/
The tension was palpable in the classroom, where desks had been replaced by rows of desks spaced apart. This was during the final inquiry period for the March mock exam. The children glanced at their watches and then at their test papers, quickly marking their answers. When the closing bell rang, the teacher clapped her hands.
“Put down your pens and collect your papers from the back.”
As the student at the back of the class collected the papers, Kim’s arms slumped over the table. He’d spent the entire test concentrating, ready to unleash all of his studying over winter break.
“Boys, keep your desks straight because your homeroom teacher won’t let you finish. Give me your marks for the practice tests. And for the English supplement after the midterm, I want 10,000 won each from the vice principal. This is because we have to pay for it in a group order.”
Se-kyung, who had already left the classroom, gently delivered the message. On the day of the mock test, there was no yaja, so the kids were noisy as they prepared for dismissal. Kim Deuk-pal bent down like an old man with a bent back and gently pushed his desk back to its original spot. When he reached the front of the class, Se-kyung, who was staying near the teacher’s table, snatched up his test and asked.
“Did you do well on the test?”
“I won’t know until they grade it.”
Kim Deuk-pal’s grumbling didn’t stop Se-kyung from taking the test. In fact, he looked forward to it. It wasn’t just a night of reading, it was a night of reading. He didn’t do any organizational work, he just studied day and night, and he’s sure he’ll get a 7+

.
Se-kyung covered the test paper but didn’t return it. With his fingertips, he traced the name ‘Song Yi-heon’ on the test paper cover.
“Do you want to study together? I’ll explain what you got wrong?”
Kim Deuk-pal’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, realizing that this bastard probably didn’t mean well by asking us to study together.
“I’d love to
 Are you okay?”
“Yeah, let’s go to your place and study.”
“My house?”
Maybe it’s because he’s such a clueless bastard, or maybe it’s just because he’s so shallow, but Yi-heon find Se-kyung adorable. Cute and creepy are different.
‘There’s nothing stopping me from taking him home. However, I’m hesitant because usually when I get home from Kim Duk-pal’s pajamas, I find Song Yi-heon’s biological mother drunkenly occupying the couch in the living room. Based on her behavior since her discharge from the hospital, it was unlikely that she would be sober during the day.’
Yi-heon remembered walking to school this morning and having to keep his head down to avoid seeing Song’s mother sleeping on the couch in a slutty slip. He suggested a different place.
“Let’s go to the detention room.”
“I don’t want to visit them.”
Se-kyung said in a rare refusal. The study hall was open to students who wanted to stay up late. However, on a mock exam day, there would be no teacher to supervise them from talking as usual. The room would be loud like a market. Kim Duk-pal won’t offer twice because Se-kyung is so adamant.
“I want you to study separately, or I’ll chase you home.”
But he didn’t give in to Se-kyung’s demands. She was grateful for his help, but he was confident in this mock test. He wouldn’t have gotten much wrong, but with the right amount of detailed explanations, he didn’t mind not having Choi Se-kyung around.
“Yi-hoen”
Heard Kim Deuk-pal call Hong Jae-min a few times, and then Se-kyung repeated it. As Kim Deuk-pal became disgusted by this, he realized the true meaning of the station’s support was apparent.
“You’re so wrong.”
“
 A lot?”
“A lot.”
From here to here. Se Kyung flipped open the math section of the practice test and traced his finger across the page. He didn’t need to say a word. Kim Deuk-pal’s mind became blank. It’s all wrong.
* * *
Song Yi-heon’s house was near Choi Se-kyung’s. It was so close that it almost made up for all the heartache he’d suffered over the past year when he couldn’t find him. As they rode in the sedan to pick up Song Yi-heon, Se Kyung looked out the window at a familiar street. He retraced the path Song Yi-heon must have run barefoot in his pajamas on a rainy day.
As they stepped out of the sedan and crossed the nicely manicured garden, the front door opened. Kim Deuk-pal kicked off his sneakers first, then blocked Se-kyung from entering.
“Wait here for a minute.”
He hurried inside without indoor shoes. Se-kyung waited, suspicious of his concealment attempts, but soon heard a faint call from inside.
“Come in.”
In the spacious living room at the end of the hallway, Kim clucked his tongue as he threw a blanket over the person lying on the couch.
“Aig, tsk. Young .”
He couldn’t see the person lying on the couch, hidden by the backrest. But as soon as she realized that the brown hair sticking out of the couch was the same as Song Yi-heon’s, Se-kyung impulsively walked out.
As soon as she got near the couch, she held her breath because the liquor smell was overpowering. The woman sleeping on the couch was so drunk that even Se-kyung could tell she was drunk.
“
Who is it?”
“Mother.”
The woman was too young to be her mother and had been drunk since broad daylight, but she looked like Song Yiheon. Se-kyung took a closer look at her face, thinking that her shabby appearance was similar to Song Yi-heon’s visit on a rainy day. Mmm, the woman tossed and turned in her sleep. Se-kyung jerked her head away as the blanket slipped off, revealing a skinny shoulder with a prominent comb-over, clad only in a slip.
“Let’s go upstairs.”
Kim Duk-pal patted him on the shoulder and gestured toward the stairs leading to the second floor.
“Hey, is Yi-heon’s student friend here?”
Seo Sandaek left the kitchen to greet the guests. Kim Deuk-pal tilted his head at her cheerful greeting and naturally called out to her.
“Please boil some water for the kids.”
Wouldn’t you normally ask for a snack or refreshment? No, you are a child. Se-kyung was offended by Song Yiheon’s patronizing tone. He glanced over at Seo San, wondering if the housekeeper had noticed something strange as well.
“Yes, yes. I’ll get you some fruit and something to drink.”
But Seo Sandaek, already acclimatized, nodded. As she followed Kim Deuk-pal upstairs, Choi Se-kyung couldn’t help but wonder if he was the only one sensitive to the change of Song Yi-heon.
They reached the second floor hallway. A high-pitched shout alternated with the sound of a Wudang bathtub collapsing downstairs, and Se-kyung reflexively leaned down to see what the commotion was about. A slender bare leg in a red slip, half hidden by the first-floor ceiling, ran from the living room.
“Auntie, auntie, chairman, chairman

!”
“Ugh, Mrs. Lee, calm down. The chairman called to say he couldn’t come.”
“Where’s the butler? I’m trying to talk to the butler. Let go of me

!”
The woman looked unsteady and couldn’t keep still. Seo Sandaek, who was a lot thicker than her, grabbed her and shook her, insisting she must see the chairman. She fluttered like a fluttering flag, and then, tired of weeding, she grabbed the hem of Seo Sandaek’s dress and collapsed.
The slender body in the slip curled up and gasped for air at the slightest disturbance. But unable to control my own breathing, I didn’t let go of my grip on Seo Sandaek’s dress hem. I raised my head, clutching the hand that tried to slip away.
“Chairman, tell the chairman, I’m about to pass away
 I’m dying
 I’m going to die
 Come quickly, please save Min-seo

.”
The long hair that covered her face fell away, revealing her side. A plump forehead, a fine nose bridge, lips that trembled as they swallowed back tears, and pale cheeks like wax. It was an attractive face, but it was the eyes, with their thick lashes, that disturbed Choi Se-kyung. Eyes that pleaded for help, just like the night she came to him. They were the same eyes.
His forearms gripped the railing. As she turned to go downstairs, Kim’s arm grabbed his shoulder from behind. He dropped his bag into his arms.
“First room down the hall. Come in.”
Descending the stairs, he plucked the hem of Seo Sandaek’s robe from the fainting woman’s hands. He slipped off his school uniform, Mai, and draped it over her shoulders. He forced her to her feet and she followed him groggily. She sobbed, unaware she was leaning on her son.
As Kim Duk-pal held her shoulders and supported her, Seo San-daek, who had fallen, walked ahead and opened the door to the woman’s bedroom. He could hear a voice calling somewhere, explaining the situation.
“Whoa.”
It wasn’t the first time this had happened. When Kim Deuk-pal sighed in frustration, the woman who had asked him to call the chairman stopped crying. In an instant, she looked back at Kim Deuk-pal. She pushed him away with her red nails like an angry cat.
“What did I give birth to?”
Her legs trembled, she swung her arm around, barely able to stand, and her left-handed hand slammed into Kim’s right cheek. The ring on her left ring finger drew red welts across her cheek. When the slap didn’t work, she blamed her son.
“You can’t take the chairwoman’s beauty, but you’re doing something disgusting

!”
Looking at Song Yi-heon’s diary on the tablet, Se-kyung knew his mother wasn’t normal. However, this was way beyond what the “original” Song Yi-heon, a high school student, could handle.
As a young actress at the peak of her popularity, she met the chairman and became pregnant with Song Yi-heon. The chairman promised to divorce her and marry her if she gave birth to a boy. However, she didn’t keep the child and was forced to take a break from acting when she couldn’t hide her belly. She didn’t expect to retire, and she never imagined that she would be forced to live a life of obscurity. This was because the chairman’s wife, who gave birth to one daughter after another.
She had to give up the life she wanted when she gave birth to Song Yi-heon. Her shining life was compressed into a man she had called Mr. Chairman. Because the dreams she had to abandon were so colorful, she clung to the chairman, thinking she had only one left.
Song Min-seo, who is still considered a star of memories, was possessed by crazy. Trapped in a small house, unable to cope with her bare existence, she got drunk and gnawed at herself. She believed the chairman was her only way out.
“

.”
Kim Deuk-pal’s head snapped back upright as he brushed past subordinate. His dark gaze was locked in silence, and Song Min-seo, fueled by evil, shrank back. After nearly two decades of living at the mercy of violent emotions such as rage, she could not bear emotion stillness.
Kim Deuk-pal raised his hand. The chairman’s cheek was often placed on hers in his drunkenness, and Song Min-seo’s skin crawled with fear. Unable to recognize the son she had given birth to, she cowered like a small animal trying to hide. Her eyes fluttered frantically, and her bony hands clutched the silk slip.
But the upraised hand did not strike Song Min-seo; it wrapped around the back of her head and pulled her to bury her head against his shoulder, stroking her roughly and whispering in a cracked voice.
“You’re pretty enough, you don’t need the chairman’s favor.”
Seo San-daek said that Song Min-seo gave birth to Song Yi-heon when she was twenty. She would have been forty then, but Song Min-seo, who looked so much younger, reminded him of the younger sister Kim Deuk-pal had left behind in Mokpo. She would have been around Song Min-seo’s age when she rebelled against her parents’ refusal to let her return to school and left without saying goodbye.
It bothered him that he had never been a big brother to his sister, whose face he could no longer remember. He gladly offered his shoulder.
“Take it out on me. Don’t look for the chairman, just tell me, and I’ll take it all.”
Song Yi-heon, don’t do it to that poor kid.
Somewhere along the line of crude comforting touches, his shoulder became damp. Song Min-seo shivered dryly. Kim Deuk-pal calmly stroked her hair until the sobs choked out of her tight throat became the sobs of a child crying for release.