Closed Door

Everything irritated and caused discontent. A fighting energy was bubbling inside me, ready to respond with ten words for every one said.

I didn’t understand before why people walked around with frowning faces and instantly got irritated and angry, but it seems this was that very feeling. I wonder how funny I looked, just smiling and saying “what’s good is good” in front of them.

It feels like I’ve encountered an aspect of human nature I didn’t know before.

Grandmother, even after death, probably wouldn’t have agreed, but I started to think that thirty years of business conducted with a semi-charitable mindset was just a waste of time. For them, grandmother was probably just a naive old lady who was convenient to use.

The store during lunch, as usual, was full at every table.

Although a week had passed since the funeral, nothing had changed except for grandmother’s absence. There were still many visitors, and although they threw meaningless words of comfort while waiting for their seolleongtang, after eating they left as if their business was finished.

I used to cry a lot before.

I cried every time visitors said: “Is it hard for you?”, “Do you miss your grandmother?”, “Hang in there.” It seemed that every word they spoke was close to me and reminded me of my grandmother. I thought these were words of understanding and sympathy for my sorrow.

Now I knew,

That these were just empty words of comfort. It’s an act of generosity that costs nothing because the words spoken by these mouths were worth nothing. There was no understanding or sympathy anywhere.

If the restaurant continued to operate and the price of seolleongtang didn’t change, they didn’t care who died.

“Excuse me!”

“Yes?”

I woke up from the call, sitting on a chair.

The menu only had seolleongtang, radish kimchi, and water, it was self-service. Except for the moment of entering the restaurant, ordering, and paying, there’s no reason to call a waiter, so I approached with puzzlement.

“Um…”

“Yes. Do you need anything else?”

The unfamiliar face looked about thirty years old.

Large build, dressed in a leather jacket, quite a free style. Judging by the abundance of accessories – rings, necklaces, earrings – he looked like a hunter passing by.

Is he here for the first time? Or had he been here in the past, before I returned in time? With a difference of ten years, it’s hard to remember if it’s not a regular customer.

Probably yes, this is a new visitor.

If I had seen his face before, I couldn’t have not remembered it. Even if I had met him just once ten years ago, it would have been clearly imprinted in my memory. It was a face that’s not easy to forget, whether you want to or not, so I was sure I was seeing it for the first time.

You can’t help but exclaim: “Wow, whose son is this handsome!” Thoughts come to mind like “His parents must be pleased just looking at their son’s face” or “If I had saved the country seven times in my past life, would I have been born with such a face too?”

“Do you want another portion?”

I asked, seeing the empty bowl of seolleongtang, and wondered if he also didn’t know that kimchi could be taken for free.

“No, it’s not that…”

The man hesitated for a moment, scratching near his mouth with his index finger, then continued with difficulty.

“Cho Roy.”

“…”

Why did he call me by name? I was surprised at first, wondering how he knew my name, since this was our first meeting. But then I thought, if he listened carefully, he could easily find it out, as regular customers always addressed me by name as soon as they stepped into the restaurant.

“I’m Sa Gongwoo… Don’t you remember? About fourteen years ago… I came here and your grandmother treated me…”

I stared blankly at the face of the man who was asking with an awkward expression, slightly wrinkling his nose.

“Why do scammers always have similar schemes?”

The head of the man who called himself Sa Gongwoo tilted in confusion at my words, spoken with regret.

“Scammers deceive to survive somehow too. But shouldn’t they try and develop? Or at least be more diligent.”

They say the early bird catches the worm. Apparently, in fraud too, you need to act quickly to succeed.

Look at Lee Dongjae. If I hadn’t lived a whole life, hadn’t returned to the past, he would have succeeded in one fell swoop, cleaned me out, and run away. And this guy appeared a week later than that man, and even his method of work wasn’t original.

“Listen, Mr. Sa Gongwoo. A week ago, someone from the same field already came. The scam with past connections won’t work anymore – it’s already been used, so no, it won’t work. If you want to rob someone, come up with something else.”

I clicked my tongue, looking at Sa Gongwoo, who couldn’t find what to answer me, just opening and closing his mouth.

He had a decent face and wasn’t lacking in figure, but he didn’t try at all, and his fraud methods were no different from others. He looked better than Lee Dongjae, but something else was important here – in the ability to persuade, he was completely weak. Judging by that indecision in his voice, he seemed to lack audacity too.

Fraud isn’t done with the face, but with the tongue. Add to that audacity and confidence. In this regard, Sa Gongwoo was far inferior to Lee Dongjae.

With current abilities, he probably couldn’t even feed himself.

All these accessories were probably just a disguise to look like a hunter. A real hunter, instead of trying to pull off a dubious fraud here, would go and clear another gate.

I don’t know if this place has become popular among scammers, or if word has spread that it’s easy to find suckers here, but meeting a new scammer after Lee Dongjae only caused me greater disgust with the world.

“No, I’m not a scammer…”

“Yes, yes. In the past, fourteen years ago, as you claim, or at any other time, maybe you really did get food from grandmother. Even in this area, there are plenty of people who ate for free from grandmother, so why wouldn’t you have had such an opportunity?”

“No, I understand your suspicions, but I really…”

“But you know what, Mr. Sa Gongwoo. I don’t know people like you. I’m not interested in whether you have a connection with grandmother or not. If you really want to repay grandmother’s kindness, leave a donation and go. I don’t want to think of you as a close older brother and I’m not going to accept your help, so don’t stick to me. And if you’re done eating, make sure to pay before leaving.”

I don’t believe in religion. I don’t believe in Tao. I don’t perform memorial rites. I don’t buy jade mats. And I already have a water filter.

(tl/n: It’s essentially saying, “Don’t try to sell me anything – I’ve heard it all before!”. “Leave me alone”)

When I blocked all possible approaches in advance, Sa Gongwoo laughed in confusion.

Maybe he should do something more productive with such a face? No matter how you look at it, he doesn’t seem to have a talent for fraud. Being beautiful is fine, of course, but if you ask whether it would help in fraud, I would say no. It’s too memorable. Unless the appearance is so ugly as to cause disgust, for fraud it’s better to have an ordinary face that evokes a sense of closeness – that’s my opinion, which has become almost expert after being cleaned out to the bone.

I was thinking about whether to treat this bastard to a bowl on the head too or report him, but decided to just ignore it, as he hadn’t done anything to deceive me yet, but only started a conversation.

My life was miserable, but this man’s life was pitiful too. Although, only the victims who fall for his deception will become pitiful. Rather than pitiful, they’re worthy of pity. How much does he have nothing to do to try to deceive a guy who’s not even twenty yet?

Noticing my judgmental gaze, the man quietly paid and left the store with an awkward smile.

∞ ∞ ∞

“Is it time to close already?”

“Yes, as soon as that visitor leaves.”

I answered, looking askance at the last customer who was leisurely eating seolleongtang, and a regular visitor handed me money with a laugh.

“Here, you worked well today too. Thanks for the food.”

The regular customer patted me on the shoulder, said goodbye, and left, leaving only one visitor at the table in the store. I moved the empty bowls onto a tray and threw them into the sink for washing dishes, after which I started vigorously wiping the tables with a cloth, but at some point irritation took over, and I vented it outward.

“Excuse me.”

The man, the cause of my irritation, raised his head and looked at me. His face was innocent, blinking his eyes and as if asking why I was calling him.

“Not ‘excuse me’, but Sa Gongwoo.”

“Sa Gongwoo or So Gongwoo, I don’t care. You haven’t given up yet? What, have you come up with some fresh way to fool me in this time?”

I was already irritated that he came right before closing, but it was even more irritating that this last visitor turned out to be that novice scammer who came this afternoon.

Maybe he felt offended to give up and leave with nothing? Do I look like such an easy prey that even a novice scammer couldn’t easily let go of his intentions?

“I’m really not a scammer.”

“Ah, so you really came just to eat seolleongtang? You’re just a customer without ulterior motives?”

I approached and plopped down on the chair opposite the man.

Even looking at him again, he was still as handsome. Some might say he would definitely survive with such a face, just using his appearance. Maybe he should go into hosting instead of fraud?

“I’m sorry, but I know what you’re thinking.”

“It doesn’t seem like it.”

“I don’t want to believe that the seolleongtang was so delicious that you came to eat it for both lunch and dinner. And the fact that you came right before closing, when there are no other visitors left, and that you’re eating slowly and just stalling for time, doesn’t it mean that you’re waiting for me to be alone, right?

“The seolleongtang is delicious.”

“Okay, enough. I understand why you’re looking for an opportunity to talk alone. Did you want to reduce the psychological distance in conversation? Since I don’t believe the story about past connections, you decided to just come first, eat, joke around, and when we become friends – stab me in the back?”

Unfortunately, this was also a method used by Lee Dongjae first. I don’t know if he attended some fraud courses, but his repertoire is still obvious, banal, and low-grade.

“You seem to be a novice, so I’ll tell you in advance not to waste your time. I don’t trust people. No matter how close we become, I will never deal with you with money, and I have no desire to give even a thousand won to someone for free. The only thing you can get here for free is seolleongtang, so go and find another easy target or change your profession. In my opinion, you have no talent for fraud at all.”

Hearing my words, Sa Gongwoo put down the spoon he was holding.

“Alright. I’ll give up on the story from the past. Choron has become much smarter.”

“…”