VDN Ch 114

The scariest dad in the world hastily grabbed his hidden belongings and ran away. This meant that his son, Nam-woon, was also not safe either. The scary uncles had already come into the house earlier and hurled harsh words at him.

I’m going to die. If I stay in this house, I might really die. Nam-woon was afraid of his father’s violence, but there was nothing more terrifying than the thought of dying right now. With tears streaming down his face, Nam-woon pleaded,

“I won’t say anything, I won’t move, and I’ll just stay still.”

The man paused for a moment, stopping his raised hand and thinking. Then, instead of hitting Nam-woon, he headed towards the car. It was a sudden thought that perhaps the child might be of help in his escape.

Nam-woon ran after him, wiping tears from his eyes with his palms, hoping his father would change his mind.

The car sped off. I need to get out of here and go to Gangwon-do. His father muttered softly. As the car repeatedly sped and stopped abruptly. Nam-woon, sitting in the passenger seat, to keep lurching forward. Thud! His head bumped against the glovebox and the window several times.

Won’t there be an accident at this rate? Nam-woon shuddered and glanced at his father out of the corner of his eye. Feeling anxious, he struggled to fasten his seatbelt with his small hands.

They stopped in front of rundown shops or dim alleyways a few times, and when they stopped in front of a house, they switched to another vehicle. After passing through several places, they finally arrived at a rest stop.

Without a word, Nam-woon’s father got out of the driver’s seat and left. Gurgle. Alone in the car, Nam-woon held onto his stomach. He hadn’t eaten anything since yesterday and was extremely hungry. He was also very thirsty. But he couldn’t get out of the car, fearing his father would leave him behind.

Nam-woon pressed his forehead against the car window and looked outside.

“Wow….”

A small exclamation burst from his round mouth. People were holding hot dogs and potatoes in their hands. Plop. The sound of him drooling was so loud that Nam-woon was startled. Don’t look. After straightening his posture and lowering his head, a small object suddenly caught his eye. It was his father’s wallet.

“……”

The hot dog he had seen earlier kept flashing in front of his eyes.

If I don’t eat now, won’t I starve for a week? What if my stomach hurts like last time? If that happens, will my father really abandon me?

Nam-woon hesitated in the car, then cautiously reached out his hand. The wallet was filled with green bills.

…With this much, would anyone notice if one bill went missing? With trembling hands, he picked out a bill. Quickly hiding it in his pants pocket as if someone might see, he opened the car door and stepped outside. He was going to grab a snack before his father returned and come back quickly.

***

Nam-woon ran to the front of the shop and shouted.

“Please, one hot dog! I have the money!”

He handed over a ten-thousand-won bill, and with small trembling hands, Nam-woon received a hot dog and some change. He eagerly bit into the hot dog, his cheeks puffing up as he ate like someone being chased. Passersby glanced at him.

With tears welling up in his eyes, Nam-woon suddenly looked up and scanned the area where his father’s car should have been parked. However, the car was nowhere to be seen.

“…?”

As he chewed on the hot dog, his cheeks stopped moving. Huh? Nam-woon slowly walked forward. His hesitant steps quickly turned into a hurried pace.

My dad’s car was definitely here…. Uh… Where did it go?

Tears welled up in Nam-woon’s eyes in an instant. He stood in the middle of the parking lot. With the hot dog he hadn’t even swallowed still in his mouth and cried uncontrollably.

“Dad, Dad…?”

At that moment, a woman who was opening the car door in the neighboring parking space asked,

“Oh my, why are you crying? Did you lose your dad?”

“Uhh….”

As Nam-woon silently shed large teardrops, the woman approached him and crouched down, looking concerned.

“If you lost your dad, should we go to the police? If we tell the police, they will take you to your dad.”

“…Hiccup.”

At her words, Nam-woon nodded nervously. When the scary men had come to their house, he had mustered the courage to tell them he would report to the police, but they laughed him, saying they had many police friends and to go ahead and try.

He was worried that if he went to the police station, he wouldn’t find his dad, and the scary men might find him.

Wiping away his tears, Nam-woon replied in a trembling voice,

“I came with my dad… I think he forgot that I didn’t get in the car.”

“What? How could he forget that?”

“W-We have a lot of kids in our family. So, it’s possible that my dad wouldn’t notice if I didn’t get in!!”

The woman gave me a puzzled look. How could a father not notice that his child hadn’t gotten into the car? It didn’t make sense, unless he was intentionally abandoning him. Moreover, the child’s appearance was unusual—a wrinkled white t-shirt, shorts, and worn-out shoes. Especially the shoes didn’t seem to be meant for a boy. The red shoes with a pretty ribbon attached looked similar to what her daughter would wear.

Suppressing her rising doubts, she asked where he was going. The child replied that he was going to Gangwon-do.. It just so happened, she was heading in that direction too, and there was a police station on the way.

“Well then, if we can’t find your dad nearby, would you go to the police with me?”

Nod. Nam-woon nodded cautiously. After that, the two of them held hands tightly and circled the rest area several times. However, they couldn’t find Nam-woon’s father. Eventually, Nam-woon got into the woman’s car and carefully watched the cars on the road the entire way, wondering if he might see the one he had arrived in.

“Oh my, did something happen?”

The woman suddenly parked the car. She leaned her head out of the window and looked at the road ahead. Many cars were lined up, and some people were waving light sticks and controlling traffic.

“It looks like there was a big accident….Ah, hey! Where are you going!”

Nam-woon opened the car door and ran in the direction of the accident. There was something he needed to check. A man in safety gear blocked Nam-woon as he tried to approach.

“Hey! You can’t come this way!”

“……”

Nam-woon’s round eyes fixated on the car. Inside the overturned car, a man with closed eyes was bleeding profusely. Paramedics were trying to pull the man out, but he seemed to be firmly stuck in the driver’s seat.

As the man in front of him kept asking about his parents, Nam-woon lost in a daze and mumbled with tears in his eyes. It was because the face of the man who couldn’t open his eyes looked familiar to him. Soon, a sob mixed with words burst out from the child’s mouth.

“Dad, it looks like Dad.”

Overwhelmed by the unfamiliar feeling of loss and fear, Nam-woon trembled and cried. Even though he wasn’t a good person, his father was his only family member who had stayed by his side. But now there was no one by his side.

How would I live without my father? Am I going to be dragged away by the scary old men?

The fact that he was left alone in the world drove Nam-woon into a deep fear. He could hear the adults talking busily from a little distance away. Orphanage. It was when that word came out of their mouths that Nam-woon’s heart dropped.

“Is there a child named Seok Nam-woon here?”

His heart sank as he heard his name. A man with a fierce expression was approaching him, just as intimidating as the scary men who had come to their house.

“Are you Nam-woon?”

Come with me. The man with a blank expression suddenly reached out his large, rough hand. Reluctantly, Nam-woon grabbed the man’s hand. He felt a faint warmth in their touching hands.

From then on, Nam-woon worked as a young errand boy in a gangster office. Although the money his father had brought in exceeded their standards, the gangsters scolded Nam-woon for being short of money. Fortunately or unfortunately, they judged that he couldn’t repay the debt due to his young age, so they sent him on small errands, telling him that he would have to pay it all back when he grew up.

With nowhere else to go, Nam-woon lived with the blunt man who picked him up.

The man said he had received help from Nam-woon’s father and took care of him by feeding and clothing him. Nam-woon was surprised. He couldn’t believe there was someone who was so grateful to someone like his father. Anyway, it was fortunate for Nam-woon.

From middle school onwards, he worked after school. All the jobs he did as a middle school student were just barely enough to pay back the debt. Nam-woon couldn’t fit in school and was always alone. He had a good appearance and was tall, but he was a troublemaker who didn’t pay attention in class and just slept all the time. No one except the delinquents interacted with Nam-woon, who was rumored to live with gangsters.

In his freshman year of high school, the man who had taken care of Nam-woon was hospitalized. He didn’t know the details, but he heard he was seriously ill. The man couldn’t be discharged from the hospital for a month, two months, or even half a year.

Around that time, people around him started gossiping that the man was too weak. At such times, Nam-woon was overwhelmed by the urge to knock them all down. But with his skills and shackles of debt. It was an impossible story.

The gangsters seemed unsatisfied with just insulting the man, they started to get on Nam-woon’s nerves.

“You want to repay the debt, right? Then do you want to work at a host club?”