I grabbed his shoulders and pulled him off sharply. Jiwoo looked at me with innocent eyes.
“You can give it to me now. Just in case, I’d be really grateful if you could give me two types—some cut with scissors and some plucked out with the root attached.”
What the hell is he talking about? Then, like a bolt of lightning, hyungnim’s words came to mind. That Jiwoo’s perceptiveness went beyond just being sharp—it was practically like a ghost. But since ghosts were too unrealistic, he told me to think of him as more like a shaman.
“Is hair a bit much? Then fingernails or toenails are fine too.”
When I stood there awkwardly with a reluctant expression, Jiwoo tilted his head and said something horrible. His expression was as casual as if he were asking me to choose between pizza or hamburgers.
It was incomparably more shocking than when Jiwoo had been rubbing against my neck.
“Why do you want that?”
“Because I want to be with you all the time.”
“…What?”
“If I have a part of you, it’ll at least feel like we’re together all the time.”
A chill ran down my back again and goosebumps spread all over. It was similar in intensity to hearing nails on a chalkboard. But the mental shock was even worse.
“That’s a bit…”
What am I supposed to do if I give it to him and he does something weird with it? What if Jiwoo really is a shaman and puts some kind of curse on me with it? Even if it wasn’t a curse but a protective charm to ward off evil, I still didn’t want it. I fucking hate that kind of invisible, unscientific stuff in the first place!
“Why?”
But Jiwoo was noticeably disappointed. That was even more ridiculous. Did he think I’d give it to him if he asked? Hair or fingernails? He really wasn’t in his right mind.
“It’s just hair.”
“That may be true, but still… it’s weird. Anyway, I don’t want to. Don’t you want anything else? Something you need for the house, or something you’ve wanted?”
“Then when are you going to the hair salon?”
“What?”
“Is it okay if I follow you when you go to the salon and collect a few strands?”
“……”
He’d said a lot of absurd things before, but this was truly at a disgusting level. Is he really a shaman? Did he figure out about hyungnim’s spy and everything by fortune-telling? If I give him my hair, could he use it to divine and figure out my identity?
This wasn’t some fantasy novel, so that could never happen. But combined with all of Jiwoo’s bizarre behavior I’d seen so far, I kept getting uneasy thoughts like what if.
“You give it to the person who cuts your hair, so why won’t you give it to me?”
When I continued not to answer, Jiwoo spouted nonsense as if he felt hurt.
“I don’t give my hair to the hairdresser—they just cut it and throw it away.”
“So why won’t you give me something useless that you’re throwing away anyway?”
Have I ever argued with Jiwoo’s words this much? I wanted to refuse until the end, but if I did that and hurt Jiwoo’s feelings, I’d be the only one at a loss.
I forced the corners of my mouth upward.
“You really want to receive my hair as a gift?”
“Yeah.”
“Fine, then. I’ll give it to you now.”
I went to the kitchen, grabbed whatever hair I could with my hand, and cut it with scissors. Then I took out the smallest ziplock bag from the drawer and put the hair inside.
Barely hiding my surging irritation, I handed Jiwoo the ziplock bag with the hair.
“Here.”
“Pluck out one strand.”
Without arguing, I quickly plucked out one strand of hair and carefully placed it in the ziplock bag.
“That’s good, right?”
“Yeah, thanks. I’ll think of it as your clone and always carry it with me.”
Seeing him smile so brightly at how happy he was made me feel queasy. Even with his usual absurd antics, I’ve never felt this unpleasant…
“What do you want to receive?”
Maybe because of that, I didn’t even feel like wanting anything. I just wanted him to leave quickly.
“I’ll tell you next time we meet. Let me think about it.”
“Okay, then. Don’t feel pressured, just think comfortably. I have a lot of money.”
With that, Jiwoo left with only a fresh smile.
“……”
Finally alone in the quiet house, I collapsed onto the blankets. Whether it was from being constantly tense or exhausted from Jiwoo’s bizarre behavior, I became acutely fatigued.
The drug problem, hyungnim having someone tail me for surveillance—there were so many serious issues, but they didn’t feel real. Maybe because it was all too unrealistic.
“I really started a job wrong—what kind of suffering is this?”
They say with great power comes great responsibility. To earn a lot of money, you had to take big risks. I’m such a coward I don’t even do stocks, so what the hell am I doing…
For now, Jiwoo would contact me within a few hours after meeting hyungnim, so I should wait for that. Since I already knew hyungnim sent those drugs, I needed to think about how to handle the situation afterwards.
Fortunately, Jiwoo seemed to think I was caught up in this. If I just got through this problem well, there wouldn’t be anything to hold against me going forward.
“…Right?”
I’d have to have done this spy stuff before to know. Ugh, my head hurts. It would be nice if I could at least contact hyungnim, but I couldn’t do that either. He only said he’d contact me at an appropriate time, but didn’t tell me when that would be.
If Jiwoo meets hyungnim today, hyungnim will know the situation too, so won’t he contact me somehow? Since the situation has changed…
With those thoughts, I waited for contact. Whether from Jiwoo or hyungnim, whoever I heard from, I’d act accordingly.
But today passed and the next day came, and I didn’t hear from anyone. I had an ominous feeling, but since it was the day Seogong was being discharged, I couldn’t think deeply about it.
“Did you leave the boiler on when you came out?”
Seogong gasped in shock as he entered the sweltering house.
“Hurry up and get in. It’s cold, it’s cold.”
“Holy shit, crazy. The floor is literally boiling.”
“Change into comfortable clothes and rest. I’ll make you some porridge.”
“Okay, but why does it feel like I haven’t been home in forever?”
I roughly unpacked and went to the kitchen. I was about to quickly make porridge with the ingredients I’d organized last night when I heard Seogong’s surprised voice.
“Hyung, what are all these clothes in the closet? Did you win the lottery?”
I’d already removed all the tags from the clothes Jiwoo had given me as gifts and thrown away all the plastic wrapping. Expecting Seogong to be surprised when he saw them, I used the lie I’d prepared in advance.
“Someone I know was going to throw them away because they don’t wear them, so I took them. They almost all look brand new.”
“Isn’t this a luxury brand?”
“I don’t know, they said they were throwing everything away and put it in a burlap sack, so I just brought the whole thing.”
It was true that someone I knew gave them to me, so it wasn’t a complete lie. Seogong seemed surprised at first, but maybe because he didn’t know much about luxury brands, he quickly lost interest.
“When did you make a rich friend?”
“Is that stuff really that expensive?”
“I don’t know much either, but someone I knew once showed me that one t-shirt costs over a million won. It looks like that brand.”
“You wear them all. You lost weight anyway and need to buy new clothes, so this works out well.”
After eating a small amount of porridge for 30 minutes, Seogong slowly circled around the living room, constantly moving. Meanwhile, I divided the porridge into the new containers I’d bought.
“Hyung, aren’t you going to your part-time job today?”
“No, I said I’m taking a break.”
I’d decided to keep working only until Kim Minjun got used to it, so I only needed to go to Pig Dream until the end of this month. The problem was Seogong. I’d have to at least pretend to be working so he wouldn’t get suspicious, but I couldn’t meet Jiwoo every day I went out…
But why hasn’t Jiwoo contacted me yet?
I leaned against the sink and fiddled with my phone. Then after hesitating, I sent Jiwoo a text.
Are you very busy?
Seeing as there’s been no contact until now, maybe he’s busy with work. He did work until dawn and all… Or maybe there was a problem with hyungnim. Did the two of them even meet?
As I was thinking that and about to put my phone down, a call came. Lee Jiwoo’s three-character name was displayed on the screen.
For a moment, I wondered if I should answer the phone here. Even though I hadn’t done anything wrong, I felt self-conscious about Seogong for no reason, so I took my phone and went into the bathroom.
