I Threw the Shit Car Away

When the last grains of sand in the top half of the hourglass had fallen, his father opened his eyes. Then he asked Sung-shik in a low voice.

"If your car broke down right now, could you fix it yourself?"

"……"

Sung-shik could only pucker his lips; no answer came. An extra layer of anger had crept into his father's voice.

"Tell me properly, just what experience or expertise Jae-gyeom is lacking. Out of my two sons, the seat at Motors is going to the one who actually knows cars. So why are you making such a fuss about it?"

"Father, even so—"

"What exactly is the problem?"

Unable to argue back, Sung-shik clammed up like a clam. His father's expression grew even darker.

"You useless boy. Raising your hackles at the only sibling you have. Tsk tsk. Get out."

Sung-shik scrambled to his feet and stumbled out of the sauna.

"Jae-gyeom, stay a while."

His father, Yoon Dong-man, was the chairman of Daeyun Group, ranked fourth among Korea's conglomerates, with heavyweight affiliates like Daeyun Telecom and Daeyun Chemical under his wing.

Daeyun Motors was an automotive corporation still in the process of being established. Chairman Yoon flipped the hourglass over once more and spoke quietly.

"Wrap up your country life. Quickly."

"I have no interest in being involved with the company. I'll go on living the way I do now, looking after myself."

"Don't get cocky. Your rebellion has gone on long enough. Come up to Seoul. You need to learn the business. Motors is yours. It was made for you in the first place."

"No. I'll be going now."

Jae-gyeom rose from his seat.

"This isn't something you can dodge by refusing. Come up to Seoul while you're still a year younger and claim your share. Go out and make peace with Sung-shik on your way. We're all having breakfast together tomorrow—your mother included—so eat and then head back down."

He had already finished the dinner marking his father's birthday. One meal of that uncomfortable, stomach-churning affair was plenty, and now he was being told to come back for breakfast tomorrow. He was just opening his mouth to refuse again when—

"Is this not what your birth mother wanted? Young-hee. That you would melt into this family as if you had always been one of them. So eat with us tomorrow and go."

"……"

"However much you kick and squirm, the fact remains that you are my son. If you're going to live as the son of Yoon Dong-man of Daeyun Group, then accept that there are things you must do whether you like them or not. Your mother's will says as much. HR will contact you, so get ready to start work."

His father was right—before she left this world, his mother had said as much to Jae-gyeom. Don't think of yourself as the one left behind. I want you to live as if you were your father's son from the very beginning. It was because of those words, spoken by a mother who wished only that her son would never be lonely, that he had come to this place at all. Jae-gyeom gave no answer and walked out of the sauna first.

"You beggar's brat. Did you sweet-talk Father into handing you Motors?"

Sung-shik seemed to have waited for Jae-gyeom just to spit out his mockery. But Jae-gyeom was not soft enough to swallow an over-the-line insult in silence. If anything, he was hard-edged and sharp. That was exactly why Sung-shik kept him at arm's length like this.

"If you were actually good at your job, would Father be going out of his way to invent a company, a position that doesn't exist, just to hand it to me? Instead of spending all this time exploding with inferiority complex, why not try doing your own work better?"

"Wh-what? Inferiority complex? Me? At you?"

"Stuttering when you're hit where it hurts. Some things never change."

"Why, you—"

Unable to contain his fury, Sung-shik swung a fist, but Jae-gyeom caught his wrist and blocked it midair. He flung the flailing man's wrist away as if discarding it, then headed out and up toward the guest rooms—a suite at the Daeyun Hotel, where he always stayed when he came to Seoul.

He attended family events as Chairman Yoon's son, yet there wasn't a single room in that house where he could lay his own body down. That was Jae-gyeom's place within the Daeyun Group household.

The night view of Seoul spread below the hotel window was made of pure light, unmarred by noise—a pleasure for the eyes. But even beautiful things did nothing to lift his mood, and his face remained expressionless. He was just thinking a drink might help when the vibration of his phone cut through the heavy silence.

"Honestly, how is she this cute?"

The words burst out of him the moment he checked the messages, and the laughter in his own voice came boomeranging right back to his ears. The Yoon Jae-gyeom who had been wearing a death-glare one second ago seemed to have evaporated on the spot. The smell of alcohol seemed to drift through the phone screen itself, and now Jae-gyeom felt drunk too. He dialed her immediately.

"Hello?"

"Hello, my wife. Have you been drinking?"

"It's my first time ever being drunk. Alcohol is so amazing and so good. So this is why people get drunk, huh?"

"A celebration toast, in honor of ditching the shit car?"

"How didd you know?? I drank with Eun-mi. Eun-mi fell asleep. Eun-mi is my friend."

His reflection in the window was smiling so broadly that Jae-gyeom covered his face with a hand and swept it away, half in embarrassment.

The trailing, stretched-out ends of her words—something that could never, ever exist in the usual tone of the always-composed Im Ji-su—tickled his ear. The feeling of being disarmed by that voice wasn't unwelcome, but this sensation, one he'd never known before, felt new and a little frightening. He also caught himself looking forward to just how soft she might ultimately make him.

"Ji-su. Can I come see you right now?"

Jae-gyeom grabbed his car keys without a second's delay, murmuring her address as he quickened his pace. It was the middle of the night—if he pushed the speed as much as he safely could, he'd make it in twenty minutes.

"It takes forever to get here from Gyechon. It's so far away. I miss you."

"When my wife says she misses me, I have to come."

"But like, who even are you? You're not my classmate. Eun-mi says there's no Yoon Jae-gyeom."

Right. Back then, there had been no Yoon Jae-gyeom. Only Kim Jae-gyeom. I should tell her the next time we meet. Of course, Kim Jae-gyeom or Yoon Jae-gyeom, Ji-su wouldn't know him either way. Im Ji-su had always had her face buried in a book.

"I really am a Gyechon High graduate, I promise."

"Nooo. He doesn't exist. If Eun-mi says he doesn't exist, then he doesn't exist."

"…Just how much did you drink? You get so adorable when you drink. Not that Im Ji-su isn't adorable sober."

"There's one, two, three, four… cans of beer here right now…"

He kept the conversation going as he drove toward her. Mostly Ji-su talked, and Jae-gyeom listened, and her drunken rambling was so wildly endearing that it was a pleasure just to hear it. Of course, the threads of it were torn and tangled beyond all sense, never once connecting.

"I ran into Kim Young-baek today, and he drank half my americano. Kept saying it was expensive and gross while gulping it down."

"What a jerk."

"Eun-mi says she's so relieved she never has to see that shit car again. She calls him a shit car. Puhaha."

"Kim Young-baek or whatever his name is—certified shit car. Even third parties agree."

"No, not that shit car, the actual car. But I left an air freshener in it, so I should take it out before you hand it over. That one's mine."

"I'll buy you a new one. Forget it."

"Yoon Jae-gyeom, I'm sorryyy. I deleted your phone number."

Even the full confession was perfectly adorable, and Jae-gyeom laughed again.

"But… I'm sleepy."

"Ji-su. Don't fall asleep. I'm almost there."

"Don't liiie. Gyechon is so far from here. I'm going to bed. You sleep too, soon."

One more block, and he'd reach the neighborhood of modest one-room apartments, with Ji-su's place at the very end of it. But the call dropped flat, without warning.

"You really are asleep, huh?"

Still smiling, Jae-gyeom kept driving toward Ji-su's house anyway.

By the time sunlight had flooded every pane of the apartment window, Ji-su was the first to stir.

"Ugh, my head. Ohh…"

Retraction issued: alcohol is not a good thing.

Had she known it would leave a hangover like this, Ji-su would never have poured that reckless amount of beer down her throat. It felt as though a traditional percussion troupe had been transplanted directly into her skull—drums and gongs all loudly asserting their own agendas, clattering out of sync. And then…

Mouth hanging hopelessly open, Ji-su scrambled through her call log as well, too flustered even to think about closing it.