Chapter 33: White-Noise Fever
The attic is a kiln.
I rip free of the blanket, breath rasping like a saw dragged through wet wood. Sweat slicks the cotton sheet to my back; each swallow tastes of rusty tap water and metal pennies. Somewhere outside a rooster coughs—only one, thin and unbelonging—then the world drops into a hush so dense it has weight.
03:10, my phone screen says before the battery dies.
A hiss begins inside my skull, faint as drizzle on dry leaves. By the time I sit upright the hiss has swollen into surf, a great grey tide breaking against the seawall of my mind. Over it, distorted voices strobe in and out of range:
SELL-SELL-SELL—
해장국 half-price—
You crashed the index, girl—
I clamp palms over my ears; the roar only grows, flooding wrists, elbows, spine, until my insides feel granular, like television snow has replaced my blood.
Heat. I strip off the hoodie, fling it toward the candle-stub altar. Wax shards scatter like fallen teeth, dotting the ledger tape with white freckles. My bare arms prickle—flesh gone glittery with goose bumps even while fire ants march beneath the skin. Fever and chills in the same breath: exquisite torture.
The wallpaper sways. Roses blur into pink smears, leaking down the plaster as though someone has rinsed water-colour paint across the room. A memory flickers: the tiger's silhouette from last night, prowling behind those flowers. I try to find the outline, needing its feral steady gaze, but the petals melt faster, leaving only fleshy drips.
Water. Just water.
I roll off the mattress. The floor tilts like a listing deck; boards creak in protest. The plastic jug waits across the room, cap loose from earlier sips. I crawl—elbows, knees, dragging fever-weak legs—while the static in my head modulates into a chorus of synthetic alarms. The Kyoto trading floor, phones blinking crimson. Jin-su's laugh, rich and tutorly—Little crane, did you really think numbers forgive?
His voice slices through me; I lunge for the jug, overbalance, and smack it with my wrist. A glug, a slosh, then water blooms across the boards, shining silver in moonlight that sneaks through the cracked window. I plant both hands in the puddle and lower my mouth, lapping like a parched hound. Cold stings cracked lips, cold is mercy, but half the drink drains into the boards before it reaches my throat.
Too little. Too late.
The hiss crescendos—now it is every note in the karaoke catalogue played at once, set against a backdrop of roaring highway. My heart forgets its rhythm; the pulse leaps erratically, small bird trapped in rib cage. Muscles tense, fingers curl—a prelude to seizure, a whisper of death.
Inside the gale, Ha-eun's voice threads a single silver line.
Four beats in, seven beats hold, eight beats out.
I follow. Mouth open—air is lava pouring down trachea—
One–two–three–four.
Hold—my lungs tremble at the brim—
One–two–three–four–five–six–seven.
Exhale—one–two–three–four–five–six–seven–eight, a sigh scraping from deep furnace.
Again, and again, until the surf recedes, leaving only static grit at the edges of hearing. Heart settles to a frantic but sustainable gallop.
Ha-eun withdraws, the strand cut. I am alone with the sweat, the shivers, the river of melted roses.
Ledger—document—anchor. The thought is a life-ring. I grope for the receipt strip pinned to wall. Fingers slip; I tear it down, smearing damp wax across the ink. Knees buckle, so I sit right there in the water, back to cooker's cold metal.
With a stub of pencil I scratch into the sodden paper:
03:45 Fever storm – hallucinations escalating
Debit: pride, water lost
Credit: breath kept (4-7-8)
The act of notation narrows the room to something chartable, less monstrous.
Yet strength drains by the line. My head lolls. Ceiling beams elongate, stretch into corporate fluorescents; the attic transforms into a Seoul office canyon where monitors shriek market losses, numbers molting zeroes like feathers. In the nearest screen Han Jin-su grins, pixels peeling off his face.
Did you think you could just leave the game, Seo-yeon? The board remembers every move.
"No," I croak, though I'm unsure if it's answer or denial. The screen buckles, dissolves into the wallpaper stain. A lone karaoke note warbles through floorboards—then multiplies, chorus singing Arirang off-key, modulation sliding until it matches the white noise in my ears.
Panic surges anew. I press forehead to the cooker, metal cool against burning skin. Tears mingle with sweat and river water; salt stings the chapped cracks.
"Help," I whisper—not a scream, just a vowel pushed past swollen tongue. "Help… tomorrow." To Ha-eun? To the tiger? To any mountain spirit willing to cash this prayer?
Answer comes only as exhaustion. Muscles unclench; eyelids droop. The hiss dwindles to a faint tuning-fork whine. On the inside of my skull a single image glows: green-gold eye of the tiger, unblinking, keeping watch.
I slide sideways into the small remaining puddle. Fever heat meets wood chill, balancing somewhere close to bearable. The ledger strip flutters from my grip, drifts like a leaf onto the wax-spattered floor.
Outside, the rooster starts his second, braver crow. It echoes through alleyways that smell of wet cabbage and coal dust, then filters up through cracked windowglass to the place where I lie—half drowned, half purified, wholly spent.
Drumbeats, softer than breath, usher me into a cavern of restless sleep.
Chapter 34: Ghost Audience
Sunlight knifes through the cracked attic window and settles on my eyelids like a brand.
When I dare to open them, the room swims—edges melt, colours over-saturate. Sweat beads on my temples; the skin there feels boiled, soft as rice left too long in steam. I try to lick cracked lips. My tongue is a strip of blotting paper, soaked in the sourness of night sweats and fever breath.
The floral wallpaper—already puckered with damp—ripples in the heat. Roses swell, contract, swell again, as if the plaster itself is breathing for me.
Water. The word is clear in my skull, but my muscles ignore it. They have become someone else's limbs, heavy, jointed wrong.
A sound slips out of the layered silence: a low, appreciative clap… clap… clap.
I jerk. The mattress springs screech under sudden weight shift.
He is leaning in the far corner, one ankle crossed over the other, immaculate suit uncreased even in this dust-choked den. Han Jin-su's hair gleams billboard-black; his tie is the exact burgundy of half-dried blood. Between two manicured fingers he dangles a martini glass that holds nothing but melted ice. Droplets slide down the stem like sweat down my spine.
"Little crane," he drawls, voice as smooth as trading-floor marble. "You look dreadful."
Air leaves my lungs in a wheeze. I squeeze shut my eyes—hallucination, just fever—but the clapping continues, measured and polite.
When I open them again the corner is empty.
Relief lasts a heartbeat.
A shadow crosses the window, lengthening into the room. Jin-su's silhouette reforms on the peeling wallpaper—no, inside the wallpaper, stitched between bleeding roses. His grin splits wider.
Numbers never lie, but you did.
The words vibrate against my teeth. Behind him, jagged graphs crawl across the floral pattern: market indices plunging, red arrows stabbing downward. Stock symbols I once manipulated blink like dying stars.
"I wasn't—" My protest breaks into a coughing fit. Throat fire. Every hack sends pain lancing through fever-loosened joints.
He glances at the invisible watch I know sits on his wrist, a gift from the syndicate the year our fund doubled. "Still no accountability. Typical."
Heat throbs against my skull; the graphs pulse brighter, filling the room with crimson glow. The wallpaper seems to blister. Roses peel back petal by petal, revealing raw plaster beneath—flesh under torn skin.
"Stop," I rasp, trying to swing legs off the mattress. The floor tilts; bile jostles at the back of my tongue. Jin-su's laughter thickens, becoming the froth of market chatter, chair wheels, ringing phones. Somewhere a bell opens trading, loud enough to split bone.
Jump again, he urges, strolling toward the window. His shoes leave no prints on warped floorboards. This time finish it. Markets respect closure.
Mapo Bridge explodes behind my eyes: steel railing slick with city dew, black river yawning. My knees buckle under phantom vertigo; I taste the Han's dirty water.
Four beats in, seven beats hold, eight beats out.
Ha-eun's voice is no louder than a breeze sliding under doors, but it threads through the cacophony, silver and taut.
I inhale—lungs hiss—one two three four.
Hold—static flickers, graphs falter—one … seven.
Exhale—pushed from belly, slow—one … eight.
On the seventh cycle a smell cuts across the room: cold pine under fresh snow. The attic is suddenly a winter ridge, sap crystallised on bark; a mountain stream rushes somewhere below, water so clear it rings like glass.
The trading floor dims. Red graphs burn out section by section, leaving only ochre stains. Jin-su's outline stutters, as though the projector malfunctions.
He bares his teeth. "Breathing exercises?" he sneers. The voice wavers, glitching. "You think self-help podcasts can audit a ruin?"
I push to my feet. Ankles wobble, but the planks hold. "The numbers…" I swallow, taste iron. "The numbers were yours. I just—"
I just forged the signature, whispered the tip, pushed the button. Guilt prickles, but for once it is not a noose—more like a shard I can inspect, name, maybe set down later.
Jin-su lifts the empty martini glass, puzzled to find it dry. Cracks spider from the rim; the stem shatters. His torso frays into drifting pixels. A final glitch of laughter, and he collapses into dust motes that swirl once in the pine-scented current and vanish.
Silence.
No—white noise still rings in my ears, but faint, like an untuned radio in a distant apartment.
I sway to the window, brace both palms on the sill. Outside, cabbage trucks rattle toward the five-day market; their exhaust, thin white ribbons, rises into alpine sky. My mouth spasms with thirst. The jug on the floor remains overturned, water long dried to a watermark resembling a map of nowhere.
River.
The word surfaces, cool and absolute.
Legs tremble as I crouch beside the mattress, tug ledger receipt from beneath clotted wax. A pencil nub rolls out; I catch it, scrawl with shaking hand:
10:34 Ghost: Han JS
Trigger: fever + guilt
Shield: pine / cold water / breath 4-7-8
Need: real water soon
Ink bleeds where sweat drips, but the words exist; evidence that hallucinations can be catalogued, maybe cornered.
I pull socks over clammy feet, jam them into the canvas shoes bought in Seoul Station—their soles already separating. Each lace knot is a negotiation with fingers that won't obey, but they hold.
The attic doorknob feels furnace-hot from midday sun; when I twist it the metallic tang stays on my palm, ghost of Jin-su's broken glass.
Downstairs the noraebang is closed, neon lights dead for once. Mrs Oh must be sleeping off soju. The hallway reeks of stale smoke and microwave corn dogs. I steady myself on the rail—head swims; black dots waltz across sight—but instinct drags me forward.
Outside, mountain air slaps my fevered face, sharp as vinegar. I gasp. Somewhere beyond the warehouses a river offers a promise of water cool enough to drown white noise, strong enough to rinse the last of last night's poison from my skin.
"Just… down the hill," I whisper to no one, or to the pine-scent lingering at my left shoulder.
Ha-eun does not answer with words, only with the faint intensifying of that alpine fragrance, as if pointing the way.
I step into the road's wavering light, ledger slip crumpled in my fist like a passport, and let gravity draw me toward the river's unseen silver.
Chapter 35: Riverbank Collapse
The alley behind Happy Night Noraebang wobbles like a heat mirage, though the October air is brisk enough to raise goose-flesh on my fevered arms. I clutch the empty plastic jug against my chest and put one sneakered foot in front of the other, boots of iron strapped to my calves. Every few steps the world judders, as if someone is kicking the earth's tripod.
Follow the sound of water, Ha-eun murmurs—no louder than a reed sighing—but I hear it. Beneath the pulse screaming in my ears lies a faint, steady hush: river on rock, river on river.
I angle down the dirt lane that cuts between shuttered shop sheds. Weeds taller than my knees snag the fabric of my trousers; burrs cling like desperate hands. A cabbage truck growls past on the paved road above, its diesel exhale hanging in sunlight, but no driver sees the staggering woman below. I am grateful—shame is a weight I cannot carry today.
The slope steepens. Pebbles roll under my soles; vertigo pitches forward, and I nearly follow. The jug leaves my fingers, tumbles once, twice, and lodges against a bramble. I squat—knees crack—to retrieve it and almost retch from the motion. My vision strobes white; the lane tilts another few cruel degrees. Breathe. Four beats in, seven beats hold… I cannot remember the count, only know I must keep my feet moving before the sun drills straight through my skull.
A final veil of scrub opens. The river lies below—no broad Han ribbon, but a mountain child, bronze-green and quick. Sun diamonds jitter across its back; wind combs reeds that bow like monks. The sight is so beautiful it hurts.
Gravel slides under me as I descend the embankment. Each shift of footing jabs fever-loose nails into my joints. At the bottom I drop to my knees in a patch of cold shadow. The stones jab; I welcome the bite, proof I am awake.
I scoop water into the jug, plunging it until bubbles gurgle. My hands tremble so violently half the river slops back out, but at last the vessel is three-quarters full. I press the rim to my mouth.
The first swallow is electric: metallic cold, tasting of pine roots and granite dust. A second mouthful follows, then a third, desperate gulps that leave no room for air. The jug lowers, but a fist of cramp seizes my gut. Water—and something hot as battery acid—surges up my throat.
I twist aside as vomit erupts, bitter with bile and half-digested miso. It splashes across a flat stone and strings of it drip into the current, carried away before I can be ashamed. Spasms follow, empty and savage. When they finish, I fold forward and rest my forehead on the stone's slick, algae-stitched skin. The granite is wonderfully cold.
A gag of river water runs from my chin. I want to wipe it, but my arms have decided they are no longer part of me. The jug rolls from limp fingers, bumps once down the rocks, and tips—glug-glug-glug—back into the very mouth that filled it.
Something wetter than water touches my cheek. I lift my head a finger's breadth and see ink bleeding through ledger paper. The crumpled receipt has slipped from my coat pocket and now floats on a puddle's thin skin, the graphite letters fanning outward like wounded wings. Ghost of J.S. 10 : 34—Shield: pine/cold water… The rest smears into gray bruise. I reach for it; the riverbank pirouettes. Paper and rocks all whirl together.
"Not yet," I whisper, though I do not know who I am bargaining with—mountain, spirit, or the remnant of my own will. Wind carries my words away, un-bargained.
The world narrows at its edges, colours draining to sepia. My furnace skull cools a fraction as breeze tongues the sweat on my hairline. From somewhere upriver comes a child's bark of laughter, followed by a dog answering, but the sounds arrive through layers of cotton.
Hold the breath of the mountain, Ha-eun intones, but the voice feels distant, as though she calls from the high ridge I can no longer see.
I try to inhale. Air rasps through a throat raw from retching. The ground under me is no longer ground; it is a raft, sliding gently, insistently toward sleep. I let one arm extend into damp sand that looks like powdered bronze. Grains stick to my skin, tiny cold stars against fevered flesh.
The ledger fragment drifts, catching a sluggish eddy that pivots it in slow circles. I watch until the letters blur, until the white becomes silver, until silver becomes bright nothing.
Above the rushing in my ears another sound begins: a hollow drum, distant yet familiar. It might be my heart, or the echo of a shaman's janggu from a different night, or simply the river remembering every stone it has ever touched. The distinction no longer matters; all rhythms fold into one.
I close my eyes. The last thing I feel is the river's chill seeping through the back of my coat and into my spine, tugging the fever downward, washing me toward—somewhere, someone—who might lift me clear of both ghosts and numbers.
Then the drum fades, and the riverbank empties of light.
Chapter 36: Mountain Water
A bicycle bell trills once, sharp as a dragonfly's wing, before the front tire crunches to a stop on the loose river gravel.
Park Yujin swings one leg over the frame and lets it drop. The pharmacist's white windbreaker flutters in the up-valley breeze, and a twig of pine scent twists through the air, carrying the faint sweetness of sap. She was on her way home from a delivery—two boxes of blood-pressure pills for the senior center—but the heap of color at the water's edge has pulled her off the road.
It is a woman's body, half in sun, half in shadow. Jeans soaked dark along the thighs. One arm splayed toward the current as though reaching for a departing boat. A plastic jug glimmers beside her, half-full, mouth uncapped.
"Again?" Yujin mutters—she recognizes the narrow shoulders and tangle of ash-brown hair from the attic over the noraebang. She plants both knees in the coarse sand, fingers already seeking pulse. It flutters erratically beneath clammy skin, too fast, too weak.
"Miss Lee?" She tries the name, uncertain if the woman ever offered it. No answer.
Yujin presses the back of her hand to the feverish forehead. Not as hot as she feared—cooling, perhaps, from river water and the bite of mountain wind—but the skin beneath is parchment dry. Dehydration, withdrawal, she thinks, remembering the tremor she noticed when the young woman bought miso and cheap rice two mornings ago.
She glances up-river. No one. Only cicadas thrumming in reeds and the steady throat-song of water over stones.
"Right. Do it here." From her backpack she pulls a small foil packet—salt and sugar mixed for making kimchi brine—and a chilled bottle of spring water she had planned to drink later. The salt-sugar granules hiss into the bottle's neck; she caps and shakes until the liquid clouds.
Kneeling, she slips a hand beneath Seo-yeon's neck and lifts. Eyes flutter open—glassy, unfocused. Bile crusts at the corner of cracked lips.
"Easy now," Yujin says, voice trimmed of panic. "Sip this. Mountain water won't betray you."
She coaxes the rim between slack lips. The first swallow triggers a gag, shoulders jerking. Some of the solution dribbles out, darkening the sand. Yujin steadies the head, waits, offers again.
"One breath. Then drink."
Seo-yeon obeys, or at least her body does: chest rises, shudders, stills. She sips. Another breath; another sip. A spark of color returns to her cheeks.
"Name?" Yujin asks, slipping into triage cadence. "Do you know your name?"
"Lee… Seo…-yeon." The syllables drag like wet laundry across a floor.
"Good. Day of the week?"
"Fri—" A frown. "Saturday?" She blinks at the treetops. "Gangwon. Not Seoul." The answer comes out as fact and apology.
Yujin allows the faintest smile. "Close enough. We'll work on calendars later." She scans for other injuries: bruised hip, sand-scraped cheek, knuckles raw. Nothing bleeding hard. Her gaze catches a soggy wad of paper rocking on a shallow eddy. Ink feathers across the top line: Ghost of J.S. Curious, she hooks it out with two fingers.
"Yours?" she asks.
Seo-yeon's eyes widen with horror that saps more strength than fever. She nods once, unsure, like a child caught stealing. Yujin tucks the ruin into her pack before the river can reclaim it.
"Ledger can dry. People can't. Drink."
Minute by minute, color deepens. The tremor eases. Sweat beads on Seo-yeon's brow—not fever-glaze but proper perspiration, signaling fluids returning to the cells. When half the bottle is gone, Yujin judges it safe to move.
"Can you stand if I help?"
A doubtful silence; then a barely audible "Try."
Yujin loops Seo-yeon's arm over her own shoulders, braces their weight against the slope. Pebbles slide but hold. Together they shuffle up the path toward a wooden rest pavilion that watches the river bend. Under its shade the air feels five degrees cooler. Pine branches whisper overhead, scattering cork-brown needles that tap the roof like settling rain.
Yujin eases her patient onto the bench. She unslings her backpack, produces another water bottle and an elastic-banded sachet of herbal powder. "I'll mix you a stronger batch at the clinic," she promises, "but this will keep your cells happy until then."
Seo-yeon's voice rasps out. "Clinic… costs money." Embarrassment burns through the salt on her lips.
"First consult is free," Yujin says, and means it. "After that, we can talk installments. Health before pride, hm?"
She empties the powder—tart with dried persimmon peel—into the electrolyte mix. Seo-yeon sips, grimaces, sips again. Orange sunlight glints through the bottle, painting honeycombs on her hollow cheeks.
"I thought," Seo-yeon begins, words floating like leaves, "I could do it alone."
"Withdrawal?"
A stiff nod.
Yujin sits beside her, letting their shoulders almost touch. "No one climbs Taebaek alone in winter. Detox is steeper." She draws a line in the air. "You're on the slope. Good news is, you have ropes now."
Seo-yeon's lids lower; a tear—or river spray—catches her lashes. Under the bench, the jug waits, refilled and capped tight. Beside it, Yujin sets the ruined ledger inside a paper take-out bag so the breeze won't steal it.
Above them, clouds drift like shredded silk across a cobalt sky. The cicada chorus has thinned, giving way to the hollow knock of a woodpecker deeper in the pines. Seo-yeon inhales, long and careful. The scent of resin and mineral water fills her lungs. Somewhere inside, Ha-eun's warmth flares—a silent bow of thanks.
Sip by sip, the bottle empties. When the final mouthful is gone, Yujin pats her knee. "Think you can walk to the bike? I'll push; you ride pillion. Ten minutes to the pharmacy."
"I—I can try."
"Good. The mountain already started the work. We'll finish it."
Together they rise. Seo-yeon wobbles, but Yujin's grip is steady as an anchor knot. As they take the first slow steps back toward the road, the river swirls below, carrying bile, ink, and the shimmer of a woman's old life downstream—leaving behind only the taste of mountain water and the faint promise that it will not betray her.
Chapter 37: Herbal Bitters
The sliding glass door sighs open, and a brass bell above it taps out two bright notes. They ricochet across rows of neatly labeled apothecary jars, then dissolve into a heavy tide of scent—ginseng earthiness, licorice smoke, and the grassy bite of mugwort hung to dry along the ceiling beams.
Seo-yeon inhales once and nearly buckles. The mingled aromas barrel through her nostrils and smash into an old memory: a stranger-warm kitchen, tatami mats chipped at the corners, and her halmeoni pressing a steaming china cup into her seven-year-old hands. Yakssuk—drink before the cold reaches your bones, little crane. Bitter steam. Piano scales waiting beyond the doorway. She tastes the tea again now, phantom and precise, and a tear she does not feel rolls down the bridge of her nose.
Yujin's voice cuts through the haze. "Easy. Smells can knock harder than fists."
A steady hand—warm, callused from mortar work—guides her to a stool at the reception counter. The pharmacist's bicycle helmet dangles from two fingers, forgotten, as she studies Seo-yeon's face.
"Focus on what you can touch," Yujin says. She presses a cool bamboo tumbler into Seo-yeon's palms. The outside sweats beads of spring water; condensation traces down her wrists like silver threads. "Here and now."
Seo-yeon breathes. The water is impossibly sweet after electrolyte grit and river metal. With each swallow the clinic solidifies around her: the soft clatter of a ceiling fan, a poster showing acupressure points on a cartoon foot, Yujin's lavender nail polish chipped at the tips.
When the tumbler empties, Yujin takes her wrist. The blood-pressure cuff hisses, Velcro crackles, stethoscope diaphragm chills her skin. Numbers click off on a manual gauge.
"Better than I expected." Yujin releases the valve. "Your pulse is still racing, but the rhythm's good. Fever's down."
"Mountain water." Seo-yeon's voice hovers above a whisper, unsure if she is thanking or apologizing.
"Yes, and salt and sugar." Yujin grins. "But I'll accept the mountain's help. Now—tongue out."
A wooden depressor tastes of clean pine as Yujin examines the back of Seo-yeon's throat. Satisfied, she gestures to a narrow doorway behind the counter. Beyond it, copper kettles squat on induction plates, their lids rattling like coins in a beggar's cup. Shelves hold burlap sacks labeled 오가피 and 백출, tiny wooden drawers stamped with fading hanja.
"My workshop," Yujin says. "We'll brew what your liver is begging for."
She flips a switch. One kettle glows red beneath. Into a mortar she pours glossy black seeds—schisandra—followed by brittle curls of dried milk-thistle, a pinch of dandelion root, slivers of ginger. The pestle circles with rhythmic grace, releasing waves of fragrance that braid with steam.
"Schisandra closes the gates—keeps the toxins in so the liver can filter. Milk-thistle repairs the walls. Dandelion flushes the rubble. Ginger persuades your stomach not to riot."
Seo-yeon watches, hypnotized, as powder drifts like cinnamon into the roiling water. Amid the hiss, Ha-eun's voice flutters inside her chest: You are present. Memory is mist. The mantra steadies her breathing while the clinic's air thickens to an herbal fog.
Minutes pass. Yujin lifts the kettle and strains the dark liquid through cotton into a squat ceramic teapot. She sets two medicine glasses on a lacquer tray—the kind Seoul bars use for soju flights—and fills them with syrupy brown.
"Brace," she warns.
Seo-yeon grips the glass. The first swallow is a sledgehammer of bitterness—greener than espresso grounds, sharper than burnt alcohol. Her lips pucker involuntarily; tears spring again, this time driven by taste.
Yujin's laughter dances up from her belly. "Worse than soju, right?"
"At least…" Seo-yeon coughs, "legal."
Warmth unfurls from her throat downward, spreading through veins like sunlit ink in rice paper. The clinic's walls steady; the edges of objects sharpen. For the first time in days, she feels anchored fully inside her body.
"Take five milliliters three times a day," Yujin instructs, pouring the remaining tonic into a dark amber bottle. She corks it, slips a measuring spoon through a rubber band around the neck, then presses a small instruction card against the glass. Shake well, respect bitterness, chase with water.
Seo-yeon's fingers close over the bottle. The glass holds residual heat from the kettle, and she savors it the way one might savor a secret.
"You looked somewhere else when you came in," Yujin says, voice softer now. "Where did the smell take you?"
Seo-yeon mouths the memory before she speaks it. "My grandmother's kitchen. She brewed something similar every winter. I hated it." A shaky laugh. "But I always felt warmer afterward. She died when I was nine."
Silence pools, gentle rather than awkward. Yujin folds her arms across the counter, resting on those lavender-tipped nails. "Scent wires deepest," she says. "Sometimes medicine isn't inventing new paths, it's reopening old ones."
Seo-yeon bites the inside of her cheek, surprised at how freely the tears come now. Not panic tears—something else. "Thank you," she manages.
Yujin waves it off but her eyes shine. "You can thank me by taking every dose and coming back tomorrow. Morning is quiet, but if you need night care, ring the bell. I live upstairs."
Seo-yeon nods. The simple offer feels monumental.
As Yujin walks her to the front, she lifts the ledger from a sunny windowsill where pages flutter like injured moths. The ink has bled into watercolor storms, yet the scrawled line Credit: self-made juk is still legible. Yujin slips a sheet of blotting paper between the damp leaves and hands it over.
"Looks better than half the prescriptions doctors write," she teases. "Keep writing."
Outside, the mountain afternoon is crisp, the sky a polished blue bowl. Pine resin sharpens the air; far off, a truck downshifts on the highway, its engine a low brass note. Seo-yeon pauses on the wooden porch, paper bag crinkling in her hand. Inside, the tonic bottle glugs softly with each breath, as though echoing her pulse.
"Yujin," she says, turning. "I'll come back."
"I know," Yujin replies. "The mountain water already made you a promise. I'm just holding it to its word."
Seo-yeon steps onto the gravel path. The amber bottle bumps her thigh, spreading a faint medicinal warmth through the fabric of the loaner hoodie. With every footfall the bell above the clinic door rings behind her—clear, bright, and strangely reassuring—until distance swallows the sound and leaves only the rustle of pine needles and the bitter-sweet aftertaste of possibility.
Chapter 38: Pill Reminder App
The sun was sliding behind the ridgeline when a soft rap echoed up the attic stair.
Seo-yeon, perched cross-legged on the thin mattress, jolted upright. The amber tonic bottle stood open beside her ledger; its sharp, herbal perfume still prickled the air. She had just finished the second dose, tongue numb from bitterness, when the knock came again—two brisk taps followed by the squeak of the narrow door.
"Delivery," Yujin called, head appearing around the frame. She held a folding camp-stool under one arm, a coil of white cable dangling like a tame snake from the other. A small pouch bulged from the pocket of her windbreaker.
"You should charge admission," Seo-yeon managed, embarrassed by the sour laundry smell that clung to the room.
Yujin stepped inside anyway. "If you're conscious enough to joke, you're conscious enough to learn." She parked the stool by the outlet, straightened, and surveyed the cramped space—the slanted ceiling, the lonely candle stub, the ledger drying against the window. "Cozy," she declared, as though it were a choice.
Only one socket protruded from the wall, brown with age. Seo-yeon's cracked Samsung lay beside it, battery icon a gaunt red sliver. She winced. That phone had once been a live wire to Seoul—market alerts, clients' demands, Jin-su's midnight pings. Since the night on Mapo Bridge she had kept it powered down, a dead limb she was afraid to amputate.
Yujin knelt, plugged in the charger, and the cable's LED pulsed red—steady, patient, undeniable life. "First aid item one," she said, twirling the loose insulation where metal showed through. "She's on hospice care, but we'll resuscitate her long enough for a noble retirement."
Seo-yeon's laugh came out scratched, but it was a laugh. "I haven't opened it since…" She let the sentence fade; the date felt radioactive.
"Good. Fresher start." Yujin dropped onto the stool and patted the floor beside her. "Sit. Vitamins next." She produced a slim sachet printed with cartoon honeybees and tore it open, handing over a bright–yellow powder. "B-complex. Straight shot, then water."
The powder dissolved sugary and sour on Seo-yeon's tongue, chasing away tonic aftertaste. A slow warmth uncurled in her gut.
Yujin tapped the phone's power button. The screen lit—spider-webbed glass reflecting a distorted version of Seo-yeon's face. Battery at twenty-three percent. No missed calls. No messages. An empty, humming corridor.
"Let's make this thing useful," Yujin said. She thumbed through the app store with deft swipes, the pale green of her nail polish flashing in the dusk. Search bar, Korean characters: 약알림무료. Options bloomed—cartoon tablets smiling, neon pill bottles spinning.
"MediChime Lite," she decided, selecting an icon of a tiny bell wearing a nurse's cap. "No ads, no data mine, just alarms."
The install bar crept across the scarred glass. Seo-yeon's chest tightened. Alarms. In a past life they had meant margin calls and spreadsheet errors, each shriek another condemnation. Pulse drummed in her temples.
When the app opened, default tone chirped—a shrill digital ping identical to the stock-market open. Her fingers twitched. For half a heartbeat she saw red candles plunging down a trading chart and felt Jin-su's phantom breath at her ear.
"Too sharp?" Yujin asked quietly.
Seo-yeon nodded, throat tight.
"No problem." Yujin scrolled to the sound library. "Let's try… traditional." A soft daegeum flute floated from the speaker—breathy, river-cool, followed by a faint gurgle of water over stones. The melody curled through the attic like a silk ribbon.
Seo-yeon's shoulders lowered. "That one."
"Set." Yujin entered three alarm times, aligning them with tonic doses and the vitamin packet. 07:00, 13:00, 19:00. For each, she attached a photo of the dosage card she had snapped earlier. "When it chimes, you open the app, tap 'Taken,' and the streak counter goes up. Make a game of it."
Her nimble thumbs paused. "Test?" She pressed the virtual bell.
The flute whispered again—morning mist, pine forest, everything that was not Seoul. Seo-yeon surprised herself with an audible chuckle. The attic, for that blink, felt almost like a cabin retreat.
"There." Yujin locked the phone and flipped it over. On the battered case she stuck a neon-yellow note, neatly folded so the adhesive hugged the cracks. ☎ Yujin 010-xxxx-xxxx – mortar & pestle doodle.
"Call or text—any hour," she said. "Even if you just need the flute reset."
Seo-yeon traced the cartoon pestle, throat tight for a different reason now. "Why?"
"Because bodies don't heal alone, and apps glitch." Yujin stood, dusted her palms. Through the window, sunset carved a molten stripe across her hair. "Besides, you still owe me ₩5 000 for the tonic bottle." A wink. "Interest accrues in smiles."
Seo-yeon managed another, smaller one—ragged but real. Her phone vibrated as the battery ticked to thirty-one percent, charger LED blinking like a new pulse.
Yujin folded the stool, slung it over her shoulder. "Let the flute nag you, not guilt. See you tomorrow morning—bring that ledger; pages should be crisp by then."
At the door she paused. "Proud of you, little crane."
The nickname brushed Seo-yeon's ears with startling tenderness. Before she could answer, Yujin was clattering down the stairs, scent of mugwort trailing behind her like an invisible ribbon.
Seo-yeon sank onto the mattress. Outside, the sky shifted from apricot to bruised violet. Below, the noraebang's bass thumped its early-evening warm-up, distant and harmless. She lifted the phone—the sticky note glowed lemon in the dim.
A thought surfaced: Tools serve breath, not fear. Ha-eun's silent echo.
She tapped MediChime's test bell once more. The flute sighed; the water chuckled over stones. Somewhere in sync, her heartbeat settled into that gentle flow.
For the first time, a digital alarm sounded not like a verdict, but a promise.
Seo-yeon placed the phone face-up beside the tonic bottle, both quietly charging for tomorrow, and lay back. Dust motes drifted across the last amber shaft of sunset as the attic settled around her, imperfect yet newly ordered, every breath chiming with possibility.
Chapter 39: Alley Echoes
A thin blade of autumn sun slipped between the alley's tin-roof eaves as Seo-yeon eased the attic door shut behind her. Cool air—pine sap and distant woodsmoke—brushed the last traces of bitter tonic from her tongue. She rolled her shoulders, feeling only a muted tug where fever aches had raged two days earlier. The 07:00 flute alarm still hummed in her memory like a river reed: Take tonic, breathe. For once, the day felt possible.
Pebbles crunched under her thrift-shop sneakers while she picked her way down the back lane behind Happy Night Noraebang. Rusted gutters glimmered orange in the angled light; dew-soaked cabbage leaves, stacked on flatbed carts, lent the morning a sweet-sour tang. Somewhere beyond the roofs a dog barked three lazy syllables, as if reminding the village to stretch.
PING-clang!
A dented cola can shot out from behind a leaning fence and struck the toe of her shoe with surprising force. Seo-yeon staggered, arms pinwheeling, heartbeat sprinting for an instant before balance returned. The can spun in a wobbly circle, sunlight flashing off its scarred metal.
A boy—eight, maybe nine—skidded after it, sneakers kicking dust. Behind him loped an older girl with a single braid and the impatient energy of a starting pistol.
"Sorry, Seoul eon-ni!" the girl called, switching to an exaggerated bow mid-run. "Duri's got no brakes."
Seo-yeon blinked. Eon-ni. The honorific landed softly but firmly, as if the alley itself had decided she belonged. "No harm done," she managed, nudging the can back with a cautious tap. It clanked toward the siblings.
Duri scooped it up and inspected the new dent with pride. "Stronger than a Seoul taxi," he declared.
Seul-ki rolled her eyes. "Taxis don't smell like old cola."
"They smell like air-freshener," Seo-yeon said before she could stop herself, then added, "And sometimes stale coffee."
The kids looked delighted. "Is the Seoul sky really pink at night?" Seul-ki asked, stepping closer. A faint freckle constellation dotted the bridge of her nose.
"Only when the dust blows in from China," Seo-yeon answered, remembering smog-stained sunsets over glass towers. "Mostly it's gray."
Duri frowned as though that violated a sacred cartoon. He bounced the can between his palms, metal ringing like a tiny gong each time it hit. "Do subways smell like bread?"
"Like fish-cake," his sister corrected.
"Depends on the station," Seo-yeon said, surprised by the warmth rising in her chest. Each question felt like a gentle tug, reeling her outward from weeks of isolation. She gave the can a playful side kick. It skittered across the gravel, and for five unplanned seconds she jogged after it with them, dizziness nipping at the edge of her vision but never quite biting.
They reached the lane mouth where a single persimmon tree threw mottled shade across cracked pavement. Duri caught the can triumphantly, holding it aloft like a championship cup. "First goal of the day!"
Seul-ki checked a cheap plastic watch. "Speaking of goals, we gotta bring kimchi jars to Kang ajumma's café before homeroom. They're short on helpers again." She turned to Seo-yeon. "Madam Kang says the lunch rush is a war these days. Maybe you could—" She stopped, suddenly shy. "Well, you look strong enough now."
Strong. The word settled over Seo-yeon like a quilt still warm from the sun. Two mornings ago she'd been a shaking heap by the river; now a twelve-year-old thought she looked capable.
"I might drop by," she said, tasting the idea like fresh water. A job meant cash, purpose, something besides counting tonic doses.
Seul-ki brightened. "Tell her Seul-ki sent you. She'll pretend to grunt, but she's happy inside."
Duri saluted with the battered can. "Victory present," he announced, pushing it into Seo-yeon's hands. The metal was cool, the dents deep, its silver skin mottled with rust—yet somehow it gleamed. She tucked it into her sweatshirt pocket, absurdly honored.
The school bell clanged from across the fields—an old iron pipe struck with rebar. "Gotta run!" the siblings chorused. As they sprinted away, their voices bounced back down the alley: "See you, Seoul eon-ni! Don't forget the café!"
Echoes lingered long after their sneakers vanished around the corner. Seo-yeon stood alone beneath the persimmon tree, heart beating an unfamiliar rhythm—half laughter, half awe. Wind rustled the dry leaves overhead, scattering orange petals of light across the gravel. For the first time since stepping off the bus, the quiet felt like company, not accusation.
She drew a steady breath, opened MediChime, and tapped the green checkmark beside 07:00 Taken. A miniature confetti animation danced across the cracked screen. Streak: 2 days.
The can in her pocket clinked against the tonic bottle with each step as she turned toward the main road. In the distance, a red-and-white sign swung lazily: Mount Valley Café — Homemade Buckwheat Noodles. Seo-yeon squared her shoulders and started walking, the children's chant carrying her forward like a song.
Seoul eon-ni, Seoul eon-ni…
Today the nickname sounded less like a reminder of where she'd come from and more like an invitation to where she might, at last, belong.
Chapter 40: Apron Inquiry
A thin curl of steam fogged the inside of the café's plate-glass window, drawing silver runes on the morning sun. Above the clouded pane, a handwritten notice flapped—red marker on scrap cardboard, corners dark with grease:
HELP WANTED / KITCHEN HAND / IMMEDIATE
Seo-yeon traced the letters with her eyes until the strokes blurred. One small step, she told herself. One rung, as Ha-eun liked to whisper. She adjusted the strap of her tonic bottle, inhaled the comforting scents of roasting barley and sesame oil, and pushed through the door.
A brass bell chimed, bright as cut crystal. Heat wrapped her instantly: broth bubbling somewhere out of sight, garlic crackling on a pan. The dining room held six square tables, varnish nicked by decades of chopsticks; sunlight pooled on floorboards scuffed to the color of old chestnuts. At the far counter stood a woman in a flour-dusty apron, fingers flying over a hand-held abacus. Her hair was coiled in a no-nonsense bun, gray strands shot through like early frost.
To her left, a younger woman—mid-twenties, ponytail, cheeks flushed—wiped a tabletop in lazy spirals. She glanced up, assessing the stranger in thrift-shop sweatshirt and Seoul jeans. One eyebrow lifted, equal parts curiosity and caution.
Seo-yeon's throat went dry despite the humid air. She stepped closer to the counter, conscious of her own heartbeat echoing the abacus clicks. "Excuse me," she began, voice catching. "Is the position still available?"
The older woman stilled, eyes flicking from tonic bottle to cracked phone peeking from a pocket, then back to Seo-yeon's face. "You're the attic girl from noraebang, yes?" Her Gangwon dialect was blunt but not unkind.
"Yes, ma'am."
"Name?"
"Lee Seo-yeon."
"Age?"
"Twenty-nine."
Madam Kang grunted. "Too young for my knees, too old for games." She gestured with her chin toward a narrow doorway behind the counter. "Come."
The kitchen smelled sharper—bleach battling onion skins, hot soy, and old iron. A mountain of plates teetered beside a deep, square sink; scalding water hissed through a flexible hose, raising a ghostly cloud.
"You see?" Madam Kang said. "Hands in here all morning. Grease so thick you'll dream of soap. Wage is thirty-eight thousand won for the day, breakfast and lunch included. Late twice, 끗이다—game over. Still interested?"
Dish steam dampened Seo-yeon's fringe; her stomach fluttered at the thought of standing here for hours. But blisters healed, and empty pockets did not. She nodded. "I can start tomorrow."
Behind them, a clatter—order pad skidding across tile. The younger woman had dropped it while stacking side-dish bowls. Seo-yeon reacted before thought: rescued the pad mid-slide, gathered the paper tickets, and rifled them into tidy bouquet, earliest times on top. Years of trading-floor reflex: time stamp, sequence, efficiency. She held the sorted stack out.
"Thank you," the young woman said, surprise flickering into a quick smile. "I'm Min-ji."
"Seo-yeon." Their fingers brushed; static popped, light as pepper sparks.
Madam Kang watched, eyes narrowing, then returned to the counter. She plucked a faded red apron from a hook—fabric patched at the waist, smelling of sesame and Sunlight soap. She tossed it across the worktable.
"Wash it tonight, bring it tomorrow. Shift starts six-thirty sharp. Understood?"
"Yes, ma'am," Seo-yeon said, clutching the bundle. The coarse cotton felt heavier than any silk jacket from her past life and infinitely more valuable.
Madam Kang scribbled on a receipt slip: 06:30 / LEE SEO-YEON / TRIAL. "Show this to me when you arrive," she said, sliding it over.
Min-ji leaned on a broom handle. "Better eat something first. Morning rush is like a typhoon."
"I'll be ready," Seo-yeon answered, though a flicker of doubt rippled through her ribs. Ha-eun's voice surfaced, low and calm: Tools serve breath, not fear. The words steadied her like hot broth.
She bowed—not the shallow city nod but a full waist bend. When she straightened, Madam Kang's lined face had softened by a millimeter, enough to wrinkle one corner of her eye.
"Go rest," the older woman said. "Tomorrow we'll see if Seoul hands can survive Gangwon water pressure."
Back on the sunlit street, the bell's echo still tingled in Seo-yeon's ears. She pressed the apron to her chest; the patchwork seams smelled, impossibly, like belonging. Her phone vibrated—a quiet reminder from MediChime: 08:00 Dose Taken—Nice Work. The screen shimmered in the morning glare, crack lines catching light like spider silk.
She tapped the green checkmark, then opened a new alarm. 05:45 DAEGEUM FLUTE—enough time to swallow tonic, tie hair, and walk to the café before War Hour began. As she saved the setting, the test chime floated out: soft bamboo notes blended with a recorded stream, the same mountain water that had revived her.
Seo-yeon smiled. One proactive decision, one red apron, and a melody to wake her. The can in her pocket clinked with each step as she headed back toward the alley, rehearsing tomorrow's greeting in her mind.
Good morning, Madam. Sink's already running.
The words felt crisp, solid—like the first bricks of a bridge leading from survival into something that might one day be called life.
Chapter 41: Madam Kang's Eyebrow
The lunch rush had fled like a receding tide, leaving Mount Valley Café strewn with crusted bowls and the warm, greasy perfume of pepper-pork stew. Steam still trembled on the inside of the windows, turning the late-morning sun into wandering gold coins that slid across upended chairs. Seo-yeon paused just inside the doorway, laundered red apron folded over her arm, tonic bottle clinking in her canvas tote. Her pulse drummed against her throat hard enough to blur the room's edges.
Behind the counter stood Madam Kang, sleeves rolled past muscled forearms, chop-chapped lips pursed in concentration as she jotted numbers into an ancient receipt ledger. Even at rest one of her eyebrows arched skyward—sharp, inquisitorial, daring the world to prove itself worthy. She glanced up, took in sweatshirt, jeans, and the faint tremor in Seo-yeon's fingers.
"You came back," she said, wiping a bead of sweat with the side of her wrist. "Sit."
The single syllable left no space for refusal. Seo-yeon slid onto a low wooden stool. The café's hush magnified every sound: the soft glug of tea inside a brass kettle, Min-ji's broom bristles rasping in the dining area, and—louder to her own ears than every other noise—the staccato of her heartbeat.
Madam Kang poured roasted-barley tea into two dented metal cups. The liquid swirled amber, smell of toasted grain settling Seo-yeon's stomach. Madam set one cup before the newcomer, then braced knuckles against the counter. Eyebrow inching higher, she fired the first question.
"Why Gangwon?"
Seo-yeon lifted the cup to buy time. Warmth pooled in her palms. Part truth, not the whole gospel, she told herself. "Seoul burned me out," she said, voice steady but quiet. "I needed… a place where the sky doesn't blink with neon all night. Somewhere my hands can stay busy while my head rests."
Madam snorted, though the eyebrow dipped a millimetre—as if acknowledging honesty. "Rest? You choose dish water?"
"I need work that's real," Seo-yeon replied, surprising herself with the firmness in her tone. "Something I can finish and see clean."
Across the room, Min-ji propped her broom and wandered closer, a stack of wiped bowls balanced on her hip like a sleeping cat. She lingered within earshot, curiosity sparking in her eyes.
Madam Kang leaned forward. "Knife skills?"
"Basic home cooking. I won't mince a fingertip."
"Cash drawer?"
"I can count change blindfolded." Reflexively, she pictured ticker ribbons, quarterly reports—but chased the memory away.
"Dish-pit endurance?"
Seo-yeon inhaled. "Audit season in my old office—we washed coffee mugs till 3 a.m. Some nights the sink drain was the only thing that listened." The confession slipped out before she could censor it. Shame flushed her cheeks, but Madam Kang's mouth twitched—half amusement, half sympathy.
The older woman tapped a pencil against the counter, each rap punctuated by that climbing eyebrow.
"Rule one," rap. "Arrive six-twenty, ten minutes before open. Punctual means early."
"Understood."
"Rule two," rap. "Reek of alcohol and you're gone. My customers smell everything."
Blood rushed to Seo-yeon's ears. "Understood."
"Rule three," rap. "No phone in the kitchen—oil and screens don't mix."
A ribbon of panic fluttered—those alarms were lifelines. She forced a breath. "Can I keep it in the apron pocket on silent? I need it for medicine reminders."
Madam Kang studied her—a stare as direct as frost against glass. After a moment she grumbled, "Pocket. Silent. If you stare at it, I confiscate." Eyebrow settled—deal.
From the side, Min-ji broke in, voice lilting with local cadence. "그럼 시간 잘 맞춰라-요, eon-ni." Then watch the time properly, big sis. A sly smile tugged her lips.
Seo-yeon blinked. "잘… 맞춰라… ?" She fumbled with the dialect ending. Min-ji's grin widened.
"It means don't be late," the younger woman translated. "I can teach you more after shifts, if you survive the first day."
"I'd like that," Seo-yeon said, the words warmer than the tea sliding down her throat.
Madam Kang opened a thick time-card ledger—pages yellowed, edges curled like dried seaweed. She pushed it across the counter with a fountain pen whose cap had lost its clip decades ago. "Sign. Full name."
Seo-yeon set apron aside, uncapped the pen. Her hand trembled once, steadied. LEE SEO-YEON—ink bled a small blot at the tail of the last syllable, blooming into the vague shape of a crane's wing. She exhaled, oddly buoyed by the accidental omen.
Madam scratched tomorrow's date beside the name, circled it. "Daily pay in cash envelope every Friday after closing. Bring your own rubber gloves—thin ones tear." She produced a small business-card square printed with the week's rota and slid it across. "Study this. Lunch included, but you eat fast."
Seo-yeon tucked the schedule into her tote, then reached for the washed apron. The fabric smelled of sesame oil and cheap detergent; it felt like possibility itself. "Thank you for the chance," she said, bowing low—trading-floor etiquette replaced by rural gratitude.
When she straightened, Madam Kang's eyebrow had relaxed at last, brows almost level. "Show up on time, work hard, we'll talk 'chance' then," she said, but her tone carried a thread of rough-spun kindness.
Outside, midday sunlight sharpened every ridge of the valley's surrounding peaks. The café's sign creaked in a mild breeze, squeaking like a rusty hinge but, to Seo-yeon, humming with welcome. She hugged the apron against her ribs; the cotton warmed quickly under her palms.
Her phone buzzed—a gentle river-flute trill. 12 : 00 Hydration & Bitters glowed on the cracked screen. Right on cue. She uncapped the tonic bottle, tipped back the measured dose, grimaced at the medicinal sting, then chased it with a swallow from the public faucet beside the curb.
In the glass reflection of the café window she saw herself: hair tied in a stubborn bun, sweatshirt too big at the shoulders, red apron draped like a sash of intent. Not glamorous. Real.
Ha-eun's murmur drifted through her mind like a leaf on calm water: Breathe, answer, listen. First the dish, then the day.
Seo-yeon drew a steady breath, squared her shoulders, and stepped onto the sun-splashed road. Dawn would come early, dishes would pile higher than Seoul rooftops, and Madam Kang's eyebrow would gauge her worth. But for the first time in years, tomorrow felt like something she could shape with her own hands.
Chapter 42: Dish-Pit Baptism
The alley behind Mount Valley Café lay hushed in predawn pewter, a ribbon of frost glittering along the gutter. Seo-yeon's breath puffed white as she checked her phone—05 : 55—and slipped it, silent, into the front pocket of her freshly washed red apron. Rubber gloves, still smelling of new plastic, were rolled like sausages inside her tote. She bowed toward the back door, more prayer than courtesy, then pushed inside.
A warm fog of sesame oil and bleach greeted her. In its midst stood Madam Kang, weighing rice on an old brass scale. The owner's perpetually arched eyebrow flicked to the clock—06 : 05—then settled on Seo-yeon with needlepoint precision.
"Early," Madam said, neither praise nor complaint.
"I aimed for ten minutes before," Seo-yeon replied, voice crisp with cold and nerves.
Madam pointed a flour-dusted finger at a rust-red time-card machine beside the pantry door. Seo-yeon slid a blank card under the lever; the stamp clacked, printing 06 : 05. Ink still glistened when the first eel of doubt wriggled through her stomach. Too late to run.
"Dish station," Madam announced, setting the scale weight with a thunk. "Min-ji'll show you menu callouts when you've proven you can keep plates alive."
The dish-pit squatted at the kitchen's rear: three deep stainless-steel basins, a lye-soap bucket big enough to drown a goat, and an industrial hose coiled like a sleeping snake. Steam curled from the centre sink, turning taps into dripping stalactites.
"Left—scrape. Middle—wash. Right—rinse. Change water every twenty racks," Madam said. "Bleach bucket for cutting boards. Try not to poison us." Eyebrow up, she disappeared toward the grill with a slipper-slap that sounded like a judge's gavel.
Seo-yeon slid her gloves on. The new rubber stuck slightly to the healing cuts on her wrists; the memory of the kimchi brine's burn still pulsed under the skin like low embers. One breath, one task, Ha-eun murmured inside her chest, a calm percussion beneath the kitchen's growing clatter.
By 06 : 30 the breakfast crowd crashed through the front door—construction crews, bus drivers, high-schoolers in puffy parkas. Bowls of steaming potato soup and baskets of mixed-grain rice flew across the pass. Every plate's departure echoed back to Seo-yeon in dirty form, a relentless tide of metal trays, chopsticks, sauce-slick dishes. Hot water roared; her glasses fogged. At first she fumbled, soap-slippery bowls clanging like cymbals, but muscle memory from corporate all-nighters re-surfaced. Scrape, dip, scrub, rinse. Left hand fed the right in mechanical rhythm. Sweat dampened her bangs though dawn frost still rimed the window.
Between stacks she stole a glance at the clock—07 : 28. Her arms already trembled with a fine tremor that had nothing to do with withdrawal. She inhaled the nutty undercurrent of barley tea, exhaled the ghost of Seoul exhaust fumes, and kept going.
The breakfast rush tapered, but Madam Kang swept in with a new trial. "We change banchan barrels Mondays, Wednesdays, Saturdays. Grab the hose."
She led Seo-yeon to the side alley where three earthenware onggi—each large enough to hide a small child—waited, drained of their kimchi. Inside, a crimson paste of fermented chili and cabbage veins clung to the clay like dried blood.
"Scrub until the clay smells of nothing," Madam ordered. She handed over a short-handled brush, bristles already pink-stained. "Gloves tear fast. Work smart."
Steam escaped the onggi, mingling with the dawn air. Seo-yeon knelt, braced the barrel, and tipped the first pitcher of water. Rust-red slurry splashed up her sleeves, seeping past glove cuffs to kiss the raw skin beneath. The vinegar sting snapped across every tiny cut. She hissed, fought the surge of nausea—and the temptation to bolt.
One breath, one scrub, Ha-eun whispered.
She drove the brush against the clay. Seeds and pepper flakes slithered under bristles, releasing a sour-garlic perfume both nauseating and strangely alive. Water inched pink toward the drain. Her gloves, as predicted, split at the thumbs by the third rotation. Chilies invaded, salt and capsaicin scorching every micro-abrasion. Tears blurred her vision, but she kept the rhythm: scoop, splash, scour, rinse.
Footsteps approached. Min-ji, ponytail hastily tied, crouched beside her with a roll of electrical tape.
"Told you city hands are thin," she said, eyes crinkling. She wrapped black tape around Seo-yeon's gloved thumbs and palms with practised efficiency, then demonstrated a trick—using a long, flat ladle to scrape the stubborn ring near the barrel's base without flaying knuckles. "Farm-kid hack," she said, winking.
A laugh burst from Seo-yeon, short and genuine. Steam curled between them like rising camaraderie.
By 08 : 15 the last barrel gleamed inside, scent reduced to clean clay and faint sea-salt. Sunlight spilled over the ridge and struck the water trickling across the alley floor, turning crimson run-off to molten gold. Seo-yeon straightened slowly, discovering muscles she hadn't known existed. Her gloves—patched and dyed red—resembled battle trophies.
Madam Kang stood in the doorway, arms folded, that eyebrow assessing. She said nothing, but a thermos thudded onto the low wall beside Seo-yeon, sloshing with the unmistakable aroma of barley tea. Madam disappeared as soundlessly as she'd come, yet the silent gesture throbbed louder than praise.
Seo-yeon unscrewed the lid. Warm malt rolled down her throat, soothing chili burns and pride alike.
Inside, the café had slipped into mid-morning languor. Chairs were down, tables polished, a single pensioner sipping makgeolli in the corner. Min-ji hummed a pop ballad while stacking fresh banchan dishes. Madam Kang waited at the counter with a small brown envelope and a round metal tin.
"Trial pay," she said, sliding the envelope across. "₩38 000, minus nothing. You earned every won."
Seo-yeon's gloved fingers, still tacky with soap, closed around paper soft as promise.
Madam tapped the tin. "Calendula and perilla oil. My own mix. Good for blisters."
Seo-yeon opened the lid: pale gold balm smelled faintly of crushed marigolds and sesame. Grateful heat pricked her eyes. "Thank you, ma'am."
"Tomorrow," Madam said, eyebrow lofting for accent, "same hour. If you can lift those city arms." But her lips tugged upward, the ghost of a smile.
Min-ji leaned on the counter, smirked. "Better stretch. Barrel-scrub is Wednesday again."
"Looking forward to the spa treatment," Seo-yeon shot back, surprising them both.
Outside, the valley had awakened fully: trucks grinding up the main road, sparrows arguing on power lines. Seo-yeon loosened her apron strings, letting cool air soothe her sweat-saturated back. Pain flared across her palms and forearms, yet beneath it pulsed a sturdier current—pride, raw and startling.
She opened the wage envelope. Bills, crisp and humble, nestled inside like fledgling wings. She tucked them beside the blister balm, then took out her phone. 10 : 00—Meal & Rest flashed, the flute alarm she'd chosen with Yujin. Right on time. She marked the reminder Taken, then added a new one: 05 : 20—Stretch & Breathe.
Ink-blot crane, red apron, barrel water turning clear—tokens of a life scrubbed raw but gleaming. Seo-yeon inhaled the sharp autumn air, winced at the ache in her shoulders, and smiled into the sun.
Tomorrow the baritone clang of dish racks would begin again before dawn, and Madam Kang's eyebrow would rise in silent judgment. She was ready to meet it—one breath, one scrub, one honest wage at a time.
Chapter 43: Grease & Pride
The alley behind Mount Valley Café smells of kimchi-steam and wet cardboard. Cold air bites my blistered palms as I peel yesterday's rubber gloves from a nail where someone left them to dry. New bubbles of skin glisten like stolen pearls along each finger. I flex, wince, and hear Ha-eun stir beneath my breastbone—Skin mends stronger when earned. The whisper vanishes before I can reply.
Inside, Madam Kang's boots already drum across the tiled kitchen. "Clock starts now, Seoul," she barks. I bow, slide the gloves on, and step into the dish-pit's wet heat.
Bowls tower beside the sinks, gleaming with yolk slick and pork-fat glaze. Steam fogs my glasses; lye stings the cuticle crescents that used to polish banker pens. I scrape, dunk, rinse—two-second cadence, three if the pan fought a fire. Soap suds pop like ticker tape in my ears. Madam Kang prowls the pass-window, abacus mind counting every plate I don't break. "Faster," she snaps. The radio coughs trot music through a tin speaker; its beat merges with my pulse until both become the metronome of humiliation and relief.
Min-ji floats through the swing door carrying more casualties—skillets scarred black. "Having fun yet, unni?" she sings, smug as a cat stretching. I flash a smile brittle as dish glass.
Grease finds the floor before my heel does. A tray skids, and hot oil flicks over the sink lip onto my wrist—white skin blooms red, hissing. I bite the inside of my cheek; copper floods my mouth. Min-ji pauses just long enough to toss a damp cloth. Her half-smirk softens—fractionally—before she pivots back to the dining room. I press cloth to burn, swallow the urge to cry, and count stock losses disguised as blisters: ten minor, three major, one pride.
Orders ricochet—kimchi jjigae, dubu-bokkeum, two bibimbap extra gochujang—and for the first time the stacks thin instead of swell. My arms move on instinct: scrape-soak-rinse, left hand flipping bowls while right hand wields the spray like a conductor's baton. Water turns opaque with pork fat, but pans reach the pass in rhythm with the printer's spit. Madam Kang grunts approval; that single grunt is richer than any bonus confession.
Grease no longer smells like failure. It smells like currency I am finally earning.
Stove fires gutter to simmer. The bleach bottle sits uncapped; fumes coil into my nostrils and twist, alchemising into phantom vodka—sharp, beautiful, lethal. My hands tremble around a ladle; sweat beads cold on the back of my neck. Three taps—index, middle, ring—against my thigh, the agreed-upon flare. Cold water, little crane, Ha-eun murmurs—second and last intervention. I thrust both wrists beneath the faucet. Silver needles bite; the world narrows to chill and roar until the hallucination dissolves, bleach becoming bleach again. Four counts in, four counts out. My knees hold. Ha-eun falls silent.
We circle the dented aluminum table like weary planets. Madam Kang ladles dubu-kimchi stew into metal bowls; the aroma—fermented, garlicky, alive—wraps my empty stomach in velvet. I raise the spoon with blistered fingers and taste. Chili heat blooms, tofu silks across my tongue, and for a heartbeat shame melts into something warmer. The food I enabled now feeds me. I swallow, grateful and starving for more than calories.
Min-ji watches from over her barley tea, eyebrow arched as though recalibrating a theory. Our gazes lock; this time neither of us looks away first.
Shift over—three more hours until dinner prep. Rain has rinsed the morning grit from the alley, leaving a cool wind that smells of river and possibility. Madam Kang appears beside the bins, expression unreadable. She presses a small mint-scented analgesic patch into my palm. "For the burn," she mutters, then adds, almost grudging, "Back at five, Seoul. Don't be late."
The patch's menthol bite seeps through its wrapper, bright against fried-oil musk. I bow—lower than necessary—and pocket the square like treasure. As I straighten, Ha-eun sighs approval inside my chest, wordless but luminous.
I flex my raw, trembling hands. They hurt; they are mine; they can work. Pride arrives—not the brittle glass kind, but forged, hammered, and cooled in dish-pit steam. I step onto the street, patch mint rising above grease, and the afternoon breeze lifts a smile—small, honest, and just for me.
The café door swings shut behind; somewhere beyond it waits Min-ji's side-eye and gossip I have yet to earn. For now, I walk toward the market pharmacy for ointment and maybe a moment under an awning where no one mistakes me for anything but a woman who survived another shift.
Three hours until the next round of plates. Plenty of time to let the skin mend stronger—earned.
Chapter 44: Min-ji's Side-Eye
The café's afternoon lull feels like a held breath after the frenzy of lunch: burners turned low, exhaust hoods purring, a single fly cracking against the blue zap-lamp above the sink. At the service table tucked behind the kitchen, I ease blistered hands into a metal basin filled with warm salt water and sliced ginger. The sting bites first, then blooms into relief that broom-sweeps the ache from knuckle to wrist.
Min-ji drops onto the opposite stool, flour-dusted apron still looped at her skinny waist. A twin-cup of iced coffee sweats in her fist; she slides one straw my way. "Hygiene test," she says, watching whether I'll sip after her.
I weigh the invitation—a tiny ceremony of tribe or exile—then lift the straw, the plastic chilled against my lip. Caramel rushes over my tongue, bitter with chicory. Min-ji's dimple appears, small and satisfied.
"Good," she says. "You're not squeamish."
"Only about spreadsheets," I answer, too quickly. The lie hangs between us like steam that won't rise.
We stand hip-to-hip at the scarred birch counter, trimming mountains of napa into tidy squares. Cabbage sap slicks our palms; radio trot chatters from a speaker clipped to the shelf.
"So," Min-ji begins, chopping rhythm steady, "Seoul unni knows her way around a knife. Culinary school?"
"Not exactly." I slice instead of answering.
"Hmm." She eyes the callouses at the base of my fingers—half-healed ridges no dish-pit could raise in two days. "Office worker hands don't look like that."
Her gaze drifts to the mint patch cooling my shoulder, then lower to the strip of skin peeking beneath its edge—a sliver of ink, sharp lines forming the top of a tarot tower. Recognition flares behind her lashes.
"Nice tattoo." Casual tone, not fooling either of us.
I shrug, let the sleeve fall. "Bad habit from college."
"College where? Finance major?"
Before I find a safe lie, a stock-floor memory blindsides me: boards flashing red, boss Han's voice slicing through open-plan air like a paper cut—Clean it up, Seo-yeon, or you're finished. My knife stalls above the cutting board.
Min-ji notices the pause but says nothing. She simply sweeps the cabbage into a steel tub, leaving me space to breathe.
Min-ji
She has the same jawline as that blurry tabloid photo last winter—the "fallen banker" story everyone doom-scrolled for a week. Back then the woman's eyes were masked by pixel blocks, but the wrist tattoo was mentioned in every caption. Tower card ink—irony much? I didn't expect her to land in our mountain-valley nowhere, dunking plates instead of martinis.
Now she's right here, hands shaking above a vegetable like it might indict her. And for a moment I'm less curious than worried—her knuckles bleach-white, shoulders drawn so tight they might snap.
Madam calls for sesame oil. Min-ji volunteers, but I'm already crossing the threshold, eager for the dim cool. Shelves breathe darkness and star-anise. I climb the rung ladder, reach for the heavy glass bottle. My sleeve rides up—exposing the Tower tattoo in full and, lower, a pale scar that ladders across my inner arm like a lightning strike.
Glass clinks against wood. The faint chemical bite of bleach wafts from an open drum below—too close to my nose. Bleach bends into hotel-mini-bar vodka, the smell so vivid my knees unlock. Shelving swims; bottle slips.
Breathe through the hinge, Ha-eun whispers—voice silver, steady. I suck air past copper-stitched teeth, focusing on the metal hinge of the storeroom door gleaming in a streak of afternoon sun. Vision narrows to that dot of light; world steadies.
Fingers reclaim the bottle a hairsbreadth before it shatters. Warm hands close over mine—Min-ji at ladder's foot, eyes round. "Woah, got it?"
For once I don't fake a grin. "Almost redecorated the soy sauce." My voice shakes.
She eases the bottle from my grip, sets it on the floor, then rummages in her apron pocket. "Gran swears by this." Out comes a strip of gauze soaked in chili tincture—homemade blister plaster. The peppers' crimson oil stains her glove as she presses the strip into my open palm. "Stings first, heals fast."
The kindness lodges in my throat, unfamiliar as mercy. "Thank you."
"City ghosts follow long," she says quietly, retrieving the sesame oil. "But here, the mountains echo louder."
I do not know the correct reply, so I nod and pocket the plaster like a gift voucher for grace.
Afternoon light slants gold across empty tables. Together we flip chairs, wipe soy-ring halos from laminate, and polish stainless cutlery until we can see our twin reflections—one smear of sweat on my brow, one flour stencil on hers.
Min-ji teaches me local slang as we work: nagari means sold-out, sibyeol for a customer who haggles too hard. I parrot the dialect, rounding vowels wide. She snorts, amusement genuine, and corrects my tongue-shape with a tap to my chin. The sound of our laughter startles a sparrow on the sill; it flutters out into the alley, wings scattering dust motes like glitter.
Sun sinks behind the fishmonger's roof, leaving the narrow lane half-blue, half-amber. Min-ji flicks a lighter, shields the flame with her palm, and draws on a cigarette. Smoke coils around her head like a lazy dragon. She offers the pack.
I shake my head; even the sight of the smoldering cylinder reminds me of late-night high-rise balconies where I chased vodka fumes with menthol haze. The heat of the lighter flashes across my face—confession enough.
She exhales toward the gutter. "Your secret stays in the dish-pit," she says, eyes on the smoke dissolving into twilight. "We've all got one."
A nod is all I manage, but relief loosens something near my lungs. Somewhere inside, Ha-eun's approval warms like a low cello note.
Cloth-bound timecards stand in rigid rows beside the kitchen door. Madam Kang watches from the pass, wiping her hands on a towel, eyebrow arched at the shared grin we forget to hide. She says nothing—just gestures at the clock.
I slide my card under the stamp; the machine thuds 16:45. Under the date someone has scrawled DAY-1. Hours survived: 10. The ink looks darker than the bruise on my wrist.
Min-ji's card slams a heartbeat after mine. "Dinner rush, Seoul," she warns, but her mouth curves upward.
"Bring it," I answer, and this time my hands are almost steady.
Madam barks orders for banchan refills. The radio clicks to a faster trot song. Chairs scrape as early diners shuffle in. I tuck the chili plaster inside my apron pocket to use after service, roll my shoulders, and step back into the heat—ready for whatever the evening flings.
Above the clock, tomorrow's date waits blank, but now I believe I might reach it.
Chapter 45: Pay-Day Envelope
The café exhales the day like a tired horse.
Lights above the dining room hum at half-power, splashing dull amber across overturned chairs and tabletops streaked with drying suds. I guide the mop in lazy figure-eights, brine seeping into every blister on my palms. Each drag of the handle vibrates all the way to my shoulder where Madam Kang's mint patch cools the burn left by a rogue frying pan. Grease still perfumes the air—pork-belly sweet mingled with disinfectant citrus—yet beneath the fatigue a shy bloom of pride unfurls: I survived my first full shift on payroll.
From the pass window, Min-ji whistles a trot melody while balancing the day's final tray of ramekins. Her ponytail is a damp rope down her spine; flour freckles her cheek like pale confetti. Beyond her, Madam sits at the cashier table, glasses low on her nose, an ancient bone abacus clicking beneath her knuckles while a silent calculator blinks green in the lamplight—carbon and silicon keeping dual watch over the numbers.
The mop bucket sloshes a last, satisfying circle. I set the handle against the wall, flex aching fingers, and wobble toward the cashier where receipts pile like ivory dominoes.
"Sit," Madam says without looking up. One word, leveled as a gavel. I obey, sliding onto a low stool. My thighs tremble in quiet rebellion; even gravity feels heavier than it did this morning.
Min-ji drops beside me with two chipped bowls of staff ramen, steam curling around her grin. "Dinner of champions." She nudges my elbow. "But first—reckoning."
Madam finishes a final column, flicks the abacus once—clack, clack, silence—then opens the cash drawer. Notes shuffle like soft wings. An unmarked brown envelope appears, edges sharp, sealed with one neat strip of tape. She scribbles across the front in block Hangul: Day 1 + advance. When she slides it across the lacquered wood, the paper rasps louder than any praise.
My breath catches. Day-wage on the very night I nearly collapsed in the dish-pit? Guilt rises hot, threatening to boil any gratitude into self-disgust.
"Madam, I—bank transfer is fine next week."
Her eyes, ink-dark, lift to mine. "Rent is not next week." A statement, not a rebuke. She pushes the envelope another centimeter, decisive. "Take what you earned. Ice boxes don't keep pride warm."
Min-ji snorts. "Translation: stop being stubborn, Seoul unni."
I peel back the flap. Inside: ₩38 000 in crisp bills—and tucked between the notes, two medicated heat patches like pale moths folded for travel. The lump in my throat swells until words cannot pass. My vision films; the lacquered table ripples.
Earned breath earns balm,Ha-eun whispers, voice a silver thread through cotton wool. Accept what is yours.
"Yes," I manage, voice salt-rough. "Thank you, Madam." I bow from the stool, forehead nearly grazing the tabletop.
She clears her throat, embarrassment masquerading as impatience. "Be early tomorrow. Market prep starts before drums."
"Four-thirty," Min-ji adds, waggling her brows. "Hope you like cabbage at dawn."
I tuck the envelope inside my apron pocket, paper cool against sweat-damp cloth, then lift the ramen. Steam fogs my glasses; the first sip of broth is pure garlic lightning, jolting me awake long enough to wash dishes, stack pans, and snap off the gas. By the time we kill the final light at 21:40 the sky beyond the windows has iced over with stars.
Madam locks the front door, then flicks the porch bulb twice—blink, blink—a mute semaphore I'm learning means on time tomorrow. She turns down the alley toward her shingled house without another word. Min-ji mock-salutes after her, then bumps my shoulder.
"Walk you home, Seoul unni?"
"I'm good." I stretch stiff arms. "Your dad's bike needs you more than my ego."
She laughs, digs a cigarette from her apron, and steps into the shadowed lane where the lighter's flare sketches her face amber. "Remember," she calls around the smoke, "budget first, panic later."
Alone beneath the porch light, I press the envelope flat against my sternum, feeling its heartbeat answer mine.
Night air is raw, scented with chimney briquettes and frozen river. My boarding-house sits five blocks uphill, a brick rectangle older than my shame. Halfway there, beneath a flickering streetlamp, I stop to count the notes like a gambler checking luck.
₩38 000.
Mental columns spring up, crisp and orderly:
Lodging top-up: ₩20 000
Kimchi-poultice refill for the burn: ₩10 000
Savings jar (repurposed soy-sauce bottle under my cot): ₩8 000
Total allocated. Balance zero. Yet instead of dread, satisfaction settles in my bones—black ink devouring red. Numbers have always been my comfort; tonight they serve survival, not obsession.
Snow-flurries shimmy from a cloudless sky. I tip my face upward, let one melt on my lip, tasting tin and possibility.
My room—a sloped attic smelling of pine resin and mildew—greets me with its usual chill. I set the envelope on the crate that doubles as bedside table, glue the two heat patches over shoulder and spine, then lower onto the quilt with a hiss of muscles uncoiling.
Phone battery clings to 9 %. I open a blank note titled Ledger and type, thumbs slow but steady:
Day 1
Wage +₩38 000
Lodging -₩20 000
Burn care -₩10 000
Savings +₩8 000
Net +₩8 000. Proof of living.
The mint patch radiates warmth through fabric; the extra heat—a kindness I did not dare budget for—seeps deeper than camphor, loosening every knot the mop handle left behind.
I draw the envelope stub under the quilt, tuck it safe beneath the pillow like a talisman, and lie back. Floorboards creak as the boarding-house settles, a lullaby of expanding wood. Somewhere in the alley a cat yowls, answered by the distant chuckle of a convenience-store door chime. My eyelids drift.
You earned this rest,Ha-eun murmurs, then fades, leaving the hush entirely human.
The last thing I see is the digital alarm set for 04:00, glowing soft green. Four and a half hours until the dawn drumbeat, until crates of cabbage and another ledger page. For now, the math is balanced, the pain tempered, and the envelope's rustle still whispers against my ear:
On time tomorrow.