Chapter 14
A very old memory suddenly popped up in Baek Jin’s mind. When he had been living at the orphanage, every time he went to school, a teacher had held both his hands and said something like that, he thought. But that had been when he was an elementary school student. Now he was twen—
“That much…….”
“You know that too?”
“I’m twenty-two.”
When Baek Jin mentioned it again, in case Seo had mistaken his age, their held hands naturally parted, and a ha-ha laugh rang through the living room.
To say he was not young, Baek Jin looked far too young in Seo’s eyes. He still had so much to learn.
“Even twenty-two looks like a baby to me.”
Seo sat cross-legged, stretched both arms behind him, and planted his palms on the floor. His shoulders spread, his upper body leaned loosely back, and he looked at Baek Jin, still smiling, sitting on the sofa.
“I saw you don’t eat kimchi.”
“Who told you to leave so much of your lunch boxes? A full-grown adult.” While Baek Jin had been unconscious, Seo had gone back to the scene to separately secure evidence of the confinement and the CCTV footage. Looking around inside, he had seen lunch boxes piled high on one side, and inside the plastic containers, things like kimchi and vegetables had been left behind.
“If you fix your picky eating first, then I’ll treat you like an adult.”
Seo, who had been sitting on the floor, got up and sat down heavily on the sofa. Then, saying they should rest a bit, he turned on the TV and flipped through the channels one by one.
The living room, where conversation had stopped, was filled with the voices of people coming from the TV. Baek Jin did not know if it was all right to stay like this, but having nothing else he could do, he watched for a moment and then settled into a more comfortable position.
Along with the chattering of people on the large screen, a low laugh was heard beside him.
Baek Jin lowered his head and looked down at his palm. Even though a long time had passed since the hand had been let go, the palm that had touched still looked reddened, as if cooked.
***
“Bear with it even if it’s uncomfortable. Your bed hasn’t been delivered yet.” Baek Jin watched from the doorway as Seo spoke while straightening the bedding on the bed.
“I can sleep on the floor.”
“I can’t allow that. Hurry and lie down.”
“But…….”
It was not because it was a bed someone else had used. He was grateful just to have been brought here, and on top of the clothes and dinner Seo had taken care of for him, to use the bed as well. He could not do that.
“Malnutrition and stamina problems can’t be made better with guiding.” Seo strode over and pulled the hesitating Baek Jin by the hand. When he felt the bony wrist, he loosened his grip slightly and pulled back the covers.
“Lie down.”
“Then where will you sleep, Mister?”
“In my own house, would there be nowhere for me to sleep?”
As the standoff continued, Seo’s expression gradually hardened as well. He knew better than anyone that no matter how high one’s rank was, it was useless if one’s health was poor to begin with. If Baek Jin just ate well and slept well, his condition would improve quickly. This parenting that was not in his fate was, as expected, not easy.
“You need to sleep soon for your body to get better.”
“I’m fine because you guided me. Really…
..”
“Jin-ah, I told you, you need to rest now.”
“I’ll sleep down here.”
Watching Baek Jin, who stubbornly refused, Seo finally sat on the bed first and patted the spot beside him.
“Here, is this good enough? There’s plenty of room for two to lie down, so you lie down too.”
“…….”
“Baek Jin.”
At the firm call, Baek Jin, who had been standing stiffly without moving, carefully climbed onto the bed. Seo adjusted the lights in the room with his phone.
“Let’s sleep soon.”
“Are you going to sleep right away, Mister?”
“I’ll do some work first.”
Seo sat leaning his back against the headboard and picked up a tablet. Repeating work and deployments while looking after Baek Jin in between, his inbox had filled up in just two days.
As he sorted them, starting with the ones he needed to check urgently, and dealt with them one by one, he began to worry about Baek Jin, who, far from falling asleep, was blinking his large eyes at the ceiling.
“Why aren’t you sleeping, sitting like that?” In the end, Seo spoke with his gaze still fixed on the tablet screen.
“It’s been so long since I slept in a bed. The feeling against my back feels good.” The finger about to touch the screen stopped at Baek Jin’s words, but Seo reacted as if nothing was wrong.
“And how do you know the mattress is expensive?”
“It’s expensive…….”
His murmuring voice was so small it could barely be heard.
Except when he had caused a disturbance, Baek Jin was a very obedient type. It had been the same when Seo witnessed the scene of the incident. From what could be seen, he had not even resisted when a man much older than him had thrust his genitals at him. So Seo had not intended, if he could help it, to lie in the same bed. Baek Jin would surely keep his mouth shut and simply accept it even if something was uncomfortable or burdensome. Seo had tried to keep his distance except for guiding, but he could not bring himself to make a patient sleep on the floor.
He tried not to recall the scene from that day, which kept coming to mind, but all the remaining emails were about that incident. Not wanting to check them right beside Baek Jin, who was the person involved and the victim, Seo finally put the tablet back on the nightstand and lay down on the bed.
“Mister…….”
At the voice beside him, he turned his body toward Baek Jin, propped up an elbow, and rested his temple on his hand.
“Do you have something to say?”
“I’m sorry I stabbed you with the glass before.” Who knew he was still holding onto that?
“Anyone in your situation could well have done that.”
“Will you forgive me?”
“There’s nothing to forgive or not. Just don’t do it again.”
“I won’t.”
Really. A tremor clung to the voice that added the word. It was nothing, so had he been nervous?
Seo soothed him again, saying it was fine, and changed the subject.
“By the way, you keep calling me ‘Mister’ since earlier, with that ‘excuse me’ tone.”
“Then what should I call you?”
“What would be good? Now that I’m your guardian…….”
Calling him hyung would be odd because of the age gap, and Team Leader felt a bit off too. Hmm. With a hum, Seo looked at Baek Jin, lying stiffly without even meeting his eyes.
“Call me Dad.”
He had no taste for being called Dad by a man twelve years younger than him. He had only joked to ease the mood for someone who could not relax his tension.
“Yes, Dad.”
But at the answer that came with not even a brief moment of thought or hesitation, Seo was so surprised that a huh of breath burst out of him on its own.
“Jin-ah, no. You can’t call me that.”
“Huh? You told me to call you that…….”
Baek Jin turned his head slightly. Seeing him only now look troubled, Seo, who was rather the more surprised one, swept a hand over his face. He felt as if he were the one who had been had.
Judging from Baek Jin’s behavior, it was clear there had been sexual abuse during guiding. So Seo had thought it would be enough to keep some distance only where physical contact was concerned, but he truly had not expected Baek Jin to be excessively obedient in a part like this too.
“It was a joke. Mister. Just call me Mister.”
“Oh, yes. Understood.”
It was very brief, but at the feeling that for a moment he had become a trash criminal, embarrassment crossed Seo’s face. Truly, it gave him a headache.
Vowing never to make a joke like that again, he pointlessly pulled the blanket up to below Baek Jin’s chin and turned off even the remaining light.
His closed eyes flew open. When had he fallen asleep? Seo raised his upper body, looked around the still-dark room, and at the small breathing sound beside him, quietly left the room.
“Is it because I’ve been guiding continuously lately?”
After he guided Baek Jin, he did certainly feel as if his body was being overworked. To the point that it drained more stamina than dealing with twenty espers. But apart from falling asleep for a bit, there was nothing else unusual, so it was not a bad thing.
Tilting his slightly stiff neck to the side as he came out, he headed straight to the study. There was still a lot of time left until morning, so he planned to finish off now the work he had not managed to complete.
He opened the emails he had not gotten to earlier and opened the compressed CCTV video file. From the first day to the day of the incident. First, he clicked the very first video.
Baek Jin’s behavior was monotonous. He would sit leaning against the wall, then stand at the window and stare outside endlessly. Seo wondered if the video had stopped, but the time in the video kept flowing.
“How long is he standing there?”
His movement was so still that Seo suspected the footage had been manipulated. Only after watching outside until the sun set did Baek Jin eat his lunch box or try to sleep.
The next day, and the day after that, were no different. Perhaps because that was all he could do, but he looked as if his longing for the outside was great.
As expected. Finding it suspicious that he only stared outside, a staffer came, closed the window, and even locked it. Once he could no longer see outside, Baek Jin spent most of his time lying down without moving at all.
After four days passed, Kim Hyeong-seop’s corporal punishment began. As scenes of simple disciplinary exercises and punishments played, Seo’s expression gradually hardened.
His face could not be seen because his back was to the camera, but his back as he threatened with the three-section baton somehow looked excited.
An inferiority complex toward awakened people. Seo had experienced it too. Baseless envy and sordid jealousy were at times more frightening than variants. In that, even if they could not inflict physical blows, they gnawed away at awakened people mentally.
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