“……Fuck off.”
He never intended to compromise in the first place.
I spat at his face. The man wiped the spit from his face with the hand that had been prodding my ass and stood up. This silence was terrifying. I thought he might drag me away to give me an enema or shove something like a vibrator inside me as punishment.
The man stared at me without a word, then finally turned and left the room. Was he angry? I muttered to myself as the door slammed shut. I hoped he wouldn’t come back. But even as I thought that, I shivered.
If he never came back, I’d starve to death in here. How long would it take for my body to be found? What if I turned into a skeleton and still wasn’t found? Would that man ever be caught? Had anyone even reported me missing? My aunt might not care much about me, but surely she’d have filed a missing person’s report by now.
No, it didn’t matter if she had or not……. I…….
I didn’t want to die.
My mind was a mess, in complete disarray. Tears welled up in the corners of my eyes and began to stream down my cheeks. Just then, I heard a clattering sound, and the door that had been closed opened again. It was the man.
He had returned with a ladder. A lightbulb was in his gloved hand. He looked down at me, my tear-filled eyes wide open as I stared up at him, shrugged, set down the ladder, climbed up, opened the light fixture on the ceiling, and inserted the bulb.
I asked him in a subdued voice,
“What are you doing now?”
“Installing a lightbulb.”
“Who doesn’t know that? Why…….”
“You were suffering, so I’m compromising.”
Compromising? Was that all? I frowned and closed my eyes, turning my head away. The man climbed down from the ladder, found a switch I hadn’t noticed, and pressed it. Then he picked up the ladder and left the room.
Through my tightly closed eyes, I saw the light seeping in. My heart pounded wildly. It was racing. Hope. I was hoping over something as small as a lightbulb. It was pathetic. But I couldn’t stop this strange feeling.
I slowly opened my eyes. The bright light entered my thinned corneas from being in the dark. The darkest bedroom was now the brightest space in the house. I had vaguely known the layout from the flashlight, but under the white bulb, the colorful, cute wallpaper and the decently furnished dresser looked different. As expected, the room was small. With a king-sized bed and a dresser that didn’t fit the space, it was no wonder it felt cramped.
There was enough space for maybe one desk, but the wallpaper there was yellowed with stains. I realized it was from my urine and blushed. The flooring was wooden, and the urine seemed to have seeped in.
I might have to smell this stench until it fades while I’m locked up here.
***
After Baseok sunbae mentioned Cha Jin-wook, I started watching him closely. I wasn’t suspecting him at all. We were in the middle of a practice match, so maybe Sunbae Baseok had seen wrong. Even if Jin-wook really had touched my phone back then, the idea that he was the stalker was absurd……. Damn it.
Honestly, I didn’t want to believe it was Jin-wook. I sighed as I wiped the sweat off the basketball with him. It was frustrating. “Hey.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you like guys?”
The ball Jin-wook was holding slipped from his hand and rolled far away. He turned to me with a stiff expression. Goosebumps rose on his muscular arms, exposed by his loose tank top. “Are you crazy?”
“No, just asking. Never mind if not.”
I took off my basketball shoes, put them in my bag, and changed into my regular shoes, trying to sound casual. Jin-wook looked like he’d heard something unpleasant, rubbing his arms as if he had goosebumps, then ran to pick up the ball.
I stared at his back, then nervously packed my bag. After using the shared gym, we always had to clean up before leaving for the next person, and Jin-wook always ended up doing most of the cleaning. Waiting for him had become routine. As usual, I waited for him, fidgeting and biting my nails. Ever since I heard what Sunbae Baseok said, I couldn’t stop thinking about it.
If the guy I thought was my friend was really my stalker. If the lukewarm semen scattered on my bed was Jin-wook’s. I imagined Jin-wook on my bed, his pants down, masturbating, and swallowed hard, leaning against the wall to calm my churning stomach. I hated having these filthy thoughts. The more I associated the stalker with Jin-wook, the more suspicions piled up.
He had answered “Are you crazy?” when I asked if he liked guys, but anyone could lie about that. Once the doubt started, it grew like a chain. It was suspicious that he had never had a girlfriend despite his good looks. And the way he had camped outside my house for a month to catch the stalker—now that I thought about it, it was incredibly suspicious. Come to think of it, he was the one who had found the stalker’s tiny camera in my room.
If he was the stalker, what was that KakaoTalk message I got? Maybe there was a way I didn’t know about.
Lost in thought, leaning against the wall, a hand suddenly reached out and cupped my cheek. I flinched and sidestepped away from him. It was Jin-wook, finished with cleaning. “What are you doing? Are you sick?”
“No, not really.”
“Asking things you never asked before. I thought you were making fun of me for not having a girlfriend.”
“Have you ever secretly dated someone?”
“If I had, that’d be great, but unfortunately, no.”
“You really don’t like guys…….”
“I told you, didn’t I? Ugh, I’ll make a girlfriend just to prove I’m not lying.”
“Why don’t you have one?”
“Do you think I’m single because I want to be? It’s not that I don’t want one, I just can’t get one. But why are you asking……? Unless you’re getting those messages from that stalker guy again?”
I flinched at the mention of the stalker. I couldn’t tell him I was suspecting him, so I changed the subject. “No, it’s not that. I just noticed a lot of the people I know are gay, so I was curious.”
“……I’m thinking about something.”
“What?”
“I’m seriously considering whether to hit you or not.”
“…….”
“What the hell are you talking about? Did you catch some late summer heat?”
Maybe I should just ask him outright. Did you touch my phone? Why did you unblock me? How long have you known about the stalker? Are you my stalker? I couldn’t get a single word out. I didn’t want him to know I was suspecting him. It felt pointless to bring up the past, and I didn’t have the courage to see disappointment on his face if he found out I suspected him.
“Maybe I did catch some late summer heat.”
“Want to get ice cream? Lee Heon isn’t around today. It feels like I can finally live without seeing that bastard.”
“Why do you hate him so much?”
“He’s so damn confrontational.”
“About what?”
“The way he looks down on me. How dare he be so rude to his sunbae.”
“He’s not even in physical education. He’s in horticulture. Maybe he just looks that way because he’s tall?”
“That’s what makes it worse. And……”
And what? He hesitated, then finally added cautiously, “……I don’t like how you’re getting close to him.”
“What?”
He wasn’t a kid, but after all this time of tormenting Heon, that’s what he said.
“Who is he? Where did you meet him?”
“He lives in front of my house. He’s also a friend of a sunbae I know…….”
“……He lives in front of your house?”
I snapped, making him flinch and step back. Jin-wook seemed to realize his voice had been too loud, so he clenched his fist and cleared his throat. “Ah, I’m hungry. Should we eat first and then get ice cream?”
I looked at his profile, clearly trying to change the subject. He quickly turned his head toward me, mouthing “Why?” I avoided his gaze, afraid my suspicion would show, and answered, “Sure, whatever.”
“Pointless.”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
