Regarding My Life (2)
The weekend arrived, and for the first time in what felt like forever, the four of us managed to get together. Loud music, boisterous voices, the sharp bite of alcohol in the air. Maybe it was because I’d been locked away in Som’s world for so long, but this once-familiar scene felt like something from another universe entirely.
“Hey, Lee Seung-ho. Are you starving yourself or what? Why does the kid look like this? You’re wasting away.”
Chan-uk took a swig of beer and looked me up and down.
“Me? I’m the same as always…”
“Same my ass. Yong-jun’s the one working his bones off, so why are you the one turning into a damn skeleton?”
“Ah~ Looks like all that meat went straight to me instead. We’re screwed, for real.”
They grumbled, but beneath those teasing eyes was worry they couldn’t hide.
“Hey, today’s on me. Seung-ho, shut up and stuff your face.” Jae-hyeok announced it was his treat for finally passing the N Company interview.
“Thanks. I’ll eat a lot.”
“Whoa, Jae-hyeok hyung looks badass as hell.”
“Only calls me hyung when it benefits him, this bastard…”
I ignored Yong-jun’s antics and silently bit into a piece of perfectly crispy fried chicken. The salty, spicy, savory explosion hit my tongue. After months of eating only the bland, salt-free food tailored to Som’s tastes, my neglected taste buds screamed at the intense stimulation.
“Holy crap… What is this? Why does it taste so good…?”
The genuine awe that slipped out of me made the guys stare at me like I’d lost my mind.
“What the hell, dude? You’re acting like you’ve never eaten chicken before.”
I just laughed and tore into the chicken like someone might steal it from me.
“Anyway, I’m a corporate slave now, Jae-hyeok’s at N Company… What about you two? Chan-uk, Seung-ho, what have you been up to lately?”
At Yong-jun’s question, the noisy table fell quiet for a moment.
“Me? Well… it’s not exactly my major, but I’m prepping for an internship at a small company.”
Once Chan-uk finished, all eyes naturally turned to me. I forced down the piece of chicken stuck in my throat with a gulp of beer.
“I’m just… preparing for job hunting, I guess…”
Once again, I hid behind that empty, meaningless answer. Chan-uk stared at me quietly, then tossed out a sigh-laced joke.
“This guy’s completely lost his mind raising Som. Last time, who was it? That cousin or whatever you were looking after.”
“Oh, you remember?”
“Of course I remember. White hair… super wary of us. Is that friend doing okay?”
Chan-uk laughed like it was just a funny memory, but I felt my heart turn to ice. Without knowing any of the connections, he had precisely stabbed at the most painful part of me.
“I’ve been taking good care of them… so, yeah, they’re fine now.”
“But before you take care of everyone else, take care of yourself first. You look like a damn zombie and you’re still trying to look after people?”
“Agreed. You need to get a job, but you’ll drop dead before you even start.”
“Yeah… I got it.”
I knew it wasn’t something to just laugh off, but right now, all I could do was smile and brush it aside.
The lively atmosphere while we ate chicken didn’t last long. I soon started getting ready to head home.
“Hey, I should get going first.”
“What? Already? Because of your girlfriend?”
“Yeah. Som’s waiting.”
“Look at this guy openly calling Som his girlfriend now, kekeke.”
Before I could leave, they added one last jab.
“Sigh, fuck. The second you get home you’re gonna start taking care of Som again, you idiot?”
“……”
“At least don’t starve to death, man.”
It was rough, but it was exactly the kind of goodbye they’d give. I turned and hurried home.
On the way back, my friends’ words weighed heavily in my ears. What did it even mean to live for myself? My entire world, every second of my time, had already been reorganized around Som.
I suddenly looked around the streets. People noisily chatting and clinking glasses. People cheering under the bright lights of the arcade. All those ordinary scenes felt strangely unreal.
I didn’t belong in that world anymore. When I was alone, I had hidden myself from the world. Now, I was forcibly hiding myself inside this bizarre secret called Som.
I no longer belonged to that ordinary world. I was trapped inside Som’s world, and I had dragged myself even deeper into hiding.
“Oppa!!!”
The moment I opened the door, Som threw herself into my arms as if she’d been waiting.
“Yeah, Som. I missed you too.”
But my greeting came a beat too late, weighed down by the bitter reality that had sunk in. The words from the cafe boss, Yu-ri, and my friends stuck in my ears like thorns.
Even as I held Som, I looked around the empty room. This was Som’s world. And under the excuse of protecting her, it had become little more than a hiding place for me.
I gently set Som down and walked to my desk. In the dark, the laptop screen—thinly coated with dust—reflected my zombie-like face.
I have to do this for Som.
That determination wasn’t a free pass to stay stagnant. If anything, it was the very reason I couldn’t stop. If I wanted to take responsibility for this kid and this reality until the end, I had to start running again.
I opened the laptop.
That’s right. Coding. It was something I could do. I had to start by moving my stalled time again. That was where it had to begin.
“Hehe… Oppa smells nice…”
At some point Som had crept up behind me, wrapped her arms around my waist, and buried her face in my back.
“What are we doing today? Playing with dolls? Or should we be a prince and princess!”
Som looked up at me with sparkling eyes, urging me on. Seeing that innocent face, I couldn’t bring myself to speak right away.
I was just about to start again, but her world still revolved entirely around playing with me. After waiting for me all day, I had to say something selfish.
I swallowed hard and finally forced the words out.
“Som, today… would it be okay if Oppa studies on the laptop for a bit?”
The moment the words left my mouth, I regretted them. I was sure her face would crumple into tears any second.
“Never mind, Som. Let’s just—”
“Okay!”
Before I could even finish, Som gave a bright, clear answer. For a moment I just stared at her blankly, unsure if I’d heard correctly.
“If it’s something Oppa wants to do, I like anything! Som wants to watch from the side!”
“Pfft…”
The breath I’d been holding finally burst out as laughter. Right. This was what Som was like. What we did didn’t really matter. As long as she was with me, that place became her entire world.
“Alright, Som. Thank you.”
Som scampered over and plopped down right beside my chair. That small warmth supported my back more firmly than any other comfort could.
That warmth told me how foolish all the heavy worries that had crushed me on the way home had been.
I was turning my stopped time once again.
It had been a while since I’d turned on my laptop and opened a coding test practice page. Black letters tangled across the pure white screen like a complex maze.
“W-what is all this…”
Som, who had at some point rested her chin on my knee, looked at the screen with wide-eyed curiosity.
“Pfft… It’s pretty complicated, right? This is what Oppa does.”
To Som, who had only just started learning Hangul, all those tags and variables must have looked like alien code.
“Ugh… It’s so complicated. I’ll do this instead!”
She quickly lost interest and began drawing in the notebook she’d brought over. I felt a surge of pride watching her study on her own, but it only lasted a moment. Seeing her burning eyes and the sly little smirk tugging at her lips, it was clear her real goal was the reward waiting at the end of her studies.
I let out a helpless chuckle at her ridiculous enthusiasm and turned back to the screen.
Work for employment. Labor for survival. In the past, just facing this black screen would have suffocated me. But now it was different.
Tap. Tap.
The sound of the keyboard rang out cheerfully. The moment I caught a logical error or solved a stuck algorithm, I remembered. The pure joy I’d felt as a freshman, knowing nothing, yet completely captivated by this logical world.
The fact that Som was by my side. The heavy weight of needing to take responsibility for her. Strangely, it felt like all of it had wiped away the anxiety that had been crushing me.
For the first time in a long while, I could focus completely.
After a long stretch of concentration, I opened the dreaded self-introduction form again. When I was alone, that white screen in the empty room had been nothing but a string of lies to hide how pathetic I was.
Responsibility. Diligence.
It had been an empty, miserable act of forcing together hollow words. But now it was different.
Scritch. Scritch.
Beside me, Som sat with her legs tucked under her in a tiny lotus position. Just like she used to do as a dog, she stuck the tip of her little tongue out between her pursed lips while writing her letters.
Watching her, I started typing again and wrote the word responsibility on the screen.
It was the weight of this small being beside me, clumsily learning about the world. It was the desperate need to become a guardian she wouldn’t be ashamed of. My once-empty self-introduction finally felt like it had gained a solid core because of Som.
Suddenly, I looked at her. She had finished today’s portion in her clumsy handwriting, lifted the notebook high, and was smiling at me with pride.
“Som did it all!!”
Seeing her like that, I couldn’t help but pull her into my arms—this unrealistic yet only reality of mine.
“Som.”
My voice came out hoarse without me realizing.
“Yes?? Oppa, what’s wrong?”
Startled, Som turned to look at me.
“Thank you for staying by my side.”
That was all I could say. Because you fill up my empty world so completely. Because I found a reason to live again. I poured all those feelings into that one sentence.
“Aww… Som is even more thankful! Som can’t do anything without Oppa. I love you, Oppa. Hehe…”
Som gave the happiest smile in the world, rubbed her face against my chest, and without hesitation licked my cheek just like she had done back when she was a dog.
Today, rules didn’t matter. The damp displays of affection that usually left me so flustered felt heartbreakingly happy instead.
“Since Som wrote Hangul so well… now… please give me a kiss, Prince.”
“Pfft… As you wish, Princess.”
She stopped licking my cheek, looked up at me, and boldly demanded her reward. Her completely predictable behavior was so lovable that I gently pressed my lips to hers. For once, I didn’t feel the usual embarrassment at all.