GBH 121

Side Story 1. Sports Day

Song Yi-heon’s body was affected by the seasons. When Kim Deuk-pal didn’t know this fact, he had no way to explain the inexplicable restlessness, so he would do push-ups at night or go jogging with his hood on. As he ran through the alleys on moonlit nights, becoming familiar with the stray cats that let down their guard, he realized that the fluttering in his chest wasn’t a heart condition like heart failure or angina.

He was running through the neighborhood alleys for a while when he stopped to catch his breath. His throat bobbed with labored breathing, and his sweaty back rose and fell steeply. The wind swept across the back of his neck as he bent over, hands on his knees. The sweat-soaked nape of his neck cooled, heightening his senses.

As his senses sharpened, the empty alley was no longer quiet. The flow of air he had never been conscious of before made him nauseous just by touching his skin. Amidst the lingering summer air, a cool breeze blew, as if foretelling the approaching autumn. It was the flow of seasons he hadn’t noticed before.

For Kim Deuk-pal, who was a corpse in everything but physical strength, the seasons couldn’t affect him. But the sensitive Song Yi-heon embraced the changing seasons with his whole body. As if the flow of air had changed, as if the smell of the wind had altered, he was swept up in small changes with keen and delicate senses.

The fragile Song Yi-heon was sometimes melancholic, occasionally in pain, and at times joyful, swept up in unwanted changes.

This is the world he lived in.

He stood there for a long time, looking up at the night sky. As his rough breathing calmed and the heat left his thin skin, leaving behind fading red marks, he closed his eyes. He focused on the sensations of the body that had grown slender with its delicate temperament.

It was a night when the Seoul nightscape spread out like a curtain under a night sky with a clear crescent moon.

After that, he stopped exercising as if he couldn’t control his boiling blood. Kim Deuk-pal accepted Song Yi-heon’s world. With the hope that there would be at least one person who could empathize with the world that child, who might be wandering somewhere, had experienced.

Still feeling restless, he instead filled his empty stomach with food. That was why Song Yi-heon headed to the school store right after the morning assembly.

“Yawn-“

Still not fully awake from studying until dawn, he stumbled down the stairs. But the scene of the school grounds he surveyed while swaggering in his sloppily worn uniform was different from usual.

“Huh?”

The school store, which should be bustling at this time with students who hadn’t eaten breakfast, was unusually empty today. While looking around wondering where the usual pack of students had gone, Song Yi-heon enjoyed the luxury of grabbing two pizza breads that usually sold out quickly. He folded the first pizza bread in half and devoured it in a few bites, then leisurely bit into the second one as he left the store.

What’s going on today…? Finding the quiet store strange, Song Yi-heon was looking around and didn’t notice the figure running towards him. He was suddenly jolted by an impact to his chest and dropped the pizza bread.

“Oh, I’m sorry!”

The female student who had been running to the store apologized immediately, but Murphy’s law couldn’t be avoided, and the topping side of the pizza bread stuck to his uniform. As the bread slid down and fell, the tomato sauce smeared, and the cheese that had just been melted in the microwave stretched out. The girl’s mouth opened just as wide.

“Ugh.”

Song Yi-heon indifferently looked down at his shirt and flicked off a stuck piece of onion.

“It’s fine. Go on.”

It really was fine. What’s the big deal about accidentally dirtying a school uniform? The washing machine in his utility room was good at doing laundry. Even if the stain didn’t come out, he didn’t want to say anything unpleasant to a young kid over ruining some clothes, but the female student, unaware of Song Yi-heon’s sincerity, unzipped her gym uniform top.

“If you take off your uniform, I’ll quickly remove the stain! You can wear mine in the meantime!”

Thinking that Song Yi-heon wore a white T-shirt underneath like she did under her gym uniform, she urged him to quickly take off his blouse. Fortunately, her assumption was correct, as the neckline of a white tee was visible through his collar.

“No, really. It’s fine.”

As Song Yi-heon backed away cautiously from the boldness of this unfamiliar girl trying to undress a stranger, she stomped her feet in frustration. Worried that this senior might change his mind later and demand payment for the uniform instead of just cleaning costs if the stain didn’t come out, she managed to almost forcibly remove his shirt.

“Hey…!”

“I’ll wash it and bring it back!”

As the girl dashed off to the old building’s restroom, Song Yi-heon, left behind in confusion, scratched the back of his head bewilderedly. The wind blew. An early fallen leaf rolled across the empty schoolyard.

“It’s chilly…”

Song Yi-heon, who had been standing there blankly, rubbed his goosebump-covered bare skin before putting on the gym uniform the girl had left. It seemed she had bought a size larger thinking about growth, but perhaps there was some overestimation. The small girl’s gym uniform fit Song Yi-heon comfortably.

“She’s a first-year.” Song Yi-heon muttered to himself, looking at the yellow sleeve extending from elbow to wrist.

The gym uniforms at Song Yi-heon’s high school had the same design but different colors for each grade. While the base color was black for all, the sleeves of the top and the diagonal stripes on the pants’ calves were different colors for each grade.

So, everyone could guess the grade by the color of the gym uniform. Third-year was navy, second-year was green, and first-year was yellow. When the third-years wearing navy graduated, the new incoming first-years would wear navy, rotating the colors.

Feeling cold, Song Yi-heon zipped up the first-year gym uniform all the way to his neck and wandered around the lobby, waiting for the girl who had taken his uniform to come back.

However, before the girl returned, someone called out to Song Yi-heon, “Hey, you there! First-year boy! Come here and lend a hand!”

“Pardon?” Song Yi-heon looked around. The lobby was empty except for him. Just in case, he pointed at himself and asked, “Me?”

“Yes, you! Who else is there? Come help move these drinks!”

A teacher wearing a tracksuit and sunglasses gestured for him to come over. But I’m not a first-year… Scratching the back of his head, Song Yi-heon went over anyway since a teacher was calling.