And so Haeshin made his way to the village community center storage room and gathered things one by one — a ladder, gloves, a broom.
He was absorbed in the task when someone gave his shoulder a half-hearted pat. He turned around, expecting Hwichan, but the hand belonged to a middle-aged man he’d never seen before. Come to think of it, the hand was a bit small for Hwichan.
“Hey, kid — you got any more soju in here?”
Haeshin frowned at the man, who reeked of alcohol. Even living on an island with fewer than thirty residents, this was a face he’d never seen. Just then, the Village Chief, who’d been chain-smoking under the community center eaves, came over warmly.
“Oh, this is Yunsik. My friend. Came to the island yesterday, slept over at my place.”
“Ah — you’re the Village Chief’s friend?”
He remembered the unfamiliar sound of a boat horn that had come to the island yesterday morning. He’d wondered who it was — apparently it had been the Village Chief’s friend.
“So, how old are you?”
“Me?”
“Who else would I be asking.”
“Twenty-seven. I’m Lee Haeshin. Nice to meet you.”
Haeshin bowed politely. The man was still holding an umbrella under the eaves even though the rain had stopped long ago.
“All the soju we have is what’s inside the community center.”
“What about yours?”
He probably meant don’t you have any at home? As it happened, the only alcohol in Haeshin’s house was cooking wine.
“Sorry about that.”
There was nothing to actually apologize for, but Haeshin smiled awkwardly and said it anyway.
He finished rummaging through the storage room, gathered the empty bags and tools he needed for cleaning Hwichan’s breaker box, and headed out. The man, reeking of alcohol, fell into step behind him.
“You from the city?”
It was a familiar reaction. Adults taking one look at Haeshin’s hair color and writing him off as a delinquent was nothing new.
“No, I’m a Samsam Island native. I’ve lived here my whole life.”
“Then why’s your hair like that.”
“I take after my mom.”
“Your mom has yellow hair?”
He didn’t like a complete stranger bringing up his family, so he just smiled at the last question and said nothing.
The man was wearing only a short-sleeved shirt and a vest padded jacket in the dead of winter, with hiking pants and shoes crammed onto his feet. He didn’t seem to care that his socks were soaked through as he wandered around inside the community center. The Village Chief’s wife would’ve been furious if she’d seen it.
By then the Village Chief had slipped away somewhere. Haeshin wasn’t happy being left alone with an unfamiliar adult. Even less so when that adult was drunk.
Haeshin was about to drape a towel over his head and head over to Hwichan’s house, but the man — who had just cracked open the last remaining soju from the fridge — suddenly grabbed him by the sleeve.
“Where are you carting all that at this hour?”
The man’s expression was one of mild amusement, like he was watching something ridiculous. In the brighter light indoors, his face looked vaguely familiar.
Where have I seen him before. He felt like he’d seen him on Samsam Island, but couldn’t quite place it. If he was a friend of the Village Chief’s he would’ve visited the island more than once, so maybe he was one of the fishermen he’d spotted on the rocks.
Haeshin answered, “Just going to check the breaker box at a friend’s place,” and smiled. In his head he’d briefly wrestled with whether to call Shin Hwichan a “friend,” or a younger acquaintance, or something else entirely — but whatever he called him, this man probably didn’t care either way.
“A friend?”
“Yeah. A friend……”
“You’ve got someone your age here too? Jangseok said there was only one.”
“The Village Chief said that?”
Well, Hwichan had only arrived recently, so it made sense he wouldn’t know yet. Just then, the Village Chief came back in through the door, shaking the water from his hair.
“A few weeks back, another one showed up.”
“Another one? Who?”
“Shin Gyeongcheol’s nephew. You know, the big one — mean-looking, with those upturned eyes.”
It seemed everyone knew Hwichan’s uncle, because the man gave a short “oh” of recognition.
“Oh right, I remember now. That rude little punk?”
Yeah, he does look rude on the outside. I thought the same thing myself at first.
Haeshin felt a quiet bitterness, but figured there was nothing he could do about how adults saw things, and clicked his tongue dryly. It was smarter to steer the conversation elsewhere than to jump in and defend Hwichan. He brought over some dried pollock from the kitchen corner and set it down in front of them with a smile.
“He’s still young, that’s all. A bit standoffish too. But once you get to know him, he’s a good kid. I know him. Can I get you more to snack on?”
But the next words that followed, thrown out without a second thought — those, even Haeshin couldn’t let roll off him.
“What do you expect from a kid who killed his own parents? Plain as day.”
A kid who killed his own parents. The rough, cutting phrase made Haeshin’s chest drop.
“On the kid’s sixth birthday, Gyeongcheol’s younger sibling drowned in the sea. On his seventh birthday, the mother tried to take the kid with her but drowned alone. Only that kid survived.”
He was caught off guard, speechless. He hadn’t wanted to hear this — in such detail, about someone’s private family history, and from a stranger’s mouth rather than the person himself.
Did anyone actually need to use language this cruel to pick apart someone else’s family history? And over a kid who was only twenty-three at that. No — even if he were fifty-three, words like that always left a wound.
And yet the Village Chief joined in, clucking his tongue right along with it.
“Haeshin, you were raised by all of us here. That’s why you turned out fine without parents. Diligent, gentle.”
“Right, you can tell just by looking at him. Jangseok raised him well.”
The island elders’ words were sometimes like hands full of thorns. Fussing and worrying on the surface, and cutting you just the same. Haeshin kept a strained smile and said nothing, as though he were used to it.
The two of them talked on about a third party right in front of him. It wasn’t just Hwichan — he knew the Village Chief loved to talk about other people’s family affairs whenever he got a few drinks in him, so he neither stopped him nor played along.
He also finally remembered where he’d seen the Village Chief’s drinking buddy before. A few years back, this man had freeloaded snacks at a neighbor woman’s house and then turned around and talked badly about her eldest daughter who’d moved to Seoul, and the whole thing had ended in a huge blowup.
Of course it had to be him. Of all people.
People like this — the best approach, Haeshin knew well, was to nod along every time they said “right? am I right?” and answer with a mild “yes, yes, I think so too.”
It weighed on his conscience, listening to people run down someone he’d been laughing with just a few hours ago. But if he stepped in now, Hwichan would end up on the receiving end of even more unprovoked nagging starting tomorrow.
“You know too, don’t you, Haeshin?”
But today didn’t seem to be a day his mild agreement was going to get him through.
The soju bottle was already less than half full. The Village Chief’s face had gone ruddy as he grabbed Haeshin by the sleeve and sat him down at the table.
“You know, don’t you, Haeshin.”
I don’t know, Haeshin replied flatly. It was a quiet way of saying he didn’t want to talk about this anymore — but the drunk adults were too far gone to catch it.
“How can you not know that kid killed his own parents.”
Why did some people act like there was a treasure map hidden inside this island — so desperate to tear someone apart with their words. What does it change if I know that? What does it change for anyone?
On top of everything, it was twice as unpleasant to sense that the man kept looking to him for agreement — probably to ease his own conscience over badmouthing his friend’s nephew.
“That kid’s star-crossed, he is. Bad luck’s contagious, you know.”
“Both parents died in the water, at that. Nothing worse than that.”
Haeshin shut his eyes tight. His head filled up with thoughts, all crowding in at once.
Died in the water?
The more he turned it over, the more the ground seemed to give way beneath him. “Give way” wasn’t quite the right way to put it. Collapse was closer.
