Obsession

Chapter 6

Part 1

I’ve been feeling strangely unwell for the past few days, and then my period came earlier than expected. It’s the first day, so the amount isn’t heavy, but my body feels really saggy.

“Take a look around and let me know if you need anything else.”

A man sitting on the sofa took out a cigarette and put it in his mouth. Lee Jong woo said that this was the house that he bought for me. It was not an apartment, but a two-story house with a garden. The garden was quite large and there were even pine trees. Yoon Seon-oh’s parents’ house was also a two-story house, but it wasn’t this large and nice.

This place feels more like a gallery run by Yoon Seon-oh’s older sister than a house. It’s spacious and comfortable. And it’s completely untouched, giving off the feeling that no one has lived here since it was first built.

“Did you live here?”

“No. I want to live here. I waited a long time because I heard it’s hard to find a house like this. Do you like it?”

“Yeah it’s good.”

This house is one that cannot be fully described in words. You probably wouldn’t be able to buy a house like this unless you had a lot of money. Of course, Yoon Seon-oh wouldn’t have acted so meanly if he had a moderate amount of money. He’s a man who wouldn’t show such an attitude when you entrust him with a few hundred million won.

“Do you have a lot of money?”

“Is that the only thing you’re curious about? How many years have you been asking that question?”

“You never told me the truth. When I asked you something, all you said was your name, and nothing else.”

“I have a lot of money.”

“How much do you have?”

“I don’t know because I didn’t count.”

“Roughly.”

Heeyoung opened the large refrigerator. The refrigerator was so big that you wouldn’t even know it was a refrigerator until you opened it.

“Is it worth about a hundred billion?”

“Yes?”

Hee-young turned her head, doubting her ears after hearing those words. A hundred million?

“Don’t tease me.”

“I think it’ll be around that amount, but I don’t know for sure. I don’t really want to worry about that. I have so many businesses going on.”

“What kind of business are you in?”

“You don’t have to know.”

“You’re doing something bad.”

“So, you don’t like it? Even if you don’t like it, I won’t let you go. Don’t worry, I won’t do anything that will get me arrested by the police anymore. I used to do it back then. Back then, when I was basically living in hiding.”

“Ha… then my guess was correct, so that’s why you were hiding.”

“I wasn’t hiding, I was just trying to leave. I was sick of this place. Just like you back then.”

Hee-young became serious when she heard that he was trying to leave this annoying place.

“What’s so tedious about making so much money? You don’t know the struggles of being shabby, so that’s why you say things like that.”

“Do you know what it feels like to stab people in the stomach with a knife and cut their throats every day?”

“How would I know that?”

“After a while, I can’t tell if I’m stabbing a person or a dead piece of meat. If you just keep stabbing, you won’t think about anything and you’ll start to feel a little bit crazy. Don’t you know what it’s like to have someone slowly turn around without you knowing? That’s why some guys try to cover up that feeling of going crazy by taking drugs and end up going crazy. Stabbing people isn’t an easy thing to do.”

“Do you still do that?”

“I don’t do it myself these days. I have other kids do it for me.”

“Are you going to keep doing this? You said it was annoying.”

“So I washed my hands and tried to live well, but you pulled me back into it.”

“Me, what did I do?”

What does he mean? Is he saying that she ruined his plan or something?

“I really wanted to wash my hands of it and live a good life, but some bitch ran away, so I had to go back in there to catch her. You’re the one who ruined my life.”

The man pretended to throw it out there as a joke, but Hee-young knew that it wasn’t a joke.

“If it weren’t for me, then you would have washed your hands and lived well…”

“Yes, so if you’re sorry, then do better.”

“… … .”

Honestly, I’m not sorry. Running away with the money? After all, it was money earned through bad deeds.

But because of me, someone who was about to wash his hands clean ended up doing bad things again. Who told him to chase after me?

Those are all just excuses. So there’s nothing to be sorry about. Even if I run away again, I won’t feel sorry to this man. I still remember clearly what this man said to me.

[You have to do dirty things to survive.]

This man told me that I had to do dirty things to survive. If that was his advice, then I followed it. I did dirty things to survive, I ran away with the money to survive, and I will run away again to survive. So there is absolutely no reason to feel sorry.

“You said it. You want to live in a house where you don’t have to wear earplugs every night and where drunk people don’t try to open your door. There are no such people here, and there are no other houses around so it’s not noisy.”

“Yes?”

“If you live here, you don’t have to run into perverts in the alleys where the streetlights are broken, and the windows are large so the sunlight gets in and the rain doesn’t leak in. Is that good enough?”

Hee-young was quite embarrassed. This man still remembered what she had said before.

“Run away now. No matter where you go, you won’t be able to live better than you are staying here.”

“I, I won’t run away. There’s nowhere to run to, and even if I do, you’ll chase after me… … .”

“I know. Our country is so small, you know? Even if you run away from here, it’s just that you are in the palm of my hand.”

“I know.”

“If you’re done looking around the house, then come here and sit down.”

The man taps the side of the sofa as he shakes his cigarette ash into the ashtray. Hee-young knows what he means by coming next to him. He is a man who acts as if he can do that all day long without it being enough. Or maybe all he thinks about is sex.

“Not today.”

Heeyoung, while sitting on the sofa, became serious.

“Why?”

“I got my period.”

“So?”

“I’m on my period.”

“Then can’t I do it?”

“It’s better not to do it.”

“How long will this thing called menstruation last?”

“A week.”

“It’s so freaking scary.”

The man let out a sigh of regret, as if his appetite was being licked. Still, that was fortunate. It is true that she was worried that he would push through in her even though she said it was her period.

“Then suck it.”

“Yes?”

“If I can’t suck it, then you suck it. Do you know how to suck it? You’ve sucked it before.”

Hee-young hesitated for a moment at the word “Suck.” It had already been several years since she had sucked it.

“Why? Can’t you? Are you upset?”

“Oh, no. That’s not it.”

Hee-young got off the sofa and knelt in front of the man. He unbuckled his pants and unzipped them, and an erect penis popped out from inside the zipper. Hee-young swallowed and grabbed the flesh with both her hands. The weight felt heavy in her palms.

I opened my mouth wide and swallowed half of the growing mass in my palm, the smell of soap filled my mouth. He must have washed himself just now.

“Ugh, ugh.”

I’ve swallowed half of it, but the head is already touching my throat. I can’t swallow any more.

“Huh, uh, uh… … .”

Every time I suck on something in my mouth, my cheeks puff up and then sag. The thing I’m holding in my hand keeps wiggling, so my palm keeps slipping. When I look up slightly, I see the face of a man leaning against the sofa with a satisfied expression on his face. The shaggy hair that is revealed through the open zipper is dark.

“Ugh, huff, huff.”

Hee-young’s face turned bright red. She was out of breath and her jaw was sore. She held the man’s penis, which was not ej*culating easily, in her hand, and while sucking it, she inflated it and sucked it, and then hot air poured into her mouth.

“Kuckk……!”

Hee-young quickly spat out the man’s genitals and vomited what was in her mouth onto the clean marble floor. The white substance mixed with saliva flowed down to the floor.

“Are you okay?”

The man looks down at Heeyoung and smiles, while showing his teeth.

“But isn’t it a shame to end it like this?”

“Yes?”

“I can’t be enjoying alone, it feels like I have no conscience. You should enjoy too.”

“Ha, but right now I… … .”

Before Hee-young could say anything, the man grabbed her wrist and pulled her up. The man who laid Hee-young down on the long sofa pulled down her panties without warning. Hee-young, who spread her legs with one leg under the sofa and the other firmly attached to the back of the sofa, gasped for breath. Her skirt was lifted up to her waist.

“Ha! Oh, yeah!”

As the hand of the man who was overlapping her body stirred her v*gina, Hee-young’s waist arched. While poking the finger that was inserted into her open v*gina, the man ripped off the button of Hee-young’s blouse with his mouth. As the blouse opened with the button being ripped off, the man buried his face in her breasts and started sucking it.

“Yeah! Haa-eung! Ah, ah-huh!”

The hole was already starting to get wet. The man’s hand that was poking the hole was rubbing her cl*toris. My head was boiling with excitement.

“Yeah! Huh!”

She was going crazy. Heeyoung screamed, shaking her waist and hips as if she was already about to reach climax. The ecstasy boiling from her swollen cl*toris permeated her entire body.

“Ahhhh!”

Hee-young’s whole body trembled as an unbearable pleasure rose to the tip of her head. A stream of water gushed out from the hole where the man’s finger was stuck. The man who had been sucking her nipples slid down. Then he spread her v*gina with both hands and buried his face in it.

“Ahhh! Huh! Yeah!”

The man licked and chewed my cl*toris, which was soaking wet, while he swept his tongue up my hole.

“No more, no more… … no more… … ahhh!”

If he licked further more here, then I wouldn’t know what will happen. He might get even have a chance of tasting my period blood.

“Ahhh!”

The man lifted his face from Hee-young’s legs, who was groaning loudly. He licked the glistening fluid on his lips with his tongue, then climbed onto the sofa and sat down. Hee-young was still lying there, panting.

“It smelled like blood.”

Heeyoung’s face turned red at those words.

“But I also like the smell of blood.”

Hee-young quickly turned her head as she met eyes with the man who was smiling widely at her. Sometimes, this man would smile very affectionately, but it was so unfamiliar that she didn’t know what kind of expression to make in front of that smile.

Above all, Heeyoung had never smiled like that before. So she avoided that eye contact from him.

* * *

Yoon Seon-oh was surprised that there was not a single text message. Even after 10 days had passed since that incident, there had been no calls or text messages. It was as if the person had never existed in the first place.

He called Hee-young out of curiosity, but the call was disconnected as soon as the dial tone sounded. And when he called again, all he got was the voice message, “The phone is turned off… ….”

Hee-young moved into this house yesterday. It is a detached house with a large garden that makes you wonder if there is such a place in the middle of Seoul. Because the garden is large, there are no other houses nearby. At midnight, the surroundings were just quiet. There was no barking of dogs, the usual motorcycle noise, or the sound of car horns.

During the day, the housekeeper comes and sweeps and cleans the house for hours, and even does all the laundry. There is nothing for Hee-young to do in this house.

[Don’t do anything. If you’re bored, then for shopping.]

Lee Jong-woo gave Hee-young two cards. One was a cash card and the other was a credit card. He gave her the cash card so she could withdraw cash when she needed it and use the credit card when she went shopping. That would be the case, since Hee-young only had a few clothes in the house. However, she didn’t have anything to bring.

I came into this house last night and had sex until past midnight and fell asleep. When I woke up, it was past 11 AM.

“The chairman told me to make sure you eat.”

While eating the food prepared by the nice lady, Hee-young looked around the house. The last time she came, she had a quick look around, but she didn’t get to see everything properly.

‘I’m leaving soon, but I guess I can still take a look at the house.’

Hee-young doesn’t want to stay here for long. However, if she runs away rashly, she’ll be caught right away. So she plans to run away carefully.

She had to think about where to go, how to get there, and how to avoid the man’s pursuit.

Lee Jong-woo is good to me. There is probably no one who can be better to me than that man. However, the higher you go, the greater the shock you experience when you fall. I may be scared because I am a coward, but I can’t help but think that, that man won’t stay with me for long. So I’d rather abandon him than be abandoned by him.

‘What is this?’

In the corner of the living room, Heeyoung found something strange. It was a triangular piece.

‘Why would you bring something like this?’

At first glance, it looks like a pyramid or just a triangle.

‘Is it a decoration?’

Hee-young, who was just passing by with a glance, discovered a small phrase engraved on the bottom of the sculpture.

[With love and respect from everyone at Samgak Orphanage.]

‘Samgak Orphanage?’

It was only then that Hee-young realized that this triangular sculpture was not just a sculpture, but a kind of plaque of appreciation.

‘They give out plaques of appreciation at daycare centers? Are they sponsoring them or something?’

It doesn’t really suit him. That guy, Lee Jong-woo, and supporting a daycare center.

‘Come to think of it, I don’t know anything about that person. He doesn’t tell me anything, so how can I know?’

The guy keeps almost everything under wraps, either because he has a lot of secrets or because he doesn’t want to reveal anything. Maybe I’m the only one who doesn’t know.

‘Well. It doesn’t matter. If I run away anyway, I’ll never see him again… … .’

Heeyoung passed the place where the triangle was and went out into the garden. It was still the rainy season before July, so the air in the garden was warm. Still, the greenery was nice to look at.

‘It would be nice to live in a place like this… … .’

Hee-young closed her eyes as she sat on the chair in the garden. She thought that sitting in such a large garden and feeling the breeze was a life that only the rich could enjoy. She could not feel even a single breeze in the yard of the narrow inn where she lived.

Summer, with its rainy season, was the season she hated the most, and winter was even more horrible. However, in a garden like this, even the sound of rain during the rainy season would be pleasant, and even the snowy scenery in winter would be beautiful.

Suddenly, I felt sad.

Where did I go wrong? I am not being able to accept good things as they come to me, not being able to feel happiness, not being able to accept affection as affection? How twisted did I become like this? If I were someone else, I might have accepted the man’s affection without any resistance in this situation.

Is there anyone in the world who cannot accept kindness and affection because they are afraid of being abandoned later? Maybe it’s just me.

‘This is also a disease.’

The constant desire to run away, the constant doubts, the constant anxiety, these could all be an illnesses. If it is an illness, I want to cure it. I don’t want to live this hard.

‘The wind feels nice… … .’

Why does it feel so good when the wind is warm and humid? There was a ring on Hee-young’s finger, which was resting on her lower abdomen. It is the ring that the man gave her. It is an unimaginably expensive ring with diamonds.

Even now, Hee-young doesn’t know.

What on earth is that man’s heart towards me? What on earth is his true feelings?

Love? That can’t be right. Why would you love a woman who you met briefly in a place like that and ran off with your money?

Obsession? If it’s obsession, why is it the obsession? Or is it just like playing with a toy? It costs too much money for something like that.

There’s no way he’d buy a diamond ring like this for a toy he is playing with. Even if that man says [I love you], I’d never believe it. Because [love] doesn’t exist in Hee-young’s world.

She has never seen love. The only love Hee-young knows is the love between her father and mother, which she saw in her mother’s diary. She does not know any other love. And even more so, the love of such a bad man. There is no such thing.

Isn’t this just pleasure?

* * *

The opportunity came sooner than expected.

‘Why is there no one?’

Hee-young looked outside the window as the rain poured down. There is always someone in this house. Even when Lee Jong-woo is away, there is always someone in this house. That is because the man does not trust her, so he always leaves someone in this house to watch over her. But today, there was no one.

When he goes out, he is usually followed by another man, including a chauffeur, and when he is at home, there are two men outside the front door and one man standing guard outside the front door. If someone were to see her, it would seem like he is locking up a criminal. He always has five or six men with him.

Sometimes there are five or six people. Sometimes there are more than ten. Just by looking at that, you can almost tell that he is a gangster. He is a gangster, but I still don’t know what kind of work he does. He says [business], but who knows what kind of business it is?

‘Is there anyone outside the front door?’

Hee-young went out into the garden with an umbrella. There was really no one outside the front door. Hee-young walked through the garden in pouring rain to the front door and opened it. As expected, there was no one.

‘What’s going on?’

There has never been days like this before, so it could be because it rained so much.

‘Today is my chance.’

Hee-young quickly went back inside the house and took out the bag she had put in the closet. Inside the bag was some money and some clothes. A heavy bag would only be a burden. She put three or four changes of clothes and her wallet in a small bag that she could carry on her shoulder. This was something she had prepared in advance. She wanted to run away right away when the opportunity arose.

I took off my ring and put it on the dresser. I figured out where to run away to in advance. For now, I’m going to get out of here, go to a motel near the airport, sleep for a night, go to the airport early in the morning, buy a flight ticket to Jeju Island, and go to Jeju Island.

The reason for going to Jeju Island is simple. I don’t think the man will find me if I cross the ocean. I can’t go abroad. I don’t have a passport. So in my current situation, I’m going to Jeju Island, which is the furthest I can go. I’ve been saving up money in cash little by little. If I withdraw a large sum at once, I’ll be suspicious, but if I withdraw a few hundred thousand won over several days, I won’t be suspicious. That’s how I saved up a few hundred dollars.

If I go to Jeju Island, I might be able to find a job. But if I abandon my name as Han Ji-ae and Yoon Hee-young, I might have to use another alias there. This time, I really have to hide so that not a single hair of mine is visible. I shouldn’t meet anyone, I shouldn’t do anything noticeable, I just have to be quiet as if I’m dead. Then that man wouldn’t be able to find me. I have to become a ghost, just like a ghost.

Heeyoung, carrying a bag and an umbrella, hurried out of the house. After closing the front door, she ran straight down the alley and reached the main road, where she caught a passing taxi.

“Please go to the airport first. Gimpo Airport.”

Hee-young suppressed her pounding heart in the running taxi. She also left her cell phone behind.

‘This time, I will definitely… … .’

I know that he’ll be furious when he finds out. He might never forgive me for real this time. But I hope this makes me feel better. I really hope so.

‘I wish… you would just leave me alone… … .’

Hee-young closed her eyes and let herself be carried by the shaking taxi. The rain was getting heavier.

“There’s a lot of traffic.”

Hee-young opened her eyes at the taxi driver’s words. Just as the driver said, the road was blocked.

“It’s raining so hard… … It looks like the roads won’t be cleared easily. What’s your flight time?”

“I have a flight tomorrow. I’m going to sleep near the airport.”

“Then it’s not urgent. I’m drinking this because the car doesn’t seem to be moving.”

The driver handed Hee-young a bottle of drink.

“Thank you.”

Was it because she was nervous? Hee-young, who was already thirsty, opened the lid of the drink that the driver gave her and drank it in gulps. She felt a little better after drinking the cold drink.

“By the way, if you’re from Gimpo, are you going to Jeju Island?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Jeju Island. All alone?”

“Ah, yes… … .”

“Are you going on a trip?”

The drivers questions were burdensome.

“Yes, on a trip.”

“Why aren’t you going with your family?”

“I just want to go alone.”

“Well, there are times when I want to do that too. I also want to travel alone because I’ve been so tormented by my wife, but I can’t go alone.”

Taxi drivers talk a lot.

“Haam… … .”

Hee-young yawned deeply. She wasn’t pretending to be sleepy because she didn’t want to listen to him. She was strangely feeling sleepy. She hadn’t done anything hard today, and she had taken a nap in the afternoon. But why was her eyelids drooping and why was she so sleepy?

“Are you sleepy? If you’re sleepy, take a nap. I’ll wake you up when we get there.”

“Yes…….”

Heeyoung closed her eyes while leaning back on her seat. She couldn’t keep her eyes open.

‘Jeju Island… … What should I do if I go there… … .’

Even in the midst of sleep, worries crept in. Will I be able to find a job without my identity? Will restaurants and other jobs accept me without my ID?

‘I don’t know… … Let’s just take a deep breathe for now… … .’

Heeyoung let out a long sigh and leaned back comfortably. Her body was gradually becoming heavier.

* * *