TIN 141

I closed my eyes and felt the sea breeze on my face. A faint smell of rain mixed with the salty water scent. The air on my skin was humid too, as if rain would pour down at any given moment.

“…What timing.”

Should I call this good timing, or bad?

I took off my slippers and gently placed my bare feet on the sand. The sand, warmed throughout the day, was still cozy and toasty. Finding it not unpleasant at all, I went ahead and untied my bandage, taking a step forward.

“Ugh…”

With each step, the tightly wrapped bandage gradually loosened. The bandage from my ankle stretched out long across the sand with my steps. Though my sprained ankle hurt a bit, that pain actually gave me a sense of freedom.

Walking on the soft sand was much harder than walking on flat ground. My feet sank deep, making the path to the sea feel unnecessarily long. Perhaps it was because I felt detached from reality, as if floating.

By the time I dipped one foot in the incoming waves, raindrops had finally begun to fall from the sky. Drip, drip, the falling rain was unseasonably cold. I roughly wiped away the water running down my face and walked toward the horizon.

How many times had the weather changed just today? I found out that my mood was as changeable as the weather. This morning I had rejoiced at the blue sea, but now even that joy was gone.

‘If we part now, I feel like there won’t be a next time.’

What a perceptive person. I thought I hadn’t shown anything, but what did she sense in me?

“…Haa.”

The thought to stop didn’t even cross my mind. Someone watching might call me crazy, but this was the best I could do. Now that all the future I dreamed of had vanished, it was time to end everything.

I forced my uncooperative legs to move, cutting through the water without pause. The water that had been splashing at my feet soon rose to my waist. My injured ankle and the clothes borrowed from Seokyung became completely soaked in seawater.

“Haha…”

The meaningless laughter turned out to be a relief that everything was finally over. No more need to find a place to sleep, no need to worry about how to make a living, no need to be on guard and defensive about everything.

Maybe, yes, this was what I wanted from the start. Even when I dreamed vaguely of the sea and struggled to return to the past, even when I wandered searching for that person, clinging to just those words.

‘Live.’

How can I live? When there’s nothing in this world. No reason for me to live, no one to live for.

‘Since that day.’

‘…’

‘I dream of drowning in the sea.’

Joo Do-hwa’s words echoed in my ears. As if now, floundering toward the sea, was the moment I could realize the answer I gave him then. Though he probably wouldn’t know, this was sometimes the future I wished for.

‘…Me too.’

Yes, I sometimes dreamed of that too. Of drowning in the sea, such a romantic end. That at the end of this drift, there would somehow be my ‘end.’

“Huck…gasp…”

The seawater suddenly rose to below my chin, covering my nose and mouth with each wave. I mindlessly swallowed the water entering my mouth and choked on the water entering my nose. Though I knew how to swim, I just crudely walked along the bottom.

“…Cough, cough!”

Looking back, it was a future that never changed, not even for a moment. Whenever I thought that person might be dead, I felt liberation rather than despair. Even while stubbornly doing reckless things, perhaps I desperately wished for everything to end.

“Hnn…”

A large wave sent a rush of salt water into my mouth. At some point, my feet could no longer touch the bottom properly. Even my flailing movements to reach deeper water gradually became meaningless.

“…Ugh.”

I let my body go limp with a quiet groan. Now I could no longer hear any sounds. The surroundings had become muffled, the sky in my blurry vision, and even the rain pouring down felt distant.

It wasn’t painful. Just that this moment felt slow and tedious. In my quietly submerged mind, only one more memory I had tried to forget came to the surface.

‘Ji-soo…’

When was it? When I learned that name. When that person’s expression froze at the name I muttered carelessly.

‘Yoon Ji-soo.’

It was around when I had just started learning to read Hangul. When I discovered those three characters neatly written in a notebook lying in a corner of the room.

‘Who is Yoon Ji-soo?’

‘…’

At that question, the woman’s eyes widened without giving any answer. Her already pale face turned completely white and bloodless. Only after a long while did she ask back with a trembling voice.

‘…Where did you see that?’

I thought I’d done something wrong. Or said something bad. Her expression was like when I complained about food and knocked over dishes, when I ate random fruits from trees, when I went too deep into the sea without permission.

‘Over there…’

‘…’

‘It was written over there.’

I pointed at the notebook apologetically and bowed my head low with hands clasped together. Fidgeting with my fingertips, I asked for forgiveness in a small voice.

‘…I’m sorry.’

I didn’t know what expression the woman made at that apology. I only realized it wasn’t my fault when she hugged me afterward. And then I burst into tears when I heard her subsequent apology.

‘I’m sorry. I’m not angry.’

After consoling me for a while, she smiled with teary eyes. Then she warned me firmly. Never to mention that name in front of others. I vaguely realized on my own that it was the woman’s name.

The notebook with the name was never seen in that place again. Because that brief silence had been so frightening, I consciously lived trying to forget that name.

I remembered it again after meeting the child later.

‘Can you read?’

The child who wanted to teach me various things after finding me on the beach that day taught me how to read Hangul while writing crooked letters. The first thing written was ‘Joo Do-hwa,’ and what followed were words I’d never seen before.

‘This is my mom’s name, and this is my dad’s name. This is the family name, and this is the given name.’

‘…’

‘Do you know what a family name is?’

The last air bubble rose to the surface with a gurgle. Though my lower abdomen ached painfully, I didn’t even have the strength to curl up. My limp body just sank endlessly, endlessly downward.

Ah, so this is the end. No more pain, no more suffocating anguish.

‘Someone like you couldn’t possibly be my hyung.’

Ironically, that one phrase was the last thing that came to mind. It was amusing, almost hilarious, that the kid who could tell at a glance that a drowned corpse was fake couldn’t recognize that I was real, that he would never know anything until the very, very end.

‘I’ll let you go even if you find the real one.’

What did I tell you? That you’d never find him.

‘…Hyung.’

I closed my eyes gently and smiled slowly. When you find my corpse someday, will you then know that I was your hyung? What reaction will you show when you see me, bloated and ruined by the water?

‘Take care, Joo Do-hwa.’

In this finally peaceful feeling, I repeated the farewell I’d given to the child. The cold depths of the sea now felt as cozy as a cradle. My mind, full of scattered thoughts, gradually began to fade to black.

“…”

Blink, blink, consciousness faded in an instant. In the moment of falling into endless sleep, I thought I heard a loud noise from far away. Then chaos erupted in the quiet sea, and unknown hands grabbed me tightly.

“…!”

There was no time to register the sudden change. My body was pulled upward as if being sucked somewhere. With a splash, water flew everywhere, and I felt the water I’d swallowed rushing back up.

“Cough…!”

My breath burst out. Along with pain like my solar plexus was being squeezed, my chest stung as if cut by a knife. Gasping for breath while spewing water like I might throw up was secondary.

“Cough, cough!”

The loud helicopter noise wasn’t important. The splashing waves made the already noisy surroundings even more chaotic.

While my brain wasn’t working, as if clouded, the hands holding me tightened their grip.

“Ugh…!”

It felt like my ribs were being crushed. As I desperately caught my lacking breath, I felt my foggy mind suddenly clear.

And when I opened my eyes…

“…”

“…”

It felt like time had stopped. Through gaps in the dark clouds pouring rain, I could see the sky turning reddish. But more importantly, there was that hardened face looking down at me, and the low words that escaped those lips.

“…The sea again.”

It was a scene that didn’t feel real. The trembling eyelashes, the golden eyes like melted gold, even the droplets caught in them.

And finally, the sigh that burst from those blood-red lips.

“Ha…”

I couldn’t tell if the droplet that fell was rain or tears. The liquid running down my cheek tasted like warm seawater, but the words from those lips were nothing but cold.

“Hyung.”

The one who pulled me out looked down at me with a face cold enough to freeze. They held my body as if they would never let go again and burst out laughing like a madman.

And with twisted lips, they muttered, “Found you.”

Reality, which had felt so distant, became shackles gripping my ankles. The one who pulled me back from the gates of death was none other than Joo Do-hwa.