By Zephyria 
Eden also stared at the gaunt man at the end of Ha-jin’s gaze. He seemed to have injured his leg, as he was limping this way.
“Are you going to keep wandering around without permission?!”
Hee-soo, who had been sitting at the table, jumped up and strode towards him. Despite the harsh scolding, his steps were filled with anxiety. The man, who was clearly her younger brother, shrunk his shoulders, looking utterly dejected.
“Aren’t you going to answer me, you little shit?”
“Ah, Noona, just…”
The man glanced at Hee-soo, who had raised her hand, and widened the eco-bag as if to show her what he had brought.
“I was late because I was getting this. They said we were out of antibiotics.”
“What about the others?”
“They’re just checking outside to see if the nets are damaged. They’ll be back soon… Ah!”
Before he could finish his answer, she raised her hand again and slapped his shoulder hard.
“Antibiotics or whatever, I clearly told you to guard the campsite when I go to get food. Are you going to keep wandering around as you please? What if something really bad happens when you’re already injured?”
At the endless nagging, the man finally looked utterly defeated, his lips twitching. Hee-joon, who had been playing with a beer bottle, joined in the fray. Only after some time of lecturing was he led inside by his siblings, standing like a child being punished.
Ha-jin couldn’t take his eyes off the man’s face. Lee Hee-sung. If his memory served him right, he was definitely Jun-seok’s college classmate and a Cast Member who worked with them at Neverland.
He vividly remembered Hee-sung suddenly greeting him and making a fuss about being a fan on the day he last video-called Jun-seok, who was in the same dorm. Even the dark scar across his right eyebrow.
As if sensing the intense gaze, Hee-sung belatedly raised his head. Their eyes met head-on. Ha-jin’s lips slowly parted as he finally confirmed the scar on his eyebrow.
“…….”
“…….”
Hee-soo tilted her head at the two men’s gazes, which seemed to be frozen in mid-air. Eden’s eyebrows also twitched as he sensed an unknown tension in the air.
“Do Ha-jin, do you know him?”
“What? You two are acquainted?”
Eden and Hee-soo asked simultaneously. No sooner had the question ended than Ha-jin grabbed Hee-sung’s arm as if possessed. Everyone who was watching was taken aback by the sudden physical contact.
“You know me, right?”
Ha-jin asked in a choked voice, and the lips he faced turned pale blue.
“You said you were my fan. Don’t you remember?”
Ha-jin took another step forward and this time gripped his forearm so hard it felt like it would burst.
“You’re Hee-sung, the one who asked me to show you Magic next to Jun-seok during the video call, right? You two were college classmates, and you started working part-time together. Aren’t you that Lee Hee-sung?”
“…….”
Hee-sung, frozen like a statue, merely opened and closed his mouth, and Ha-jin began to shake the arm he was holding.
“Where is our Jun-seok now?”
The eco-bag that had been hanging on Hee-sung’s arm slipped and fell to the ground. White pill bottles tumbled haphazardly on the gravel, but he didn’t even think to pick them up, shrinking back instead.
“Answer me.”
Hee-soo, sensing something was amiss, hurriedly stepped between them.
“Hey, Hee-sung has aftereffects from the accident, so he’s not in good condition. Calm down and take it slow…”
“Just tell me where Jun-seok is. Huh?”
“Do Ha-jin.”
“He’s Jun-seok’s friend. I definitely remember his face…!”
Even in his agitation, Ha-jin constantly watched Hee-sung’s reaction. The uneasy trembling in his gaze whenever Jun-seok’s name was mentioned, the beads of sweat trickling down his temples, the tongue moistening his dry lips… All the signs unmistakably pointed to the worst-case scenario.
At the continued harsh prodding, Hee-sung’s Adam’s apple bobbed once. Finally, his lips parted, and a moist voice leaked out.
“…Ju, Jun-seok…”
“…….”
“He wasn’t with us when the Zombie broke out… So, I don’t really know.”
That’s a lie.
In their last call, Jun-seok had clearly said that he was hiding in the souvenir shop in front of the Twister with Hee-sung. Judging by the numerous body language cues revealed in that short time, it was certain that Lee Hee-sung was lying.
Then why?
Could it be that our Jun-seok….
The moment that chilling assumption flashed through Ha-jin’s mind, it felt as if a dagger had flown and lodged itself in his lungs. Each breath he exhaled felt like his chest was tearing apart, making it painful. The snow-white fingertips that had been holding Hee-sung dropped limply.
Hee-sung, freed from his grasp, faltered backward. A pill rolled powerlessly across the ground, caught on his heel.
“Hee-sung.”
Ha-jin couldn’t hear his own voice calling his name. Was that why? It wasn’t as difficult as he thought to utter the sentence that had been circling in his head. It was almost as if he was speaking through someone else’s mouth.
“Are you saying Jun-seok is dead?”
Hee-sung’s body, which had been restless, stiffened once more. The others who had been watching the situation also swallowed hard.
The sky was being tinged with the dim glow of sunset, but no one noticed the passage of time as a suffocating tension enveloped the surroundings.
“…….”
At the cruel silence that was slowly tightening around his neck, Ha-jin clenched his fist.
He wanted to tear open Hee-sung’s tightly shut mouth, but at the same time, he hoped that he would never answer. Endless contradictions were brutally gnawing away at his reason.
Everyone was waiting for Hee-sung’s next answer with nervous eyes when suddenly an unexpected sob burst from him.
“I… I really didn’t know you were coming… Heuk….”
Soon, along with incomprehensible words, Hee-sung knelt on the gravel. Startled, the twins hurriedly grabbed his shoulders as he lowered his head.
“Hey, Lee Hee-sung.”
“What’s wrong with you?”
The more the two fussed, the deeper Hee-sung’s sobs became. He couldn’t continue speaking and cried like a child. The tears he sobbed out seemed to resemble resentment.
Hee-soo, flustered, squatted down on the ground next to Hee-sung.
“Hee-sung? Why are you crying? You need to calm down and explain what’s going on.”
The more she pressed for an answer, the louder his cries became. The way he was choking was so alarming that it wouldn’t be strange if he fainted.
Ha-jin stared blankly down at the crown of his head, desperately biting his lower lip. Surprisingly, at this moment, he wanted to kill Hee-sung, who was kneeling in front of him.
He knew very well that the object of his anger was misplaced, but he couldn’t control the increasingly heated feeling in his chest. He just wanted to resent the person in front of him, and that feeling reached his throat. No one could treat him so cruelly after he had come all this way risking his life. He couldn’t let his desperate expectations be shattered in an instant like this….
At some point, Pie, who had come to his side, licked his ankle desperately as if to comfort him, but Ha-jin felt nothing. He couldn’t hear Eden’s voice speaking to him from the side, and he didn’t even realize that he was panting.
Ha-jin, who had finally confirmed Jun-seok’s fate amidst the sorrowful wails, had the thought of wanting to die for the first time in his life.
❖ ❖ ❖
Eden, who had asked the twins for a place to sleep for the night, led Ha-jin and Pie into the first trailer.
Eden sat him down on the bed-cum-sofa and carefully examined his complexion. His trembling eyelids and tightly closed lips, his calm gaze moved busily.
If a stranger were to see him, they would mistake him for a traveler exhausted from fatigue, Ha-jin had been wearing a blank expression all along. This was by no means a good sign.
It was only after the blue moonlight cast into the dark trailer that Eden found a portable lamp and lit up the surroundings. The soft orange light illuminated the inside of the camper van warmly. He got up from his seat and was about to lower the curtains on the windows one by one.
Knock, knock, there was a polite knock on the door from outside. When he opened the door, a man and a woman he had never seen before were looking up at Eden with curious faces.
“Uh… hello. Hee-soo told us to bring you over. We’re preparing dinner right now, would you like to join us? If you have any food, you can share it with us.”
It seemed that the rest of the group who had gone out had returned. Eden looked down at them silently, nodded briefly, and locked the door.
He sat down again opposite Ha-jin. Now that he thought about it, all he had eaten since leaving Neverland was a half-burnt potato.
“Do Ha-jin.”
At his call, Ha-jin, who had been staring somewhere in the air, met his gaze.
“You may not have an appetite, but eat something. I’ll bring you some food.”
“…I’m okay, so go ahead.”
Eden leaned forward as if he knew he would say that and slowly stroked Ha-jin’s cheek. The skin that touched his palm was cold. He hesitated unlike himself, opening his mouth and then reluctantly getting up from his seat.
“Wait a little bit.”
Then, he took out a few pieces of food from his bag, left Pie and Ha-jin behind, and went straight outside. There were a total of five people sitting around a fire in front of the Welcome Center. Eden watched them quietly from afar and then turned around.
His steps headed towards another camper van that was emitting a faint light.