World Chapter 2.5

I hadn’t heard that my father’s friend was a professor at the school. Professor Ahn Gyeong-sik introduced himself as a professor in the Department of Religious Studies, a high school classmate of my father’s who had also studied with him in Germany.

“I was passing by when I saw someone had collapsed, and it turned out to be you. My office was nearby, so I told them to lay you down here. You look extremely pale. Is something wrong?”

“No. I find it strange too. I eat well and sleep well, but my body is always tired and I’m hungry and in pain.”

“My goodness, Chungnam didn’t even tell me you had enrolled here until he called me just the other day. Said he was suddenly worried and asked me to check in on you. Your father hates being indebted to others more than anything, so he probably hesitated a lot before calling me. How is it, coming from a quiet, secluded place to the most chaotic place in the world?”

“……It was overwhelming, I felt like I was falling behind, and I was a bit lonely, but I’m okay now.”

“I heard you live alone? Is it far from here?”

“It’s about a twenty-minute walk from the school. It’s quiet, pleasant…… a good place.”

“Do you not need to go to the hospital?”

“I’m not in that much pain.”

“You said you were hungry, right? I don’t have anything to give you. Ah, I think someone left this here earlier, would you like some?”

It was a cake. I was about to refuse, saying it was fine, but I found myself nodding my head without realizing it.

The professor brought me a slice of cake and some coffee. I devoured it in just a few bites. He let out a hearty laugh and rummaged around his office, finding some snacks and a few pieces of fruit. I shamelessly gobbled them up. It was as if a gluttonous demon had taken up residence in my stomach; despite feeling embarrassed and ashamed, I was so hungry I couldn’t stand it, and I couldn’t control my actions.

“Are you starving yourself?”

“Well……, no. I eat well, but I’m strangely hungry.”

“You must have a big appetite.”

“……”

That wasn’t really the case. There were times I skipped meals because eating was a bother. I couldn’t understand why I was being like this lately. That wasn’t the only thing I didn’t understand. I used to have a healthy-looking face with a bit of flesh on it, but now I was so gaunt and emaciated that I would jump in surprise every time I saw my reflection in the mirror.

The strange thing was, when I looked in the mirror in my room, my face looked healthy and radiant with a peachy glow, but when I saw my reflection on the street or in a school mirror or window, my complexion was as pale as a sick person’s, to the point where I couldn’t even tell which was my real appearance. Until now, I had dismissed it as a trick of the lighting, but now my appearance was so bad that I couldn’t even do that. It wasn’t just my appearance that had changed; I had actually collapsed, so it was true that I was wasting away day by day.

“I’ve already spoken to the professor in charge and asked him to postpone the exam for a day.”

“Ah, thank you.”

“You should eat lunch. It seems like you’re still not full, shall we go get some meat?”

I went to a galbi restaurant with the professor. I, who usually had a small appetite and couldn’t eat more than one serving, shamelessly devoured four servings of sirloin steak.

He said he liked that I had a good appetite and ate well, but I was so embarrassed I wanted to hide in a mouse hole. I declined the professor’s suggestion to go to the hospital, and with a full stomach, I returned to my place.

Having confirmed Taewan’s survival, Sungjoon returned to his former, neat self. Taewan seemed to have left without a word of farewell due to some urgent matter.

Where was Taewan wandering? I knew nothing about his activism, but I found myself naturally accepting his actions and the era.

“You’re back?”

It was Hyungjo. I smiled at him reflexively. He looked at me with an expressionless but infinitely affectionate gaze.

I am truly loved. They were eyes that made one feel such a thing.

Hyungjo came over, stroked my head, and asked.

“Did the exam go well?”

“I’m taking it again tomorrow.”

“Why?”

“Well……, I collapsed during it. I must have been tired.”

“Collapsed?”

Hyungjo pulled me toward him without warning and looked me over as if checking me from head to toe. Embarrassed by his gaze, I turned my head to the side, and only then did Hyungjo let me go.

Like a loving couple, this time I asked.

“Hyungjo, how did your exam go? Then again, since you memorize everything like that, of course you did well, right?”

“It was cancelled.”

“Cancelled?”

“You didn’t know? The National Council of Student Representatives sealed off the building, so no one could get in.”

“……What?”

“The professors are fed up, the students are angry……. The students who were holding a sit-in at the New Democratic Party⁶ headquarters all flocked to the school and blocked the main gate. Let alone exams, even classes aren’t running properly now.”

“What are you talking about?”

“……Nothing, it’s nothing.”

I looked at Hyungjo quizzically as he spoke of incomprehensible things like the New Democratic Party and the National Council of Student Representatives.

What on earth are you guys talking about?

The school was fine. There were no police, no protesters, no one.

“You look tired.”

Hyungjo caressed my cheek and then kissed me without any hesitation.

I responded to his lips. They say there’s no thief like an old thief who has learned new tricks; Hyungjo, who used to push me away every time I approached, was now completely submerged in the puddle that was me and approached even more actively. He was relentless even when Sungjoon was with us. Seeing us like that, Sungjoon would only smile.

Hyungjo and I liked to sit on the old sofa. It was our designated spot. We would sit together and listen to Maria Callas’s songs. When I whispered in Hyungjo’s ear, Hyungjo would press his lips to my ear and respond softly.

More than the stories Hyungjo told, my entire mind was captivated by the fact that his lips were touching my skin.

Liking someone, loving someone, was always a heart-swelling affair. I would often be so lost in thought that I would have to ask him twice, but Hyungjo was the type not to repeat what he had already said once.

“So?”

I asked languidly, leaning my head on Hyungjo’s shoulder.

“So Callas, despite being a married woman, fell in love with Onassis.”

“She was married. I think I’ve heard something like that.”

“In the end, Callas separated from Meneghini the following year.”

“It was an affair.”

“I’ll break up too.”

“……What?”

“I said, I’ll break up.”

“What are you talking about?”

What?

Startled, I lifted my head from where it was leaning and sat up. It was nonsense. Hyungjo’s brow was furrowed.

“What are you talking about right now? Breaking up?”

“……”

“Was there someone else besides me?”

The accusing words came out trembling. We were so close, our skin touching, I could smell Hyungjo’s cologne, yet suddenly he felt a million years away.

Hyungjo opened the collar of his shirt to show me something hanging on a necklace. It was a ring. The ring glinted, revealing its light. A shiver ran down my spine.

“The truth is, I have a fiancée.”

“……What did you say?”

“I have someone I’m promised to marry back in my hometown.”

“You, you……. You’re still young. We’re still young. We’re only twenty.”

“It’s a common thing. A loveless, arranged marriage. An agreement between families.”

“That can’t be. No way……”

“I didn’t intend to deceive you. I’ll break it off. I agonized over it for days and nights. I won’t agonize anymore. I’m going to break it off.”

“……”

My heart pounded uncontrollably.

He has a fiancée?

There’s someone he’s going to marry?

I moved away from Hyungjo. He grabbed my arm as I tried to pull away. Holding onto a confused me, he said.

“I’m going to break it off.”

I looked at him with a dumbfounded expression.

For the first time, it was painful to look at Hyungjo. It was a sense of betrayal. There was someone else. That was absolutely not the kind of thing one could tolerate and understand.

“You……, deceived me? You lied to me?”

“……”

“Kim Hyungjo, you deceived me!”

“I couldn’t tell you!”

“Let go! Don’t touch me!”

“Hyunwoo.”

“I, I want to be alone.”

“……”

As I rejected his hand with revulsion, he let go of the wrist he had been gripping tightly. I scrambled up from the sofa and fled upstairs to my room as if escaping. Maria Callas was still singing.

I locked the door and sank to the floor.

He’s engaged? He has someone to marry… back in his hometown?

My shoulders began to tremble uncontrollably. I like you this much, so much that my heart aches because I can’t suppress my feelings, and yet you’re engaged?

Tears burst forth. I buried my face in the bed and tried to choke back the flood of tears. To think that the first person I ever loved was a man with a fiancée.

Regret, remorse, and a sense of betrayal toward Hyungjo washed over me like a tidal wave.

When he pushed me away, did he think of her face?

Did he think of his fiancée’s face?

“Ugh……!”

I was barely swallowing the surging tears when someone gently pressed on my shoulder. It was Hyungjo.

I locked the door…….

I didn’t want to see anyone, I didn’t even want to see Hyungjo, so I locked the door…….

There was no time to think about that. Seeing Hyungjo made my tears feel pathetic, and I couldn’t stand the self-loathing.

“Get out!”

“It was an arrangement between our families, so I couldn’t help it. I’ll break it off.”

“Stop it! Why didn’t you tell me sooner?!”

“I was going to tell you.”

“You should have said that before I started liking you! Before I liked you, before I, I……”

“If I had told you…… would things not have turned out this way?”

“……”

Don’t touch me!

I knocked his arm off my shoulder. Hyungjo grabbed me again and shook me reproachfully.

“If I had told you sooner, could you have stopped yourself from liking me? Could you have done that?”

I responded to him shaking me in a hollow voice.

“I would have tried, I would have tried……”

“You think I didn’t try?”

His words made anger surge within me. This wasn’t a matter of trying.

“You just let me be! You let me do something shameless!”

“Shameless? Is this shameless? Is loving you a shameless act?”

“……”

“Do you feel that this is a shameless act? Is that it?”

“Hyungjo.”

Hyungjo’s eyes were ice-cold.

No, that’s not it.

My lips felt sealed shut, and no words came out. Hyungjo shoved my shoulder, and I fell onto the bed.

“Shameless…… so that’s how it is.”

Hyungjo’s words echoed forlornly. A chill ran down my spine at his desolate tone. He left my room without a shred of lingering attachment.

I was miserable. I buried my face in the bed. No more tears came. The bleakness of everything having ended seemed to have dried up even my tear ducts.

Sungjoon, who had prepared dinner, came to call me twice when I said I wouldn’t eat. But Hyungjo didn’t come. With just a wall between us, we ignored each other as if we were strangers.

With a stone in my chest, I stared endlessly at the wall. Hyungjo was on the other side. Hyungjo, with his air of clean poverty and neatness. Hyungjo, who wore a white shirt and would slightly open the collar when he felt stuffy. Hyungjo, who sold his soul listening to Maria Callas. And his fiancée was beyond the wall.