The Taste of Lies Chapter 19

This Mister really…

He hurriedly covered his mouth. His eyes, which his palm hadn’t quite hidden, were red. His heart pounded and a few tears leaked out.

“A, a present, why…?”

His voice wouldn’t come out properly, his throat was so choked. Youngmin handed Sangtae a glass of water and waited until he had finished it before answering. Sangtae set the empty glass down with a thud.

“What’s with the sudden birthday present? I’m not a kid.”

“What does age have to do with birthday presents? Isn’t it something you can give to someone you live with?”

Youngmin answered with a blank expression. He seemed not to attach much significance to the gift. Still, Sangtae’s heart fluttered.

It was the first time since coming to Korea that he’d heard someone say they’d celebrate the day he was born. Even his grandmother had said that since she gave birth to a daughter, and that daughter gave birth to him, he should be the one making her seaweed soup.

“You’re really going to give me one?”

“I’m asking because I’m going to.”

“You have that much money? You’re not Santa, throwing money around like that. If you buy stuff for the senior officers you work with at the substation too, your wallet won’t hold up.”

Even at the petty provocation, Youngmin didn’t get flustered. Rather, he seemed to see right through it—that Sangtae’s reaction stemmed from some kind of defense mechanism—and remained perfectly calm.

Sangtae shoveled stew into his bare mouth. Youngmin, saying it was too salty, took a spoonful of rice with his own spoon and fed it to Sangtae.

He still hadn’t even recovered from his cold.

This is why, this is why I can’t help but give him my heart. Because he’s only gentle to me.

“Tell me what you want.”

“If I ask, will you buy me anything?”

“As far as my pockets allow. And no motorcycles. They’re dangerous. You’ll get hurt.”

He shows his gentleness only to me.

Sangtae had already received so much from Youngmin. Youngmin probably didn’t know, but the kindness he showered—that very thing—was a huge gift to Sangtae. The days he spent with him were like birthdays, and even if Youngmin handed him a Monami ballpoint pen as a present, he’d be overjoyed.

“Mister, my birthday is more than six months away. I’ll think about it slowly from now.”

Still, he didn’t want to turn down the gift he was being offered. He didn’t want to just accept anything either. It would be awkward if he blurted something out now and then wanted something else by the time his birthday came around. Just as he resolved to think carefully and decide for sure what he wanted, a question slipped out without him realizing.

“Mister, when’s your birthday?”

“Me? February twen—”

Stopping mid-sentence, Youngmin suddenly fell silent. Sangtae stared at him, waiting for him to continue. But once closed, his lips were like an oyster shell stuck to a rock—they wouldn’t open easily.

“Twentieth-something? The 21st? The 22nd?”

“…”

“The 23rd? The 24th?”

He didn’t answer. Not only that, his face was deeply flustered. Sangtae quietly watched Youngmin. He waited for his answer until the steam from the soybean paste stew cooled and it became lukewarm. Exhausted by the persistent pressing, Youngmin finally spoke.

“Why are you asking that?”

“I’m asking so I can give you a present too. So what day is it?”

“My birthday passed a long time ago. You don’t have to give me anything.”

“Does your birthday only come once in a lifetime? There’s next year’s birthday too. Even if we’re not living together by then, you can still give me a birthday present, can’t you?”

“Forget it. I don’t need one.”

“You don’t need one?”

“I don’t need one. Save that money and put it toward your independence. Starting in January, it’s every man for himself.”

“…”

Sangtae put his spoon down as if throwing it, and at the same time, Youngmin also took his dishes and stood up. In his rice bowl, which Sangtae caught a glimpse of, more than half the rice remained.

Sangtae knew how much he usually ate. Regardless of whether he didn’t need a birthday present from him or not, Youngmin was currently avoiding conversation with him.

No human being doesn’t have a birthday. There might be people who can’t tell you theirs, though.

“Fine. If you don’t want it, don’t take it. I’ll save the money I would’ve spent on your birthday present and put it toward my independence fund, just like you said. Money saved, how great.”

Youngmin paused for a moment, but then calmly told him to hurry up and go to school. Sangtae snatched Youngmin’s rice bowl away. He scraped all the remaining rice into his own bowl and handed back the empty one.

“Finish your rice. You finished your rice, right, Mister?”

He also knew the rice cooker was empty. And on top of that, that the rice had run out completely and they’d need to buy some today.

Youngmin was about to go hungry as punishment for not revealing his birthday. Sangtae was being petty. Youngmin couldn’t retort and just set his spoon down in the sink.

It didn’t matter that he wouldn’t tell him his birthday. There were plenty of ways to find out. He could request a copy of his resident registration, but the easiest way was to check directly.

Sitting in the very back of the bus, Sangtae sniffled and patted his pocket over his school uniform pants. Inside was Youngmin’s wallet, which he’d quietly “borrowed” while Youngmin was doing the dishes.

As soon as he arrived at the library, he headed for the shelves. His hurried footsteps were louder than usual. The librarian cleared her throat as a warning. But Sangtae didn’t hear it.

Sangtae tucked himself into the 440 section, which was rarely borrowed from. Neither the 430 section on the left nor the 450 section on the right saw many visitors. Glancing around, he leaned his thigh against the radiator by the window. A spider tried to cling to his leg, so he flicked it off with his finger and took out the wallet.

The men’s leather wallet, which folded in half, was light and thin enough that even a pickpocket would ignore it. The cash inside was barely 27,000 won. Sangtae, curious, counted the bills and put them back in the exact same arrangement as before, then shook out the rest.

In the top slot were three stiff business cards stamped with Youngmin’s name and one credit card. In the slot below were five other people’s business cards, presumably exchanged for work purposes. On the other side were a couple of restaurant business cards and some receipts.

That was all.

Nowhere in the wallet could he find a resident registration card, a driver’s license, or a police ID.

“That’s strange…”

If someone found this wallet on the street, they’d have a hard time identifying the owner. There wasn’t a single legal proof that the owner of this wallet was Ma Youngmin.

Even if he kept them separate for fear of loss, wasn’t it normal to have at least one? Sangtae’s wallet had his student ID and resident registration card.

“Does he have another wallet?”

Tilting his head and thinking, but this was the only wallet Youngmin had. He carried it when he went to work, when he went to the market, and even when he stopped to get gas while driving.

He found nothing from the wallet.

Come to think of it, Sangtae didn’t know much about Youngmin either.

His unsavory birth, his preferences—Youngmin had said he liked older women—the fact that he wore boxers to sleep and briefs to work, those intimate details of his private life he’d naturally come to know as a cohabitant. But about the external things he could know even if he weren’t living with him, he knew nothing.

It wasn’t just his birthday. Things that anyone who knew Youngmin socially would normally know—like his highest level of education, for example—Sangtae knew none of them.

He only knew Youngmin was from Incheon because Youngmin had told him himself. And if he hadn’t overheard the aunties’ gossip, he would have never known that Youngmin was 24—born in 1978.

He’d never asked, sure, but weren’t these kinds of things supposed to pop out once in a while, just a word or two?

Sangtae had laid everything bare—his hometown, his parents’ jobs, his family situation, even the reason he came to Korea. But Youngmin had said not a single word. He seemed like the type who was reluctant to disclose information about himself.

Maybe even the claim that his hometown was Incheon was a lie. Since he said so, Sangtae just believed him.

In the end, it seemed Sangtae knew nothing about Youngmin at all.

He organized the wallet back to its original state, shoved it into his back pocket, grabbed a random book, and returned to his seat.

He set the book he’d brought on the desk. The title was Calendar and Power. The pages turned easily, but the content naturally didn’t sink into his head.

Turning the pages out of habit, Sangtae thought. He liked Youngmin. Liked him enough to dream of kissing him and giving him a handjob. And Youngmin didn’t know about Sangtae’s feelings.