Despite all the awkwardness of before, once we started talking, it became natural and effortless again. It felt even more so because this time I had things to tell him too. He told me about his time in the military and his graduation ceremony. I told him about dropping out (he wasn't happy about that) and my job at Do Hoon's auto repair shop. He told me about his internships and exaggerated the amount of ass kissing he had to do to get his placement in the NSP. I vented to him about how I thought I had things handled with dad, only to find out it was so much worse than I could have ever known. I even told him about the missing money from my savings box.
He smacked me on my head. "You could have had a bank account the entire time! The moment we get to Seoul, we're opening a bank account for you. I can't believe you've just been keeping money in a box like a caveman!"
I rubbed the back of my head where he had smacked it grumpily. "I don't think cavemen had figured out money yet." I wondered why Mr. Do hadn't told me I could have had a bank account this entire time. Maybe he had also thought I needed to be older.
The time flew by as we talked. Because it had been a few years since we talked, there was a lot to say. Somehow, talking about my problems aloud seemed to have lessened their severity. Before Han Jungho, things had been pretty manageable. Han Jungho's appearance had been pretty horrendous, but it was first actual crisis we had experienced in those years. I felt ashamed for running away the moment things became really hard. At the same time, after hearing Taejun's story I felt like I could better understand why Taejun had to try so hard to upkeep up his image. Without the connections his privileged classmates had been born with, he had to work twice as hard as them to get noticed. Any mar on his reputation might cost him all of that.
"Now arriving at Seoul Station," a pleasant but loud voice announced. I looked at the time in surprise. It had only been a couple hours. With each trip, Seoul and Busan seemed closer and closer.
Taejun gave me a reassuring smile, but I still felt nervous following him off the train. Despite still being in Seoul, moving in with my brother was my first real step to finally being independent of my parents. (My short tenure at the playground didn't really count.)
Taejun seemed to be much more comfortable around me again, and he chatted away on the journey to his apartment. I felt a pit in my stomach, but did my best to try to keep up with the conversation.
When we arrived, I gawked at the high rise building we were standing before. "You live here?" I exclaimed. The entire building seemed to be made of mirrored glass, reflecting the night lights. It seemed so high tier, so modern compared to the little cluster of shabby old buildings our old neighborhood was.
My brother chuckled. "It's a pretty average building. You've lived in Seoul your whole life and you act like you've just come from the countryside!"
"Inner Seoul is different!" I protested sheepishly. Despite the fact that we could see the night lights and skyscrapers of Inner Seoul from where my family lived, I'd never had a reason to make the short trip in from Outer Seoul. My world was pretty small, and had only shrunk in the past few years.
I tried not to look too awed as we crossed the marble tiled lobby and stepped into an elevator. I've been in them before but the sheer amount of levels in this particular one was easily triple the highest number I'd ever seen. There were three rows of buttons. It looked like the panel of a spaceship. "Are there really forty two levels in this building?"
"Why else would there be that many buttons?" Taejun was definitely amused by my reactions to everything. He pressed the 27th button.
He opened the door to his apartment with a code, not a key. "So this is it," he said, gesturing for me to enter first.
"Heol! Wow, Taejun, you've really made it, huh?!" I looked around at all the stylish modern furniture. Even though it was only a two room apartment, it also had a spacious designated living/dining area with a giant window looking into... well it was the side of another high rise, but it was so high up!
"This is even nicer than Park Bonghwan's place!" I kicked off my beat up shoes, and immediately set to exploring. It was Taejun's place, and I was much less reserved about my curiosity than I had been at Mr. Park's house.
"The apartment was partially furnished. You're so easily impressed," chuckled Taejun. He hung his coat on a rack by the door and followed me. "Wait, you've been to Park Bonghwan's home?"
"Only once," I answered distractedly. I was busy peeking into every kitchen cabinet. They were pretty sparse. It didn't seem like Taejun did much cooking.
"Alright, have a look around. Actually, do you want to wash up? I'll find you something to wear and you can go first." Taejun disappeared into the bedroom.
I moved my exploration to the living area, but there wasn't much there to look at. I stopped in front of a mirror and grimaced at my appearance. I had to admit, I really was an eyesore. My work shirt clearly showed its age. It hung soft and limply on me, faded and shapeless after years of washing. The knees of my jeans were ragged and scuffed. Dark, oily fingerprints dotted it all over. The bruise on my face was turning blotchy and dark. I tried to fluff my hair to make it look like Taejun's, but mine didn't have the same sort of cut, and it flopped lifelessly back against my forehead.
"Ran out of things to look at already?"Jaehyun came up behind me. I watched him in the mirror and compared myself to him. To my surprise, my face was a lot more similar to his than I had thought. The biggest difference was our complexion. His skin was clear and pale. I was tanned from days of working in the sun of the open garage. It irked me to note that I was still a couple of inches shorter.
"What did you eat to grow so tall," I complained jokingly.
"It's not about eating, just good genes," he smirked.
"You didn't leave any for me, huh."
"First come, first serve," he shot back. He made a show of running his hand through his perfect hair. "Aren't you lucky to have such a handsome hyung to look up to?"
I snorted and elbowed him. "You're so full of yourself!"
We laughed. It was a nice moment. Our eyes met in the mirror, but he looked away quickly. "Here. You can probably wear this."
"You're not that much bigger than me." I took the towel and clothes he had proffered. "Which room is the bathroom?" He pointed, and I followed his finger.
This time I remembered the ventilation fan.
—
When he came out from his shower, he found me looking unhappily into his near empty refrigerator. "All you have are eggs and kimchi. You on a diet or something?"
Taejun shooed me away from the fridge and shut it. "Work's been busy these last few weeks. I've been staying late at the office pretty much every night," he explained. "It's a bit late, but most restaurants in Inner Seoul open all night. If you're hungry, I was thinking we could go out to eat."
Of course I was hungry; the last meal I had eaten was yesterday's lunch. "I'm starving," I said exaggeratedly.
He chuckled. He had a nice laugh, low and rumbly. "Well, since today is special, we can go to a gogi-jip." Taejun smiled at me. "We've got to celebrate our reunion, after all."
I couldn't hide my delight. It had been years since I had gone to a gogi-jip (meat house). One year after a particularly good month, Mr. Do had taken all of us to one to celebrate our success. The amount of roasted meat we had eaten then caused him to jokingly lament that decision. I relayed my good memories of that story to Taejun as we walked to the restaurant.
"Do Hoon-ssi sounds like he was a good boss," he said. His voice had almost a wistful tone to it.
"He can be a bit of a hardass, but yeah, in the end, he is," I agreed. He was probably wondering why I hadn't come in to work today. "I should probably call him."
"You're going to go back to work?" Taejun asked suddenly.
"Well yeah, I can't expect you to pay for everything forever, can I?"
He started to say something but then seemed to decide against it. Taejun motioned to me that the restaurant was just ahead. He hadn't really needed to. The fragrant aroma of cooking meat had been floating down towards us for a while. When we entered, the entire room was saturated with that mouth watering aroma.
As we sat down, my stomach loudly reminded me that it wanted food. Taejun looked at me in surprise and I felt myself blushing from embarrassment.
"My god, I think half the restaurant heard that." He burst into laughter. I turned even more red.
"No they didn't!" I popped open the menu and was mesmerized by the bright photos promising quality red meat and fatty cuts of pork belly. Dreamily, I said, "I bet I could eat an entire cow by myself."
"Then I'll order two. One for me and one for you." Taejun was also reading the menu, though he didn't look quite as starstruck.
"Eh??? Let's go all out then, hyung!" Since Taejun was paying, I decided I was going to order as much as possible.
"Oi, oi, they have fees if you don't finish." But he put down his menu and looked at me instead. He was strangely misty-eyed. "That's the first time you've called me hyung since …" He didn't finish, but we both knew what he would have said. Since our last call, years ago. I hadn't realized that I almost stopped seeing him as my brother after all the misunderstandings today. I didn't really know what to say.
He looked back down at the menu without reading it. "It… should have been like this from the start," Taejun said quietly. "I never should have left you behind."
I tried not to be choked up as I recalled all the times when I wished that he hadn't left me behind, and how I had hated him for doing so. I had to remind myself that he was trying to make amends and to stop pushing him away as he was reaching out. I remembered the things he had told me on the train. "Y-you had a lot going on yourself, even without a kid brother thrown into the mix." I replied, finally.
"But, because I did, you…" he was unable to continue what he was trying to say. Taejun took a moment to steady himself before continuing. "Maybe, but that's behind me now. I can stand on my own merits now. I'll never leave you like that again."
Before I could reply, an ajuma waitress appeared at our table with enthusiastic greetings and introduction. "Oh my goodness, you two look just like each other! You must be brothers," she gushed.
Taejun and I looked at each other. We nodded yes.