By Zephyria 
His wide, puppy-like eyes remained fixed on the floor for a long time. Perhaps shocked by the shoehorn, a strange glint began to flicker in his pupils. Eun-myeong’s lower lip trembled violently.
“Why do I have to be sold to Hyung?”
Eun-myeong spoke in a heavily suppressed voice. It was a voice strangely laced with resentment, unlike him. Jjangja looked at him askew. Look at this, even a worm wriggles when you step on it, huh?
“You little beggar brat, but still.”
In the past, this kid would have been so terrified just looking at him that he’d nearly piss his pants, but now that he’d caught a break with that man, he was clinging to him like a cicada and acting all high and mighty. It was absolutely repulsive.
“So what, did you think your life would suddenly be set just because that bastard appeared?”
Huh? Huh? Jjangja poked Eun-myeong’s forehead repeatedly with his fist. The scrawny body was pushed back helplessly time and again.
“Hey, why are you giving it away for free to a piece of shit who’s absolutely nothing? I told you, I can sell you for a high price. After all, we’ve got history.”
Then the elevator doors opened, and Eun-myeong stepped backward. Jjangja strode after him and snatched his arm.
Jjangja thought he had sufficiently broken the boy’s spirit, but suddenly, Eun-myeong’s thin elbow pushed Jjangja’s arm away. While his terrified eyes searched Jjangja’s face, his mouth spat out: “Don’t talk about the Boss like that.”
That was it. Even while his lower lip trembled, he dared to defy him.
“…This little…?”
Jjangja’s eyes flared instantly.
“If you hadn’t done anything to me in the first place, the Boss wouldn’t have done that to Hyung.”
Eun-myeong’s gaze reached Jjangja’s forehead.
“You think just because you have a mouth, you can say whatever you want? You want to shut the fuck up?”
Irritation surged, and Jjangja raised his fist. Then, sensing a presence in the hallway, he startled and shrank his neck. Cold sweat beaded on his forehead beneath his beanie and trickled down the bridge of his nose.
“What is it?”
Jjangja whipped his head around to check. A cleaner had just stepped out of a room. That piece of shit, showing up now without any tact. Jjangja glanced down at the “rat.” Their eyes met.
“Hey, I wasn’t scared, okay? I just looked because I heard a sound!”
When he asked threateningly, “You get that?” the cleaner immediately cast his gaze down. Jjangja scanned the surroundings aimlessly. He didn’t know why he had this unpleasant feeling that something was chasing him even though no one was there. It had been going on for days, and it was grating on his nerves.
…Come to think of it, it’s not like this piece of shit, Eun-myeong, is defying him for no reason. Could that old fossil be around here?
Tapping, tapping, Jjangja shook his leg obsessively. He smacked the top of Eun-myeong’s head as if stroking it.
“See you later, huh? When Hyung contacts you, actually reply, you brat.”
Then, like a man being hunted, he quickly hopped into the elevator. His face was reflected in the mirror. He yanked his beanie up and scratched his forehead vigorously.
“Fuck, it’s so itchy.”
On his forehead was a disgusting, brown, bubbling scar from a cigarette burn. That, too, was the work of that dog-like old fossil.
‘Why.’
That old fossil’s voice echoed viscously in his ears. It felt as if something like mud had been shoved deep into his ear canal; no matter how much he tried to clean it with a cotton swab, it was useless. The voice resonated, ringing through his cochlea like a cave.
‘Why do you keep trying to wield it as if it were your own?’
Then came a slicing, slicing sound.
The man had barged into the house at will and dragged the blue-haired brat by the hair with a hand as thick as a cow’s foreleg. His eyes were those of someone completely gone.
‘…What is this crazy bastard talking about?’
He seemed so devoid of sanity that even the great Jjangja had simply frozen like ice, staring blankly. He wondered what the man was trying to do, but the man was slicing through the blue hair with a sashimi knife—slice, slice.
After being dazed for a moment, Jjangja suddenly snapped back to his senses. Why the hell am I frozen over something like that?
‘Fuck, that’s my money source!’
So Jjangja raised a paring knife. He slammed it down onto the man’s hand—the one Lee Eun-myeong had left behind after peeling an apple. A small, thin 15cm knife. It couldn’t pierce the bone, but it dug quite deep into the skin.
But regardless, that psycho didn’t even look his way. Even though blood was flowing, his gaze remained fixed solely on the blue head.
‘My, you touched him with this hand? How filthy.’
Then, claiming he was losing his temper, the man even sliced the blue head’s fingerprints into thin fillets. The blue-haired one let out a scream—Aaaagh!—and chaos erupted around them. People were screaming, crying, and wailing; it was a complete madhouse. Some people even sneaked out the back, fearing they’d be screwed if the police showed up.
In the midst of that, the tip of the sashimi knife pointed toward Jjangja. The man let go of the hair, and the blue head’s skull dropped forward.
‘You should know that I am watching you. My patience isn’t as good as it seems.’
The thug calmed his panting breath and smeared his hand all over the blue head’s cheek.
‘Think carefully about why I’m letting you live right now.’
The sashimi knife flashed. Jjangja thought it would stab him even if it were his last moment, but the man simply turned around and left the house.
Why the hell did he just leave?
His gaze was strangely erotic and crazed, yet he was too piercing to be a drug addict. …Which meant he was sane and yet crazy. Jjangja’s knees trembled with a chill.
“Excuse me.”
At the call, Jjangja snapped back to reality. Goosebumps had erupted on the back of his neck as if he had just watched a horror movie. In the meantime, the elevator doors had arrived at the lobby and were wide open. Jjangja added a curse as if bluffing.
“Bullshit.”
Walking out of the lobby with a swagger, he whipped his head around to scan the hall thoroughly. Watching me? Which bastard is it here? Is it that guy who just made eye contact? Or the guy cleaning over there?
“What a joke.”
Usually, those who say “just you wait” are never actually scary. Jjangja shook his head violently. He had come to shake down that beggar for some billiard hall money, but what a windfall this was. The small change was gone for now, but soon a large sum of money would fall into his hands.
He thought about borrowing money from the guys he hung out with today. When he took out his cell phone, the message box was a total circus.
[Hey, anyone seen Kim Philip lately?]
Kim Philip was that blue head. Jjangja felt his mood about to sour again and tried to exit the message box.
[His parents contacted me asking if he was with you]
[I’m sc-scared ttt]
More annoying nonsense. Jjangja sniffed and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.
[That bastard went bald]
[He’s probably diving underwater cuz he’s embarrassed lol don’t be a joke lol]
After hitting the send button, Jjangja let out a “Damn” and ruffled the back of his hair. On that day, he—the homeowner—was the only one who saw the end of Kim Philip, the blue head.
After that crazy bastard left the house, the other guys and girls had also fled in terror. Since they were on drugs, it would have been a disaster if the police arrived.
But then, thugs suddenly stormed the empty house. They looked exactly like that man’s subordinates, and they dragged the blue head away.
The blue head was loaded into a car trunk without a single struggle. Thinking about how he had watched that from the window made his skin crawl instantly. A damp cold sweat soaked his spine.
“So, what are you gonna do?”
Jjangja glared, bluffing. No matter how much of a thug he is, this is a country governed by law. Surely he wouldn’t have killed him? As that thought occurred, the chilling gaze of the man slicing the blue hair flashed before his eyes. Suddenly, the back of his neck felt freezing.
His legs trembled for no reason.
* * *
Twilight had already fallen outside. The man got out of the car and entered the hotel room. Since the lights weren’t on, the room was filled with darkness. The man scanned every corner. The atmosphere was strangely different from usual. The boy was usually so fearful that he always kept a small light on.
Then, a silhouette that had been blending into the darkness slowly rose.
“…….”
Silence flowed between the two.
Eun-myeong was looking down at the floor, his bangs hanging gloomily over his eyes. The man wondered if he was protesting his long absence, but it was Eun-myeong who broke the heavy silence first.
“Boss.”
Eun-myeong swallowed hard. The man tilted his head slowly. Without blinking, he took in the white silhouette before him.
“Boss, here.”
Eun-myeong fumbled and pulled something out. The rustling sound revealed a plastic bag with a wrinkled handle. The white envelope had a pharmacy’s name written on it.
“They say this is the best for knife cuts.”
The man frowned, wondering what this was about, but Eun-myeong grabbed the man’s forearm and gently pulled him.
Entering the bathroom, he carefully removed the man’s glove. The wound was revealed. It was slightly gaped, rubbed raw by the leather glove.
“…Ugh.”
Looking at it, Eun-myeong frowned and winced as if he were the one in pain.
Eun-myeong turned on the faucet and let water flow over the wound. He carefully watched the man’s expression to see if it stung. Next, he opened the cap of the disinfectant and slowly poured it onto the affected area. He was being incredibly cautious, as if performing a great task.
“This stings a lot.”
He dipped a small brush into the red medicine and gently spread it across the man’s hand. As he leaned forward, the gap in his long bangs opened. Eun-myeong’s pale face became more visible. The man took in that face as if licking it with his tongue.
“Your forehead is swollen.”
“…Yes?”
Eun-myeong looked up at the man with only his eyes. The brush slipped and touched another area. The liquid dripped, drip, drip, into the sink. An eerie silence filled the bathroom.
“I bumped into something.”
At that answer, the man asked:
“Are you sure?”
When asked if that was all, Eun-myeong’s eyes wavered. His small lips parted and closed repeatedly. Those lips were so precious that they rarely opened toward him. The man wanted to force his way into that mouth right now and dig out whatever was inside that throat, but he waited patiently.
“What happened to that blue-haired person, by any chance?”
Eun-myeong continued to mutter. The man silently stared at him. Had that face tossed and turned in a pale, anxious body during the nights he was gone? Perhaps he had been groping for the man’s empty space, staring at the door with that fucking sorrowful face.
The man had darkly expected that Eun-myeong would cling to his side, whining about how he’d be terrified and lose sleep wondering what that blue-haired person would do if he attacked.
“He probably has a lot of money at home; what if he’s being harmed?”
The question that escaped completely overturned the man’s expectations.
“And if Jjangja takes revenge on the Boss by any chance….”
“Ah.”
The man let out a long sigh of admiration. To think that this head was only considering his well-being. What on earth did he look like in this creature’s eyes?
“Revenge against me?”
It wasn’t even funny. A piece of trash who didn’t even have the capacity for that. At most, he’d take his anger out on someone easy.
That was why the man had attached a shadow to follow that pathetic thing. He heard the brat spent all his time in a billiard hall playing games and smoking heavily, only to be kicked out because he ran out of money for the games.
On his way out, he apparently stole a shoehorn from a shoe rack. He had rolled up a newspaper from a crosswalk on the street.
When he heard the brat was loitering in the hotel lobby, the man thought of the shoehorn. Since nothing had tripped the metal detector, that must have been the only weapon on his person. He was reported that after being let in, he used it to deceive and threaten Eun-myeong in the lobby. It was a total disaster.
Despite being such a joke. Despite being so dull, senseless, and slow-brained that he’d be fooled by such a thing, he still didn’t ask for help.
Deficient thing.
When all you know how to do is be pretty and lovely, why don’t you ask for help? A vein popped in the man’s temple. Sudden irritation surged.
“Does it hurt?”
As he frowned, Eun-myeong looked up. He scanned the man’s expression as if gauging his mood, then blew soft breaths—hoo, hoo—with his bright red lips. Then he looked up at the man again, meekly checking his reaction.
“If it hurts a lot, shall we go to the hospital? We could just say you were stabbed at a sashimi restaurant.”
His long eyelashes fluttered softly. Because he was nervous and focused, hot sweat beaded on the nape of his neck. With such a warm body, he showed concern, asking if it was okay or if it hurt.
A life that is nothing but trampled upon, yet here he was, worrying about someone else. The man watched him for now, finding it commendable that he was scurrying around on his own, but it seemed this too would not last long. The man’s patience was about to run out.