“Did I ever say your crying face was pretty? Keep crying like that. If you want to know just how far my affection goes.”
Before his breathing could return to normal, Gong Haejin grabbed Dohui’s earlobe. That soft ear was mercilessly pressed between his calloused hands.
“Ugh……”
“If you heard me, answer.”
“……I, I understand.”
What kind of answer does he want. Dohui had blurted out whatever came to mind when told to answer, and his head was a mess all over again.
Smack! His head snapped to the side, and what he saw next was…… a man with a horrifying appearance. With that memory as his last, Dohui lost consciousness once more.
***
He didn’t know how much time had passed. It had been like this ever since that day.
Whether it was morning or night, whether it was raining or clear. Would it be cold today. Maybe spring is coming at this rate. He thought things like that in brief flashes. The reason he couldn’t hold onto those thoughts for long was because the men had been giving him drugs. When he took them, he acted like a beast with a clouded mind.
His memories had large gaps scooped out like ladles had been taken to them, and what remained in those spaces was humiliation and shame. And hatred — faint but steadily rising. A raw, knife-sharp hatred toward Gong Haejin.
He never thought he would fear someone this deeply, and in equal measure, come to hate them.
There was so much he wanted to ask Jinho’s uncle — no, the man who called himself his uncle. Why he was lying. Whether Jinho had really deceived everyone. What his purpose was to go this far. Whether Jinho knew he’d been caught. Whether he had truly felt nothing after pushing everything onto him.
He was curious about Jinho’s intentions — introducing him to that club part-time job and then jetting off to Europe just like that. If not his uncle, then who was he. When would Jinho be entering Korea.
That he had moved drugs — that had never happened. The more he tried to prove his innocence, the more strangely he was treated. Does that change what you did?
“Ugh……”
At some point, Dohui had begun suffering from terrible migraines. Probably since he came here. The relentless pain played along his temples. It felt like his skull was going to crack. He groaned and suffered through it for a long while.
When he was briefly free from the pain, he didn’t want to open his eyes, so he kept them shut. Reality was hell, and only dreams were his escape. He wanted to keep sleeping. He thought it would be fine even if he never opened his eyes again at the end of it.
They pressured me to repay a debt. Said they’d threaten my family if I couldn’t pay it back. And yet — when they actually caught the real culprit, they didn’t treat him the same way as me. He…… had killed him far too easily.
Why am I the only one still alive.
He couldn’t understand Gong Haejin. If things went sideways, the tip of his blade could turn at any moment and aim for his throat. Thinking about it, he didn’t want that. He didn’t want to die.
Ah. Dohui let out a low sigh and opened his eyes. The surroundings were unfamiliar again. It no longer surprised him much.
The place, which had nothing but a single plush bed, was different again from where he’d received the IV drip before. When Dohui raised his hand to press against his throbbing temple, he felt a familiar pain. It was from the IV line running from the back of his hand.
Where is this. He thought that, then laughed at the absurdity of it. Because similar thoughts kept cycling around like a hamster wheel. His parched lips parted slightly, and he tasted a faint hint of iron. He ran his fingertips over his chapped lips.
How long…… just how long do I have to stay here.
Maybe I’ll end up dying just as miserably as that man. As if being raped wasn’t enough, he might be headed toward that kind of ending too. His stomach churned, like he’d just watched a disturbing film. Nausea surged up and he rose from the spot.
Not even knowing where the bathroom was, he climbed out of bed without a plan. And immediately dry-heaved. There was no time to find the bathroom. His insides twisted like a pretzel. But no matter how much he heaved, all he got was a wrenching pain in his gut — nothing came out.
“Again?”
A cold voice pierced his ears.
Dohui clutched his aching solar plexus and looked up. His shirt had grown damp in no time.
“There’s nothing to bring up if you don’t eat.”
He’s right. There was nothing flowing from his empty stomach. Only the saliva that had run down his lips from all the heaving pooled at his chin.
Gong Haejin lightly wiped it away with his fingertip.
“Get up.”
“……Is this a dream?”
“……”
“That man — is he really dead?”
Gong Haejin tilted his head slightly. His hair was always styled the same. He was dressed neatly enough to head out at a moment’s notice, and he smiled softly.
The moment Dohui saw it, he felt a sting behind his nose. When Gong Haejin smiled, he cried. It felt like a fixed formula. Had there ever been a time Gong Haejin smiled without meaning? Every time he smiled, something bad followed.
Recalling a series of events, goosebumps rose on his skin. Wanting to put distance between them, he slowly inched backward.
“I wonder when you’ll realize that’s pointless.”
Gong Haejin pressed the tip of his finger against Dohui’s forehead. At that small force, his head jerked back before returning to place.
“Hmm……”
“I said your crying face was pretty, so now you’re leaking at all hours.”
“That man…… did you kill him.”
Dohui asked through clenched molars. No matter how hard he tried to hold back the tears, it was useless. They fell in drops, and the tip of his nose was flushed like a strawberry candy.
“Does that matter?”
“……Yes. To me it does.”
Was what he saw real. Or was he high on that godforsaken drug again and seeing things. Was the man even actually brought in to begin with. He endlessly doubted himself.
So Gong Haejin had to answer him.
Whether it was true or not.
Gong Haejin slowly ran his hand over his jaw. There was something like amusement caught at the corner of his smooth lips. This man isn’t normal.
“If you really want an answer — what you saw was real.”
“Why…… why did you kill him. I, I had so many things to ask……”
Dohui pressed his forehead to the floor and sobbed.
“Why he did it. Why it was me. Why he lied. And even after all that……”
“You wanted to ask if his conscience was clear?”
“I…… didn’t do it. I don’t know him. I only saw him once that day. Don’t believe what he said.”
Lashes soaked heavy with tears slowly lifted. He could see the tips of Gong Haejin’s feet. Instinctively, Dohui crawled and grabbed the man’s ankle.
“How cliché, Dohui.”
“I…… I’m not lying. I won’t say a word to anyone……”
“I told you to beg, and here you are actually begging.”
“Hic……”
“How cute.”
No matter how hard one tries to make a negative into a positive, it doesn’t turn into one.
***
Dohui yanked the needle out in one smooth pull. Blood ran again, but he felt nothing.
His face, where Gong Haejin had struck him, must have been swollen for some time now. The inner lining of his cheek stung every time he spoke. Having taken the slap without bracing for it, it felt like he’d bitten through his flesh. When he pressed his tongue to it, a rough texture came with the pain.
“You pulled it out again?”
Dohui’s body flinched hard at the voice coming from near his feet. A warm hand lightly closed around his cold toes.
“Not a single day where you do as you’re told. Such a bother every time……”
Gong Haejin studied the fingertips where the red liquid flowed. The bloodless back of his hand, the impossibly thin wrist, and the slender forearm laid bare by the short sleeve.
Gong Haejin, who had been studying the unmarked skin closely, lightly pushed Dohui’s shoulder.
“Don’t tense up.”
“……”
Dohui’s lips parted soundlessly. By now, he already knew what questions would come from those lips without even hearing them. When do I get to leave. Why are you doing this to me. What on earth is the reason for all this. Questions that came cycling back like a tiresome round song.
He took hold of Dohui’s ankle — weak as weak could be — and stroked up to his calf. Even with a thick blanket covering him, Dohui’s natural body temperature ran cold, so to Gong Haejin’s touch, it felt chilly.
Gong Haejin suddenly let out a laugh. Because he recalled the clumsy movements of someone who had grabbed a knife and lunged at him with that frail body, thinking he could do something. What did he think he was going to accomplish with movements like someone who’d never thrown a punch in his life. To Gong Haejin’s eyes — a born fighter — it was even more pathetic than a child throwing a fist.
If that’s his goal, shall I humor him for a while.
“Let’s set some rules.”
“……”
“I promised that if you killed me, I’d let you go without issue — so shouldn’t there be something equally matching on your end when you fail?”
His voice drove itself deep into his eardrums.
He didn’t want to hear it. This wasn’t a simple game. He wanted to cry out that he refused to participate, but Gong Haejin covered Dohui’s nose and mouth with his palm. Hah — hah — the hot breath he barely managed to exhale came right back down his throat.
Gong Haejin leaned his upper body forward. His slightly firm nose briefly grazed the earlobe.
“You’ve failed once, so what are you going to offer.”
Dohui couldn’t say a word.
“I wonder what there is.”
