Page 63 of The Way Back Home

I think about that sometimes in the hours before sleep. How close it was. How easily it could have gone the other way.

When we’re finally discharged, the neighbors have already started repairs on the store. Mr. Goh and Mr. Han and half the street show up with tools and lumber, patching walls, replacing the burnt shelving, scrubbing smoke damage from the ceiling. Mrs. Nam declares that from that day forward neither Ryowoon nor I will pay for a single thing in her store ever again. Free meals, free snacks, free everything.

True to her word, our fridges never stay empty after that. If my mom opens the door and finds the shelves bare, by the next morning there’s somehow rice and banchan and fresh vegetables waiting in containers. Ryowoon’s too.

The scars fade but they don’t disappear. Mine on my palm, a shiny patch of skin that pulls tight when I make a fist. Ryowoon’s arm, mapped with marks. And my lungs, damage that won’t become clear until later when I’m wheezing after climbing a flight of stairs, when the cold air makes my chest seize up, when I wake in the middle of the night feeling like I’m drowning on dry land.

But we’re alive. Mrs. Nam’s alive. The store survived.

And through all of it, Ryowoon and I are still standing.

That spring I break up with Minjoo and feel almost nothing about it. She cries a little, which makes me feel guilty enough to buy her a milk tea from the vending machine and sit with her on the bench outside the school gate until she stops sniffling. But walking home afterward, the evening light stretching long across the pavement, I don’t feel the ache I felt after Jiae, or even after Sohee. Just a vague looseness, like setting down a bag I didn’t realize I’d been carrying.

Three days later Haeil catches me behind the gym with my hands on Yujin’s waist, a second year with a short bob and a laugh that makes my ears warm, and he doesn’t even have the decency to be subtle about it. He tells everyone. By lunch the next day Jinwon is shaking his head at me across the cafeteria table, Sihyung is cackling into his rice, and Haeil is pointing at me with his chopsticks calling me a stone-cold scoundrel, a menace to the women of Haemok, a villain in a school uniform.

“You didn’t even wait a week,” Yoohan says, looking impressed.

“Three days,” Haeil corrects. “Three days. The man is ruthless.”

I shove a spoonful of rice into my mouth and say nothing.

Ryowoon, lounging beside me with his chair tipped back on two legs and a toothpick between his teeth, just grins.

Spring settles in. Cherry blossoms come and go, the air turns soft, the days get longer. I can feel summer approaching in the shifting of the light, the breeze off the harbor starts carrying heat instead of cold.

And then one afternoon Ryowoon appears at the door of the classroom where I’ve barricaded myself with a stack of textbooks and a cold can of coffee, leans against the frame with his arms folded, and says, “Get up.”

I don’t look up from my notes. “Busy.”

“You’re coming outside.”

“Can’t. I’ve got two chapters left on this section and then I need to review my—”

He crosses the room, plucks the textbook out of my hands, and holds it above his head. Which, given the stupid height advantage he’s gained, puts it well out of my reach.

“Ryowoon.”

“Soccer. You and me. School field. Now.”

“Give me my book.”

“Come take it.”

I jump for it. He laughs and lifts it higher and I crash into his chest, which is infuriatingly solid these days and doesn’t budge. I shove at him, he shoves back, and before I know it he’s got me in a headlock and is dragging me toward the door while I swear at him and try to hook my foot around a desk leg.

By the time we reach the field I’ve given up fighting and started changing into my gym shoes, muttering about how he’s going to be responsible for my grades dropping and therefore my entire future collapsing. Ryowoon kicks a ball at me in response and it catches me in the thigh.

“Ow!”

“That’s for being dramatic. Come on.”

There are no rules when it’s just the two of us. No teams, no positions, no keeping score past the first few minutes. We play like we fight, with everything, elbows and knees and blatant fouls that would get us thrown out of any real match. The late afternoon sun hammers down on the field, not yet the ruthless heat of summer but enough to make me sweat through my shirt within minutes.

Ryowoon’s legs are a menace. He’s always been quick, twitchy and explosive, but the extra inches of stride he’s gained make him a nightmare to keep up with. He blows past me, the ball glued to his feet, and I have to sprint until my lungs burn just to close the gap. When I do catch him I throw my weight into the tackle, both of us crashing into the grass with grunts and curses, wrestling for the ball, yanking each other’s shirts, laughing when one of us eats dirt.

He steals the ball off me again and I grab a fistful of grass and hurl it at his face as he cuts past. He sputters, spitting grass out of his mouth, and the look of indignation is so funny I double over wheezing. He retaliates by scooping up his own handful and shoving it down the back of my collar. It sticks to the sweat on my skin and itches horribly and I howl, swatting at my own back while he dances away cackling.

It devolves from there. Less soccer, more war. We slam into each other going for the ball, skid across the turf on our knees, leave long green streaks on our uniforms. The sun burns overhead, sweat rolling down my temples, stinging my eyes. My lungs protest after every long sprint, my chest feels tight and my breath starts to get thin and wheezy.