The Trial
Crowded rows of red-brick houses.
Scruffy dogs wandering the roadside.
Cigarette butts tumbling across the ground.
Blackened wads of gum.
Sleazy business cards turned limp and soggy from the rain.
A shabby snack shop.
A laundry whose open-or-closed status was anyone’s guess.
A corner store with puffed rice set out for sale, and a tiny church.
A steep uphill climb.
All of it jumbled together in a cramped alley too narrow for a fire truck—the landscape of the neighborhood where I once lived.
And rising in the middle of it, our six-story walk-up with no elevator.
Beside it, the neighbor’s door plastered with flyers.
I peeled away the thick layers of paper and tape and pushed the door open.
“Grandma!”
The smell of fermented soybean paste.
The smell of Grandma and Grandpa.
The smell of old side dishes.
Naphthalene.
Bleach.
Yesterday’s leftovers.
Stale diapers.
Feces soaked into the wallpaper.
And, faintly, fabric softener.
I never liked those tangled smells.
On top of that—
“Mom!”
“I’m not Grandma’s mom. I’m Noah’s mom from next door.”
“Mooom!”
Cracked and dry.
Toothless, the words came out thick and slurred—yet the volume was enormous.
I was terrified of the old woman next door’s voice.
“Noah. Just set the side-dish containers down and go home. Mom needs to clean first.”
She let out a small sigh and looked around the house. My eyes followed hers.
Wads of tissue everywhere. Stained clothes. Rolled-up diapers and overflowing trash bags. Our own side-dish containers scattered across the table. A soju bottle filled with sesame oil. A chamber pot so full it looked ready to spill. Cans brimming with waste oil. And a family photo, grimy with filth, taped crookedly to the wall.
“...Okay. I’ll help.”
“No. Noah, go home—”
“It’ll be hard if you do it alone, Mom.”
“Come on. Mom does this all the time. It’s fine.”
“Even if you do it all the time... work is still hard. So let’s do it together.”
Ignoring her protests, I stepped into the chaos.
The smells thickened. I forced my face into a neutral mask and walked into the kitchen.
Skitter—
A cockroach so big it made noise when it moved darted under the fridge.
“Ugh...”
I swallowed the terror crawling up my spine, rose onto my tiptoes, and set the containers on the cleanest spot I could find.
Then I scampered over and stuck myself to Mom’s side.
“Th-there? Is that okay?”
“Yeah. I have to clean the fridge anyway, so Mom’ll sort them later.”
She gave my bottom a couple of light pats, steadied her breath, and opened the door to the room where Grandma’s shouts were coming from.
Through the widening crack I glimpsed the room—and immediately turned my head, clamping down hard on the rising urge to vomit.
“...Noah. Want to wait at home?”
“Huff... N-no. I’ll wait.”
“...All right. Let’s finish quick and go home.”
“Okay...”
Once I saw Mom step inside and close the door, I pulled on the plastic gloves I’d brought from home and began gathering the trash strewn across the floor.
Moving fast but carefully, every sense on high alert for another cockroach.
Fifteen minutes or so must have passed.
A burning smell began to drift in.
At first I thought nothing of it—our neighborhood always smelled like that—but it grew stronger until it filled the whole house.
Mom had the door shut, and the stench inside that room was probably too thick for her to notice.
It was definitely coming from inside the house...
I stopped picking up trash and searched every corner.
Checked the gas.
Shut the valves.
Examined the wiring.
Then I found the source.
Laundry on the veranda, blackening as it burned.
Cigarette ash rolling beside it.
I sprinted to the kitchen, filled a basin to the brim with water, and raced back to the veranda.
Splash—!
I made sure it was completely out, checked for any other flames, then leaned out and looked up at the floor above.
A heaping ashtray. A plastic water bottle stained murky brown.
As I thought... a cigarette butt that had fallen from that ashtray.
“...I’m telling Dad.”
That man on the sixth floor had already made half the building suffer with his cigarette smoke. I hoped he got chewed out good this time.
Sure, living on the sixth floor made going downstairs to smoke a hassle—but he still ought to think about other people.
I gathered the charred laundry and thought quietly to myself.
We were really lucky.
“Ugh, what a cocky bastard.”
“How did it go, honey?”
“Same as always... He says he’ll cut back for now. Three days from now he’ll be puffing away in his room again.”
“Haa... I hope not.”
Mom’s sigh turned into a white puff of breath in the cold air.
Dad watched the fading cloud, then startled at her thin clothes, wrapped an arm around her waist, and gently steered her inside.
“You’ll freeze, honey. Let’s talk more inside.”
“Yeah. We still have to eat dinner, after all.”
Mom followed his lead.
The moment the front door clicked shut, Dad let out a heavy sigh.
“Anyway, if it hadn’t been for Noah we could’ve had a real disaster. If that waste oil had caught fire...”
“Um... why does the old lady next door even have oil drums from a chicken place?”
“Grandpa collects waste oil for a living. He must’ve left them there for a bit... We really need to talk to him. It’s too dangerous.”
Mom answered for Dad, scribbled something on a sticky note, and slapped it onto the front door.
“Honey, help me move them later, okay?”
“Of course I will.”
Dad nodded readily, then pulled Mom and me into a big hug and laughed bright and free.
The little box in his pocket poked my arm.
He’d found the ring...
After dinner and a bath, I went to my room as usual and turned on the computer.
I launched Black Sun without thinking.
Not the character who carried a greatsword.
I logged in with a different one and started a raid.
I finished the raid by a hair before stamina reset, shut the computer off with a clean feeling, and lay down.
Morning of a special day.
I opened my eyes.
Saw Dad off.
Saw Mom off.
Turned on the computer.
Logged into Black Sun.
Wedding anniversary.
We went to the all-you-can-eat barbecue place we always visited.
Ate.
Took pictures.
Happily.
Joyfully.
Came home.
I turned on Black Sun.
On my finger, a silver-white ring set with a blue cubic zirconia gleamed.
An ordinary clear day.
I said goodbye to Dad as he left.
Said goodbye to Mom as she hurried out.
Turned on the computer.
Logged into Black Sun.
The silver ring on my hand kept bothering me.
An ordinary clear day.
I said goodbye to Dad as he left.
Said goodbye to Mom as she hurried out.
Turned on the computer.
Logged into Black Sun.
The silver ring on my hand kept bothering me.
Today is the day I die.
I wipe the pure-white urn clean.
Wipe the faded photos in the frame.
Hang the necktie.
Hang it from the light fixture.
The necktie around my neck tightens my breath.
The silver ring on my hand keeps bothering me.
The necktie around my neck tightens my breath.
The name of the silver ring that kept bothering me rose to the surface.
Rubia.
“Hey, kid! Get up... Wait. You’re already awake?”
The door opened and a man’s face appeared.
Not my real father by blood.
But more of a real father than anyone else could have been.
Always cool.
Reliable.
The one who believed in me.
My dad.
“If you’re up, hurry out. We have to do this before Mom gets home.”
“...Yes.”
“...Since when do you listen the first time?”
“It’s your wedding anniversary. Mom and Dad’s... twentieth.”
“Saying something that sweet still won’t get you allowance.”
The words were stingy, but the smile on his face was so warm it felt like it might tear my chest open.
“Okay. Hehe.”
“Come on. Dad made doenjang stew. I snuck in a ton of thinly sliced beef without telling Mom, so let’s eat before she gets back.”
“Sounds good.”
Dad’s hand reached toward me.
A big hand.
Covered in calluses.
Full of burn scars.
Rough and ugly.
But the hand of a hero who saved people.
I gripped it tight and stepped out into the living room.
And so,
the happiest,
the unhappiest,
and the most unforgettable day of my life
began.