Arcadia Chapter 2.5

“Will you come if I call? Even if we’re apart for a little while.”

He’s this cute, I might as well grant his wish.

Dia, who had cupped the locket of the necklace in both hands and brought it to his lips, pretended to whisper something, then blinked his golden eyelashes.

“Of course…”

…I can’t. He didn’t know the purpose for which Dia was entrusted to him, but if he was handed over to Michel, he would undoubtedly be sent to a research institute, and if so, then probably… Even the ignorant Van could predict that he would live his entire life in a sealed-off place.

“I have to go see you. It’s you who’s calling, after all.”

The contract period had only been shortened by a little over two months. There were still ten months left with the child, and it wasn’t so difficult to throw out an empty promise to smooth over the moment. Perhaps the answer, thrown out while hiding his bitterness, was what he wanted to hear, as Dia blushed and smiled.

“You have to keep your promise. If you don’t…”

Dia, who was rolling the locket between his fingers, burrowed into his embrace and trailed off.

“What are you going to do about it?”

“I’ll go find you.”

“How are you going to find me?”

Van, who had enveloped the child’s hand and the tracker together, tilted his head and asked. He wanted to act serious, but he couldn’t suppress the corners of his mouth from twitching upwards.

“I know how to drive a car, and I know how to ride a plane. If I go incredibly far away, how will you find me?”

“Van.”

Dia, leaning against his shoulder, looked up at him vacantly and then moved his lips.

“I know where Van is.”

The child’s hand, which had been in his grasp, slipped out and touched a toy car rolling around on the floor. The toy, which rolled forward with just a slight touch, got caught on the leg of a pink stuffed doll and came to a stop. Van, pulling the car over, chuckled.

“Ah… I’m not a big fan of this kind of restraint.”

The way to respond to a silly remark was with another silly remark. As he let go of the necklace, Dia raised his arms and wrapped them around his neck. The warmth of the child, who had put his full weight on his shoulders, transferred to him, and a small voice fell upon his ear.

“So does Van love me?”

“Yeees. Of course. I love you.”

Van replied lightly, his mind elsewhere. It was because of those damn movies that packaged that thing called love as some great destiny that Dia had become like this.

That damn romance and destiny don’t put food on the table, and that love is something to be enjoyed lightly and ended moderately is the wise way to live life.

“Ah, say ah.”

He put the toothbrush into Dia’s mouth, which was opened in a circle. He held the slender chin and brushed his teeth very carefully, but it was difficult to control his strength because of Dia, who kept grinning even though he knew full well he was concentrating. Van, while pouring out rebukes, couldn’t maintain a firm attitude.

“How old are you now, huh? Why am I brushing your teeth for you?”

“I dunno.”

“You don’t know? What do you mean you don’t know.”

Van, who had fed him after much begging and was now even brushing his teeth for him today, let out a hollow laugh. Brushing his teeth was one of the many things Dia demanded. It was pure childishness.

“Bu’ you said you wove me.”

“This is beyond love.”

Dia mumbled with a mouthful of foam and dangled his legs. The tips of Dia’s feet, perched on the desk, tapped rhythmically against Van’s knee.

Did he learn how to be annoying from the movies too?

Van held back a sigh, had him rinse his mouth, and wiped it dry. After tapping the toothbrush dry and putting it in the cup, he crossed his arms, and Dia hopped down from the desk and started walking backward toward the open doorway. He wanted to applaud the feat of not breaking eye contact for even a moment.

“One hour, Van.”

Dia left that one remark and headed toward the clock set up in the most visible spot inside the glass wall. Van, who was staring at the back of the boy, whose rather handsome bone structure was beginning to show, climbed the ladder belatedly.

As he came up to the living room, the chilly air cooled his body. Since he was living in the basement without any time to clean, the display cabinet and the living room table were thick with dust. Can I finish the meal and cleaning in an hour, he lamented as he entered the kitchen.

He wasn’t hungry since he had eaten snacks in the basement, but he had to go through the annoying procedure of getting Dia’s permission every time he came up, so he had to fill his stomach a little whenever he had the time.

What should I eat, he wondered, tapping on the countertop, then slightly drew back the curtain that had been covering the outside all this time. Van, who was looking outside to check if the snow had melted, frowned. He could see the back of a police car speeding toward the forest. When he stuck his head out the window, red and blue lights were noisily illuminating the dark night. He had an ominous premonition.

Van quickly came out to the living room, turned on the TV that had been off the whole time, and switched the channel from a documentary to the news, perching on the edge of the sofa. The news screen was chaotic. Below the anchor, who had blonde hair similar to Dia’s, the word ‘Breaking News’ and a familiar place name were displayed in huge letters. Just as he was trying to listen to the news, the doorbell rang.

[An unidentified body was discovered, and an investigation has begun…]

The anchor’s smooth voice was interspersed with the repeatedly ringing doorbell. He thought they would leave if he ignored it, but it seemed they were waiting for someone to come out. Van’s eyes darted around, and he slowly rose from the sofa. The build of the figure visible through the transparent glass of the front door was unusual. Was it the police again?

[Identification of the mutilated body is difficult, so the exact circumstances of the incident are under investigation…]

Van, standing in front of the door, placed his hand on the lock and looked back. The display cabinet was open, revealing the entrance to the basement, and the remote to close it was in the kitchen. If he went back, the other person would see him too. And under the circumstances, it wouldn’t be good to ignore the police. After hesitating, he spoke.

“Who is it?”

The unknown visitor raised his head. Even though he was blocked by the door, the low laugh was transmitted clearly.

“It’s me. Van.”

Unlike the friendly call, the voice was both familiar and unfamiliar. Van quickly tried to recall all the faces he knew, but no one came to mind. It seemed to be a local he knew by sight, so with the intention of making a suitable excuse and chasing him away, he undid the heavy locks one by one.

Van, who unlocked the last lock without thinking, opened the door just enough to see the face and then slammed it shut. It was a perfect door slam, so much so that the bang sound struck his ears. The visitor, who had been kicked out in one second, gave a scolding remark mixed with a snort and knocked on the door instead of ringing the doorbell.

“Why’d you close it?”

Van covered his mouth, which had almost let out a scream, and clutched the doorknob. It was a guy who had no business being here. He had never told him his address, let alone his hometown, and they weren’t close enough to share trivial stories—a very, deathly uncomfortable bastard. A bastard whose face alone was enough to ruin the whole day…

Thinking he must have seen wrong, he tapped his forehead again and again, but it wasn’t easy to mistake that damn face for someone else’s.

“Is he crazy…”

The guy he thought he would never see again after leaving Cancún was at his front door. At the front door of his house, where he was raising a being that was either an alien or a monster.

Unable to believe it, Van, who was frozen at the entrance, unable to leave or open the door, felt a vibration in his thigh and fumbled in his pocket. The old-fashioned cellphone, which hadn’t rung in a long time, was vibrating like crazy. It was that tiresome mechanical voice, but right now, it seemed like a way out of this helpless situation.

He answered the phone without delay, and a voice that had cleanly shed the annoying mechanical sound drilled into his ear.

— Open the door.

His head turned with a creak. Through the opaque window, the bastard who was beyond uncomfortable and downright dreadful waved the hand holding the cellphone.

What were the chances of reuniting with an ex-colleague you didn’t even want to see in your dreams in your hometown? The chances that they were tied up together in a job forcibly handed over by your only family member? And the chances that the person in question had no idea about it at all?

Van felt his limbs go stiff. Blinking with a dazed face, he opened his mouth, which wouldn’t move, into the phone from which he could hear faint breathing.

“…It was you? That pervert bastard?”

His vision went blank. As the past flashed through his mind, he was stunned as if he had been hit on the back of the head.

While he was losing his mind taking care of a child for the first time in his life, the mechanical voice had made all sorts of disgusting requests from time to time. Come closer, wear blue clothes, open your mouth… In the end, it even made him do strange poses, mentioning additional pay, and Van had readily complied with most of the requests.

What pride was there to uphold in the face of money? It wasn’t like he was being asked to masturbate in front of the camera, so there was no reason he couldn’t do it. The additional pay accumulated in this way exceeded five hundred dollars, and the guy who had watched that shameful display with a smile…

— You were so obedient. You weren’t like that with me.

No matter how much he struggled to deny reality, the voice coming from over the phone was that of the guy he knew all too well.

Without even a moment to agonize, Van threw the door open and rushed out, grabbing him by the collar first thing.

“Hey, you crazy…!”

Wayne, whose black jacket was firmly gripped, took a step back and scanned his face with an expression that was always unpleasant to see. Eyes that gave no clue as to what he was thinking and a persistent gaze. For a relationship where they had never exchanged a single deep conversation, it was intense.

“You must have had a hard time. You’ve lost weight.”

“How are you, no. You and Michel…”

Things that were incomprehensible mixed together in a mess, actually blocking his throat. A murder happening in a boring town, an ex-colleague showing up as a helper. The situation was full of questions. Van, who had given up on sorting it out neatly, threw down the jacket he had been gripping tightly. Wayne, who brushed off his wrinkled outer garment, pushed his shoulder.

“Get inside.”

Van, who had promptly blocked Wayne from entering the doorway as he pleased, had a face full of annoyance.

“Where do you think you’re coming?”

Wayne, who was looking down impassively at Van, who was showing his hostility without hiding it, suddenly reached out his hand. He grabbed the collar of the off-guard Van and pushed him into the house.

“What are you, hey!”

The grip of the hand that had twisted his sweater was unusually strong. Van urgently tried to twist the guy’s wrist and shake him off, but it came to nothing as his back hit the wall. The bodies pressed together without a gap felt only unpleasant, and his brow furrowed wretchedly. The front door slid shut behind Wayne, who had finally set foot inside the house.

“It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other, shouldn’t you ask how I’ve been first?”

“Don’t give me that ‘it’s been a while’ crap, you crazy bastard.”

“Greet me a little more warmly.”

Van snorted. He had no intention of greeting the guy warmly before, and he wouldn’t in the future either.

“Let go.”

Van roughly shook off his hand and properly closed the front door, which had been left ajar. After locking it and even covering the opaque window with a small curtain, the living room became a completely isolated space. In the entrance hallway, where only their shallow breaths could be heard, Van held out the old-fashioned cellphone in his hand.

“This is you. The bastard I’ve been in contact with.”

Wayne, who had placed a paper bag on the shoe cabinet, shook the cellphone of the same model in his hand without a reply.

It was so absurd that he had to laugh. Van, who rubbed his throbbing forehead, looked straight up at Wayne, whom he had never once tried to look at properly.

“What the hell are you?”

The man, with his dark brown hair tousled haphazardly just like in Cancún, met his eyes. His lips, which were long and thin to the point of looking vicious, opened, and a voice lower than a sigh flowed out.

“Just as you know.”

“What I know? A cheapskate?”

“Aren’t we the same in that respect?”

There was nothing to refute. That unknowable bastard. Van gritted his teeth and backed away. As he passed Wayne and entered the living room, a leisurely pace followed. Van, who had slumped onto the sofa, checked the time. The time allowed was a little over forty minutes, which was enough to talk with that guy.

He moved away to create distance, avoiding Wayne who was brazenly planting his butt a hand’s breadth away. Regardless of whether Van was disgusted or not, Wayne naturally found the remote as if it were his own house and turned off the TV, where the news was continuing. As the noise disappeared, an uneasy silence descended on the living room. Van silently fiddled with his fingernails and summoned his ill-disposed work colleague from his memory.