Chapter 39

When we’d walked off dinner, I drove Seolhee home. At the entrance to her apartment building, she hesitated. I realized she was waiting to see if I’d ask to come up. After tonight I was starting to wonder if Seolhee had become entangled with the mentality that she had to use her sensuality to be liked.

I just kissed her goodnight. “Thank you. I had a good time tonight,” I told her.

“Me too.” She hugged me tightly. “Good night, Jae-ya,” she murmured. Seolhee slipped my (actually Taejun’s) jacket off her shoulders and returned it to me. I watched her walk through the lobby. She waved at me before she stepped into the elevator.

Taejun was waiting for me when I got home. I felt like an adulterous man returning to his old maid of a wife. I tried to skitter past him but he was far too quick to be avoided.

“How did it go?” Taejun asked hopefully.

“It was really nice, actually,” I said. “Seolhee and I had a good time.”

“Did she like the Garden of Memories exhibit?” he interrogated. I winced. Not the dumb musuem again.

“Ah… yeah, I guess she did.” I tried to get around him to escape to the shower but he blocked me.

Taejun’s smile turned malicious. “You didn’t go to the museum, did you?” he accused. “There’s no Garden of Memories exhibit.”

“Hyung! Leave me alone. She was fine with watching a movie, alright?!” I felt embarrassment wash over me.

“How could you?” Taejun groaned.

“Ssi-bal! Let me shower! Don’t you have work to do?” I complained. I punched him.

He let me hit him. “Oof,” Taejun grunted. “It’s my dongsaeng’s first date,” he said. “It’s my brotherly duty to make sure it went well.”

“You did a good job,” I admitted. “She liked the restaurant you picked. And my clothes. And the movie. And the jacket. So apart from the museum, all your advice was perfect.”

Taejun looked a little too emotional at my response. He pulled me in for a hug as I protested. Then he ruffled my hair, ruining his hard work from earlier. “I’m glad,” he said. “You can go shower now.”

Before I did, I asked, “Did you get the night off?”

“Yeah. I took the night off,” he replied. Almost as soon as my brother said so, his phone vibrated in his pocket. “Technically,” he sighed as he pulled out his phone to check it.

I laughed. Poor Taejun. “When I’m done, will you help me sign up for cram classes?”

Taejun looked up from his screen in surprise. “Of course,” he promised.

It took some time to get back into the habit of going to school again. My brain felt rusty after not being used for so long. I’d forgotten almost all non-essential education, particularly history and English. My scores on the placement tests the hagwon made me take were embarrassingly low. But to my surprise, most of my classmates didn’t look too much younger than me. It was quite varied, and I was far from the eldest in the class. That fact cheered me, and kept me from feeling too humiliated in the beginning.

The English classes were by far the most excruciating, but fortunately for me, Taejun had gone to a school well renowned for its foreign language studies, and his English was exemplary (far better than that of my loathsome tutor).

I don’t know how, but he always managed to make time for me in the evenings to help me with my English homework. But then he took up the annoying habit of speaking to me in only English, and only replying if I spoke English at him, until I was about to tear my hair out. He even texted and forced me to text in English. At least he could always tell when my frustration was spilling over into anger, and let me speak in Korean when I couldn’t express myself in English.

Irritating as they were, his methods were actually quite effective. My cram tutor always praised me for my good work, and I improved quickly, going from the bottom of the class to the top. At least in English. I put in only the most minimal effort for history.

Three times a week, Taejun and I also went to the yoga studio where he continued to teach me to spar. He hadn’t questioned why I still wanted to continue the sparring lessons even though I’d quit the racing scene. I asked him about it once, and he simply said it was good exercise. Fine. He could keep his thoughts secret if he wanted.

Even though I knew Seolhee was still hooking up with other guys, she and I still went on dates when I could find the time to ask her out. It was definitely not an ordinary relationship by any means, but both of us enjoyed pretending it was. She might have been emotionally using me to feel that someone cared for her, but so was I.

I was just as lonely as she was. Even though I’d made up my mind to cut off the Tigers, I still found myself missing the good times and spontaneous hangouts we’d had. I’d made a few shallow friends out of my classmates, but we never met up outside of cram school, and our conversations never really went too far beyond complaints about the work we had to do. I’d always been reserved but it would have driven me crazy to only talk to my brother every day (especially because he made me speak English, the bastard).

As rarely as Jung Hana called me in to help, most of her clients were part of the racing scene, and I ran into familiar faces almost every time she called me in. I eventually asked not to send work to me and thanked her for the work she had brought me in on. Jung Hana knew I’d quit the racing scene, and didn’t question my request.

So now I worked at a convenience store during the day before my cram classes. It was dull and didn’t pay well, but I couldn’t find work anywhere else.

Months passed like this. It felt good to finally be able to focus on my own future again and to work on improving myself. Even though Taejun was busy as ever (probably even more now that he had to tutor me as well), he seemed happier and less stressed now around me. I think he was pleased at what I’d decided to do with my life. I often wondered about his plans to transfer to France. He rarely mentioned it, but I think I was just about ready to agree to go with him.

I no longer really had anything binding me to Seoul.

I was stacking bottles of water one evening when someone slung their arm around my neck from behind. Immediately I went on the defensive, but before I could do anything–

“Hey handsome. Does this place have tomato juice by any chance?”

That voice was all too familiar. “Eunsoo?” I choked. I pulled his arm off me and turned around to face him. I hadn’t seen or heard from him in months even though we’d never really said farewell.

Eunsoo grinned at me, and I felt a little relieved that he didn’t seem too upset at my attempt to ghost him. “Bring it here, bud,” he said, and before I could stop him, he pulled me into a hug and thumped me on the back.

“Seolhee told me you guys were dating,” he commented.

I just looked at him in disbelief. “I haven’t seen you in months and that’s the first thing you say to me?” I grumbled.

“Actually, the first thing I said to you was if you guys had tomato juice,” Eunsoo corrected me. He grinned.

I chuckled. Eunsoo was annoying, but I’d definitely missed his antics. “I didn’t think we were on speaking terms,” I said. But I was pleased to see him again.

“Eh. You may not be around, but we’re still mates. You broke up with Ryu, not me, jagi,” Eunsoo said.

“Well, I haven’t heard from you in months, either,” I retorted.

“Because you broke up with Ryu-chan,” Eunsoo grinned back. Fucking Eunsoo and his dodgy answers. I didn’t understand him sometimes. “I wasn’t kidding about the tomato juice, by the way. Do you have it or not?”

“Quit saying ‘broke up’,” I complained. The tomato juice was in the fridge next to the one I’d been stocking, so I handed him a bottle with a face. “I’ve never seen you drink this stuff. Are you sick?”

“It’s not for me. Also, give me another one. Actually, just fill this.” Eunsoo dropped a basket at my feet.

“Who’s this for?” I asked baffledly as I filled his basket. Who needed this much tomato juice? My manager would be pleased. These things were terribly unsellable.

“Obviously Ryu. He loves this shit for some reason.”

I winced and snapped my head around, scanning for Eunsoo’s perpetual second shadow.

“Chill out. He’s not here,” Eunsoo chuckled. “He’s outside having a cig. You’re awful jumpy. Must have been a bad break up.”

“Technically, I think he broke up with me– aish, you’ve got me saying it too,” I groaned.

Eunsoo snickered. “Yeah, he does that,” he said breezily.

It sounded so casual when he said it. “Wait. How serious is it?” I asked.

“Pretty damn serious. It’s hard to get off his shit list,” Eunsoo replied with the same casual energy as before. He grabbed himself a pack of soju and added it to the critically full basket. The entire time we’d been talking, he’d been grabbing things seemingly at random and chucking them in.

“I see.” Leaving the Tigers behind after all they’d done for me was a shit move, but it was jarring how different Eunsoo and Ryu had reacted. I frowned as I put the last bottle of juice into the basket. “There’s more in the back. Do you want me to get it?”

Eunsoo hefted the basket with an exaggerated grunt. “Nope,” he wheezed. “Don’t think I can carry anymore.”

“I’ll ring you up then.”

As I scanned the plethora of items Eunsoo had accumulated in his cart, Eunsoo spoke up again. “You can’t just walk in and out on people as you please, you know.”

I looked at him.

“It’s easy for you because you’ve got abandonment issues or something. Maybe you feel used and unwanted. But you perpetuate the cycle when you leave whenever you want. You leave people feeling as hurt as you do. You gotta remember you’re not the only one with issues. Hell, everyone’s got them. You missed this one, by the way. You’re a shit cashier.” Eunsoo handed me a packet of chips.

I blinked. I knew Eunsoo had an innate understanding of people (which he mostly used for mischief), but he’d never reprimanded me like this. I grabbed the bag of chips from him sullenly and scanned it. “You seem fine,” I grouched as he paid.

“I’m Choi Eunsoo,” he said smugly. “Everyone wants me.”

“Get the hell out of my store.”

He cackled. “Now that I know where you work, let’s keep in touch.”

“Sure.”

I watched him stagger outside with his overstuffed bag. I could see Ryu from here, but he had his back to the store. I heard him exclaim at Eunsoo.

“Eunsoo! Why did you buy so much? You said you were getting one thing!”

“Help me carry it,” Eunsoo wheedled.

“Carry it yourself, you psychopath!”

As they walked away, their bickering faded until I couldn’t hear them anymore. I felt a pang of loneliness.

Maybe I should go visit my parents.

It was a good thing I called before I showed up. The person at the other end of the line wasn’t my mother. Nor my father.

“Sorry to bother you, seonsaengnim,” I apologized. “I was looking for the previous tenants.”

“It’s not a problem,” the unfamiliar woman said. “Maybe give our landlady a call. She might have their new contact information.” She gave me the landlady’s phone number. (I already knew it. For years I’d been the one paying rent.)

I thanked her and hung up.

Fortunately the landlady did know the new address my parents were living at. But they didn’t seem to have a landline.

I decided I’d go Sunday evening, when they were most likely to be at home. Taejun had taken to driving my car to his work (and wherever else he went during the day). I didn’t mind. He probably did need it more than me. My work and my school were close by, and I would have taken public transport anyways. But this evening he’d managed to return home with it in time for me to drive it to Outer Seoul.

My brother had been concerned about me visiting them again, but didn’t insist on stopping me.

“Just be careful,” he had cautioned. “Don’t let them suck you into anything again.”

I hadn’t been nervous about that at all until he had brought it up.

As I drove to the new neighborhood my parents had moved to, I regretted driving my car again. Clearly I’d learned nothing from my visit to Old Ansan. Again, eyes seemed to pop up everywhere to follow my Z down the street. We’d always lived in a rough neighborhood (we didn’t have the luxury to afford anything better), but this particular part of town was especially decrepit.

I didn’t have any option but to park streetside, but I put on my best Taejun impression as I exited my car with the bag of oranges I’d bought on my way here. The street urchins who had gathered like buzzards to gawk at my car scattered at my threatening glare.

I tossed one of the smaller oranges to the biggest of loitering kids. “I’ll give you 10 thousand won if you keep your friends from messing with the car until I come back,” I said to him.

“They’re not my friends,” he replied with eager malice.

I gave the adolescent gang one last warning look before I walked into the complex.

Both my parents were home. My mother burst into tears (expected) when she answered the door and saw me standing there. This time, as she embraced me and squeezed me tight, it felt good to be in her embrace, not constricting. I was even glad to see my father again. He’d lost some weight from the stress of his injury, and he looked small and weak with his spindly, healing legs. As I greeted him while he sat there propped up awkwardly in a shoddy chair I no longer felt like he was an oppressive, menacing figure in my life.

I was appalled by their new apartment. As an underground apartment, it was stuffy, humid, and tiny. Streaks of mold and discolored water stains lined the walls and corners. It was a true one room apartment: four walls, one entrance. There was no closet. My parents’ possessions (few as they were) simply lay heaped against the wall in various dilapidated boxes. They didn’t even have their own bathroom. My mother told me that they used the communal one down the hall.

I felt horrendous guilt washing over me. “What happened to the old apartment?” I asked, even though the gist of the answer was obvious. They hadn’t been able to make rent.

“Your father’s legs were very badly broken,” my mother twittered nervously. “He can’t work –he can hardly move– and I need to take care of him. With just the government disability pay, we couldn’t afford rent there anymore. Taejun-a does send us some money from time to time. But we had to use it for the doctors.”

I hung my head in shame. “I should have sent some too,” I choked out. It killed me to see my own parents living in this squalor while I had been living it up in Upper Seoul, first at the Tiger’s hangout, now at my brother’s apartment.

To my surprise, my father didn’t reprimand me for not doing so. “Jaehyun-a. You already did so much. We know you paid off the debt to the Seven Directions gang. Han Jungho confirmed it with us some months ago.”

I still couldn’t raise my head.

“I don’t know how you did it,” my father said. “Your mother worries, but –”

My mother interrupted. “Jae-ya, you’re not in a gang, are you?” she whimpered. She knew that when I was younger, I stole things to scrape together cash for the family. My mother might not have approved, but she couldn’t say anything. We were desperate then.

I shook my head. I don’t know if the Blue Tigers could be properly considered a gang even though technically street racing was illegal. But either way, I wasn’t part of them any more.

“I didn’t steal anything. I didn’t break any laws to earn that money,” I said. It was mostly true. A good deal of it had come from my mechanic work, and I hadn’t really done anything legally punishable. Driving over the speed limit on an empty road hardly counted. If people wanted to give me money to watch me do it, there weren’t any laws stopping them from doing so either.

I don’t know if my mother believed me, but that answer was good enough for my father.

“I’m proud of you, son,” he said. “I’m a good for nothing father, but you’re out there making something of yourself. You and Taejun both.”

I trembled. I was overcome with the urge to embrace him, as my mother often did to me when she was overwhelmed. But my father had never been physically affectionate. He noticed. My father reached out his hand to me and I took it as eagerly as a dog leans into its master.

“I want to change, Jae-ya,” he said. His voice shook. “Now that I know how it feels to be out of debt, I want to stay like this. Appa and umma are going to try our best.”

Tears were flowing down my mother’s cheeks, but I couldn’t blame her. I felt like doing the same. I doubted I could help them to rent somewhere more liveable on my current measly convenient store employee salary, but silently I set that goal in my heart. If my father was truly going to change his ways, then once he and my mother were able to find work again, the three of us contributing should be able to allow them to rent somewhere less horrendous.

“For now, just focus on getting better,” I said softly. It was going to be a long, difficult road to recovery for my father with so few resources. I doubted they had the luxury of affording physiotherapy and other remedial medicine.

“It’s not so bad,” my mother commented with a faint smile. “You dad can’t run off to the gambling tables like this.”

Nor could he chase and beat my mother around the house throwing everything into disarray, I thought. But I forced myself to smile with her.

Even my father chuckled. “Another month like this, and I’ll finally kick that addiction for good,” he promised.

Even I dared to hope that they had finally changed after all this time.

When I left, there was a scuffle outside. The kid I’d charged with guarding my car had another, younger and smaller, kid pinned beneath him. The one on top was laying into him with unbridled gusto. I grabbed him by the back of his shirt and yanked him to his feet. The one under him scrambled off, wailing his hurt.

“Oi! What are you doing?” I asked irritably.

“Ahjussi!” he said brightly without a trace of regret. “He was trying to touch your car. I stopped him.”

My mouth dropped open. “I’m not old enough to be an ahjussi,” I snapped at him. “And I never told you to beat anyone up.” Unfortunately I had to admit, the young thug’s brutality had worked. My car looked perfectly unmolested. Even though I wasn’t pleased with his methods, a promise was a promise. I pulled out a pair of bills from my pocket and held it out to him. He snatched it out of my hand with glee.

Unfortunately his victim had disappeared. I would have liked to have given him a bit of money to buy something sweet to comfort himself with. But if I gave my small hired jopok that money, I was certain he’d pocket it for himself.

“Thanks, ah-” He caught himself at my glare. It took him a moment to decide what to call me. “Hyung-nim,” he decided. Before I could reprimand him for his new choice, he scampered off with his ill gotten funds.

It didn’t sit well with me that the kid had called me Brother like I was some sort of gangster.