CHAPTER 52
Chung-Hee caught Noeul before he hit the floor. For several seconds, he simply held him, staring at the blood beginning to darken his hair.
“Noeul?”
No response. The broken bottle slipped from Chung-Hee’s hand.
“Noeul.”
Noeul’s eyelids fluttered. His eyes opened slowly, unfocused at first, before his gaze settled somewhere beyond Chung-Hee. He was conscious, but dazed and frighteningly passive.
Chung-Hee carried him to the bedroom. Noeul remained awake but did not speak or resist. When Chung-Hee cleaned the wound, he flinched once, then became still again.
Chung-Hee told himself the cut was superficial. He told himself Noeul was only in shock. He told himself he would call a doctor if anything changed.
Instead, he sat beside him. Noeul had wanted to leave. Chung-Hee closed his eyes. No. He couldn’t let that happen. He lay beside Noeul for a while, holding him against his chest as though closeness could somehow undo what had happened in the kitchen.
Then he reached for the handcuffs. By the time he left for work, Noeul’s wrists were secured to the bedposts. Chung-Hee told himself it was temporary. Just until Noeul calmed down. Just until they could talk. Just until he understood.
He hoped to return before Noeul became fully aware of what was happening.
He didn’t.
***
Morning light filtered through the curtains when Noeul opened his eyes. His head throbbed. He recognized Chung-Hee’s bedroom, but he could not remember being carried there.
Then he tried to lift his hand. Metal pulled against his wrist. Noeul froze. He tried the other. Another cuff. He pulled hard, once, twice, the metal biting into his skin.
“What—”
His voice barely worked.
He scanned the room. Large windows. Dark furniture. Chung-Hee’s bedroom. He knew where he was. What he couldn’t assemble was how he had gotten from the kitchen to the bed. He remembered the kitchen. Haneul’s note. Gong. Crying. Chung-Hee blocking the door.
Then…
Nothing.
The harder he searched, the further the memory seemed to retreat. His head hurt. His mouth was dry. His thoughts felt strangely slow, as if every one of them had to travel through water before reaching him.
Hours seemed to pass that way. Awake. Asleep. Pulling at the cuffs. Calling out once or twice before giving up. Trying to remember.
When Chung-Hee finally returned, Noeul couldn’t tell whether it was afternoon or evening. He watched him enter the room.
“Noeul.”
Noeul tried to sit up. “What happened?”
Chung-Hee stopped.
“I can’t remember.”
Something flickered across Chung-Hee’s face.
Noeul searched his own mind again. Fragments surfaced.
I can’t bear the thought of losing you.
You belong to me.
I need your promise that you’ll stay.
His breathing changed.
“No…”
Chung-Hee approached the bed. Noeul pulled against the cuffs.
“Don’t.”
Chung-Hee stopped. For a moment, uncertainty crossed his face. His hand hovered over Noeul, then withdrew.
He could still stop. He could unlock the cuffs. Call a doctor. Call Ji-Woo. Walk out of the room.
Instead, he stayed.
When he reached for Noeul again, Noeul’s body went rigid. He wanted to move. He couldn’t. The command existed clearly in his mind.
Move.
Nothing happened.
Push him away.
His arms remained heavy.
Say no.
His throat closed.
Fear seemed to have severed the connection between thought and movement.
So when Chung-Hee began removing his clothes, Noeul remained frighteningly still. His gaze fixed somewhere beyond him. The room seemed to recede. Sound dulled. Even Chung-Hee’s touch began to feel distant, as though it were happening to a body Noeul could see but no longer completely inhabit.
Inside, he was screaming.
Outside, almost nothing moved.
It wasn’t consent.
It wasn’t surrender.
Noeul’s body had found the only response available to it in that moment: stillness.
He stared at the ceiling until even that began to blur.
When Noeul became aware of the room again, he was alone. Hungry. Thirsty. Aching. His head still throbbed where Chung-Hee had struck him. He tried to remember how long he had been there.
Minutes? Hours? A day?
His thoughts wouldn’t hold together long enough to count.
“I can’t focus,” he whispered.
Even speaking exhausted him. His eyes closed.
A touch woke him sometime later. Noeul flinched.
Someone was standing beside the bed. For several seconds, the face wouldn’t resolve into meaning.
He knew it. He should know it.
But the name wouldn’t come.
“Who are you?”
The man stared at him.
Noeul frowned, struggling to concentrate. “I feel like I should know you.”
Then the effort became too much. He turned his face away.
Chung-Hee’s expression hardened. “I see through your act.”
Noeul didn’t respond.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know me.”
Still nothing.
Chung-Hee grabbed the bag containing the food he’d brought and threw it into the trash. “Fine. If you’re going to behave like this, you can stay here until you’re ready to talk to me.”
Across from the bed, a cracked mirror divided his reflection into pieces. Whenever his awareness returned to the room, Noeul found himself staring at it.
An eye. Part of his mouth. The edge of his face.
Never the whole thing at once.
Sometimes he thought of Gong. Sometimes he couldn’t think at all. The reflection refused to become one person.
Eventually, night swallowed the room again.
Pain woke him.
For one disorienting moment, Noeul didn’t understand what was happening. Then he saw Chung-Hee. Recognition came back all at once.
And this time, so did his voice.
“No!”
The scream tore through the room.
“Stop! I don’t want this!”
He kicked, twisted, pulled against the restraint until metal cut into his wrist.
“Please, stop! It hurts!”
Nothing about him was still now. He fought with everything his exhausted body could give him. The only thought he could hold onto was escape.
Chung-Hee tried to restrain him. Noeul fought harder.
Then came a blow. The room flashed white.
Still Noeul struggled.
Another.
His strength began to fail.
Chung-Hee kept telling himself the same thing. Noeul was confused. Noeul was frightened. Noeul didn’t understand what he really wanted.
If Chung-Hee could only keep him here long enough, he would understand. He would calm down. He would stay.
Every thought required Chung-Hee to ignore what Noeul had just screamed at him.
No.
Stop.
I don’t want this.
Eventually, the room became quiet again.
Chung-Hee woke before sunrise. For a moment, habit took over. Exercise. Shower. Coffee. Breakfast.
He prepared food for two.
When he returned to the bedroom, Noeul lay exactly where he had left him. Chung-Hee placed the tray on the nightstand.
Water. Coffee. Breakfast.
Small gestures from another life.
“Noeul.”
Noeul stirred.
“I brought you something to eat.”
No answer.
Chung-Hee unlocked one of the cuffs so Noeul could reach the tray. Noeul’s freed hand dropped heavily onto the mattress. He didn’t reach for anything.
Chung-Hee looked at the untouched water. Then at Noeul.
For the first time, something about the scene before him seemed to break through the story he had been telling himself.
But only for a moment.
Chung-Hee left the apartment telling himself that time would make things easier.
It didn’t.
When he returned that evening, the food remained untouched. So did the water. Noeul was still asleep. Chung-Hee stood beside the bed, staring at the tray.
“Noeul.”
No response.
“Why didn’t you eat?”
Noeul stirred faintly.
“You’ll make yourself sick like this.”
Still nothing.
Chung-Hee reached down and pulled him upright. Noeul’s head dropped forward before he slowly lifted it again. His eyes barely focused.
“What is this?” Chung-Hee demanded. “Is staying here really so unbearable that you’d rather starve yourself?”
Noeul stared through him. This emptiness gave him nothing to hold onto.
“Noeul.”
No response.
Chung-Hee touched his face. Noeul flinched. The reaction was small. Almost nothing.
Chung-Hee bent toward him, trying to force some response from him: anger, recognition, anything.
Noeul turned his face away.
“Look at me.”
Nothing.
“Please.”
Noeul’s eyes remained unfocused.
Chung-Hee caught Noeul’s chin and forced him to face him. A spark of resistance appeared. Noeul tried to pull away.
“There you are,” he whispered.
What followed blurred into fear, pain, struggle, and exhaustion. Noeul fought when he could. When he couldn’t, his mind retreated somewhere Chung-Hee could no longer reach.
By the time the room became quiet again, neither of them had anything left.
The third morning arrived beneath a pale, colorless sky. The night before, Chung-Hee had messaged his assistant and claimed illness, postponing every meeting.
He wasn’t going to leave Noeul alone again.
Chung-Hee woke first. For a few moments, with the room still dim and Noeul asleep beside him, he could almost pretend the scene was ordinary.
Almost.
Then he saw the cuffs. The bruising around Noeul’s wrists. The untouched glass of water on the nightstand.
The illusion cracked.
Chung-Hee looked away.
He went to the kitchen and prepared breakfast. Fruit. Rice. Eggs. Coffee.
When he returned, Noeul had not moved.
“Noeul.”
He set the tray down. “Wake up.”
Noeul’s eyelids opened slowly. For several seconds, there was nothing in his expression.
Chung-Hee felt something cold settle in his stomach.
“I made breakfast.”
Noeul’s gaze drifted toward the tray. The smell of coffee reached him. His stomach turned. The scent seemed familiar. Important somehow. But when he tried to connect it to anything, the thought dissolved.
“Let’s eat something,” Chung-Hee said.
Noeul looked away.
“Noeul.”
No response.
“You have to eat.”
Nothing.
Chung-Hee glanced at the untouched water from the previous day.
“Three days.”
Noeul blinked.
“You’ve barely eaten or drunk anything in three days.”
The words reached him slowly. Three days. He tried to understand what that meant. Pieces surfaced without order.
Darkness. A voice. Pain. The cracked mirror. Hands. Sleep. Coffee. Something about a kitchen.
Every time he tried to follow one memory, it disappeared. His free hand rested limply against the mattress.
Chung-Hee picked up the chopsticks. “Open your mouth.”
Noeul’s attention snapped toward them. The chopsticks moved closer. His body reacted before his mind understood why. He jerked his head away.
Chung-Hee stopped. “Noeul.”
Noeul pressed himself farther into the pillows.
“You need to eat.”
The chopsticks approached again.
“No.”
The word escaped him quietly.
Chung-Hee frowned. “What?”
Noeul stared at the food. His breathing quickened. He didn’t know why the chopsticks frightened him. He only knew they did.
“No.”
Something in Chung-Hee’s expression tightened.
“I’m trying to help you.”
The chopsticks touched Noeul’s lips. Noeul recoiled violently. His hand shot up and struck Chung-Hee’s arm. The chopsticks clattered onto the floor.
Both men froze.
Noeul stared at him. Fear moved through him faster than thought.
Chung-Hee reached toward him. Noeul shoved his hand away.
“Stop.”
“Noeul, calm down.”
“No!”
The scream surprised him as much as it surprised Chung-Hee.
His breathing broke into short, desperate gasps. He pushed himself backward, twisting against the restraint.
Chung-Hee grabbed his wrist. The contact sent panic crashing through him.
Noeul kicked. Twisted. Shoved. He didn’t know exactly what he was escaping from. He only knew he had to get away.
“Let me go!”
“Noeul.”
“DON’T TOUCH ME!”
Chung-Hee tried to hold him still. Noeul fought harder. His body knew this man was dangerous. That knowledge was enough.
Chung-Hee reached toward the tray again, still trying to make him eat. Noeul knocked his hand aside.
“Stop!”
He kicked wildly. His heel caught Chung-Hee’s hip. Chung-Hee lost his balance.
Noeul shoved him with everything he had left. Chung-Hee fell from the bed and hit the floor.
Silence.
Noeul pressed himself against the headboard, gasping. His eyes darted around the room. For a second, even the room looked unfamiliar again.
Where was he?
Why was his wrist tied?
Who…
His gaze landed on Chung-Hee.
Something inside him recoiled.
He knew that face. Or thought he did. The thought slipped away before he could catch it.
The breakfast tray had tipped sideways. Coffee seeped across the carpet. Fruit rolled beneath the bed. Chung-Hee sat on the floor, breathing hard.
Then a sound came from somewhere beyond the bedroom.
A phone.
Noeul turned toward it. It rang once. Stopped. Then started again.
He stared toward the door. The sound stirred something. Not a memory exactly. More like the sense that it mattered. That someone, somewhere, existed beyond this room.
He tried to follow the thought. It disappeared.
The phone kept ringing.
Chung-Hee got slowly to his feet. Noeul watched him, confused.
“Phone…”
His voice sounded distant even to himself.
Chung-Hee looked toward the hallway.
Noeul pulled weakly against the cuff.
“My…”
He frowned.
Was it his?
He thought so.
The certainty wouldn’t stay.
The phone rang again.
Noeul pressed a hand against his forehead.
“Who…”
He couldn’t finish the question.
Chung-Hee grabbed his keys. Noeul looked at him.
“Where…”
No answer.
Chung-Hee walked toward the door.
“Wait.”
Chung-Hee stopped.
Noeul stared at him, trying desperately to remember what he wanted to say. The thought wouldn’t come.
“Please…”
That was all he managed.
Chung-Hee stood there for a second. Then left. The bedroom door closed.
Noeul stared after him.
The phone continued ringing somewhere beyond the walls.
Again.
Again.
Again.
He listened because the sound seemed important.
Somewhere beyond the fog in his mind, the ringing told him one thing he could almost understand.
There was something outside this room.
He just couldn’t remember what.