“I know that. But you know I can’t refuse when the matching rate is over 80%.”
“Then you should have told me beforehand. If I hadn’t come home early today, were you planning to sign the contract and just notify me afterward?”
Seo Jiwon had tried to resolve this through a calm conversation, but upon hearing the news Joo Minchul brought, she could only grab the back of her neck and fly into a rage. She had tried to understand him leaving the child at home and working as a temporary Guide, but when she saw him saying that he had received an offer to be a dedicated Guide and would likely sign the contract tomorrow, she lost it. She even felt the urge to immediately sew his mouth shut with a needle for his shameless attitude of saying he had no choice when he should be apologizing.
“Is that Esper in their right mind? How could they think of taking a married man with a child?”
The government only considered matching rates when arranging dedicated Guide contracts, but in cases like this, it was morally right for the Esper to refuse. Seo Jiwon muttered that they were both crazy, then startled at the sound of a baby crying, rushed to the room. She held the baby in her arms and soothed it, and the whimpering baby quickly fell asleep. Seo Jiwon gazed at the baby’s face for a long time with complicated emotions.
The next morning, Seo Jiwon demanded a divorce, and Joo Minchul begged on his knees that divorce was not an option. Seeing him like that, Seo Jiwon’s heart softened, and she decided to trust him one last time. Fortunately, Joo Minchul seemed to have come to his senses. He canceled the dedicated Guide contract and returned home, and Seo Jiwon wrapped up her overseas schedules and worked only domestically. Peace returned to their home.
Since they were both working, they continued to employ a babysitter out of consideration for each other, but they shared even small matters and made clumsy but sincere efforts to be better parents to Joo Seolhyeon.
Then, when Joo Seolhyeon turned six, Joo Minchul began bringing someone home whenever Seo Jiwon was away.
“Seolhyeon, say hello. This is Daddy’s friend.”
“Nice to meet you, Seolhyeon. I’m younger than your dad, so you can call me Junwoo hyung.”
“Hey, that’s not right. Seolhyeon, don’t call him hyung, call him uncle.”
Even to young Seolhyeon’s eyes, the two seemed very close. After all, his father’s bright smile, which he rarely showed even to his mother, burst out constantly when he was with this uncle. Seolhyeon liked the uncle who made his father smile, and he liked how the uncle would pat his head and give him candy whenever he came over. So when he turned seven and drew pictures at kindergarten, he naturally included the uncle in his drawing. Mom, Dad, me, Uncle Junwoo. The picture turned out quite nicely, and Seolhyeon was so pleased with it that as soon as he got home, he ran to his mother to show it off.
“Uncle Junwoo?”
But his mother looked puzzled, as if she was hearing about him for the first time, and Seolhyeon excitedly talked about Uncle Junwoo who had been frequently visiting their home since a year ago.
Being still young, he didn’t notice the shadow falling across his mother’s face. That night, after going to bed early, Seolhyeon woke up to loud noises and discovered the source of the sound through the gap in the door where light was seeping through.
His mother, who had never raised her voice at him no matter how badly he behaved, was screaming at his father.
“After everything, you’re having an affair with a male Esper? Amazing, truly amazing. I was completely fooled all this time!”
“It’s not like that.”
“It’s not like that, but you’re signing a dedicated Guide contract and setting up a second household? This is maddening, really. You’re disgusting, you know that?”
Seo Jiwon, who had been raised gently in a wealthy family and didn’t even know what swear words were, trembled all over before finally breaking into a scream-like sob.
Seolhyeon was so frightened by both his mother’s wailing and his father’s cold gaze down at her that he fled the scene. Entering his room, he covered himself with his blanket and repeated that what he had just seen was a nightmare. But his mother’s desperate sobs echoed in his ears until dawn, making sleep impossible.
After that day, a chill settled in the house, and his parents’ small arguments continued. And a week later, Seolhyeon entered an unfamiliar house holding his father’s hand. There was Uncle Junwoo, who embraced him with a pitying face.
“Dad, I want to go home.”
“This is our home now, Seolhyeon.”
“This isn’t our home,” he muttered, but somewhere in his heart, he seemed to understand the meaning, and tears welled up in his eyes without him realizing.
“Seolhyeon, from now on, let’s live with Uncle and Dad.”
“Yes, and you’ll see Mom on weekends. It’s not like you’ll never see her again. Stop crying now.”
Even though he ended up living with his dad, he could still see his mom on weekends. Seolhyeon gradually adapted to the changed environment and became increasingly accustomed to a life where his uncle and father did the things his mother used to do.
“The more I look at Seolhyeon, the more he resembles his mother.”
One day, as Seolhyeon was closing the piano lid after playing, he was startled by a voice beside him. His uncle was standing next to the piano, though Seolhyeon hadn’t noticed when he arrived.
“From his father, he got maybe his eyebrows and nose.”
He reached out to brush aside the hair covering Seolhyeon’s forehead and caressed his face. Suddenly, Seolhyeon felt a sting near his eye and pushed his hand away.
“Sorry, I saw your eyelashes were stuck together and tried to separate them, but I accidentally scratched you.”
Uncle dropped his eyes apologetically, but looking at his face, Seolhyeon felt his hair stand on end. Later, when he looked in the mirror, he saw that the area near the corner of his eye was not only swollen where the nail had scratched him, but there was even a hint of blood. It stung even when he just applied water, and he had to suffer for several days.
After that day, injuries on Seolhyeon’s body cunningly increased. Almost all were injuries from Yoon Junwoo accidentally hitting or pushing Seolhyeon while asking him to do something. Spilling hot soup at the dinner table, stepping on his foot, and other incidents that could commonly happen in daily life, so Seolhyeon couldn’t bring himself to mention them to his father.
“Now that Seolhyeon is entering elementary school, shouldn’t we manage his grades?”
“Isn’t it a bit early to send him to a tutoring academy?”
“I can teach him.”
That’s how Yoon Junwoo began teaching Seolhyeon. It was also from then that he started persuading Joo Minchul that corporal punishment was unavoidable for discipline. There was a rod at home bought for punishment, but Yoon Junwoo never hit Seolhyeon with it. He rolled up his sleeves and hit the child with his bare hands. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that Seolhyeon was hit on every part of his body that could be covered by clothes.
Once it started, the corporal punishment gradually intensified, and Seolhyeon became increasingly afraid of his uncle. But he couldn’t tell his father about this. It was because of what his uncle had said.
‘Do you know why your father left your mother? It’s all because of you. It happened because you told about me. Why don’t you go tell your father again this time? Then once again, your father will lose the person he loves because of you.’
Seolhyeon didn’t want his father to be alone because of him. Although his uncle was cruel to him, his father genuinely loved him, and Seolhyeon wanted to protect that.
But that resolve didn’t last long. After being dunked in the bathtub and water-tortured by Yoon Junwoo, who called him dirty, Seolhyeon was overwhelmed with fear that he might die, and when his uncle wasn’t around, he clung to his father.
“Dad, I want to go to Mom.”
After entering elementary school, he couldn’t even see his mother on weekends anymore. Seolhyeon begged through his tears.
“I want to go to Mom.”
Joo Minchul looked troubled by his son’s state, but he immediately made a phone call somewhere, and Seolhyeon was able to see his mother again. But his mother wasn’t alone.
“Seolhyeon, have you been well?”
“Who is that man?”
“He’s someone Mom loves.”
But seeing his mother already remarried to someone else, Seolhyeon felt despair. The man standing beside his mother smiled consistently, but his eyes looking at Seolhyeon were very cold. He seemed to have come along to monitor and prevent Seolhyeon from saying anything unnecessary.
The time spent with his mother passed in the blink of an eye. Looking at the dark sky where the sun had already set, Seolhyeon felt the time to part approaching.
“Mom.”
“Yes?”
“I want to learn piano from you.”
At the end of the short day, Seolhyeon racked his little brain to find a way to hold onto his mother, and that was the piano.
However, a few days later, the one who appeared before him was not his mother, but an unfamiliar man he had never seen before.
“You must be surprised that a stranger came? I’m your mom’s friend. My name is Woo Seongjun. Nice to meet you, Seolhyeon.”
The man who introduced himself as Woo Seongjun was more interested in Seolhyeon than in the piano. How was he doing at school, what did he do with his friends, what did he find fun, what food did he like.
Not only piano lessons, but when meeting him, Seolhyeon could laugh and chat like a child his age. He laughed and sympathized with stories that no one else had ever shown interest in. One disappointing thing was that Woo Seongjun only came to teach piano for a mere two hours, and even then, he could only see him once every two weeks.
“I told you before that my eldest son is two years younger than you, right?”
As he began learning piano from him, Seolhyeon naturally also heard stories about his family.
“Do you know what song that kid likes the most?”
One day, he brought a sheet music book he had composed and abruptly asked Seolhyeon a question. Seolhyeon shook his head with a face that showed he had no idea, and Woo Seongjun burst into laughter and opened the sheet music book.
“Seolhyeon, you already know this song too.”
A song that was created even before Seolhyeon was born.
A song that his mother played at least once a day as prenatal education.
As he listened to Woo Seongjun’s explanation, Seolhyeon stared intently at the sheet music. His mother had played numerous pieces, and such a song might have been among them, but it was unfamiliar to Seolhyeon.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
