PAHO 60

Nam Gyeonhwa pretended not to know and continued walking. Despite his quick pace, the presence, far from receding, grew closer. A shadow that had been in hot pursuit loomed over Nam Gyeonhwa’s shadow as he stopped in front of a fork in the road. Na Taebeom grabbed his forearm and spun Nam Gyeonhwa around.

“Where are you going?”

Nam Gyeonhwa silently stared at him as he growled. A white-hot light filled his fierce, angular eyes, matching his ragged breathing.

“…I couldn’t sleep, so I’m going for a jog.”

“A jog? At one in the morning?”

“Yes, I’m going for a jog at one in the morning. Go back inside. You said you were tired.”

Cutting off the conversation indifferently as if there was nothing more to say, Nam Gyeonhwa turned around and started running. But the sound of footsteps chasing him persisted. It seemed that a roundabout expression of his wish not to be followed would be useless. In the end, stopping for a second time, he spun around and faced Na Taebeom.

“…Actually, I didn’t come out to jog.”

Nam Gyeonhwa sighed and continued.

“I started a side job recently. From one to five in the morning. I’m on my way to do that.”

“I know.”

At the unexpected response, Nam Gyeonhwa narrowed his brow. Na Taebeom, who had been tapping the phone in his hand, finally turned the screen towards Nam Gyeonhwa.

“I think I’ve told you this before. That necklace, it detects biological responses.”

“…”

“Originally, there was only a movement pattern of you wandering around the nearby area from about four in the morning, but last Wednesday, I think, starting from that point, there were absolutely no biological records between one and five-thirty in the morning. Unless you were dead, the conclusion is that you took it off and went somewhere.”

Feeling around his neck, Nam Gyeonhwa bit his lip. The fact that deliberately leaving the device at home to avoid his movements being tracked by Na Taebeom would instead arouse suspicion was something he had not considered.

“Besides, if you had worked at a house or a room by any chance, I would have gotten a tip, but there was no news, so those are out. What’s left is simple manufacturing or logistics.”

“…Since you already knew, I guess I don’t need to explain at length.”

At the blunt reply, Na Taebeom shoved his hands in his pockets and looked Nam Gyeonhwa up and down. His sunken eyes were bloodshot with gaunt fatigue. His face was pale and delicate, but his appearance was like that of a zombie. Making a displeased sound, he took a step closer to Nam Gyeonhwa, as if to back him up.

“I gave the puppy a house to live in, bought him clothes and food, and even bought him medicine, so what on earth are you lacking that you have to go around doing this crap?”

“It’s not my house, the clothes and food aren’t my money, and I can’t buy medicine with my money, so I’m earning money.”

Suppressing a raised voice once, Nam Gyeonhwa took a deep breath.

“…I’ll make sure it doesn’t interfere with my bodyguard duties. And I have been. I have that much sense of responsibility. So I’d appreciate it if you didn’t nitpick about things like this. There was no condition that I couldn’t have a side job.”

“You could have just asked me for it. You think I wouldn’t give you that much when we’re having sex?”

“That’s payment for sex.”

“What’s wrong with payment for sex?”

“Does the thought that it’s wrong not even cross your mind while you’re talking about putting a price on my body?”

“Then just think of it as a bonus, not payment for sex. You were so eager during sex, why are you so conservative about things like this?”

“…”

Responding to the shameless tone with silence, Nam Gyeonhwa coldly brushed past him. Na Taebeom, who had been glaring at him with a sulky expression, hurriedly followed after him, afraid he would get away. At the blatant sound of footsteps, Nam Gyeonhwa stopped again and shot him a sharp glance.

“Don’t follow me. I’m not kidding.”

“I’m just taking a walk, too.”

“…At one in the morning?”

Nam Gyeonhwa, who had been pressing him, fell silent. The situation was the reverse of a moment ago, with the questions and answers switched. A deep gaze held Nam Gyeonhwa.

“What can I do when the dog I’m raising is stubbornly refusing to go home?”

“…”

“Ah, the wind feels nice.”

Brushing back his hair, which had been ruffled by the wind between the buildings, Na Taebeom nonchalantly began to hum. Shoving a sigh down his throat, Nam Gyeonhwa quickened his pace as if to shake him off. After running for a while, he glanced back out of habit, but there was only his own shadow flowing from beneath his feet. In place of people, clusters of light shattered and settled like snowflakes. On the empty street, Nam Gyeonhwa did not look away for a long time. It was as if he was looking for someone.

Amidst the noisy operation of the container belts, the hands of the logistics workers in navy work clothes moved incredibly fast. Inside the delivery trucks lined up in front of the warehouse, they were busy organizing the outbound goods that were coming in without a moment’s rest. After moving the last lonely box to the front of the forklift, Nam Gyeonhwa finally straightened his back and dusted off his hands.

Although it was an era where guide robots capable of responding in the six official languages designated by the UN roamed the streets, simple tasks like loading and unloading were still short on manpower. There was no trace of the latest engineering, like robots with multiple arms, in the entire process of sorting, sealing, and transporting the boxes that flooded in to match the hundreds of thousands of orders that poured in daily.

In place of the robots of imagination, the shift supervisor, who had been going around to each of the robotically systematic workstations, blew his whistle. It was the signal announcing a shift change before the morning logistics shipment.

“Good work!”

“Good work.”

The workers, who had been silently flipping over and sealing boxes, scattered as if they were strangers as soon as they exchanged closing greetings. Half of the hundreds of workers were full-day employees heading for a simple breakfast before the morning shift, and the other half were daily laborers mobilized only for late-night loading and unloading. Watching the convoy of trucks leaving the logistics warehouse, Nam Gyeonhwa took off his work gloves.

He thought he would be relentlessly followed, but Na Taebeom had surprisingly disappeared at some point. It was a bit unsettling to think that his strong recommendation not to follow or interfere had worked. If things like that had worked, he wouldn’t have had to go to such lengths to accommodate his whims until now. Then again, he had a car, and he had special forces and security personnel who could rush to his door if need be. He must have returned to Wiyoung-gwan on his own, or if not, he might have gone for a drive.

Suddenly, his voice, nonchalantly suggesting payment for sex, echoed in his mind. The confident expression, as if he considered it a brilliant proposal, was vivid before his eyes. Come to think of it, until a few years ago, he had even made a living from the money he earned from selling his body, drifting from one motel to another, so what was the difference with the money Na Taebeom was giving him that he should refuse it? And yet, Nam Gyeonhwa hated hearing those words. That attitude, as if he were treating him like an object, every single word he uttered kept scratching at Nam Gyeonhwa’s insides, creating a sore. On the other hand, he couldn’t understand his own feelings at all—how he would get so worked up and angry, and ultimately, vexed, only with Na Taebeom.

Nam Gyeonhwa was not one to dwell on the every action of others. Having survived in an environment where he had to be unfeeling and insensitive, he considered unnecessary people to be fleeting moments. He was too busy taking care of Nam Haejin to worry about some stranger he knew nothing about. But he kept, getting on edge with Na Taebeom. His nerves became taut like a sharpened knife. Had he become a variable, not just played by his whims? He couldn’t figure it out.

The break room he entered after a moment’s hesitation was surprisingly empty. To be precise, it looked like a space prepared for one person.

“Ah, you, you’re the new guy, right?”

A middle-aged man in work clothes spoke casually to Nam Gyeonhwa as he entered the break room. A name tag engraved with ‘Lee Seokjin’ dangled from the left breast of his work clothes. There were usually two types of people who wore name tags. Either a shift supervisor or a manager temporarily dispatched from the internal staff. And usually, the latter was more common.

“What was your name again? Mr. Nam Gyeonhwa, is that right?”

Responding with just a nod of acknowledgement, Nam Gyeonhwa found his locker and took out his things. The man, who had come closer, put his arm around his shoulders in a feigned friendly manner.

“Leaving right away?”

“…Yes, that’s right.”

“Not working the morning shift?”

“I have something else I do.”

“That’s a shame. Still, shouldn’t you have breakfast before you go? The gukbap at the diner in front is pretty good. Want to have a drink with it?”

“No, I’m fine.”

Nam Gyeonhwa replied concisely, just enough not to be offensive, and removed Lee Seokjin’s arm. The intention of a man who would suddenly suggest a drink to a mere newcomer, one out of hundreds, was as clear as day. Either go to a motel, or ask him to relieve his sexual urges in a place like the bathroom. If he was on dispatched duty from the main office to the underground site, he would be a respectable head of a household who owned a house in Seoul, yet the sight of him hitting on a penniless daily worker was pathetic, but even that was a form of power, if you could call it that.

Smirking at the natural refusal, he suddenly stroked Nam Gyeonhwa’s hair.

“Pretty boys, whether they’re guys or girls, act as pretty as they look. Playing hard to get is thrilling, but wouldn’t it be better to know your place?”

“Isn’t sexual harassment within the workplace considered in performance evaluations?”

“The higher-ups aren’t that, well, free enough to look into every single incident that happens in a mere underground logistics center.”

He didn’t even bat an eye at the mention of sexual harassment. He was dead tired as it was, and to think that on top of that, he had to deal with this kind of trash hitting on him in the morning.

“How much do daily workers earn these days? Do they even pay a hundred thousand won a day?”

Nam Gyeonhwa, who had been suppressing his irritation, finally couldn’t stand Lee Seokjin’s hand touching the back of his hand and grabbed his arm, twisting it. Letting out a loud, single scream, Lee Seokjin jumped up and down, clutching his arm. In the meantime, Nam Gyeonhwa calmly gathered his clothes and shoes and gestured towards him with his chin.

“And you’ll have a hard time working if you drink from the morning.”

“You, you son of a bitch. You’re just going to leave after breaking my, my arm?”

“You said yourself that the higher-ups don’t bother with things like this. And your arm isn’t broken. To break an arm, you have to use more strength than that.”

“Fuck, hey, you, you don’t know who I am? The director of this logistics center is my older brother. You came in without even knowing that?”

The blunt retort, ‘Good for you,’ rose to his throat, but Nam Gyeonhwa silently opened the break room door wide. No, he tried to open it. Lee Seokjin, who had charged at him from behind like a rhinoceros, grabbed Nam Gyeonhwa and spun him around. A hand flew out and slapped his cheek.

“A guy who’s working a part-time job from dawn because he has no money, should be grateful and smile sweetly when someone talks to him in a friendly way. Fuck, you’re going to be sarcastic with nothing to your name?”

His nose tickled. Reflexively rubbing under his nose, Nam Gyeonhwa swallowed a groan at the sight of blood smearing on his fingertips. It didn’t even hurt that much, but if a single slap to the cheek was enough to cause a nosebleed, he must have been really tired. Perhaps because he was tired, his irritation grew even more, and his fists tightened. Daily wage be damned, he felt like he had to pay him back for the one hit he had taken.

Suddenly, he felt a bustling presence from outside. Through the crack in the door, he could see the shift supervisor walking over. To be precise, his shuffling gait was that of someone guiding a person of high rank.