Chapter 364: I didn’t want therapy anyway
"Seo-Jun, do you want to know what he wrote in his letter?"
"Jo-Pil," Seo-Jun called. "Please look at me."
But I couldn’t. And because of that, I bit my bottom lip, feeling miserable.
"I’ll just tell you anyway, since I’m the storyteller," I said, laughing drying. "He apologized for leaving the boy alone in a world filled with cruelty. He apologized for not being with him a bit longer and then warned him about reality."
"Reality is full of cruelty, my boy. But I hope you don’t live on the cruel side of reality and live happily. I... I will make sure you at least do not struggle after I am gone."
"Those words that were supposed to be confusing to a boy that age were crystal clear because he just tasted the bitter side of reality. The cruel side that took his grandfather away from him, leaving him with nothing. Only, he wasn’t left with nothing. His grandfather had saved up a lot during his lifetime, and then coupled with his life insurance. This was his way of making sure his grandson did not lack anything in life for as long as he lived, up until he was ready to get married."
I went silent, my heavy heart going solemn for a bit.
"But the boy detested the fact that there was so much money because he felt that if they had used a bit from that money then his grandfather would’ve survived. He threw a tantrum. He was so angry and sad and..."
I brushed my cheek.
"...it was only thanks to the lawyer’s explanation that the boy was able to calm down. He said, ’money can’t buy time for the aged who have lived the entirety of their life. Rather, it would be a waste to spend the money on them when the living were still struggling. This was the message your grandfather wanted you to understand.’ Kind of cool, right? With just those words the boy calmed down and cried silently."
The money was given to me after high school when I was ready to get into college, but before then, the lawyer took care of the rest.
He took me in, because social workers would dip their hands into my case if I were left alone.
It was only going to be for three years anyway so it didn’t matter.
I had been a little dead on the inside after my grandfather’s death. I didn’t do well in my finals, but I did enough to be promoted, and that’s how I got into high school.
Still, I had no more motivation in life. Since reality was so cruel, I didn’t want to give my all and end up falling like my grandfather did.
I just... Wanted to give up.
But then one day, I overheard a few girls talking about a novel they were reading.
That’s when I came into contact with the idea of reading novels, since the concept of escaping reality through immersion in a different world seemed to work well as a form of therapy.
I didn’t want therapy anyway, I just wanted to escape reality.
I just wanted to visit the words where life felt easy and predestined partners came out of nowhere and made life feel like a dream.
"Seo-Jun, the boy, finally decided to try and escape reality, both the cruel and the good ones. So, he began to read. He read novels of all kinds but mostly went for romance that had a happily ever after. Because he, too, wanted a happily ever after one day but he couldn’t be sure in his reality. It was... Hard."
I don’t know if that last part gave away the fact that the boy in the story was me but it was okay.
Seo-Jun must’ve already heard of my story from Jin-Yeok’s investigation, and none of it aligns.
He might think this is just me being emotional for no reason.
"Jo-Pil, just... Who are you?"
My eyes widened and I lifted my head in shock.
What did he just ask me?
Seo-Jun was looking me straight in the eye with his face slightly twisted in agony and his lips pressed in a thin line.
His eyes held a sharp yet weary gaze. He was being careful but not so much that he couldn’t meet my eyes and spill his intentions through them.
But... did he just ask who I was?
Was that... Him trying to understand where this story came from or was he just suspicious of my origin?
That couldn’t be, right?
Then, he grabbed his head, his face twisted in pain.
"What’s wrong?" I asked, alarmed. This headache felt suspicious too.
"Agh, it’s nothing. It’s..." He raised his head again, dropping his hand. "It must be just a headache. I guess even when my temperature dropped, the fever is still there."
Just a headache? Was he sure?
That was too well timed.
I mean, maybe I was the one reading too much meaning into it.
"Jo-Pil, what I meant was... Who is the boy in the story? Is it you? Or is it a novel you read?"
I went silent, staring at him for a while. I was a bit dumbfounded.
What does... What does this man want from me?
(You know, each time Jo-Pil asks this question, it means something else from what he’s asking. What does this man want from me? It’s rather rhetorical and doesn’t need an answer but we can feel Jo-Pil’s feelings in each question. Sometimes, he’s simply exaggerating. Other times, it’s filled with a heavy and desperate confusion. And other times, he just wants to know what’s in Seo-Jun’s mind.)
I shifted a bit. Would he believe me if I said it was a novel? But then he’d ask what the novel was and ask if it was an otherworldly novel like the one I wrote for him before.
He would believe me if I said it was a novel, but for some reason, I didn’t want to make my life seem fictional... This life may be fictional but my life in the other world... It was real.
No one read it. I experienced it by myself. Unlike the way many readers read a story and feel for the characters, no one cried for me.
No one consoled me. No one sympathized with me. No one fought for me with words from mouth or keyboard.
I was basically invisible.
So, I don’t want to say a life I lived like that was a novel. So instead...
A small smile played on my lips, my eyes squinting as I said,
"I made it up."