Short novel

Was in broad daylight after the heatwave lasted four days. The small window of the monitor displayed the number of kalguksu, behind which 5 people could see. Filled with a large red rubber bowl that's perfect for mixing kimchi on the inside, kalguksu contains no garnish or sauce. It didn't even have cabbage or zucchini. Half of the screen was occupied by a rubber basin filled only with whitish cotton wool. So, today we will start with Kalguksu. How are you doing? The man holding the wooden chopsticks turned to the basin and sat down.

Myung became a different person without knowing. She had all her hair removed and her body, which was not cluttered, had a little flesh and looked like the boss of the organization had just freed himself. After eating all the kalguksa in the basin without leaving a single strand of hair, Myung ate five bowls of tofu pancakes stacked on a large plate. It seemed like it was a concept of only targeting uncooked food. Myung's mouth was clear and his expression was calm. He also explained the history and taste of Kalguksu in a friendly voice. But throughout the whole show, I couldn't understand what he was trying to say. The completely white food, slowly sliding into his mouth and disappearing, felt like an act of climbing a snowy mountain, step by step, or a religious ritual but unstoppable violence. When I sat down with a pot full of boiled quail eggs and said it was dessert, I closed my eyes. When I heard the obituaries of people, the first thing I thought to watch the video to the end came to my mind.

The train passed eleven o'clock in the morning due to delays and stopped at a simple station. The snowy street was empty. Shadows seemed to accumulate in places where it was impossible to determine the distance. Along the straight road opposite the train station, you will find the river, and after crossing the long bridge over the river, you will soon find a funeral home.

Snow touched the brown paper wrapped in irises. When the irises were being bought, the radio in the flower shop in front of the station predicted that it would be a white Christmas five days later. However, it has been snowing for a long time. The florist puts the strawberries on a plastic bag, what color will the ribbon be? And asked. When I asked for the geunjo tape, he looked at me with a pruner. Is this floral language called Good News? I laughed as if it meant nothing. I didn't know what he would say if there were people around him. A flower girl with a careless face, like a water buffalo, scattered the unclean stems. The sound of him chopping off stems and leaves continued to annoy.

Myung said that when I think back to my childhood, the first thing that comes to my mind is the iris flowers blooming in the brook in front of the church. He added that this was because only the landscapes were beautiful. Myung's voice came from the strangely sunny weather. I remember a hot light that touched my skin as if it had texture, but I repeatedly rolled my coat and stroked my hand. Then I remembered the scent of tough grass, with his dark tan straight back and a tuft of regrown hippie hair tied to a handful of peacefully swimming dogs. I liked the best of us then.

At the time when I was twenty-two I quickly left in search of people. This happened because a person who had been traveling alone for over a year read a diary that was written on a blog. Men looked different from the other boys. I believed that people can understand the world. Just because I was young, everything was a catalyst and an explosion. For us, who thought that the world would end when we were thirty, it was a time when we tried to live our youth in some incredibly interesting way.

"It was the hardest thing for me to live like I did."

I remembered the words I had written under the picture taken from the cliff. The picture captures a breathtaking sky without a single cloud and the edge of a cliff. I pretend to place the verse in my palm. The transparent spelling of my name on my hand at the age of thirty now resembles a shadow like a tombstone and seems a little young. Why does the same sentence reach different points of view over time? As the starlight that began a long time ago hits our eyes, we, who are twenty-two, are now clearly drawn.

Myung's obituary was natural. I thought people would go much earlier than their universal life. It was a thought close to hardness, so I thought I could take it and touch it in my particular form. I heard from a high school student at a meeting we attended together in college. Two more of us died before reaching the age of thirty. However, the elder was embarrassed, saying that he could not guess that the verb (凍死) was the cause of death. It was a mountain, the first time I heard it. It seemed that I got up alone and got lost. There seems to be no one to go to the funeral. Are you busy now? The kids said you and Myung are best friends. I immediately listened to the words that poured out and looked around as if my elder was in front of me, but no, I'm not busy. I'll go and he answered quickly.

The publishing house was not very busy. I was working in a small office of 20 pyeong, with a sign that read "Yong Publishing Company - Miscellaneous Document Agency." Three employees took turns planning, hiring, writing and editing, and even running the print shop. College libraries were useless. The publisher's name was huge, so I felt like I was gradually disappearing every day.

Our main task was to proofread a dissertation at the Faculty of Humanities or write an autobiography. From time to time there were requests to introduce myself for college admissions and sometimes I wrote a New Year's letter, complaint, and petition. Largely thanks to the wide legs of the boss, the work did not stop, and there were many people who were introduced. But I didn't think I was busy. All these works had a certain direction and character. So, writing the requested article was just copying an object of the same shape and shape, as if only the ingredients were slightly different in the frame for making a triangular gimbap. They all had a face as pale as a sheet of paper, and there was no shouting or throwing of payment documents. I lived without any scheme during such a climax. The point where I compromised with the world was a single point white line on the target. It's breathtaking, but it's not about the air.

But sometimes I wanted to scream. Such a moment came suddenly. It felt like someone was pressing their fists on Myunchi. At that time, I used the method that my people taught me. They ordered small banners and hung them anywhere on the street at dawn. I booked a guerrilla walk because it doesn't matter in the alley. However, I have never tested it. The poster company did not ask anything if they posted the deposit on time. They were also like contractors in that they asked where the scream should be, but they were not curious about the kind or nature of the scream.

The first banner I ordered was "K, I know who you are." K. was a client who requested an autobiography and was a professor at the age of 50 who taught law at Gyeonggi-do University. He came here and said that he had become well acquainted with the president of the publishing house while playing golf. Once he began the data collection interview, he detailed his memories of living abroad as a child. He was extraordinarily handsome and was asked to tell an anecdote about a German homeroom teacher who awkwardly packed a Korean lunch box such as bulkogi or gimbap. After completing his secondary education at an international school in Sweden, he left for the United States, graduated with excellent grades, and added a great episode that is unilaterally loved by women of all nationalities. Especially when I talked about the memories of dancing the blues with the Prom Queen in line with school tradition after I was chosen as my American high school graduate, I tried to take my hand and suddenly lifted me up to dance. When I made an embarrassing expression on my face, I leaned deeply on the leather couch, returned to my authoritative expression and continued the story.

However, when examining the data, none of them matched K's words. There were no Korean students at the Swedish International School at the time, and there were no photographs of the time they were selected for clues. Moreover, the anecdotes he told were too banal and vague to be included in one person's autobiography. He made an advance payment, and once a week I had to continue the interview with him. He only fell silent when I drank the water and when he checked its contents to make sure I was taking notes. The more I listened to him, the more I realized how much he wants to love him.

The boss said he had never met such a person on the golf course. I knew that K. was not a professor of law, but a teacher who taught social work in evening classes, but I did not say that. We don't need truth or objectivity. If you say that a client has lived such a life, we believe it unconditionally. What makes customers happy. So what makes a profit. Just remember these two things. The boss taught me in a kind and firm tone, like a kindergarten leader.

Everything that I wrote in the meantime is far from the truth. Most of the clients who come here have lived false lives and received false degrees. I myself knew better that my body's suggestions exaggerate my past and education. It's not my job to leave a strange life with trembling fingertips, a classic that survives for a long time, turning over paper filled with a mass of reflections. Professor K.'s autobiography was entitled My True Life. He insisted on the name. After I saw the final sample, I sent the file to the printer.

When I told Myung's story, he told me to hang up a poster one day when he felt unbearable to others. I said that I couldn't stand Wow K. It seemed that something I could not bear, but that it was unclear. Only the feeling that something in me is constantly disappearing. However, I ordered a banner as the title says. I sighed and held out the rice, imagining my voice trembling in the wind among the guerrilla banners that were opposed to finding someone lost or building a special school. But the comfort did not last long.

Myung told me that I would eventually have to write about my mother. Mother died alone in an empty house outside the city. So, no matter what I said about her, walking through the air, I felt lonely in the courtyard of the temple, trembling with a white longta. I had no intention of holding the funeral service alone. I didn't lose without showing her respect. So my mother's death was not overcooked, and I could not throw anything into the air.

Myung said that he started hanging banners with a heart tossing every verse from a poem that was rejected in the air. Myung introduced to only one person, not the publisher. I knew who he was holding on to. Myung Myung was a friendly and deep person who studied literature for a long time, exchanging poetry after returning from a trip. When people stayed up all night in the playground in front of his house, sometimes I was there. Myung didn't get up, even sitting on the swing, hearing the sound of the door closing and seeing the light go out from the window. From day one, Myung followed like a shadow wherever he went and sent dozens of letters. I captured my entire daily life on social media, printed it out and put it in my bag. The man pulled back, calling him "Analog Stalker." At some point I left the team. For people like us, this happened because we misunderstood that blindness was enough to motivate us to continue our lives.

Myung wrote on the man's mailbox, door, brick wall, and magnolia leaves falling over the fence. Then I sent him a poem, but ordered to hang a banner around the house, breaking the poem, and another - back. Then I found my banners, photographed and considered it a kind of trip. I liked reading the pictures I sent in like a jigsaw puzzle and connecting the pieces.

“I walked to Lonely Beach, carrying alone an empty universe, like the washed feet of Jesus, a poor heart, whether to jump into the sea or not, the wind is floating on me, the power of the sand that pushes me with my breath. '

I asked what the poem was called, but Myung didn't answer. When there was no answer, I did not ask twice. It was likely Myondo believed that something in his head would be contaminated and sink after surviving the dynamic season. I just had to wait for people in their twenties to get through the season safely.

Met and ate at the end of the season. I liked the direct speech. It hurts so much, but the severity of the pain did not prevent me from speaking. I also liked the way people ate in silence. He seemed to have reached the peak of silence. Myung once said that he no longer writes poetry and does not love him. He said he had no intention of becoming a poet. He just slid down to the floor inside himself, spitting it out like a riddle. Myung didn't order the banner anymore, but I thought of Myung every time I saw a banner without sources as I walked the streets.

Only later did I realize that he became a person who lives in a completely different way. Now he was a spit inside. I didn’t know that all the tongue and energy of blindness entered his body like breath inflating a balloon.

There was no sound other than the sound of snow on the plastic sheeting wrapped around the flowers and the sound of the heels hitting the sole of his boots. The wind died down, the snowflake became thicker. There were no buildings like shops, restaurants or hotels around the straight two-lane road. Cherry trees grew on both sides of the road, and only the rice fields were whitewashed with snow. Even the seldom-standing streetlights were extinguished, so their eyes shone. Like a lost world, the son-in-law was silent all the time.

The bundle of frozen irises felt like the corpse of a small animal. What's good about all this? He took out a bunch and threw it on the snow. As if I closed my open eyes over him, Sobok began to snow. The dotted line and all the boundaries of the road disappeared into the snow, so it was impossible to determine the direction in all directions except the cherry trees at regular intervals. The cars did not travel in the same direction as the obituaries. The eyes sticking to the woolen coat looked like rice leftovers left in a rice cooker for a long time. I threw out another flower. The hands did not become lighter. I looked up. The snowflakes seemed to appear suddenly, like the cotton of a pillow bursting in the dark air. I threw the flower away and left. My heart grew heavier as I remembered people's faces.

The place where people stayed was Aoruk Beach, which is rare even on Koh Tao. The journey from the airport by buses, ferries and Songthaew took 15 hours. I couldn't even check if I read my email suggesting to go there. However, since the route he found in his daily diary on his blog hadn't changed for over a month, he assumed that he would still be there. Myung traveled to stay in one place for a long time. In a year, he visited less than five countries. He said that he always stayed in the cheapest hostels with shared bathrooms, ate street food prepared by the locals, and spent time smoking with the locals under a flower fence.

Instead of an air conditioner, I found a hot little bungalow with a long, thick fan running on the ceiling to create wind. An old hammock hung on the creaky wooden balcony. Two men from England stopped in a bungalow a few steps to the right. Through the window of a room without curtains, I could see their deep eyes looking at each other.

The next day I met people. Since it was a very small beach, the faces of the remaining people quickly became familiar. I did not confuse words with travelers. It was a time when I doubted that I would be frozen by their cynicism, because I could see the stigma applied to me somewhere in my expressions, gestures and speech. I just walked with the thought that my mind would clear up when I saw people. At the end of a narrow alley on a gentle slope, the open sea and a sandy field, stretching for about two hundred meters, formed the beach. At both ends, the stones were stacked in the form of a rock, and on it was a small restaurant and cafe. Myung played with the skinny dogs under the shade of a beach umbrella. His tanned face and natural gestures seemed local and almost passed him by. I sat down in an empty seat next to him among a pair of sun loungers. One of the three dogs with raised ribs stared at me.

I'm here. It is said in a light tone. I didn't answer. Instead, they broke news of the meeting. Jun Young is dead. Philosophy and the child? Yeah. After all, you died. Finally he died. I couldn't get over it. People did not ask for anything else, so I talked long and indifferently about how people in the group are doing. Myung just looked at the distant sea and listened to me.

At the meeting, we were just able to be sure of the justification of existence day after day, and we met a desire to rely on each other's similarities, but we did not desperately need each other. Nothing really was desperate. We were people who got together and talked about wounds. We had our own world, invisible to people over 30. People amazed youth with charm, opportunities and beauty. He said that after this period he would know that it was just good. We didn't believe them. But we had the courage to calmly deal with all the dark things. As I covered the wounds of others with wounds, I saw a point at which sadness became vague. Myung and I sat down inside and barely breathed.

Myung studied theology. I went to fight. When asked why I chose theology, Myung answered like this. Myung spent his childhood in a religious community. His parents did not send him to school. He said that studying anything other than the Bible is tinged with evil. When he was 13 years old, he stole a woman's wig among the props for Christmas events. He said it was night when the worship bell rang and heavy snow fell. It was an attic, where the light from the colored lamps hanging on the roof of the church penetrated. The moment I put on a wig and looked at myself in the mirror, I was convinced that this is my real life. You don't need to tell anyone to find out.

Myung ran erratically until the church lights went out and the roofs of the small houses in the camp remained dark. Some wind in my heart kept screaming to run away. Myung said so. I listened to the story of the name, feeling like the wind. The next moment I recall the time when the voices of prayer, crying and anger got entangled in the distant darkness and immediately pierced my ears. In the dark darkness, the voice of the father's prayer was especially distinctly heard. I prayed with my name. To save his son from the devil. These prayers pierced my heart. This is a small deep hole. see? Myung said, clutching his fingers between his neat ribs. There was a point the size of a black 50 won coin. It really looked like a hole, so I tried pressing my finger on it several times.

Myung said that he has prayed a lot since then and is not joking. He also made everyone feel relieved by confessing his love to a girl from the community. But when he was alone, he discreetly pulled the other boy inside him through a small deep hole in his heart and touched him. Myung was waiting for the day when the boy burst out and jumped out at the appointed time. And years later, on that night when everyone was sleeping peacefully, they fled the community alone.

After that, Myung lived the way he wanted. I have long hair, beautiful makeup and high heels. He loved and confessed to men, being despicable. I could not forget the expressions on the faces of some elderly men who looked at him as if they wanted to kill. These expressions became an indirect wound for me. This happened because he was sensitive to things that could not be accepted by the sincere heart of a person. Anything that was not loved was like my story.

Isn't it boring to live honestly? He said with a smile. I heard Myung Min's love story under the shade of an umbrella on Aoruk Beach. In fact, we were even more lonely because it was audible during the day, when the sunlight crashed and reflected in the waves. Myung looked like the person who saved all those words to tell me this story. I already knew a lot, but I heard it again and begged to hear it again. It seemed that I could somehow live if I listened to the calm voice of people.

Every time we were bored, we went to sea. The sea water was warmed by the sun, making it warm and shiny. The dogs followed and swam. The swarm of blue fish swayed and backed away, spinning. I visited people every day for two months. He was always there. They drank watermelon juice, ate fried noodles, smoked. The dogs took a nap with us under the shade of an umbrella and swam together in the sea. Whenever I lost strength while swimming, I would lie on the back of one of the dogs and swim in the sea. What I missed in my head often came to mind and flew away.

Myung wrote a poem while drying his long, wet hair in the sea breeze. Dogs, waves, wind and strangers appeared in the poem. “If I live like this every day, the day will not endure anything,” he said. He said that day that he would return when he didn't have to be afraid to cut himself and cut others. I started talking about someone I want to understand. With the desire to resist the beautiful scenery in front of the hot sea breeze.

From an early age, I realized with my body that my mother does not love me. There was always enough free space in her hands to hold three or four fists, as if she was only patronizing others. I agreed that the fact of my birth was a waste for my mother. Every time I went out, I lived with all the advice in case Mom dumped me and went home alone. When I traveled to a remote area where my maternal grandmother's home was, I always put my mother's car keys in my pocket. Our maternal grandmother did not like us. There was no red pepper paste, miso, or garden vegetables.

Since I was not a foster child and was neither a mother nor a stepmother, I could not interpret the distance between mother and daughter as a universal bias. It's not about motherhood. It was a matter of boundaries. I fought silently under her subtle disdain and cold treatment, who saw me as if I were looking at others, and I grew up watching my cracks. I thought it would be better if I got bruises. One of my friends had a child who often matched his mother. Trophies, hangers, and shoehorns were of different sizes and depths and we knew how to tell the difference. A friend cried, beating me, wanting his mother to beat him.

As a child, I would open towels or wash dishes to be praised, and my mom, who came back from the weekend, would open the towels again, fold them and dry the dishes loudly. When I cooked fried rice or egg rolls, I heard my mother scrape them from the pan at night. I didn't read my diary or celebrate my first period. I left the world, including my mother. I couldn't trust the world, so I dug in the book. In the virtual world, the child could confront the world alone, and the causal relationship was clear because the beginning and end of the story were clearly present. The wizards recognized the unloved child. Tickets to a cheerful and bright world have always been a priority for a lonely and lonely child.

I talked about my mom every day until I returned to Korea. He never stopped talking about his mother, who was very close, but farthest, until his tongue turned bitter. Each time, Myung stared at the far end of the shining blue sea for a while. It's like weighing a sentence. For a long time, the dogs who were waiting to swim together did not look at us, having soaked their ankles in sea water with their tired eyes. Myung said that the timing of those days can help him live a little longer with the force that propels him.

When I think about people, the first thing I think about is the facial expressions at the time. Like grain-free tofu, carefree and laid back. Even in Mokbang, people's faces have not changed. I could look at people through a screen the same way people look at the sea. But he was not what I expected.

We weren't who we knew.

After returning from a trip, the first thing I did after a few years went to my mother. My mom divorced my dad and lived in the village as if I was waiting for me to be an adult. The decision to live with my maternal grandmother, whom my mother found so difficult to deal with, was more surprising than the fact that they separated without consulting me. Mom lived in the house behind grandma's house for rent. As I sat on the floor, I could see all the moments when the scarlet lights burned over the walls of my grandmother's house. The smell of cooking came from every meal. That was enough to know what program he was watching and when he was snoring and falling asleep. My mom sat on the floor all day and stared blankly at this place without going into the house.

That day, when I was in the dark for several days, I quietly asked my mother. Why was I so cold? It is called. Be careful not to reveal your sincerity. I didn't expect anything like a twist. At that moment I thought maybe my mom would want to talk, and I also wanted her to convince me. I expected my mother to know how I would feel. I didn't know then that I could live a life that could be understood.

But my mother looked at me as if she was looking at the wrong toy, and said firmly. I've never been like this. I gave all the love I could give. My mother believed in this, and after living in this house for several more years, she died alone.

The flowers disappeared without any sign of existence. Snow poured out. The wind seemed to subside and build a horizontal white wall.

The road, lined with cherry trees, ended, the view opened up and a wide black river appeared. Across the river, the yellow light of the building flickered in the snow.

Myeong and I, the brightest moment, are long gone. All that remains of me now are those who need to be lost. I am already far from understanding others and trying to be loved. Just standing there like a gravestone and looking into my eyes empty-handed seemed like a suitable comfort to me.

The snowflakes all throw themselves into the river, but the night was dark black.