7) Find the Evidence!
For several days, Seo Wonseok didn’t show up at school.
Yi-hyeon, who believed the school must have issued disciplinary action since it was so obvious that Wonseok had slapped Han Jun across the face, found himself hoping that the bastard would just never come back at all.
About a week passed since Wonseok stopped attending school. That day happened to be the day Han Jun—who’d had the back of his head split open and stitched up—was scheduled to go to the hospital to have his stitches removed.
“I’ll go with you.”
Yi-hyeon walked over to Han Jun, who was lying slanted against his desk with a large piece of gauze taped to his head, and spoke.
“It’s not like I’m going in for some big surgery that needs a guardian’s consent.”
“Still.”
Insisting on going together, Yi-hyeon headed toward the bathroom. There, he ran into Lim Haejun—and the moment Haejun saw him, his face twisted into a vicious scowl that immediately set off alarm bells.
That was when Yi-hyeon realized his assumption about why Wonseok hadn’t been coming to school was completely wrong.
“You fucking homo bastard!”
Haejun suddenly grabbed Yi-hyeon by the collar and started demanding to know if it felt good to send Seo Wonseok all the way to the school violence committee.
“You happy? Huh? Fuck, are you happy? You piece of shit—always grinning like an idiot, never saying a word, and then you go and seduce some guy, latch onto him, and use him to open a violence case. That feel good?”
“What the hell are you talking about? Let go of me first.”
“Fuck that. What are you gonna do now, huh? You two teamed up and ruined Seo Wonseok’s life—what now?”
“I don’t know what you’re saying. Calm down first—”
“That bastard Han Jun did it on purpose, didn’t he? He deliberately provoked Seo Wonseok. Fuck, you think no one could see through that sly little fox?”
“What the hell are you even saying? What did Han Jun do?”
At Yi-hyeon’s question, Haejun tightened his grip on Yi-hyeon’s collar and glared at him with bulging eyes.
“You little shit, don’t pretend you don’t know after hearing everything from Han Jun. It’s fucking disgusting.”
Haejun didn’t explain any further, but as Yi-hyeon suddenly recalled the location of Han Jun’s injury, he was finally able to piece together part of what had happened.
“Quit throwing a tantrum. If Seo Wonseok gets expelled because of Han Jun, from that moment on, I’m gonna drain you down to the fucking marrow. You’re a senior—you can’t even transfer. For half a year, until you’re begging me to kill you, I’ll make your life a living hell. Got it? So if you want to live, go tell that bastard not to spew bullshit at the violence committee.”
As his voice rose, students began pouring into the bathroom to watch.
“What is it, what is it? Is it true that guy teamed up with Han Jun?”
“I knew something was off from the moment he kept smiling and wagging his ass at Han Jun.”
“What happened? Tell me too.”
“They say Han Jun recorded Wonseok saying he’d kill Yoon Yi-hyeon, then told him he’d delete it if he followed him to the back yard.”
“Yeah. And then Seo Wonseok lost his shit and smashed Han Jun’s head with a bat.”
Amid the buzzing chatter, Yi-hyeon finally learned why Han Jun had been hurt—and his head rang as if he’d been struck himself.
…That day, Han Jun got hurt because of me.
His legs gave out, and Yi-hyeon staggered.
Passing his burden onto Han Jun in the first place had been a mistake. He should’ve stopped things before they spiraled this far.
Thinking about how he’d ignored Wonseok’s behavior all this time made Yi-hyeon’s throat feel painfully tight.
The guy had been nasty, sure—but he’d never used direct violence or interfered with Yi-hyeon’s studying. That was why Yi-hyeon, who didn’t want to lose his scholarship at a school where no one outperformed him academically, had convinced himself that all he had to do was endure the annoying, infuriating moments.
But his complacency had dragged Han Jun into it—and in the end, Han Jun had been seriously hurt.
Yi-hyeon recalled Han Jun’s face that day—smiling as he apologized for being late, even though he’d been injured badly enough to need stitches in his head.
After going through something like that because of me, how could you say you were sorry to me—no, how could you run there worrying about me? How was that even possible…?
Yi-hyeon roughly shook off Haejun’s hand that was gripping his collar. Ignoring Haejun’s furious shouting, he bolted for the classroom.
Han Jun, who had been sleeping with his head down on his desk as usual, turned his face toward the window, rolled his lower lip between his teeth, and looked up at Yi-hyeon, who stood there staring down at him in silence.
“Alright, alright. We’ll go to the hospital together.”
“You got hurt because Seo Wonseok hit you.”
“……”
At Yi-hyeon’s darkened expression, Han Jun pressed his smiling lips shut.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Tell you what?”
“That Seo Wonseok swung a bat at you.”
“It’s not exactly something worth broadcasting to the whole neighborhood.”
Han Jun spoke as if it were nothing, grumbling about how there hadn’t even been any witnesses, so he thought rumors wouldn’t spread—yet some loudmouthed bastard had gone and blabbed anyway.
“You should’ve told me, at least. It’s because of me!”
“Ah, damn, you’re loud. What do you mean, because of you? That bastard just went crazy trying to get revenge on me.”
“He didn’t take revenge on you, though!”
“I said no.”
“I need to meet Seo Wonseok.”
“Why the hell would you meet him?”
Han Jun snapped, his brows knitting together.
“I was careless. I thought it was enough if I just endured it. I’ve got a scholarship, and when my weekly living expenses are only ten thousand won, even bus fare is a burden. I didn’t want to get assigned to a school farther away than this one. So even if I got bullied a bit, the benefits outweighed it, and I could endure it. But the moment you got dragged into my problem, I should’ve set things right… Ha.”
Yi-hyeon rubbed the heat burning at the corners of his eyes with one hand.
“I’m going to find Seo Wonseok and make him apologize to you. And I’ll tell him never to lay a hand on you again. If he doesn’t, I’ll report everything he did to bully me to the violence committee.”
At Yi-hyeon’s words, Han Jun let out a deep breath, his shoulders visibly rising and falling.
“Don’t go looking for him.”
“I’m sorry. I never should’ve dragged you into this. I really am sorry.”
When Yi-hyeon apologized sincerely, Han Jun straightened up and sat properly.
“Are you stupid?”
“Yeah. I guess I am. I’ve been doing such stupid things all this time—”
“That’s not what I mean.”
Yi-hyeon slowly lifted his head and looked at Han Jun with eyes reddened from anger and heat.
“Why is the victim the one apologizing?”
At those words, the breath that had been climbing up Yi-hyeon’s throat—choked with guilt over hurting the person he liked through his own complacency, and with rage toward Wonseok—finally began to settle.
“And how many times do I have to tell you it’s not because of you? I just hated Seo Wonseok as a person. That’s all.”
“But in the end, because of me, you got hurt by Seo Wonseok—”
“What about it is because of you? You think I went off on Seo Wonseok for bullying you, and that made him hold a grudge and do this? Not even close. That bastard already couldn’t stand the sight of me, but since he didn’t have a real excuse to pick a fight, he just used you as leverage. And even if that were the case—wouldn’t that just mean he’s a lunatic? He’s the psychopath for going around harassing someone who helps you. So why the hell are you apologizing to me? Stop stuffing weird thoughts into that tiny head of yours and put some English vocabulary in there instead.”
Only then did Yi-hyeon finally understand why Han Jun always said he hadn’t really helped him—even though he had, every single time. Pretending not to help, pretending it was just an accidental clash, pretending it was all just coincidence. That must’ve been how he’d brushed everything aside.
But no matter how much Han Jun tried to hide it or deny it, there was no way someone who’d received that help couldn’t see the brilliance of his heart.
“Han Jun, I—”
“The bell’s about to ring. Grab your science textbook. We’ve got a class change today.”
