How to Survive the Horror Novel I Wrote
Chapter 36
Ondam. He sure could talk. If only he didn’t beat her.
“You’re crossing the line. I haven’t kidnapped anyone; I am protecting her.”
“Pro-tec-ting? Ha! Who the hell are you to talk about protecting my daughter or not?!”
Ondam’s father roared at the top of his lungs. It felt as though a bomb had detonated in my ears.
Startled, my heart pounded wildly. It felt as if he was going to start beating me next, right after the front door. Honestly, I was terrified.
But I couldn’t show fear. People like him were always weak before the strong and cruel to the weak.
I fought to steady my voice, desperately keeping it calm.
“I am Ondam’s schoolteacher.”
“You think being a teacher gives you the right to butt into someone else’s family business? Mind your own damn business and get lost! Insolent little bitch.”
His vulgar tone and glaring eyes were thoroughly vile. How could someone be so sickeningly identical to my stepfather?
But I was no longer the helpless child who cowered before her stepfather. I was an adult, and I was a teacher. I had to remain composed.
“I don’t think that’s something someone making a scene in front of another person’s home should be saying.”
“What did you just say? A scene? Hey, you fucking bitch. What you’re doing is making a scene! A so-called teacher taking someone else’s kid and brainwashing her not to go home! Are you in a cult? Some pyramid scheme? A worthless piece of trash like you has no business holding a piece of chalk!”
Ondam’s father’s spit-flying roars rained down on me like artillery fire.
Every single thing about him felt like a threat.
His bloodshot, glaring eyes. His savagely contorted face. His index finger stabbing through the air as if it were about to pierce me.
Fear snowballed, rising all the way to my throat. I just wanted to turn and run.
Yet ironically, the word teacher, spat from his sneering mouth, anchored my resolve.
“I’m not in a cult, I’m not in a pyramid scheme, and I have never brainwashed Ondam. Furthermore, whether I teach or not is none of your business.”
“How dare a bitch like you talk back to me?!”
Ondam’s father raised his hand high. I flinched involuntarily.
<How dare you.>
It was my stepfather’s favorite refrain. Instantly, the memory of his massive, heavy hands flashed in my mind.
The hands that seized fistfuls of my hair. The hands that slapped my face without mercy. The clenched fists that battered my entire body.
For a moment, darkness washed over my vision. The sheer terror of being beaten to death choked off my breath.
It felt as though, at any second, he would grab me by the hair and smash my forehead against the front door.
Seeing my reaction, Ondam’s father jutted his chin out, triumphant.
“Cut the bullshit and open the door right now.”
His contempt for me was unmistakable. A surge of defiance flared up inside me.
“No. I cannot do that. Please leave. If you continue to cause a disturbance like this, I will call the police.”
It was a bluff. I had no intention of calling the police.
I had only said it to scare him, but it backfired completely.
Far from being intimidated, Ondam’s father snapped back as if he had been waiting for it.
“Go ahead, report me! You think I’m scared of the police? What a joke. Whose side do you think the cops will take? Let’s do this by the book, then! By the law!”
He was right. Regardless of everything, he was Ondam’s father.
Yet I had already spoken the words, and hesitating now would mean losing the battle of wills. Reluctantly, I pulled out my phone. I unlocked it and opened the keypad.
Still, I couldn’t bring myself to dial 112. How could I report this? The police would just send Ondam back to him.
While I hesitated, Ondam’s father snatched the phone from my hand.
“What are you hesitating for? I’ll call them myself.”
“Give it back!”
Panicked, I lunged at him.
A brief scuffle broke out.
I quickly grabbed the phone back, but the call was already connected.
- This is the police. What is your emergency?
“I’m sorry. I dialed by mistake.”
It was then.
Suddenly, Ondam’s father thrust his flushed face right in front of mine.
The stench of alcohol hit me, sending chills down my spine.
“This bitch is a kidnapper!”
Ondam’s father shouted into my phone.
Horrified, I stepped back.
“What are you doing?!”
“Reporting you! You think you’re the only one with a mouth?”
Ondam’s father sneered.
“……”
I was speechless. I had tried to reason with someone who was beyond reason.
While I stood at a loss for words, Ondam’s father kept shoving his face forward and screaming into the receiver, telling them to come arrest the bitch who kidnapped his daughter.
Terrified, I hung up the phone.
“Why’d you hang up? Why aren’t you reporting it? Huh?”
Ondam’s father pressed, scoffing as he shoved my shoulder hard.
The anger was greater than the pain. But greater still was the fear. Ondam’s father’s face was beginning to look just like my stepfather’s.
“Don’t hit me.”
“You call this hitting? This? It’s just a push.”
Ondam’s father sneered maliciously, shoving my shoulder again and again.
Jolted backward by his shoves, I stumbled back step by step.
With each step back, my stepfather’s shadow looming over Ondam’s father grew larger, while I shrank smaller and smaller.
With every backward step, it felt like I was turning back into a nine-year-old child.
No. I’m not that child anymore.
I gritted my teeth and scraped together every shred of courage I possessed. Then, with all my strength, I struck away the hand shoving me.
Smack!
“I told you not to touch me!”
Ondam’s father froze in shock.
I was shocked too. I… I had done it. But the relief was fleeting.
His expression contorted into something savage as he glared at me.
“You dare hit me? Fine, you’ve done it now. You struck first, so this is self-defense, you fucking bitch.”
The moment he raised his hand high, I saw my stepfather in him.
Just as he had twenty years ago—young, strong, and cruel—my stepfather was bringing his massive hand down toward me.
In the blink of an eye, time rewound, reducing me to a helpless child once more.
A child who could do nothing but take the blows and weep.
Reflexively, I covered my head and curled into myself.
The moment I squeezed my eyes shut, a dull thud echoed near my ear as something was caught.
“Who the hell are you now?!”
I opened my eyes and saw Ondam’s father’s infuriated face glaring behind me, his palm frozen right in front of my face, and the hand gripping his wrist.
Long, thick fingers. A masculine back of a hand where blue veins stood out.
A crisp white dress shirt cuff emerging from a black suit jacket, adorned with elegant cufflinks.
Tears welled in my eyes instantly.
It was a hand I knew. The hand that had protected me every time danger struck.
I turned my head to look at my savior.
Ugeum, standing behind me, glaring at Ondam’s father with an expressionless face.
“That’s what I should be asking.”
With a chilling retort, Ugeum twisted Ondam’s father’s arm.
“Aaargh! Ah, ah, aaaagh!” Ondam’s father’s screams echoed loudly down the apartment hallway.
Amid the screams, Ugeum’s flat, uninflected voice cut through clearly.
“Who do you think you are, making a scene with my woman?”
My woman. My heart squeezed with emotion, even as a chill ran down my spine.
This was already the third time Ugeum had directed his murderous intent toward someone who wasn’t his target.
The hunting woman who had insulted me at the blind date restaurant. Mo Yeyeon and her clique who had cornered me in the teachers’ room. And now Ondam’s father, who had threatened and shoved me.
None of them fit Ugeum’s criteria for people deserving death. So why?
It was as if a new criterion for his prey had been added—with me at the center.
“Stop. He’s Ondam’s father.”
I tried to stop Ugeum.
“Yeah, I’m Ondam’s father!”
Ondam’s father quickly yelled.
Ugeum didn’t even pretend to listen, asking coldly,
“And?”
“That bitch took my daughter first—Aaagh!”
Ruthlessly twisting his arm further, Ugeum growled in a low voice.
“Watch your mouth. How dare you.”
I stood dazed.
<How dare you.>
Ondam’s father had just received the exact words he had thrown at me earlier. What a dramatic reversal.
Groaning in agony, Ondam’s father outright began begging him to let go.
Ugeum ignored him completely and looked at me.
His eyes asked: What should I do? What do you want me to do?
I nodded. Let him go.
Tch. I almost thought I heard him click his tongue. Looking displeased, Ugeum shoved Ondam’s father away.
Released from Ugeum’s grip, Ondam’s father let out a choked gasp and tumbled clumsily to the floor.
Sprawled on the floor, Ondam’s father looked up at Ugeum with venom in his eyes.
“You pushed me!”
“And?”
“I’m suing you, you motherfucker.”
“Go ahead.”
Ugeum didn’t even bat an eye.
As he locked eyes with Ugeum, the color gradually drained from Ondam’s father’s face.
Ugeum’s gaze was that chilling and savage. The murderous intent radiating from him was sharp enough to prick the skin, sharp enough to cut like a blade.
An image flashed through my mind of Ugeum seizing Ondam’s father by the throat with one hand and slamming him against the wall.
A merciless, unyielding grip like a serpent coiling around its prey, lifting Ondam’s father off his feet with superhuman strength.
Suspended in the air, Ondam’s father’s legs kicking pathetically.
His face turning crimson, choking and begging.
‘P-please… spare me…!’
Ugeum answering expressionlessly.
‘I don’t think I can do that.’
In the end, his eyes rolling back white, frothing at the mouth.
Tossing the corpse aside like garbage, Ugeum turns to look at me and smiles.
‘Why don’t you head inside first? I’ll clean this up and follow you.’
A cold shiver ran down my spine. Snapping out of the vision, I shuddered and grabbed Ugeum’s arm.
Ugeum turned his head and looked down at me.
I shook my head, my eyes pleading. Don’t. Stop.
Ugeum merely looked at me without a word.
I waited anxiously. It felt as though a lit fuse was burning inside my stomach, racing to the very end.
Finally, Ugeum spoke in a cold voice toward Ondam’s father.
“Leave.”
Yet Ondam’s father didn’t budge.
His face deathly pale, he was frozen like a frog before a snake.
“Can’t you hear me? I said get lost.”
Ugeum repeated fiercely.
Only then did Ondam’s father flinch and scramble backward.
Muttering that I hadn’t seen the last of him, he fled without looking back.
Only then did the strength leave my legs.
As I swayed, Ugeum caught my waist and pulled me effortlessly into his embrace.
“Are you all right?”
“Mm-hmm.”
I answered out of habit, but in truth, I was far from all right.
There was no way I could be fine after confronting a man like my stepfather.
As the cold sweat drenching my back dried, a chill seeped in, and my whole body trembled.
Tensed to the limit, my stomach was knotted tight and nausea churned within me.
“I’m sorry I’m late. You were terrified, weren’t you?”
Ugeum kissed my forehead and apologized softly.
Why did those simple words make tears suddenly surge up?
Without a word, I buried my face in Ugeum’s chest.
I didn’t want to cry over a piece of trash like that, but since I couldn’t stop the tears, I at least wanted to hide them.
Ugeum silently wrapped his arms around my back, as if telling me he understood everything I felt.
His embrace was warm and comforting. As always, it felt as though I was in the safest place in the world.
A sudden thought struck me: I desperately needed this embrace. Even if it meant dying in his arms.