.
However, when his cousin, Woo San asked him, “Are you gonna take those notes off the wall then? It’s quite a lot. Do you need some help?” while looking at the wall, Woo Jooin just shook his head wordlessly.
‘Why did I react that way?’ wondered Woo Jooin. Even after Woo San left his house, Jooin sat on his bed and looked somewhere in the air vacantly for quite a while. His unusual behavior didn’t last long. Jooin soon got used to his room full of sticky notes on the wall. Trying not to bend his eyes in that direction, Jooin read books, watched movies, or played video games like usual.
The second day of the strange week passed that way.
Watching Christopher Nolan’s film, ‘Memento,’ was just a coincidence. In the movie, a guy having short-term memory loss was struggling to find the culprit who killed his wife.
‘The person called Ham Donnie won’t be the culprit who killed someone precious to me, right?’ Having those silly thoughts in mind, Jooin giggled shortly, but he soon turned dark and changed the channel.
For some reason, it wasn’t that delightful to watch the guy on the screen desperately running everywhere to find his wife whom he couldn’t even remember. He looked pathetic and absurd at the same time.
‘But come on… would that be the only reason? Is that why I really switched to a different channel?’ Questioning himself for a moment, Jooin then furrowed his brows at the TV screen.
“Ah…”
This time, a movie about fraudulent marriage was on the new TV channel on all occasions. Since Jooin had gone through difficult times under his stepmother, he couldn’t help but react very sensitively to these kinds of movies.
Biting his lips firmly, Jooin pressed the remote control button hysterically again. At that moment, he suddenly realized something and paused his moves.
“Why…?” he murmured in a low voice with downcast eyes. ‘Why do I feel not that bad?’
No matter what he recalled about his stepmother, the words she shouted out at the court always came across Jooin’s mind at the same time.
She told Jooin he should get aware of how creepy he was. When those harsh remarks entered Jooin’s head, he quickly fell into a bad mood while his heart beating so rapidly.
He suddenly felt guilty about deceiving others while pretending to be a good person. Whenever that sense of guilt struck him like a tidal wave, Jooin wanted to grab any people around him and confess that he wasn’t the person who they were thinking about.
However, now he didn’t feel that way at all.
Woo Jooin raised his hand and put it on his chest. His heartbeat sounded calm as if he had heard some lullabies.
‘This can’t happen…’ wondered Jooin. That was when someone’s voice in his memories flashed through his head.
‘I think you’re easily understandable.’
His hand holding the remote control flinched. The device slipped from his fingertips and fell onto the floor with a thud. Since it got bumped in the wrong direction, the lid got separated and the batteries inside rolled away to somewhere else. However, Woo Jooin couldn’t even think about picking those up.
He was just dwelling on the voice that he recalled desperately. Comparing it with the voice of every people that he knew, Jooin tried to find the person who matched that sound. However, no one had that voice. Even though the person wasn’t in his memories at all, the words and sounds were clear in his head.
Woo Jooin’s mouth opened naturally.
“Ham Donnie…”
At that moment, there was the sound of the doorbell. Being in a daze shortly, Woo Jooin soon got up from the bed and headed to the front door.
No one reached out to him for visiting his house, but Woo Jooin opened the door without a second thought. He just considered that it would be one of his cousins who barged into his place all the time during winter break.
As the door opened, Woo Jooin widened his eyes at the unexpected person and exclaimed in surprise, “Uh…”
“Let me go in.”
The platinum blond hair emitted cold light like a star under the winter sun.
Eun Jiho looked somehow even more absentminded than Woo Jooin himself. ‘Though it’s winter break, is he under some challenging times?’ wondered Jooin. Clicking his tongue, Jooin asked Eun Jiho what was going on.
“Let’s go to your room for a second. I have something to tell you,” replied Eun Jiho. As if he felt exhausted, Eun Jiho closed his eyes and just urged Jooin to do so.
Nodding, Woo Jooin walked up the stairs nonchalantly and thought, ‘He could just speak in the living room, but maybe it’s something important then.’
Woo Jooin then pulled himself together all of a sudden when he half-opened his door. What if Eun Jiho got to see the wall full of sticky notes written ‘HAM DONNIE?’ Jooin didn’t even want to think about what Eun Jiho would imagine then.
Once he quickly closed his door back, Jooin could feel Eun Jiho’s suspicious glance toward him.
“Ah, my room’s a little messy since my cousins came over yesterday. Let’s just talk in the living room, or do you want to go to another room?’ uttered Woo Jooin with a calm voice.
The moment when he pulled Eun Jiho’s arm while saying, ‘There’s also a guest room although we don’t use it often,’ Eun Jiho stretched out his hand out of the blue and grabbed the doorknob. Woo Jooin held Eun Jiho’s wrist.
“Hold on,” said Woo Jooin.
Eun Jiho diverted his gaze back onto Jooin. In a close distance, Eun Jiho looked paler and more tiresome than earlier.
“Why?” asked Eun Jiho.
“I told you the room’s messy,” replied Jooin.
“Dude, since when did we start arguing about messy or dirty?” With that response, Eun Jiho dashed immediately toward Jooin’s room.
‘I said, no…’ Stopping Eun Jiho from entering his room that way, Woo Jooin suddenly got aware of something. Eun Jiho, who had undergone severe discipline at home, was well-mannered as a guest even at his longtime friend’s house. Thus, he wouldn’t try to step into the room that the owner of the house said not to. However, Eun Jiho was behaving strangely tenacious today.
As soon as Woo Jooin stopped to block Eun Jiho from entering his room all of a sudden, Eun Jiho flung a question sulkily.
“Are you done now? What are you hiding inside there that makes you act so fussy like this?”
“Don’t you really get it?”
“What?” replied Eun Jiho while frowning at Woo Jooin’s sudden response.
“Don’t you really know… what’s inside my room…?” Woo Jooin tossed another question.
Eun Jiho thought for a moment. Dropping his gaze at the floor, he quietly uttered, “Yes.” He then added hesitantly, “Maybe I do.”
Still blocking his door, Woo Jooin asked, “What are you gonna do if I don’t let you in?” He then heaved a sigh inwardly. Since Eun Jiho didn’t look good, Jooin thought Eun Jiho might have something going on, but he never knew that they both were concerned about the same thing.
According to Eun Jiho’s absentminded look and his desperate attitude, Jooin could tell that the person called Ham Donnie was also quite significant to Eun Jiho. However, Eun Jiho also seemed to not know who that person was at all.
That person had been removed from Jooin’s memories in the first place. Would there be a reason for Eun Jiho to remember who she was then? It would also be better for Eun Jiho to just let that thought go and never recall that person again.
Rambling those things in mind, Woo Jooin stared at Eun Jiho’s face piercingly. Suddenly, Eun Jiho lifted his hand and rubbed his forehead with a sigh.
He blurted out, “Since it’s your room, I know that I can do nothing if you won’t let me in, but…”
“But…?” replied Jooin.
Eun Jiho asked again, “Won’t you regret that?”
“…”
“Why do I keep thinking that you’re gonna regret it?” murmured Eun Jiho indifferently while still fastening his gaze at the floor.
That was true. After a moment, Woo Jooin opened his door wordlessly. He couldn’t help but start wondering who Ham Donnie was… the person who completely wiped out his memories of his stepmother from his mind.
Both Woo Jooin and Eun Jiho began to read all the notes on the wall immediately; however, it didn’t last long. As soon as something came across his head, Woo Jooin grimaced. Eun Jiho switched his gaze to Woo Jooin and asked,” What’s wrong?”
“Some part of the memos are gone,” replied Woo Jooin.
“What?” Looking surprised for a second, Eun Jiho uttered again, “Is there anyone who came into your room in the meantime, or someone who can do that?”
Woo Jooin thought about the possibility of it in a calm voice.
“My dad and my cousins… No one else except them…”
Listening to Jooin’s response, Eun Jiho’s brows slightly met in the middle. He tossed another question, “Is there any possibility of those people to take the notes off the wall before you get to know?”
“No, not at all,” replied Jooin with a shrug. He added, “Besides, Rihon hyeong and Nara noona have schedules abroad.”
The fact that the two were both celebrities was useful at this moment. Eun Jiho, who still looked serious, slightly nodded. Among Woo Jooin’s cousins, Woo Rinara was likely to touch Woo Jooin’s things in his room without Jooin’s permission. However, she was now staying overseas due to her working schedule. In other words…
“The note has been gone by itself,” murmured Eun Jiho.
