A Scorching Day Chapter 22

For the past several days, Ki Joon and I had been eating late-night meals together. The day before yesterday, it was hamburgers; yesterday, it was the udon place we’d gone to before. Today, we decided to eat something light, so we had kimbap and tteokbokki at the snack bar in front of the school. I couldn’t break Ki Joon’s stubborn insistence on walking me all the way home, so we ended up walking side by side to my house.

At this rate, meeting Ki Joon at night and eating something was going to become a habit. But I didn’t dislike it. After studying until late, getting hungry was a common occurrence. I’d never had the leeway to eat late-night snacks, so I’d grown accustomed to going to bed with an empty stomach, but after eating something warm and delicious before sleeping, I actually slept better.

Actually, whether I ate late-night snacks or not was a secondary issue. I just liked meeting Ki Joon like this at night. The trivial conversations we shared. The warm glances we exchanged. The high body heat I felt when he occasionally pressed close to me, and the good scent that made my heart race.

Gawon had never had a proper friend before. So he couldn’t help but be confused. Whether this was truly just the rapport shared between friends. Whether boys normally played around like this with each other.

He knew that Ki Joon’s personality was naturally kind. But… even so, he didn’t act this way with other friends. He didn’t give anyone else in the classroom such a gentle look. The one he consistently walked to the front of his house, the one he stroked on the head, the one he kept buying delicious things for—it was only him.

Why would Ki Joon give me such preferential treatment? He tried to examine himself with self-deprecating scrutiny, thinking he was thinking of himself as too special, but the conclusion was always the same. Ki Joon acted no differently toward the other kids than any typical high school boy.

For example… just looking at how he put them in headlocks, or how he played roughly by shoving with his body, made it clear. When teased as a joke, he’d freely fire back with mischievous words, and occasionally he’d mix in a mild curse. All things he absolutely never did with me.

Above all.

Whenever he and Ki Joon were alone together, there were times when they’d stare intently at each other, then get shy and avert their gazes. Not just once in a while, but quite often. At those times, Ki Joon’s earlobes were invariably bright red. The earlobe he’d secretly touched himself was also just as hot.

Whenever their bodies happened to get close, he’d startle and step back, afraid that his pounding heart would be heard. When he heard the voice calling “Gawon-ah,” a tingling sensation spread from his ears to his neck and down to his chest. The scent of fabric softener he’d grown used to would come to mind even when the other wasn’t there, and Gawon had tried to ask Ki Joon what product he used several times, only to hold back.

To say all of this was just the kind of feeling one shares with a same-age classmate felt a bit…

‘A bit… strange.’

Ki Joon, you and I… why on earth are we like this?

He couldn’t find the answer. But he didn’t want to rashly scrutinize and dig into it either. He was afraid that this peace might be ruined. He wanted to enjoy this gift-like time a little more, just a tiny bit more. Because it felt good. Just… because it felt so good.

But every time, a question inevitably followed.

Is it okay to do this?

Is it okay to like this person this much?

Whenever they faced each other, talked, ate, and walked side by side, there was a fact that kept growing fainter. Perhaps he desperately wanted to turn away from that fact, and maybe he himself was intentionally making it blurry. But even if it grew hazy, the essence still remained there.

The fact that Ki Joon was born and raised in the very hellish world that Gawon had endured his entire life. Even if he pretended not to know now, a clear and sorrowful premonition that someday he would be deeply hurt by that very fact.

“We’re already here.”

He heard Ki Joon’s disappointed voice. Gawon quickly raised his head and stopped walking. They were already in front of his house.

“Go on in. It’s late.”

“Yeah. …Thanks for walking me. Tomorrow.”

After a moment of hesitation, Gawon’s lips moved. He was about to swallow his words but ultimately decided to say them. No matter how much he tried to remind himself of the essence… when he was with Ki Joon, it always ended up like this.

“…Let me walk you to your house.”

“No, my house is really far.”

“Still, you’re always the one walking me.”

“I told you. I need to manage my weight, right? It’s good for cardio too.”

Looking up at the face smiling freshly under the streetlamp, Gawon felt a little melancholy. He was already home, so he should go in, but why did he feel so reluctant?

“Go in.”

“Yeah. You go safely too.”

They waved at each other from a moderate distance. He was afraid that the other might see the shabby interior of his house. Since he’d already been caught living in an alley like this, there was nothing more to be embarrassed about, but still.

Gawon closed the door and let out a small sigh. Okay, this much is fine. Spending time together at school, going through their own schedules, then sitting across from each other at night eating late-night snacks—just up to this point…

But then there was the money issue again. He couldn’t just keep being treated every single day. Ki Joon had subtly said not to feel burdened, that he didn’t want to eat alone anyway and was just grateful to have someone to share with, but that was just him being considerate.

He should contact his uncle and ask if there was any more work available. Gawon let out a small sigh and took out his phone. He found ‘Uncle Kim Hyeongju’ in his contacts and sent a text.

[Uncle, hello. This is Gawon.]

[I was wondering if you might have any more work. It doesn’t have to be peeling onions—washing dishes or serving is fine too.]

Uncle Hyeongju’s family was one of the only acquaintances his mother had maintained ties with since he was very young. Uncle Hyeongju and his aunt, who ran a restaurant near the establishment where his mother worked, had pitied his mother, who was pregnant and frequented the place, and often extended a helping hand to her when she came to eat at their restaurant.

That connection led to Uncle Hyeongju’s family caring for Gawon for a few months when he was very young, he’d heard. They had taken in a newborn abandoned carelessly in a corner of a room, given him a name, and raised him on formula. If his aunt from Uncle Hyeongju’s family hadn’t done that, he probably would have died on the cold floor of that room without a single sip of milk.

Currently, his mother no longer associated much with Uncle Hyeongju’s family. But Gawon always made sure to contact them on holidays and at the end of the year. No matter what anyone said, they were the people he was most grateful to.

Whenever he was short on money, he’d contact them and help out at the restaurant. The restaurant had been doing consistently well, so they always said they needed extra hands. For Gawon, it was more convenient to work for 4 or 5 hours occasionally and get paid by the day, rather than having a regular part-time job. That way, he could focus more on his studies.

Just then, the door opened. Startled by the creaking noise, Gawon turned around with wide eyes.

“…Mom?”

His mother, carrying a plastic bag with bottles of alcohol in her hand, stumbled into the house. It seemed she had the day off. Just as he was about to ask if she’d had dinner, Gawon’s eyes widened. His mother’s eyes, with a terrifying gleam, were bruised a deep blue.

“Mom, are you okay…!”

“You. How long are you going to keep going to that damned school? Seriously.”

His question of concern was brutally cut off by the sharp voice. A piercing glare was fixed on the bookbag Gawon was carrying.

“With our means, I can barely feed myself, and now I have to feed two? Huh? Those bastards take every penny I earn. Fuck, they even fucked up my face, so I couldn’t even work today!”

“…Let me put some medicine on it first. I’ll go buy some right now…”

“Medicine?”

His mother’s furious face turned toward Gawon. Her terribly bloodshot eyes rolled in a chilling manner.

“Medicine, my ass. Don’t pretend to be concerned; it’s annoying. What the hell were you doing while I was out there earning money? Are you telling me I have to earn the money and do the housework too?”

“…”

“Have I ever asked you to do anything hard? Just come to the place and carry the fruit! They give good tips, you know!”

“…”

“You can’t do it? You hate working that much? What the fuck makes you so high and mighty that you can’t do it? Your whore of a mother is getting beaten up by thugs and selling her body!”

Thugs…. Today, those words pierced his heart like sharp shards of glass. Gawon bit his lips tightly and bowed his head.

“If you can’t do that, then get your ass out there and get a part-time job. Stop just wasting food! Who the hell do you think you are, studying? Studying isn’t for just anyone! That’s for kids from rich families! Know your place!”

If he listened any longer, his chest, filled with rage, felt like it would explode. Leaving his mother shouting at the top of her lungs behind him, he ran into his room and slammed the door shut. At times like this, he was grateful to have two rooms, even if they were suffocatingly small.

He took out the earphones from his pocket. He turned on an English listening file he’d downloaded from an educational site and maxed out the volume. Immediately, the door burst open again. His mother, having flung the door open as if to break it, stormed into the room and began ranting.

“Hey, you little bastard. Do you think I’m a joke too? Do you think everything a whore says is bullshit? How dare you go hiding away while your mother is talking to you, hiding away!”

“Just stop it. Please.”

Just stop. His trembling voice burst out. The long-buried anger and resentment had been lying beneath the surface for so long that they rarely ever exploded.

But when he listened to his mother’s words, berating him as if to kill him for no reason at all, he sometimes wondered. Was he born simply to absorb his mother’s rage? Was he born so that, like a used rag, he would silently wipe away and endure all the filthy words his mother spewed out?

“This fucking bastard, now that you’re all grown up, you’re glaring at me? You think you can hit your own mother? Go ahead! Hit me, you little shit!”

“Just stop it, please! You’ll break the bottles!”

His mother charged at him with fire in her eyes. A thick smell of alcohol wafted over. The two bottles hanging from her wrist clashed loudly with a clinking sound.

Gawon firmly grabbed and held his mother’s wrists as she screamed and thrashed about. The wrists that were clawing and pinching him wildly were so thin that the sight of them made Gawon’s heart sink once again. Where on earth did such strength come from those slender arms?

After ranting for a long while, his mother eventually collapsed into sleep as if passing out from exhaustion. She was already far past the point of intoxication. Gawon silently took the plastic bag hanging from his mother’s wrist and put it in the refrigerator. At least he was thankful that no bottles had broken in all the commotion.

A question suddenly occurred to him.

Why had Uncle Hyeongju’s aunt been so merciful to a complete stranger like his mother, enough to save his life? And yet, here he was, the one who survived… such a nuisance to his mother.

A birth that no one welcomed. A name given out of pity by complete strangers, not his parents or grandparents. A life so insignificant and shabby that he had to attend the same school everyone else did, only to be told to know his place.

Was there really any meaning in dragging out a life like this?

Gawon slumped against the wall as if collapsing and closed his eyes. The sigh, mixed with pent-up indignation and despair that he’d been swallowing throughout the commotion, finally escaped.