CH 3

I grew up with a venomous spirit and was seventeen years old. When it was time to enter high school, I bought a school uniform. I told my dad I could use a second-hand one, but he insisted on spending a fortune on a new one. He said it was worth every penny for his only son.

“My son, you look great!”

“Really? I think it’s a little big.”

“When you’re growing up, it’s good to wear big clothes. Your dad suddenly grew taller when he was in high school.”

Dad said he met Mum in high school and it was love at first sight. I remember hearing this story as a kid, but never asked. I didn’t want to bring up my mum on such a happy day.

He’s been handsome and articulate ever since. While he was complimenting me, he suddenly pulled out his mobile phone.

“I don’t recognise this number….”

“Take it, just in case.”

“I will. Wait a minute.”

After he went out into the living room to answer the phone, I checked my hair in the mirror. It was a little big, but as Dad had said, it was new, so it looked neat. But there must have been a reason for the expensive school uniforms. He was worried that someone would tell me that I didn’t have enough because I was from a single-parent family.

“I don’t really care about that….”

I sighed heavily and put the jacket on. Suddenly, a strange text appeared in front of my eyes.

[Fate to Die] was transferred from the Awakener Lee Yoo-yeon.

Lee Yoo-yeon. Even though I tried to forget it, it was my mum’s name, so what does ‘destined to die’ mean? The moment I carefully placed my hand on the letters, I understood the strange curse.

If the curse is on you, you will die in 10 years.

Until then, no matter what you do, you will never die.

And that the moment you die, the curse will be transferred to the person you love the most.

“…Transfer… transferred?”

My mum’s curse had metastasised to me. That could only mean one thing.

“Dad.”

Dad, who had been staring blankly into space as I walked out into the living room, turned to me urgently. The pale, worn face, the unfocused eyes, they belonged to someone who had fallen into the deepest depths of despair. I tried to pretend not to notice, but I couldn’t.

“Mum, is she dead?”

“How could you…”

Dad blurted out, unable to hide his bewilderment.

“No way. No… It’s Hajae, isn’t it?”

I couldn’t hear what he was asking, but I could sense what he wanted to know. I remained silent, and then he sank to the floor, sobbing the tears he’d been holding back.

“No, no. You promised to hand it over to me.”

It was a desperate cry.

“You should have loved me more, not Hajae!”

It finally hit me. I understood why Mum was leaving home, why Dad never caught her, why Dad didn’t hate her, why you looked so hurt whenever I told you I didn’t want her.

You left home to stop the curse from spreading to me, to forget about me, your son, to stop loving me.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Hajae.”

The sound of a forced swallow of tears rang in my ears, and the hand holding my shoulder trembled unworthily. For the first time, my dad, who had always put on a strong front, showed tears in front of me, but I wasn’t sad. It wasn’t because I wasn’t sad about my mum’s death when I was seven.

“Dad. I’m okay.”

I was the one she loved most before she died, and I was glad to know that.

“Really… I’m okay.”

I felt redeemed. She hadn’t left me because she didn’t like me, or because I was a burden, but because she really loved me. And yet, ten years later, she hadn’t forgotten me, so her curse came back to haunt me.

‘Hajae, your mum is leaving because she loves you.’

The words she uttered as she left me were not a contradiction, but the perfect truth.

From that day on, I put back one by one the traces of my mother that I had erased. When I tidied up the house where she lived alone, I expected to find a will, but my dad was adamant that there wasn’t one. So I carefully put the remaining items in a drawer.

A year passed. I didn’t mind that Dad’s eyes were filled with mourning when he looked at me from time to time. Above all, the idea of dying in 10 years didn’t seem so real to me. I was happy to be able to exercise, which helped my asthma, which had plagued me since childhood.

“Why are you acting like I’m a sinner? I don’t go to the doctor and I feel fine.”

“Hajae.”

“I don’t think it’s a curse.”

I deliberately smiled brighter, but the shadow on Dad’s face didn’t go away. I know it’s not easy for parents to let go of their children, but I thought I could live happily ever after with Dad for another ten years.

But life, alas, did not go according to plan.

“Yes…? A hospital…?”

Tragedy struck again. They say that when one of them dies, the other will follow in their footsteps in the near future. As if to prove the myth, Dad was in a car accident that winter. When I heard the news from the institute and rushed to the hospital, he was shattered beyond recognition.

When I finally got my hands on him, he was breathing heavily.

“By the bed… Check the chest of drawers. ……I’m sorry.”

That was it. I stood there, unable to believe the death in front of me, and then, as Dad’s face was covered with a white cloth, a flood of emotions poured out of me. I begged him not to leave me alone, and that I would die with him. But less than three seconds after I said those words, I realised that I would never die.

I realised that I was never going to die. I was going to spend the next 10 years in hell.

“…I’m back.”

When I returned home after the funeral and opened the chest of drawers, I found a small envelope.

[To my beloved son].

It was in Mum’s handwriting, with long vowels. Dad had said she didn’t have a will, but it turned out that Dad had been hiding it all this time. I opened the letter, eager to see what he had to say to me.

But it said,

[Hajae, I’m sorry].

The letter began with an apology,

[And if you do fall in love with someone, please don’t love them].

Bitter regrets and

[Give it up as soon as possible, that’s the last advice I can give you].

Only a warning remained.

‘Please don’t love me.’

Clutching my mum’s last words in my arms, I headed towards the church like I was possessed. The spires on the cliffs above the crashing waves were just as I had seen them when I was a child, often accompanying my father to Mass. Sitting on the edge of the cliff and listening to the crashing waves was strangely soothing.

From that day on, whenever I could, I volunteered at the church’s nursery. Only here, I’m not called “high school student Shin Hajae” but “teacher John”. Even though I was still in high school, I was happy to hear the children call me “teacher” because it made me feel like I had accomplished something.

Then one day, I saw a face I hadn’t seen before.

“Teacher. Don’t play with him.”

“Why?”

“Something’s wrong with him. He doesn’t talk to you.”

The child was a stranger. He was the only outsider in a nursery that was as close as family without a drop of blood between them. As it turns out, he wasn’t alone from the beginning. Silky black hair, long eyelashes, and fair skin that framed every second of his face. The children, fascinated by his good looks for a man, tried to get close to him. But he wouldn’t even make eye contact with them.

As they continued to be ignored, they began to spread bad rumours about him.

“Someone said. He sees ghosts.”

“That’s right. That’s why he was abandoned here.”

It was not the kind of behaviour one would expect from children being educated by a compassionate priest in a holy cathedral, but the boy did not respond to any of the insults. He didn’t even deny that the rumours were false; he simply read in silence from a tattered maths textbook on his bookshelf.

Without firewood, a hot fire goes out. Soon the rumours died down and he became like air. At lunchtime, when the boys were playing football and the girls were out for a walk, he would read in the classroom by himself.

I was relieved to see him out of the limelight.

“Hi.”

I finally had a chance to talk to him alone.

“I finally got to talk to you.”

In the short time I’ve been volunteering at the orphanage, I’ve met so many children who have been taken from their families, and they are understandably hungry for love and attention. Having lost my own parents not long before, I felt lonely myself, but this child was special. I couldn’t help but be curious as I brushed off the oncoming favours.

“Do you like math?”

Again, he didn’t answer. But my curiosity about him grew and grew, not faded. Yes, he was like a stray cat that refused to let me touch it. And, alas, I am a persistent bastard who, whenever there is a cat that is wary of me, will go to it until it allows me to touch it.

From that day on, I hovered around him and talked to him every day. I kept asking him what his name was, what food he didn’t like, and if he liked to play games. But he never answered. He would just flip through his sun-bleached book, as he always did.

“Is it hot today? Do you want some ice cream?”

Still, I didn’t think I was being ignored, and neither did he, because his eyes flickered subtly with each question I asked. Sometimes his brow furrows, sometimes his lips twitch as if he’s about to say something.

He’s clearly listening. But he doesn’t answer. Maybe he’s just hiding his face.