Chapter 14:

My God! What could have happened to someone so old that he would kill himself?

They say the light was incredible.

No matter how far gone he is, he has children...

Well, what about his daughter?

I don't know what I was thinking these past few days. I felt like I was swimming through endless clouds, gasping for air, and every now and then, I would regain consciousness and find myself in an unfamiliar place.

I was lost. The sight of the large wooden coffin in front of me brought me back to consciousness. It was my father's funeral. I rubbed my eyes with the back of my hand, feeling the strangeness. But the scene before my eyes remained the same. Ha ha, a dry laugh escaped me, or rather, I thought it did.

Thank you for coming today.

No way. If it were yours, not someone else's, I would definitely come. It's a real shame my own brother left like this.

 Because in my previous life, my father didn't care whether he was alive or dead. This is my first funeral. And the first time I've attended one.

Perhaps that's why everything feels so unfamiliar. The people with grim smiles, their faces frozen in stone, the burning incense, my father's motionless body buried in the coffin, the pure white chrysanthemums surrounding him.

It's not so much a feeling of freedom as a feeling of loneliness, disconnected from reality. Everyone plays their roles, like gears meshing, but only I remain motionless, frozen like a broken robot.

"Aren't you tired?"

Someone approaches and speaks. He's wearing an elegant suit and a white bracelet on his left wrist. His bangs are carefully swept back, and his eyes are narrowed. He resembles his father, but his face seems much younger.

His worried gaze sweeps over me. His face is familiar, like my father's, but we've only met a few days. He was his father's younger brother, I think. So, to me, he's like an uncle.

My father rarely spoke about his family. I only knew that he had cut ties with them a long time ago and moved away. Still, if my younger brother attended the funeral, I doubt he would completely cut them off. And seeing that younger brother so preoccupied with such trivial matters, I guess that quality runs in his blood.

"The truth is, I have something to tell you."

While I remained silent, my mouth closed, the man gently scratched my cheek with his finger. Then he carefully lifted it. What was he asking for? A division of the inheritance? Is the only inheritance I have a loan to pay off?

Or my own body? This brat? What a ridiculous idea, haha. His expression remained blank, unblinking.

 "If it's okay with you, I'd like to welcome you into our home. Even though we haven't seen each other in years, you've always taken care of my business. I want to repay you for that."

"Uh... well, to be honest, I'd like to adopt you. What do you think?"

We've only known each other for a few days, and now, out of the blue, Imyang calls me. I don't know what to say. So I answer quietly, like a scarecrow. After a while, the person looks embarrassed and leaves, head tilted back. Then, someone else arrives.

A stubble of beard covers his chin, and his top button is undone. It's hard to believe he's still in his twenties. His face looks battered by the passage of time. I feel his ears perking up.

My trainer, who gave me a sweet victory. For some reason, I can't see the sunglasses he always wore.

"Nice to see you." I thought we'd exchanged a kind word and was smiling, but for some reason, the corners of his lips remained motionless. Training is on hold for now. Take a moment to gather your thoughts. That'll benefit you too. You won't have any complaints, will you?

I'll be waiting.

The coach, as if he didn't want to say much, blurted out a few words and turned around.

I grabbed his sleeve as he left.

"Coach, coach."

"Why?"

"It's raining outside, so I told him to bring an umbrella."

"What are you talking about? The sun is so bright..."

The coach suddenly fell silent mid-sentence. He stared at me blankly, then carefully removed my hand and continued walking without another word.

I followed his disappearing footsteps and walked to the empty window. I rested my arms on the sill and looked out.

"Rain."

Although the sunlight was dazzling and not a single bird could be heard outside,

it was definitely raining. -Ttirik

I push the front door until it clicks and a mechanical beep announces the lock. It's been a while since I've been back, and a chill, perhaps due to being away from home for the past few days, welcomes me. I take off my shoes and enter. My hesitant steps naturally lead me to the living room.

It's nighttime. The furniture is plunged into darkness, and I look down at my clothes. A black dress tucked away in a corner of the closet. I'd rather not change and just fall asleep. Still, out of habit, I turn on the living room light.

The filament lamps hanging from the ceiling emit a bright yellow glow. At the same time, a desolate scene unfolds: an empty sofa and a dining table. My father was away from home more than I thought, but why do I feel so uneasy?

My vision blurs. I stare, then turn back to Buck. The pristine white wallpaper. A little taller than me, a gaping hole the size of a finger opens. I raise my arm and stroke it.

My father hanged himself. This hole is the mark of that death. He hammered a nail and tied a rope right here.

Although the police recovered the nail and rope as evidence, I was the first to discover his body. I know that. Even if I did, it wouldn't mean my father came back to life, so it's useless.

Without turning off the living room light, I enter the master bedroom. I see my father's bed. I sink onto it. The soft cushions embrace me, and the cool air caresses my bare skin. I sniff, hoping to smell a widower, but I only catch the fragrant scent of fabric softener.

After a moment, I crawl under the covers like a snail. Like a true snail, I pull the sheets over my head and force my eyelids shut. When I close my eyes, the scene floods back. It's the same even if I don't close my eyes, but when I do, the memories come back even more vividly. So I don't close them. Sure, I can't sleep, but after all, if a living being doesn't sleep for a long time, it's destined to fall asleep sooner or later.

Now that I think about it, what should I do? My thoughts are about to turn negative again as soon as I let my guard down, so I quickly change the subject.

What should I do now? First, I have to go to school. Whether my father dies or not, the school won't give me even a week to recover. I doubt many children can process the death of their parents in just five days, but that's the standard the country sets.

And then? After that, I have to keep training. I'm a runner on a team. My mother and father wanted me to compete. Athletes can't afford to miss a single day. I have to train every day. Keep going, keep going! —Ah, my head hurts. I feel like I'm forcing words into the small space of an A4 sheet of paper. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I repeat like a parrot.

There's no medicine, so should I put on some music? The song was "Where Is My Mind?" by the Pixies. What am I? A child ignorant of the world. What are my strengths? I have none of those, but instead, the image of my father hanging. My tongue hanging out of my mouth. What an ugly sight. Should I just die? Horrible thoughts. Why does it seem so ugly to me? A sheet full of Prozac instead of cotton. A corpse covered in preservatives.

It wasn't intentional, but having experienced it once, I thought it wouldn't be so difficult. I babble, I babble. And what happens once inevitably happens twice. I babble, I babble.

My body is trapped under the sheets, but my senses reach out like long arms. In an instant, my hands reach out into the living room, groping for the place where my father died. There's no warmth, not even the smell of blood. The body wash must have arrived and left by now.

At that moment, my phone ringing brings me back to consciousness. I don't know who it is, but it's definitely not the call I was expecting. I cover my head with the blanket, as if trying to cover my ears.

But for some reason, my phone keeps ringing. It's a constant, annoying buzz.

If I don't want to hear it, I can just reach out and turn it off. It's right there in my pocket. But why can't I let go of it? I just don't want to touch it.

Finally, I closed my eyes. Unwilling to stay awake, I remembered a scene I hated, and a piercing scream filled my ears.

But now I'm deaf and blind. Self-hypnosis, self-hypnosis.

Soon, the dawn moon sets. The morning sun rises through the hazy morning mist, but no light floods the sunless room.

Am I finally falling into a deep sleep, or is the same dream simply continuing?