SUBURBIA

For: Junseo Result: Hermit

It’s a skill, to look inside yourself, one you have mastered. The endless corridors and shifting thoughts are mapped to very carefully. This all takes time, of course. And those twisting hallways are so very difficult to map. It would be so easy to get lost. You know this space so well. Wouldn’t it be a lovely place to stay? So well-known and comforting. Why go back? How nice, how easy, to dissolve, to hide from the rest of the world and all the people in it. Why bother, when you are so good at looking inside yourself. Like enlightenment, the self. Retreating this far inwards is like retreating just as far out, into the vast ether. So comforting. The thing that was you looks at the thing that was the old woman. There is no you anymore. Goodbye.

There was no doubt that the number the young patient had given her was correct. No doubt that she had typed it in correctly, as well. As soon as he opened that mouth of his, Seol-ju let out a small, scoffing breath, though, from where she was standing, if anyone could notice, there was a smile that lifted the corners of her mouth, a bemused reaction to his nonchalant words. “You’re lucky you’re injured,” she told him as she lingered at the entrance way a while more, looking down at her feet. Wriggling her toes in her flat shoes, she hoped to get home as soon as possible and allow every bone and muscle in her body, worn down from the day, to relax, but something kept tugging away at the back of her mind. “Otherwise, you’d be in for quite a telling off at this point.”

Hello, this is Doctor Park Seol-ju, I’m a trauma surgeon at KU Anam Hospital. she had asked his mother as soon as the woman had picked up the phone. Yet, the woman’s amiable tone of voice had changed as soon as her son was mentioned. Mr Oh Junseo is your son, isn’t he? Madam, he has been in an accident, but don’t worry, he’s going to be fine. I needed to contact someone from his family. The conversation had been cut short soon after that. The woman made it clear she was uninterested in her son’s condition and hurried to get off the phone. As Seol-ju started forward again, moving away from the hospital building, she replayed the conversation with his mother in her head once more, her hand squeezing around her phone.

“Where are you right now?” she asked. It did not take a genius to figure his parents, if he had both of them, did not care to seek him out. Soon enough, she had left the front lot of the hospital and was right across the street from Junseo, unaware as of yet that he could have an even better look of her from where he was sitting. “Are you outside? You don’t sound like-” having looked to her left and then to her right to see if she could cross, her eyes eventually landed ahead of her and she squinted at a familiar figure, in his cast, on the bench. Letting out a sigh, she felt her heart drop somewhat. “Wait,” she hung up without waiting for his response. When the road was clear, clutching her bag, she ran right across - hey, if anyone wrote her in for jaywalking, she likely would not have given a damn - reaching Junseo before long.

“Junseo-ssi,” she said. “Are you waiting for a taxi? It’s not going to be easy to catch one here.” Hesitating for a moment, she let some silence fall between them as she waited for his response, though she felt like she could predict what he would say. “Do you need a ride?”

It takes a while before Seolju realises that Junseo has been watching from across the street. He leans back and enjoys the delicious sight: her lack of knowledge, the delicacy of her features, the simplicity of her civilian-clothes. She looks so different without her white coat, so approachable, remarkably younger even, if it isn’t for the tiredness he makes out in her movements. And then he is caught red-handed, but he doesn’t flinch, continues to stare even, and he gives her a half-smile.

“I’m not waiting for a taxi”, he responds and gets back onto his feet again - albeit still struggling with the crutches, he isn’t used to being to frail. Junseo doesn’t hesitate at her question despite his tendency to waver at crucial moments. He gives her an assertive nod, and follows when she leads the way.

As they walk, he decides to break the silence, perhaps get her to warm up to him. “Why did you call me?” His question sounds unusually genuine, and under the street lights and his face half-obliterated by his dark, cheek-long locks, Junseo looks rather boyish and innocent. His crutches only add to the illusion. He struggles forward not faster than a snail. Then he remembers, the doctor must have talked to his mother, and like any other normal person with a normal human heart felt a little bit of pity for him, a thought that left a feeling of disdain.

“Hell?” Inwoo’s voice repeated this, echoing through the silence as the church pulled into view- as dreary as he remembered it, and so much easier to dispose of his victims. His lips pull to the sides of his face as it splits into an unhinged, maniacal laugh, one that was humorless at its core. “I fear nothing.” It was a defiant declaration, an echo of his own pathos. Fear was weakness, and anyone who succumbed to it would meet their end quickly and easily. It was a tactic he’d employed for so long that to think about those who would attack him in some imagined plane was laughable.

His laughter hitched remembering something, though. Ghosts did exist- maybe Hell did too. No matter, he inwardly mused, getting off the car as he turned the ignition off. He took the corpse by the armpits, casually dragging it off the seat before moving unceremoniously to one of the open plots, leaving a trail of skid marks across the pavement. The rain would fill the mud, either way, destroying any signs of anyone passing through. Circling around the plot like a hawk, he looked to the shovel left aside before leaning down again, removing the man’s effects for him. Even in death, he would not be allowed to be clothed. It was how it was- the effects would be destroyed to not leave a trace.

After meticulously removing the corpse’s effects, he began to get to work with a shovel in hand, digging the pit for the man to be inevitably tossed into. “Are you about to simply stand there, father?” he spoke again, not once raising his voice but loud enough to be heard, “Or will you assist me in my endeavor in sending this scum of the earth where he truly belongs?”

In the first flush of feeling that he has brought doom upon himself the first time he invited Inwoo into his life, Haneul begins to gesticulate and moves his right hand to head, chest, shoulders. He quietly whispers a prayer and continues with a “Please father forgive me”, before his hasty eyes follow the man who has left the car and is now dragging the corpse across the mud. His stomach turns when he hears the sound the body makes against the wet grass and dirt. Haneul hears quiet whimpering and only after a while realises that it comes from him.

“H-How can you not be afraid?” His voice is meekly. His eyes try to make out Inwoo’s but he finds it hard to see anything in the dark. His heart races within his chest, and for a whort while, he feels as though the air in his lungs is frozen.

How lucky he is that the priest is asleep, and that the church is rather secluded and that on a Thursday night not a person would make plans to show up.

“You shouldn’t burry him here”, he finally says after a long pause filled with the sound of the shovel being pushed into the ground and dirt falling to the side. “They do funerals here on weekends. If you burry him, they’ll notice.” Haneul doesn’t dare to make eye-contact again.

“Cut him apart and drags him into the forrest. The animals will do the rest.”

Their house lies in Gangnam where the streets are lined up with Teslas, Morseratis and Porsches. Junseo presses the gate opener and looks out over the Valley and watches another day begin. At dusk, the streets are washed in ghostly hues, and give him a sense of strange familiarity. It isn’t the first time he comes home at the break of morning. Home. It isn’t quite anymore. It only used to be.

He pulls into the driveway and parks his car next to his mother’s, which itself is parked next to a Ferrari that he doesn’t recognise. Junseo stays in his car for a while, listening to the quiet and to nothing in particular. Everything is slightly off. Everything is only mildly changed. As though he has gone to sleep one night and woke up the next morning with all his life moved just one inch to the left. Everything looks the same, but it isn’t.

Eventually, he enters the big house. His first instinct is to walk upstairs into his bedroom and he follows it. Out of habit, he locks the door behind him and lights a cigarette. His bedroom has been kept squeaky clean from the last time he has been here. Junseo turns on the TV and and the sound off. The room is washed in the light of late night television.  He takes off his clothes and throws a glance at his digital clock. 04:22. His mother will wake up in a few hours, he thinks, which means he will only squeeze in two, at most three hours of sleep.

The bed is comfortable when he lays down on it, but not comfortable enough for him to sleep right away. He stares at the TV screen hard until eventually, he falls asleep.

At 8:00 sharp, his alarm goes off. The sun lights through the venetian blinds. Junseo watches his own reflection on the mirror-wall to his left. He doesn’t know how long he stays like this. He eyes himself and contemplates getting a haircut, and finally, turns around to pull an envelope hidden underneath his sweater.

Junseo cuts himself two lines of the coke he bought last night. He does them and feels better.

Eventually, noise downstairs catches his attention. Junseo is still wearing his jockey shorts when he comes down. He catches a glimpse of his mother parting with someone, but the figure is out the door too fast for him to make out who it is. 

“You’re home”, she says without being startled at his presence when she turns around to see him.  She looks healthier and younger than the last time he’s seen her - if he doesn’t look at her for too long. “I came in last night.” “Did you see your father again?” The silence around them is awkward, and Junseo feels tempted to ask her about the Ferrari he saw when he walked in. But he doesn’t say anything.

“Do you need money?” “No”, he tells her, knowing she’ll slip him something when he leaves anyway. Then he watches her pour a glass of wine. “You look thin.” No response from him again. “And pale.”

“I mean, it’s my duty as a highly ethical person, to ring the police if there’s a gangster in her hospital, isn’t it?” It was meant as a joke, the tone of her voice very clearly humorous. A nurse had walked into the room and the two of them exchanged brief looks as the other woman proceeded to walk to another patient. Had the daily rounds begun? If they had, Seol-ju had no business intervening, not here at least, but she comforted herself with the fact that at the very least, Oh Junseo was her patient. None of the other men in the room were, but he was.

“Thirty?” His blatant lie snapped her out of her thoughts and she gave him an almost contemptuous look. “You don’t need to lie, Junseo-ssi, you’re clearly much younger than that.” Early twenties, she had decided, willing to stretch it to about twenty-four or twenty-five. It was odd how predictable human age could be, even if one wanted to fool oneself otherwise. But, there was a boyish defiance in his eyes, a kind of light that she rarely saw in any of her peers, yet it was accompanied by a strange and distant fatigue that she could not associate with his current post-accident state. Nonetheless, his hands were what betrayed him the most - their youthful glow and perfect anatomy could not have belonged to anyone in their thirties. One could call it a hunch, but that was what Doctor Park was going to go with.

“Minister of Justice?” she repeated. Oh boy. Did she have a spoiled “heir” on her hands? He certainly looked the part, almost, though the name he gave her rang no bells. “I’m sorry but I don’t have a TV.” Snorting at the comment of his phone number, she “Hey!”-ed him when he just grabbed her pen. Taking the paper from him, she looked down at the numbers and nodded, letting out a sigh. “Try not to give the rest of the staff any trouble, okay, Junseo-ssi?”

When she left the room, she did it with some strange air of regret. The daily rounds must have proceeded, and Chief Kim must have checked up upon Mr Oh as well, but the strange feeling that weighed on her persevered, and only intensified when she rang up the boy’s mother. Such disregard - stunned by the woman’s indifference at the fact of being at a hospital, Seol-ju was left speechless and dwelt on it the entire rest of her shift. When the evening came and she was passing by the room where Junseo had been staying, she saw that he had already been discharged and she felt a sting of regret yet again. She could have said goodbye more properly, she could have made sure that someone came to pick him up.

What a horrible mother.

By the time she walked out of the hospital, she was already listening to the phone ring, as she waited for him to pick up. “Hello? Oh Junseo-ssi?” she asked when she heard it answered, without waiting for the other person’s voice. “It’s Doctor Park, from Anam Hospital.”

Eventually, the doctor left, and Junseo had to humor himself -- all by himself. Here and there, the occasional nurse walked in with whom he could flirt. But all in all, time seemed to move slower when he had to live through it sober. It dragged on endlessly, shapelessly, until the very late hours, right before the sun went down and he would be released.  Junseo, of course, knew what it meant that no one came in again to inform him about what he had heard from his family. They must had called his mother. And while he was definitely disappointed at the outcome of things, he wasn’t surprised: No one would be coming. No one had the patience for his antics, no one from his immediate family anyway.

Junseo was discharged all by himself, even if hospital guidelines suggested otherwise. As he walked out of the building, he struggled with the crutches. Who would have thought being a cripple was this much a pain in the ass? The evening air was cool and soothing. A few cars passed him by, and he watched a young girl help an old man into a taxi. As his eyes trailed his surroundings, they eventually landed on a bench just accross the street.

He sat down there eventually, his phone in hand, hoping to find someone to pick him up. In a condition like this, he couldn’t go back to Haesoo. Not that he was ashamed --- he simply didn’t want to be mothered by her. She liked to do so already, anyway, and acted like the kind of mother he had never had: strict and disciplinary.

His contacts, however, did not seem like much of any solution to his problem. Noona #1, Noona #2, Big breasts, Delivery, Daewoo, Daewoo’s sister, Short delivery girl, Yera --

His phone began to ring.

“Hello? Oh Junseo-ssi? It’s Doctor Park”, the voice spoke from the other line. Instinctively, Junseo raised his eyes and saw the female doctor standing in front of the entrance of the hospital. He was a little far for her to notice him right away.

Dongyoon jogged over, casually warming down with a radiant smile- he didn’t look any different from before, even with the still-uncharacteristic nook around his neck. Hearing the other mention a date, however, his ears pinned back at the sound of further movement, but he was ready to start teasing anyway, the sense of danger not even raising any hackles.

What was the strange man going to do on a date? Bore them to death by staring at them?

He giggled a little, impetuous and brazen in his attitude as he bounced on the balls of his heels to start warming down. He was in his element, really, after everything that’d happened the past year- but he was still but the ripe old age of 22, and nothing really fazed the boy at this.

“Who’s the poor unfortunate soul?” he joked, casually coming to a halt: he’d been instructed threatened to not strain his newly-regrown tendons, and he knew he’d never be able to run as fast as he did anymore, if he even could. He plopped down next to the unnamed man, tying his shoelaces while he talked (multitasking was very good!), “You didn’t buy her flowers! You’re so unromantic.”  

Had it not been for the unlookers --- the potential witnesses if you will --- _____ would have grabbed Dongyoon by his wrists, thrown him over his shoulder, then would take out his most reliable possession, his beloved Beretta, which was secured safely against his back under his jacket, and with a defeaning bang, he would disturb this fine day’s balance. Of course, he would shoot four more times into Dongyoon’s lifeless body. Just in case.

That thought alone drew his lips into a wide smile. _____ was grinning now from ear to ear. “There is someone like that”, his words came out like a confession. Had one seen him, one would believe he was about to meet the woman of his dreams. But _____ was merely still intoxicated by his little fantasies of ridding himself of this nuisance.

Don’t be suspicious.

Although she had expected the young patient to protest again, or act on whatever was left of his defiance while his body visibly fought against it, the moment he spilled his name, Seol-ju felt like she had won something. An unreasonable feeling, especially considering the professional barrier she ought to keep between doctor and patient, but there was no stopping it now, the pleased and almost victorious, small smile that curls one corner of her mouth upwards as she watches him give up. “Oh Junseo,” she repeated, nodding once.

Scoffing softly, she unfolded her arms and reached for something in her pocket, though having found nothing, her arms fell down beside her body as she replied to him. “No, not all of them. Just those with a bad attitude who ought to be a bit more grateful instead.” She had certainly overstayed her visit. She had done the same thing with a person who was now, allegedly, her best friend — when no one had come to visit him, Seol-ju had taken it upon herself to assure he was doing well.

But what about Oh Junseo? It had only been a few hours but had anyone been contacted? She had no idea. The mention of his leather jacket and his IDs made her feel stupid. She could have thought of that herself, but she had not even registered the jacket before. Had someone else already done that and failed to notify her? Indignant, she walked over to the clothes rack. “Why do you need five IDs? What are you, a gangster or something?” she heard herself ask and the moment the words left her mouth, she paused, staring off somewhere. Her back turned to Junseo, he could not have possibly seen her expression - she looked as though someone had brought an ice cube down her back and she was trying hard to show no reaction to the sudden glacial cold overtaking her senses. Is he a gangster for real? What am I supposed to do if yes?Was he one of them?

Clearing her throat then and doing her best to shake off the discomfort, she rummaged through the jacket and found a wallet in it. She took it out and turned around, showing it to Oh Junseo. “Are they here? Am I going to find someone’s number in here, to call? You must have some family or a friend to pick you up when you’re discharged, Junseo-ssi. It will be a while, however, as you’ve suffered a fracture in your leg,” explaining, she walked back to him, slow steps guiding her back to his bed.

“I don’t have to answer to you.” His voice was meekly, unlike his usual nature. Where once was rage, now nested the sweet solitute of the painkillers and narcotics he had been pumped with while he was unconscious. Junseo watched the doctor rummaging about in his jacket. As she moved, the white fabric of her coat loosely draped her body, Junseo could not help his wandering eyes. How long had it been since he last touched a girl? Right, the accident, last night. Because he not only had wandering eyes, his hands liked to wander as well.

The doctor held up his wallet, a brown, old one, made of leather, bursting at the rim from all the used up cards, papers and what-nots he had inside. The doctor came back to his bedside eventually and handed him the wallet.

The first thing that revealed itself when he opened it, was two condom wrappers. Junseo let them fall out without any second thought. His fingers began to pool through the openings in search of his actual, original ID, and he began to speak again.

“I don’t keep numbers in my wallet. How old am I? 30?” A laugh followed his words. He was trying to hit home with her. As a doctor, she would be around 30, he assumed. “I have a family. In fact -- maybe you’ve seen it on TV -- my father ran for Minister of Justice. Oh Moohyun.” Before he was arrested for Client Theft and interest of conflict. There was a sense of pride when he spoke. It rarely happened. His old man was a legend in his eyes, a real women’s man who knew his way around life. Of course, Junseo knew, that sooner or later a man like that would always be caught. But that was only part of living, wasn’t it?

Uriel: ...sentences.

IRRITATION SEEPS INTO THE VERY ESSENCE OF HER SOUL. Though what more could tarnish it? She’d always thought of souls as pure white with the ability to tarnish over time; the innocence of children giving into the pure mire of adulthood until what is left is broken, tattered bits soaked in the blood and ink of daily life.

She is not the only one who has found herself in such a vicious cycle; no, certainly not. Dark eyes ringed with the purple tinge of sleepless nights see more than people realize, only wrapped in the safety of earbuds that play very little if anything at all. It is what keeps her bubble safe and secure, that people might think she is oblivious to the way things go on. Yet even such safety nets can be rendered improbable and that much can be seen in the halls of the ‘bosses’ meeting place.

It’s an old and decrepit place; the muck hidden behind pristine carpets but you cannot hide the raucous laughter of men who think themselves untouchable. The men whose profits from crime and whose power could be reached even in the pits of such poverty as hers. Many of their faces blend together but there is one in particular that stands out enough to cause her stomach to turn in circles, causing fire to settle in her chest and threaten to choke her out into nothing.  ❛ Don’t you have someone else to beat up on? You’re their dog, right? They haven’t gotten tired of me yet? ❜

Effortlessly, he had merged into the role. By now, it had been 143 days ever since he had assumed the name Go Dongjae, an unfortunate fella in his opinion, who had killed himself at the age of 24 and now re-emerged from the dead with a new face. Dongjae was the perfect mask, unremarkable in his living, quiet and ghostly. He left behind no immediate family when he left, which had made _____’s transition into his life all the more easy. 

And now he was working his way up the ranks of a mafia-like organisation. Which meant the first step was torment he had to endure while being out with the footmen. They were a terrifying bunch when they gathered together, like an impenetratable force to be reckoned with. But the foes they faced together were regular folks, not undefeated supervillains, which made their cause all the more laughable in _____’s opinion.

The enemy they faced today was as unremarkable as Dongjae must had been in his prime. She was a young thing with big empty eyes. She seemed fiesty, and the way she picked him out of the crowd of men made him uncomfortable. He wasn’t the only one who noticed that he was singled out. A murderous backslap hit him and propelled him a step forward. The culprit was another gorilla of a man with a voice of millenial penetration and power. “She wants you to take care of this, pretty boy”, errupted and along with it a choir of hyena laughter. What followed was indistinguishable chatter and screaming, and an air filled with the smell of alcohol and their body sweat. 

_____ stepped forward toward her and began to speak, his voice deep and loud enough to catch the respect of those men around him just for a moment. “Aren’t you a brave little thing? You can’t involve yourself with things like this and then expect the easy-out” He joined in on the laughing.

“Aren’t we friends? That’s not how you speak to your friends.”