World Chapter 3.1

On my way to the next class, I ran into Professor Ahn. He asked if I had time, and if I wasn’t busy, he wanted to talk, so he led me to his office.

Having skipped meals even at home because of Hyungjo, I was on the verge of starvation. Shamelessly, I asked the professor to buy me lunch.

He treated me casually, so I didn’t feel the distance I usually felt with other professors.

As I ate ravenously, the professor looked at me with an unusual pity in his eyes that day. After letting out a belch and patting my stomach, he opened his mouth cautiously, as if asking a question he had been holding back for a long time.

“Have you ever received psychiatric treatment?”

“Pardon? What do you mean all of a sudden?”

“I won’t beat around the bush. Do you have a mental illness?”

“Mental illness… as in, are you asking if I’m crazy?”

“Well, I suppose so. I’m asking if you’re crazy.”

“Professor, are you joking right now?”

I laughed, finding it absurd, but the professor didn’t laugh.

“You’re acting strange today, Professor.”

I replied dismissively and picked up a piece of fruit that was served for dessert. He spoke gravely.

“The students were saying that you were laughing and talking to yourself in an empty classroom.”

“What?”

I had often sat alone in empty classrooms, but I had never once laughed and talked to myself. I stared at him with a look that said, what kind of strange story is this?

“That’s strange. There wasn’t just one or two witnesses. You can’t possibly have a mental illness; if you did, your father would have told me.”

“Instead of a mental illness, I have a gluttony illness, and that’s the problem.”

“Gosh, this is just so strange.”

“I must have been talking in my sleep while dozing off.”

“According to a student who witnessed it directly, you were laughing and talking, then you stood up and even bowed.”

“What? I’ve never done that….”

“That’s what I’m saying. You seem perfectly fine.”

The professor still looked at me seriously and tilted his head.

So, after making me a forced outcast, my classmates are now going around spreading all sorts of nonsense.

I sighed in disbelief. I didn’t have the slightest desire to play along with the pranks of my classmates who didn’t like me much.

Such absurd talk didn’t even register in my ears right now. My mind was so full of thoughts of Hyungjo that there was no room for anything else to penetrate. Hyungjo was coiled up tightly, filling every corner of my mind.

After leaving the restaurant with the professor, who still had a suspicious look on his face, I thanked him for the meal and quickened my pace to get to class.

A wave of anticipation, or perhaps fear, that I might run into Hyungjo at school washed over me. But on this vast campus, the chances of me, an engineering major, and Hyungjo, a humanities major, crossing paths were slim, even after four years.

After finishing my day, I returned to my place. Hyungjo was sitting on the sofa, directly visible from the entrance. It was the spot where we always sat together, our designated seat. He saw me, stood up, and moved away to another spot.

He was avoiding me.

That fact made my heart ache as if it were being sliced. Hyungjo pretended to look at his LPs, ignoring me.

I, too, ignored him and went up to my room. The distance between Hyungjo and me felt like the opposite ends of the universe, light-years apart.

I wonder if Maria Callas, when she loved Onassis, ever considered her status as a married woman.

I was the one who had clung to Hyungjo, who was pushing me away, begging him to love me. Hyungjo had rejected me because he had a fiancée. It must have been a difficult time for him as well.

While clinging to him in his torment and telling him not to think about anything, I was uncontrollably shaken by the fact that he had a fiancée. In the end, it was as if I had been the one to abandon Hyungjo.

Soothing my gloomy heart, I sat at my desk and opened a book. I was forcing numbers and symbols into a head already filled to the brim with Hyungjo. Suddenly, the door burst open with a bang. Startled, I froze and stared at the source of the sound.

“I can’t, I can’t do it.”

Hyungjo broke down. And I broke down with him. Knowing full well that we shouldn’t be doing this, we embraced each other. I felt a thirst so intense it was as if my throat was on fire. We kissed and kissed again.

It’s not enough, not enough….

My body trembled, begging for more. Hyungjo looked at my trembling form desperately. His gaze was scorching.

Before I knew it, Hyungjo and I were entangled, completely naked. Every time his lips brushed against me, and this is no exaggeration, it was so truly hot, like I was going to burn up, that my body trembled with pleasure.

This was a completely different act from the masturbation I did while watching porn. It felt like every single nerve ending for pleasure in my entire body had stood on end. Everything was hazy, as if in a dream, but the sensation of Hyungjo’s lips and tongue crushing and sucking at my flesh was vivid. So vivid that I could recall it decades later if I tried.

The wet sounds of skin sliding against skin filled my ears. My breathing became ragged, gasping as if it would give out at any moment.

Responding to Hyungjo’s hot hands, I came again and again.

To the point where I wondered if this was even my body….

∞ ∞ ∞

I was sitting in the lecture hall, looking at the professor, but I couldn’t hear a single word.

I was not in my right mind because of what Hyungjo and I had done last night.

I had been held by a man who was engaged to be married.

That pleasure, that passion, that heat….

Just the brush of clothes against my skin brought back memories of yesterday. Heat flared up all over my body, as if I were getting hot flashes. Like being burned.

Sitting at my desk, I hunched my shoulders and surrendered my body to the sensation. The hairs on my back and head stood on end, and my tense lower body trembled. The pleasure still lingered on my skin, like a low-grade fever.

Strange, so strange…. Something I couldn’t explain was strange, but I couldn’t bring myself to refuse the pleasure.

As soon as the lecture ended, I rushed to the bathroom and sat in an empty stall. My body was still trembling. Shamefully, I put my hand inside my pants.

“Bang, bang, bang!”

Someone was knocking on the door. I didn’t answer. Instead, sitting on the toilet with my eyes closed, I frantically fumbled with myself like a madman. The banging sound stopped in an instant. But I didn’t even notice, completely surrendering my body to the pleasure.

“Hyunwoo.”

A sweet voice echoed from outside the door.

“……Hyungjo?”

Without even zipping up my pants, I opened the stall door. I couldn’t believe it. Hyungjo was standing there, and he pushed me back inside. Before I could even ask what was going on, his lips crashed down on mine. We fell into the act again, as if we were receiving a harsh punishment.

I skipped meals and classes. I abandoned my daily life and intertwined my flesh with Hyungjo’s. Since everything was a first for me, I didn’t feel anything about the things I should have found strange.

The more we did it, the more we held each other, the more I was held, the more intense the thirst became. My insides churned and my esophagus went dry. It felt like I was dreaming alone. I craved something I couldn’t touch, couldn’t reach, like a desperate thirst. When I called his name, for some reason, tears welled up fiercely from deep within my chest.

Hyungjo, a name I longed for with an aching heart.

I was trembling, wrapping my arms around Hyungjo’s bare back and kissing him.

A loud banging noise startled us both, and we froze. I wondered if it was detectives who had stormed in to catch the older guys. Hyungjo, who had been listening intently to the noise outside, soon lost interest and pulled me into his arms.

“Who is it? Isn’t it the police here to catch the guys?”

“Heo Seok.”

Hyungjo’s lips hardened coldly as he pronounced Heo Seok’s name. The sound of rough footsteps and panting shouts came from Sungjoon’s room.

I quickly grabbed Hyungjo’s shoulder as he leaned in to kiss me. When I pushed him away, Hyungjo looked at me with a what’s wrong? expression.

“This isn’t the time. The guys are fighting. Let’s go see.”

No sooner had my words ended than Sungjoon’s scream-like cry was heard. Hyungjo and I hurriedly got up and got dressed. Before I could even finish buttoning my shirt, I opened the door and ran to Sungjoon’s room.

“Hyung, what’s going on?!”

Something shattered. Heo Seok was panting as he wrecked Sungjoon’s room.

Sungjoon’s room was in a state of chaos.

The bizarre abstract painting, supposedly of Heo Seok, was also torn in half and rolling on the floor. Heo Seok had stopped his destruction and was staring blankly down at something. His limbs trembled with rage.

That was it. The painting Sungjoon was working on… unfortunately, it was of Taewan.

It wasn’t the painting I had seen before, but one of a nude Taewan.

Lee Taewan, sitting comfortably on the sofa where Hyungjo and I made love.

His beautiful body was so lifelike it seemed as if it would stir and stand up at any moment. Hyungjo, realizing what was happening, turned around without a word and left.

Heo Seok frantically rummaged through the floor, then picked up a palette knife and slashed at Taewan. As the canvas ripped with a tearing sound, Sungjoon screamed as if he were vomiting blood.

I watched them, dumbfounded. An unknowable anger surged within me.

Sungjoon clearly liked Taewan. The affection he felt for Taewan was vividly and heartbreakingly revealed in the painting he drew. The canvas frame was completely shattered, and the painting was torn beyond recognition.

Heo Seok let out a ragged breath and glared at Sungjoon. This was not the cool and composed man he usually was. His eyes, twisted with fury, were bloodshot, and his hair and clothes were disheveled. He spoke, panting with uncontrollable breaths.

“You brought that bastard into this room, didn’t you? Didn’t you?”

“……”

“What did you do, you filthy bastard! What did you do!”

“Don’t do this….”

“You said you liked me, didn’t you?! How dare a piece of trash like you play with me?!”

“No, that’s not it…, Seok, it’s not like that.”

“It’s not? What do you mean it’s not! Did you think I wouldn’t know you were thinking of that bastard while you were spreading your legs under me? Did you think I wouldn’t know you were only giving me your body but never your heart! You gave that bastard the same fucking hole I’ve worn myself out in, didn’t you? Tell me the truth! You filthy rent boy!”

Heo Seok slapped Sungjoon hard across the cheek. His body fell to the floor with a thud. Sungjoon lay collapsed, looking weak and pitiful as he cried. He tried to gather the torn pieces of the painting with his hands.

Heo Seok snatched even that from him and threw it into a corner of the room. Sungjoon, his vision blurred by tears, could only flail his arms in the air, letting out moans of “don’t.”

“Heo Seok, stop it!”

I shouted at Heo Seok, but he didn’t seem to hear me. No, it was as if he couldn’t even see my existence.

“I said stop! Hyung, Heo Seok! Can’t you hear me? Stop it!”

I shouted until my throat hurt. He paid no attention, throwing books from the desk, breaking the bookshelf, his eyes wild with jealousy as he trampled on Sungjoon’s belongings.

“Stop it! Don’t!”

I wanted to kill him for not even looking back no matter what I shouted. It was a violent impulse, hard to bear. Staggering with the murderous intent, I screamed for him to please stop.

I knew. This was not my anger.

From Heo Seok’s perspective, the situation was bound to make him angry. The man he loved had drawn a nude of another man. I tried to understand Heo Seok’s violent reaction and suppressed my own rising anger, but I couldn’t control it.

Hyungjo rushed into the room and grabbed my wrist as I was about to strike Heo Seok down. He shut the door.

Soon, along with a dull thud, the sound of flesh slapping against flesh could be heard. The moans of animals mating echoed throughout the house. The sound turned my anger into a helpless sorrow.

I felt myself falling into an abyss, into a sorrow that was not my own.

Into a dark void.

It was that evening.

Sungjoon’s cheeks were swollen as if they had both been slapped. Heo Seok was a cruel and merciless person. After turning the house upside down like that, Heo Seok had left. Though he had unleashed his brutal anger on Sungjoon, his rage had not subsided; he was still panting, and a chilling, murderous glint flickered in his eyes.

I helped the disheveled Sungjoon sit up against the wall and cleaned his room for him. I pieced the torn painting back together as best as I could and placed it on the easel. Sungjoon looked at the Taewan in the painting and shed tears, drop by drop.

“You like Taewan, don’t you?”

Sungjoon didn’t answer. With tear-filled eyes, he only gazed at the canvas I had barely managed to piece together.

“Why, with Heo Seok….”

He opened his mouth as if wandering through a dream.

“Taewan and I went to the same high school. In that oppressive atmosphere, the teachers beat us and broke things every day. The school was no longer a school, and the teachers could no longer be called teachers. In the midst of that, Taewan was the only one who shone. So bright it was blinding…. He reorganized the student council and asserted our rights. He did that even while getting beaten up and hearing threats that they would kill him. It was the same when we came up to Seoul. Taewan’s spirit was always in Gwangju. And for him, the season was always May. Because Taewan had thrown himself into the student movement, that’s why. That’s why Taewan was so far away. I couldn’t dare to reach him.”

He hunched his back sorrowfully. To hold a man with a cause in your heart was a vain desire to possess the unobtainable, and having to yield your own to an ideology must have been a painful dichotomy, like having your flesh sliced by a sashimi knife.

Sungjoon knew he had to kill his feelings, and so he couldn’t tell Taewan. The illusion of their heartbreaking emotional trajectory appeared before my eyes.

Taewan, linking arms with strangers, singing a marching song, and crying with tragic determination, and Sungjoon watching him.

My chest feels so tight.

“People liked Taewan. They were mesmerized by his fiery passion, his terrifying madness, and the more that happened, the further he moved away from me. So I gave up, I had to give up. To let Taewan be… the Taewan they wanted…. But Hyunwoo, I never knew it would hurt this much. I really didn’t know. I thought if I gave up, if I folded, it would all be over.”

The sound of someone singing came from somewhere. The unstable melody, in which choked sobs were swallowed down like fists, was tinged with the heat of alcohol, a fiery passion, and a sense of tragedy.

‘In the dark age of death. My friend shed red tears, red blood, as history called. To the sound of drums, they disappeared down a long and rugged road….’ *

“Taewan can never be mine alone. Hyunwoo….”

It was obvious that Sungjoon would cry endlessly every time he looked at this painting.

I took the broken canvas and left the room. Hyungjo, who had been leaning against the wall next to the door and silently listening to Sungjoon’s words, let out a long sigh.

“Hyungjo, I need to see Taewan.”

“……”

“I have to see him.”

“He’ll come. Tonight.”

After a long silence, Hyungjo’s eyes gleamed coldly. His tone was firm, as if he already knew everything that would happen from this point on.

The entire house was submerged in an air as heavy as lead. Barely holding onto my consciousness as it plummeted somewhere, Hyungjo and I waited for Taewan.

The rough sound of the door was heard. Just as Hyungjo had said, Taewan appeared. His hair was a disheveled mess. A stream of red blood was even trickling down his torn forehead.

As he entered, the smell of gunpowder-laced tear gas filled the surroundings. Though he staggered as if he would collapse at any moment, Taewan’s eyes shone fiercely and clearly.

He was looking for Sungjoon. As if he had already seen Sungjoon crying huddled in a corner of the room, he called out his name harshly.

“Ji Sungjoon! Sungjoon!”

Sungjoon, who had been stumbling as if ill, saw the bleeding Taewan and rushed down, his face pale.

As if he had been holding on by sheer will just to confirm Sungjoon was safe, Taewan collapsed into Sungjoon’s arms like a marionette with its strings cut. Sungjoon hugged the slumping Taewan tightly.

“……Jungwan self-immolated. Gilhwa was pushed from the library and died. Why can’t I do anything? I threw myself into this, leaving you, giving you up……. And yet I just stand by with my hands behind my back as my comrades die. I just watch as the media flogs Jungwan’s dead body yet again. It’s agonizing. It’s agonizing, Sungjoon.”

He poured out his surging shame in tears. The tears flowed over his scabbed face, becoming tears of blood that stained his cheeks.

Hyungjo led me, who was staring blankly at them, into the room. Strangely, my heart felt at ease. I was completely assimilated with Taewan. His warmth, his comfort, and his bliss as he was held by Sungjoon.

Had my soul been completely dyed by Taewan?

By his blue-flame-like passion and ideals.

Hyungjo, recalling Taewan’s words, spoke as if to himself.

“Jungwan and Gilhwa are core members of the Sammin Struggle Committee*. A Frakchi is on the move.”

“……What’s a Frakchi?”

“……”

Footnotes:

1] Frakchi: Derived from the Russian word Fraktsiya. Means ‘spy’ or ‘informer’.

2] Sammin Struggle Committee Chairman: The head of a struggle organization organized under the National Federation of Student Associations (Jeonhangnyeon).

3] New Democratic Party: A party founded by integrating opposition forces with the aim of a peaceful transfer of power ahead of the 6th presidential election and the 7th general election for the National Assembly. (February 7, 1967)