Work Text:
When Na Baekjin opened his eyes, everything around him was white. Totally white, without walls or ceiling, or even, it seemed, a floor, though that made no sense, because he was definitely lying on some hard, flat surface. But when he rose to his feet, he couldn't tell for sure what he was standing on. Everything around him was a uniform white, simultaneously receding into the distance and lacking depth, and—as far as the eye could see—the whiteness was unbroken.
Na Baekjin took a few steps. His feet landed softly and springily on something, but looking down immediately made his head spin. So he decided not to look down.
...
Na Baekjin didn't know how far or how long he'd walked. He didn't even know why he'd been walking. But just sitting in the middle of nowhere seemed utterly pointless.
The landscape (or rather, the complete lack thereof) around him remained unchanged. The same endless white nothingness. At first glance, it seemed like nothing to worry about, but if he was doomed to wander here alone forever, then it could easily be his personal hell.
...
Na Baekjin walked, and walked, and walked... Nothing changed. He didn't feel tired, didn't feel hungry... He felt nothing but growing despair. He didn't want to wander here forever. He would have preferred to actually burn in hell, or become a bug, or simply cease to exist—anything but the utter meaninglessness of this place.
...
At one point, he became so desperate that he almost went mad and simply screamed into the void. But there were no walls, no ceiling, no echo, and his scream was simply lost in the endless nothingness. Honestly—even though it went against his whole life, his whole personality—he really wanted to just lie down and curl up and hope that it would change something.
"Hi." Suddenly, a voice came from behind, and Na Baekjin whirled around, half expecting no one to be there, and that it was simply his brain, quite sensory deprived by this point, creating hallucinations.
But no, there was a guy standing behind him. That didn't prove anything, and he could still be a hallucination... But, firstly, Na Baekjin didn't even mind hallucinations right now. After all, it was a change—and that was a good thing. And secondly, Na Baekjin was almost certain that if the guy were a product of his own brain, it would be someone familiar. Mamba, Kwon Seokhyeon, his mother... Maybe even Park Humin or Keum Seongje, but definitely not a complete stranger.
Na Baekjin took a few seconds to study him before engaging in conversation.
The guy was slightly shorter than him, with auburn hair and orange-brown eyes. He was wearing shorts and a tank top that looked like some school's PE uniform.
"Where are we?" Na Baekjin asked, deciding that under these circumstances, it was okay to slightly disregard common courtesy.
"I have no idea," the guy replied and shrugged. "It's probably some form of afterlife, but in all my time here, I've never been able to figure out anything for sure."
Na Baekjin already suspected that this was hell, or purgatory, or whatever else the afterlife world might consist of. But he really wanted to think he wouldn't be here forever.
"How long have you been here?" He wasn't sure what answer he was hoping for. But it was unlikely that this guy's time here was measured in centuries. If only because Na Baekjin himself was wearing the same clothes he'd been hit by the truck (even traces of blood from his fights with Park Humin, Mamba, and Joo Seungjin and his mutts were still there), so if this guy had died in that outfit, it had to have happened ten years ago at most.
"Again—I have no idea." The guy shrugged again. "There's no sign of time passing here. And while due to my circadian rhythms I have some semblance of a schedule, unfortunately, I can't estimate it in absolute terms."
It wasn't exactly reassuring, but it wasn't not-reassuring either. The guy looked calm and not at all crazy, so it was obviously possible to exist here without a risk to become totally nuts.
"Can I ask you something?" the guy asked, while Na Baekjin considered his own next question. "You don't have to answer if you don't want, because it's a bit personal."
Na Baekjin nodded.
"How did you end up here? What happened to you?"
It was, of course, the kind of question that could be answered with varying degrees of detail. Na Baekjin chose a low level. He wasn't ready to share details just yet.
"I was hit by a truck, if I remember correctly." Na Baekjin shuddered involuntarily at the memory of the approaching metal thing. Mamba's scream still echoed in his ears. It seemed like it had happened just a couple of minutes ago, but—as the guy had said—time felt different here.
"I am sorry, that should be awful." It sounded quite sincere, not like a stock phrase. Na Baekjin wasn't used to that.
"And how did you end up here?"
"Me? I fell off the roof."
"No, I mean – here." Na Baekjin gestured to the space next to him. "Right here, next to me."
"Ah! I heard you. And I came to check." The guy said it as if it was a matter of course.
"Came?"
"Well, not exactly." The guy smiled. "I just thought of being here. I just thought about it and then I ended up here."
"What do you mean?"
"That's how this place works." The guy shrugged. "You'll get used to it. Look."
He turned and extended his hand, then closed his fingers as if around a doorknob and pulled. And suddenly, out of nowhere, a door opened. Na Baekjin felt his eyes widen in surprise. He quickly tried to force a normal expression onto his face.
"Welcome to my humble abode."
...
What the guy called 'my humble abode' turned out to be... Well, it couldn't really be called a house or a room, because there were no walls or ceiling—like everywhere else here—and a rug lay in the middle of the white nothingness, along with a sofa and a coffee table near it. There was a potted plant of some sort next to the sofa.
The guy turned to Na Baekjin.
"Come in, make yourself comfortable." He plopped down on the sofa, and in that instant, his athletic attire gave way to a school uniform unfamiliar to Na Baekjin.
"What the hell??"
"What?" The guy looked at Na Baekjin with confusion at first, but then followed his gaze. "Oh, that. Well, that's part of how this place works. As long as I am thinking of what I'm wearing, I can look however I want. As soon as I stop thinking, I'm back in the clothes I was wearing when I fell off the roof. And so on with everything else. Look." The guy closed his eyes for a second, then pointed to the coffee table. Just a moment ago, there had been nothing, but now there was a cup.
"Is this real?" Na Baekjin asked, stepping closer. Steam rose from the cup. Na Baekjin brought his hand up to it and felt the warmth radiating from the ceramic.
"Yes and no," the boy answered. "Yes—because I can pick up the cup and drink the coffee. No—because if I stop thinking about the cup, it disappears. Like that."
Na Baekjin blinked. The cup was no longer on the coffee table. Na Baekjin glanced up at the few furnishings.
"So you're always thinking about the couch, the rug, and all that?"
"Yes and no. I mean, I don't think about the couch, the rug, and everything else separately. I think about the room. At first, I tried thinking about each thing, but it was difficult, and it took a while to start thinking about it as a whole instead of individual things... But time is all I have here."
Na Baekjin wanted to ask how long exactly it took, but he knew it was a pointless question.
...
Na Baekjin was sitting on the rug and trying to imagine a table. It was damn hard. As soon as he concentrated enough and the outline of the table began to appear amidst the white nothingness, he almost immediately felt like the rug was no longer underneath him. Imagining one thing was easy, but two at once... Actually, the first thing he had been able to imagine had been a chair (just like a real one: stable and sturdy enough to sit on), and, incredibly proud of himself, he had immediately tried to imagine the table—and promptly plopped down on his butt on the floor. His butt hadn't been hurt, but his pride sure had. It had been a good thing Ahn Suho hadn't seen it. That would have hurt Na Baekjin's pride even more.
Ahn Suho—that was the guy's name. They had introduced themselves before Na Baekjin had left to digest the information from their first meeting. More precisely, Ahn Suho had had to open the door for him, because Na Baekjin apparently hadn't yet mastered the art of space manipulation and could have only left on foot, and he had been a little tired. Not physically, because physical fatigue didn't seem to exist here, but the thought of walking had made him nauseous at the moment.
They had seen each other several times after that. Usually, Na Baekjin would just see the door open slightly in the middle of nowhere, and then Ahn Suho would knock, asking if he could come in. Or Na Baekjin would simply shout into space. Like now.
"Fuck!" he screamed and collapsed on the floor. (If only he'd known earlier how good it felt to simply scream into the void. To throw anger, pain, and frustration into the air without fear of anyone seeing you in your moment of weakness. Except Ahn Suho, of course, but that didn't count. Because he understood.)
"I understand your frustration." A few seconds later, a voice came from somewhere to the right, as if confirming his thoughts. Na Baekjin turned his head. Ahn Suho was back in his gym clothes, holding a basketball. He, Na Baekjin had realized, played basketball quite often (‘It's a game you can play alone, and you only need to imagine the ball and the basket, so it's the perfect form of physical activity’, Ahn Suho explained the first time he appeared in front of Na Baekjin with the ball.) "They say you have to do something ten thousand times to master it."
"I think I'll go nuts before I reach the first thousand." Na Baekjin said.
"You won't," Ahn Suho said confidently. And for some reason, Na Baekjin believed him.
...
"I prefer to think of it in terms of quantum mechanics," said Ahn Suho. "What I mean is, everything here is in a superposition or something. And when we imagine something, the wave function collapses—and objects materialize. They transition from a wave state to a particle state. So, for a time, we seem to be in the same space, but we vibrate at different frequencies..."
"Thank you, Einstein, I know how quantum mechanics works." Na Baekjin imagined a pebble and, when it materialized in his hand, tossed it into the water. The pebble hit the surface and vanished. No splash, no ripples. Ahn Suho said this was because he could either think about the sea and talk, or think about a realistic sea with all the applicable laws of physics, but then he wouldn't have the brainpower for conversation. Despite this, the sea looked quite realistic. Or so it would have looked, if it hadn't ended about fifty meters away. However, the beach they were sitting on also ended abruptly. It looked as if both the sea and the beach had been cut out of a postcard. Perhaps a postcard had served as the inspiration for the image, but Na Baekjin didn't ask.
"Wow. I'm not sure if I know how it works." Ahn Suho snorted. "If someday you get out of here, don't forget to contact the Nobel committee."
"You know it doesn't work like that?" Na Baekjin asked, trying not to focus on the 'someday' and 'get out' parts.
"I know. But can't I hope?" Ahn Suho smiled.
...
"Do you think we'll be here forever?" Na Baekjin asked.
They were sitting in Ahn Suho's room (Na Baekjin still couldn't maintain the decor himself) and playing 'dots'. Na Baekjin was already good enough at imagining that his pen and the dots it drew wouldn't disappear when he looked away from the paper, but he wasn't good enough to maintain the paper, so it was up to Ahn Suho.
"I don't know. I probably will. You probably will not," Ahn Suho replied, drawing a dot and then several lines around his opponent's dots.
"What do you mean?" Na Baekjin asked, pondering his own next move.
"No one's ever stayed here this long before." Ahn Suho shrugged and imagined a bottle of Pokari Sweet for himself, as if he hadn't just stunned Na Baekjin, who'd even forgotten about his move, with completely new information.
"What do you mean, 'no one's ever stayed here this long before'? Have you met other people? Why didn't you tell me?"
“At first, I didn’t think it was necessary because, like I said, people usually didn’t stay long. Sometimes they’d stay for a couple of hours or a day, or what felt like a couple of hours or a day, you know. And one time, a guy literally showed up for a couple of minutes and disappeared, and I didn’t even have time to say hello to him... That’s why I thought you’d disappear soon too. Although, now I was thinking...” Ahn Suho fell silent and stared somewhere behind Na Baekjin (Na Baekjin knew there was nothing there, it was just a habit). After a few seconds, the piece of paper with dots and lines disappeared, which meant Ahn Suho was deep in thought (but, fortunately, not so deep as to forget about the couch). “Maybe they’ve disappeared only for me. I mean, maybe I just can’t find them anymore and separate them from the superposition? Damn, if that’s the case, that’s sad. I hope they’ve moved on to some other stage. And I hope you'll move on sooner or later, too. Although, of course, it will suck for me. But I still hope."
...
They were in Ahn Suho's room again (Na Baekjin was making pretty good progress in maintaining the decor, but still preferred to visit rather than invite). Ahn Suho was lying on the floor, doodling, while Na Baekjin was sprawled on the couch, working out math problems. It was a bit of a shame that the notes couldn't be saved (and also that no one could give them appreciation, because Ahn Suho refused to even look at them, arguing that he had only ever been willing to study math to bet on being number one at school), but still, as always, math entertained him and calmed him down to some extent.
"Have you ever tried to imagine a person?" Na Baekjin asked, briefly looking up from his matrix equations.
"I haven't. I thought about it, but I decided against it."
"Why?"
"Because it won't be the person. I can imagine the appearance pretty well, I can imagine the behavior well, but it will still be my perception of the person, not the person." Ahn Suho waved the sheet of paper he'd been drawing on. Na Baekjin caught a glimpse of someone's profile, sketched in a few quick lines. "And I don't want to ruin my memories with a fake."
...
"Do you have any regrets?" Ahn Suho asked, taking a sandwich out of the basket. They were having a picnic. Ahn Suho had spent a long time persuading Na Baekjin to agree, and finally, he had relented, and here they were, lying under a tree on a blanket spread out on the grass. Ahn Suho was in charge of the lawn (approximately ten by ten meters) and the tree. Na Baekjin was in charge of the blanket. They imagined their food themselves (Ahn Suho pretended to take it out of the basket, he said, 'for greater verisimilitude').
"A lot." Na Baekjin replied after a moment of silence. "I never really thought about how good or right any of my choices had been. I guess I was just afraid to look back and realize that things could have been different. Or afraid to look back and realize that they couldn't have been different." He paused for a moment, replaying the memories in his head. "When I was little, my mom really wanted me to go to a good school and make friends there. And I wanted her to stay healthy and divorce that jerk. She ended up dying, I crippled that jerk, and got into a good school with a bit of blackmail. And my whole life... I beat people up, I ordered people to be beaten up, I took advantage of corruption... And now I'm trying to understand why – and I can't. Well, I mean, in the beginning, I had the goal – I wanted revenge on that bastard and the bastards from the school, and I did exactly that. But why didn't I stop after?" Na Baekjin leaned back on the blanket and stared at the absent sky. "And why am I telling you all this now?"
"Because there's no one else here to talk to?" Ahn Suho suggested, and it was clearly an very awkward attempt at humor, to lighten the mood a little, and Na Baekjin was grateful for it.
They were silent for a while. Ahn Suho was amusing himself by creating dandelions and watching the tiny white pappi fly and disappear against the white nothingness. Na Baekjin watched them too.
"Do you have any regrets?"
"Me? Just one," Ahn Suho answered, without even thinking for a second. "That I didn't have a chance to say goodbye."
...
"If you could go back there right now for one day, what would you do?" Na Baekjin asked, finishing setting up the chess pieces on the board. They had already played two games, and the score was tied at one-one.
"First, I'd ask what day it is," Ahn Suho replied, making his first move. Pawn to e4. Classic.
"Really?" Na Baekjin moved his pawn to e5.
"Sure." Knight to f3. "We don't know how time moves here. How time moves there. Maybe I'll end up in the 25th century. Or maybe in the day before yesterday."
"That makes sense." Na Baekjin also made a knight move. "Then let me clarify: what would you do if you could go back there, say, a year after coming here?" It wasn't like they'd agreed on this, but it was common practice for them to avoid words like 'death' and 'died'.
"Then... Then I'd eat some luosifen* first." Ahn Suho wanted to touch the second knight first, but ended up moving the bishop. "I've always wanted to try it, but never has a chance. I want to see if it's really as stinky as they say."
"Is that really what you want to do?" Na Baekjin looked at him.
"Why not?" Ahn Suho shrugged, but Na Baekjin had spent enough time with him to know he was just trying to appear nonchalant. "Are you going to make a move or not?"
"Yeah, why not." Na Baekjin muttered and moved his second knight forward. They played in silence from then on.
After some (as usual, unknown) time, only the kings and one knight on each side remained on the board; there was little point in continuing, as both kings could run away indefinitely. Ahn Suho swept the pieces off the board and leaned back in his chair, staring at the non-existent ceiling.
"Of course," he began, his voice serious and sad, "of course, first and foremost, I'd like to see certain people. My parents. S... Some friends. But... I died." (And this was the first time any of them had said it out loud.) "I understand that. And I really hope that over the course of a year, they've been able to process it at least a little, to grief, to mourn, and let it go. At least a little. And even if I watch from afar, there's always a chance they'll catch a glimpse of me, even if only by accident. And that would be too cruel." Ahn Suho shook his head, bringing a smile back onto his face, and began setting up the pieces on the board again. "Another game?"
...
"Can I ask a question?" Na Baekjin asked.
They were walking through the 'city'. It was Ahn Suho's idea, of course. They simply walked, taking turns imagining the view: houses, benches, street cafes. Of course, the detail was low, but it was a good exercise. And it was fun.
"Of course." Ahn Suho nodded. They were just approaching the corner of a bookstore (the result of Na Baekjin's efforts; he had no specific store in mind, it was just nice to see so many books), and Na Baekjin could see Ahn Suho's imagining gradually unfold further down the 'street'. At first, it was just a gray rectangle with window openings, then the wall took on color, a sign appeared above the door, and next to it, a gilded dragon figurine. Apparently, it was a Chinese restaurant.
"Was it an accident?"
Ahn Suho focused on the building for a few more seconds, adding two tables for two on either side of the front door.
"Yes."
And it was perfectly clear that this was a kind of a 'no', but it was also clear that Ahn Suho didn't want to talk about it. If he did, he would have already laid out all the details and a couple of side stories, because for Ahn Suho, being silent was usually harder than speaking.
"Okay," Na Baekjin replied, trying to simultaneously think about his next building and where to steer the conversation. "At least it wasn't the result of your own idiocy." Out of the corner of his eye, Na Baekjin saw Ahn Suho flinch slightly, which obviously meant that falling from the roof—at least partially—was the result of some less-than-smart behavior. Or at least, that's what Ahn Suho sincerely believed. And of course, Na Baekjin knew him well enough by now to doubt that Ahn Suho would willingly do anything truly stupid, but—before the truck—Na Baekjin had thought the same thing about himself, so... "Whatever it was," Na Baekjin continued, unsure if he was trying to make Ahn Suho feel better or if he'd simply finally reached the point where he could tell his own story, "it hardly compares to me standing in the middle of the road and not looking either way. I mean, seriously, the road was empty, I was walking in the middle of it and didn't notice a truck. A big, rumbling truck. It's so ridiculous. And fucking embarassing."
Na Baekjin tried to imagine a bakery. The bakery flickered, and then—for a second—the truck appeared in its place, and Na Baekjin closed his eyes, trying not to imagine anything.
"You must have been thinking about something else. Something really important," Ahn Suho said, suddenly taking Na Baekjin's hand and squeezing it lightly. It seemed to be the first time they made physical contact that felt emotional. Something beyond the usual bumping of shoulders and elbows. Na Baekjin couldn't remember the last time someone had touched him like that, trying to support and encourage him, as if to say, 'You're not alone'.
"It seemed important then." Na Baekjin swallowed and shrugged.
"But not anymore?"
"Not like that," Na Baekjin replied after a moment of silence. "I mean, I was too desperate back then. I wanted... I don't know... for someone to understand me? And I thought I'd found someone who could... Actually, at that moment, I thought I just wanted revenge. Or re-play. Now I realize I wanted a friend. I guess it was worth dying to finally understand myself."
Ahn Suho said nothing, only tightening his hold of Na Baekjin's hand.
...
At first, Na Baekjin didn't understand what was happening. For a moment, the world switched off and then immediately switched back on, and Na Baekjin assumed he'd simply been lost in thoughts and blinked, but then the world flickered again. Na Baekjin dis-imagined the Rubik's cube he'd been playing with and listened to his senses.
At first, he felt nothing unusual, but then a sound appeared. A beeping, very quiet at first, but it grew louder with each passing second, and soon Na Baekjin wanted to cover his ears with his hands, but he suspected it wouldn't help, because the sound was both all around and inside his head.
Then voices appeared. He couldn't tell how many there were, couldn't make out the words, only the intonations. Warried. Commanding. Frightened.
"Suho!" Na Baekjin shouted. He wasn't sure he could concentrate enough to open the door, so he hoped Suho would hear and come. Na Baekjin needed him to come because he was scared. "Suho!"
The world flickered again. And again. Na Baekjin had become unaccustomed to darkness. He didn't want to be in the dark.
"Suho!" Na Baekjin crouched down and tried to cover his ears with his hands, but the voices and beeping grew louder.
"What happened?" Suho appeared in front of Na Baekjin. He immediately crouched down and placed his hands on Na Baekjin's shoulders. "What's going on? Baekjin, are you hurt?"
'I'm not hurt'. Na Baekjin wanted to say, because even though the voices were pounding his skull from the inside and outside ["Clear!"], it didn't really hurt. But then it did hurt. In his heart. It felt like his heart was being squeezed in a vice, and at the same time, it felt like it was ready to explode, and it was so damn painful, and Na Baekjin wasn't ready for it, because here—in the white nothingness—pain didn't exist, not physical pain, at least ["Shocking!"], and he'd already gotten used to be painless, and what was happening now... He was scared. He was so scared.
"I don't want to die. Not again." He whispered.
"You won't die." Ahn Suho told him, and pulled him closer, enveloping him in an embrace. "You won't die. You won't die." Ahn Suho continued telling him, but then the world blinked again and again and again... ["Resume CPR!"] And then the world turned off completely.
...
"The patient is stable. Remove the endotracheal tube. Monitor oxygenation. If it drops below 95%, administer oxygen at 15 liters per minute. I will notify his legal guardian."
...
Na Baekjin was in pain. Not as much as before he had passed out, but still in pain. He couldn't even pinpoint what exactly hurt because it felt like everything hurt. But the pain wasn't sharp, just a dull, lingering ache. And his shoulder blade was itchy. And that was the most unbearable sensation. He urgently needed to scratch it.
Na Baekjin opened his eyes and tried to sit up. He couldn't because he was entangled in a web of tubes and wires. He was in a hospital.
He looked up and met the gaze of a woman in a medical uniform. Her eyes widened to almost anime-ish proportions.
"Ouch." She said, then rushed to the door. "The patient in room 316 has woken up!"
...
Kwon Seokhyeon was holding Na Baekjin's hand and sobbing. He'd been crying for about ten minutes now, and for those ten minutes, he'd been clinging to Na Baekjin as if he'd disappear if let go. Na Baekjin had woken up two weeks ago, and Kwon Seokhyeon came every day, and every day he cried for a long time before he could speak and act normally. Na Baekjin didn't blame him. After all—as they'd explained to him on the very first day—he'd been in a coma for five months, with no sign of improvement, and then he'd suffered cardiac arrest... Which had finally led to his awakening.
Being alive was strange. After spending so much time in the white nothingness, he had to get used to eating again, sleeping again. Using the toilet again. God, that was a bodily function he definitely hadn't missed back there. Especially since now every trip to the bathroom took forever—his muscles had atrophied considerably over the past five months, but he refused to use a catheter or a bedpan.
"You'll be dehydrated," Na Baekjin said. It was strange to him, but he was genuinely worried that such prolonged sobbing could be detrimental to both Kwon Seokhyeon's physical and mental health.
"You always have water here." Kwon Seokhyeon sobbed, wiping his eyes with his sleeve (the previous Kwon Seokhyeon would have died before allowing himself to do such a thing; and it truly spoke volumes about the state he'd been in for the past five months). Kwon Seokhyeon took a few deep breaths, calming himself. He was finally able to let go of Na Baekjin's hand. "I have something for you." He picked up his bag and pulled out a large envelope. He looked a little nervous. "You'll be discharged tomorrow, and I'll be here, of course... but just in case." He handed the envelope to Na Baekjin. "Here's money, apartment keys, and a phone."
"Thank you," Na Baekjin said, accepting the envelope. "Finally, I'll be able to find out what's been going on in the world while I've been gone." (During the first week, his eyes and head would quickly ache if he tried to read or watch TV, so all entertainment—including books—had been banned until now.) "And what's this?" Inside the envelope, besides the things Kwon Seokhyeon had listed, was another, smaller envelope.
"This..." Kwon Seokhyeon hesitated slightly. "This may seem strange, but it's from Yeon Sieun. From Mamba. He asked me to give it to you. I don't know what's inside."
"Even if he could get his hands on anthrax spores, I doubt he'd have chosen to kill me that way," Na Baekjin muttered, opening the envelope and pulling out a folded piece of paper. "At least not in a hospital where there are other people."
He unfolded the paper. Written on it were Na Baekjin's last problem and Mamba's solution. Underneath the problem and solution, in neat handwriting, was 'We can start from here'. At the bottom of the paper was a phone number.
Na Baekjin swallowed the lump in his throat and blinked a couple of times. This piece of paper was an olive branch. It was a promise of something more. It was hope.
Na Baekjin closed his eyes, trying not to cry. The emotions were overwhelming him. Hope sprouted inside him, filling the void left by the anger and despair that had once been his primary emotions and motivators, but had vanished while he had been in the white nothingness. And of course, Na Baekjin couldn't be sure that Ahn Suho actually existed, but if he did... Then perhaps he, too, was lying somewhere, in some hospital room, surrounded by tubes and monitors, and perhaps he, too, would wake up someday. And yes, the likelihood of them ever meeting was slim. Suho could be in Busan, or Daegu, or Gwangju... He might not even be in Korea, after all. But it didn't matter. Na Baekjin simply wanted to hope that Suho, too, could someday live the life he deserved. That he could someday say 'hi' to the person he hadn't said 'goodbye'. And—who knows—maybe Na Baekjin would meet him one day. Maybe they would bump into each other on the street, or on the subway, or in a Chinese restaurant, or in a bookstore... If Na Baekjin could manage to not ruin the opportunity Mamba was giving him now, he might end up with two friends... Na Baekjin opened his eyes and looked at Kwon Seokhyeon, who was watching his former boss with concern. No, not two friends. He might end up with two more friends. That's right.
"When I get discharged tomorrow," Na Baekjin said, carefully folding the piece of paper and putting it back in the envelope, "do you think we can order some luosifen?"