The rain poured down. Woonjeong left Nunbi’s side room with a sleep well still hanging in the air behind him.
✽
“Nunbi.”
Nunbi woke up early the next day, on time.
“Nunbi! Seriously, what’s wrong with you again?”
He wiped down his warm forehead and flushed face in turn, and then, right on schedule, gave the young novice monk who’d come looking for him a few bouncy swings like always. He made sure not to forget to take the small hand in his and walk up to the main hall to greet the head monk. He’d steeled himself for the day — smiling hard, moving hard, working hard, just like always.
“I said what’s wrong with you.”
True to that, he’d finished preparing the morning meal early and moved over to the main building. In the wide open hall, he was shaking out and tidying the rain capes that had been hung up to dry. The novice monk sitting cross-legged beside him, swinging his feet, had already asked Nunbi what was wrong for the third time — but Nunbi pretended not to hear any of it and hummed to himself.
“Good grief.”
The monk let out a heavy sigh.
“Oh my. The ground’s going to open up because of some young monk.”
“You heard everything this whole time! Oh honestly!”
The novice monk was Nunbi’s shadow. Maybe that was why he’d noticed, sharp as ever, that Nunbi was in low spirits. He’d been sighing so dramatically that Nunbi had teased him about it, and a balled-up sock came flying at his back in retaliation. Nunbi shot him an unbothered side-eye and bent down to pick up the clothesline he’d set on the floor. His head was heavy, and for a moment everything in front of him went briefly white — then it passed.
“Hff….”
Nunbi quickly wiped away a cold sweat. Now he needed to tie the line taut from this pillar to the one across the hall, then hang the rain capes flat so they wouldn’t crease. He limped over and knotted one end of the line to a pillar, then stood on the open, unenclosed hall floor and took a slow breath in. It was raining again today, so the view was something.
“Nunbi’s acting weird.”
The novice monk watching him added one more thing from behind.
“Why would you say that. What did I even do — come over here and help instead.”
“I suppose I have no choice. Fine. Honestly.”
Nunbi received the rain capes that the closely-cropped little head kept bobbing up to hand him and spread them over the line one by one. There was no chance of running into Woonjeong. And even if he did, he could just ignore him. That meant there was no need to think about it anymore. After everything that had happened yesterday, he’d made up his mind.
“See, I knew something was off.”
The novice monk grumbled again, watching Nunbi go blank. Nunbi grinned and gave the monk’s head a brief pat. It’s true. He did feel something like a sense of danger about Woonjeong. Whenever he was near Woonjeong, a chill ran down his spine. It had been that way from the very beginning, every time. What had started as a vague, formless unease was now crystallizing into something with edges. An instinct — that if he let himself get tangled up this way, he would be shaken to his very core.
“Ow! Hey!”
The novice monk, apparently fed up with Nunbi’s subdued moping, finally grabbed onto Nunbi’s leg and hung there. In that instant, Nunbi felt a sharp, stinging pain shoot from his right knee down through his shin, and let out an involuntary ow.
“That hurt! Be gentle.”
“Pfft. Drama queen.”
Nunbi scooped the novice monk up and held him in his arms. He pulled the child close and patted his back steadily, and the boy settled right down. In the quiet moment that bought him, Nunbi lifted the injured leg and turned it slowly. This was a problem. This needs to heal. The wound that had nearly closed was acting up in a strange way.
“What, does it actually hurt? Nunbi, does it hurt?”
The novice monk, still being held, asked with quick eyes. Nunbi said no, no right away and, pushing through the pain, carried the monk down from the hall. It was around ten. There was nothing more to do here, and it was nearly time for the novice monk to go to his dharma lesson.
“It’s almost time for the lesson, so today you have to go in and not fall asleep, okay? You understand?”
“I don’t want to go. Studying is boring.”
The novice monk whined with his finger in his mouth. Making sure he wouldn’t get soaked by the rain blowing in, Nunbi found a spot under the roof and set him down properly.
“I’ll tell the kitchen to put some choco aside for you.”
“Really?”
“Yes. But only if you work hard and come back with something to show for it.”
“Okay. Promise, Nunbi!”
Nunbi smoothed out the novice monk’s robe, which had gotten rumpled from rolling around on the floor earlier. The child, not at all afraid of catching cold, made a dash up toward the main hall. He was probably delighted enough at the thought of getting choco after the lesson that even getting rained on didn’t bother him. Nunbi watched that little figure sprinting up the steps and swallowed a short sigh. He was really glad the novice monk was his closest friend at the temple. Bright and gentle and clear-eyed, that little rascal. So wonderfully different from a certain someone — it was a relief to see.
“….”
There was a saying that warmth itself could be a sickness. Not everyone who you cared about and worried over would answer back with the same kind of warmth. Some people liked you for no reason, and some people disliked you for no reason — that was just how it was. Up until now, Nunbi had run into far more of the latter and spent much of his life nursing quiet hurts because of it. But that didn’t mean there weren’t good people too.
“It’s fine. Don’t think about it.”
Not even knowing what I’m confused about. And I already decided to dislike him. Nunbi took one long deep breath and turned around. The face of that pretty young master swam before his eyes. Nobody gets through life without difficulty — but this boy’s life was a little more sorrowful than most. An orphan. Lame from birth. A foundling kept by charity at a temple. Some people had called that unfortunate, and others had called it unlucky.
If any one of those things were different, would it be easier? If any single piece of what makes up Nunbi were missing from the picture — would Woonjeong treat him at least a little less badly?
‘I want you to find me irritating. And I want you to be so bothered by me you don’t know what to do with yourself.’
He really was irritating. He really was so bothersome he didn’t know what to do with himself, and it made him angry. Nunbi let out another long sigh. His knee and shin ached dully.
“Nunbi! Come eat some tteok!”
Just then. He snapped his head up at the sound of a warm voice calling for him.
“We were looking all over for you! Take it easier on yourself, won’t you.”
“Come on over, Nunbi! We made the sirutteok you love!”
“Let it cool a bit and sprinkle bean powder on his — he’s always liked it that way since he was little.”
The devotees in their head wraps were smiling brightly and waving to him from the dining area all the way across the way. Nunbi stood still for a moment. Then, right where he was, he broke into a wide smile.
