Had he ever faced his smile like this? No matter how much he thought about it, the Euiju that Moon Jeonghun had seen over three years was someone who had never smiled, not even a little. Since the situation was such a situation, no one had made an issue of it either. That’s why he couldn’t help but doubt his eyes.
Had something good happened? Moon Jeonghun was lost in a daze, unable to take his gaze off the corners of Euiju’s mouth where a small arc hung.
“Hyung. What’s wrong?”
Only when Euiju spoke to him with a face full of questions did he come to his senses.
“Ah. I came earlier, but you were working so hard I couldn’t interrupt. Why are you doing it yourself? You could just call someone.”
“Ah, the kids said they wanted to try it.”
Euiju tapped the handle part of the weed trimmer. Moon Jeonghun’s gaze persistently followed that face where a faint but clear smile still hung. When their eyes met again as Euiju turned his head, he coughed unnecessarily.
This house located in the middle of Perry Avenue was a two-story detached house. Although it was a bit old, it had a spacious yard and a bathroom on each floor. Best of all, the hospital was located within a 30-minute walk or 5-minute drive. Also, the elementary school was just two blocks away, so looking at the map, it was no different from a perfect place for Euiju’s family.
About three years ago, when Euiyeon and Euiju first set foot in America and arrived here, they had suspiciously interrogated Moon Jeonghun.
-The conditions are too good. Does it make sense that the rent for this house is 500 dollars?
It was natural to be suspicious. Considering that the average house rent in California was 1,200 dollars, this house was on the very cheap side. At the time, Euiyeon and Euiju, who didn’t fully trust Moon Jeonghun, naturally had no choice but to think it was strange.
In fact, Moon Jeonghun had pulled strings in advance. It was a house he’d secured in advance under his adoptive parents’ name, but Moon Jeonghun insisted to the end that it was a property he’d coincidentally obtained and reassured them.
His way of repaying kindness was always this secretive. He probably wouldn’t reveal this fact until the day he died.
“I’m hungry, hyung…”
Euiho, who threw off his gloves, clung to Euiju’s waist. Three years had passed, so he’d grown taller and his frame had become thicker than before, but he was still Euiho who loved acting spoiled with his older brother. The relatively mature Euiseong picked up the gloves Euiho had thrown away and organized them neatly.
Moon Jeonghun caressed Euiho’s cheek, which had become dirty with soil.
“Let’s go inside since it’s hot. I did some grocery shopping at the mart. It’s still before lunch, right?”
“What did you buy?”
“I bought ingredients to make chicken burritos. Ah, and also…”
Moon Jeonghun approached behind the children and whispered something in their ears. He covered his mouth with his hand so Euiju wouldn’t know. Euiju, who was holding the house door wide open for them to enter, tilted his head as if puzzled.
“Wow, really?!”
“Yeah. So hurry inside and wash your hands. Euiseong too.”
“Okay! Got it!”
Whatever they’d heard, Euiseong and Euiho’s faces brightened. The highly excited children ran into the house at a fast pace.
“What did you buy?”
“It’s a secret from you.”
“What?”
Since Roun’s illness onset, Euiyeon and Euiju tried to provide the children with as healthy food as possible. They were children without picky eating habits to begin with, but on days when Moon Jeonghun came, they liked being able to eat snacks and fast food that Euiyeon and Euiju didn’t usually buy them. Since he’d stopped by a famous bakery before coming home to buy ice cream called sundaes and pretty cupcakes, it was understandable the children would be excited.
Although he didn’t know what was bought, Euiju, who roughly sensed it from seeing the children so happy, let out a small laugh and followed them into the house.
SHCS Hospital located in California was established in 1920 and is a world-renowned hospital for organ transplantation, cancer diagnosis and treatment, cardiovascular medicine and surgery, neuroscience, and more. There was a medical team with experience curing pediatric patients with the same condition as Roun, and it was a high-level facility equipped with state-of-the-art equipment. The hospital readily accepted Roun, who suffered from a rare disease.
The given conditions were very good. The equipment and doctors were top-level, they’d secured a house close to the hospital, and the twins’ school was not far away. Everything was an environment good for caring for a sick child, but the life of watching the child’s battle with illness from the side was really not easy.
Every night, Euiyeon and Euiju took turns commuting to and from the hospital. Without a caregiver, they personally received the child’s urine, feces, and secretions and watched every process of treatment. Because it was such a rare disease, sometimes the child’s treatment process was revealed in detail to the media or externally. Camera lenses like cannons would be thrust at them several at a time, people in suits would visit as a group and bombard them with questions, and strangers would touch various parts of the younger sibling’s body and evaluate him like livestock.
The experience of having to watch such things helplessly was extremely miserable. But such things couldn’t even be counted as difficult compared to Roun being sick.
-Hyung. I’m having a hard time……
Could there be anything more horrific than watching from the side as the small, delicate youngest endured terrible treatment that even adults would find difficult to bear? That alone never developed immunity no matter how much time passed.
Euiyeon and Euiju cried along when the child wailed, and when he fainted during treatment, they couldn’t sleep for three days and nights, only burning with anxiety and falling into a swamp of despair. There were days spent entirely in prayer, afraid the youngest might let go of the thread of life at any moment. Every day was a continuation of anxious and uneasy days.
This went on for three years.
“…You’re saying the newly developed drug is showing effects?”
“Yeah. Internal results already came out too.”
Moon Jeonghun’s mouth, having put down the burrito he was holding, opened mercilessly wide.
“I, I see. No wonder…!”
That’s right. There was a reason why Euiju’s smile, which couldn’t be found for three years, had returned.
A few days ago, Roun had just moved down from the intensive care unit to a general ward. Euiyeon and Euiju, who had suffered a lot in the meantime, obtained the spark of hope while looking at Roun, who showed great signs of full recovery ahead.
Moon Jeonghun had watched Euiyeon and Euiju’s hardships right beside them for nearly three years. He couldn’t help but be happy as if it were his own matter. He, who usually showed only a mature and serious appearance, got excited and kept asking Euiju this and that for quite a while. When Moon Jeonghun, who had heard all the detailed stories, burst out in hearty laughter with joy, Euiju also began to laugh along as if he couldn’t stop him. The laughter of the twins, each holding a burrito, was a bonus.
The lunch table where Moon Jeonghun was squeezed in among the harmonious three siblings was extremely warm and friendly. The warm sunlight now began to shine through the window onto the dining table like lighting.
“Wow. Even in the midst of all that, Euiyeon-ssi is really amazing. While nursing the child, she prepared in her spare time and finally passed.”
Moon Jeonghun admired as he put corn on Euiho and Euiseong’s plates.
Most of the money borrowed from Jeong Gwangho went into the child’s medical expenses. The money Euiju had saved in Korea was gradually bottoming out due to housing and living expenses, and since only Euiju could speak English, he went here and there as a day laborer in his spare time to cover living expenses.
However, there were limits.
Euiyeon, who couldn’t bear to watch Euiju handle everything alone, devoted herself to studying while saving sleep even while nursing the child. She acquired the language at a fast pace, and even after gaining skills enough to have a job, she didn’t stop there but continued studying to become a medical interpreter. And not long ago, she finally achieved her desired accomplishment.
Moon Jeonghun, who placed a cupcake each in front of the children, asked.
“Other than that, was there anything else special?”
Moon Jeonghun asked Euiju. Euiseong, who had been munching on his burrito, immediately interrupted.
“Right, Uncle. Uncle really needs to be careful.”
“Hm? About what?”
“Some ahjussi at the hospital is following our noona around, you know? But that person is way more handsome than Uncle? Uncle’s really in danger now.”
“Right. He’s super tall too!”
“…What?”
At Moon Jeonghun’s dumbfounded reaction, the twins made eye contact and giggled. They were clearly teasing him openly. Moon Jeonghun looked at Euiju with a dumbfounded face.
“He was a patient in the room next to ours. I guess he’s interested in noona.”
“I’m telling you, he really looks like a celebrity on TV? Uncle. You really need to take care of yourself…”
“What? Hahaha!”
At Euiseong’s cool-headed and realistic words, laughter burst from Moon Jeonghun’s mouth. There had been a man who showed interest in Euiyeon before, and that person followed her around to an obsessive level, so Moon Jeonghun had escorted by Euiyeon’s side for a while.
The twins, who didn’t know the situation well at the time, misunderstood that he liked Euiyeon and would often tease him mischievously like this.
“Euiseong-ah. You can’t do that to Uncle.”
When Euiju spoke in a deliberately firm voice, Euiseong turned his head sharply and stuck out his lower lip.
“Hahaha. Well, it’s about time the rose-colored glasses fell off from the kids’ eyes.”
Moon Jeonghun, who had distinct and flashy features, was also burly. Even though Asians were relatively unpopular in the West, there was no shortage of people of the opposite sex making advances toward Moon Jeonghun.
“It feels like just yesterday you said Jeonghun Uncle was the second coolest.”
“Hmph. Even if second place changed, first place hasn’t changed, you know?”
The corners of Euiju’s mouth, who was obviously in first place, rose slyly. Moon Jeonghun burst into laughter once more seeing that.
After finishing the meal, Moon Jeonghun, who gave the twins an ice cream each and sent them upstairs, made two cups of coffee and headed to Euiju’s room. When he handed coffee to Euiju, who was sitting at his desk writing something, Euiju received it with both hands saying thank you.
Sitting on the bed sipping warm coffee and quietly watching what Euiju was doing, Moon Jeonghun carefully asked a question.
“Contact, still nothing yet?”
Euiju’s movement, which had been writing something while bringing coffee with steam rising from it to his lips, stopped as is.
An arid atmosphere, different from before, engulfed them as if swallowing them whole. From Euiju, who couldn’t easily answer Moon Jeonghun’s question, a resigned chuckle flowed out.
Euiju, who put down the pen he was holding, got up from his seat and approached a poster hanging on one wall of the room. Euiju stared at the paper hung in the frame as if looking at something distant and far away. His appearance, as if looking at something he wanted to grasp but couldn’t, looked so desolate that Moon Jeonghun, watching from behind, almost pulled him into an embrace momentarily.
“What I’m writing today is the last. I’m not going to wait anymore.”
“……”
“Now I just… I’ll be satisfied with being able to see him even like this.”
Emotions of regret flowed dot by dot from his voice. Euiju, who slowly stretched out his hand, caressed the cheek of a man staring straight ahead while holding a woman in his arms.
The title of the crisp, unwrinkled movie poster was <Ripe>. Director Charlie Harris, starring Bianca Taylor and… Jin Haeseong.
Twenty-year-old Jin Haeseong was imprinted as is within the poster.
Euiju looked at Jin Haeseong, who could no longer be called a child, for a long while.
