Today too the jumping conversation continued naturally. It was so natural that it was now scary. Kwon Yunsu ignored the group insulting (those words didn’t actually come out) his grandfather and ate his food diligently. The doctor said you have to eat well for bones to heal quickly.
“Are you going to the hospital today?”
Lee Euishin asked while dropping chicken nuggets on top of the heaping rice. Kwon Yunsu nodded. It was a day for physical therapy.
“Yeah, I’m going. Come with me.”
Lee Euishin ate his rice silently. Kwon Yunsu found it both sad and amusing that he was getting used to this way of refusing.
Before long, Lee Euishin got up with his tray. He’s a guy who doesn’t really like school food anyway, and today he’s probably going to see the homeroom teacher. Since there was a summons earlier.
“Ask someone with a bike to give you a ride.”
Looking down from above holding his tray, Lee Euishin had a somewhat dissatisfied face. Kwon Yunsu swallowed his rice and answered.
“Kim Wonwoo says his bike is expensive so he doesn’t want to give me a ride.”
“Kim Wonwoo….”
…That son of a bitch, just.
It seemed like Lee Euishin who turned around sharply muttered like that. Seriously. That bastard always acts all standoffish but really looks after me. Kwon Yunsu laughed hahaha.
Two days had passed since the Sports Festival ended.
It’s obvious, but even those burning hot moments disappear without a trace once they pass their peak. Not a slow descent but like a mirage, in an instant.
Even now, when Kwon Yunsu thinks about that day, his heart tingles. He sleeps with the sacred Crayon Shin-chan t-shirt hung by his bedside. He asked his noona to develop the commemorative photo, and he planned to snatch the ‘Soccer Division 1st Place’ certificate hanging on the class bulletin board faster than anyone else once the closing ceremony ended.
In any case, the peak had passed. While carefully treasuring that memory that had come closest to the form of happiness, he now had to prepare for exams. He should re-register for academy too. Mom would contact him soon. That became Kwon Yunsu’s new hope.
But hope is hope and sleepy is sleepy. Knowing that the last 7th period class had been changed into teeth-chattering technical torture (they say the cruelest torture is sleep deprivation), Kwon Yunsu resolutely stood up.
“Class President, I’m not feeling well so I need to go to the nurse’s office.”
The school nurse, who had seen him crying for his mom, was particularly weak to Kwon Yunsu’s whining.
“Already picked up bad habits?”
Lee Euishin’s eyes were naturally filled with contempt. Kwon Yunsu leaned in and made an offer he couldn’t refuse.
“Want to come too?”
The flower on the cliff haughtily turned his head away. Strange. He wasn’t usually like that, but he seems to lack energy today.
“…Will hyung let me spend money today?”
He asked carefully. Perhaps because he kept complaining about having no money, Lee Euishin thought he was seriously poor and kept refusing free food.
“Go sleep.”
The guy who had been resting his chin and looking out the window just stretched out his hand and patted his head. Kwon Yunsu turned away desolately, thinking he should show Lee Euishin his savings bankbook.
Kids these days are delicate and timid, coming to the nurse’s office at the slightest injury. So even when class started, the nurse’s office was always noisy. Nevertheless, Kwon Yunsu slept well. It’s a place isolated from the world by a single partition that provides comfortable bedding—there’s no way he wouldn’t fall asleep.
“Yunsu-ya, the bell rang. Hurry up and go back.”
Only after the school nurse repeated those words about three times did Kwon Yunsu sluggishly get up and head to the classroom. Come to think of it, it was homeroom time. He needed to quickly clean up, get physical therapy, and go home.
When he opened the back door and entered, the classroom atmosphere was a bit strange. The homeroom teacher was gone, and judging by everyone holding their phones, homeroom seemed to be over, but the kids weren’t going home and were gathered together murmuring.
“Hey, this is kind of absurd.”
“What is this?”
“They left really fast.”
“Hasn’t it been less than two months since he transferred in?”
“Then who’ll be class president now?”
“Kwon Yunsu, did you know?”
When the question flew at him, Kwon Yunsu didn’t know what expression to make. From the conversations going back and forth, he had a sense of what they meant, but somehow it didn’t make sense.
“…What is that?”
He muttered to no one in particular, dumbfounded. At the end of his gaze, the window seat in the first row of the first section was completely empty.
“Kwon Yunsu, the class president transferred schools again.”
Baek Seunghyun said, patting the shoulder of the deflated Kwon Yunsu. His tone was annoyingly honest.
Transferred? Where? …Why?
Feeling like tears would burst out if he opened his mouth, Kwon Yunsu silently left the classroom.
***
Dry, shabby scenery passes by outside the window. Apartments, shopping buildings in front of apartments, playgrounds, daycare centers, middle schools, elementary schools, convenience stores…. It was time to say goodbye to this shabby neighborhood too.
[Have you reflected enough?]
To his mother’s question, pretending to be strict, Lee Euishin answered like this.
‘I haven’t reflected, but I want to go back.’
What am I supposed to reflect on for beating up a guy who dared call me a crippled piece of trash.
He could hear his father making a strange “eeeek” sound from the other end of the phone, eavesdropping on the call. But his wish was immediately accepted. His mother’s emotion at hearing the words “I want to go home” for the first time from her delinquent son was immense.
“You should be grateful your son didn’t turn out gay.”
At the muttered words while recalling Kwon Yunsu’s face, the driver who had been silently driving flinched.
“When he’s so ugly….”
He added, grinding his teeth. Running away scared of being bitten by a country bumpkin who only knows soccer—pathetically infuriating.
‘…Euishin-ah.’
Why did that stupid, harmless country bumpkin look so dangerous?
On the way home after the sports festival, Lee Euishin felt a strange displeasure. It’s common to feel shitty alone on a day when everyone else is happy, but that day was different.
After finishing his shower, until he lay in bed and closed his eyes, Kwon Yunsu hugging his neck and crying came to mind about seven times. He felt indescribably strange. Like he was anxious and also dissatisfied. Just like the feeling right before nausea, and it kept going. He felt dizzy.
The call from his mother came the next day on the way to school. In a thoroughly foul mood from not sleeping all night, Lee Euishin declared he would return. Exile life over. Danger element removed. Simple. He just needed to never come to this country town again.
“…Young master, your phone is ringing.”
Breaking the silence, the driver spoke quietly. Lee Euishin snatched the phone he’d thrown on the seat next to him and held it.
“I kno…”
The letters on the screen read ‘Country Bumpkin.’
Glaring at it irritably, Lee Euishin only answered the call after feeling it vibrate about five times.
[…Class President……]
How childish…. Kwon Yunsu was sobbing.
[Where are you…?]
“Why.”
[You’re not here, damn….]
Lee Euishin smiled pleasantly.
“I’m transferring schools.”
[That’s not the point… you should at least see my face before you go, why are you so cold-hearted? I’m right now….]
Come to think of it, it’s quite noisy beyond the phone. An ominous feeling arose.
“…Where are you right now?”
[The, the terminal.]
Lee Euishin finally sat up straight.
“Crazy… why’d you go there?!”
[To see you….]
Why would I be there?!
It would only hurt his mouth to say it. Lee Euishin sighed in disbelief and spoke toward the driver’s seat.
“Is there a bus terminal in this neighborhood? Please take me there.”
The driver turned the car without a word.
Kwon Yunsu was sitting on a central bench at the terminal with a stupid face.
In his unchanged gym uniform with a cast on one leg, a backpack dangling on his back, and tearstains remaining on his face. Really so shabby I can’t stand to look. Lee Euishin quickly managed his expression.
“Hey.”
