Chapter Text
Moon Ki's reply sat on the screen for a while before Han Su locked his phone and tossed it onto the kitchen island. His mother didn't say anything immediately. She'd learnt years ago that silence usually worked better on her son than lectures ever did. Han Su had an unfortunate habit of interpreting criticism as a challenge, a trait she'd spent near two decades trying and failing to correct.
It wasn't entirely his fault really. Growing up with money meant growing up without consequences. Teachers looked the other way, strangers bit their tongues, and people laughed off behaviour that would've landed anyone else in trouble. Somewhere along the line, Han Su had stopped asking whether he should do something and settled for whether he could. Most of the time, the answer was yes.
The stable manager had called him four times that morning. Han Su had ignored the first three before finally answering out of irritation, only to hang up twenty seconds later after deciding the man was being unnecessarily dramatic about a horse that had been his responsibility for less than a day. His mother hadn't even bothered asking what happened. She'd heard enough of the conversation to know Han Su had probably insulted somebody's intelligence before disconnecting. "You look bored," she observed eventually.
"I am."
"That's never a good sign." She wasn't wrong. Nearly every terrible decision Han Su had ever made could be traced back to boredom. The racehorse. The motorcycle he'd driven straight through the front gates because waiting for security to open them had taken too long. The fight outside a nightclub that somehow ended with three men in hospital and Han Su complaining that he'd ruined his jacket. He'd never gone looking for violence. Violence simply had a habit of finding him, usually because he'd said exactly the wrong thing to exactly the wrong person. Han Su had always preferred solving problems with his fists. It was quicker than arguing, and considerably more satisfying. His mother used to hate that about him. It reminded her of Seongje. The son she always tried to forget exists. Hard to when both share the exact same face, however now she mostly sighed. Han Su picked his phone up again, thumb hovering over Moon Ki's contact before drifting elsewhere. Almost absentmindedly, he opened another conversation instead.
My twin
There were no unread messages waiting for him this time. Just Seongje's last one telling him, in far fewer words than necessary, to get rid of the horse. Han Su stared at it for a moment before locking the screen again. He hadn't seen Seongje in almost three weeks. Normally that didn't mean much. They lived in different cities, had different lives, different people demanding their attention. Weeks passed easily. Months, sometimes. But still...this time it felt odd. He glanced towards the bowl sitting by the front door, car keys tossed carelessly between his wallet and a pair of sunglasses he'd been looking for since Tuesday.
His mother followed his gaze without needing to ask. "You're going." It wasn't a question.
Han Su shrugged, already reaching for his keys. "I've got nothing else to do." She smiled into her tea, the sort of smile that suggested she knew better than to believe him. "You've always been terrible at admitting you miss your brother." she whispered almost to herself then Hansu, not because she disliked the boys seeing each other, she'd never stop them but because every visit was a quiet reminder of a decision she'd spent years pretending had been inevitable. The divorce had split more than a marriage. It had split two boys who'd once refused to sleep unless they were in the same room. Han Su had stayed with her. Seongje had stayed with his father. It had been easier that way. At least, that was what everyone had agreed.
Children adapt and forget except Han Su never really had. No matter how much she gave him, no matter how comfortably he grew into the life she'd built around him, he still found reasons to drive three hours just to spend an evening irritating the brother she'd convinced herself no longer belonged to her. She looked back at her son as he pocketed his keys. Han Su barely looked up. She smiled again thinking of how i’d be if both her sons were with her, though that smile never quite reached her eyes. She let him have the excuses. It was kinder than asking why he always came home quieter after seeing Seongje.