Ren’s Panic (2) – The Surging Past
Ruman shook his head as if he’d lost. His slender hair scattered across his forehead then fluttered back. He swept back his disheveled hair and recalled Ren’s shoulder. The blue bruise in the shape of fingers that had risen like a brand.
Ruman spoke mockingly.
“Looks like it’ll last a long time.”
“…”
“Well. Since Kirki the priest healed it, it should be fine.”
When Ruman muttered something to the two horses he’d gotten from Coco, a yellow light appeared next to the reins and moved on its own. Then Ruman lightly jumped onto the driver’s seat.
When he pulled the reins, the horses whinnied and slowly began to move.
“But it will hurt. Since it’s a wound that even divine power couldn’t cover.”
The two men’s gazes clashed on the running horses and the driver’s seat. The carriage slowly cut through the forest path.
***
“Are you concerned?”
When I peeked out the carriage window, Gepetto, who had been sewing with narrowed eyes, looked up.
“Just… I’m curious.”
It had been a while since Ruman went outside, but the carriage still showed no signs of departing.
What are they talking about with Hyung? I’m dying of curiosity!
Something like leaving me behind…
Of course not.
Hmph.
I turned my train of thought before I could overthink.
Anyway, Gepetto was really good at sewing.
As he skillfully stitched the fabric, he glanced at me.
“What?”
“Can I perhaps… do some embroidery?”
“Embroidery? Like flower patterns or something?”
“If I just stitch it like this, it’ll look too much like patched-up clothes…”
Gepetto trailed off and smiled awkwardly.
Hmm. That’s true.
Maybe because he’d torn the clothes too roughly earlier, if I wore the clothes torn diagonally in a jagged line as they were stitched, it would be a bit embarrassing.
“You know how to embroider?”
“Of course!”
I asked doubtfully, but Gepetto answered as if he’d been waiting.
“What can you do?”
What, a physician who’s also good at embroidery?
“Oh! Should I show you?”
When I showed curiosity, Gepetto chattered excitedly.
He said what he was best at embroidering was a climbing rose pattern.
Gepetto, who had been expounding on the fresh and passionate beauty of climbing roses for a while, stared at me intently. So talking about climbing roses for a while and then staring at me this passionately means… he wants to embroider on my clothes so he’s asking for permission, right?
“…Do as you like.”
“Thank you!”
“I feel like I should be saying that…”
Even as I grumbled, Gepetto beamed.
Then after knotting the fully stitched clothes, he prepared to thread the needle again. Seeing him choose green thread, he seemed to plan to embroider the vines first.
Gepetto was thin but his hands were surprisingly large. Should I say his fingers were thick? They weren’t thick, but they were really big. Perhaps because of that, the needle in his hand looked very small. It didn’t look like a needle, but like a thin pin.
“Give it here.”
“Thank you.”
I reached my hand toward the needle in Gepetto’s hand… Gepetto, who had a surprised expression thinking I’d just take it, handed over the needle and scratched his head while smiling.
Just for threading a needle, he doesn’t need to say thank you every time.
It’s embarrassing!
And it’s not like I always snatch things like that every time. Whew. I need to fix my temper a bit… While staying together at the Princess’s castle, Coco warned me. That I have a personality that’s easily misunderstood, so I should hold back sometimes even when I can… So when I picked a fight asking why she didn’t say to hold back entirely, Coco looked at my face for a while then shook her head.
Was it ‘minimum safety device’? What does that even mean!
I grumbled inwardly as I threaded the green thread through the needle and gave it to him.
Gepetto excitedly started sewing again. His eyes gleamed tenaciously, but his concentrated mouth was tightly shut, which was somehow funny.
His sewing posture looked exactly like when he treated patients.
His silently focused eyes and hands moved seriously.
Remarkably fresh vines were growing on my top.
The dark green vines gradually erased the traces of where the clothes had been torn and re-stitched, slowly extending to various parts of the top.
“Wow…”
“My handiwork is pretty good, right?”
“…Well. …I guess so.”
Ugh. This mouth of mine!
I should have just said yes…
But Gepetto smiled as if he’d received praise from me.
Geez.
The top he’d sewn was really magnificent. I felt like I’d received a gift. I wanted to say thank you or that he’d worked hard, but somehow the words got stuck, yet Gepetto just organized the scattered thread and needles as if such greetings didn’t matter.
When our eyes met, he smiled again.
Gepetto smiled really well, more than I thought. Maybe thinking he was timid was my misconception. Gepetto treated Hyung and Ruman kindly, and got along well even with bad-tempered me. But I’m still wary of Gepetto.
“Ren. When we arrive at the village, shall we brew some tea? You seem to like tea.”
“I don’t want to…”
I regretted it again after saying it.
But Gepetto the physician was too much. He casually asked only about things I was hiding and didn’t want to mention.
“Haha. I’ll drink it alone… If you want some, tell me.”
Gepetto scratched the back of his head and smiled, then took out his notebook and started reading.
I looked at his concentrated face and worried.
Is this okay?
I dislike and hate him because he touched my herbs, but Gepetto treats me well regardless of my attitude. That really bothered me! Because he just laughs off even my prickly speech and actions that keep bursting out without me knowing! I’m only used to mutual hatred. I wanted to grumble complainingly.
As much as I’m uncomfortable with him, I wish Gepetto would hate me instead.
Then suddenly I had this thought.
Could this be what being an adult is…?!
Understanding the other person?
The words Gepetto had said last night, those words I’d heard without emotion, suddenly came to mind.
‘People who are sick inevitably become sensitive. On top of that, Ren is young, so how much more painful must it have been?’
If I tell him, will he understand me?
Our relationship is just a physician and a patient he has to care for briefly, so even if I die, there will be no sadness for him to bear. Maybe if I tell Gepetto… won’t he understand me trying to quietly face death? Wouldn’t it be okay to tell him?
Why suddenly, only now, like this…
Something surged up inside me.
It really hurt a lot.
Even though I couldn’t tell anyone it hurt.
I really was in pain…
From crawling and scraping the cabin floor until my nails completely broke…
I couldn’t even count how many ropes I’d obtained before receiving help from the pharmacist old man.
The wretchedness of when I couldn’t even tie those ropes properly and rolled off the chair, and that memory I couldn’t tell anyone—I didn’t want to recall it even in dreams.
‘This might be a story you don’t want to bring up, Ren, but. Being stabbed by a sword is no small matter. That kind of experience isn’t something even an adult man should casually go through. Just because your body has healed doesn’t mean the fear and pain from that time disappear. You might think you’re fine though, Ren.’
The pain Gepetto was talking about was probably about the sword wound in my chest, but…
Suddenly, the days I fought the illness alone in the cabin came to mind.
For a moment, Gepetto’s words given like comfort in a warm voice, ‘How much did it hurt?’, became a sharp sword and seemed to gouge out my chest.
Deep pain surged from within.
It was pain incomparable to when I was stabbed by the sword.
The ordinary comforting words I hadn’t even listened to carefully, words that even Gepetto probably didn’t imbue with deep meaning, became the sharpest sword and stabbed into my chest. It was a pain that seemed to gouge out my insides.
‘The fear and pain from that time don’t disappear.’
‘You might think you’re fine though, Ren.’
I was definitely fine.
I was definitely fine.
I had to be fine…
I couldn’t not be fine…
With nowhere to lean, nowhere to speak, nothing at all, just myself… waiting for Hyung who wouldn’t come in the cabin, all I could do was scrape the floor.
These comforting words are a luxury, and I didn’t even expect to hear them.
I mustn’t become weak.
When I face death afterward, I must be thoroughly alone.
“Ren?”
But…
I’m scared.
I thought I was fine.
I thought I had to be fine.
The fear hasn’t disappeared.
When another seizure will happen, when I’ll be in pain, how much agony it will be. I thought I was used to it and fine, but I wasn’t. It remained vivid.
“Ren!”
“Huhk… huhk… haah…”
“Ren!! Hero-nim! Hero-nim!”
Gepetto urgently pounded on the carriage ceiling.
Bang bang bang bang.
Before the carriage could stop at his urgent movements, Temarr suddenly opened the window.
