**
S-S-Sinju.
After days of being absent, the one who welcomed Yoo Sinju back was the dimwit little brother. The younger boy didn’t resemble his hyung in the slightest. If there was one thing they shared, though, it was a warmth that didn’t come easily to most. The dimwit got beaten and mocked by the neighborhood kids every single day, yet he’d always smile that empty, foolish smile of his. Not because he was simply an idiot. One day, Sinju had asked him. What’s there to smile about all the time? It’s pathetic. It’s infuriating. And that weak little fool had grinned his dopey grin and answered. B-because hyung is c-coming soon.
The child Sinju had written off as stupid — he was hanging on that way. Weak yet strong, in his own way. Living brightly off something that amounted to nothing. In this sewer of a place.
Don’t call out to me like we’re close.
Sinju sat down beside the dimwit who’d rushed to greet him and muttered flatly.
D-did you get hurt? Your face, your face….
The younger boy fretted anxiously, eyes fixed on the cut across Sinju’s cheek and the bruising around his eye from the fight.
Yeah, I got hurt. You’re no different.
But Sinju wasn’t the only one who was injured. The dimwit, same as always, had a split lip and bruises scattered along his neck.
I-I-I don’t hurt at all.
Sure you don’t.
I-I really don’t.
I hurt like hell. Hurts so damn bad.
Should we ask our h-hyung to give them a good s-scolding?
The younger boy said it like it was something to be proud of. Even though that terrifying hyung fought desperately to protect his little brother, the kid was always covered in wounds. Sinju was young, but he understood. No matter how big that person looked, he couldn’t always be there. He was dependable, but he wasn’t a hero from the movies.
Don’t bother your hyung with it.
N-no. Hyung isn’t b-bothered.
Like hell he isn’t. By someone like you.
N-no. I-I-I’m not a bother.
Yes you are.
N-no I’m not. W-we’re even going on a tr-trip.
The dimwit beamed and pressed on through his halting words. Sinju’s eyes automatically narrowed at the word trip.
A trip?
Y-y-yeah. A trip. We’ll t-take a bus, take a tr-train.
…Where to?
F-far away. Far, far away, and hyung said w-we’d eat something d-delicious.
So where exactly?!
Young Sinju had sharp instincts. He’d spent his whole life reading his mother’s moods, sharp enough that people said he seemed older than his age — and with that came a good sense for things. A trip. He knew hyung, still a student, came home late every night working day after day just to put food on the table. And now a trip? A carefree vacation? There was no way.
Hey, kids.
Just then, hyung appeared, dragging his exhausted feet through the door, and Sinju shot toward him in an instant. He called out urgently.
Where are you going?
What?
The out-of-nowhere question made the older boy squint in puzzlement. Sinju pressed him, words tumbling out breathlessly.
A trip — are you going on a trip? Where?
At that, hyung’s expression flickered with discomfort for just a moment. Sinju felt his heart drop. Instinctively seized by dread, Sinju snapped back to himself and grabbed hyung’s arm with a hollow, desperate look on his face.
Can’t you… can’t you take me with you?
…What?
Take me too…… take me with you.
Hey, kid, this is….
I-I’ll do whatever you say.
Next week, he’d be taken by the hand of some stranger and left somewhere unknown. He’d taken the plane ticket that man had thrown down and painstakingly looked up the destination written in English. It wasn’t Korea — it was somewhere foreign where only English was spoken. The moment Sinju realized he was being abandoned there, he’d been swallowed by dread with every passing day. Praying that someone would save him — that even without heroes, someone would come and rescue him. He’d prayed standing guard outside his mother’s door, over and over.
I… I c-can do anything.
Sinju wanted it to be that hyung. He wanted it to be that person — the only one who meant anything to young Sinju.
If you n-need to make money, I’ll make it too.
…What?
Housework too — I’ll do all of it, everything.
Young Sinju begged wretchedly. A child, beating his own chest with his fists, eyes wide and frantic and burning.
The dimwit — no, Huijae too. I’ll look after Huijae too.
Hey — do you even know what you’re saying right now?
So please… take me too. Take me w-with you.
……
Take me… take me with you.
Please.
Please.
From that lonely house with no light, no warmth, no smell of anything alive.
Please save me from being abandoned by everyone. Please, please, he begged.
…Haven’t seen you in a few days.
At his frantic, near-deranged pleading, the man said quietly, offhandedly. Those teary young eyes looked up at him, and hyung’s rough hand gently brushed the cut on Sinju’s cheek.
……You too, honestly.
A pitying sigh slipped from his lips. Young Sinju wanted that pity to deepen. After the fight with his mother, he’d caught sight of the wounds on his face and almost laughed. Because he’d thought — maybe now, he’d get to see this expression from hyung. The worry hidden beneath indifference. He knew the man pitied him. He’d seen it — how every time Sinju showed up hurt, concern would cloud those sharp, severe eyes. To young Sinju, even pity felt warm. He wanted more of it, however he could get it.
…I’m not as great a person as you think I am.
……
Even so — you still want to come?
At the troubled, conflicted question, Sinju nodded without hesitation.
…No matter what kind of parents make you end up like this.
……
Having them might be better than having no one.
Sinju shook his head.
……It might be harder than what you’re going through now.
Sinju was a child filled to his very bones with loneliness. Hardship wasn’t the issue. Sinju. Young Sinju….
I want to…
……
…I want to go too.
This wasn’t a request. It was a plea to be saved. Not a child throwing a tantrum — it was an appeal for salvation, for his life. And the answer to that appeal came after quite a long silence.
Tomorrow, at this time.
He said it quietly.
Be outside by then.
It was a hesitant answer — one pulled out despite everything, unable to turn away from a desperate child’s plea. When it came, Sinju felt, for the first time, that he was glad to be alive. From somewhere, the sound of bells drifted in, and the dim, murky hollow inside him began to fill with light.
**
Sinju dressed prettily the next day. He woke early, washed up clean, took his medicine, and spent hours drinking in the sight of his sleeping mother.
…I won’t resent you.
Looking at his sleeping mother, Sinju let out what he’d been carrying inside.
He didn’t want her to die — but he didn’t want to stay with her either. He was leaving behind a mother who had tried to take her own life, and yet he felt a flutter of excitement about it. He was giddy at the thought of escaping this unbearable place, and happy knowing he could keep being with that person — the way Huijae got to be. Sinju felt happiness for the first time, and found himself smiling all day without meaning to. He was probably the only one in the world thrilled at the thought of abandoning his own mother.
…They call this settling the score.
You abandoned me first.
So I’m abandoning you too. That makes us even.
Young Sinju whispered to his mother, who lay sleeping like the dead, and pressed a brief kiss to her cheek as a final goodbye. An abnormal tenderness welled up in young Sinju, but he pushed it away, ignored it, and slipped out of his mother’s room.
When everything was in order, Sinju stood before the full-length mirror by the door and looked at himself smiling back. He looked just like the dimwit who smiled whenever he saw his hyung. He learned that day, for the first time, that he was someone who could smile like that too. He bounced on his feet with excitement, humming to himself as he packed his most treasured book, some underwear, and a few changes of clothes. He was probably the only person in the world who felt gleeful about abandoning their mother. Probably the only one who could feel joy while leaving behind a mother who might die without him there. He’d been looking forward to this moment that desperately.
He waited for nightfall all day with a fluttering heart. Dressed up nicely, wearing the shoes he’d spent an hour scrubbing clean, deep into the night — Sinju waited for him at the empty playground. He stared at the bare trees with only their branches swaying, gazed out at the hollow, vacant space, and waited and waited and waited for that person to appear.
…The time has passed……
The face that had smiled all day long began to slowly dim. The feet that had bounced with excitement gradually shifted into feet that pattered with impatience.
He was on the verge of dying from anxiety, but there was nothing he could do. He didn’t know where hyung lived, and he had no phone. All he could do was wait, endlessly. That person wasn’t someone who said one thing and did another. He had actually come to Sinju’s house once, just to scold his mother.
He wasn’t a man who broke his promises. He was nothing like that person called father — who had betrayed his mother and never shown his face once. He was Sinju’s one and only adult.
One hour, two hours… and then about four hours later, the sky slowly began to brighten. Then five hours, six hours. Until the sun hung high in the sky.
After waiting alone for all that time, Sinju watched the sun rise to its peak — and it wasn’t until he saw with his own eyes that the man who came for him was a suited stranger who found him sitting blankly in the playground that he finally understood.
He had been abandoned again. He had left behind his mother — who might die without him — and come out to wait. And still, he had been abandoned.
His face had gone stiff, his cheeks and both hands flushed red from the cold — he waited and waited, and waited some more. Only then did he understand.
That to that person, he was nothing at all.
