SSL 7

Doyoon cut him off immediately.

“I am fine with studying for a long time. But it is because of meals. It is only possible until six o’clock. If my father gets hungry, I might have to finish a little earlier.”

“Huh?”

“I have to prepare my father’s meal. He usually eats at seven, but if he gets hungry early, I give it to him earlier.”

“Ahhh…. Okay.”

As he replied, Jaehyun belatedly realized. On weekends, from one thirty to six, on Wednesdays, after nine thirty in the evening.

Those were the study times Doyoon had set. So it was because this kid was in charge of meals at home. On weekends, he had to prepare lunch and dinner, and on weekdays, he had to prepare dinner after his father came home from work. In any case, once they had agreed on the schedule, the two of them soon started studying. Jaehyun had Doyoon review the subjects that required memorization, while he looked over the mistake notebook. The notebook Doyoon had written as per Jaehyun’s homework assignment.

The handwriting was a complete mess. Even though he had repeatedly urged him to write neatly in block letters and stay on the lines. Jaehyun burst out laughing. Doyoon had never once been late so far, and he wore his school uniform immaculately. And yet, just looking at his handwriting, it seemed as if he could not stand or absolutely hated conforming to standards.

When it turned eleven o’clock, Doyoon looked at the clock. Jaehyun also got up from his seat and handed over the photocopies of his lecture notes, which he had organized in a file beforehand.

“You have to memorize the pages with the post-it notes, no matter what. See you tomorrow then.”

“Yeah.”

Watching Doyoon pick up his bag and head to the entryway, Jaehyun also followed him to the front of the shoe cabinet to see him off. Just before leaving, Doyoon whirled around and spat out.

“Thank you.”

With his eyebrows furrowed so intensely and his cheeks flushed, his expression alone made him look like someone who was extremely angry. But Jaehyun replied with a grin.

“I had fun too. Get home safe.”

After Doyoon left, Jaehyun cleaned up the dining table. He was whistling through his lips when he suddenly looked behind him. It was because he felt as if a window was open. As if a single stream of fresh night air was flowing in through the stuffy indoor air.

But the window was securely latched. Because of the lighting, only Jaehyun’s own reflection flickered on the glass instead of the scenery outside. Jaehyun looked at the forehead area of the reflection and thought. This is strange, he thought.

His heart was pounding. To the point where he could feel the air stirring even while clearly seeing with his own eyes that the window was closed, like a child just a few days away from an unknown picnic at an unknown place. Jaehyun tilted his head, finished his shower, and went to bed. Just before falling asleep, the three syllables of ‘Saturday’ flashed brightly in his mind like a neon sign, but it was quickly forgotten into his dreams.

In the morning, Jaehyun woke up with a slightly clammy feeling on his back, thinking that he should probably start turning on the air conditioner soon.

As June passed its midpoint, the heat was gradually deepening. When he got to school, all four fans in the classroom were turned on, and the homeroom teacher, his face flushed hot over his suit jacket, hurriedly finished the morning meeting and left. After leaving a few instructions for the students on duty regarding the air conditioner.

Jaehyun cast a furtive glance toward Doyoon. He was in the same posture as always, his forehead planted on his desk. He said he would tell me today, right?

He said he would tell me today whether I could come to his house on Saturday or not. How is he going to let me know. He said he did not want the other kids to find out I am studying with him, so I do not think he will come to my seat. Just as he was thinking, a scream was heard.

“Ah, fuck!”

Jaehyun turned his head. One of the girls on duty was covering her mouth and staring out the window. The other kids were whispering to each other, what is wrong with her? What is it?, and soon they flocked to the window and began to look outside. From here and there, sounds mixed with gasps and curses erupted.

“Ah, what is that.”

“Wow…. How long has it been there?”

“Fuck, isn’t it all rotten?”

“That crazy bird, if it was going to die, why die in a place like that.”

“So fucking gross….”

“How do we clean that up?”

“Ah, tongs. What about using tongs. They are in the cleaning supply closet.”

Screams, complaints, laughter, and voices trying to offer solutions in their own way. Jaehyun also approached the window, and upon seeing what the kids were pointing at, he burst out laughing. What the heck.

It is just a dead pigeon.

The homeroom teacher had said it earlier. That they would probably start turning on the air conditioner soon, so the students on duty should check the condition of the outdoor unit and report back. So it seemed one of the students on duty had looked out and discovered it. The pigeon corpse, exquisitely wedged between the safety guard of the air conditioner’s outdoor unit and the window frame.

It seemed to have been left there for quite some time, as its condition did not look good. Jaehyun raised his hand and called out.

“I will clean it up….”

“I will do it.”

But he was cut off by a thin, shrill voice.

In an instant, the surroundings fell silent. The kids stared at Doyoon in surprise. It was the first time Doyoon had stepped forward to take the lead in a class matter.

With all eyes on him, Doyoon silently rose to his feet. Coincidentally, from his seat by the window right near the outdoor unit. As the kids hesitantly made way, Doyoon went straight to the cleaning supply closet, and came back holding a pair of tongs and a volume-based waste bag.

Jaehyun saw his hands trembling. His face under his glasses was also red. His jaw was slightly clenched as if he was gritting his teeth. It was an expression where it was hard to tell if he was nervous, excited, or both.

Returning to the window, Doyoon stepped onto his chair, sat on the window frame, and leaned his body out, extending the hand holding the tongs. But the tip of the tongs only swirled in the empty air near the outdoor unit. After struggling for a bit, Doyoon finally pushed his entire upper body out of the window.

The thigh propped on the window sill began to convulse. His posture started to look dangerous enough that a few kids let out a small “uh,” but perhaps because they were usually awkward with him, no one readily reached out to touch him. Jaehyun quickly approached and grabbed Doyoon by the waist, pulling him back inside.

“Hey, you have to be careful.”

While chiding him, Jaehyun was a little taken aback inwardly. Crazy, he is so fucking light.

The weight in his arms felt like a dry tree branch. It was ridiculous for a first-year high school boy’s weight. Does this kid even eat properly? Pulling Doyoon down from the window and setting him on the floor, Jaehyun held out his hand.

“I will do it. My arms are longer.”

“….”

“Give those to me.”

Jaehyun took the tongs and the bag from Doyoon’s hand, almost snatching them in succession. Then he perched on the window sill where Doyoon had been sitting and struggling just moments before, and leaned his upper body out.

Jaehyun was about 15 centimeters taller than Doyoon. His arms were that much longer, and his movements were much more adept. Soon, the pigeon’s corpse was gently pulled by the tip of the tongs and rolled cleanly into the bag, and Jaehyun brought his body back inside the classroom, tightly clenching the opening of the bag.

“Wow.”

“Nice, Cha Jaehyun.”

“Good job.”

“Yes, yes. Thank you. I will go throw it away.”

As the kids applauded, Jaehyun headed for the back door with the bag.

He could not leave it in the classroom trash can, so he had to go all the way to the recycling area in the corner of the open space behind the building. Before stepping out the door, Jaehyun glanced back. The kids were already dispersing from the window, murmuring something among themselves. Amidst them, only Doyoon was standing stock-still, looking this way.

It seemed like he had probably been watching the whole time. Not at Jaehyun’s back, but at the bag in Jaehyun’s hand.

Is this kid really some kind of corpse enthusiast or something?

Perhaps what Park Kanghyuk said was not a complete lie after all. He might have actually kissed that dead stray cat. But…. Avoiding the gaze that seemed to pierce through the white plastic, Jaehyun quickly stepped out into the hallway, rounded the corner of the stair landing, and mulled it over. But so what if he did?

Is it disgusting? Is it creepy? Not really. No, Jaehyun thought, slightly surprised at himself. Not at all.

Doyoon was a strange kid. That much was clear from the beginning. His actions, personality, and the way he walked were all strange, he was bad at reading comprehension and writing, and his handwriting was worse than a worm’s trail. On the other hand, he was strangely good at math and played the piano well. The terrible parts and the outstanding parts were bizarrely intertwined.

The kid named Kang Doyoon is like a puzzle with only scattered pieces so far. The puzzle pieces of ‘strangeness’. It is different from the kind of obvious puzzle where you can guess the whole picture just by looking at a few pieces. It seems that only after gathering all the pieces and staring at them for a long time will the structure of some exquisite architecture be revealed. You cannot know just by looking at each one individually.

So, well, it is fine to just place ‘is very interested in animal corpses’ as one newly discovered piece of that puzzle for now. That alone does not tell you anything. You cannot judge rashly. You are just curious. What kind of picture it will be, you wonder.

“….”

Coming out the back door of the building, Jaehyun went to the recycling area. And as he was about to toss what he was holding into the container for incinerable waste, he hesitated. Because the texture of the plastic bag suddenly felt unfamiliar in his hand.

A pigeon’s corpse. Jaehyun could only perceive this as a piece of garbage, a lump of germs. That is why he had carefully wrapped it in a bag and come down to throw it away. To obediently follow the sorting regulation of incinerable waste and put it in the designated box. But Doyoon might feel differently. He might be looking at things in a way that is not confined to boxes.

Jaehyun took a breath. As he recalled the dark gaze that had persistently clung to the bag, he smelled a faint scent of wind at the tip of his nose. What kind of world is it?

The one reflected in those eyes.

Jaehyun threw the bag, and after confirming that it had disappeared into the darkness of the container with a dull thud, he turned and went up to the classroom.

After that, the kids spent their time as usual, attending classes and chatting, as if they had forgotten all about the morning’s incident. During the break just before fifth period, Jaehyun opened his locker to get his gym clothes. Just then, a crumpled piece of paper that had been stuck in a crack fell out with a plop.

It was a note, looking like a page torn from a spiral notebook and folded. When he unfolded it, he saw crooked and extremely clumsy handwriting.

[My father said it is okay. Saturday 1-6. My home address: Eok-dong Apartments, Building 12, Unit 1003]

He tried hard. Jaehyun could not help but laugh.

The handwriting was like that of a child who had gripped a pencil tightly in his fist and pressed down on each and every stroke. It could not have been an easy task for Doyoon to write the letters this straight. Moreover, as if imitating Jaehyun, he had even drawn something resembling a map at the bottom. It was a useless drawing, just a single circle in the corner amidst a tangle of straight and curved lines that could have been roads or something else, but it was impossible to tell.

Jaehyun smoothed out the wrinkles in the paper, folded it neatly, and slipped it into his handout file, then took out his gym clothes with a faint smile on his face.

While he was attending classes until the seventh period, a song occasionally swirled in Jaehyun’s head. Like background music that kept cutting in and out, a melody that seemed to be a mixture of the Goldberg Variations. By the time the end-of-day homeroom was over, it had even flowed out to the bridge of his nose. As he was getting up from his seat, humming, Woo Jincheol approached and handed him a translucent file.

“What is this?”

“Photocopies of cheat sheets for Korean, English, and Math.”

“Oh, oh, right. Thanks.”

“Yang Juhwan and Kim Yoon already have them, so…. You just look at this one.”

“I thought they give them to everyone if you go to the student council?”

“There are a lot of kids who do not even know that information itself.”

Jincheol looked around and lowered his voice.

“It is better to have fewer competitors.”

“Alright.”

Such a petty bastard, anyway. While replying, Jaehyun thought to himself.

The class president, Kim Yoon, is not like that. He tends to show his lecture notes to his close friends, so Jaehyun would sometimes get help from Kim Yoon whenever he skipped class. Of course, Jaehyun himself lent his notes to anyone as if they were public property.

Jincheol is different. He never shows his notes to anyone, and even when he gets information about exams or college entrance exams, he keeps it all to himself and keeps his mouth shut. And on top of that, he is persistently curious about other people’s private academy and tutoring situations.

He only hangs out with him because he is Kim Yoon’s childhood friend; if it were not for that, he might have distanced himself from him long ago. In any case, Jaehyun thanked him again and put the cheat sheets in his bag. It was not that he was not grateful. It was good material. He was happy to have gotten it.

He was not happy for himself. Jaehyun could solve most problems no matter what they were anyway. But it would be a great help to the type of person who can only narrow down the answers once they know the problem types.

After packing his bag, he went out into the hallway with Jincheol, where Kim Yoon and Yang Juhwan were waiting. The four of them walked to the bus stop together, but Jaehyun soon parted ways as he was getting off at a different place alone. It was because he was heading not home, but to a large supermarket. Wandering through the basement grocery section, he pondered. A gift to buy when he visited Doyoon’s house.

Snack bread, fruit, chocolate, juice…. What would be good. Since it would just be his father, fruit would probably be the safest bet. Jaehyun had his eye on a daily fruit set and left the supermarket, but on Saturday, he went back again and changed his mind, buying madeleines instead. Since Doyoon would be eating them too, he thought something that would replenish sugar to the brain and also help him gain some weight would be better.

“Come in.”

At 12:50 on Saturday, when he pressed the bell next to the apartment building’s first-floor entrance, Doyoon immediately opened the door and whispered.

Jaehyun went inside. He had noticed it from the address written on the note, but as expected, it was farther than he thought. Even without traffic, it took a good 15 minutes by bus from Jaehyun’s place. When he arrived, he saw that there was another high school right next to the apartment complex, to the point where it was surprising that he had been assigned to Unheon High School.

Carefully taking off his sneakers in a corner of the narrow shoe cabinet, Jaehyun headed straight for the living room. There were signs of someone being there, so he intended to greet them first.

“Hello. My name is Cha Jaehyun, Doyoon’s friend.”

“Oh, oh, right.”

A short, balding man who was watching TV hastily stood up and greeted him.

It was a home without a sofa. The man had been crouched on a colorful yoga mat-like thing on the floor, watching TV. As Jaehyun bowed his head in that direction again, he spoke politely.

“Um, this. I thought it would be nice to have when you’re feeling peckish.”

“Hey, thanks. Gosh, this really makes my day.”

The man beamed and clapped Jaehyun on the shoulder. The smell of alcohol.

His cheekbones, and even the tip of his nose, were red, as if from habitual drinking. There were also green liquor bottles scattered next to the mat. In any case, it seemed true that he was in a good mood, as the man added a few more words with a silly grin.

“Doyoon-ie, he said a friend is coming over today. He has never had a friend come over to the house before. Really, not once. And what’s more, you’re going to teach him? Well, thank you, so, so much.”

“No, it is my pleasure.”

“Yes, yes, go on in. The bathroom is over there. Doyoon’s room is there. Ah, that, please just leave it on the dining table. I will put it away later.”

“Okay.”

The man plopped back down in his spot. The volume of the TV sound was turned down a little. It seemed he intended to be considerate since they were going to be studying.

Jaehyun placed the shopping bag on the dining table and went into Doyoon’s room. Doyoon followed him in, and as he quickly closed the door, he said.

“I am sorry.”

“Huh? For what.”

“You are not my friend.”

The sentences followed in rapid succession.

“I explained to my father that you are my friend. Because I thought it would get complicated otherwise. I am sorry for lying. I know you are not my friend.”

“Huh? What? What are you talking about.”

“You are teaching me because the homeroom teacher asked you to. To raise my grades. That is all. I am not having any strange misunderstandings.”

The awkwardly forceful pronunciations flowed into Jaehyun’s ears. A voice like the letters in the note he had received a few days ago.

“You are not my friend. Absolutely not. I know that well.”

“…Can’t I be?”

“…?”

“I’m asking if I can’t be your friend.”

Jaehyun looked Doyoon straight in the eye.

“We are only doing the study session together until the finals. After that, can’t I meet up with you and hang out, and talk? I want to be friends.”