Cockade
That my life is one long string of misfortunes is already common knowledge. Even so, this particular stretch of bad luck is so extreme I have to wonder if someone is deliberately arranging it.
The moment I part ways with Hyeonji, I run into Eunju. The moment I part ways with Eunju, I run into Hyeonji.
They live in the same neighborhood—hell, the same building—so bumping into one of them now and then is understandable. But no matter how I look at it, this is way past coincidence.
At this point their biological clocks would have to be perfectly synchronized for it to keep happening. And that makes no sense either, because the two of them live completely opposite lives.
Hyeonji has basically checked out of reality and lives in her own little world like some wandering free spirit, while Eunju is the model student who throws herself harder than anyone into every role she’s given.
Which is why today, once again, I have to go on a flower-viewing date I never asked for. All because Hyeonji found out I went to Yangjaecheon with Eunju yesterday.
“Going out again today?”
Harin came over and asked while I was getting ready that morning. This kid usually treats me like I’m invisible, yet the second I try to leave the house she suddenly takes a keen interest.
“Yeah. Meeting a middle-school classmate. Kim Hyeonjin—we used to be pretty close. Just found out recently that he lives in Seoul.”
“Okay. Have fun.”
Even her responses have become so standardized that I end up picking only the answers she wants to hear. That aside, did Harin have nothing planned for today either?
“What about you? Your friends didn’t invite you out now that the flowers are blooming?”
“I’m going to Seoul Forest later to take pictures.”
So Seoul Forest was now officially off-limits. But the important part wasn’t where—it was who.
“Yeah? Who with?”
“Unnie Jihye and Thuy. The ones I prepped the election with before.”
“You’ve only been transferred a short while and you’ve already made friends? How’d you get close to them, anyway?”
“Just… somehow.”
Does talking to me for more than ten sentences make thorns sprout in her mouth? Sensing the conversation was about to drag on, she shut it down with a vague non-answer.
A little disappointing, but compared to the days of pure monosyllables this was huge progress. Harin headed into the kitchen and poured herself some water.
“Oh—right. I stopped by the mart yesterday and they threw in a bundle of tea bags, so I brought some home. Try them and tell me if they’re any good.”
I’d bought a new pack of iced-tea bags because the ones she usually liked seemed to be out of stock. Buying a mountain of them would only make her feel pressured, so I got just one box and used the “free bundle” excuse.
“Peach iced tea… again?”
Harin tilted her head like she genuinely couldn’t understand my obsession with peach iced tea. In the end she didn’t even touch the tea bags, just drank her water and went back to her room.
Hmm… something feels off. Isn’t peach iced tea your absolute favorite drink? Or are kids these days so brain-pickled by short-form videos that their tastes change by the second?
Or… am I missing something important?
I left the house before lunch. The meeting spot with Hyeonji was the convenience store in the neighborhood where we kept running into each other.
If I headed over to Singun Palace and unluckily bumped into Eunju, it would be a disaster, so I’d deliberately set the meeting here. Those kinds of accidents had been happening way too often lately.
I arrived five minutes early. Naturally, there was no sign of Hyeonji.
Figuring I’d be waiting a while, I went inside, poured myself an iced coffee, and claimed a seat under one of the parasols. I sipped through the straw and let my thoughts wander.
Was Harin really going to Seoul Forest with Jihye and Thuy?
It was the weekend, after all. Flowers were in full bloom everywhere and the weather was clearer than it had been all year.
And on a day like this she wasn’t meeting her boyfriend?
Yesterday there hadn’t been any sign she’d gone out. Spending the rest of the weekend casually with friends just didn’t add up.
Even if Harin wanted that, her boyfriend would never just leave her alone. Look at Lee Jubin—he’d already pulled out the chicken-and-beer card just to lure a minor years younger than him.
So what the hell was Harin’s boyfriend doing, leaving her free to hang with friends on a perfect day like this?
“…?”
No. Maybe I was being too naïve.
Harin said she was meeting Jihye and Thuy, but there was no guarantee those two would actually show up.
This was a girl who hid her boyfriend’s identity not only from me, her dad, but from her own classmates. Since I wasn’t about to go ask Jihye or Thuy, she could have just thrown out a smoke screen.
Even if I gave her the benefit of the doubt and assumed Jihye and Thuy really were coming, what if she simply hadn’t mentioned the boyfriend and the two extra guys he’d bring?
Yesterday’s Eunju suddenly floated into my mind—the girl who’d drunk half a can of beer out of curiosity, lost all self-control, and fallen asleep with her head on my lap.
And Harin was supposed to have zero casual curiosity?
Even Eunju had said she wanted to try alcohol first. No matter how much she was my daughter, could I really claim Harin was as thorough and careful as Eunju?
Ah, no! What if Harin got drunk and fell asleep? I’d protected Eunju as an adult and a friend’s father, but Harin’s boyfriend wouldn’t have any of those restraints.
He’d probably been waiting for exactly that moment to show his true colors. Then, just like my brother had done to Yu Jiyeon, he’d start trying “this position” and “that position” with my Harin…
“You not gonna say hi?”
A rough voice yanked me out of an imagination that had already crossed the line from fatherly concern into pure human depravity. I spun around, startled, and of course there she was—Hyeonji.
“You’re not wearing the shiny jumper…?”
The words left my mouth before any greeting. Because standing there was a Hyeonji I’d never seen before.
The kid had finally taken off that glossy windbreaker. Not only that—her whole outfit actually looked like something a normal person might wear.
Except for the part where it looked like she’d rewound the clock thirty years.
Baggy hip-hop pants so wide they threatened to drag on the ground, Air Jordans underneath. An oversized round-neck tee big enough that even I would swim in it, and her signature headphones hanging around her neck.
“It’s hot.”
“You took off the shiny jumper because it’s hot, yet you’re still wearing a bandana on your forehead?”
The absolute peak of the look sat right on top of her head. Why was a kid who looked like she did neither cleaning nor cooking wearing a giant bandana like that?
This was exactly the “street bum” look Aunt always talked about.
“You know fashion?”
“I may not know fashion, but I at least know I wouldn’t walk around dressed like my aunt did when she was young. What era are you even living in?”
“Shut it. Say one more word.”
“…”
The second I openly criticized her clothes she got genuinely pissed—her breathing even turned rough. Retro is one thing, but did she ever stop to think how embarrassing it would be for the guy walking next to her?
Regardless, Hyeonji snatched the coffee right off the table and started casually sucking on the straw. Every time she displayed that level of hygiene my eyes kept drifting up to the bandana on her head.
“W-well, let’s just go. Where to?”
“Somewhere close. Seoul Forest.”
“Seoul Forest? What are you talking about? When it’s cherry blossoms it’s Yeouido.”
Harin was going there—what a disaster that would be. Plus Hyeonji’s current look was guaranteed to draw every eye in the place; we’d be spotted for sure.
Taxi!
Worried someone might see us, I flagged one down immediately. The fare to Yeouido would hurt, but protecting the secret was worth the expense.
Vroom!
We climbed into the back seat side by side and headed for Yeouido. Once I finally caught my breath, it was time to ask about the true nature of this bizarre flower-viewing outing.
“Hey, Hyeonji?”
“I told you not to call me that.”
“Haa… Kim Hyeonji, third-year at Cheonji High School? I still don’t get this situation. Why do I have to go look at cherry blossoms with you?”
“Or I’ll spill everything to Kang Harin.”
“Uh… that’s not what I was asking? Telling on me to Harin is the method, not the goal. I’m asking because there has to be a reason you’d go that far just to force me into flower viewing.”
“You hung out with Park Eunju yesterday. So today you hang out with me.”
“…”
Still zero comprehension. Of course I already knew Hyeonji showed pretty open hostility toward Eunju.
But why? This was a girl who slept for three straight hours the second she got to school and then casually hopped the wall like it was nothing.
Weird enough that she knew all the underclassmen’s names by heart—what possible conflict could she have with someone as proper and well-behaved as Eunju?
“Did you two fight or something?”
“Is she even on my level to fight?”
“Obviously not. So why are you so conscious of her?”
“Who’s conscious of her? You’re the one who lied. You said you and Park Eunju were nothing, so why were you together yesterday?”
“It really wasn’t whatever you’re thinking. We ate, then walked around to digest, and cherry blossoms were blooming everywhere so petals just happened to stick to me.”
“Why’d you eat with her?”
“She treated me.”
“Does Park Eunju like you?”
“Of course not. There’s a bit of a debt between us—it’s complicated to explain.”
“Explain.”
“Do you have zero concept of privacy? Just like I don’t talk about you to Eunju, I can’t talk about Eunju to you either.”
“You two got a secret now?”
“You’re doing this on purpose, right? Fine, let’s say for argument’s sake that something is going on between me and Eunju. What does that have to do with going to see flowers today?”
“You said you like Kang Harin. So why are you two-timing?”
“Two-timing? What kind of horrible thing are you casually saying? So this is ultimately because of Harin, isn’t it?”
I finally got the rough picture. Looking at today’s outfit, Hyeonji was a rare anachronistic retro-obsessive.
She’d somehow gotten close to Harin and appointed herself the girl’s godmother. From her perspective I looked like I was playing both sides between Harin and Eunju, and she didn’t like it.
So she’d dragged me out to give me a hard time. Just imagining walking through Yeouido looking like that already made my head spin—she’d already half-succeeded.
“Part of it is because of Kang Harin.”
“…?”
But Hyeonji left one last question mark hanging. The reason I’d guessed was mostly right, yet apparently it wasn’t the whole story.
So what was the rest of it for?
We somehow made it to Yeouido. With the weekend in full swing the flower paths were already packed with crowds.
So I had to walk through all that… with Hyeonji? Next to a girl whose tastes belonged to an aunt living alone in the nineties?
Whisper whisper…
See? People were already murmuring about her bizarre getup.
Two girls who looked about middle-school age snickered between themselves, then suddenly walked right up to Hyeonji.
“Unnie? Can we take a picture with you?”
“No.”
“…”
Hyeonji shut them down instantly. The two students wilted and shuffled away. Then Hyeonji grinned smugly.
“See?”
“See what?”
“Everyone wants to take my picture. You’re so ugly nobody bothers. This is fashion.”
“What kind of… Did it never occur to you they wanted a shot because you’re the only one cosplaying? Tourists throw bananas at monkeys and take pictures all the time, you know.”
“You wanna get hit?”
“…”
When she glared that hard I couldn’t tease her anymore. What really annoyed me, though, was that she wasn’t completely wrong.
I had enough social awareness to read how people around us were looking at her. As much as I hated to admit it, she was right.
Surprisingly, people seemed to rate her fashion highly. No matter how incomprehensible the influencer world was, her Y2K look—which to my eyes was pure bum-core—was being accepted by the crowd.
“What’d you do with Eunju yesterday?”
“Just walked around like this.”
“Got it. Keep walking.”
“…”
Of course we hadn’t just walked. Under my guidance she’d experienced her first drink and shown me a side of herself I’d never seen.
But. The second I mentioned that she’d march straight to a kiosk and buy canned beer, so I kept my mouth shut.
“Kim Hyeonji, third-year at Cheonji High? I’ve got a question. When exactly did you get so deep into classical culture?”
“First year of high school.”
“What the hell happened then?”
“I joined A-Team.”
“…”
Was I the only one feeling like this conversation wasn’t happening normally? Then again, maybe it was perfect timing. I finally had a chance to ask about something I’d always been curious about.
“What exactly is A-Team? You explained it so vaguely before that I still don’t get it.”
“What do you know already?”
“That they don’t wear name tags. And that you’re a member. Oh right—someone said they take the tags off because they don’t want their names called.”
Ma Haejin had definitely said that. As a teacher at the school, she had to know far more about A-Team than I did.
“Yeah. I hate random people I don’t even know calling my name, so I took it off.”
“Uh… but those ‘random people’ are either fellow students or teachers. There are times people need to know your name—roll call, or when underclassmen greet seniors…”
“I decide that. I never gave permission.”
“…”
Somehow whenever A-Team came up, her already overflowing swagger went completely overboard. The more I pushed back the worse the posturing got, so I switched to passive listening mode.
“Fine. I’ll shut up. Explain.”
“You know the French Revolution?”
“What exactly do you take me for asking that? And why do we have to go all the way back to the French Revolution? This isn’t the Freemasons.”
“You said you’d shut up.”
“…”
I wanted to keep quiet, but the fact that she was dragging the French Revolution into an explanation of one school clique was just too funny. Anyway, Hyeonji continued.
“During the French Revolution the revolutionaries wore red, blue, and white ribbon decorations on their chests so they could tell who shared their cause.”
“You mean a cockade?”
“It’s not a cockade, it’s a ribbon decoration.”
“What… That’s literally what a cockade is. An identification mark soldiers wear.”
“…”
Whenever something she didn’t know came up, Hyeonji’s mouth just sealed shut—it was like a passive skill. A cockade is the kind of badge or emblem pinned to a uniform or dress hat.
The eagle on a police cap, or the Nazi mark the SS used to wear—those are types of cockades.
Military dress for identifying friend from foe. As a former sailor there was no way I wouldn’t know that.
“Anyway, so what?”
“A-Team is the opposite. We take off our name tags to show we’re comrades.”
“So you went all the way back to the French Revolution just to force a half-baked comparison for that one point? How long has A-Team been doing this?”
“Starting with me.”
“Huh?”
I stopped walking, not understanding. Hyeonji stopped too, looked me straight in the eye, and said:
“I was the first.”
“…”
This kid… was a much bigger deal than I’d thought.