Back to Sokcho
The morning after the monsters' massive misunderstanding dawned bright.
In the room right next to where Siyeon had been sleeping, Mari lay sound asleep, breathing soft and even.
And the one who came into that room was none other than Siyeon herself.
Shake, shake. Shake, shake.
Siyeon—who usually couldn't even get up unless someone woke her first—was shaking Mari awake under the covers.
If you thought about ordinary school mornings, their positions had been flipped so thoroughly it was almost absurd.
"Mari, wake uuup…"
"Nngh…"
Hearing Siyeon's plaintive voice, Mari managed to claw her way toward consciousness. With a weird little groan, she slowly pushed herself upright.
There's no way Siyeon got up before the alarm… she thought, groping around for her phone.
Wherever the smartphone she'd left by the pillow had rolled off to, she couldn't reach it with her eyes still shut. Squinting hard with one eye and blinking the other, she finally snagged it.
Did the alarm not go off…?
She hit the power button, and the phone's light—unusually searing on mornings like this—washed over her face. A glow she never thought of as bright any other time of day suddenly felt blinding. She narrowed even the eye she still had open and peered at the screen.
6:48 a.m. Alarm set for 7:00.
Siyeon had genuinely just woken up absurdly early.
…Did she want to go that badly?
Still squinting one eye shut and keeping the other only half open, Mari looked at her. Far from looking sleepy, Siyeon looked as fresh as if she'd been up for hours.
Kids really were selfish. On days they were looking forward to, they could haul themselves out of bed just fine. It would be nice if they managed that on school weekdays, too.
"Mari, if you're up, let's go to the ocean! The ocean!"
"If we go now it'll be freezing… Let's eat breakfast first. Breakfast."
Siyeon tugged at her arm, insisting they head for the water right that second. Still dangling and half-dazed, Mari insisted they eat first. Even in summer, the air before dawn was cold. If they went out now and caught a chill, that would only make things worse.
"Ugh."
Siyeon puffed her cheeks out in a little pout of disappointment. It was cute enough to jolt Mari fully awake—but no still meant no. She poked one of those overinflated cheeks and let the air out of the balloon.
"Pff."
The second her finger prodded the cheek, a tiny puff of breath escaped. That was how much Siyeon had been looking forward to the sea.
They'd come all the way to Sokcho. For as long as they were staying, Mari was going to make sure Siyeon got to play and eat to her heart's content.
"Let's just have a little breakfast."
"Okay!"
"A little" was relative—looking at their frames, there wasn't room for much anyway.
The moment she opened the fridge, rows of drinks and microwave-ready instant meals greeted her. From among them she pulled a vacuum-packed carbonara spaghetti and read the instructions. Refrigerated meals these days were so good you didn't even have to puncture them—just toss the whole thing in the microwave as-is.
With a series of beeps, the inside of the microwave glowed orange. The vacuum pack swelled like a jellyfish's body, trembling as if it were about to burst.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Three flat mechanical tones later, the bag that had ballooned so dramatically collapsed in an instant. Mari pinched the hot plastic tray between the tips of her thumbs and forefingers and carried it straight to the table. The corner she wasn't holding sagged and tipped downward.
"Ow-ow-ow."
She gritted her teeth through the unexpected heat that bit into her fingertips and got it to the table. Feeling the temperature of an ordinary object again—something she never noticed while transformed—she pressed her fingers to her earlobes to cool them.
Next she fetched two forks from the utensil holder, sat down, and handed one to Siyeon. The moment she tore open the vacuum pack, pure white steam billowed upward. Her phone's 7:00 a.m. alarm went off belatedly. She killed it in under three seconds and forked a mouthful of the thick, udon-like spaghetti.
"Mmm, good."
Siyeon and Mari both chewed on the fat, noodle-like strands. It really wasn't much food, but for little kids it was plenty.
After taking their time getting ready, they finally stepped out of the villa once the sunlight had begun to warm the ground—at last heading for the ocean, just as Siyeon had wanted.
"Whoa."
"The ocean—!!"
It was nothing like the night sea they'd seen during monster cleanups: a bustling sandy beach and glittering water under the full sun. Siyeon was so excited that after changing into a swimsuit at a nearby portable changing room, she bounced around on the sand.
A little girl's one-piece that covered her chest still felt awkward on Mari. Unnecessary pressure all the way up her torso. If she'd never known better it wouldn't have mattered, but she found herself missing the kind of swimsuit that only covered the bottom half.
Grumbling or not, she paid the rental fee for a pre-set parasol for the shade and unloaded their things under a canopy that was more than wide enough for two kids. She needed to go into the water with Siyeon, but that left no one to watch their bags.
That glorious duty fell to their mascots.
It was peak vacation season at a noisy beach, with every kind of sound mixed together. Even if other people saw her talking to the mascots, they'd just assume a little kid was chatting with a stuffed animal.
"You treat this wallet like it's your life, and you hang on tight… If anyone other than me or Siyeon touches it, you scream your lungs out like a damn alarm system, got it?"
No answer came back from the mascot, but Teddy's head bobbed in a natural-looking nod that said he understood.
"Okay."
Still in her swimsuit, Mari carried a limp tube over to the air-pump station. Three thousand won just to fill one of them, they said.
This goddamn world.
Watching six thousand won evaporate after a few pumps, she cursed inwardly. So now people were making money off air. Was this creative economics? Three thousand won for a few pumps? Must be nice, having an easy way to earn a living. Some people had to fly around at night fighting for their paychecks.
She put the thoroughly vacation-and-recreation-plundered wallet back where it belonged, then got dragged out to the water by Siyeon, whose face was blooming with a full smile.
"You hang on tight to the tube, okay?"
"Okay!"
"And get wet slowly."
Mari slipped the handled tube around her waist and wet her chest at the shoreline where the waves just met the sand. To anyone watching, it was a heartwarming scene—and also a slightly off one. A kid giving another kid safety tips.
The seawater was cold, out of place with the heat. Or maybe that was exactly what made it fit.
Okay, yeah. This is nice.
Like stepping out of a sauna and dropping straight into a cold bath? It was a cheap kind of feeling, but how long had it been since she'd actually submerged herself in the ocean at a real beach? Thinking about it, even in her past life she'd only gone a handful of times as a kid with her family.
"Kyaa—! Ehehe!"
Siyeon followed her into the water and, for reasons known only to her, laughed so brightly and kicked so hard she made a mess of spray while clinging to her tube.
Come to think of it, you didn't need a reason to be happy. Just being out to play was enough. Siyeon was only feeling what Mari herself had felt once upon a time.
"Is it fun, being at the ocean?"
"Yeah!"
A bright, full-throated answer came right back to the throwaway question.
Yeah. If you're happy, that's all that matters.
For a long while Mari drifted near Siyeon, hanging onto the tube's handles, warm sunlight on her upper body and the cool, wet current of the sea on her lower half. That was balance—perfect, just-right moderation. The only thing that ruined it was her long hair getting completely soaked in seawater.
"BEEEEEEEEEP—!!!!"
As she floated jellyfish-style near Siyeon, a very particular sound came from the direction of the beach.
What now?
Curious, she lifted her head toward the noise—and realized it was coming from under their parasol. The sound was so loud that a pot-bellied, balding middle-aged man who'd been poking at their bags jumped out of his skin, yanked his hands back, and fled the scene. Even as he ran, he left under a long trail of stares.
Between that noise and the man's shady behavior, anyone could tell he was a thief after other people's things. The unwelcome guest who'd tried to take advantage of the vacation bustle made his exit thanks to Teddy's performance.
Lounging back against her tube, Mari applauded the satisfying alarm cry.
Good work.
And so two full hours passed without either of them really knowing how. Tireless Siyeon poured every bit of her energy into the ocean, then—true to how little she'd eaten—clutched her stomach as hunger hit early.
"I'm hungry…"
At Siyeon's complaint they trudged back under the parasol with their tubes and set them down somewhere convenient. Facing Teddy's triumphant expression, Mari gave him a raised thumbs-up with a clenched fist.
When you got peckish at the beach, there was only one thing that came to mind.
She reclaimed the wallet Teddy had been clutching like a lifeline and bought two small cup ramens from a stall right on the beach. The man there filled the cups with seasoning and hot water on the spot, stacked them two high, and set wooden chopsticks on top. Mari braced the tower carefully against her chin so it wouldn't tip and successfully made it back under the parasol.
"Let's eat ramen!"
One little cup of ramen after getting thoroughly soaked—that taste had stayed with her as an unforgettable memory, so she was going to share this special flavor with Siyeon too.
She tugged the folded plastic on the rim with her fingers, and the lid popped open with a soft polk. Beyond it, bright red broth and pure white steam rose to meet them.
Slurp, slurp.
Noodles vanishing down their throats without pause. Pure bliss.
Why did cup ramen always taste so impossibly good after you'd been in the water?