The Actor Comes Home
As the moon hung over the alley, Doyun’s pojangmacha came into view.
Wolha-dong.
The village beneath the moon. They really had named it well.
From the entrance to Wolha-dong, where both Samryong Materials and Doyun’s Pojangmacha stood, a savory aroma already drifted on the air.
They must be busy already.
Normally it would be quieter at this hour. Today, though, the place seemed brighter, as if the warmth inside was spilling out into the street.
I had worried she might be tired after watching a play at the theater for the first time today. That was why I had suggested she take the day off from the stall.
But she had answered,
…That was what she had said.
Instead of telling me not to come as she usually did, today she had specifically asked me to stop by.
I was planning to come help at closing time anyway, even if she hadn’t said anything.
I smiled as I looked at the pojangmacha.
Mom had her own kind of pride.
She had always been a proactive person, after all.
Come to think of it, I seemed to resemble her more now than I had before the regression, back when I was so timid.
That’s nice.
Still, she worked too hard. She was still young, so there was no real cause for worry, yet the image of her from before the regression kept floating up in my mind no matter what I did.
With those thoughts, I lifted the plastic flap and stepped inside the pojangmacha.
“Mom, I’m here…?”
The stall was so packed and lively that no one even noticed a new customer had arrived.
“For real? Our Doyun’s going to be on TV?”
“Hey, mister! Not going to be—he already was!”
“That’s right. Don’t you know KBC? KBC?!”
“What? That KBC?”
The same uncle who had spoken badly about me last time was now asking in open astonishment.
“Is that true?”
“Mr. Kim, didn’t you say last time that acting would never work out for him?!”
“Well, if he’s actually on television, that changes everything.”
The uncle laughed, looking a little sheepish.
“Ah, look! There’s Doyun right now!”
On the pojangmacha’s TV, my broadcast was playing at that exact moment.
Mom didn’t know how to record anything. I glanced at the Samryong sis laughing and chatting beside her.
She must have recorded it for her.
I smiled.
They really are good people.
Just then, the Samryong sis spotted me and called out softly.
“Doyun!”
All eyes swung toward me at once. A brief silence fell.
Then—
“Waaaah!”
“Well, well! Our Wolha-dong’s great actor has finally graced us with his presence!”
“What are you doing standing there like a fool? You’re the star today—come on in!”
Applause and cheers filled the pojangmacha.
Overwhelmed by the enthusiastic welcome and starting to feel embarrassed, I felt the Samryong Materials sis slip her arm through mine.
“Haha… Sis?”
She looked at her employees with a warm smile and spoke.
“Our workers might look like they do rough jobs, but every one of them has grown sons and daughters.”
“I see.”
“Yes. Most of them have already married their children off, so the house is empty. They say a diligent young man like you feels just like a son to them. That’s why they’re so fond of you.”
I really had been blessed.
“Today was during work hours, but they kept hovering in front of the TV to watch your broadcast, so I told them to just watch it comfortably.”
“Haha… That must have caused you trouble.”
“If our Doyun buys us some makgeolli, maybe it’ll make up for your sis’s loss.”
“Haha…”
“I’m joking. This sis doesn’t have many merits besides having plenty of money.”
Looking at her smile, I thought,
So this is the kind of expression she makes.
It was the kind of smile that explained why the employees followed her so well despite her youthful appearance.
I nodded and said, “Among all the merits you have, money is probably the smallest one.”
“What?”
At her expression that seemed to ask what on earth I was talking about, I smiled again.
“What catches the eye first is your beauty.”
“What?”
Samryong sis burst into hearty laughter.
“You really know how to handle women, don’t you?”
“I’m a complete blockhead. That’s why I can’t even lie.”
Of course, I meant every word.
“…Is that so.”
She looked a little awkward. I bowed my head with a smile.
“Thank you for taking Mom out today.”
“It was nothing. It was nice to have a change of mood after so long.”
Her expression as she said it looked completely sincere.
That was when—
“What? Our Doyun is here?”
“Yes, I was just talking with Sis for a moment…”
She must have stepped away briefly. Mom, holding empty food containers in both hands, spotted me. She quickly wiped her hands and hurried over.
“Doyun!”
I was about to greet her with a smile when Mom threw herself into my arms.
“Haha… Mom, why are you doing this? It’s embarrassing.”
“You were really wonderful today.”
Her voice trembled with emotion.
“Mom, are you crying?”
“Would I cry!”
She looked at me playfully, but the corners of her eyes—always hiding exhaustion behind a smile—were red.
Mom wiped her eyes and smiled.
“Our son… you really are an actor.”
For a moment my vision blurred. No, not today. On a good day like this, I wanted to smile with style.
“You were so cool.”
For twenty long years I had wandered as an extra and part-timer, never once able to show her this side of me before she ended up in that hospital bed. This was the image of actor Kim Doyun that Mom had wanted so desperately to see.
You were cool. That’s how it was.
I’m glad.
I looked at her face. She was smiling so beautifully.
She had been this lovely.
There were no wrinkles around her eyes or mouth, and none of the burn scars that had been there because of me.
She had given up this beauty and youth to raise a son who resembled the father who had abandoned her, sacrificing her own life in the process.
I swallowed my tears with everything I had and forced a bright smile.
“Mom, what are you saying? Your son is an actor! And his very first public broadcast debut is on KBC!”
The words I should have said twenty years ago.
“Mom, listen. I became friends with that famous actress Lee Se-rin, and do you know that idol group Beatwave? I also got close to their member Kim Chan-uk… Ah, maybe you don’t know them, haha…”
The words I had put off, thinking I would say them someday. The words I had never been able to say in the end.
“And I met the director I truly respected. At first he said my acting wasn’t good, and I was so sad, but now he says he likes it. So… so… Ah, I still have so much more to tell you…”
Right after returning twenty years into the past, my senses had been numb. It hadn’t felt real. Standing before the respected Director Lee Tae-ryun, meeting ten-million actors who once seemed like distant stars, encountering the incredible people in the Actor Gallery—my senses had been paralyzed the entire time.
But after the first broadcast ended, the tension finally unraveled. The word “already” fit perfectly; all the strength left me at once.
Ah, I really shouldn’t be doing this.
Tears kept threatening to fall against my will. I rubbed them away roughly with my hand and kept talking.
“You can stop running the pojangmacha… No, since you like this place, I’ll definitely move it into a proper store for you. So… so…”
The words I thought I would never get to say again poured out as if I were speaking to someone I might never see again.
“This time, I will really, truly take good care of you…”
I had to finish properly. It was a good day; I had wanted to say it all with a smile. There were so many people here, and I was ruining the atmosphere. Why did I always make mistakes like this?
As that thought crossed my mind, Mom came closer. On her small frame she rose onto her tiptoes and, with some effort, patted my head.
“I can’t reach it easily anymore. It used to be so simple when you were little.”
Perhaps because my heart had finally relaxed, thick teardrops fell to the floor before I could stop them.
“You’re still my baby.”
Ah, Kim Doyun. It must be because I’m in front of Mom.
Only after crying for a long while did I look around with an awkward expression.
“I’m sorry. Everyone came for a company dinner, but because of me the mood…”
Contrary to what I expected, the uncles and aunties were smiling at me with warm, fond eyes.
“Our Doyun is saying something disappointing.”
“Yeah, exactly. We’ve been regulars here for years.”
“Aigoo, now you’re making even me tear up.”
At one auntie’s words, the manager uncle shouted.
“This auntie has always had too many tears, that’s the problem.”
“Look who’s talking—your eyes are red too!”
“That’s just dust. A man doesn’t cry.”
I smiled at their words.
“You all go this far…”
“What do you mean ‘this far,’ you punk! We all know your mom drank acting every single day here just to make you an actor.”
“Haha…”
Complaints poured from the aunties and uncles.
“We’ve seen you do talent shows saying you wanted to be an actor since you were a tiny little bean, hundreds of times, you punk.”
…It had been so long ago that I had forgotten. Embarrassment washed over me.
“That’s right! We’ve been regulars here since before you were even weaned, you punk!”
Everyone at the pojangmacha was so warm. Their eyes shone with pride as if they were looking at their own son.
Suddenly the four-million-won contract that Manager Go Yun-hui had offered me on the top floor of the Cheongram building came to mind.
A miraculous sum for a rookie. Yet right now it didn’t matter at all.
This place—though the lowest in status—was far happier than any safe nest offered by the country’s top agency. Here was my mother who believed in me with all her heart, the rough but genuine cheers from the uncles and aunties, and the Actor Gallery.
With these, what did a ten-million audience matter? I could go even further.
The certainty that not even a trace of lingering attachment to Cheongram remained.
It was in the middle of that thought, while I was still immersed in emotion, that Samryong sis approached with a smile.
“Haha…. It seems I received plenty of love ever since I was a baby.”
At my words, she came closer with a sly smile, wrapped her arm around my neck, and whispered quietly.
“You don’t remember? When your mom wasn’t around, you used to whine so much for milk that I came and breastfed you.”
“Haha… You’re joking, right?”
“I’m not joking.”
“What?”
Huh?
By the time the heat of the dinner party had begun to cool, Samryong sis called me outside separately.
“What is it?”
She casually put a cigarette between her lips and lit it. A long plume of smoke drifted out.
The Samryong sis who usually laughed and smiled everywhere now looked at me with sharp eyes.
“Doyun. I’ve started wanting to try actor management.”
“What?”
It felt like I had been hit hard on the back of the head twice in one day.