After an unbearably cold winter passed, the weather was gradually warming up. Like my light wallet, my clothes should have gotten lighter too, but the truth was the fabric was already so worn out that it hadn’t been particularly heavy to begin with.
I was the only person on the street wearing a long padded jacket with all the stuffing dead, so I stood out a bit, but since I needed to stand out anyway by acting extremely conspicuous from now on, it was actually advantageous.
Is this what they call a blessing in disguise? Even a beggar-like life without money has its moments of usefulness. If I had money, I would have just blended into the cookie-cutter fashion of the rice grain-like masses on the street and become just another passing rice grain.
“……”
I feel like I’ll lose my mind if I just stand still, so I relieved my tension moderately by indulging in useless thoughts and mental victories by myself.
I kept an expressionless face, pretending to be indifferent to everything in the world, while rapidly rolling my eyes to examine the appearance and clothing of passersby. Since his hair color stood out so much, I thought finding him wouldn’t be too difficult, but I misjudged. Why were there so many people with colorful hair on the street today of all days…
Before coming here, I’d checked his face in a photo, but given how excessively clean and handsome he looked, it was definitely taken with a filter app. How was I supposed to match that to the faces of people passing by? An ominous thought struck me that I might not even recognize him if I saw him right in front of my nose.
First, I needed to figure out who he was before I could stand in front of him and do a dog paddle dance or a handstand or whatever.
There were a few other photos, but those were out of focus and taken from too far away, so I couldn’t even see his face.
“Haah.”
Why is my life so damn hard?
I lost my parents at a young age and spent my school years like a lonely migratory bird, moving from house to house, working day and night. Until even the relatives on my father’s side died in an accident, life was at least somewhat manageable, but the problem started after that.
My relatives got into a major car accident on their way to a summer vacation funded by the gye money they’d saved up over 10 years. At that time, my model student cousin Seogong-i and I stayed home under the excuse of studying at the reading room.
Everyone looked at me with eyes that said “How dare you?” when I said I’d tutor Seogong-i, who was ranked first in the entire school, but they let it slide without making a big deal of it.
I thought all that was left was to play around freely and wildly for the next 3 nights and 4 days, but our deviation ended in less than a day.
On the way to the valley, they collided with a large dump truck, and everyone in the car died instantly at the scene.
“……”
This was already three years ago. It was a long time if you thought about it that way, but it was ridiculously short for the death of family members to become dull. Maybe because I’d already lost my parents long ago, or maybe because they were relatives and not parents, I came to my senses relatively earlier than Seogong-i.
And I had to come to my senses. The shock Seogong-i received affected not just his mind but his body as well.
Between dealing with the accident and insurance issues, debt and inheritance problems, and nursing Seogong-i who had developed an illness, my grief gradually evaporated bit by bit until only traces remained.
Anyway, I had to pay off debts and earn money for Seogong-i’s hospital bills, so I worked without rest. Then I met this rich hyungnim, and if I gently catered to his mood, he’d treat me to meals and introduce me to various jobs, so I met him occasionally, though not frequently.
I got this job from that hyungnim too. I heard his name when we first met, but I’d long forgotten it, and when we met I just respectfully called him hyungnim like a gangster would.
“You really do live hard. You’re not picky about work either.”
A few days ago, he looked at me muttering to himself, then suddenly spouted nonsense asking me to dig up secrets about his cousin.
At first I thought it was drunken rambling, but it wasn’t a joke. He was seriously serious about it.
“So what list or whatever the hell…”
I don’t know exactly what it is either. The problem is that the hyungnim who gave me this job doesn’t know what it is either. Apparently, there was another spy before me who was assigned the same job, and that guy saw it.
The secret black list containing the personal information of hyungnim’s closest associates and all the spies…
“This is ridiculous.”
Even thinking about it again, it’s absurd. Of all words, why “spy”? Though looking at what I’m doing, I guess it is kind of spy-like… Ugh, it’s exactly like the opening of a third-rate failed spy movie that spent 10 billion won on production but only got 100,000 viewers.
Normally I would have politely and tactfully refused, but he offered too much money to refuse. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for my beggar-like life with so many places money needed to go.
“But why are you giving such an important job to me? I mean, sure, I’m pretty quick-witted and do my work efficiently, and my face is decent enough, and I have a good personality, and I don’t shy away from dirty work and work hard at everything, but still, I’ve never done spy work before… You’re not trying to lure me with this sweet money to harvest my organs, are you?”
Honestly, for this amount of money, I might have considered giving up a kidney, but fortunately it wasn’t organ trafficking.
“That’s exactly why I’m asking you. Because you seem like you’ve never done this kind of thing before.”
Hyungnim said something meaningful to me as I glared at him with suspicious eyes. There was no more wicked employer than this bastard. No matter how much money he was offering, I couldn’t help feeling uneasy.
After much deliberation, I eventually tried to refuse, but…
“His intuition is extraordinary. I’m sure all the professionals around me already know. I even brought someone from abroad, but they got caught in less than a day. So don’t think of this as work—think of it as actually seducing him.”
“…What? Seducing him? Didn’t you say your cousin is a man?”
“He’s gay. Or maybe bisexual. Either way, in terms of preference, he likes men more than women. That’s for sure.”
“Oh…”
“Anyway, that’s the easiest way to approach him. The guy’s promiscuous.”
This is where I really tried to refuse. Isn’t that obvious? Seduce a promiscuous bisexual, build a good relationship, and then extract information? Absolutely not. Above all, no matter how much money he’s offering, how could I do that with someone who has the same thing hanging… Ugh.
Even if a knife was at my throat, absolutely…
“I’ve deposited it, so check.”
A notification came on my phone.
One, ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand…
100 million won had been deposited. I was so shocked I thought my heart would stop. After counting the zeros several times, I asked.
“You’re giving me all this as an advance payment?”
“If you succeed, I’ll give you a bonus too.”
A success bonus on top of the originally agreed amount? I put my phone in my pocket and bowed my head with my hands clasped respectfully.
“I will risk my life and do my best, hyungnim.”
“……”
I did pledge my loyalty inwardly for a moment when my eyes rolled back seeing the deposited money, but this was definitely an uneasy job, way too uneasy.
Whether it was losing a kidney or having gay sex with a man, those were things I could grit my teeth and do if I had to, since I’d received 100 million won.
But what if it was worse than that? What if it involved serious crime? What if it wasn’t just losing a kidney but having everything inside me completely gutted? What if I had to have sex to a life-threatening degree?
Regardless, I’d already received the money and had spent almost all of it paying off urgent debts first, so there was no way to back out now.
“Excuse me.”
I was trembling while imagining all sorts of cruel and absurd scenarios when someone suddenly called out to me. Come to think of it, I had infiltrated the route that hyungnim’s cousin frequently took in order to catch his attention.
The moment I reflexively turned my head, a face suddenly popped into my field of vision.
“…!”
It was close enough that our noses almost touched.
The first thing that entered my view was hazel eyes with gold and green mysteriously mixed together. Snow-white skin and hair mottled with light pink, sky blue, and wheat colors, faded from bleaching…
It was the guy from the photo hyungnim had shown me. The spotlessly clean skin and otherworldly appearance were exactly like in the photo.
“Hello?”
“……”
So, the hyungnim’s cousin with whom I might have to have gay sex.
Lee Jiwoo. 22 years old. Same age as me. Birthday December 29. Bisexual. Heavy drinker, heavy smoker, hedonist, suspected bipolar disorder, high possibility of doing drugs too…
The brief personal information I’d crammed flew through my mind like a panorama.
Then Lee Jiwoo casually opened his mouth in a tone as if asking where the nearest subway station was.
“Do you happen to have a girlfriend?”
“……”
“Or a boyfriend…”
“……”
What, what is this. Fuck…
