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Chapter 17: Thank You (1)
The first thing Kang Chan saw when he came to his senses was Seok Kang-Ho’s worried face.
“Are you feeling a little better?” Seok Kang-Ho asked.
The last thing Kang Chan remembered was him leaning on Seok Kang-Ho in the car. The volume of blood in the two blood bags gradually decreased, as though they were competing with each other.
“You have so many cuts that we nearly had to use a sewing machine.”
Smirk.
“Give me some water.”
“Okay.”
Seok Kang-Ho first reached out toward the bottom of Kang Chan’s bed and turned the lever.
Squeak. Squeak. Squeak.
He slowly adjusted the angle of the bed, propping Kang Chan’s upper body up and putting him in a more comfortable position. Seok Kang-Ho handed him a glass of water afterward, which he downed.
“What time is it?”
“1:15 am. I’ve called your parents and told them you’re going to sleep over at my place tonight and to call you later.”
Kang Chan was in a 4-bed ward, with a bed in each corner of the room.
“Do you want something to eat?”
Just as Seok Kang-Ho asked, the door opened, and Oh Gwang-Taek entered the room. He pulled up an empty chair by the bed and sat down next to Seok Kang-Ho.
“Give me a cigarette.” Kang Chan demanded.
Oh Gwang-Taek looked dumbfounded, but he took out a cigarette without saying a word and gave it to Kang Chan anyway.
“Ugh!” Kang Chan tried extending his left hand only for his expression to contour in pain. He held out his right hand instead.
Chik chik.
“Hoo.”
When Oh Gwang-Taek offered Seok Kang-Ho some cigarettes as well, he took one out and put it in his mouth.
“Daye, I want a cup of coffee.”
“Alright. Coffee?” Seok-Kang agreed before extending the offer to Oh Gwang-Taek as well.
Oh Gwang-Taek shook his head lightly. Seok Kang-Ho made a cup of coffee next to the bed across from Kang Chan.
“Why are you shaking your head?” Kang Chan asked Oh Gwang-Taek.
“I heard he’s a teacher. Is that right?”
Kang Chan nodded.
“Ha! Looking at the interaction between you two, it all sounds so wrong.[1]”
Oh Gwang-Taek appeared to be in his late thirties.
“It’s a long story. Just leave it at that,” Kang Chan replied.
“Ah, it’s hot!”
The two of them chuckled softly when they heard Seok Kang-Ho’s short outburst.
“Here you go.”
Kang Chan took a sip of the instant coffee. It tasted quite nice.
“Thanks to you, Gangnam’s fine for now. I’ve made a deal with the cops and reporters too, so there won’t be any issues with those punks.”
Oh Gwang-Taek spoke as Kang Chan took another sip of coffee.
“Is there anything I can do for you?” Oh Gwang-Taek asked.
“Just leave the students in school alone.”
Oh Gwang-Taek nodded.
“As for the punks in the parking lot, we had a lot to talk about because of what happened.”
“Everything’s in order, then,” Kang Chan responded.
“Hoo! It’s great that you’re not complicating things,” Oh Gwang-Taek exhaled deeply. “You should be careful. Rumors about you have been circulating among the gangs. I told them the family register was wrong and that you’re actually my friend and family. Even so, it’ll take some time for it to blow over.”
These stupid gangsters were still using the twenty-year-old dumb excuse of the family register being incorrect. It sounded stupid to both the person saying it and the person listening to it in silence.
Kang Chan wasn’t very happy about it, but it had already been done.
“I gave my business card to your teacher.”
“Oh Gwang-Taek,” As soon as Kang Chan called him out, he glared at Kang Chan sharply.
“I don’t want to talk about my life, but I don’t want you people anywhere near me. Especially not anywhere near the school.”
The ambiance drastically changed in an instant. Kang Chan and Oh Gwang-Taek looked each other in the eye.
“You said your name was Kang Chan, right?” Oh Gwang-Taek spoke softly. “I told you about the whole family register bullshit because I acknowledge who you are, with or without your ID.”
Slurp.
The tension was slowly rising. However, the sound of Seok Kang-Ho slurping his coffee exquisitely interrupted them.
Oh Gwang-Taek subconsciously broke eye contact with Kang Chan. Dumbfounded, a melancholic smile crept up his lips.
“I give up. Hey! Quit yapping about random bullshit and just be friendly, motherfucker. Wouldn’t that give me a reason to stop the other people from loitering around the school and messing with the students?” Oh Gwang-Taek shook his head. “By the way, what subject does your teacher teach?”
“P.E.”
“Ha, I can see that.”
Oh Gwang-Taek got up in an exaggerated manner.
“I ordered some of my men to stand guard outside. Let them do their job. The Ulsan guys might be up to something.”
“Okay.”
“If you want to eat something, let them know.”
Kang Chan nodded.
“You can’t eat the nurses, though.”
They all laughed at the joke with a similar look on their faces.
“I’ll get going,” Oh Gwang-Taek raised his hand and left the room, looking exhausted.
“Doesn’t that guy seem like a decent chap?” Seok Kang-Ho asked.
“Yeah.”
In truth, it was hard to predict what the outcome would’ve been if the gangsters had attacked them in the basement.
“You can leave now.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m telling you to go home. You made the kids promise to come to school an hour earlier. Are you going to disappoint them by being late yourself?”
“Ah!” Seok Kang-Ho seemed to have forgotten about them. “Mi-Young sent you a bunch of messages up until midnight. Did something happen between you guys?”
“She’s my first love.”
“Hehehe.”
“Tsk, you dirty bastard.”
Seok Kang-Ho wiped his drool. “She looks like an innocent girl, though. How did it happen?”
“Things just kind of went awry.”
Seok Kang-Ho laughed out loud.
“Why are you laughing?”
“I was just thinking about her aspirations. She’s always been the top student, so all the teachers show great interest in her. “
Kang Chan had never thought about that, so he just stared at Seok Kang-Ho.
“She wrote that she wanted to become a good wife and mother, but she changed it to diplomat after her homeroom teacher persuaded her.”
“What’s so funny about it?” Kang Chan asked.
“Huh? You don’t find it funny?” Seok Kang-Ho looked at him in surprise.
“Haa!” Frustrated, Kang Chan sighed. Strangely, the simple-minded Kim Mi-Young and Seok Kang-Ho, who would randomly laugh at unfunny things, frustrated him.
“Leave.”
“I’ll stay here and go straight to school at dawn.” Seok Kang-Ho replied.
Kang Chan left it at that since there was nothing else to say.
“Please call home tomorrow morning,” Seok Kang-Ho added.
“I left my phone at home, though.”
“You can just use mine.”
“Oh, come on. How am I going to reach you if something happens and I have to contact you urgently? When will I be discharged from the hospital anyway?”
“In about a month, probably.”
“So I have to be bedridden for a week, huh?”
The first person Kang Chan thought of was Yoo Hye-Sook. What kind of excuse could he use to prevent her from worrying about being hospitalized for a week, and how was he going to explain why he was wrapped up in bandages like a mummy?
“Just tell my parents I got into a car accident.”
“A car accident?” Seok Kang-Ho asked.
“Yeah. Just pick one of the guys outside and say he’s the perpetrator.”
Seok Kang-Ho turned his head. He looked like he was thinking.
“We have to come up with an excuse. How are we going to explain this otherwise?” Kang Chan asked.
“That’s true.”
“Call Oh Gwang-Taek and tell him to collude with the doctor.”
Seok Kang-Ho nodded.
“Anyway, you have to take care of those students at the very least. It sucks that I won’t be there from day one, but we might end up making a fool out of them if we don’t handle it well.”
“Understood.” Seok Kang-Ho’s eyes sparkled.
While both of them were talking to each other, the doctor and nurse on-call dropped by to check on Kang Chan, but they didn’t say anything even though they saw traces of them smoking. There was a preconceived notion that the hospital was associated with gangsters, but the middle-aged doctor looked surprisingly decent and affable.
Seok Kang-Ho left at dawn with a sad look on his face, and Kang Chan fell asleep once again. He was feeling drowsy from all the drugs the hospital made him take.
When Kang Chan woke up, he wished he could go back to the battlefield in Africa.
***
A nurse entered the room and gave him his medications via the IV line. He woke up because she had to take his temperature and blood pressure.
“Can I get a glass of water?”
“Yes, just a minute, please.” The nurse had to pack up the equipment.
The door opened and a man dressed in a suit entered with a huge food tray. It smelled good.
“Please eat, hyung-nim. Did you manage to get some rest?”
However, Kang Chan got annoyed by the stupid ‘hyung-nim’ treatment. Should he just kick him out?
‘Ugh, come on.’
Nonetheless, Kang Chan gritted his teeth and calmed himself down. He found it ridiculous for the gangster to serve him food from the hospital.
The guy respectfully placed the tray on one side and turned the lever to adjust the bed’s angle. He then lifted the table attached to the side of the bed and placed it in front of Kang Chan. He moved so skillfully that one would’ve thought he was a professional caregiver.
The guy was clearly an unruly delinquent back when he was a student, but he wouldn’t have expected himself to serve food to others after fulfilling his lifelong goal of becoming a gangster.
The guy placed the tray on the table, removed its cover, and bowed respectfully to Kang Chan. He appeared to be twenty or twenty-one years old.
“Enjoy your meal, hyung-nim.”
He wouldn’t have prepared such a spread for his parents. Kang Chan felt bitter about it, but that didn’t mean he’d skip his meal.
“Ha!” Kang Chan looked down at the tray and sighed loudly.
White rice was good. Kang Chan wasn’t pregnant, but he had lost a lot of blood, so he understood why the guy prepared some seaweed soup for him.[2] But he didn’t get why there were ribs and gulbi[3] for breakfast. How on earth was Kang Chan supposed to wrap his head around the fact that the beautifully-sliced raw fish[4] was prepared by the same person that was wielding the fillet knife in a fight yesterday?
Ignorant gangsters.
Kang Chan was so speechless that he just stared at the guy standing in front of him. The guy blinked in return, flustered. Kang Chan eventually decided to let it go since the gangster hadn’t done anything wrong.
Kang Chan held the bowl in his left hand out of habit. It stung.
What…?
Before Seok Kang-Ho left, he couldn’t even move his left arm. However, when he inadvertently grabbed the bowl of rice just now, it stung, but it didn’t hurt any more than that.
Kang Chan realized the nurse didn’t give him any water and simply left because that guy had entered the room.
“Give me a glass of water.”
“What was that, hyung-nim?”
“I said give me a glass of water!”
“Yes, hyung-nim.”
It was Kang Chan’s first time feeling this annoyed being called ‘hyung-nim.’
The gangster returned to the room with a jug of water and bowed to him before pouring him a glass. Afterward, he bowed to him again. If a fucking bastard like him were to get promoted…
Kang Chan drank it. When he picked up the chopsticks, he noticed the man swallowing his saliva in his peripheral vision.
Oh, what a poor fella. Yeah. You and I both have crappy lives.
There was no harm in sharing a meal together.
“Go grab a bowl.”
“It’s okay, hyung-nim.”
When Kang Chan glared at him, the guy ran out and returned immediately. It wasn’t like there was a mountain of rice bowls right outside in the hallway, so he was actually quite a handy person.
“Sit.”
“It’s okay, hyung-nim.”
“Stop annoying me and just sit, you bastard.”
“Yes, hyung—”
“Stop calling me ‘hyung-nim’!”
After bowing again, he obediently sat on the other side of the bed like a newlywed bride.
“All these three dishes—-this one, this one, and this one. Eat them with some rice.”
The man was about to respond, but when Kang Chan glared at him again, he kept his mouth shut.
“I hate gangsters, so finish your food fast.”
When Kang Chan scooped up some rice, the gangster began eating as well, seemingly trying his best to do so as quietly as possible He quickly scarfed down all the ribs, gulbi, and raw fish.
They finished their breakfast, finding it satisfying.
“Bring me a cup of coffee and a cigarette.”
“Yes…”
The man was about to call him ‘hyung-nim’ but stopped himself when Kang Chan lifted his hand, as though he was about to smack him. He cleared the tray, handed him a cigarette, and made him a cup of coffee.
“What’s your name?”
“Jang Geun-Du, hyu–...ng.”
Kang Chan glared at him, which made the end of his sentence sound weird.
“What time is it?”
“8:10 A.M.”
“Jang Geun-Dup.”
“Yes…”
Jang Geun-Dup checked Kang Chan’s expression.
“Ha! Never mind.”
Kang Chan was thinking of giving him some advice, but what could he even say to him to stop him from being a gangster?
After Kang Chan had finished his coffee and put out his cigarette in the paper cup, Jang Geun-Dup grabbed the cup and tray and took them out.
Kang Chan moved his neck and shoulders slowly since he wasn’t in good physical condition, noticing something strange in the process. He felt throbbing pain when he was stabbed right under the collarbone, but he couldn’t feel it now.
Kang Chan gently squeezed his left hand. It felt stiff.
How? How could it be?
Kang Chan shifted his gaze and saw that the IV fluid had been changed.
“Ah!” He recalled the nurse inserting some medication into the IV line. They probably gave him some painkillers.
Thud.
Kang Chan smiled. He heard a woman’s voice outside the room. Soon after, the door burst open. Yoo Hye-Sook hesitated before approaching Kang Chan.
“Are you okay?” Her eyes were red and she could barely speak properly.
“I’m sorry,” Kang Chan apologized to her.
Yoo Hye-Sook cried as she stared at Kang Chan, who was covered in bandages.
“What did the doctor say? How bad are your injuries?” Yoo Hye-Sook asked amid her tears.
“He said I’m fine. I can be discharged in a week.”
“We’ll talk to the doctor when your father comes later. You don’t have any serious injuries, do you?”
“Please worry about yourself instead. I’m okay.”
Kang Chan smiled as he moved his arms around.
It stung. He could feel throbbing pain.
His body was protesting against his actions, but Kang Chan kept a smile on his face. However, judging from the outcome alone, his plan failed. The bandages around his left shoulder, arm, and hand were a ghastly sight even to Kang Chan himself.
“Be even more careful from now on.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Witnessing Kang Chan’s movements seemed to have made Yoo Seo-Sook feel slightly relieved.
“Your father is going to check with the hospital you were previously admitted to. Let’s get a full check-up. The car accident might cause long-term effects, so we have to be careful.”
The situation made even the great Kang Chan feel flustered. He couldn’t argue that his knife wounds were caused by a car running over him.
“There are some scary men standing outside. They’re not causing you any problems, are they?”
“Of course not.”
Yoo Hye-Sook seemed to gradually regain her rationality. She removed her jacket, hung it in the wardrobe, and examined the hospital room with suspicion in her eyes.
“What kind of hospital reeks so strongly of cigarettes?”
“I agree.”
“What exactly is your father doing? Why isn’t he here yet? Our dear son is injured. We need to move you to another hospital as soon as possible.”
Kang Chan desperately needed to come up with an excuse so he wouldn’t have to relocate to another hospital.
1. Seok Kang-Ho is speaking formally to Kang Chan in Korean, while Kang Chan is speaking to him informally, which is weird because he’s supposed to be his teacher. ☜
2. It is tradition for women who have just given birth to have seaweed soup. ☜
3. Dried yellow corvina ☜
4. Korean sashimi ☜