“ I’m home ”
“ Yeah, honey~ you’re home early
Did you have a good time on the school trip? ”
The atmosphere in the house after staying out overnight
was warm and bright, not at all menacing
saying, why are you only getting home now
the mouth that should have been spitting out harsh words, belonged to Mom
and the first words out of her mouth were the unexpected phrase “school trip”
I hesitated for a moment, then hurriedly fixed my expression and went into my room
It was only one night away from home
but for some reason, the house felt like it had been a long time since I’d been here
I flopped down on the bed
For some reason, the bed looked narrow
and on the ceiling there wasn’t a glittering chandelier
but the familiar light fixture
Staring blankly at the ceiling
I kept turning over what Hwang Hyunjin had said last night again and again
He’d clearly said he brought me hometo shut me up,
but the way things played out felt way too halfhearted for that
and it left me feeling off
Usually in movies
when the main characters’ secrets get found out by someone else
they get threatened extremely hard
or silenced by having their weakness used against them
but I couldn’t make sense of why things were slipping by so carelessly
Honestly, it didn’t feel like being silenced so much as
spending a night at a friend’s place
Even though I’d been treated incredibly well, I still didn’t feel relieved
And
just how much do the men in suits get paid to work
that they bow so politely even after such rude behavior
If it were me, I’d have flicked him hard on the forehead for being so annoying
As for Hwang Hyunjin’s identity,my guess had been dead on,
and I was so shocked I got goosebumps
Hwang Hyunjin, who I’d thought was just a thug on the first day of school,
turned out to really be the son of a chaebol family
Questions I hadn’t been able to ask Hwang Hyunjin
kept popping into my head one after another
Thinking about how I hadn’t asked them then,
I pounded my pillow for no reason
When I opened my eyes, all I could see outside the window was the black night sky
The sweat I’d worked up in my sleep
had dried sticky on my clothes and skin
The awkwardly half-slipped-offsock on one foot
I yanked it off and tossed it asideand headed for the kitchen
where I could see Mom’s back as she was cooking
“ Oh, honey, you’re awake? ”
I rubbed my eyes at the sting of the kitchen light and went back to my room
I couldn’t stand wearing this sticky school uniform any longer, it felt so gross
I threw my clothes onto the floor and headed straight for the bathroom
When I came out after showering
a delicious smell was drifting out from the kitchen
the side dishes on the table and
the steaming bowl of white rice
as if it might spill out any second
I swallowed my saliva andsat down
then a bowl of doenjang jjigae was set on the table right away
