The Weight of the Lead
‘……Where is this?’
Tae-san’s eyes opened to an unfamiliar scene.
From the gap in the basement window of an old row house, someone’s sobbing cries leaked out like screams.
Following the sound, Tae-san’s consciousness settled.
“You little bastard!”
“Stop it, honey! Please!”
The iron door slammed shut with a bang!
A moment later, a pitiful sound like a child’s wail burst from Tae-san’s mouth.
Tae-san realized.
‘This is Jin-cheol hyung’s memory!’
His body felt heavy, sinking down.
His arms and legs didn’t feel like his own.
Yet the sensations were vivid.
It was as if he had stepped into someone else’s living life.
“Why does Dad…… get so angry like that?”
Young Jin-cheol’s voice echoed in his head.
The man called Father hadn’t always been this way.
But once his rubber factory and seafood distribution business collapsed, he was buried under debt overnight.
Drenched in alcohol every day, he poured his regrets over his failed life onto his young son and wife.
Unable to endure those cruel days any longer, Mother one night bid farewell to young Jin-cheol with a meager bundle of belongings.
“I’m sorry, Jin-cheol. Mom has to live too, you know. I’m sorry.”
The memories right after Mother left were hazy.
Days of running alcohol errands and getting beaten without proper meals continued.
Scenes too painful for a child’s mind to bear.
Police sirens, neighbors reporting, strangers in uniform bursting into the house — all flashed by quickly.
Soon, a place familiar to both Tae-san and Jin-cheol appeared before his eyes.
‘Nulbom Orphanage playground.’
Children with faces Tae-san recognized were playing soccer.
Among the small bodies, a large boy was sweating as he joined in.
Min Jin-cheol, whose spirit was as solid as his naturally big frame, had already regained his smile and bright face.
From a young age, Jin-cheol had played the role of the eldest brother with natural leadership.
“Hey, stop fighting. In-seok, you started it, so apologize to Hyung-min.”
“Ugh, but that jerk said I don’t have a mom first.”
“You called me dad-less too!”
“Hiss, I told you not to fight over stuff like that among ourselves!”
He stopped the children’s petty fights and had the upright heart to protect the weak from the strong.
He had learned too early how painful and bitter it was when the powerful oppressed the weak.
“One more dirty word and you’re both done for by my hands, got it?”
Watching young Jin-cheol’s actions in first person, Tae-san now fully understood that his habit of jumping into fights since childhood all stemmed from trauma.
But not everyone saw him in a good light.
“That kid got into another fight.”
“Isn’t he throwing his weight around too much?”
“He thinks he’s the king or something.”
The stares around him were always cold.
Kids his age feared Jin-cheol, and teachers often treated the orphan who was always in fights as nothing but a troublemaker.
Even the other orphanage children were wary of him.
Yet amid all that, one person was different.
‘Baek Yeon-joo.’
The girl with an unusually loud and clear voice always chattered beside Jin-cheol like a little crocodile bird, despite her tiny frame barely half his size.
“Min Jin-cheol! I told you not to hit the kids!”
“That jerk was picking on our orphanage kids and bullying them.”
“Even so, if you hit back the same way, you become just like him, don’t you know?”
“Don’t make me laugh. That punk stole money and tore their clothes, and I only hit him once, okay?”
Of course, the boy who took that single hit was rolling on the floor clutching his stomach, unable to even breathe properly.
“Don’t you know that you hitting once is worse than those kids hitting a hundred times?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m always the bad guy.”
“Keep that up and I’m really getting mad.”
“……Ah, fine. I’ll buy you tteokbokki, so don’t get angry.”
Tae-san’s lips curled slightly at the scene.
‘Hah, noona’s had him wrapped around her finger since way back then.’
In Min Jin-cheol’s gaze toward Baek Yeon-joo, there was an indescribable warmth.
It was quite different from the excessive distance or obsessive attachment the stalkers and mother’s boy types felt toward the opposite sex.
‘I want to protect her, cherish her, make her happy.’
It was the kind of feeling where he would gladly lose a thousand times over for her sake and buy tteokbokki with his only crumpled bill in his pocket.
Though the texture was completely different, it faintly resembled the emotion Tae-san felt when looking at his younger sister So-yeon.
‘……Jin-cheol hyung might have seen noona Yeon-joo as more than family.’
Time passed, and the two became high school students wearing the same school uniform.
By then, Min Jin-cheol had already become a well-known fighter in the district.
The body reflected in the mirror reminded one of a sumo wrestler on the ring.
His neck was thick like the base of an old tree, and his shoulders were as broad as mountains.
Muscles twitched and moved whenever he shifted his arms.
Yet the stares from his peers remained the same.
“Hey, it’s Min Jin-cheol. Don’t even make eye contact.”
“They say he knocked out eight guys under the overpass last time.”
“Eight? I heard it was fourteen.”
“Is that a person or a forklift?”
Whenever Jin-cheol walked by, the classroom hallway automatically cleared a path.
Tae-san couldn’t help but let out a hollow laugh at this unfamiliar sight he had never experienced.
Just then, cursing voices came from somewhere.
“Hey, go buy bread, you loser.”
When Jin-cheol stopped and quietly turned his head, he saw a few delinquents bullying a junior around the corner.
“New transfer student?”
Jin-cheol’s voice was low and firm.
“So what, you bastard. I’m Park Cheol-kwon from Anjung High. Heard of me?”
“Nice to meet you, Cheol-kwon. But fighting in our school is banned.”
“Who the hell do you think you are, you son of a……”
The next scene went as expected.
Bang!
Thud!
Save me!
Thanks to Min Jin-cheol’s violence for the sake of “stopping violence,” the delinquents disappeared from his school.
Of course, Baek Yeon-joo, who always stuck by his side, played a big role in helping him carry out this simple-minded justice.
“Min Jin-cheol! You fought again, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t fight.”
“Then what’s this blood on your clothes?”
“……I picked my nose and got a nosebleed.”
“Liar.”
She was always quick to notice.
That’s why she was the only one who could stop Min Jin-cheol.
“Jin-cheol-ah. What are you going to do after graduation?”
“I’ll go learn a trade.”
“Why not learn fighting? Why waste that good strength?”
“No. Fighting means earning money later.”
Baek Yeon-joo pouted.
“With your physique, you’d be great at judo or boxing.”
“I don’t know. I just…… like making money.”
“Is money that good?”
“You need money to start a family.”
“Oh really? Who are you planning to give that money to?”
“……I don’t know, don’t worry about it.”
“Fine, then buy me tteokbokki when you have money.”
“Okay.”
Baek Yeon-joo was always pushy like that, and Min Jin-cheol always followed obediently.
Jin-cheol’s desires weren’t big.
He simply hoped these days would continue forever.
But.
“Jin-cheol hyung!”
“What’s wrong?”
One of the orphanage younger siblings urgently called for Jin-cheol.
“Noona Yeon-joo!”
On a day when the high school senior was preparing for the college entrance exam.
Jin-cheol’s ordinary daily life shattered into pieces.
A group of delinquents from a neighboring school had picked a fight with Baek Yeon-joo.
Just as they were about to lay hands on her, fortunately, patrolling police intervened.
Before he could even hear that she wasn’t seriously hurt, Jin-cheol’s eyes had already transformed like a mighty guardian deity.
“……Where are those bastards?”
That evening, three ambulances entered the Anjung High School playground.
In the end, Min Jin-cheol was sent to juvenile detention.
Because the injured students’ parents sued him, calling him the worst thug and violent criminal under heaven.
With no parents or connections, Min Jin-cheol ended up in juvenile prison.
Even at his young age, he received criminal punishment including imprisonment through adult court proceedings.
Though separated from adult prisons, the criminal record remained clear.
‘It’s all over now.’
There was nowhere in the world that would accept Min Jin-cheol, an orphan with a criminal record.
There, Jin-cheol decided for the first time to distance himself from the world.
Leaving school, the orphanage, everything behind, he wanted to live alone for the rest of his life.
However.
“Why do you keep refusing visits?”
“……I’m busy.”
“What’s a guy in jail busy with?”
Beyond the visiting room glass, a familiar face appeared.
It was Baek Yeon-joo.
Baek Yeon-joo had requested visits every week since Min Jin-cheol was taken away.
“……Why did you come?”
“What do you mean why. I came because I was bored without you.”
“Did you do well on the exam?”
Baek Yeon-joo gave a smug smile.
“Of course. I’m getting all 1st grades this time.”
“Good. You can go to a good university then?”
“More than enough. I’m even getting a full scholarship.”
“Congratulations. Live well in college. Don’t come to places like this anymore.”
Baek Yeon-joo stayed silent for a while, watching Min Jin-cheol speak with a calm face.
Until the guard announced that five minutes remained until the visit ended.
Baek Yeon-joo, who had been staring intently at Min Jin-cheol’s face, finally opened her mouth.
“Why haven’t you confessed to me?”
“……What?”
“Why haven’t you confessed that you want to date me? For ten whole years.”
Min Jin-cheol’s eyes wavered briefly at the sudden turn.
Soon, Min Jin-cheol turned his gaze away and spoke in a cold voice.
“Confessions are for people you like.”
“Then do it. You like me.”
“How do you date a woman from prison?”
“You can date after you get out. You’re not serving life.”
“Don’t push it. The visit time is almost up. Is that all you have to say?”
“Jin-cheol-ah.”
“Yeah?”
Baek Yeon-joo smiled.
And that smile pierced straight into Min Jin-cheol’s chest.
“I like you.”
For a moment, it felt as if the world had stopped.
“Are you crazy? I’m an orphan with no parents, nothing to my name, and a criminal record.”
“I’m the same — orphan with nothing. What, should I go make a criminal record too so I can accept yours?”
“Don’t joke around.”
“Do you think I came all the way to prison in the middle of winter just to joke?”
The air beyond the juvenile detention wall felt sweet.
Min Jin-cheol felt an emotion he had never experienced in his entire life.
The moment someone looked at his entire self.
Seeing Baek Yeon-joo casually reaching out to his life buried at the bottom, his heart pounded uncontrollably.
“So, are you going to date me or not?”
“Kuh-hung!”
Tears welled up in Min Jin-cheol’s bull-like eyes.
Clenching both fists on his knees, he answered while sobbing loudly.
Min Jin-cheol vowed to live only for Baek Yeon-joo for the rest of his life.
“Wow, it’s like a drama.”
Kang Tae-san opened his tightly shut eyes.
Looking at Min Jin-cheol, who had fallen asleep on the sofa with white foam around his mouth, Tae-san shook his head.
“Be good to noona, Jin-cheol hyung.”
Then, without realizing it, he flicked Min Jin-cheol’s forehead.
Thwack!
Articles broke out.
Unlike the noisy articles, the set, restored after a week of reorganization, was fortunately full of energy.
Staff members were already bustling in front of the studio.
Equipment trucks, lighting, cables, monitors — everything was moving busily.
People whispered around upon hearing that Kang Tae-san’s role had been upgraded to lead.
“Hey, isn’t that Tae-san over there?”
“They say he really became the lead?”
“How is that guy, who’s only just being called a blue chip, supposed to replace Yoon Si-on?”
The lead actor suddenly dropped out and a supporting actor took over.
Such cases were almost unheard of, even in the turbulent drama industry.
Just then, a familiar voice came from behind.
“Heavy, isn’t it?”
It was Director Mo Yeon-hee.
“That’s the weight of the lead role.”
Holding coffee in one hand, she swept the surroundings with a determined gaze.
“Everyone, pay attention.”
The set atmosphere instantly quieted.
“From now on, filming of The Replacement will be reorganized around actor Kang Tae-san.”
For a moment, the lighting director looked up.
“Director, are you sure?”
“I am. You all saw the test footage. The only person who can replace Yoon Si-on is actor Kang Tae-san.”
Breaking the brief silence, someone clapped.
“Good. If the director says so, then that’s it. Everyone, applaud.”
When the veteran cinematographer from the camera team glared at the staff with fierce eyes, applause finally erupted from all around.
“Then let’s all give it our best and get started!”
Tae-san found his seat and sat down, opening his script.
Behind the chair, the words Lead Actor: Kang Tae-san were clearly written.