🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter 19
It was almost time to sleep. Even though they would see each other tomorrow, not once had she ever greeted him first. But tonight felt different. Those simple two words made her chest bubble up like fizz rising to the surface.
“You too.”
Yeon-woo answered lightly, but Jeong-ha’s gaze was unusually heavy. Despite the chilly wind, Yeon-woo’s eyes kept being caught—almost trapped—by the pale nape of Jeong-ha’s neck, bare without a scarf.
“Uh… do you have more to say?”
“No.”
Why was he so bothered by something so trivial?
Jeong-ha turned completely and strode back into the main house with large steps. Yeon-woo, staring blankly, also started to turn away, but then paused.
“……”
There was movement in the first-floor window. It had only been a fleeting glimpse, so he couldn’t be sure—but if he had seen correctly, then that room was—
Madam’s room.
Feeling that piercing gaze directed at him, Yeon-woo held his breath. Outside, late at night, a crow cawed harshly as it passed by. Behind the main building, the winter trees stood densely, each one baring sharp branches that looked menacing.
In just a few seconds, the heat in his flushed cheeks cooled, leaving his skin dry and prickling with goosebumps.
The Madam had warned him. She had said he would have to help.
They had come home from school together countless times before—so why would tonight be any different? And yet, for the first time, the orchard’s dense darkness seemed terrifying, as though it might swallow his shadow whole. With an uneasy feeling, Yeon-woo wrinkled his nose and eyes, then quickened his pace toward the annex.
It was well past midnight, but he couldn’t fall asleep. With a stand light turned on, he sat beside his sleeping aunt and opened his textbook.
Earlier, he had missed the beginning of math class, and as a result, everything afterward was shaky in his head. He knew if he didn’t nail it down now, he wouldn’t understand tomorrow either. Holding his mechanical pencil, he tapped his forehead.
Beside him, on the wooden hanger, hung a neatly folded pale-pink scarf.
After wrestling with formulas for a while, Yeon-woo rolled his stiff neck and happened to glance at the scarf. Naturally, thoughts of Jeong-ha surfaced—the image of Woo Jeong-ha kindly wrapping it around him.
“……”
Why had he bought something like that for a kid he’d only known a few days?
Embarrassment bubbled up, and Yeon-woo jabbed the textbook with his pencil, leaving several dark dots on the page.
“Haa.”
After today, it felt impossible to ignore Jeong-ha anymore. The curiosity toward the boy who had pulled him out from that deep sea had already soaked up his kindness like water and was now blooming into admiration—into something more.
How had things turned out this way?
Whenever Yeon-woo thought about his own circumstances, he couldn’t help but be self-mocking. No matter how hard he tried not to think negatively, whenever he cleared one hurdle, ten more would always be waiting for him ahead.
That was why he always kept his eyes fixed forward, never on what was around him. If he didn’t, he would trip and fall.
And yet Woo Jeong-ha had managed to wedge himself in.
“……”
Thoughts of Jeong-ha, which Yeon-woo had always consciously pushed aside, now kept circling back. On the day the gangsters had come, one of Jeong-ha’s harsh remarks had stuck in his mind:
“You think people like you are all different? Bullshit. Everyone thinks their own life is the only one that’s fucked up.”
Yeon-woo knew Jeong-ha lived a completely different kind of life. For now, they both went to the same school, jumping the same orchard wall. But when the time came to pay off his debts, Jeong-ha would move far, far ahead—so far his back wouldn’t even be visible.
And yet… why did he sense déjà vu from Jeong-ha? Why did he feel an unknown shadow of misfortune looming over him too?
People like you…
Those words stuck like a thick fish bone in his throat. What exactly did “people like you” mean? People as unlucky as him? Or—
That was when—
“……”
A noise outside broke the silence. Since the annex was right by the front gate, that meant someone was standing at the gate. Were they trying to come in? His heart sank heavily.
At this hour, whoever it was, they couldn’t be a welcome guest. Yeon-woo’s face tightened with tension.
Quietly, he lowered his feet from the bed to the floor. With a click, the stand light went out.
Blinking in the darkness, he tiptoed past his aunt, who was still snoring softly, and slid open the door. A gust of cold night air rushed against his face.
Murmuring voices carried through the air. The sharp edge in one of them made it clear it was a woman’s. Relieved, Yeon-woo thought at least it wasn’t a debt collector. Some of his tension eased.
He crept carefully, hiding his body in the shadows. As he rounded the L-shaped annex and neared the veranda, he saw two figures by the gate.
One of them was Woo Jeong-ha, blocking the entrance. And the other—
“Who is that woman?”
“……”
“That girl you came home with earlier! I saw it with my own eyes. Are you ignoring me again? Jeong-ha’s father, are you really trying to divorce me this time?”
Words that made no sense to Yeon-woo poured from the Madam’s mouth. She was calling Jeong-ha “Jeong-ha’s father.” Then she screamed hysterically, her voice shrill.
As though she didn’t even recognize her own son. As though she didn’t know she had already divorced.
The Madam’s usually well-styled hair was crushed and tangled. She wore a gray silk nightgown, barefoot, her soles filthy as if she had walked across the yard with no shoes.
“……”
The thought I shouldn’t be seeing this suddenly stabbed into Yeon-woo’s mind when he caught sight of Jeong-ha’s eyes.
The black pupils wavered, their light draining away, scattering into the darkness. Like a dying flame, Jeong-ha looked as though he was fading.
“Say something! Answer me! If you don’t, I’ll kill myself right here. I swear I will!”
“…Jung-hye.”
From Jeong-ha’s lips came the Madam’s name. He was pretending to be his father—and he did it so naturally, as if it wasn’t the first time.
His weary face, his heavy voice calling that name—it all looked unbearably painful.
Yeon-woo stood frozen stiff, unable to move forward or back. He couldn’t make a sound, so he covered his mouth with his hand.
“You’re always like this. You make me out to be some crazy woman. Do you think I don’t know you’re always playing around with other women? For Jeong-ha’s sake you shouldn’t, and for my sake too!”
“…Haah.”
The more the Madam shouted, the more Jeong-ha seemed to wither away. Who could have guessed the elegant Madam had such a hidden side?
As Yeon-woo blinked slowly, the Madam suddenly moved.
Like a madwoman, she rushed to the tree beside the gate and snapped off a branch. Clutching it tightly in both hands, she raised it high.
“I’ll do it. I’ll kill myself.”
It was as if she were holding a knife to her own throat. From the moment she grasped that branch, all color drained from Jeong-ha’s face.
