03. in the midst of profa (1/1)

03. in the midst of profanities “What the fuck is that?” is the first thing I hear when I enter our apartment, my dirty shoes ruining the welcome mat Sungjong bought last earlier this month as a joke. The mat was a joke within itself – no one was welcome into anything owned by Sungjong. I hold the box tentatively between my hands. It’s not that surprising, really, because I’m pretty sure Sungjong wasn’t expecting me to come home with a bright red box. I still jump slightly at his greeting though, if I can call it that. Sungjong’s hair is neatly combed, as it always is, though his face stares at the box in clear disbelief. I shrug. “It’s a box,” I say, because it is. Sungjong’s eyes stare me down. “No shit Sherlock.” I am just about to tell him that I’m not Sherlock when Sungjong takes the box out of my hands. I watch as he puts it on the table, the same one we eat on. His hands form a thinking pose – his whole body does, actually. I lean over, curious. “Is it a bomb?” I ask him. “If I knew it was a bomb,” he says, “Don’t you think I would’ve thrown it out the window by now?” I consider this, nodding. Sungjong’s usually right, and when he isn’t it’s usually for a very good reason. He opens it slightly. “It’s a red fucking box,” he breathes. It sounds as if he doesn’t quite believe it. I lean further towards him, almost losing my balance in the process. Inside the box is red tissue, the same colour as the box, and an average-sized teddy bear. I smile. That was nice of the man. “Where did you find this?” Sungjong asks, taking off the lid completely. He takes the teddy bear out and holds it above him with two hands. “On the floor when I was walking in the park,” I reply. “Hm,” he says, and doesn’t say much after that.    The next morning I wake up to the smell of take-away food. I get up and move towards the kitchen, following my nose. After a few steps I pass the living room and I see the red box and teddy bear which was once inside it. It reminds me of yesterday’s events, and I smile at the memory. “’Morning Princess,” Sungjong says when I make it to the kitchen. He pushes a bowl of udon towards me, “Nice of you to join the living today.” I nod, “Good morning.” I take a seat next to him, and begin to eat the noodles. I think of the stranger at the park while I do this, and the happiness I feel makes me want to explode. “What are you smiling at?” “The red box.” Sungjong scoffs, but he doesn’t say anything else. Instead he takes his empty bowl to our small kitchen and washes it, water gushing from the shiny new tap. Like everything owned by Sungjong, the kitchen is as spotless and foreign. When our apartment is empty, it looks as if it’s unoccupied, as if no one lives in here. Sungjong doesn’t like personal items – Sungjong doesn’t like anything – and says that they’re all a waste of time. There’s no point getting attached to materialistic things, he once said, and nothing seems to have changed til now. In fact, the only thing different about the apartment now and the one we bought a few years ago is the red box and teddy bear. I think again about the stranger. I wonder if Sungjong has ever felt the same way the stranger does. “Sungjong?” I ask. He barely turns. “What?” “Do you think that if we speak too much to people, we give away too much of our hearts?” Sungjong doesn’t reply immediately. I wonder what he’s thinking about – whether he’s considering my question or if he’s a thousand million miles away thinking about something else completely. I wait for his answer, fastening and unfastening my fingers on the handle of my green frog cup. Sungjong once said that the key to being part of a mafia is to seem as far from possibly being part of a mafia as you can. The ends of our plastic Hello Kitty table cloth tremble as Sungjong breathes out. “Only people who speak without thinking do that,” Sungjong says after a long while. “If you’re smart, you wouldn’t be one of them.” I nod. “The man at the park does though. I think he’s a smart person.” “You don’t think a lot,” Sungjong bites back, and that ends our conversation. He takes both his and my mug to the sink. “Go get changed, Woohyun wants us to run a few errands.” I do exactly that, changing from what I wore yesterday to what I’ll be wearing today. I come out and Sungjong’s ready in skinny jeans and a coat that runs below his bum. I ask him why he’s wearing that because I think he looks like a girl. I don’t tell him this though. “Why not?” Sungjong replies when I ask. “Why fucking not?” We ride the bus together. Sungjong pays our fares. He lets me sit on the seat because “I’m a wuss with no sense of balance” and stands next to me, holding the pole for support. We get off at the shady side of Seoul, where the buildings look like the darkening sky, and I tell Sungjong, “It’s going to rain.” And he says, “What a fucking genius you are.” And I feel as if it’s not a compliment, but I accept it anyway. We walk through the streets and under the shelters of awnings because the skies have darkened and turned into greying masses of smoke. We pass men who sit on the entrances to locked up hotels, the ones with messy beards and lungs full of nicotine and tar. Sungjong says tar is used for either concrete or cement, though I can’t remember which. When we stop at a building labelled ‘68’ in gold letters, Sungjong knocks against the green door. The paint is peeling from the door frame. “Fuck,” he says when no one answers. I watch him silently, pulling up the hood of my jumper when the rain starts to drop on our faces. Building Number 68 doesn’t have proper shelter. “Fuck, Sungyeol.” He pulls out his phone – the only one we have between us because Sungjong can’t trust me to look after one – and calls someone. It’s an old phone, I’m told. It’s one of those that still flips, but it’s hard to track and disposable. I watch as Sungjong talks into the phone, presumably to Woohyun. “Bitch won’t open up,” Sungjong says, “Can I kick it open?” Woohyun must have said yes, because Sungjong tries his luck and kicks at the door. It looks similar to the way people do it in movies; the only difference being now, the public doesn’t turn. The door gives way as Sungjong smiles in satisfaction. I guess they’ve seen this kind of thing before, time and time again. People in this side of the city, Sungjong says, have seen their parents skinned alive right before their eyes. A skinny boy trying to kick open the door doesn’t really bother them. “Sungyeol,” Sungjong shouts, entering the building. I follow him. We enter a narrow hallway with no lights, stale air finding a home in my lungs. “Sungyeol, you cunt, come outside right now.” I bite my lip at his profanities, still near the doorway. I struggle to adjust to the air. It feels uncomfortable, inhaling thick fumes, but I don’t have time to ponder because Sungjong says, “Hoya get your ass up here this isn’t a jolly museum.” My feet make loud, clumsy thumps against the creaking wood as I hurry to catch up. I notice that there’s a light hanging unevenly from a thin piece of wire, close but not exactly where we are right now. It makes the walls look more yellow than anything else. We walk towards it, and I notice that Sungjong’s right hand never leaves his back pocket where he keeps his gun. Finally we reach a larger room, akin to one for a receptionist, and notice that it’s abandoned. There are no keys on the board when there should be. A crooked sign says, in faded black letters, ‘sign in here’. “This is Sungyeol’s hotel,” Sungjong explains to me. He turns to meet my eyes. “It’s a dump, but when you’re on the run this is the best you’ll get.” I nod, but forget this almost immediately. To my knowledge, I’m not on the run, and I don’t think I ever will be. I take a glance at the book on the table. In it are logged the names of people who have checked in and out. Sungjong tells me they’re fake, obviously, and that I should make myself useful by looking around. He moves towards the staircase near the end of the room. There is no elevator. “Sungyeol you piece of shit,” Sungjong calls again. We hear shuffling, a small sound as if someone’s trying to be as discrete as possible. It sounds like it’s coming from the floor above us, the creaking making a flaky white substance drift onto my hand. Sungjong mutters a “fucking bitch” before running up the stairs. I follow him. Sungjong has longer legs, but I have a faster pace and better stamina. We rush up the steps like two upset elephants, feet pounding against the dusty floor, though it’s more of me as an elephant and Sungjong as a graceful swam. Mister Woohyun once said that Sungjong was the stereotypical foreign spy – skinny, graceful and deadly. The only thing he’s missing is the foreign part. I keep my mouth shut though and avoid mentioning it, focusing on my feet instead. I notice that with each step I take the boards under me slightly shift. It scares me a little, because I feel as if I could possibly fall, but Sungjong is so adamant about finding the culprit of the shuffling that I don’t really have time to pause. We reach the second floor just as a boy in skinny jeans tries to exist through the window. I think I hear Sungjong mutter that there’s a fire escape as he grabs both legs of the escapee, pulling him back. “Hoya,” Sungjong says, “Help me out.” I do so, taking the boy’s right leg as Sungjong takes the left. Together we pull back, harsh enough that, I may add, the boy could possibly have bruises on his stomach tomorrow from the windowsill. We’re huffing when he lands clumsily on the floor, legs sprayed out unattractively. Sungjong kicks him once, forcing him to sit his back against the chalky wall. The boy’s eyes are half-lidded, his too-loose grey shirt with ‘fuck off’ written on it, faded from wear. His raven hair looks shiny in the light that passes through the casement window. “That son of a bitch Sungyeol hid you good,” Sungjong mutters, “hid himself better if you ask me.” The other boy groans, trying to shift into a more comfortable position. It seems useless though, since no one can really be comfortable on a dirty wooden floor. He glares at Sungjong. “I ain’t telling you nothin’” The boy says, turning away. He spits blood onto the wooden floor before propping himself up. “Try all you like pretty boy, you ain’t gon’ get nothin’ outta me.” If there’s one thing Sungjong doesn’t like, it’s being called a pretty boy. “How cute,” Sungjong says flatly. “He still thinks he’s in charge.” Sungjong aims a kick at the other boy’s stomach. The boy moans, hands clutching his stomach as he forces his body forward. “Still ‘ain’t gon’ tell me nothing’?” Sungjong mimics. He rolls his eyes. “Just when I thought Sungyeol couldn’t get any worse, he finds a scum like you.” Grabbing the other’s hair, he pushes the latter up, forcing him to meet Sungjong’s eyes. “Now, you little pussy, remember that debt you took up?” The boy bites his bleeding lip. “I don’t take up no debts with sissies.” At this moment Sungjong grits his teeth. “Say that again cunt.” The boy on the floor’s lips curve into a grin. “I ain’t done nothin’ with your kind. Especially with your leader prostitutin’ around and lover boy over here,” he looks over to me, “playin’ with strangers. Y’all are only half the people y’all used to be, pretty boy. Tell me, how much he pay you?” The boy laughs. “Or what does he pay you with? There’s rumours everywhere ‘bout y’all. Y’all think you’re all tough and y’all still got it, but truth is you ain’t got shit.” Sungjong’s eyes narrow. “Who exactly are you?” “Heh,” the boy doesn’t look weak now, just feral, “it’s funny that a smart group of people like y’all still attach bullshit like that to people. Y’all still use names, pretty boy? Names are for people who need to stand out. Names are for people who wanna be found. We don’t want that kinda stuff.” Dangerously, Sungjong says, “I could kill you.” The boy replies with, “Then g’head and kill me, boy.” He laughs, “I ain’t got nothing to tell y’all, except that y’all better run and run and not ever come back. Not near these areas at least. Seoul ain’t for y’all no more. Your leader’s probably dyin’ right now. Think you can make it back in time?” We’re silent, all three of us, for a very, very long time. Or perhaps it’s minutes, I can’t really be sure, but after awhile Sungjong says “fuck you,” takes out his gun and blows the boy’s brains out. I can still hear his laughter echoing along the cold, stagnant walls. Sungjong turns to me, “We haven’t got much time. C’mon – get out that fucking door and move.”   (A/N: I'd just like to make it be known that this story on a whole is just me trying to me funny. Like I have no sense of humour, at all. But YaDong, so I can't not finish this story am I making sense right now. This is my attempt on humour enjoy the limited amount of funniness I can't give you. It's also ridiculously hard to update I don't even know why I can't write this. Credts to Divvy for fixing up my non-existent humour and disses with 'ghetto crackhead'. Thank her for all the dialogue.)