ASIAH 3

“Jooyoon, I’ll buy you lunch.”

“No thanks.”

“If you do this, I’m the only one who looks like a bad guy. Let me pay you back for your kindness—huh?”

“I have things to do.”

I have to play games. I have to watch anime. And you’re not a bad guy because of me; you were like that from the start. Even though I didn’t have anything I was particularly passionate about these days, I had no desire to share my time, especially not with Hyun Jaekyung. Besides, if I started getting tangled up with that guy, I had a feeling my life would become a real hassle.

So when I refused as politely as possible, he started his usual act of ‘I’m the only one trying, Jooyoon is so mean.’

“Ah, I’m getting rejected like this again?”

“Jooyoon is so mean, for real. Come here, Hyun Jaekyung. Forget Jooyoon and make a new start.”

The most troublesome part of that act was that it was audience-participation theater. My excited classmates criticized me as if I were a ‘husband who mistreats his wife.’ I had no idea when things had gotten to this point. Hyun Jaekyung wasn’t a girl who had seen my face, nor a guy who had seen my sister, nor an otaku, so there was no reason for him to be so clingy.

How could I possibly understand attention seekers? That guy’s craving for attention was truly unbearable.

For instance, it was around the end of March, after we had gone through a few rotations of all our classes. After Design History class ended, I stayed seated since the next class was in the same lecture hall. My classmates were either sleeping with their heads down or looking at their phones, when Hyun Jaekyung suddenly clapped his hands to get everyone’s attention.

“Hey guys, I was stuck in the department office and was so bored. So I was looking at the list of our classmates and found out that there are three people with birthdays in March. We can’t just let that pass, can we? So I went and bought a cake right away.”

“What?”

Is it okay to just look at and share personal information like that? But it seemed no one else was shocked for the same reason as me. Hyun Jaekyung placed a rather large box on the professor’s desk and took out a cake.

“Everyone, just invest one minute and sing ‘Happy Birthday.’ The March birthdays are Yeom Hyejin, Kim Sanna, and one more person. Will the stars of the day please come up here!”

“Wow, Hyun Jaekyung! Why are you doing something like this?”

Yeom Hyejin, excited, leaped over her desk like a hurdle (the desks in the design department are wider than those in a typical liberal arts lecture hall). The introverted Kim Sanna seemed to feel a similar bewilderment as me and refused to come out. So Hyun Jaekyung took the cake directly to Sanna, and Yeom Hyejin once again hurdled over the desks to get there.

“It’s me, Sanna, and who’s the other one? The March birthday.”

At Yeom Hyejin’s question, the corners of Hyun Jaekyung’s mouth lifted into a broad smile, a dimple forming in one cheek. It added a mischievous image to his rebellious-looking appearance. Hyun Jaekyung answered, looking slightly shy.

“The final star is… Jaekyung.”

The lecture hall fell silent for a very brief moment. Then, a few seconds later, an enthusiastic response erupted along with gasps of admiration.

“He’s doing all sorts of things just to get congratulated himself!”

“Wanna go to the club today? An oppa I know is a DJ at Hexagon, so if I tell him it’s your birthday…”

“Happy birthday, Hyun Jaekyung!”

“Guys, it’s not just my birthday. Just sing the song.”

Even though there was a fair number of us, there was enough cake for everyone to get a slice. I hate cheesecake, so I gave my piece to the classmate sitting next to me. While receiving the boisterous congratulations, Hyun Jaekyung kept glancing my way unpleasantly. As if he was trying to send me a signal.

❊

Stars and flames have different colors depending on their temperature. When you open the gas on a blowtorch, a red flame comes out, but when you add oxygen, it turns blue. I just hope that someone driven mad by stress doesn’t decide to shoot it around like a flamethrower.

There’s something you hear often, starting from the entrance exam period, if you say you want to major in Metal Craft.

‘If you don’t pay attention, you could end up with fewer body parts at graduation than you had at admission.’

It wasn’t something you could just dismiss as a joke, because we handle equipment that is physically dangerous and chemicals that are chemically hazardous. Besides accidents involving fire, gas, various acids, and saws, I heard you could also get burned from the friction heat conducted when polishing.

Safety gear, okay. Valves, okay…

Ever since the safety training, wherever I go, I imagine dying in an accident caused by the elements in that space. Like in the Final Destination series. I started having these paranoid thoughts less often after the assignments really began to pile up.

But the habit of going in early to clean the studio or workshop first didn’t disappear. We all take turns doing it, but I couldn’t feel at ease with just that. What if there was some gunpowder among the metal dust scattered everywhere? One spark and it would all be over.

The teaching assistant noona who first found me said she thought I was being bullied or treated unfairly by the sunbaes. Anyway, at first, I thought I was going to die cleaning up the old grime, but once I did a thorough wipe-down, it’s been manageable since.

“…Jooyoon?”

Usually, Kim Sanna, who commutes from Gyeonggi Province, is the first one to arrive, but for some reason, Hyun Jaekyung came early that day. The guy called my name and then just stood there staring blankly, holding onto the door. Doesn’t want to come into a dusty space, is that it? My, my, the precious young master has arrived. I grumbled internally and threw him a spare mask I had.

“Wear this, at least.”

“…This is the first time I’ve received a mask as a gift.”

I thought he was going to be incredibly annoying, but strangely, he didn’t say a word while I finished wiping everything down. He just stared at the mask for a while, and then, instead of putting it on, he pushed it to a corner of his desk.

After we started seriously learning our major subjects, I didn’t browse social media much, but it seemed Hyun Jaekyung wasn’t going out as much as before either. The reason was that the calls from him saying he was drunk had completely stopped. As I thought about why, it occurred to me that maybe he had just gotten tired of the game of tormenting me.

Right, up until now, he had been bugging me because he couldn’t stand the fact that someone was uninterested in him. That would explain why the guy who was so annoying when we were with our classmates would shut his mouth when it was just the two of us.

I’m usually quiet, so silence is rarely uncomfortable for me, but Hyun Jaekyung being quiet was quite nerve-wracking. Though it was better than him annoyingly blabbering on.

The first class of the day was Basic Metal Craft. The professor repeated what he had been saying since orientation.

“Everyone, if you get careless during work and bleed, you will get an F, no exceptions. I’m not just saying that. A true craftsman must know how to cherish the tool that is their body.”

Hyun Jaekyung leaned his body behind me and whispered to Ha Wonjong.

“But how would he know? Can’t you just pretend you didn’t get cut?”

“Right? Though I’m not gonna get cut, for real.”

“When you cut your hand, you go like this. Kkiyaak~!”

Hyun Jaekyung grabbed his own hand dramatically and let out a high-pitched falsetto. My luck with workbench assignments was bad; I was surrounded by all the noisy kids. To my right was Hyun Jaekyung, and to my left was Hyun Jaekyung’s hipster friend, Ha Wonjong. As the two of them whispered, Yeom Hyejin from across the bench even joined in.

“The TA unnie said Professor Yoo has luminol reagent in his lab.”

“Luminol? I’ve heard of it, but what was it again?”

“That thing from CSI?”

“Yeah. She said he checks everything when you submit an assignment and even inspects the workbenches.”

“Creepy… No way.”

“So he docks points if there’s a bloodstain reaction? That sounds fucking crazy.”

Is this a necessary conversation for class? I wanted to switch seats if I could.

Sawing a brass plate is the most basic of basics, but sometimes I did wonder why we had to do this kind of manual labor in an age of laser cutters. Also, since not many departments require making things instead of drawing for the entrance exams, there wasn’t anyone with particularly great dexterity at this point.

I tried to ignore the commotion around me and tightened my grip on the bench pin.¹ Hyun Jaekyung and the hipster seemed to be working their mouths instead of their hands, as they chattered on endlessly.

“My friends in Visual Design and Industrial Design said they’re going to practice for a performance these days, but we’re not doing anything like that.”

Good that we’re not. It’s not some elementary school talent show, why would we do something like that for a festival in college. But of course, Hyun Jaekyung had a different opinion.

“I know, right? If we did it too, I would’ve come up with some killer choreography.”

“Don’t first-years just learn the routine the sunbaes made?”

“I dunno, I like dancing. I probably would’ve appealed that I can dance a bit.”

“Hyun Jaekyung, don’t you just like clubbing, not dancing?”

“Hey, that’s not true—. I was in a dance club. I was famous in my neighborhood, you know.”

“Really? Show us something.”

“This kid doesn’t recognize Poppin’ Jaekyung when he sees him…”

Using only his upper body, Hyun Jaekyung effortlessly performed some locking movements, but honestly, he looked like a modern art installation with faulty programming.

“Damn, you’re so good… Open a club dance class.”

“One million won per hour.”

“Rip-off.”

For a moment, those sitting near Hyun Jaekyung started showing off their own dance skills, wriggling around or just rotating their necks. At this point, I felt like I was the weird one for just working as if no one else was there.

Just as I was starting to feel pressured to join in, Hyun Jaekyung and his friends finally refocused on their work. But the hipster was the first to lose concentration.

“Turns out I have a metal allergy. I was wondering why my skin got red that one time…”

“Then wear some gloves, like Jooyoon.”

Startled by Hyun Jaekyung suddenly making me the topic of conversation, I jammed the saw blade in at a weird angle. I tried to pull the stuck blade out with force and broke it. In that way, I used about three saw blades to cut a single curve. Hyun Jaekyung, who had apparently been watching the whole thing, chuckled as he applied wax to his own saw blade.

“Anyone who saw you would think you were cutting a diamond. You break everything you touch.”

He doesn’t even talk to me when it’s just us, how ridiculous. And what did he just say?

I stopped thinking and tried to brush it off, but even the hipster started picking on me.

“But don’t you think Jooyoon looks like a fucking murderer?”

“A murderer?”

“He’s wearing a really big mask and goggles, and even an apron… The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.”

Ah, what a fucking asshole. I didn’t react. Ignoring them should be added to the Thirty-Six Stratagems to make it the Thirty-Seventh. And if I could, I would want to wear a full-face gas mask. How can they be so oblivious to safety?

I was standing up to get a new pack of saw blades. But I felt a blatant stare scanning me from head to toe. After asking “A murderer?”, Hyun Jaekyung had been looking me over. I broke out in a cold sweat, goosebumps rose on my skin, and I had a bad feeling.

Is it because that bastard acts like he’s just playing around all the time and tries to make me his bread shuttle whenever he gets a chance? Has my body already surrendered?

…I should just change the saw blade.

“Jooyoon is fucking sexy, though?”

My head snapped up reflexively, and I saw Hyun Jaekyung’s dimple. My surroundings blurred as if that was the only thing in focus.