The Wife I Never Knew

“Oh, honey… what’s with the sudden drinks? The teacher must have evening plans of his own. Springing something like this on him with no warning is just going to make him uncomfortable…”

Jisu made a show of scolding me, all the while frantically trying to carve out an escape route for Sang-jun. She wore the mask of a tender wife gently restraining her husband, yet she could not quite hide the faint tremor clinging to the end of her voice.

“Ah, is that so?”

I laughed lightly and nodded. Then, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, I slipped my phone from my pants pocket.

“Then at least give me your number, would you? There are a few things I’d like to discuss separately, as a parent—Ha-yul’s grades, the direction of the tutoring. And every now and then we could just grab a drink outside, man to man.”

Discussions as a parent. No better pretext existed for making the hearts of two people who had committed adultery right in my own house, with my own daughter’s teacher, plummet into their stomachs.

The boy’s pupils shook wildly, as if an earthquake had struck them.

“Pardon? Ah… my number…?”

In that brief moment while he froze completely and could only steal glances at Jisu for cues, she cut in from behind me, even more flustered, her words tumbling out in a rush.

“H-honey… you can just ask me about that sort of thing. Why do you need to go and get the teacher’s number? I’ll pass on anything about Ha-yul’s studies.”

It was a desperate thrashing, an attempt to sever any contact between me and the boy. The way she even began to stammer was almost comical.

Without so much as glancing toward Jisu, I turned a perfectly casual smile on the boy and answered smoothly.

“Hmm? Whether you ask or I ask, it’s the same thing, isn’t it? I’m Ha-yul’s father either way. No need to take the long way around through you for no reason. Right, Sang-jun?”

I drove the nail into Jisu and drove the wedge into him at the same time. Faced with my firm, unflappable demeanor, Jisu could add nothing more; her lips only trembled.

Sang-jun, watching the strange war of nerves flowing between me and my wife, rolled his eyes as if turning something over in his head. But with the master of the house and the student’s father staring him down, he had no grounds to refuse.

“Come on. ^^”

When I lightly waved the lit phone screen in front of him, Sang-jun could hold out no longer. He swallowed hard and reluctantly took my phone. I could see the fine tremor in the tips of his fingers as he tapped the screen.

A moment later I accepted the phone back, checked the number he had entered, and immediately pressed the call button.

Riri-ring, riri-ring…

In the quiet entryway the ringtone blared sharply from inside the boy’s pocket. I ended the call, looked Sang-jun straight in the eye, and smiled at a slight angle.

“That’s my number. Save it. I’ll be in touch separately soon.”

Every word was barbed, yet the boy, crushed by my presence, could only keep bowing his head.

“Ah… y-yes… I understand, sir. I’ll pick up if you call.”

His face ashen, Sang-jun barely managed the reply and fled, yanking open the front door and vanishing outside. The heavy thud of the door closing pressed the silence of the living room down even harder.

The instant Sang-jun was gone, the light in Jisu’s eyes flipped one hundred and eighty degrees. The flustered, cowed woman of a moment ago had vanished without a trace; now she frowned as if offended and fixed me with a chilly glare.

“Honey, is something going on with you today? Why are you doing things you never do?”

A thorny, brazen attitude—turning the tables completely. Ordinarily, when my wife reacted with that kind of edge, I would fall back a step, still wearing the mask of the affectionate husband and good father, and soothe her mood. That had long been the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠routine. Jisu’s irritated expression, too, seemed to wait for me to apologize as usual and tuck my tail.

It was a shameless calculation: rather than risk being caught in her affair, she would raise ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠her voice and seize the initiative. But I did not look away from that detestable face. I met it head-on. At my cold stare, Jisu’s pupils wavered ever so slightly.

“I told you on the phone I’d been to the hospital because I wasn’t feeling well. And what exactly did I do that’s so out of character, or so wrong?”

My voice was low and settled, yet cold enough to chill the bone. Jisu’s face hardened in an instant. My firm, prickly response—something she could never have imagined from me—left her clearly rattled.

“No… I didn’t mean it was wrong… It’s just that suddenly asking the tutor out for drinks and then getting his number caught me off guard…”

Her momentum broken, Jisu stammered and let the sentence trail away. She had meant to brazen it out, only to be completely caught by my unexpected poker face.

The thought that those same lips had, only a short while ago, been sucking and swallowing that bastard’s cock—and that she was now trying to lecture me again like an ordinary housewife—sent a wave of disgust surging through me. I wanted nothing more than to pull the phone from my pocket right then and shove that filthy video in her face. But I forced the rising emotion back down.

I held the handle of the knife. There was no harm in savoring this precarious upper hand and the thrill of transgression a little longer. Leaving my wife still trying to string together excuses, I turned without a single word of reply and walked into the master bedroom. I felt her dazed gaze stabbing into my back, but I shut the door coldly behind me.

Once inside I threw myself roughly onto the bed, now fitted with a new pad. The stiff feel of the fabric against my skin brought, like an auditory hallucination, the violent motions and moans of only a few hours earlier—Jisu and that bastard tangled together on this very spot, mixing their flesh.

On my bed… these filthy bastards.

Rage that felt like blood surging backward boiled up from deep in my chest. The hand clenched into a fist shook. The urge rose to storm back into the living room, seize Jisu by the hair, and shake her. Yet beneath that extreme fury and wretchedness, strangely, the cock between my legs swelled again, stiff and throbbing with ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠blood.

It was a kind of brain-numbing excitement I had never felt in my life. Anger and a sense of depravity twisted together, and after them came an uncontrollable curiosity and voyeuristic lust: how on earth had my once-chaste wife fallen for that green boy and crawled into this bed with him?

I could not endure the grotesque arousal and the boiling rage any longer. I got up from the bed and opened my phone. From the video I had secretly recorded through the crack of the bedroom door, I found the frame that captured Sang-jun’s naked face most clearly and screenshotted it. I checked the number I had saved moments earlier and opened a new message window.

The moment I hit send, my heart hammered as if it would burst. I stared at the screen until the read receipt vanished without a trace. He had seen it. The boy had confirmed the message. Yet for a long while after the “1” disappeared, no reply appeared.

I could almost feel, through the screen, the terrible fear and despair that must have seized him, and a strange sadistic pleasure ran down my spine. I sat on the edge of the bed, holding my breath, waiting for his reaction.

After a silence that felt like time itself had stopped—five full minutes—the phone finally vibrated.

The boy’s reply came through, completely cowed and drained of strength. I twisted the corner of my mouth upward and rose from the bed. At the thought of how I would ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠handle him once he came running to the park in a panic, my heart pounded violently.

I threw on the outer jacket hanging on the rack and opened the bedroom door. Jisu, sitting on the living-room sofa, glanced at me and asked sharply,

“Where are you going? You said you weren’t feeling well.”

“Yeah. A friend just texted that he’s near the park for a bit, so I thought I’d have a beer and come right back.”

I made the words as flat as I could. At that, Jisu launched into the same old shameless nagging she always did, speaking to my back.

“Honestly. You finally come home early for once and instead of playing with your kid a little, you take that body of yours out drinking again? The second a friend calls, you’re up like a shot.”

The everyday scolding I would once have brushed off with a soft apology now ignited a fury so intense it bordered on murderous. The woman who had taken her little brother’s cock with her own hands was still playing the perfectly moral wife and mother in front of her husband.

For a second the rage nearly boiled over, but I managed to keep the poker face and gripped the door handle.

“I’ll be right back.”

Leaving Jisu’s nagging behind me, I shut the front door. With the heavy thud of the steel door closing, the detestable warmth at my back was finally cut off.

Outside the apartment the sunset was already fading and the surroundings were growing dim. My steps toward the park felt strangely light, yet inside my chest everything was frozen cold. The peculiar lust for power that came from knowing I held the throat of the boy who had soiled my home—and the heavy, depraved thrill that made my lower body grow dense because of it.

Carrying that grotesque impulse, a mixture of wretchedness and exhilaration, I quickened my pace toward the park where the boy would already be waiting, pale with terror.