LLU 22

When I opened my eyes, a gloomy sunset filled the room. The somber color of twilight, when the bright light that had burned through the day was being pushed away by darkness.

Just how many hours did I sleep?

My temples throbbed as if someone was hammering inside my head. I stared blankly at the burning sunset beyond the wide-open curtains, then slowly pushed myself up. My body felt deathly heavy, but I couldn’t lie here for a thousand years.

I saw the money placed neatly on the bed. That crazy bastard told me to grab a bite to eat before leaving, and then he went and gave me two million won. He must have so much money that he wants to squander it in all sorts of ways. I felt like spitting on the money.

My legs, down to the tips of my toes, were trembling uncontrollably. I barely managed to step onto the floor, but my ankle buckled, and I nearly fell. Thankfully, my wrists, which had been tied the whole time, moved without any issue. I took a couple of steps and then caught my breath a few times. With precarious steps, I headed to the bathroom.

And this is supposed to be a human face.

The reflection in the mirror was a sight not even worth laughing at. I stared at my hideous appearance with a numb gaze, as if I were a third party, before turning my head away. Having surpassed my limits in so many ways, I didn’t even have the energy to be surprised.

The bathroom of the hotel, which I was visiting for the first time in my life, looked more luxurious than my one-room studio apartment. If I had come at a different time, with a different person, I might have taken pictures and admired it with a joyful heart. That is, if I hadn’t come with a son of a bitch who beat me up and raped me like this.

I slowly crawled under the showerhead. I adjusted the angle carefully, lest the water hit my face, and turned on the faucet.

Warm water, at a pleasantly comfortable temperature, poured down generously. I stood still under the stream of water, like a dead, withered tree.

The semen and blood that had dried messily on me flowed down my legs and onto the floor. The foreign substances, mixed with the pouring water and turning cloudy white, disappeared down the drain. The moment I saw that, the breath that had been suffocatingly trapped inside me burst out in a great gasp.

“…Fuck…”

At the same time, my eyelids grew hot. I covered my face with my trembling fingers. The torn skin on my battered face let out a silent scream.

While I slowly washed the blood-caked face, my slumped shoulders heaved repeatedly. Rough breaths and a hoarse voice, which had already given out, echoed off the bathroom walls, not drowned out by the sound of the pouring water. Like that, for a long while, I purged the remnants of a heart that had been desperately shattered.

I don’t know how much time had passed. I had a bad feeling that if I kept this up, I would collapse from exhaustion right here. I rubbed my bloodshot eyes with cold water and left the bathroom.

Mechanically, I picked up and put on the clothes he had brought. Fortunately, my phone was on the table. I glared at the money on the bed for a long time before finally taking it and putting it in the inner pocket of my outerwear.

The first reason was that I didn’t have a single penny on me, having been dragged here by that son of a bitch with nothing but the clothes on my back, and the second was that there was no way Choi Junghan would know whether I left this large sum of money here or took it with me.

The one thing I hated more than death was the thought that he might misunderstand and think I took this kind of dirty money for myself. I would only use it for the taxi fare and would return the rest of the change without fail. If by some chance we ever cross paths again, I will throw it in his face, down to the last ten-won coin. With that thought, I left the room.

I called a taxi and went down to the first floor through the hotel lobby. The chilly winter wind clawed viciously at my face. It was so painful that tears welled up on their own.

Hunching my shoulders, I was looking around for the taxi I had called when a man in a suit approached and greeted me.

“Student Pioon?”

“…Who are you?”

“The Senior Managing Director asked me to take you home. Please get in.”

The murderous intent I had forcibly suppressed in a corner of my heart began to rise again. I shot the man in front of me a hostile glare.

“Just go. I called a taxi.”

“I cannot.”

The man said in an emotionless tone, yet with an overbearing posture.

“He said I must escort you all the way home.”

“I don’t want to. Who does that crazy bastard think he is, giving me a ride? I can’t even go home on my own terms?”

“Please get in. I will see you home comfortably.”

“Ah, for fuck’s sake!”

My chest heaved with an explosive rage. Unable to hold back, I yelled, and I could see the gazes of people around us gathering one by one. But my head was burning with anger, so I couldn’t have cared less about such stares.

“I said I don’t want to. Can’t you hear me? When a person says it this clearly, for fuck’s sake, just go! You and that crazy bastard are both the same…”

It was the moment I said that much. A sudden wave of dizziness washed over me, and my vision spun. My feet desperately stamped the ground to find my balance as my body staggered. The man naturally came closer and grabbed my arm.

“Don’t be stubborn, just get in. I’m not going to do anything else, so just let me take you home.”

The man whispered threateningly into my ear. I gritted my teeth and tried to shake him off, but another fierce headache and a wave of dizziness washed over me again. He used that opening to naturally support me and put me in the back seat.

It was so cold outside, but the inside of the car was unbelievably comfortable. In the end, with a feeling of resignation, I slumped into the back seat. There was nothing to be gained by being more stubborn here. If I were with Choi Junghan, I would have refused, even if it meant jumping out of the car, but it wasn’t like he was sitting next to me.

Once I quieted down, the driver drove silently toward my home. At first, I watched the outside warily, just in case he was taking me somewhere else, but as time passed and increasingly familiar roads came into view, my vigilance gradually subsided.

Come to think of it, just how long had this car been waiting in front of the hotel? How did he know when I would come out? It seemed what he said earlier about having a driver on standby wasn’t just empty words.

I scoffed inwardly. It was none of my business whether Choi Junghan had made his driver wait in front of the hotel for hours.

Finally, the car stopped in front of my apartment, and I got out as if I were escaping. It was only after I rushed inside and locked the door that I could let out a deep breath that felt like it would collapse my chest.

ㅤ

The inside of the apartment was pitifully cold. I turned on the boiler first and changed into loungewear. I pulled out all the blankets I had and lay down on the thick mattress pad. Even after pulling out the two thickest blankets and layering them, the cold wouldn’t go away.

My body was chilled and shivering. Staggering to my feet again, I took out painkillers and an antibiotic ointment.

I swallowed the medicine past my swollen throat and, looking in the mirror, applied the ointment to my face, which still stung as if it were on fire. It hurt so much that my fingers trembled. A scream threatened to burst out several times, but I forced it down each time.

It felt like some lump lodged in my chest was growing hotter and hotter. I crawled back under the blankets and closed my eyes without delay. I turned off my phone because I didn’t want to receive a call from anyone.

What would my mother say if she saw this face?

And what should I say to my mother?

Such worries were pushed back by an overwhelming wave of sleepiness. I was at the point of letting things be what they may. I willingly surrendered my consciousness to the dark slumber that assailed me.

I was sick for a whole night.

The mild fever I had started with began to boil by nightfall. But it was too much trouble to go to the emergency room, and I couldn’t go anywhere in this state. I barely managed to crawl out from under the blankets, tossed a couple of painkillers and fever reducers into my mouth, and went back to sleep.

The night was terribly long. The fever that gripped my whole body was one thing, but my torn-up ass and my battered, split-open face were what hurt the most and caused the most agony. Moans of pain escaped my lips on their own. My hazy consciousness flickered on and off like a light.

And that night, my mother did not come home.

I didn’t call, figuring she would come back after finishing her date. I was worried that she might have overexerted herself again, but I didn’t have the luxury to worry about someone else and ask how they were doing right now. Besides, Chairman Choi was reliably by my mother’s side.

In truth, I didn’t want to hear anyone’s voice right now, including my mother’s. I didn’t want to show this side of myself to anyone. Whatever happened later, for now, I just wanted to sleep as if I were dead.

Fortunately, the fever broke in a day. It was almost noon the next day when I staggered to my feet and mechanically opened the cupboard. I felt like I was going to die from hunger.

I couldn’t even eat ramen, afraid that the spicy broth might splash on my completely busted-up face. In the end, I took out some instant rice and made a watery porridge. I forced down the tasteless white porridge and lay down again.

In a daze, I checked my phone, which I had turned back on, and saw several missed calls from my mother.

‘When did she call?’

Looking at the time, they were all from early this morning. I must have fallen asleep at dawn from being sick all night, so I didn’t even hear the vibration.

Just as I was about to call my mother, I got a call from an unknown number. Looking closely, it didn’t seem to be Choi Junghan’s number, which I had seen before. It felt somewhat unsettling, so I was about to ignore it, but then I thought it might be Chairman Choi trying to give me news about my mother, so I pressed the call button.

—Oon-ah, why have you been so hard to reach? Your mother was very worried.

“……”

It was as I expected. I couldn’t say anything to Chairman Choi and remained silent. Even for me, I couldn’t just blurt out that I had been sick for days because his son had raped me.

—Hello? This is Oon’s number, right?

“…Yes.”

Holding such thorny, painful words in my mouth, it felt like my throat was festering. Chairman Choi paid no mind to my silence and continued.

—Your mother suddenly had uterine contractions again. We decided to have her admitted this time.

“She’s been… admitted?”

—Yes. Ah, Ms. Jeongin is doing fine, so don’t you worry. They say that as long as we suppress the uterine contractions with an IV drip, there will be no issues with the baby’s and mother’s condition. I’ll take good care of Ms. Jeongin, so it would be nice if you could come and see your mother often, even if you’re busy.

Another silence followed. I couldn’t readily answer yes to his kind words.

It was because every time I heard Chairman Choi’s voice, the hell his son had bestowed upon me unfolded vividly before my eyes. A memory so savage and cruel that it made me shudder, one that felt so distant even though it was only a day ago.

—Hello. Hello, Oon-ah?

“…Yes.”

I barely managed to pull the words out of my scratchy throat. Hearing my listless voice as I said I understood, he asked if something was wrong.

After a moment of silence, I answered that I just had a cold. Chairman Choi left me with a request to at least answer my mother’s calls properly before hanging up.

“……”

I stared blankly at my phone for a moment, then swallowed the empty breath that was rising in my chest. In that instant, something hot surged up from within me. I couldn’t stand the sudden, violent nausea that rushed up my throat.

I ran to the bathroom and threw up all of the pale porridge. I heaved several times, shedding tears drop by drop. I couldn’t breathe under the weight that was oppressively bearing down on me.

The feeling of exhaustion that washed over me was twice as bad as before I had eaten, and I was soon completely drained. I staggered over to the mattress pad that I hadn’t folded and collapsed on it again.

My face, which throbbed in time with my racing pulse, the pain in my battered rear, and my arms and legs, which had grown rigid from being tensed so desperately the whole time. All of it filled me with a terrible sense of disgust.

—Are you eating well? I heard from the Chairman you have a cold. I knew it, you seemed to be dressed so lightly throughout the trip. That’s why Mom told you to dress more warmly usually, didn’t I…

My mother’s voice goes on and on. The familiar tone travels through the phone, fading and fading until, at some point, it disappears as if a switch had been flicked off.

The continuous sound of my mother’s voice had no effect on me. I just sat there listlessly, holding the phone to my ear.

Instead, the unpleasant chill that wrapped around my body was all that registered clearly. I hunched my shoulders and pulled the nearby blanket over myself.

It’s happening again. The chills hadn’t subsided for days.

—Oon-ah. …Oon-ah, hello? Are you listening?

“Ah…”

I snapped back to my senses. My voice, still scratchy and hoarse, forced its way out of my throat.

“…I’m listening. Mom… you’re okay, right?”

—Mhm, I told you not to worry. I’m being treated like royalty! When else would I get to be admitted to a VIP room? All I do is lie down and eat the meals they bring me, and laze around watching TV. The baby is super healthy, too.

It must be to reassure me. The way my mother was deliberately making light of the situation.