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To Kitae, Hwayi is innocent.
He, too, wanted to be innocent—the good guy in a pack of bad guys.
“Appa, you are my hero.”
That had been ringing in his ears from time to time. It was in fact what kept him going. There were so many things he had yet to do for Hwayi as the good guy he had always hoped to be.
But he remember he did one thing: stood up for Hwayi, and saved Hwayi from Seoktae’s method of discipline.
“Appa, you’re here,” Hwayi said. A-appa is here, a-appa will take you out, and he carried Hwayi all the way up and out of that basement.
“Appa, you are my hero.”
He did that once and Seoktae made sure he would never do it again. “Stay out of this,” Seoktae had said.
Kitae could no longer go down that creaking stairs to the basement to pick Hwayi up—not when disobeying Seoktae caused more harm than good.
And so, he waited, he always did. That was the least he could do for Hwayi; to sit on a stair and hopelessly, helplessly wait until Hwayi’s episodes tone down and Seoktae finally opened the basement’s door.
Sitting there so often; seeing Hwayi walk out of the basement so often—he noticed Hwayi grew. Taller, stronger—his voice deeper—each and every time. Almost as if he was a different person, but he knew—that was Hwayi—the kid whose life he had saved. “B-bury? H-he’s alive, w-we can’t bury him,” and he had to rack his brain so hard; think, think, think—”T-they’ll p-p-pay!” For this idea, he had to thank all the gods and the god Yeongjoo had always prayed to. “T-they’ll pay us. R-ransom money. T-they’ll pay us if w-we tell them the k-kid’s alive.”
And all of a sudden, Kitae was sitting on the passenger seat. The last time he did was when Dongbeom and Beomsoo were trying to teach him how to drive—and then it was suddenly his turn to teach Hwayi. “T-this is the only thing you’re allowed to learn from me, g-got that?” He would always remind Hwayi. Screwing a girl, fucking a girl—Kitae joked about that so often, but he knew Hwayi had always been smart to know better. “D-don’t be like me, y-you got that, Hwayi-yah? ” Drinking and prostitution were the two things he would be, if he hadn't been the driver of their team.
He thought he was a good dad—for teaching Hwayi to be as good of a driver as he could be, for teaching Hwayi not to be anything like him except the part where he was a good driver.
“Appa, you are my hero,” still rang so often in his ears and it slowly became something more pressing than strengthening.
He was a fool to hold on to that. He was a fool to ever think that those words said years and years ago—almost a decade ago—could ever be something he was allowed to hold on to.
He was a fool to think that he was ever a hero to Hwayi.
All he did was ruin the life of an innocent soul. He begged for the others to let the boy live—and he was a coward for that. That boy could’ve been everything else but a deceived hostage that had himself believed that the boy could be his son.
“T-talk to me!” Kitae pleaded, stepping on the gas pedal to keep up with Hwayi’s speeding truck. “T-talk to me, p-please, I will listen,” Kitae tried. Think, think, think—but he couldn’t think of a way to make up to him. He was wrong and he deserved this and yet he'd do anything for a chance to talk.
“Stay here,” Beomsoo said, and Kitae looked at Seoktae hoping he’d think differently but—”Listen to Beomsoo.”
Kitae hoped for another chance to talk to Hwayi, to say sorry, to say whatever he could say that he knew couldn’t make up for anything but he would do anything for Hwayi and—bang!
Hwayi’s sniper—
It was the sound of Hwayi’s sniper and Kitae knew better to look up and look for Hwayi, and he ran, and ran, and climbed up the stairs. “Hwayi–yah!” He called, over and over, he almost couldn't hear all the noises, the gunshots, “Hwayi-yah!”
Kitae didn’t remember trying to snatch the sniper or trying to stop Hwayi from shooting everyone in the warehouse dead.
“You’re just like them!”
It became the only thing ringing in his head.
“You fooled me. You’re just like them!”
It was true.
Had he been braver, stronger—had he been better, he wouldn’t have just prevented them from killing Hwayi, he would’ve let him go and go back to his family and he, too, should've gone back to a life he couldn't even remember now that all he had was Hwayi and Seoktae and, and—
Kitae didn’t remember how he ended up hanging on a loose string or how Hwayi was crying and begging to reach out to him.
It was ringing in his ears, “You fooled me. You’re just like them!”
“Dad is sorry,” was all he could say. “You fooled me. You’re just like them,” it rang and rang and he repeated, “Dad is sorry, dad is sorry—”
Kitae didn’t remember not stuttering anymore.
It was ringing in his ears, “You fooled me. You’re just like them," and so Kitae couldn’t hear the Appa, no, please—”Dad is sorry, dad is sorry,” he chanted as if it could fix anything at all. “Dad is sorry—dad is sorry, dad is sorry, dad is sorry,” Kitae couldn’t hear Hwayi’s screams, Kitae couldn’t see Hwayi’s face because everything is moving away from him and Hwayi only became further no matter how hard he tried to reach him and his vision was a blur, his body was numb, but he knew his entire body was fighting for his life although the world was upside down—Seoktae was also upside down and—and Seoktae was blurry, and he was dizzy and breathing started to hurt so much but his body fought and fought to breathe and to apologize and his eyes were trying so hard to focus and to search for Hwayi up there and—
“Dad is sorry, Hwayi, d-dad is sorry—”