GBh 58
by Emerlyn“Don’t I have some stake in this motorcycle? You probably bought it with money you stole from me.”
“…”
Hong Jae-min climbed onto the bike’s seat, afraid it might be taken away. Seeing him try to leave quickly without denying it, rather than making a fuss, it seemed Jae-min’s words were true. Kim Deuk-pal wasn’t about to let him go so easily.
“Don’t tell me you bought this just with money stolen from me?”
Jae-min, momentarily forgetting the situation, flared up.
“Not all of it! I worked part-time!”
“So part of it is my money anyway. Give me two wheels.”
As Song Yi-heon reached for the front wheel, looking serious, Jae-min panicked and his eyes went wide. Any sense of deep emotion vanished as he faced the prospect of losing the wheels of the bike he’d cherished while going hungry. Jae-min tried to push the bike backward, hopping on one foot planted on the ground and yelling.
“Are you crazy? You’ve lost it! Completely lost it!”
“The crazy one is you, kid. If you want to ride a motorcycle, you should be cruising around the neighborhood on a scooter, not riding a sportbike.”
Song Yi-heon seemed to know motorcycles well, feeling for the points to disassemble the wheels. Jae-min screamed in terror.
“Don’t touch it! I said don’t touch it! I’m warning you! If I start the engine, you’ll get hurt…!”
As Jae-min was making a fuss, trying to start the bike while Song Yi-heon held him back, Yi-heon noticed another concerning point.
“Where’s your helmet?”
Not just the helmet, but there was no safety gear at all. Jae-min, straddling the bike and supporting its tilt with one leg on the ground, wore only a short-sleeved T-shirt and red track pants. Jae-min was proud, as if it were ridiculous to suggest otherwise. He was the epitome of ‘ignorance is bliss’.
“I don’t wear that uncool stuff.”
Kim Deuk-pal was so amazed at how ignorant and reckless teenage bravado could be that he was left speechless. Se-kyung, who had been watching disapprovingly, seized the moment and said gently.
“Yi-heon, it seems Jae-min is determined to die. Let’s not interfere and go.”
“This bastard, always picking a fight…!”
Song Yi-heon, snapping out of his stunned state at Jae-min’s ignorance, blocked Jae-min who was lunging to grab Se-kyung’s collar, and took out his wallet. It seemed better for his mental health to send away the seemingly hopeless Jae-min quickly.
“Hey, take a taxi home. If you get hurt riding the motorcycle, how worried would your parents be? When a child gets hurt, parents suffer terribly, you know.”
Seeing Jae-min’s disheveled appearance, it was obvious he had run away from home and wasn’t eating properly. Song Yi-heon took out several green bills, intending to give him taxi fare and pocket money. Kim Deuk-pal, who had taken in and fed many runaway teenagers before sending them back, knew that without money, these kids easily fell prey to crime. Later, when asked about their motives, they would say they did it because they were hungry – an excuse that Kim Deuk-pal, knowing the pain of hunger, hated to hear.
Ignoring Choi Se-kyung’s disapproval, he handed over an appropriate amount, careful not to give too much in case it might be used for something undesirable.
However, contrary to expectations, Jae-min didn’t eagerly accept it. He turned his head towards the road. His side profile, with protruding lips, was full of discontent. Kim Deuk-pal, wondering what was bothering him now, mentally repeated the character for ‘patience’ three times.
“…I don’t have that.”
“What?”
As Kim Deuk-pal asked, not having heard properly, Jae-min burst out angrily.
“I said I don’t have parents!”
Of course, no one is born under the sky without parents. But Jae-min didn’t want to acknowledge a father who squandered his daily labor earnings on alcohol, or a mother who frequently ran away from home, unable to endure the father’s violence as parents.
“Shit, don’t act like you know… Fuck, just because you have some money…”
Although Song Yi-heon couldn’t know these detailed circumstances, Jae-min felt as if his hidden shame was completely exposed under Song Yi-heon’s blank stare. Looking down at the road, he spewed out even worse curses than usual.
As Song Yi-heon’s chest expanded as if about to sigh, Jae-min flinched. Noticing the tense reaction, Song Yi-heon swallowed the sigh he was about to let out and forcibly pulled Jae-min off the bike.
“Follow me.”
They left the motorcycle needing repair at a nearby garage and took a taxi to Song Yi-heon’s house. As the taxi entered the wealthy neighborhood, the scenery outside the window changed, though still in Seoul. Even just the trees rising above the uniformly continuous walls and the visible parts of the houses were overwhelming in their display of the residents’ wealth.
Hong Jae-min, who had been grumbling and trying to hide his intimidation in the taxi, involuntarily blurted out his true feelings when directly facing the house.
“The house is fucking nice…”
“Yeah, it’s fucking nice.”
Damn, this guy doesn’t know humility. Jae-min glared at Song Yi-heon as he punched in the gate’s security code. Choi Se-kyung, whose reason for coming along was unclear, also snickered, prompting Jae-min to chase after him intending to kick him, only to step on the lawn in the garden.
The garden, with its lawn and trees planted along the walls, had an eerie feel with the lights off, but by Jae-min’s standards, it looked eye-poppingly good. Even the house, shining alone in the dark garden, was so large and impressive it looked more like an art gallery than a home.
As they entered the foyer, which seemed desperate to show off its high-end materials without being too obvious, Jae-min still thought Song Yi-heon, like Choi Se-kyung, was born into an ideal family and lived a life of luxury. The tiny bit of guilt that had formed from being criticized by the changed Song Yi-heon was about to melt away like snow.
“Aaaaah!”
A woman’s scream made Hong Jae-min freeze. Song Yi-heon and Choi Se-kyung ran inside.
“Madam, please calm down! Madam!”
“Leave me alone! I said leave me alone! Aaah!”
“Young master, quickly grab the madam!”
“Madam, please don’t do this!”
“Leave me alone! I said leave me alone!”
Hong Jae-min, who had been stuck at the entrance, only dared to enter after the commotion died down. In the living room he entered quietly, the woman who had screamed was crying in Song Yi-heon’s arms.
“Um…”
As Jae-min called out cautiously, not knowing what had happened, everyone in the living room looked at him. The unfamiliar gazes of the housekeeper and the driver were already uncomfortable, but when the woman crying in Song Yi-heon’s arms also stared at him, he felt a chill of fear.
Song Min-seo, who had been screaming hysterically and was covered in tears, stared blankly at Jae-min before suddenly brightening up.
“Chairman!”
Song Min-seo pushed Song Yi-heon away with a strength no adult woman should possess.
“Chairman, why are you here so late…!”
“Oh my, Madam! No! He’s the young master’s friend!”
As the unstable Song Min-seo mistook Jae-min for the chairman and tried to rush towards him, the housekeeper panicked and tried to stop her. Song Yi-heon hugged Song Min-seo from behind to restrain his and asked Choi Se-kyung:
“Take Hong Jae-min upstairs.”
“Okay.”
While Song Yi-heon was calming Song Min-seo, Se-kyung shook the stunned Jae-min and took him upstairs. Min-seo’s cries, as he made a fuss trying to grab Jae-min disappearing to the second floor, followed him.
The two-story house’s interior was just as stylish as its exterior, but Jae-min was in no state of mind to appreciate it.
The woman who looked like a housekeeper had called the woman “madam.” He referred to him as “the young master’s friend.” So was that woman Song Yi-heon’s mother? The woman with disheveled hair who lunged at a boy his son’s age, calling him “Chairman,” wasn’t normal. Is Song Yi-heon’s mother… crazy? Jae-min was startled to find himself unconsciously feeling relieved that his own mother, who ran away from home habitually, was better.
“Jae-min.”
“Huh?!”
Just then, Choi Se-kyung called him. Jae-min jumped, thinking his thoughts had been discovered, but then realized Se-kyung was holding the door open. He entered Song Yi-heon’s room.
Choi Se-kyung closed the door behind them, put down his bag, and started tidying up the desk. It seemed Song Yi-heon had fallen asleep while studying the night before, and the housekeeper hadn’t had a chance to clean up the scattered workbooks. Se-kyung, who frequented Song Yi-heon’s room, tidied up without hesitation.
Jae-min, feeling awkward with nothing to do, perched on the edge of the bed. Se-kyung spoke while shelving the workbooks.
“Were you very surprised?”
Wondering why this fox cub suddenly cared about others, Jae-min felt more suspicious than grateful.
“You thought you were the most unfortunate, but Yi-heon is unfortunate too.”
Of course. There’s no way that bastard would worry about me. Jae-min berated himself for momentarily doubting and snapped at Se-kyung’s back.
“…Shit, aren’t you going home? Why did you follow us here? Don’t you have anything better to do?”
“Jae-min, I’m curious about what you were thinking, following Yi-heon to his house.”
“Song Yi-heon dragged me here.”
“Usually, perpetrators refuse to come to their victim’s house out of guilt, don’t they?”
Irritated that this fox always brought up his history of school violence when things weren’t in his favor, Jae-min gritted his teeth.
“You’re not trying to start over because Yi-heon has changed, are you?”
“…”
Noticing Jae-min’s silence as affirmation, Se-kyung turned to look at him. The corners of his delicate eyes crinkled. It was a sweet-looking smile, white and transparent like candy melting in warm tea.
“Jae-min, I like you.”
Having finished tidying up, Se-kyung sat on the desk facing Jae-min. With his delicately handsome face making this gentle confession, even Jae-min, who disliked Se-kyung, felt his heart flutter slightly. But Se-kyung was very good at insulting while smiling. He criticized Jae-min to his face with a bright smile.
“You’re conscienceless, shameless. Plus, you’re a bad guy with thick skin, so I don’t have to feel sorry for bullying you.”
“You bastard-!”
Jae-min, unskilled at verbal comebacks, grabbed Se-kyung’s collar, and Se-kyung, having no reason to hold back without Song Yi-heon around, grabbed Jae-min’s collar in return. Just as it seemed Jae-min might be pushed back, surprised by Se-kyung fighting back for once, the door suddenly burst open.
Song Yi-heon, discovering the two about to fight, blinked and asked:
“What are you doing?”
“Oh, Yi-heon, well…”
Too tired to even listen, he waved his hand dismissively. If it were the old Song Yi-heon, he’d be fretting about Jae-min spreading rumors about his mother at school, but Kim Deuk-pal wasn’t ashamed of Song Min-seo and didn’t even consider the concept of being “found out.” Even if rumors spread, whoever spread them would end up on the receiving end of his fists anyway.
Like a father returning from work and loosening his tie, Song Yi-heon unbuttoned his school uniform shirt and nagged:
“I’m tired. Don’t fight.”
Se-kyung pushed Jae-min away and attended to Song Yi-heon, who was about to change out of his uniform.
“Is your mother alright?”
“Yeah, she’s asleep. Guess she didn’t take her sedative after dinner.”
They were used to Song Min-seo’s episodes and moved on after a brief exchange. Song Yi-heon took the t-shirt Se-kyung pulled out of the closet and asked about their plans for the night.
“Are you staying over too?”
“Yeah.”
Just as Jae-min was about to insist on leaving if Choi Se-kyung was staying, Song Yi-heon called out to him while removing the undershirt beneath his uniform.
“Hey, were you very shocked?”
Jae-min’s jaw dropped at the sight of the exposed white skin and slender muscles, but then he noticed a faint peanut-shaped scar on Song Yi-heon’s side and averted his gaze.
“…No.”
Unaware of the scar on his side, Song Yi-heon thought Jae-min was looking away because he didn’t want to see another man’s naked body, so he pulled down the t-shirt he was putting on.
“Have you eaten?”
“…”
At that moment, Jae-min’s stomach let out a loud growl, having skipped dinner to save money and only eaten a piece of bread for lunch.