Chapter 117: Eun-ah
Chapter 117: Eun-ah
28. Eun-ah
In the end, I had to lather a towel with soap and use it to wash my back.
All the desperate twisting I'd done to reach it now made me feel like an idiot.
After showering, I finished the laundry and looked around the yard.
Two metal poles with a clothesline strung between them stood in one corner of the yard.
"Hup."
Psssh
I pulled up one of the support poles, moved it closer to the other, and drove it back into the ground.
I brought out the tarp, spread it neatly, and hung it between the poles.
It was only a single screen, but it made a decent temporary shower stall.
'Shit... Why did I automatically assume the kid was a boy?'
My face burned when I remembered washing right in front of Kiddo while casually handling my dick.
It must have been a deeply shocking sight for a sensitive adolescent girl.
'In the old days, I probably would've gotten reported for sexual harassment...'
I must have assumed that any child capable of surviving in a world like this would naturally be a boy.
That assumption was what had caused this unfortunate incident.
But what was done was done.
Knock knock
"Hey, Kidd—no. Um, excuse me?"
"It's Eun-ah..."
"Right, Eun-ah. I'm sorry, and I think we have a lot to discuss, but before that, how about washing up?"
"Huh?"
"I set up a temporary shower in the yard. I won't come outside, so go wash. You must feel filthy."
"Ah... thank you."
"I'll leave some soap by the door."
As soon as I finished speaking, Eun-ah immediately opened the door and came out.
I'd expected her not to want to see my face, but apparently that wasn't the case.
"There's shampoo and everything in the bathroom here. Idiot."
"..."
This time, I was the one left speechless.
I'd already finished washing with that cucumber soap I hated so much.
"Then you could've told me earlier."
"I was too shocked earlier... And I hadn't intended to speak at all. But you kept pressing me, and I lost my temper..."
As she brushed past me, Eun-ah muttered that the sigh had slipped out before she could stop it.
Then she hurried around preparing to wash.
"Hey, Mister."
"Yeah?"
"Could you please stay here in the living room without coming outside? I want to be able to hear your voice."
"Why... all right."
I'd thought she was simply a bold little kid.
Perhaps because I now knew she was a girl, it suddenly occurred to me that she was terrified.
Maybe she kept the raincoat pulled over her face because she was that afraid of the world.
Eun-ah picked up one last small plastic dipper and headed into the yard.
Then, straining with effort, she dragged one of the large basins along with her.
She looked unsteady as the heavy rain beat down on her.
"Hang on. Let me move that for you."
Bow
"Ah... thank you."
When I came outside, she first bowed at the waist, then belatedly thanked me.
Not speaking must have become a habit for her.
Once she disappeared behind the tarp, I started preparing the meal.
I broke apart some wooden furniture and used the multi-tool Eun-ah had given me to make kindling.
I was rummaging through my backpack for the rice I'd portioned out when I glanced up.
"Wow..."
Eun-ah was washing behind the tarp with what looked like a flashlight switched on.
She had probably aimed it downward so the light wouldn't spill over the wall.
The problem was that her naked silhouette was clearly projected onto the tarp.
Gulp
Just as I happened to glance into the yard, Eun-ah bent at the waist to scoop water from the basin.
Two enormous watermelons swung free from her tiny torso.
'No way... There's no way something that small could be hiding monsters that ferocious...'
When Eun-ah straightened, the two large, round silhouettes disappeared back against her torso.
They had looked nearly as large as her head.
What the hell were they?
'Was she holding the dipper or something?'
But she'd only taken one dipper with her.
Each time she moved while washing, beautiful curves briefly appeared in the light.
Were young women these days always that developed?
'Don't tell me she's trying to seduce me...'
Slap
'You crazy bastard... get a grip.'
There were no police left to come slap cuffs on me.
But I was an ordinary man with ordinary tastes.
Though even the idea of 'ordinary tastes' might have been something society manufactured.
'Which meant that now the old social order was gone, it should be fine to...'
Smack
I forcibly dragged my gaze away from the twin masses that kept bewitching me.
They were demons.
Rubbing the cheek I'd slapped too hard, I pulled myself together and washed the rice.
'I was not a pervert. I was not a pervert.'
Then again, in the Joseon era, people married at middle-school age and did everything adults did.
Once menstruation—the body's way of asking for semen—started, didn't that mean the body was ready?
So doesn't that mean it's possible?
'Fuck... stop.'
I barely managed to stop myself after taking that train of thought far beyond reason.
Apparently, a train of thought wasn't something you could simply seize and halt at will.
And so I prepared breakfast while my mind split in two and continued battling itself.
'But seriously, how long does she plan to wash for?'
Oblivious to the struggle raging inside me, Eun-ah had already been washing for more than thirty minutes.
#
It was hot, but I kept the fire burning.
Both Eun-ah and I needed to dry our wet bodies.
At least I was wearing a tank top, but she still stubbornly insisted on the raincoat.
Even though it was soaked and dripping everywhere, she refused to take it off.
'I need to dry the laundry too...'
Eun-ah was deeply embarrassed.
Even now, she wouldn't so much as turn her head toward where my underwear was hanging.
"This won't work. I'll light another fire behind the kitchen. We need somewhere to hang your clothes too."
"Okay..."
I decided to respect the sensibilities of a young woman.
By the time we finally ate breakfast, dawn was almost breaking.
"Thank you for the meal..."
"Uh, yeah... enjoy."
I used up a good portion of our limited supplies to prepare a generous breakfast.
For someone with such a small frame, Eun-ah ate an astonishing amount.
'Is it because she's still growing?'
As I marveled inwardly at how much Eun-ah was eating, she suddenly stopped moving her spoon.
"Hey, Mister..."
"Huh?"
"I feel like you might be thinking something rude..."
She had a habit of letting the ends of her sentences trail off.
"No, I was just thinking you had a healthy appetite. I ate the most when I was in middle and high school too."
"Haa... That's not it. I need to eat if I'm going to keep moving..."
After we finished eating, I brewed coffee.
No matter how much I reduced my load, there was no way in hell I could give up coffee and cigarettes.
"Here. You like coffee, right?"
"Yes... thank you."
We took two chairs and sat side by side on the narrow wooden porch.
Plink plunk
Dawn slowly tinged the surroundings blue-green.
The rain had weakened a lot from before.
Listening to the intermittent patter of rain, I talked with Eun-ah.
"So... You already know, right? I'm Kim Tae-sik, thirty-four this year. I was an ordinary office worker, and I'm heading east."
"My name is Lee Eun-ah. I'm twenty years old, and I've just been struggling to survive however I can."
"Huh? Twenty?"
"Yes. So please stop calling me Kiddo. And also..."
Eun-ah suddenly rose from her chair and bowed deeply.
"Thank you for coming to rescue me."
"It was nothing. But even if you're twenty, you're still a kid to me."
"Pfft... Are you bragging about being old, Mister?"
"Hey, I'm not that old yet, am I?"
Eun-ah's voice grew thick with emotion.
I tried to lighten the mood with a joke, and she quickly laughed and shot back.
"Whew... Now that you're talking, I feel alive again. The frustration probably shaved five years off my life."
"I'm sorry... I had my reasons."
"Why? What happened? And why do you go to such lengths to hide your face?"
"Well... I'm not very good at explaining things..."
"That's fine. Even if you explain it badly, I'll piece it together."
"Pfft... okay. In Guri, there are two big survivor groups."
Eun-ah said she'd been alone from the very beginning.
The first people she encountered after she began using her ability to venture outside were...
"I must've seen wrong..."
"..."
"Seriously? Please tell me you're lying."
She said they were men who had tied down a female zombie and were raping her.
She'd seen one of them gripping the zombie's hips from behind and thrusting into her.
"That sight was far too cruel and shocking for me."
"Yeah... Not only for you. Any ordinary person would have struggled to process that."
The female zombie's body was still relatively intact.
They had immobilized her head and arms and forced her to bend at the waist.
Several men stood in front of the restrained female zombie, laughing and deliberately drawing her aggro.
The zombie reacted and moved in different ways depending on what the men in front of her did.
They had turned it into a living, moving fleshlight.
One that looked exactly like a human being.
The man having sex with her from behind kept issuing requests as he enjoyed himself.
"And they called the zombie by a name, as though they'd known her before..."
"...No way. You mean they deliberately..."
"I don't know that much. Urp... Give me a moment. Hoo... Once one man finished, the next one lay down and... Sniff."
"Stop. That's enough. You don't need to explain any more. Don't force yourself to remember it."
Eun-ah struggled throughout the entire explanation.
She held back her nausea, drew deep breaths, and forced herself to continue.
"I'm afraid you might be offended because of how I've treated you... That's why I'm explaining it in as much detail as I can. Please overlook it just this once."
"I understand. That's more than enough."
That was the reason.
Eun-ah had wanted to conceal the fact that she was a woman.
The gang that raped the zombie appeared to belong to one of the groups controlling territory in Guri.
According to her, if a woman caught their attention, they pursued her relentlessly.
"That's why I fled to this area recently. Like you said, this neighborhood belongs to Mutated Zombies."
"You decided zombies were preferable too, right?"
"Yes... Not merely preferable. The survivor groups in Guri have abandoned their humanity."
Eun-ah said I was the first person she'd spoken with since the Zombie Outbreak.
That was how intensely she had avoided people and lived in hiding.
She concealed her appearance and voice, using her small frame to stay out of sight as much as possible.
She had survived by using her whole body to communicate that she was harmless and had nothing worth taking.
"Then why, with me..."
"Actually, when you opened the gate and entered the second house where we met, I was terrified. You look extremely intimidating..."
"Hm..."
"And even though it wasn't intentional, I had stolen your things... But you simply went upstairs as if it were no big deal."
In truth, I hadn't realized at the time that she was the thief.
"My food had run out completely, so approaching you to trade felt like a gamble. The problem was the oxtail soup and coffee."
"I get that you like coffee. But why the oxtail soup?"
"When I was five, I ate it during a trip to the countryside with my parents... We even pitched a tent, and the memory suddenly came back to me..."
"Oh... you can remember back to when you were that little?"
"Yes..."
When the subject of her parents came up, her expression stiffened again.
"So food made you lower your guard. Sounds pretty kid-like to me."
"..."
I should stop calling her a kid.
Her short stature truly seemed to be her Achilles' heel.
"Don't tease me... I can't believe I fell for it either."
"That's understandable now. Food is precious. You must've been starving..."
"It wasn't exactly just that..."
The conversation wandered from her father to her mother, then from childhood to how she'd survived.
Our stories drifted without any particular destination.
Later, I understood why Eun-ah had brought up the oxtail soup.
'It wasn't the food. It was the memory.'
We had finished the coffee long ago, and she poured a flood of emotions out to me.
'She missed having people around too...'
Even so, it was impressive that she still hadn't removed the raincoat.
Even though I now knew she was a woman, she still refused to show me her face.
Naturally, that only made me more curious about what Eun-ah looked like.