5.
I thought this choice might be the last moment of my life. I no longer had any desire for anything. It would be a lie to say it was 100% true, but I was gradually getting worn out. Even without realizing it, I had to bring out my last line of defense to avoid sinking deeper into the mud. During the fair passage of time, I gained nothing. I failed repeatedly to reclaim the camera that revolved around me. It still sat leisurely inside the glass display case.
I took out a ballpoint pen from the lid attached to the table. I deliberately chose a day when Cheon Jaerim’s class ended late. I’ll be at the library. Seeing him turn around believing my words, I felt slightly excited, like when I’d gotten first place in school.
“Oh, oppa!”
There was a familiar face. Soyeon looked at what I was holding with a welcoming face and examined it closely.
“You work part-time here?”
“Yes!”
“Are you taking a leave of absence?”
“Ah… yeah.”
“Why?”
“I have some circumstances. Please don’t tell other people.”
Soyeon nodded with a face full of question marks. If I’d known Soyeon was working a school part-time job here, I wouldn’t have come at this time. It wasn’t reliable, but I couldn’t exactly get a written oath sealed in blood. Soyeon handed the application form I’d given her to someone who appeared to be in charge. What’s so special about that piece of paper? When that document was submitted, I finally felt like everything was over. I wanted to leave this place quickly.
But what about the camera? If I run away, he might spread it around. Cheon Jaerim reassured me there really was no camera, but even a passing ant would know he was lying. The fortunate thing was that recently we’d been having relations at my studio apartment more often, so the number of recorded moments was significantly decreasing.
Once I let go of even my attachment to school, my heart became as light as a feather.
Cheon Jaerim, whose stride was larger than others and who walked fast, had slowed down considerably when walking with me. But when he was alone like now, he was no different from before. Cheon Jaerim saw me standing at the main gate and approached with long strides.
“This makes us look like a campus couple.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah? Did you just say yeah?”
“Huh? Sorry. I didn’t hear.”
Walking without thinking, I hadn’t heard what Cheon Jaerim said. Cheon Jaerim recited what he’d said with a blank face. I agreed without much comment, saying “Right.” Campus couple my ass. I wanted to say goodbye to this damn life as soon as possible.
***
Cheon Jaerim wore condoms every single time. Can’t accidentally get pregnant. The reappearance of absurd logic.
“We’re out of gel.”
Many winds of change had blown.
Cheon Jaerim, who used to sharply criticize my studio apartment saying he felt like coughing any moment, now threw off his top first himself.
The guy who’d been fumbling above my head pulled out a pink tube from between the wall and mattress. When he opened the cap and squeezed, the gel came out with a splurt sound, coming out completely. The guy kneading the gel pooled in his palm rubbed his entire sticky hand between my buttocks. Because I was holding my legs up and gripping firmly behind my knees, strength went into my arms and body. With the hole completely exposed, feeling the gel being applied under the bright fluorescent light was extremely awkward.
Cheon Jaerim always walks opposite to me. He blocked my hand trying to turn off the light. His warm palm rubbed around the hole in circles. The lukewarm gel became as hot as Cheon Jaerim’s body temperature. Cheon Jaerim spread my buttocks apart and stared at the closed hole impassively. Looking at that face, I held onto a glimmer of hope that ‘maybe he’s not in the mood today.’
“It’s still a bit swollen.”
“Ngh……”
Heat gradually began to rise in the areas where gel was applied. Cheon Jaerim watched me squirming my butt and scraped together the gel stuck to my groin. Lifting my legs in front of someone and showing between my crotch was something I still couldn’t get used to. The gel gathered together pooled into the sunken center.
“Mm, ah, wait, wait.”
“You were waiting for me at the main gate earlier.”
“Yeah, hng, one at a, time, ngh.”
“I feel kind of……”
“Haah, ah! Slow, slowly!”
“I guess spring is coming earlier than expected.”
Without giving me a break, fingers kept pushing in constantly. With fingers stuck inside, his palm turned toward the ceiling. The palm slick with gel glistened under the light. The guy who spread his index and middle fingers in a slingshot shape dug into the hole. The deeper the fingers pushed in, the deeper the gel penetrated the inner walls. Not only the inside that had become hot, but every time he thrust into the places slickly coated even on the outside, squelch, squelch sounds wandered around the bright room.
“Hng, ngh, mm, ah!”
“I’m just not gonna wear a condom.”
Cheon Jaerim tried to grab and pull off the condom he’d just put on. I grabbed Cheon Jaerim’s forearm with the hand that had been holding behind my knee.
“You don’t want me to?”
I barely managed to nod my raised head.
“Why don’t you want me to?”
Cheon Jaerim asks playfully. One knee that had been folded and unfolded ached numbly. The knee straightened in a line rested nicely on top of Cheon Jaerim’s thigh.
“Mm? Why don’t you want me to?”
The reason Cheon Jaerim doesn’t wear condoms is when he wants to come inside. Occasionally he does aftercare, but even with aftercare, my stomach hurt later just the same. Also, I terribly hated the feeling when the semen was pulled out. Cheon Jaerim persistently asks. The reason for asking was obvious. He’d keep asking until he got the answer he wanted to hear.
“Mmm… wear it, ngh! If not, ugh… I’ll, get pregnant……”
“I’m going crazy, really.”
Cheon Jaerim’s hand came to the back of my knee where I’d been holding. I placed both hands on Cheon Jaerim’s shoulders. Matching what was trying to enter below, I quietly steadied my breathing. The glans rubbed around the hole as if warming up. The gel that had been stuck here and there smeared onto the condom. The erect cock split my buttocks and entered. Below my knees spread wide in an M-shape, my calves trembled. I sucked in a breath with a ‘hup!’ When my body stiffened, Cheon Jaerim rubbed the back of my thighs. Even when I breathed thinking this should be enough, what was filling me densely had no end.
Cheon Jaerim carefully pushed in while bending down to bite my nipple. With a slurp, the pulled nipple also began to stiffen tensely. Every time my nipple was sucked, it tickled faintly below my ribs.
“Relax.”
What Cheon Jaerim sucked to release tension made me even more rigid instead. Every time the acorn cap-like nipple was pushed under the red tongue, my fingertips tingled. While I scratched his shoulders, Cheon Jaerim slowly pushed his waist forward and sucked around the areola. It felt like my whole body was loosening in warm water. Every time the cock pushed in tightly, I exhaled roughly. After doing this several times, it finally entered completely.
“Nngh, mm, ah, still, it hurts… don’t, pull out, mm, mm!”
Cheon Jaerim pounded in all at once as if he should receive compensation for entering slowly. My insides churned as if my organs were being pushed up. When my insides filled completely with his thing, it felt like all the muscles in my body contracted around the cock. Sparks flashed before my eyes and my held legs trembled.
“Ugh! Ah! Save, me! Ah! I, don’t, want!”
“You gonna, keep, lying?”
“Ah! Uh, mm! I, won’t, do it, mm! Mm!”
I could feel that the sound from the junction wasn’t just gel. Shame rushed in. The sensation I felt every time my rear was penetrated kept improving. I tried my best to suppress my moans and separate myself from my body, but honestly that was a ridiculous idea. In the end, Cheon Jaerim made me like a koala clinging to a eucalyptus tree. I felt Cheon Jaerim taking away all my five senses. Cheon Jaerim violently penetrated my rear while defiling my upper body. He trapped flesh that wouldn’t stretch in his mouth and sucked it in making slurping sounds.
“Ah, ah, fuck, so damn tight.”
“Mm! I, don’t want, hng, ngh, ah!”
“You don’t want it? Really don’t want it? Tell me honestly.”
Heuk, heuk…… The cock pulled out. When what had been inside me disappeared like a lie, I could feel the hole opening and closing as if searching for a lost mother. Fluttering. Where is this sound coming from? The cock entered and exited very slightly in the hole that gently opened and closed. Every time that happened, I felt anxious. My butt was still on fire, but no one was spraying water. Cheon Jaerim deliberately started teasing by poking just near the hole and pulling out. I was swept up in the illusion that someone deep inside was tickling me by fanning with a fan. Without being able to open my eyes, I reached out my hand and fumbled around my butt. I could feel the cock that seemed within grasp but moved away.
“No, don’t, do, do it. Hng, mm……”
I wanted to move my waist, but my spread legs were still held. At this rate, blood might not circulate and they’d turn purple. I wiggled my toes hoping Cheon Jaerim, who was just roughly touching inside the hole, would please have mercy. Then that place that had been ticklishly breezy filled tightly as if finding its home. My whole body curled up like squid being grilled on a hot plate. The ground shook. I shed tears streaming down. Panting, I opened my eyes thinly. Cheon Jaerim was right in front of me. As if he’d been waiting for me to look at him, he lowered his head and his tongue split me open. Outside the window, I could see thin, long weeds swaying.
Is it me swaying in the wind?
The next day I couldn’t move at all. Tap, tap—I opened my eyes because of the sound. When I moved my body, Cheon Jaerim, who had climbed onto my shoulder, pulled my arm. I was being held as if wrapped in a blanket, my body buried in Cheon Jaerim’s side. My body felt fluffy. The damp blanket was crumpled and rolling around somewhere on the floor. What had been warm was because of Cheon Jaerim’s raised room temperature and body heat.
Cheon Jaerim was looking at his phone with a clean face and then looked at me. Cheon Jaerim gently touched my heavy eyelids. At that touch, sleepiness poured over me again like a lie.
“Sleep more.”
When I woke up again feeling a voice like birds chirping, the studio apartment was completely empty.
***
A cramped house is inconvenient at times like this. Every time an object is emptied, the empty space becomes noticeable. I organized starting with the smallest items so Cheon Jaerim couldn’t detect subtle signs. I gathered the checkered blanket I’d draped over my shoulders whenever I did assignments, the mouse pad, and the desk clock whose ticking had been noisy in one place. There wasn’t much to throw away either. I brought down the miscellaneous items I’d brought out intact next to the base of the streetlight. I pushed them toward the dark wall in case Cheon Jaerim might see them. The garbage truck comes at 5:30 in the morning. Then, all of these will be loaded.
What remained was a small assembly-type bookshelf and old major textbooks. That bookshelf seemed like I’d need to get a sticker from the community center, attach it, and then throw it out. I could give the old major textbooks to the junk dealer grandfather who sometimes goes around the neighborhood.
Is it right to say the emotion I’m feeling now is relief? There’s a long time left until Cheon Jaerim graduates, and I’m not confident I can endure that time until I graduate. If I’d known giving up was this easy, I would have done it earlier. Looking back, the signpost I’d been running toward looking only ahead was nothing. In high school, I thought my life would be decided if I just got into college. But college was just a different social group and a school that only differed in size. Something so trivial.
I moved secretly like a mole living underground. I’d finished preliminary reconnaissance too. I planned to hide in a quiet place with the money I’d saved.
