GBH 75

The destination the two took the taxi to was Bukchon. In Seoul, where towering skyscrapers abound, this was a neighborhood where closely packed traditional hanok houses displayed an elegance that didn’t lag behind despite their low height. Se-kyung, a Seoul native, had often visited this hanok village when touring Gyeongbokgung and Changdeokgung palaces, but the path Song Yi-heon was leading him down was unfamiliar.

In contrast, Song Yi-heon, who had taken off his windbreaker due to the heat from running and tucked it under his arm, confidently chose his way at each fork in the road. As they walked along a long wall, Se-kyung brought up what he couldn’t ask in the taxi.

“Who were those people chasing you earlier?”

Se-kyung had been watching Song Yi-heon since he was sitting at the convenience store parasol. The tattooed men spewing rough curses didn’t seem to have ordinary jobs. There must have been a reason for following such a gangster-like group, but Song Yi-heon just turned his head, staring intently over his shoulder at Se-kyung, before deflecting with a question of his own.

“How did you know where to find me?”

“The Seosan lady found a receipt while washing your clothes and gave it to me. She was very worried about you.”

It seemed Song Yi-heon had bought snacks to sit at the convenience store parasol and carelessly stuffed the receipt in his pocket. The Seosan lady found it while doing laundry.

Worried about Song Yi-heon going out late at night and returning in the morning without a word, the Seosan lady immediately handed over the receipt when Se-kyung came looking for him. It was a big change compared to the past when she would pretend not to notice even if Song Yi-heon came home beaten up.

After walking along the long wall, they arrived at a gate that preserved the traditional features of the tiled-roof house. Beyond the gate was pitch black, as if ink had been poured over it, not to mention deathly quiet. There were no signs of life or light that would inevitably exist if people lived there, and the CCTV and modern security devices attached to the gate seemed to be out of order.

Se-kyung peeled off a real estate flyer stuck to the gate and examined it. It prominently advertised a urgent need for a jeonse tenant.

“Looks like an empty house.”

“I know.”

As Song Yi-heon jumped up and down trying to see over the wall, Se-kyung knelt on one knee beside him.

“Step on me.”

He interlocked his fingers on top of his bent knee, palms facing up. The meaning was clear – use his hands as a step. Contrary to expectations that he wouldn’t do it, Song Yi-heon didn’t refuse and stepped on the pale palms.

Grabbing the wall topped with overlapping roof tiles, Song Yi-heon hooked one knee over it as Se-kyung straightened his bent knee to give him more height. Straddling the wall, Song Yi-heon looked down at Se-kyung before jumping down.

“I’ll open the door from inside. Come in.”

Despite the considerable height of the wall, there was a sound of light landing as if he had leapt down like a flying squirrel. The digital lock, whose password had been changed by the real estate agency, was unlocked from inside and the gate opened. As Se-kyung hesitated, wondering if it was okay to just enter like this, Song Yi-heon grabbed his wrist, pulled him in, and closed the gate.

The silhouette of the massive hanok was illuminated by the city’s glow. Wind chimes hanging from the eaves swayed silently in the breeze that had swept through the city.

While Se-kyung looked around the unfamiliar hanok, Song Yi-heon bypassed the front door with its unopenable digital lock and went for the paper doors of the wooden floor. Stepping onto the wooden floor where dirt and leaves from the garden had blown in, he grabbed the frame of the locked paper door from the inside and shook it. The door, much taller than Song Yi-heon, seemed about to collapse on him.

“Dangerous…!”

But Song Yi-heon, as if teasing Se-kyung, used a loose gap to lift the paper door off. As if he knew this part was loose all along. Then he went inside without hesitation.

“…Cough.”

The dust floating in the sealed space assaulted every opening on his face. Only after closing his eyes, coughing, and waving away dust for a while did he have a chance to look around. With reddened eyes, Song Yi-heon wiped away the reflexive tears.

It was a hallway screened off with paper doors beyond the wooden floor. Just half a year ago, this hallway had sparkled without a speck of dust when he was told to escort tutors, but now a thick layer of white dust had accumulated, leaving footprints. The house seemed to have been empty for at least a month or two.

The largest space, intended as a living room but used as a dining room to encourage eating together, was equally covered in a fine layer of dust. There were no guys greeting “brother” in booming voices in the fitness room, judo hall, sauna, or individual rooms. Most of the household items remained, as if they had left in a hurry.

The subordinates he had cherished had abandoned this house and left.

This was his second visit to this house. After seeing photos sent by the chairman showing his subordinates engaging in gangster activities, he had rushed straight here from school. Though he had hurried from the taxi, back then he could only stand helplessly in front of the gate with its changed door lock code. It wasn’t until dusk that he thought to check with a nearby real estate agency. He learned the house had been sold, and was only told it had been a hasty sale.

He couldn’t believe it and had been in denial, but walking through the dust-covered interior and seeing the abandoned house firsthand left no room for denial.

Even after thoroughly checking the backyard, there wasn’t a single person hiding. The only movement was insects that had entered through the garden, quickly scurrying to hide at the sense of an outsider.

As he confirmed more signs of absence, his face, which had been pale with shock, at some point changed to anger.

This was the house he had lived in with the subordinates he had personally taken in. How they had cheered when they moved into this spacious house, leaving behind the cramped quarters where they had all lived packed together. The memory was vivid – finishing the move, drinking heavily of baijiu with jajangmyeon, sprawling out and laughing boisterously while waving their limbs.

But for his subordinates, it seems even that memory hadn’t remained as a faded recollection, given that they had sold this house.

“Useless fools.”

Song Yi-heon’s clenched fist trembled. A low growl scraped through his gritted teeth. He ground his teeth, wanting to grab those subordinates who pathetically couldn’t even keep this one house and thoroughly straighten out their rotten minds.

His jaw clenched tighter, trying to hold back tears that threatened to redden his eyes for reasons other than dust. The true reason for his fury spilled out.

“How could they give up the house… what will they do in winter…”

Even if they could manage somehow in summer’s heat, they’d likely freeze to death on the streets in winter. He resented those who had given up the house knowing how bitterly cold the winter nights could be.

You have to tenaciously hold onto a place to return to.

They were all without families. It was his creed to protect their home to the end so the boys he’d taken in wouldn’t be called rootless or without background. His subordinates should have known his creed well, yet no matter how urgently they needed money, to sell this house…

His steps, which had been sweeping through the dusty house, finally entered the room Kim Deukpal had used. Likewise, when he pushed open the door, dust billowed and covered his face. As he waved away the dust, the scene of the room unfolded as if parting a fog, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. His chest trembled slightly as he forcibly swallowed the tears that had welled up.

Unable to clear away his belongings even after his death, the room remained exactly as it had been when he last left it.

Though covered in dust, there was the floor desk where he had sat studying all night, the chair with a backrest, bookshelves sagging with workbooks, the silk bedding spread without a single wrinkle. Even the math workbook he had been using for tutoring on the day he died lay overlapped with a tablet, aligned at the edge of the desk.

“Haah…”

As he took a deep breath, a moist sigh escaped, trembling across his chest. Though it was the room he had used while alive, though things were placed exactly as they had been then, he couldn’t take a single step inside. Even suppressing his lungs, which kept exhaling moist breaths, was a struggle. Letting out a long, damp sigh, Song Yi-heon closed his eyes.

Passing by Song Yi-heon standing at the threshold, Se-kyung entered the room. Having followed Song Yi-heon all along, he examined the room in place of the owner who couldn’t bring himself to intrude on these traces of life. As he passed by traditional decorations like folding screens and long ornamental swords, a memorial portrait leaning against the wall on the floor caught his eye.

The middle-aged man in the portrait could only be described as formidable. His thick eyebrows flowed into a straight nose bridge with deep shadows, and his long eyes held a fierce gaze. If this was the impression from just a photo, meeting him in person would likely be intensely intimidating.

Kneeling to examine the memorial portrait closely, Se-kyung soon stood and turned his attention elsewhere. As he picked up a math workbook from the floor desk and flipped through the pages with his thumb, Song Yi-heon approached from behind and roughly pushed him aside, snatching away the workbook.

“Don’t touch it.”

The forceful grabbing motion was childish and irritable, as if he really were a high school student. Se-kyung stepped back, brushing the dust off his hands. Without probing deeply into Song Yi-heon’s seemingly meaningful reaction, he only asked about what he had briefly seen in the workbook.

“Is it yours? The handwriting looked exactly like yours.”

“…”

Song Yi-heon threw the workbook onto the desk hard enough to raise a cloud of dust and left the room, bumping Se-kyung’s shoulder with his own. Though it was clearly picking a fight to vent his anger, Se-kyung showed no sign of being offended and picked up the thrown workbook, returning it to its original place.

Leaving the room, he saw Song Yi-heon’s back as he stood on the wooden floor, looking out at the garden. The slender boy’s figure seemed almost overwhelmed by the large, solid hanok, but his straight back, though thin, was by no means bowed.

As Song Yi-heon took in the desolate garden with its withered wisteria, he sensed Se-kyung’s presence and spoke.

“I won’t be able to go to school for a while.”