## Chapter 55 – Leisure Time (23)
The rough stone floor felt against my bare feet, stinging as if it had torn my soles.
Looking back, a trail of red blood marked my path, each footstep a crimson stain.
I don’t know how far I ran.
Emerging outside, the darkened sky blurred my sense of time. I didn’t know what time it was or where I was, but it was crucial to get far away from *that*.
“…Hoo.”
Is this far enough?
I sat on an empty park bench, catching my breath.
I had looked back several times while running, but there seemed to be no sign of anyone chasing me, which I found strange.
If you were going to let me go this easily,
why did you bother catching me in the first place?
A sense of unease crept in, but I tried to ignore it.
Getting home was the priority now.
“…”
I had rushed out wearing whatever clothes I could grab, so I was a mess.
I didn’t have underwear on, and the outer garment I was wearing kept brushing against my nipples, giving me a strange sensation.
This is no time for that…!!
My pants had been almost torn off by the monster disguised as Chaeyun,
leaving them in tatters, no longer serving their purpose as clothing.
I glanced around nervously, checking for any signs of people.
Confirming that no one was around, I let out a sigh of relief and ran a hand over my chest, finding the situation I was in so absurd that I couldn’t help but laugh.
But even as I laughed, a searing pain shot through my chest.
“…Chaeyun…”
I didn’t want to think about it anymore.
Who would believe this ridiculous situation?
A monster that steals people’s bodies?
Even I, who had seen it with my own eyes, couldn’t believe it.
No, I didn’t want to believe it.
“…”
I clenched my fist on my knee.
What could I do by dwelling on it now?
I wiped away the tears that were streaming down my cheeks,
and after confirming that the pain in my feet had subsided a little, I started walking again.
Emerging from the park,
I finally felt the presence of people filling the streets.
The surrounding noise started to give me a headache.
“…Excuse me, are you alright?”
“…!”
A man, hesitatingly approaching me as I walked, checking on my condition.
I couldn’t trust anyone.
“…I’m fine.”
I brushed off the man’s hand and continued walking.
I knew very well that this wasn’t the time to refuse help.
But the thought of the man’s touch on me,
constantly reminded me of what Im Chanwoo had been doing to me, making me want to throw up.
Barely managing to stumble out of the dark park,
I had succeeded in getting outside, but the distance to home seemed much farther than I had thought.
The daunting situation of having to walk all the way there made me feel drained.
“…That’s…”
A public phone booth in sight.
I didn’t even know those still existed these days.
Leaning against the wall as I walked, I managed to grab the receiver.
I dialed the only phone number I had memorized in my life,
the gym’s number, and wedged the receiver between my shoulder and ear, listening to the ringing tone as I slumped down inside the booth, exhausted from fatigue and stress.
*Ttururu, ttururu.*
The longer the sound went on, the more my anxiety grew.
Was it already closing time at the gym?
Just as that worry was about to consume me,
I finally heard a human voice instead of an emotionless mechanical sound.
“…Hello?”
“Dad? It’s me, Sua…”
“Huh? Suani? Where have you been all this time?”
It was finally a human voice,
but not the voice I wanted to hear.
It was the voice of a gym member who was close to my dad.
“…Ah, Mr…? Where’s my dad?”
“Your father? He always disappears around this time.
But what’s wrong with your voice? Is something wrong?”
“Ah, no… Then Hong Suho,
what’s he doing right now?”
“Suho? Suho’s here right now.”
“Please put him on.”
“Sure, whatever. It’s rare to see you two like this.”
Dad was absent, so I had no choice but to meet Suho and go home…
“…Oh, did you two fight again? He told me to tell you to talk to me if you have something to say…”
“…Pardon?”
That little punk Hong Suho…
“…Then tell him to bring my clothes to the place I’m about to tell you.
It’s near…”
Looking around, I told him the name of a large mart nearby,
and the man hung up after advising, “You guys are adults now, make up and work it out.”
“…”
I’m cold.
Was it because my clothes were torn and the wind was blowing through,
or for some reason, I felt a chill that I usually didn’t feel, so I huddled in the phone booth without even going outside, shivering.
‘I’m lonely.’
I don’t know when I realized I was different from others.
Maybe it was around middle school.
Until then, everything was fine.
I wasn’t good at studying, but I had naturally started boxing, influenced by my dad who had been running the gym since before I was born, and it turned out I was pretty good at it.
Unlike studying, it was fun because the more I did, the more progress I made.
Hong Suho, my younger brother.
My relationship with him wasn’t particularly good or bad.
Just a typical sibling relationship, bickering but never doing anything to hurt each other’s feelings.
Maybe the first turning point was my mom’s death.
My mom passed away from an illness when I was in middle school, and Suho was in elementary school.
My dad hadn’t been around until then,
and I think I started to resent him a little from that point on.
A boy in my class, whom I didn’t even know, confessed to me when I was overwhelmed by my mom’s death and my dad’s absence.
I rejected him.
To be clear, I just ignored him.
Romance was the last thing on my mind; it wasn’t a time when anyone like that could enter my thoughts.
After that, rumors started spreading around school that I was selling my body,
and I didn’t particularly care to know who was spreading them.
Whether it was the boy I rejected, or a petty revenge from another girl who liked him, it didn’t really matter to me,
and I didn’t care.
As the rumors grew and reached the teacher’s ears,
my dad came to school.
He bowed to the teacher and said firmly, “My daughter is not that kind of person.”
He took me out of school, and I skipped both exercise and school that day.
I was angry at my dad.
I wasn’t struggling, and I didn’t ask for help.
It was just kids’ games.
I could have endured it.
But our mom, who had struggled so much that she couldn’t endure it,
where was he and what was he doing while Mom was in so much pain?
Did he think I would be grateful if he did that?
Did he think he would look cool?
The next day, I went to school and found the boy who had confessed to me and beat him to a pulp.
It didn’t matter if he was the one who started the rumors or not.
So my dad was called back to school just one day after being called in, and he bowed and apologized to the teacher and the parents of the boy I had beaten up, and we skipped school again that day.
I wasn’t scolded by my dad.
After that, time passed without any major incidents.
I graduated from middle school, and in high school, I didn’t make any friends and just quietly finished school and went home to exercise.
I also entered competitions. I didn’t have any friends, but my face was plastered all over the school newspaper.
Boxing prodigy, or something like that.
Was that why? Some of my peers started talking to me,
but in the end, I ate lunch alone until graduation.
I didn’t go to college and just kept exercising.
As I spent my time like that, my tiny little brother grew up and said he was going to college.
I didn’t think it was my business, and one day, while I was preparing for a competition, my brother brought his girlfriend to the gym.
He brought his girlfriend to the gym?
I thought he was crazy, and while suppressing a burst of laughter, I focused on my practice.
But she seemed to have a good personality,
and she always bought gifts for my dad whenever she came, and she seemed to get along well with Suho without any awkwardness.
That girl, who was friendly with everyone, came to me and bothered me several times.
‘Hello.’
‘What’s your name?’
‘Um, you’re Suho oppa’s older sister, right?
Can I call you Unni then?’
At first, I chased her away because it was annoying.
But she didn’t give up and kept clinging to me like a mosquito trying to suck my blood,
and before I knew it, I was naturally talking to her.
I was surprised myself.
I had never talked to anyone for so long, not even during my school days or as an adult,
but when I talked to her, the three hours I spent exercising felt like thirty minutes.
My dad seemed disappointed and lowered his head when my brother said that she was busy with work and couldn’t come today,
and I was disappointed too.
I was disappointed? I wanted to see her?
After noticing this strange feeling, my face turned hot every time I met Chaeyun.
It was a flutter I had never felt before.
I wasn’t stupid, and I immediately recognized what that feeling was, and as soon as I realized that, I also realized a harsh truth.
I was different from others.
And I knew in my head that I shouldn’t harbor this feeling.
No matter what, she was my brother’s girlfriend.
I shouldn’t be doing this.
My head knew that I shouldn’t, but my heart didn’t.
I wanted to talk to Chaeyun more,
and I wanted to hold her hand.
My ideals and reason were fighting a tug-of-war,
and I couldn’t concentrate on exercising at all.
I had become a girl who was waiting for Chaeyun, a girl who had fallen in love for the first time at an age that didn’t suit her.
One day, while listlessly tapping the sandbag that I couldn’t even hit properly, wondering when Chaeyun would come,
she didn’t come, and she didn’t come the next day, the next week, or the next month, and I heard that my brother had broken up with her.
It was a one-sided breakup.
A little later, I also heard that she had cheated on him with another man.
“….”
“Noona.”
“…I dozed off for a bit… Suho.”
How long had it been since I called him by his name?
I awkwardly looked up at my brother, who had called me, rubbing my bleary eyes.
Suho pushed a carrier in front of me without saying a word.
“…What, I told you to bring my clothes,
why did you bring all my luggage…”
“…Take this and get out.”
“…Huh…?”
“Don’t show up in front of us anymore, Noona.”
