“Hyung.”
[Oh, Lee Euishin. How have you been? What’s up?]
The only power a twenty-year-old with nothing in hand could wield was connections like this.
“I have something to tell you.”
[Right, of course. What is it?]
A much younger cousin, the prettiest and freshest nephew among the maternal bloodline. The man replied with a pleasant laugh.
“Some fucking bastards scammed my… friend and ran away. Catch them.”
[…No, what audacious bastards did such a thing?]
Lee Euishin exhaled briefly and chose his words. He’d forgotten that this man was excessively perceptive.
“A translation company. Guys who also do human trafficking and scam various things here and there. There are more than ten job postings with fake companies that only changed the business name. They post ‘urgently hiring’ to hook random people, embezzle the payment in the middle, stall for time, then shut down. It’s an obvious method in that industry, they say. I’ve already reported them to the National Tax Service for identity fraud and I’m going to the police station tomorrow to file a fraud report, but this kind of investigation is fucking slow, you know. Don’t you know anyone at the station? Put in a word for me.”
[You’re saying it with your own mouth, asking if I know anyone. You know this isn’t my field. What am I, a detective agency? And if they’re veterans, that won’t work. Even if you put out a warrant, they’re missing so the investigation gets suspended, and for reinvestigation, there needs to be new information. Even if you catch them, there’s no hole for money to come out.]
“If there’s something I can cooperate with, I’ll do it.”
[Wouldn’t going to the police station yourself be faster?]
“It’s not the first time you’ve received a request like this.”
Fucking annoying. This is why I hated prosecutor bastards. Among relatives who live for their own arrogance, he’s the stiffest-necked one and tries to use people however he wants. But he endured. They say when it comes to having connections in police and prosecution circles, there’s no one who can match this ahjussi. If conditions are met, no matter what dirty favor anyone asks, he handles it skillfully. Fucking say yes already. Don’t make me feel like shit.
[Huh… are you cursing at me right now?]
“Hyung.”
You fucking bastard.
[Alright, I’ll look into whether it’s something worth pursuing. I’ll tell you in advance….]
“Tell me.”
How much could they have taken from a twenty-year-old college student? Lee Euishin calmly waited for the man’s answer.
[Go to my wife’s company and help out with some work. She joined a law firm recently. It’s nothing major, but she’s been busy lately and needs someone to help with paperwork. You’ll be better than most law students. My honey has a bit of a nasty personality, you know.]
“I’ll contact you after exams end next week.”
[Are you a guy who struggles with mere college exams?]
“…I’ll go tomorrow. I’ll try it for two days first, and if it’s too much, let me go.”
[Two days is too harsh. Don’t police and prosecutors have weekends? You should do it until Monday.]
“Then let’s do that.”
The deal was made. If the man didn’t bring something plausible by Monday, he’d have to look for another way. But he didn’t think there would be no results. In this country, everything becomes twice as easy with connections.
Running his hand through his hair irritably, Lee Euishin added one last thing.
“Make sure to catch them. Those fucking bastards even hit my f… friend.”
He hung up the phone and looked down at Kwon Yunsu’s face sleeping peacefully on his thigh. As he traced the blue bruise drawn over the pale skin, he imagined Kwon Yunsu getting beaten by some bastard and his fingertips trembled.
“My kid that I don’t even hit…”
Unable to bear it, he lowered his head and kissed the reddened eyes. It was surprising in a new way. More infuriating than being cleanly forgotten from fifteen-year-old Kwon Yunsu’s world, more than Shin Jaewoo kissing him, more than the hateful and wicked runaway incident—there was something that made his teeth grind.
He wanted to lock up Kwon Yunsu, who kept turning his insides upside down, in his house forever.
***
“Five minutes until the end. Start wrapping up and turn in your exam papers.”
At the teaching assistant’s words echoing lowly through the lecture hall, Kwon Yunsu raised his head. When did time pass like this? He moved his pen urgently. There were a couple of problems he couldn’t finish cleanly, but there was no time now. As soon as he organized the problem he’d been working on, the end was announced like clockwork, and Kwon Yunsu left the lecture hall as if being chased out. He couldn’t tell if he’d done reasonably well or completely bombed it. Was this professor picky about spelling? I don’t know. Blinking his tired eyes, he waited for the elevator. It seemed like he needed to take a nap to prepare for tomorrow’s exam.
Leaning against the elevator wall and turning on his phone, it immediately vibrated. The name on the screen was “Lee Euishin Master,” his mouth fell open in disbelief. When did you do this? Pretending not to be, but secretly childish.
[Did your exam end?]
As soon as he answered the phone, the guy asked.
“Just now.”
[Are you coming home?]
“Yeah. You?”
[I’m leaving now.]
Lee Euishin has an exam in the afternoon.
“Good luck on your exam. Will you come straight home after?”
[Where else would I go?]
At the curt answer, Kwon Yunsu chuckled. Well, he wasn’t someone who wandered around anywhere besides school. Still, there had been occasional gaps lately, so he asked. Whether he was going to his family home or doing team projects, Lee Euishin had been going out briefly these days. If he asked, he’d stubbornly say it’s none of your business, or only tell him after things were somewhat settled, so it was better to wait quietly.
“Then wake me up when you come home. I’m going to sleep as soon as I get there.”
[Eat and then sleep. I made food.]
Kwon Yunsu frowned.
“Hey Master. Why do you keep taking over my work? I said I’d make the food?”
[…Master?]
Even in the midst of all this, the guy kept interfering with the duties of a devout lodger. He’d started seriously hovering around the kitchen. The kid who used to sleep in twice as much as him would wake up at the crack of dawn these days and whip up something. Everything he made was excellent, which made him feel even more threatened. It was also suspicious that the refrigerator kept overflowing with food even without grocery shopping. Once exams were over, he’d sit down properly and make a household list and account book.
But a sense of crisis was a sense of crisis, and food was innocent. Having no intention of refusing food, Kwon Yunsu quickly softened his tone.
“Anyway, I’m going to sleep first. We’ll eat together when you come.”
When he said it in a roundabout way, there was no quick answer. Are you going to interfere with even meal times?
“It tastes better when we eat together.”
When he added that clichéd line, Lee Euishin chuckled and replied.
[Who told you to say such pretty things?]
“……”
…Who told you to say such scary things?
While he was at a loss for words, the guy only said what he wanted to say and hung up.
[Go home and sleep quietly. You said with your own mouth you’d go straight home, so if I find you collapsed in the club room, you’ll be in trouble.]
Looking down at the phone with the ended call, Kwon Yunsu felt his earlobes getting hot anew. Eighth-grader syndrome is truly a terrifying disease. Lee Euishin’s eighth-grader syndrome was even worse.
Lee Euishin, who despite being a sensitive prince, let him into the independent apartment. Lee Euishin, who says he absolutely hates Korean food yet makes rice dishes and side dishes. Calling from time to time to check his whereabouts, taking care of his sick body, doing heavy grocery shopping, grinding his teeth in anger at injuries gotten outside, drinking with him silently… Suddenly his vision went dark.
─Why is he so good to me?
That thought kept growing without ever being watered, occasionally making his vision go dark.
Now it was strange that he’d never particularly wondered about it. Lee Euishin’s goodwill. That special goodwill that rarely extended to anyone—why had he been accepting it so readily? As if your boundaries were naturally my territory…
“……”
As his thoughts led to thinking about other people’s goodwill, his heart sank gloomily. Until recently, if Kwon Yunsu had spare time, he’d naturally stop by the club room, but he’d been lazy these days. Exam period was an excuse—the truth was he was avoiding it. He didn’t have the courage to face the club members.
The trip together was canceled. No, it almost returned to square one. Back to the original plan where Ahn Shinwook would join Kim Younghwan-hyung and Lee Eunsub-hyung’s trip.
Although his mind and body had weakened from the shock of being scammed, the awareness that it was overstepping his bounds wasn’t a mistake. Rather, he became more clearheaded. Kwon Yunsu truly gave up on the trip and confessed the truth before that weekend passed. Throughout the weekend, the group chat stayed lit up as the soccer idiots’ persuasion continued, but it was useless. Kwon Yunsu was mortified and upset to death for making such a fuss only to pull out so absurdly.
And late Sunday night, Shin Jaewoo, whose face he hadn’t seen in days, pulled out second with a lame excuse. Song Taesu also raised the white flag, saying that gathering money in such a short period was stressful enough to cause hair loss, and only Ahn Shinwook remained with the words “I have nothing else to do anyway.” Everything was an unfortunate series of events following his own conduct.
「Soccer fanatic, want hyung to buy you a meal?」
