The Medicine Bag
Mother.
The road home after school always took me past her house. We were next-door neighbors, after all. The two houses sat side by side with only a low wall between them, and I had grown up beside that wall for as long as I could remember.
From there, her bedroom window was visible over the fence. When we were little I used to knock on that pane to call her out, and on days when she was sick I would look up at the darkened glass and worry myself raw.
As I turned into the alley, her front gate happened to open.
Her mother was just stepping out, a shopping basket in her hand.
"Oh my, Ji-an. You're home."
A welcoming smile bloomed across her face the moment she saw me.
"Mother."
I dipped my head lightly in greeting.
My own parents had been overseas for work more often than not since I was small. The days I saw their faces in a year I could count on one hand, and I had always been the child who ate alone in an empty house.
In that sense, being transmigrated into this body had almost been a blessing. At least I could cook my own meals, and my mind was mature enough to feel ease rather than loneliness.
The one who had taken me in, fed me, and looked after me was, in truth, Woo Han-gyeol's mother next door.
The person who always set out one extra bowl at mealtimes, who felt my forehead when I ran a fever, who came to school events in place of my parents. The one who had rushed over with a packed lunch on sports day while I scanned the empty bleachers—that was her.
So when I called her Mother, it was never empty words. To me, she truly was as good as a mother.
Blood or no blood, that house had been another home to me. Or perhaps it had been more of a home than my actual house ever was.
The worn sofa in their living room, the kitchen that always had something simmering, the little table where she and I sat side by side doing homework. Most of the warm memories of my childhood lived not in my house, but in theirs.
So every time I passed that house, a corner of my heart would grow warm. At least until this very moment today, that had always been true.
"How come Han-gyeol isn't with you today?"
Mother peered behind me with a playful look as she asked.
"You two are always stuck together. Seeing you alone looks so strange."
For the past twenty years, that really had been the case. At school, on the way home—she and I had always been together. Of course Mother would say that.
But those ordinary words struck the most painful place in me with perfect precision.
It was no longer my place to stand by her side. Not the paths we walked together, not the seats we shared side by side.
The scene that had felt so natural only a few days ago had become a past I could never return to. Having that confirmed through Mother's lips—not a stranger's—stung far more than I expected.
To Mother, she and I had always been bound together like a pair. I had no idea how to put into words that the bond had somehow come undone.
Unaware of any of this, Mother was simply smiling as she always did.
"……I had something to take care of on my own today."
I forced an awkward smile and made up an excuse.
Lately, lies had been sticking to my tongue more and more. I was growing slowly accustomed to swallowing the truth in the face of someone's goodwill.
Mother nodded without much suspicion. Two kids who were always together walking separately for a day wasn't that strange.
"By the way, Ji-an."
Mother suddenly lowered her voice and drew closer with a knowing look.
"You wouldn't happen to…… know if something's going on with our Han-gyeol lately, would you?"
"……Something?"
"Well, you see."
Mother went on, her face oddly bright.
"These past few days, Han-gyeol hasn't been herself at all. She keeps giggling to herself, or she's glued to her phone. When I casually asked her about it, she turned bright red and pretended nothing was wrong."
My heart dropped.
I knew better than anyone what that meant.
Yu-jin. The person she had fallen for. The one who made her smile alone, stare at her phone, blush—the true identity of that flutter.
I knew where all those changes had begun.
But Mother had arrived at an entirely different conclusion.
"The way I see it,"
Mother gently took my hand, joy coloring her voice.
"I think our Han-gyeol finally has someone she likes. And she's fallen hard, by the looks of it."
"……."
"But Ji-an. Who do you think I thought of?"
Mother's eyes rested warmly on me.
I understood at once what that look was saying.
And because I understood, I could say nothing at all.
"Who else could our Han-gyeol give her heart to but you?"
Mother's voice trembled slightly. It was the tremor of joy from watching a long-held wish finally come true.
"To be honest, I've known for a long time. The way you look at our Han-gyeol."
"……."
"Someone who stayed by the side of a girl who was never well for so many years couldn't just be a friend. I've always been grateful…… and sorry, too."
The corners of Mother's eyes reddened faintly.
"Your parents are rarely home, and it felt like you were tied down to our Han-gyeol on top of that. Even so, deep down I hoped. How wonderful it would be if you truly stayed by her side as family. Then you wouldn't have to be lonely anymore either."
At those words, I couldn't bring myself to lift my head.
Mother was genuinely happy. Believing that the thing she had wished for all these years was finally about to come true.
But every bit of that joy was wrong from start to finish. I couldn't bring myself to say it.
The person she had given her heart to wasn't me. The flutter Mother was so delighted by was the very feeling that had pushed me away from her side.
If I told the truth, that bright face would crumble.
I simply couldn't do the thing that would make her realize the wish she had held for so long had never come true even once.
So once again, I hid my heart.
"……I suppose so."
The words I barely managed to let go crumbled bitter in my mouth.
Mother took it as a shy affirmation and beamed, patting my back.
The warmth of that hand only made my heart ache more.
I didn't know if playing along with her joy through a lie was the right thing. Someday when the truth came out, how would Mother remember this moment?
Even so, I didn't have the courage to shatter her smiling face. In the end, I was always like this. In front of someone else's happiness, folding my true feelings away one more time. It was the only thing I could do.
"Oh, right, Ji-an. Perfect timing—I'm glad I ran into you."
Mother rummaged through her shopping basket and pulled out a small medicine bag.
"They added one more medicine for Han-gyeol this time. She has to take it after meals without fail, but this morning I completely forgot to pack it for her."
Then she pressed the medicine into my hand.
"When you see Han-gyeol later, could you give it to her for me? Leaving it with you puts my mind most at ease. I just don't trust asking anyone else."
The medicine bag resting on my palm was light and yet heavy.
Mother made the request as if it were the most natural thing. She must have believed we were always together, that we would naturally meet today as well.
For twenty years I had been the one who always brought her her medicine, so to Mother it was the most natural request in the world.
"……Yes. I'll give it to her later."
Unable to refuse those words, I quietly closed my hand around the medicine bag.
Only then did Mother seem relieved. She smiled brightly again and headed out of the alley to do her shopping.
Left alone in the alley, I stared down at the medicine bag in my hand for a long time.
It was just a small, light paper packet. And yet it felt like some attachment I still couldn't let go of.
If I went to deliver this medicine, I would have to stand by her side again. In the place I had resolved to step back from myself.
If I didn't go, I would be betraying Mother's trust. The request of the person who had taken me in and raised me like family.
Suddenly, a heavier truth pressed down on my chest.
Pulling away from her wasn't simply a matter of losing a first love.
If I left her side, I would grow distant from that house as well. From the mother who had fed me and raised me, from that warm home that had been the only family I had.
Losing a first love alone was cold enough—but perhaps I was losing far more than that along with it.
It had been the same in my previous life. I had poured my whole heart into caring for someone, and in the end nothing remained for me. And in this life, too, I was standing in the exact same place.
The only difference was that this time, she was alive. Until a few days ago I had kept telling myself that was enough.
But as I counted the things I was losing one by one, that resolve kept wavering.
The medicine bag in my hand only goaded that wavering further. The place I had decided to step aside from was calling me back to stand there once more.
Standing in the alley as the sun sank low, I couldn't leave that spot for a long time.
In the end, I never found an answer for how I was supposed to face her again.