Already Broken Toy (4)
I spent some time with Noona at the PC bang and came back home.
Spending a little while with her had been a good idea after all. It left me feeling like I'd clawed back some psychological stability.
In that state, the room that greeted me when I opened the door was a genuine shock. It felt like the kind of place no human being could possibly have been living in.
But the thought lasted only a moment. The second I slammed the front door—the sole connection to the outside world—I was sealed back inside the sadness again. It felt like I'd returned exactly to where I belonged.
Does the environment make the person?
The stale reek of cigarettes. Empty bottles rolling across the floor. An ashtray fashioned from a cup of instant ramen that made my eyes instinctively slide away. Before long I was melting right back into the place.
I perched on the edge of the bed and stuck a cigarette between my lips. The motion already felt completely natural. When had I started smoking that I could pick one up and put it in my mouth as smoothly as water flowing downhill?
Just smoke one first and then think. That was the mindset. Even if I cleaned this nauseating room, I'd start after a cigarette. That was the mindset.
I tipped my head back toward the ceiling light and exhaled a long stream of smoke. The glare was so harsh that afterimages bloomed across my vision and began to blot everything out.
Tomorrow.
I'll clean tomorrow.
I postponed everything that way. Tomorrow's the weekend, right? I'll clean it then. It's already late, and tackling a room this filthy is just too much right now.
Weekends had stopped meaning anything the moment I quit going to school, but I still managed to talk myself into it.
Maybe it was the alcohol. After a few cigarettes the dizziness rolled in hard; I simply let my body tip backward onto the bed. That was the last thing I remembered. I fell asleep right there and slept pretty deeply. Yeah—probably thanks to the booze.
I shuffled to the bathroom and took a piss, glancing at the face in the mirror while I did. I'd washed once yesterday, so I didn't look quite as wrecked as I'd expected. Still vaguely human, I decided. The stubble was getting thick, but my hair hadn't quite reached the matted stage yet.
Ding-dong—
The doorbell went off out of nowhere while I was still mid-stream. I jumped so hard my whole body jerked. Exaggerating a little, I realized I'd never even heard what my own doorbell sounded like before. Nobody ever came over. Even delivery guys these days just leave the bags quietly by the door without ringing.
I rinsed my hands quickly and walked to the entrance, then opened the door without a second thought.
"Hey… why haven't you been answering me?"
It was Seoa. Of course it was. She was the one person who knew exactly where I lived—floor, unit number, everything. I'd told Sebin noona I didn't know, but Seoa knew every detail.
The second I saw her face I panicked and tried to shut the door again. She shoved her body into the gap just in time to stop it.
"W-wait a second… honestly, this is too much. You have to at least hear me out before I can even apologize!"
Dragging this out in the hallway would only bother the neighbors, so I let her in. No choice.
She hesitated a beat, reading the room, then stepped inside the entryway—and immediately clamped one hand over her nose.
"What the hell is this…"
The cigarette stench saturating the apartment was clearly hitting her hard. She stayed planted by the door, reluctant to come any farther. I left her there and walked toward the bed alone. After a moment she carefully followed.
Just minutes earlier she'd barged in full of fire; now that fire was gone and she was tiptoeing around, reading every cue. Her eyes swept the room that could honestly pass for a dumpster, and something close to fear flickered across her face.
"W-why is your room like this…?"
"Just say what you came to say. You wanted to apologize?"
"Yeah…"
"Okay. Thanks for the apology."
I decided that counted. Even if I sat through some solemn, heartfelt apology from her now, nothing would change. Maybe I didn't even want to hear it. Maybe I was dodging it on purpose. Because Seoa apologizing to me still felt selfish—like she was only trying to scrub the last scrap of guilt off her own conscience. A way to dump the discomfort so she could feel better. That was exactly the kind of person I believed she was right now.
"What do I have to do so you'll stop doing this to yourself?"
"Beats me. You already know this isn't something you get to be involved in anymore."
"I'm sorry. Seeing you wrecked like this because of me… it really hurts."
"If that's how you feel, then don't show up like this. That would actually be for my sake."
"Sorry… for barging in. But I waited for you to contact me. And then you went and met that person. You wouldn't talk to me, but you hung out with her. I couldn't take it anymore… so I just came."
She kept her eyes locked on the filthy floor the whole time. Never once met mine.
"I never said I'd contact you. You decided to wait on your own. And whether I meet that noona or not has nothing to do with you anymore."
"B-but blocking me on SNS is still too much."
"How was I supposed to know when you'd start spreading more rumors? Actually, you already saw the photo, so maybe you already did. Ah… but I guess it doesn't matter now. I'm not going to school anyway."
She still wouldn't look at me, but I stared her down the entire time. Her fingers kept worrying the necklace around her throat. Yeah—the cheap silver necklace I'd given her when we were kids. She'd taken it off so easily whenever she went to see that guy. What meaning was she trying to give it by wearing it here now?
I grabbed a cigarette off the desk and lit it, layering fresh smoke over a room already pickled in the stuff. Painting another coat over my own unease.
"Come back to school… I'll make sure those rumors never reach you."
"Forget it. School was never that important to my life."
"But… you used to be happy just being able to go to the same school as me."
"Yeah. I was happy then. Now I just regret it."
"Could you not say it like that?"
"If school had really mattered to me, I wouldn't have been the idiot who picked this dump of a place just so I could walk the same halls as you—even though I could've gone somewhere better. You know that."
"I'm sorry, Minjae… I'm really, truly sorry."
She wiped the tears streaming down both cheeks with her palms.
"I never wanted to see you fall apart like this."
"You don't get to say that. You know that, right?"
"I broke you, so I should be the one to fix it. I'll put you back together. Just give me a chance. Please… let's go back to how we used to be…"
The cigarette had burned down so short it was scorching my fingers. Let's go back to how we used to be… The words kept circling in my ears. I stared blankly at the ceiling, replaying them, and every precious memory we'd shared started clawing through my head. My heart was about to soften. So I had to force myself harder, meaner, just to keep from crumbling.
"Get out. You're starting to piss me off."
I said it to the girl who was crying soundlessly in front of me, quiet as a dead mouse. She flinched at the cruelty, lifted her bowed head, and looked at me—then the hiccups started.
"We weren't that kind of people. We never threw words that cruel at each other."
"Then what kind of people were we? What exactly were you and I to each other?"
"Don't erase all the time we spent. Those were precious memories. We were precious to each other."
"Don't give me that bullshit. It was a light, empty relationship that would end the second I let go. Did you ever actually value me? You didn't."
"No! That's not true! I know exactly how precious you are to me… I know what you meant to my whole family too!"
"And yet the person who 'knows' that still did what she did to me?"
"If you hadn't done that to my brother in the first place, none of this would have happened!!!!"
She screamed it out, finally dumping every raw feeling. Hiccups kept interrupting her, but she got it all out. Even though she was supposed to be the one apologizing, the second she felt the tiniest bit wronged she lashed out like this. It wasn't only her fault, though. I'd steered us here on purpose… and at some point my own temper had flared too. It wasn't hard to understand. I'd been the one who raised my voice first.
Honestly, I'd wanted her to drop that constant soft, careful attitude. So I pushed. If things didn't go this way, she looked ready to stay until I accepted her apology. Then we'd just waste more time on conversations that were useless now—rehashing memories that only jabbed at each other's raw nerves, sinking into the same sickening nostalgia that made us pretend we were still precious to each other. I had to cut the conversation off by force.
"See? This is how you always end up. I'm sick of putting up with that personality of yours."
"That's so mean. So mean… I'm apologizing. Is it really that hard to accept it just once?"
I grabbed her thin arm and dragged her toward the door. In that instant a memory flickered up. The day I'd stormed off sulking, she'd run after me and casually caught my hand. Back then I'd told myself that hand-holding wasn't even skinship to her. And what had I been thinking? Yeah—I'd held on and hidden how my heart was shaking like an idiot.
But even now, grabbing her arm wasn't nothing. The same hand that used to make my chest race still wasn't something I could touch without feeling it. Treating her roughly like this only made it hurt more. That feeling was still lodged deep in some corner of me. It was agony. Agony enough to drive me insane.
"Let go! Let go of me! Don't use force!"
She thrashed the arm I held, trying to yank free, but the difference in strength between us was too wide. She just kept getting dragged.
Ah… I don't know anymore. My heart hurts so much I can't stand it. Please just stop hurting. Please… just leave me alone.
"I'm sorry. Like you said, if I hadn't said those things to that guy in the first place, none of this would have happened. You're right. It's my fault. This pathetic idiot liked you so carelessly… I couldn't beat the jealousy and I did that stupid shit and I ruined everything."
"W-what…? Minjae, what did you just say…?"
"Please just go home now. I'm really, truly exhausted. Being like this with you is hard too. So please… just let me go."
Once that last raw plea left my mouth, Seoa stopped fighting. She let me pull her out the door, staring at me with an expression that seemed to doubt whether she'd really heard what she thought she heard. She no longer resisted the force I used.
I shut the door behind her.
Silence.
I slid down with my back against it until I was crouched on the floor, both hands clamped tight around my head.
Please… just leave me alone now.