Small and Fragile Things - Chapter 30

As soon as Jung-pal and Gi-seon, who had spent the whole day with her, left the house, silence fell like a blanket. The place was dead quiet.

It was kind of funny how adaptable people could be. Irang had spent most of her life in quiet places, but after just a few noisy days, the silence now felt awkward.

She never used to be afraid of being alone, but now, she found herself flinching at the curtain shadows moving on the floor. That was new—and honestly kind of ridiculous.

“When’s he coming back…?”

He’d said he’d come by tonight. He’d been gone for days—didn’t show his face once. But now, finally, he was supposed to return.

Still, what exactly counted as “tonight”? How much darker did the sky have to get? She had no idea. All she could do was stare blankly at the firmly closed door.

Gi-seon had reassured her over and over again.

No one could enter the building without permission. You couldn’t even use the elevator without a special card. And the door—there was some kind of security system. Unless someone was registered, they couldn’t get in or out.

Plus, there were people stationed outside, keeping watch. There was nothing to be afraid of—he’d told her that more than once before leaving.

“Worrywart.”

Thinking about it made her laugh. Shouldn’t they be worried about her trying to escape, not being scared?

Despite the rough first impression, they turned out to be good people. Yang Gi-seon worried way too much, and Jung-pal… he was just fun to be around.

They looked completely different, but their smiles had a similar warmth, and the way their eyebrows scrunched when they fought was almost identical. They both had loud voices. They both hated white milk. And—they both thought they were smarter than the other.

<Still, I graduated high school. Unlike you, I didn’t drop out.>

<Excuse me? You think that hillbilly high school of yours compares to mine? I’m from Seoul, thank you very much!>

<Says the guy who mashes dialects together because he grew up bouncing around the country. What Seoul pride?>

They argued like that for over thirty minutes before leaving. She wondered if they’d made up by now.

It had all started because of her Korean lessons. At first, she was excited—thought it would be fun. But they ended up arguing the whole time, and it made things awkward.

Gi-seon insisted she needed to learn slowly, one letter at a time. Jung-pal said she should just use a bunch of words until she naturally picked it up.

Which method was better? She had no idea. All she could do was sit there and watch them bicker.

“Are they gonna fight again tomorrow…?”

Irang pulled a business card from her pocket and held it up to her face. The gold-embossed letters glinted under the light.

“Choi. Muk. Hyun.”

Those three characters at the top—his name.

Choi Muk-hyun. It suited him perfectly.

She wondered what his name meant. It wasn’t like hers, copied from something random. And surely it didn’t have a weird meaning like ‘Illy’.

What had his parents been thinking when they named him? Had they looked at tiny baby Muk-hyun and wondered what kind of man he’d grow into? If they saw him now, would they be proud?

What did little Muk-hyun look like? How did he get that scar on his face? She could stare at his name all day and never run out of questions.

Leaning back, she looked up at the empty ceiling and tried to picture him.

Muk-hyun, looking at her quietly. Muk-hyun, whose right lip curled a little higher when he smiled. Muk-hyun, with a cigarette in his mouth. Muk-hyun, with those long, elegant fingers. Fingers that had…

Thump.

Her cheeks flared, and she quickly covered her face with both hands—even though no one was around to see. Still, it was embarrassing.

Thump. Thump!

But once the memory surfaced, it came rushing in like a flood, unstoppable.

Her heart pounded, the back of her neck warmed. The memory of that night played out again and again.

“Stop it. That’s enough.”

She tried hard to erase the look in his eyes—that burning gaze that had pierced through her.

Tried to forget the moment she cried in front of him. The fear. The way she clung to him, begging.

“Enough already. Forget it.”

But then, a mischievous voice whispered in her mind.

“Really? You want to forget everything? You regret it?”

“…No, that’s not it.”

It was embarrassing, sure—but she wanted to keep all of it. Every second of it.

“It wasn’t a dream.” And then she remembered.

Back in the basement, wasting away day after day, she’d mumbled a wish to herself—like a mantra.

Just one good memory. One I can hold on to when I die.

Maybe that wish… had come true.

In just a few days, her empty mind had filled with small, vivid memories.

Some made her laugh when she thought about them. Others made her blush. But each one—every single one—felt precious.

That thought scared her a little.

What if someone asked, “Now that your wish came true, you’re ready to die, right?”

What if this pain in her body was a sign?

“…No way.”

Suddenly, she missed him so badly it hurt.

If she could just hold on to him, look into his eyes—maybe all this anxiety would go away.

 “He’s not who you think he is.”

No. The more she thought about it, the more it didn’t seem like he was a bad person.

“That’s how they trick you. They make you feel safe, earn your trust—then in the end…”

Even if he really was dangerous, it didn’t matter to her.

“Why would someone like him be good to you? Do you think he brought you out for no reason?”

She had no clue what he was hiding or what he was planning—but still… she liked him.

“What’s so wrong with wanting to stay by his side… just a little longer?”

Even if it made her look stupid. Even if she was being tricked.

All she wanted now was for him to open that door and walk in.

“You should run before you find out what he really is.”

She wanted him to look at her. To smile at her again.

She wanted him to call her name—Irang.

***

Muk-hyun and Jung Yoon were walking toward the nearest convenience store.

Muk-hyun had taken off his suit jacket and was holding it crumpled in one hand, wearing just his black shirt.

By coincidence, both of them were dressed in black. It didn’t stand out too much. But their shirts were damp with bl00d—not theirs, thankfully.

“What would you like to drink, sir?”

“Vanilla.”

They’d stopped by on the way back after hearing there was trouble at one of their job sites.

It wasn’t something Muk-hyun had to personally check out. But it had been a perfect excuse to escape Seo Yuseon’s insufferable party, so the moment the call came in, he jumped on it.

“I couldn’t find the kind you usually like, so this’ll have to do.”

“Yoon-ah. People are staring.”

Two tall, sharp-looking men sitting under a convenience store umbrella were already attracting enough attention. The last thing Muk-hyun needed was someone loudly calling him sir.

He peeled the wrapper off the ice cream and chuckled softly.

“You used to call me hyung just fine.”

“I worked hard to stop. No going back now.”

The days when Jung Yoon called him hyung felt like a lifetime ago. Back then, he was a completely different person.

Their story went back to their teenage years.

Director Gu, under Chairman Choi’s orders, had been looking for someone to plant near Muk-hyun. He found the perfect opportunity with a subcontractor on the brink of bankruptcy.

The offer was simple. Wipe out the man’s debt in exchange for his son.

They dressed it up, called it a “Samun Group scholarship.” But in reality, it was buying a person with money.

It sounded unreal. But it really happened.

A smart kid with a promising future was thrown into a world of gangsters and forced to learn how to survive in it.

Of course, he was angry. But not at the chairman—whom he’d never even met. His resentment was aimed squarely at his father. A man who sold his son’s future to pay off debts—a coward and a failure.

Jung Yoon had once said he’d kill his father with his own hands, then end his own life. Muk-hyun had found him and stopped him every time.

He even took the beatings from Director Gu in his place.

Muk-hyun had become his brother. His only family. He stayed by his side, helped him keep studying, and eventually got him through college.

He even took care of the funeral when Jung Yoon’s father died in a sudden car accident.

“They say people never change. But you… you really did. It’s kind of amazing.”

Jung Yoon had changed. Completely. He became Muk-hyun’s right-hand man. Even when others were against it, he insisted on becoming his secretary, changed his speech, his attitude—everything.

“Same goes for you, sir.”

“What did I do?”

“You’ve been acting strange lately.”