Sorim Grapes is Wronged

24.

We held a lonely three-day funeral, and even now, 12 years later, I remember those three days clearly. The few relatives who came to check if there was any inheritance left after confirming we were penniless. The insurance company employee, who our father had supposedly signed up with, used complex terms to repeatedly explain that this and that didn’t apply.

The funeral home director berated us, saying we should have informed them earlier if there would be so few mourners. He insisted it was courtesy to distribute drinks to the funeral home staff, opened unopened drink boxes of each type, and then made us pay for them, using the excuse that they had been opened.

There were no adults around to help us, only beasts trying to take advantage of us in any way possible. Amidst all this, I had to comfort my young brother too.

‘Hyung… Are Mom and Dad dead?’

‘Yes.’

‘We can’t see them again?’

‘We can’t see them anymore. We can never see them again.’

‘I don’t want this… I miss Mom and Dad. Hyung. Waaah.’

‘Crying won’t change anything.’

‘No. What do you know, hyung? No. I said no! Where’s Mom? I miss Mom. Dad. Dad…!’

We repeated similar conversations countless times. Every time I had to confirm our parents’ death to my elementary school first-grader brother, I also reminded myself.

Mom and Dad are dead. We can never see them again. No matter how much we cry and deny it, nothing can be done. This is reality…

Our family wasn’t wealthy, but we were harmonious. Two people who grew up in poor families and entered society right after middle school graduation met by chance, fell in love, and bore fruit.

Our parents loved us and were devoted.

By devoted, I mean they really worked hard. Dad worked at a soldering factory, Mom in a restaurant kitchen. Two years before they passed away, they quit their jobs and opened a side dish store in the neighborhood. They said they had to be diligent for the first few years after opening, so they left early in the morning and came home late at night, with only one day off a month.

When they worked separately, they at least had two days off on weekends, but now only one day a month? When we complained, Mom always apologized, and Dad would say ‘sorry’ but later call us aside and scold us, telling us never to say such things in front of Mom because it made her feel sorry. Feeling even more upset, I’d run to Mom behind Dad’s back to tattle, and Mom would click her tongue but comfort me.

Mom and Dad probably didn’t know they would die so meaninglessly. If they had known, they would have just kept working at the factory and restaurant, trying to spend more time with us.

For the hour and a half at the crematorium, as Mom and Dad completely disappeared from this world, I repeated to myself over and over:

‘I won’t live as hard as you did.’

Because death is everywhere, and no one knows when they’ll face it.

It’s too unfair to die suddenly while living so diligently.

I will absolutely not live diligently.

After the funeral, when we returned to daily life, I put my resolution into practice. As a student, I did everything I shouldn’t do and didn’t do what I should, living carelessly to the best of my ability. I started drinking and smoking then, and got tattoos. We had no relatives to take us in, so we had to live by ourselves, which made us even freer.

After spending the small compensation from the perpetrator’s side and the government support recklessly for three months, I accepted reality.

I can’t live carelessly… I have to live diligently like our parents did.

There was only one reason.

My brother, Ha Jin.

My brother didn’t change even after our parents passed away. Of course, he cried every day looking for Mom and Dad, but he didn’t go astray like I did, as if giving up on life. He studied hard and played well with his friends.

Then, on the fourth month, late at night when I came home, I found my brother sitting in the middle of the living room with swollen eyes. As soon as he saw me, he burst into tears again and rushed into my arms.

‘Hyung…’

‘What’s wrong? Have you been crying?’

I thought he might have been crying because he missed Mom and Dad again. At that time, even as we lived our daily lives, our minds were still in the hospital emergency room. But my brother, hiccupping, blurted out something I never expected.

‘I, *hic*, academy, *sob*, *hic*, teacher, *hic*, money, *hic*, told me to pay, *hic*, tuition, *sob*, I, *sob*, kicked out, *hic*. Told me not to come. *wail*.’

His words were so mixed with sobs that I couldn’t understand properly, but the word ‘tuition’ was clearly audible.

Thanks to our parents prepaying three months of tuition, he had been able to attend without problems for three months, but on the fourth month, he was kicked out of the academy on the dot.

A first-grade elementary school student crying bitterly because of tuition fees.

It was so absurd and funny that I started crying.

I didn’t cry when my brother cried saying he missed Mom, or when I saw the fridge full of side dishes, or when we had to throw away all their belongings while moving, or when I found a well-worn notebook full of meticulously organized recipes among their belongings… But I burst into tears because of my brother crying about being kicked out of the academy due to tuition fees.

Looking back now, I think it was because reality hit me hard at that moment. Until then, I knew I shouldn’t be living like this, but I was running away. I deliberately entered the fog to wander. But I had to step into the reality without fog. Because it wasn’t just me. Because I had my brother.

What will poor young siblings without guardians become when they grow up?

The reality that had been blurry until then became frighteningly clear.

I don’t care what kind of gutter-like life I live. But Jin can’t.

Imagining my brother living alone like a derelict in a single room strewn with cigarette butts and empty bottles sobered me up.

Hugging my brother whose face was wet with tears from crying so much, I said countless times:

‘Don’t worry. Hyung will take responsibility somehow.’

Hyung will do something.

Hyung will somehow…

After that, I immediately found part-time jobs. Since I earned little money while attending school, I dropped out in my third year of middle school and started working in earnest. I was already 175cm tall at the time, so finding jobs wasn’t difficult. Even though my face looked young, my build was preferred because of my size. I haven’t grown even 1cm since then, but I’m satisfied with having milked my height for all it was worth.

In the end… despite my resolve to live carelessly, I worked even harder than our parents.

Before they opened the side dish store, our parents rested every weekend, and after opening the store, they rested one day a month, but I didn’t rest at all.

At first, I rested one day a week, but as my brother grew and expenses became unmanageable, from around age 17, I worked without any days off.

From 17 to 27, until I won the lottery this February, I only rested for 5 days in 10 years.

I had to work that much to send my brother to the same academies other kids attended, to buy him trendy clothes and game consoles whenever they became popular. I gave him plenty of pocket money to treat his friends to meals, just in case he might be ostracized for being poor.

While working so hard, I often thought, ‘What if I die like this?’

To be honest, I thought about it a lot.

I always thought about death. While working for 10 years in a place so trashy I don’t even want to call it a workplace, I sometimes thought about killing all those fucking bastards and then myself. I thought about writing those people’s names in my will and dying. I thought about how meaningless it would be if I died in a drunk driving accident on my way home after just working all day.

I think I just thought about death normally. Like thinking about what to eat today, feeling sleepy, or what time to wake up tomorrow. Just as ordinarily as that. I wish everyone would die. I wish the Earth would be destroyed. I want to die. …What if I die?

What if I die without leaving any last words, hit by a drunk driver while working without rest like this?

Wouldn’t that be too unfair?

It would be too unfair…

It might be comfortable though…

Living is difficult, but there are too many easy and diverse ways to die. Death always reached out its hand, tempting me whenever I let my guard down even a little.

Still, I didn’t die and I’m here now.

In the end, I ended up living too diligently, but I hope my brother at least succeeds in living carelessly.

Now that a comfortable environment is guaranteed, he should be able to succeed.

That’s the only way I’ll be able to face Mom and Dad when I die.

5-2. Korea University Community

[Title: (Real-time) Saw MuMu while people-watching

Content:

For some reason, he’s talking a lot

But I’ve never seen him like this before

Right now, in front of my eyes, he’s in the middle of “Really?” reactions,,,

The other person is a man I’ve never seen before, seems like a couple

And he’s showing no interest in KJB

Beom keeps saying something but he just goes “Really?”,,,,

I feel sorry for him….]

┗Huh? Prove it

┗┗(Author) If you don’t believe it, forget it~

┗What’s “Really?”?

┗┗It’s when you don’t react properly and answer half-heartedly

┗I thought he wasn’t at the Gosipal online fan meeting today, turns out he went to enjoy campus life

┗┗I’m a game noob, what’s Gosipal..? Is it an insult to KJB?

┗┗It’s the team KJB belongs to, Gosung Center 8, abbreviated as GoC8, often called Gosung or Gosipal

┗┗He’s been adamant about not attending team events since entering university

┗┗? Beom never attended team events; he’s always been like that except for his debut

┗┗Our MuMu is just shy ㅠ

┗┗Ignore them all. People who pick fights about pro gamers going to college are just trash flamers

┗I just saw it and came here too lolololol He usually wears his hat pulled down, but today he’s not wearing a hat

┗Looks like he put wax in his hair, didn’t he usually not dress up?

┗┗Whoa, is he dating?

[Title: No dating allowed, Je-beom, it’ll affect your skills

Content:

Not allowed]

┗There’s still some time until the tournament, what’s wrong with dating? lololol

┗The player is only 20 years old ㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ

┗He’s not playing in the domestic league this year, so he has plenty of time to date

┗(TMI) There are rumors that Beombiga is dating these days too

┗┗What does Beombiga dating have to do with Kwon Je-beom’s performance? ^^

┗┗lolololololololololol