Irresponsibility Chapter 1.6

On the tray was a bowl of porridge. Ever since getting indigestion after eating meat, his meals had always been porridge. It did not matter what he ate, but it was better than meat.

Baek Geonhyuk’s gaze fell on the back of Joo Yeoun’s head as he cautiously sat up. His hair was sticking up severely on one side. It was long enough to cover the nape of his neck, but it was surprisingly stiff.

Baek Geonhyuk, who had been staring at the messy back of his head, noticed the tense Joo Yeoun and belatedly moved back. When he stood by the door, Joo Yeoun finally picked up the spoon and took a bite of porridge.

“If you are bored, you can come out to the living room.”

“……”

“There is a TV, too…”

Baek Geonhyuk stopped talking and shut his mouth. It did not seem like the kind of words Joo Yeoun, who tensed up every time he opened his mouth, needed to hear.

Glance, glance. Watching the round pupils move busily, he quietly turned around.

“……”

The door closed.

Gulp. Joo Yeoun swallowed and stared at the closed door. Even as he scooped another spoonful of porridge and put it in his mouth, his gaze remained fixed on the door.

Just until the day before yesterday, if someone entered the room, he would fall into a panic and could not even properly hear what they were saying. He would only react instinctively at that moment, and after it passed, the event would become hazy and he could not remember it well.

But he was gradually becoming able to maintain his composure. He also remembered the words he had just heard.

‘If you are bored, you can come out to the living room.’

He had definitely said that.

Does he really mean I can go out? Yeoun’s gaze, as he drank water, flickered to the door.

He had a thought that it might be a test. If he really went outside, he might be beaten with a “I knew you would do that.”

Joo Yeoun hung his head limply.

Having experienced torture he had never even imagined in his life, one would think he would become numb to pain, and having endured such torture, one would think his courage would well up. But Yeoun came to fear pain even more. He learned with his whole body just how terrifying it was.

Pain ultimately takes everything away. Even his very self.

The things he considered important, his innate personality, his precious people… It seems to wipe away everything that makes him up and builds up in its place.

So he almost…

“……”

Anyway. Getting hit is scary.

The man’s hands were large. His whole body was covered in bulky muscles, and he was tall, so even one hit would probably break a bone. His spine tingled at the thought.

He unconsciously hugged his arms, and something hard touched his left hand. Joo Yeoun stared blankly at the cast that bluntly covered his right hand.

‘We will take it off around next week, check the progress, and, umm… that should be it.’

The words the doctor had said as if to himself suddenly came to mind.

When someone was next to him, his mind would blur with fear, but when he was alone, it became reasonably clear. Words that had been buried in a fog would suddenly pop into his memory.

It seemed true that both the doctor and the man were trying their best for his recovery.

Right now, they were taking care of him. Their tone and actions were all as if they were dealing with a patient. Not only the doctor, but even that man as well.

It was the same when he looked back on the time he found the man sitting blankly at dawn a few days ago. At the time, he had been too scared, but thinking about it later, it did not seem like he had come in to harm him.

He could not remember well what the man had said. He only recalled the low, vibrating voice, but the sensation of his touch on his hand was vivid. It was rough, and warm.

Right now, their purpose must be for him to regain his health.

…Then what about after he recovers?

He could not believe the doctor’s words, “we are trying to protect you,” at face value. Even though they seemed to be treating him well, they had clearly confined him here. They did not give him a mobile phone, and he could not meet anyone other than them.

In the first place, it had started with a kidnapping, had it not? Joo Yeoun stood beside the bed and repeatedly glanced at the door.

He only managed to muster up the courage when the sun began to set.

From his guess, it seemed that man lived alone in this house. The doctor only visited him during the day or evening and did not show up in the morning or at dawn.

And the man seems to go out for a few hours a day. Was it the day before yesterday? When he brought dinner, he had said, “Sorry. Work ended late.”

He probably goes to work.

Where?

…That interrogation room? Was he on his way back from torturing someone else?

Joo Yeoun, his face pale, squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them. This was not the time for this. He had to figure out the layout of this house before the man or the doctor came, and then return to his room.

His heart was beating so fast that he felt nauseous. Joo Yeoun swallowed dryly and slowly turned the doorknob.

He opened the door slightly, muffling the sound as much as possible, and the living room came into faint view. He could not tell if there was anyone there, so he opened the door a little wider.

“…He, hey.”

Joo Yeoun called out in a small voice and carefully looked to both sides. It felt like someone would appear at any moment, and his hand gripping the doorknob turned white with force.

There was no sign of anyone. Yeoun cautiously stepped outside the room.

Directly across from the room he was staying in, there was another room. The door was always closed, so he had no idea what the inside looked like.

I have to escape this place. To do that, figuring out every corner is the first priority.

Joo Yeoun hesitated and approached, putting his ear to the door of the room across. Then, for no reason, he quickly turned his head and stared in the opposite direction.

Even after confirming that no one was there, his hand kept hesitating.

To be honest, he did not want to open the door. He felt it would be full of cruel and scary things.

‘Yeah, do not say anything. We can just try using everything here, one by one.’

Hard, sharp, rough-surfaced. Things like that.

“……”

His left hand, gripping the doorknob, trembled slightly. Yeoun, looking down at his hand, gritted his teeth and squeezed his fist. The door opened.

He immediately felt drained. The room contained none of the things he had imagined. A dusty piano, a bookshelf, a pile of books, a large dining table… It seemed to be used as a room for storing miscellaneous items. Yeoun quietly closed the door and turned around.

The living room was to the left of the short hallway. He hid himself at the corner at the end of the hallway and took a peek, but there was no one in the living room or in the kitchen to the right.

Joo Yeoun carefully surveyed the living room and kitchen. His nerves were on edge, feeling as if something dangerous would jump out, but the house was ordinary. Yeoun closed the kitchen drawer slowly and glanced behind him.

There were two doors left, and both were half-open. Yeoun first opened the door on the right from the entrance, closer to the kitchen. It was an ordinary bathroom.

Then the remaining place must be that man’s room.

A dry swallow went down his throat. Yeoun tiptoed and carefully peeked through the crack in the door. After confirming again that no one was there, he sidled through the half-open doorway and entered.

Fiddling with his cast, Yeoun looked around with anxious eyes. The thought that he was in that person’s room made him keep flinching and feel a chill.

The man’s room was suffocatingly small. It was the smallest room in this house, and it seemed impossible to even place the bed he was using in it.

Yeoun’s gaze, which had been on the neatly folded blanket on the cot, moved to the side. On one wall, there was a single clothing rack, and not many clothes were hanging on it. Just enough clothes for one season. The only other items were a bench and dumbbells in the corner.

It looked like a temporary room. Perhaps he was staying here to keep an eye on him.

“……!”

Then, he heard voices from afar.

Joo Yeoun, his face pale, turned around and went back the way he came. He slipped through the man’s doorway and then ran quickly to his own room.

He stumbled slightly, but he succeeded in closing the door without a sound.

As he stood with his back to the door, a rushed breath burst out. His ribs ached from the breathing that filled his lungs to the point of making his shoulders heave. Yeoun placed a hand on his side and sat on the edge of the bed.

He had figured out the general layout of the house, but it was a pity he had not been able to check the area near the front door. He needed to know what kind of lock was on it.

He also had not been able to open the sliding door next to the front door. Judging by the layout, it was probably a pantry or a shoe closet.

This house had three rooms and two bathrooms. Since the room he was confined in had an attached bathroom, it seemed this was the master bedroom. The room across was a storage room, and the man’s room was next to the front door, farthest from here.

The fact that the man was guarding the entrance was chilling.

Fortunately, he had confirmed with his own eyes that the house was empty for a few hours a day. Considering the man’s huge back or his thick forearms, the chances of success with a frontal breakthrough were too low, so he had to escape when he was out of the house.

If he had had a little more time, he would have looked out the window more carefully. He could have planned an escape route for when he got out of the house.

For now, he had no choice but to wait for the man to leave the house again.

Joo Yeoun, who was trying to catch his ragged breath, suddenly lowered his head and looked at his bare feet. The floor under his feet was warm. He thought the floor outside was cold.

*

The next day, the man also left the house.

The man was so frighteningly quiet that he could not figure out exactly when he had left the house. Even if he was careful, the sound of the front door opening and closing should have been audible.

So Joo Yeoun opened the door at the same time as yesterday. The man was not there. If he had known he was out, he would have come out a little earlier to look around. It was a pity.

Because he did not have the courage to open the door early, he had to move as if he were being chased. He decided to leave the places he had checked yesterday and focus on exploring the surroundings of this building through the window.

From the living room balcony window, all he could see were rice paddies. He could see a few low houses on the other side, but they seemed too far to shout for help. When he watched for a while, he did not see any people passing by either.

He suddenly felt anxious, but at least he had discovered that there were houses, even if they were far away. If it came to it, he could run there. The distance was hard to gauge because of the vast rice paddies in between, but since he could see them, would he not be able to arrive within an hour?

Joo Yeoun glanced back and forth at the window and headed to the kitchen window on the other side. It was a small window located above the sink, so it was not easy to see outside.

Joo Yeoun, whose eyes were darting around, went into the utility room right next to it. It was a small space with a washing machine, but the window was larger than the kitchen window, making it easier to survey the outside.

He stayed there for a long time until he heard the sound of a car and went back to his room.

The result of his observation, with his face practically pressed against the window, was not bad.

He found out that this was the top floor of the villa, and more importantly, he came to suspect that someone lived next door. White steam was leaking from the boiler flue on the outer wall. There might be people living on the lower floors as well.

There are definitely other people nearby.

Therefore, it had become much easier to ask for help, but for some reason, Joo Yeoun became anxious. It was because he had an ominous premonition that things would not be resolved this easily.

Besides, that evening, the man said something strange.

“You can walk around inside the house as much as you want. You can do whatever you want.”

Standing at the doorway, he added, looking blankly at Yeoun.

“Just do not go outside the house.”

From then on, his heart pounded as if it would explode. It seemed the man knew that he had been walking around the house.

I am caught. I am caught. His breathing grew increasingly rapid, and he heard a ringing in his ears.

“If you go outside…”

It seemed the man was saying something, but the ringing was so severe that he could not hear anything.