Chapter 44

                                    

                                          
When the two of us arrived at the station near home, his phone suddenly rang. He fished it out from the pocket of his coat, took a glimpse at who it was, then tucked it back in. I reached into his pocket and took the phone out, pressed the button to answer the call, then held it up against his ear.
                          
He looked down to glare at me, then reluctantly answered, “Mum.”
                          
Silence dwelt on us for more than five minutes. In the noisy subway, I could barely hear the words which sounded like ‘die’, ‘leave’ and other short words that were rich in colour. It may have been because I did a lot of homework regarding sentence construction when I was in grade school, and basing it on the way his mum usually behaves, I’ve constructed some sentences from the phrases I’ve just heard: “You have to make that damn woman leave! Either I die or she leaves! I’ll just die if she won’t leave………alright then.” When I was a kid, the teacher would often mark me with an X as my sentence construction was different from that of other kids.
                          
In the end, I heard Jungkook say, “I won’t listen to you, so be it, I’m busy right now.”
                          
I just want to make a side comment, if I would talk to my mom like that, she would probably shove me back inside her womb, drown me in amniotic fluid, then strangle me using an umbilical cord.
                          
Jungkook seems furious, after he hung up the call, and shoved the phone inside my coat pocket, he never uttered a single word again.
                          
I touched the phone that was inside my pocket and apprehension blossomed in my heart: Should I remind him that this is his phone? Will he fly into a rage out of humiliation and say he doesn’t need a phone? Then it would be convenient to me who has the intention of wanting to change my phone.
                          
As we were idling in the station, I kept on pushing Jungkook to finally say something. He took my hand and followed the surge of the crowd who were alighting. We were almost overwhelmed by the crowd at one time so Jungkook simply pulled me, and caged me inside his arms as we walked forward. When we finally escaped with great difficulty from the subway, Jungkook released me, heaving a sigh, “It’s difficult without a car.”
                          
I teased him, “Young Master, how long has it been since you’ve taken the subway? I’ve never seen you complain back when we were in university.”
                          
He replied indifferently, “If I wasn’t around during university, who knows how many times you’ll find yourself crying in the bus and subway.”
                          
I couldn’t help but pull on his sleeves, my fingers tightly clutching unto it.
                          
We were from a small town and came to the city to study in a university. In our town, when you amble down the street, there would be simple-minded and honest uncles who are all smiles, riding their motorcycles that are attached with some sort of cart, asking you, “Child, where are you going?” Hence, when I went to university and saw the cobweb-like bus and subway system, I just felt stupid. So no matter where I go, I’d just follow Jungkook around. He was responsible for taking me back and forth in those complex bus and subway routes. I never had to think about which line I should take to get there, or worry about taking one that was going to a wrong direction.
                          
When I was just starting my work after graduating, one day he especially took me on a lot of bus and subway rides — from the hospital he was interning to the place where I live, from my place to my company, and again from my company to where he was interning. He even made a mnemonic chant for me to learn by heart, ‘hospital to company, cross the street 304, home to company, cross the street 507, home to hospital, cross the street 216’, he told me I also have to remember, if the places in the mnemonics are the same but are written reversed in the bus, then I don’t have to cross the road. I said, I got it, I’m not that stupid. Even though I claimed to have already known, but I would occasionally still take the wrong one. When that happens, I’d just casually look for a bus stop to get off, then make a telephone call to Jungkook, a call that was like me spitting on his face if he were around, demanding him to bring me back.