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Morning of day 1 of 7
Yoon-sensei clapped once in the cafeteria.
Yoon-sensei "There’s an aptitude test this afternoon"
Seongho "It’s usually at the end of the month, so why are we taking it now?"
Seongho grumbled, but Yoon-sensei just smiled.
Yoon-sensei "There’s another graduation ceremony, isn’t there? And while we’re at it, I want to see how well you all are growing"
The morning was navigation class.
Behind Eunhawon, there’s a hedge maze.
Round hedges, just above head height, curve like waves and overlap endlessly,
with a narrow gravel path running between them.
Even standing on tiptoe, you can’t see the other side clearly.
At the end of the maze, sharp arborvitae stand in a row like soldiers.
From above, it looks like a pretty pattern, but once you’re inside, there isn’t a single straight path, so you lose your way fast.
The layout changes every week, and each pair has a different entrance and a different route.
There are gates scattered along the path.
Some have to be crossed physically; others have problems you need to solve with your head.
You only know which gate you’ll get when you go in.
Because there’s only one exit, everyone who starts runs for that one exit.
After class, as always,
we pinned up the times it took to reach the exit on the leaderboard.
Even when it rained, class was always held as usual.
The top row of the board, which had had Yuri unnie’s name on it until yesterday, is empty.
Yoon-sensei "Today’s pairings are by lottery"
Wunhak "Noona! I want to go with noona!"
Wunhak grabbed my sleeve and kept hanging on, but the draw was fair.
Seongho and I-han got the line one badge
Jaehyun and Wunhak got the line two badge
Tae-san and I got the line three badge
Today we were taking part in an odd number, so one person had to run alone.
Ri-woo had the line four badge all to himself.
Each color had a different entrance.
We waved to each other and scattered to our own entrances.
The whistle blew.
As soon as Tae-san went in, he started counting under his breath.
Tae-san "Twelve, thirteen... left"
Tae-san "Twenty-one, they flipped last week’s layout here, right"
I walked on, only looking at Tae-san’s back.
The path kept curving.
As I walked, it felt like I was heading back the way I’d come.
Rain sound rang out through the wet leaves.
Over that sound, last night’s voice kept overlapping.
'Someone help me'
Beyond the hedge, the sound of gravel underfoot rushed past.
Seongho "I-han, this is mud! I’m sinking, I’m sinking!"
From somewhere on the other side, along with the sound of leaves shaking hard, Wunhak’s voice came through.
Wunhak "Hyung, how am I supposed to cross this!"
Jaehyun "Take it slow, I’m right here"
When I turned the corner, the path was blocked.
A wooden wall had been erected between the hedges.
A knot-tied rope hung down from the wall, which was twice a person’s height.
The rain-soaked rope was slippery.
I hooked my foot into the knot and climbed up one rung at a time.
The skin on my palms scraped and stung.
Perched on the top and looking down, I saw Tae-san straining as he held onto the rope.
Tae-san was the type who could count numbers well but couldn’t hang from a bar for even a second.
Hana "Give me your hand"
Tae-san "...I’m heavy"
Hana "I know, hurry up"
I pulled on Tae-san’s wrist.
With his glasses crooked, Tae-san finally got himself over the wall.
After we got over the wall, a wooden door blocked the path this time.
A lock with two number dials was hanging on the door.
Words carved above it with a knife
‘1 1 2 3 5 8 13 □ 34’
Tae-san’s eyes sparkled.
This was Tae-san’s turn.
Tae-san "If you add the previous two, you get the next number... then here is..."
While Tae-san was counting on his fingers,
someone tapped my shoulder.
It was Ri-woo.
Before I knew it, he was standing beside me.
Inside the maze, if someone came close, you could hear everything.
The sound of gravel underfoot, the rustling of leaves
You could tell where Seongho was and where Wunhak was wandering just by the sounds.
But I never heard Ri-woo coming.
Not until he was right behind me
Ri-woo didn’t even look at the writing carved on the door.
He just turned the dial.
I, ii
Click
The lock opened.
Tae-san "...You’re on the white side"
Tae-san’s voice dropped.
Tae-san "This is the path for a different badge. You can’t come here"
Ri-woo "Guess I took the wrong path"
Tae-san "Then what about the problem? You didn’t even look at it"
Ri-woo "Intuition"
Ri-woo smiled.
His wet bangs hung down.
Ri-woo "Hana, your hands are slippery"
When I took Ri-woo’s outstretched hand and passed through the door to the exit, there was no one in front of us.
We were first place.
Ri-woo had vanished by the time we reached the exit.
We definitely came out together..
Much later, the red team came out.
Seongho was covered in mud up to his waist.
Seongho "They strung up a rope over a mud pit and made us cross it. How is that something a person should have to do?"
I-han "Hyung fell in twice"
Seongho "Why would you say that!"
The blue team came in last.
Jaehyun came out carrying Wunhak on his back.
He said Wunhak’s legs gave out and he sat down at the single-log bridge gate.
Jaehyun just laughed it off.
Jaehyun "It’s fine, as long as we place in the middle"
No wonder he’s always middle of the rankings.
My name was put in the empty top slot on the board.
Right where Yuri unnie’s had been
When I turned around, Tae-san was looking at the white badge for a long time.
With an expression that didn’t smile
Lunchtime
Tae-san set his tray down in the seat next to mine.
Tae-san "Where were you yesterday?"
My hand holding the spoon stopped.
Tae-san "I saw it when you climbed the wall earlier—red mud on the soles of your shoes. The dirt in the playground is gray. That color of mud is only in the northern woods"
Tae-san said it casually while eating.
Only his voice was low.
No answer came out.
Then from across the table, I-han spoke first.
I-han "She was with me behind the barley field yesterday"
Without even lifting his head, I-han scooped up some soup and ate it.
I-han "It was raining, so it got slippery. I tried to hold her up, but we fell together"
Tae-san "The dirt in the barley field is gray too"
I-han "Then maybe you saw it wrong"
Only then did I-han lift his head and look at Tae-san.
His face was quiet as usual.
But under the table, I-han’s toe tapped my shoe.
As if telling me not to say anything
Tae-san didn’t ask any more.
Instead, he looked at my shoes once more and picked up his spoon.
In the afternoon, it was the aptitude test.
It was the test we always took once a month.
You solved problems in the classroom, had a little blood drawn in the infirmary,
and then put on a cold metal ring on your head and looked at pictures—then it was over
Until yesterday, it hadn’t been scary.
The first pages were the usual questions.
Find the exit in the maze drawing
Memorize twelve numbers and write them backward
Match the torn-up map pieces
Only the scratch-scratch of pencils could be heard.
On the last page, my hand stopped.
'Write down everything you saw while seeing someone off on graduation day'
It was a question that came every month.
What had I written last month?
I couldn’t remember.
Wunhak in the seat next to me was already spinning his pencil and mouthing that he was done.
Wunhak final question answer sheet 'Rain umbrella hand-waving Yuri noona'
The crooked handwriting was visible.
I sat there with my pencil in hand for a long time.
White hands gripping the doorway into the black space beyond the iron gate
I couldn’t write something like that.
In the end, Wunhak wrote the same thing.
Rain umbrella hand-waving Yuri unnie
My fingertips trembled the whole time I was writing.
Warning warning
In the infirmary, Yoon-sensei was waiting.
Yoon-sensei "This will sting"
The needle pierced the inside of my arm.
Red blood filled the small glass tube.
The teacher wrapped a paper strip with my name written on it around the tube and stood it upright on the tray.
Seven glass tubes labeled with the children’s names were lined up on the tray.
Yoon-sensei "Now this is the last one"
The teacher placed a metal ring on my head.
The metal touching my temples was ice-cold.
Wires stretching out from the ring led to an old machine on the wall.
The needle scratched across the paper, scratch-scratch.
Yoon-sensei "Open your eyes and look at the picture in front of you"
One picture after another flipped across the board hanging on the wall.
Ocean
Dock
Green barley in the playground
The mug of Wolmyeong tea in the cafeteria
And the moss-covered iron gate
My heart dropped with a thud.
The needle scribbled wildly across the paper.
A short beep
Yoon-sensei looked into the machine.
For a very long time
Then she picked up my test paper lying on the desk.
She looked at the last page for a long time.
Yoon-sensei "...You were nervous, weren’t you? It’s okay, Hana"
The teacher gently patted my head and removed the metal ring.
She tore off the paper that came out of the machine and tucked it into a file with the test paper.
She picked up a pen and wrote something down.
I couldn’t see it from where I was.
As I was leaving the infirmary, I looked back.
One of the seven glass tubes on the tray had been moved aside.
It was the tube wrapped with my name.
D - 6
Hello! This is Hiki!
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