Don't Catch the Itch
Just as Hoesaegi and Sapsaree bolted from the exam room, Lee Jun reached for the bottle of eye drops he always kept ready beside the treatment table.
Go Gi-jin took one look at the bottle in Lee Jun's hand and the two retreating backs flying out the door, and bellowed after them.
"You kids, it's fine! You two ain't gettin' no eye drops!"
He swung his head back toward Lee Jun.
"Aigoo, hyung-nim, those two are too smart, ain't they? How'd they even know those were eye drops?"
Ah. So that was how it looked.
Lee Jun smiled.
"They ran off because they were afraid of catching the eye infection."
"Huh? That so?"
Go Gi-jin's eyes lit up.
"Hold on—so they understood what you said, hyung-nim? How do those two keep gettin' smarter every single day?"
"They've always been smart."
"Well, that's true. In all my days I ain't never seen critters as sharp as those two."
He said it, then reached over and stroked Gkamnyangi, who was crouched on the treatment table.
"You're smart too, Gkamnyangi."
Lee Jun smiled at the way Go Gi-jin tacked that on, just in case Gkamnyangi felt left out. He really is so kind. He was grateful, always, that Go Gi-jin treated the animals with such steady gentleness.
"But hyung-nim, if they run off now, what's the point? If it was catchin', they'd already have it, wouldn't they?"
"That's true."
"And it ain't gonna spread anyway. They've all had their shots."
The feline four-way vaccine protected against herpesvirus, calicivirus, chlamydia, and the parvovirus responsible for feline panleukopenia. Hoesaegi and Gkamnyangi—and the park cats as well—had received their shots from Lee Jun the year before, and their boosters were due next month. Of course, the cats themselves did not know that yet.
"That's true."
Lee Jun did not believe Gkamnyangi had caught a contagious disease either. He was sending a sample out to the lab anyway, not because he expected a positive result, but because he wanted to walk Go Gi-jin—still new to feline medicine—through a diagnosis the proper way. Which was why both of them looked so perfectly calm as they regarded the black cat on the table.
"Then shouldn't we tell 'em it's fine? What if they start avoidin' Gkamnyangi?"
"We'll tell them later. Right now, having them underfoot would only annoy him."
Lee Jun stopped mid-sentence and looked at Go Gi-jin, who had opened a drawer and was pulling out a spare blanket.
"What are you doing?"
"This? I'm gonna put the drops in for Gkamnyangi. I studied up, y'know~."
He snapped the blanket open with great confidence.
"You're going to wrap him up with just his face showing, aren't you? In case he scratches when you put the drops in."
"Heh, that's right. I learned it on Gowi Cafe. They say if you swaddle 'em up like a baby, the drops go in real easy."
Lee Jun huffed a quiet laugh.
"No need. Gkamnyangi takes his eye drops like a champ."
"Huh, really? They said you never miss if you do it that way..."
Lee Jun let him mutter and simply took hold of Gkamnyangi's lower lid, then let a drop fall. Go Gi-jin blinked at the sight.
"Wait—it's true?"
Lee Jun stroked Gkamnyangi's head.
"Of course. This one's a genius at taking eye drops. A genius."
The hand on that small head was careful, almost tender. It was the touch of a man sorry he had not noticed until the eyes had already gotten this bad. The guilt sat strangely heavy in him.
"Gkamnyangi, how long have you been hurting? Why didn't you tell me you were in pain?"
Gkamnyangi looked up at him. His lower lip was stuck out a full mile. He's sulking, isn't he. Sulking that Lee Jun had missed it, and sulking that his friends had taken one look and fled.
"Teacher's sorry he didn't even notice you were hurting."
The lip tucked straight back in. Gkamnyangi gave his small head a firm little shake.
"No. Hyung-nim doesn't have to be sorry. Hyung-nim didn't sleep. Hyung-nim fixed his friends."
Mongmong Animal Hospital had been running at a frantic pace of late. The surgical load had been so heavy that Lee Jun had not made it home for the past two nights, and Go Gi-jin was no better off. A large-breed patient had come through surgery and stayed on as an inpatient, which meant Go Gi-jin had been pulling overnight duty every other day. That was what Gkamnyangi was talking about.
"Still. Teacher was too careless."
Shake, shake. Gkamnyangi kept turning that small head from side to side.
"No. It only itched for two nights. Hyung-nim has to sleep."
Itchy since two nights ago, then.
"If you don't sleep, you go owie."
And with that, Gkamnyangi flopped weakly onto the treatment table and put on a magnificent show of suffering.
Kiiing. Kiiiing~.
He was imitating the time Lee Jun had collapsed from overwork. His own eyes had to be itching and stinging, and still he was the one doing the worrying. Lee Jun's gaze went unbearably warm. This is why I have no choice but to give it my all.
Go Gi-jin, unlike Lee Jun, did not look proud. He nearly jumped out of his skin.
"Wh-wh-what?"
His eyes flew wide. He scooped Gkamnyangi up in both arms and shouted.
"Hey—what's wrong with him? G-Gkamnyangi? Where does it hurt? Hyung-nim, where's he hurtin'?"
"He's not hurt..."
Lee Jun smiled and told him the truth.
"I think the time I was hospitalized for overwork shook him up. So..."
He did not get to finish. Go Gi-jin crushed the cat in his arms even tighter.
"Aigoo, you sweet thing! You held it in till your eyes got like this 'cause you were worried this hyung couldn't sleep?"
Kack, kack, kack!
Gkamnyangi coughed, and Go Gi-jin let go at once.
"S-sorry! Gkamnyangi! Why're you so good? Good boy, brave boy—aigoo, you're truly, truly somethin' else!"
He poured praise over Gkamnyangi with eyes so fond they could have dripped honey, then looked at Lee Jun.
"Hyung-nim, I'm sorry. I should've been keepin' a closer eye on them."
"What are you talking about? You barely had time to sleep. I'm the one who should be sorry. I couldn't even give you a proper rest."
"Ah, come on now. You were busier, hyung-nim. And I'm sorry I didn't look after you neither!"
Every word of it was stuffed full of worry for Lee Jun.
"Hyung-nim, there's just too many surgeries. How about we bring one more person on? You look so worn down even this little guy's worryin' himself sick over you."
Go Gi-jin was afraid Lee Jun would push himself until he collapsed the way he had last year.
"Or we cut back on the surgeries, even."
"Yeah. Let's think about that, bit by bit."
Lee Jun had been thinking the same thing. The work had been running ahead of him lately, and the juniors looked just as wrung out. Gi-jin's right. I should bring another doctor on.
He was still turning it over when Go Gi-jin asked,
"So we put the drops in every three hours, right?"
"Yeah. The two kinds, five minutes apart... but you've got appointments."
"I'll put 'em in when I get a minute."
"That's true, but... let's ask Manager Jang."
Lee Jun gathered Gkamnyangi up and went to find Jang Sora.
"Manager Jang, could I leave Gkamnyangi's eye drops with you?"
"Oh my, Gkamnyangi has an eye infection? But how did I not notice?"
"You were off yesterday. And from this morning on you've been running around nonstop."
"Even so."
She took Gkamnyangi into her arms.
"Gkamnyangi, were you hurting? Noona's sorry she didn't know."
That warm voice, those careful hands—Gkamnyangi's mouth slid slowly upward. A gaze of worry aimed entirely at him. Attention he usually had to split with his brothers, all his, just this once. The corners of his mouth twitched. And he puffed up. Just a little.
As if that were not enough, Jang Sora kept him tucked right against her side and tended to him with painstaking care for the rest of the day.
"Who did this to our Gkamnyangi's handsome, handsome eyes? Noona's going to make them all better. Don't you worry!"
Gkamnyangi, in excellent spirits, rubbed and nuzzled his head along her arm and grinned a blissful little heh.
It was not only Lee Jun and Go Gi-jin and Jang Sora. Every member of the hospital staff fussed over him, and the moment anyone had a spare second they came over to comfort him.
"Ehehehehe! They're looking at me, just me. Just meee~~!"
And so Gkamnyangi took the fact that Hoesaegi and Sapsaree had abandoned him and fled, and flung it cheerfully into the far back of his mind.
Meanwhile, Hoesaegi and Sapsaree—who had charged out on the pretext of getting a drink of water—needed no discussion at all. They thundered straight into the playground and vanished inside.
The 1st Floor Animal Playground was mostly a dogs' place. Hoesaegi and Gkamnyangi rarely set foot there, which meant there was no chance Gkamnyangi would come looking. The two of them went to the farthest corner, put their heads together, and whispered.
"Sapsaree-ong. I'm scared of the itchy stuff, ong."
Hoesaegi gave a full-body shudder, remembering how wretched it had been when his legs itched.
"That's right, it is. The itchy stuff is scary, it is."
Sapsaree had been through it himself, and he agreed with his whole heart.
"If we stay next to Gkamnyangi, we'll get itchy too, ong."
"That's right. We gotta stay far from Gkamnyangi-hyung, we do. But hyung, how far apart do we have to be? This far, like this?"
Sapsaree stomped two booming steps away from Hoesaegi's side. Hoesaegi looked at him, then bounced backward—dong, dong—until he had put three times that gap between them.
"This should be far enough, ong."
"Got it, I do."
Sapsaree measured the distance between them with his eyes and answered. And for as long as they remained at the hospital, neither of them went anywhere near Gkamnyangi.
Once Lee Jun and Go Gi-jin had left Gkamnyangi with Jang Sora, the appointments and surgeries stacked up so tightly that they never even made it to the playground. They did not see Hoesaegi or Sapsaree again before they clocked out, and so of course they never got the chance to say that Gkamnyangi's eye condition was not contagious, and that standing next to him was perfectly fine.
The day darkened. For once, both Go Gi-jin and Lee Jun left on time and came home to Golmokjib. They had been so busy they barely remembered how the hours had gone, and each of them assumed the other had already told Hoesaegi and Sapsaree that the eye condition would not spread.
The moment Hoesaegi stepped out of the carrier, he shot up to the second floor. Sapsaree pounded after him.
"Kids. Dinner time."
At the promise of food, Hoesaegi and Gkamnyangi—no, Hoesaegi and Sapsaree—came bouncing down the stairs with their hindquarters wiggling.
"It's dinner, ong."
"Hehehe, it's dinner! I'm gonna eat a whole lot, I am."
Then, at the bottom of the stairs, both pairs of eyes wavered. They had only just realized that the three bowls were sitting in a neat, close little row.
"Hoesaegi-hyung, the bowls are way too close, they are."
"Th-they are, ong."
It was a problem neither of them had ever considered. They stood at the foot of the stairs and stamped their feet in place.
That was when Strong Hyung-nim's voice rolled over them.
"You kids, I ain't playin' favorites! Gkamnyangi's sick, that's why I'm feedin' him, so don't you go gettin' all hurt now."
Go Gi-jin had seen them stamping and decided they were upset because he was only holding Gkamnyangi.
Hoesaegi and Sapsaree lifted their faces at the sound and looked at Gkamnyangi. They raised their heads and lowered them again without a word, glancing back and forth between the cat in Go Gi-jin's arms and the row of bowls, and Lee Jun added his own voice to the mix.
"That's right, kids. You can ask to be held later. So don't be too sad, and come eat, okay?"
The instant he finished, both of them broke into smiles and trotted over to the bowls with great dignity. Go Gi-jin grinned.
"That's it. Once Gkamnyangi finishes eatin', I'll hold you two."
Lee Jun huffed a quiet laugh.
"We really do have to treat them equally."
They were talking entirely past each other.
Hoesaegi and Sapsaree had only been lifting and lowering their heads to measure the distance between Gkamnyangi and the bowls. They had decided it was a reassuring distance, and so they had gone to eat in perfect peace.
Even after dinner, they kept well clear of him. When the two of them headed upstairs, Gkamnyangi wore the smile of a victor.
"Kyahaha. They're sulking. Totally sulking."
He was quite sure his brothers had gone off in a pout because he had hogged all of Hyung-nim's love. Bedtime came and they still did not come down, and Gkamnyangi savored the spoils of war.
"Heh heh. So wide and nice. So nice. Just Hyung-nim and me sleeping together!"
He rolled and tumbled across the generous bed like a wandering kimbap roll. Then, little by little, a hollow feeling crept in. No matter how much he rolled, there were no brothers to bump into, and no one picking a fight to tell him to hold still.
"Ah... I'm bored."
Something in the room felt empty. The moment Hyung-nim came to bed, though, the feeling vanished as if it had never been there.
"Heehee. I get to sleep with Hyung-nim all by myself."
On an ordinary night, sticking to Hyung-nim's side meant a three-way scuffle for territory. Tonight Gkamnyangi plastered himself against Lee Jun and slept in a deep, easy purr.
And the next morning, when he opened his eyes, the itch was gone. The ache was gone. Every last bit of it had vanished, and Gkamnyangi was in such a fine mood that he called to his friends out in the yard, ready to brag.
"Hoesaegi!"
Hoesaegi did not even answer. He simply took off—click, click, click—and ran for the far end of the yard. Gkamnyangi thought he might not have heard, and called louder.
"Hoesaegi! Sapsaree!"
This time Sapsaree, who had been ambling in from a distance, let out a shriek.
"Hwaaack! I-it's Gkamnyangi-hyung!"
And then he fled for the horizon as fast as his legs would carry him.
"...I-I'm all better. I'm all better!"
They did not even pretend to listen. Far across the yard they put their heads together and whispered.
Did they not hear me?
Gkamnyangi ran toward them as he spoke, a little louder this time.
"My eyes don't itch anymore. They don't hurt either."
They ran farther.
Watching them go, Gkamnyangi got angry.
"Tch. I said I'm all better, you idiots!"
He hooked a small ball that was sitting in front of him and kicked it forward. It was nothing but a gesture of temper. He had kicked it too well, though. The ball sailed a long way and smacked Hoesaegi square in the head.
It was soft and light, so it did not hurt. Getting a ball to the skull out of nowhere, however, did nothing for Hoesaegi's mood.
"Gkamnyangi-ong! Why are you attacking me, ong!"
The ball came flying back with the words, packed with more force than the one Gkamnyangi had sent. It struck him neatly in the forehead.
Bonk!
"Ow!"
It did not really hurt. It did make him furious. Being avoided had already stung; now they were attacking him too. Gkamnyangi hurled the ball with everything he had.
It did no good. Sapsaree lofted into the air and caught it in his mouth with insulting ease.
"Hmph!"
Gkamnyangi was so angry he charged them. Hoesaegi and Sapsaree only ran farther.
"Hmph! Just you wait. I'll show you the power of the Bluebird Park Boss!"
He had already forgotten why he had called them in the first place. The only thought left in his head was to catch the two creatures fleeing in front of him and give them a proper smack.
Thud-thud-thud-thud.
Gkamnyangi ran with all his might. Hoesaegi and Sapsaree, of course, kept running.
Da-da-da-da.
Do-do-do-do.
The three of them tore around the yard in a frenzy. It was not a wide park, though, and Gkamnyangi closed the gap soon enough.
Whoosh!
He sprang, stretching his front paws toward the back of Hoesaegi's head.
"Hoesaegiii~! Take my paws~!"