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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 43
Chapter Title: Let's Just Hang Out
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“Welcome!”
“Hello. You're open, right?”
“Oh, of course. Please, have a seat anywhere you like.”
The owner of a mobile food stall on a quiet roadside welcomed the rare customers.
“My, you're soaked.”
Was the umbrella just for show?
“Yes. Haha. It just sort of happened.”
As Yeon-joo replied with an embarrassed look, the owner glanced over the two of them.
Seeing a perfectly normal-looking man and woman, drenched to the bone but still holding an umbrella, walk in, the owner looked startled for a moment before setting down warm water and a dry towel.
Unlike the woman, who lifted her head to scan the menu, the man sat with his back turned, wearing a mask and only nodding. The owner looked the man up and down, sensing his tall, handsome build even from behind, before turning away.
As soon as the owner turned away, Yeon-joo looked at Eun-seong. *How is it that he looks even more handsome when he's wet? Tsk.*
“Dry yourself off. You'll catch a cold.”
“You first.”
“I pulled my clothes over my head, so I didn't get that wet. I'm fine.”
When Yeon-joo handed him the towel, Eun-seong ruffled his hair dry. As if pleased by the unique, cozy atmosphere of the food stall, he glanced around and let out a short laugh.
“Thanks to you, I get to come to a food stall for the first time in a while. This is nice.”
“I couldn't really think of anywhere else. There aren't many customers here, and it's a good spot for a simple meal.”
“Do you come here often?”
“Well, sometimes. Very rarely. Udon is okay, right?”
Eun-seong nodded at Yeon-joo's question. Food stall udon was an immortal menu item that no one could argue with.
“Sir! Two bowls of udon over here!”
“Coming right up!”
“And a bottle of soju, please.”
“You got it.”
Eun-seong, who had been sitting stiffly like a waterlogged machine, conscious of the owner's gaze, ordered alcohol, making Yeon-joo's eyes widen.
“You're going to drink? Are you sure?”
“Not much.”
“Fine. Well, do as you please. I know you're not the type to listen if I tried to stop you.”
Eun-seong poured her a cup of warm water and smiled. At his simple, meaningless smile, her heart dropped with a thud—
At the sound of that small laugh, the world fell silent—
“Thanks for knowing I'm not one to be dissuaded.”
“It's not like I've forgotten that much.”
“It's nice to see the honest Go Yeon-joo again, too.”
*Just for a moment. Just for today.*
“Want a drink?”
“Yes, well, then I'll have one too.”
She wanted to let her heart have its way.
*
He said he was hungry, that he hadn't eaten all day, yet Eun-seong barely touched half his bowl of udon and instead emptied his glass. The cheap sound quality from a cassette tape, a rare find these days, that the owner had put on to kill the boredom, strangely stirred their emotions.
They ate their udon without much conversation. They emptied their glasses. The first bottle was finished in no time, and Eun-seong poured from the second.
“There are so many things I want to ask you.”
It was the first thing he'd said after a long silence.
“I keep telling myself, 'I'll ask next time we meet, I'll ask next time,' but when I actually see you, I can't bring myself to ask.”
“Why... not?”
“Because I feel like my questions would put you in a difficult position.”
At the end of his sentence, he drained his glass. The sound of the rain tapping against the stall's walls mixed with the cheap song, washing away the bitter taste of the soju.
His brow furrowed slightly as he refilled his glass. In that time, Yeon-joo quietly emptied hers.
“I'd rather you never ask me anything, from now on.”
“...”
“I don't think there's much I can answer.”
“Have you been well?”
Her eyelids fell shut on their own, and Yeon-joo forced them back open with all her might. Why was this simple question causing a hot lump to form in her throat, choking her?
“Well, so-so.”
She barely managed to reply.
Was that the answer he wanted, or not? He nodded for a long while. Hurriedly refilling her empty glass, Yeon-joo added more.
“It's been manageable. Not terribly unhappy, but not terribly happy either. I don't know how that sounds to you.”
“It's a good answer. All this time, I thought I'd go crazy whether you were doing well or not.”
“...”
“I hated both possibilities. That's how it was for me.”
Yeon-joo stared at Eun-seong's face for a long time. It felt as if the sadness, layered deep inside her, was surging up, and she had to swallow dryly several times.
She had the futile delusion that if she were to caress his face, still damp with rain, he would shatter like a beautiful mirage. She knew it was a ridiculous fantasy, but she clung to it like a superstition.
It was a baseless illusion. If she touched him, he would disappear.
The only way to keep him for a long time was to just look.
“It seems there was a lot of trouble while the employee named Jeong Ju-mi was working.”
“What? Ju-mi?”
Yeon-joo's expression changed as if waking from a dream at Eun-seong's next question. Eun-seong pursed his lips, swallowed his drink, and set down his glass without any particular expression.
Then he looked at Yeon-joo.
“It seems like she gave you a hard time. Why didn't you say anything?”
“What do you mean, a hard time? There was nothing like that.”
“Really? Nothing?”
When Eun-seong asked again, Yeon-joo fell silent. She paused for a moment, recalling Ju-mi, who had tormented her with strange words and actions from the first day to the last.
“You can't get along with every employee. Everyone thinks differently.”
“If someone ignores the discomfort of others for their own convenience, that's not just a matter of different ways of thinking. You should have told Director Jin. Or even me.”
“It would just end up being about badmouthing her. What's the point? As long as the set runs smoothly, that's all that matters.”
“If it were me, I would have put a stop to it immediately. Who's going to recognize your patience?”
“I might wonder if anyone understands how I feel, but then, I don't know how others feel either.”
“...”
“I just call it even. Then it's bearable.”
At her overly nonchalant and concise tone, Eun-seong took a deep breath. He wondered if she intended to embrace every single thing that happened in life, making her existence feel suffocating, but then a dry laugh escaped him as he thought, *You're much more of an adult than I am.*
“Go Yeon-joo, you're a real adult.”
“It's because I'm immature. Even at my age, I don't know how to resolve things amicably, so I just avoid them.”
Her eyes unfocused, Yeon-joo stared at the soju bottle. She let out a long, unintentional sigh that had been building inside her, and only after a long moment did she lift her gaze to look at him.
Their eyes met.
“As you well know, we can't be doing this.”
“...”
“You know. You know it all too well.”
“Stop. We're having a nice drink for a change, don't nag.”
“If we keep getting tangled up like this, it's too hard for me. To be more honest, even if I wanted to quit, I can't now because of Han-byeol.”
His fingertips tingled, and he clenched his dry fists. Not wanting to reveal the shift in his emotions, Eun-seong shoved his hands in his pockets and cleared his throat.
The meaningless cough sent a sharp pang through his chest.
“If you think about it, we weren't on such good terms, were we? No matter how you try to romanticize it, back then, we—no, *I* was a really bad person.”
“...”
“Don't get caught up in romanticized memories. It's natural to be happy to see each other again, and for that to bring up old thoughts, but humans have an innate tendency to only hold on to the good memories...”
“Our breakup—it wasn't entirely your fault.”
Just when she thought it was a dull ache, the slashing began.
“I didn't hold onto you back then, either. Well, if I had really set my mind to it, I think I could have found a way. But as you know, my life was turned upside down at that time. That alone was overwhelming, and I was out of my mind.”
“...”
“You were just the one who delivered the news. I tacitly agreed to it, too. I felt like I'd go crazy if I didn't blame you out of my own young, selfish thoughts, so I endured by blaming you.”
She remembered how, a few days after she told him they were breaking up, his phone number had been disconnected. Yeon-joo took a long, deep breath.
Eun-seong raised his glass. It was hard to tell if he was talking to himself or making a belated confession.
“The better my life got, the more I thought of you. I wondered if maybe I had made it this far by stepping on the foundation that Go Yeon-joo built for me.”
“...”
“Maybe Go Yeon-joo stepped aside for my future. You're the kind of person who would do that.”
“That's... not possible.”
“That's what I thought. Of course, I never imagined you'd get married so quickly.”
Listening quietly to his lament, her heart stirred, and Yeon-joo lifted her gaze to the ceiling. She stared at the pale, warm-white lightbulb, thick with dust, trying desperately to wash away the sorrow inside her.
*If I could turn back time, where should I go?*
“After more time passed, I wanted to see you at least once. I wanted to ask, 'Look how successful I've become, are you watching?'”
*Should I go back to the time when you loved me, when I loved you? Or should I return to before I met you and never even start?*
*Where should I go? Where must I go to pass by without knowing this painful corner of my heart?*
“I wanted to treat you to a real, proper meal if we ever met, but it's udon again. I don't like it.”
*...Even if I went back, I would have to meet you. I would have to be loved by you, and I would have to love you.*
*Even if the same breakup, the same ending, awaited us, I would have to meet you and love you all the more passionately.*
*That is how I would have to meet our child again.*
“Make some time for me. I'll buy you something delicious.”
“It's okay. A bowl of udon is more than enough.”
Ignoring the stinging sensation at the tip of her nose, Yeon-joo poured a drink. Pouring for themselves, drinking by themselves, they hid under the flimsy tent amid the rain, stuck in a state where they could neither move forward nor go back.
Eun-seong rested his chin on his hand. He looked at her with a bright smile, as if recalling something immensely joyful.
“Being with you, then and now, is fun. It makes me forget everything.”
Her large, expressive eyes wavered.
“So, let's just set everything else aside and hang out for a little while.”
“Hang out? We're not kids, what would we even do...”
“Just like this. Eat together sometimes, have a drink, talk about the old days, and talk about how we're living now. Just... just like this.”
Watching him smile like a child, asking her to just hang out for a bit, she wanted to caress that face even if it meant he would crumble and disappear.
*Even though she had no confidence she could run away.*
“Hang out with me, Go Yeon-joo.”
“...”
“Just for a little while. Okay?”
*Even though she didn't have the courage to love.*
