking about it.
I rubbed my face and forced myself to focus.
"Alright. Let's think about saving the house."