Why! Just Once! Get Out!
I had a bad feeling about this, and they say bad premonitions are never wrong. Just as expected, Hyeonseo came charging in with a brush in hand. Naturally, I threw a fit and kicked at her, yelling for her to get lost. Anyone else maybe, but not her. No way.
"Why are you two fighting again?"
We were bickering loudly in the room when Mom, drawn by the noise, burst in.
"I just wanted to brush his tail, but oppa..."
"Just let her do it. You're the older brother, aren't you?"
Hyeonseo immediately tattled to Mom in that irritating way of hers. Mom brushed it off like it was no big deal—the same line I heard every single time Hyeonseo wanted something.
"He said no! Where's your sibling love?"
"You let Mom do it just fine earlier."
Fed up with hearing it over and over, I snapped back, but Mom pinned me down with flawless logic.
"That's only because it's Mom..."
I muttered the protest in a deflated voice. At this rate, it looked like I'd be stuck letting Hyeonseo have her way.
"I'm scared to let her do it!"
Before Mom could get another word in, I pointed straight at my sister and shouted.
"I'll be gentle!"
"She says she'll be gentle."
The mother-daughter tag team kept pushing me, rendering all my resistance pointless. Hyeonseo promising to be gentle, then Mom jumping on board. In front of my parents, I was always the one who lost.
"...For real? You promise you'll be really gentle?"
"I said I got it."
In the end, I paused the game and headed back to the veranda. I even dragged a low stool out from the bathroom and sat down comfortably—unlike when Mom had done it earlier.
"Wow, it's seriously so soft."
"Brush it all in one direction, like when you comb hair."
"Okay."
Under Mom's supervision, the tail grooming session began. A ticklish sensation ran through the fluffy fur at the tip of my tail. The small, unpleasant touch sent goosebumps racing up my arms. Soon Mom spoke up, sounding puzzled.
"The fur's sticking up all over, unlike before?"
"I heard a dog's tail does that when it's nervous."
Hyeonseo chimed in with the dog fact she'd apparently picked up somewhere. Hearing it left me strangely annoyed. Are you calling me a dog right now?
"But even like this, it's really soft."
"It really is soft."
Whether I felt bad about it or not... the pair kept offering their opinions on my tail fur from behind me. They kept marveling at how soft it was, one comment after another. The brushing continued through all the admiration. It wasn't as nice as when I'd let Mom handle it, but it wasn't enough to make me freak out.
Clumps of orange fur piled up from the constant brushing. Yet the tail's volume refused to decrease at all, as if the fur kept regenerating endlessly.
Afterward, Hyeonseo started pulling the massive clumps of fur off the brush one by one.
"Oppa, can I make a pillow out of this fur?"
Instead of tossing it out right away, she gathered the clumps and asked me with sparkling eyes.
"Uh...?"
"This would be perfect for making something."
I let out a dazed sound, completely thrown off, while Mom nodded along like it was a brilliant idea.
What's so great about it? I hate it. I spoke firmly to my excited mother and sister.
"No. Don't make anything. It's creepy."
"Ah, whyyy?"
When I twisted my face into the most disgusted expression possible, Hyeonseo whined in a drawn-out voice. This girl was really rolling her tone now. She seemed certain that with Mom right there, she'd be able to get permission somehow.
But this time I couldn't just back down.
"I'm not joking. I really hate it."
"Eep."
Hyeonseo looked a little flustered by my unwavering refusal. I hadn't expected to feel this strongly about it either, but the psychological revulsion at the idea of someone making something out of my tail fur was intense. It felt like being told they were going to knit a scarf from my hair or craft something out of my leg hair. It just felt incredibly gross.
"Why do you hate it so much? It seems fine."
"Imagine if someone said they were going to make clothes out of your hair. Would that make the person hearing it feel good?"
I threw the question at Hyeonseo, who couldn't grasp my perspective. After hearing it, she must have found it creepy herself because she clamped her mouth shut for a moment before answering quietly.
"No..."
"Exactly. So don't do it. For real."
I drove the point home after her short, understanding reply. She should have gotten the message after all that. I left Mom and Hyeonseo on the veranda, stood up, and returned to my room.
I sat down comfortably in front of the computer and went back to gaming. It was Friday night, so staying up late was forgiven. This was my first weekend since coming down with the fox beast syndrome.
"Huaaah, aah..."
"Uum."
I greeted Saturday with a long yawn and some lazy tapping on my phone. It was Saturday afternoon and no one was around to wake me. I squirmed around in my blanket before finally sitting up. The room layout meant that when one person got up, the other had no choice but to wake up too. So even on a school anniversary holiday, trying to wake the other person meant both of us would end up awake. Anyway, our sibling weekend began after noon.
I claimed the computer, while Hyeonseo picked up the game console she hadn't been able to play during the week because she'd been out with friends. The faint sound of the TV drifted in from the living room. Right now it was just Dad, me, and Hyeonseo at home. Mom always went to some gathering with the neighborhood ladies on Saturdays.
"You two both up?"
When the light flicked on in the room and he heard the rustling, Dad wandered over from the living room and asked.
"Yeah..."
"Huaaah."
I answered with sleepy eyes, then gradually forced them open while my fingers moved across the keyboard. Meanwhile Hyeonseo, who had turned on her game console, let out an enormous yawn.
"Huh, what time did you go to bed last night if you're only getting up now?"
Dad let out a helpless chuckle as he looked at us finally crawling out of bed when the sun was already high in the sky.
"Two thirty..."
"Sigh, go to bed earlier, you two."
Hyeonseo answered in a hoarse, just-woke-up voice. It seemed like Dad would give us one scolding and leave it at that. But right before stepping out of the room, he stopped.
"Ah, what did the hospital say about Hyunwoo?"
He grabbed the doorknob and asked again, belatedly. He must have heard that I'd gone to the hospital yesterday.
"They said there's no treatment method right now."
"That's what I figured. Sigh."
Dad let out a short sigh after hearing my answer and actually left the room this time.
If I had to summarize our house on Saturdays in two words, it would be total neglect. No interference no matter what anyone did. Everyone handled their own food. Meals were haphazard, schedules were haphazard. Unlike weekdays that had the fixed anchor of school, we just wandered around the house at our leisure.
Today's breakfast... or rather, lunch. I took some rice out of the fridge, grabbed an egg along with it, and turned on the gas stove. Red flames rose with a soft ticking sound. I waited quietly while the frying pan heated up.
"What are you making?"
A few minutes after I'd come out, Hyeonseo wandered into the kitchen at the sound of activity and asked.
At the familiar voice, I didn't even turn my head. I held my hand near the frying pan and answered indifferently.
"Egg rice."
"Make one for me too."
Then this shameless kid asked me to make hers as well. Obviously I didn't want to double the effort because of her.
"Make it yourself."
To make it clear I didn't want to, I answered using an unfamiliar regional dialect. But then came the thud of the microwave door opening. She had stopped the one I'd been about to use, put her own rice in, and started it running.
"You're heating mine too?"
"You crazy girl."
The typical little-sister move of doing it first and reporting afterward. The timer had reset and I had no idea how long it had been heating. Anyway, my sunny-side-up with a runny yolk was done. I put the fried egg in a deep bowl, took out the second egg from the fridge, cracked it, and dropped it into the pan.
"Hey, take this."
"Thanks."
Hyeonseo soon grabbed the sesame oil and soy sauce from the shelf. The kid sat at the table with her game console to eat her egg rice, so I quickly finished mine and took it back to my room. If she ate at the table, I'd eat at my desk. I turned on some random video on the computer and watched while I ate.
After that rare moment of eating at the same time, I placed my empty bowl in the sink, filled it with water, and announced to Hyeonseo—who was still eating at the table while playing her game:
"You do the dishes."
"Okay."
Maybe because I'd just made hers for her, Hyeonseo accepted the chore without complaint. With that refreshing reply, I headed back to my room.
"Hey, Hyunwoo. Isn't this story about you?"
But right before I could step inside. For some reason Dad called out to stop me. He'd been staring intently at the TV and asked if it was about me, so wondering what he'd seen, I walked over to the living room.
"What about me?"
"This. This news."
When I walked over after his sudden call and asked, Dad immediately pointed at the TV and said "this news."