Chapter 343

A large truck sounded its horn and quickly drove past the bus. She, who was leaning against the window, flinched and had a look at the truck that was distancing itself. The truck was carrying a lot of construction materials. The lump of metal that was tied to the body seemed very dangerous.

She

could hear the bus driver swear in a small voice. Why was the driver driving so dangerously?

She

frowned slightly.

She

felt displeased.

The bus arrived at the bus stop in front of her apartment.

She

glanced at the apartment in the distance before going into the nearby supermarket. One of the staff was shouting ‘closing sale’ on the mic.

She

picked up a basket and walked towards the meat corner.

“Give me six hundred grams of pork back leg.”

“What are you going to use it for?”

“Jjigae.”

While the meat was being cut,

she

took out the memo that her mom wrote in the morning. Pork back leg, two pieces of soft tofu, gr.a.p.eseed oil, and milk. After receiving the meat which was wrapped in a plastic bag,

she

made rounds throughout the supermarket. After putting the items mentioned in the memo in the basket,

she

went to the bread corner. After contemplating for a while,

she

picked up a box of strawberry roll cake.

After purchasing the items,

she

left the supermarket. The wind blew against

her

face, and it was quite warm.

She

remembered seeing the news last night that the tropical nights were starting.

She

didn’t like being hot.

She

walked towards the apartment complex. Thanks to the weather, there were a lot of ladies and children in the playground.

She

saw someone she knew and approached and greeted them. At that moment, one of the kids looked into

her

plastic bag and started nagging her after seeing the strawberry roll cake.

Sorry, but I can’t give that to you.

After thanking the lady for stopping her child,

she

immediately walked away and went to her apartment.

“I’m home,”

she

said to her mom who was sitting in the living room.

Her mom was wrestling with the laptop on a low-rise desk.

“Have you had dinner?”

Her mom looked away from the monitor and asked.

She

replied that she ate.

“How about you, mom?”

“I did as well. With some cheonggukjang.”

Now that

she

thought about it, there was a slight smell of cheonggukjang in the air.

She

went into her room and changed her clothes before coming out.

“What are you looking at?”

On her mom’s laptop was a photo of a scenery rather than the usual word processor. The photo was of a street with autumn leaves, and there was a little child wearing a yellow hat and overalls.

She

sat next to her mom and asked,

“Is this me?”

“Yeah. It’s from when you were four. You were really cute back then.”

“Sorry for not being cute right now.”

She

brought some chocolate snacks from the kitchen. When

she

gave a packet to her mom, her mom thanked

her

as she received it. The photo changed. This time, the photo was of

her

riding the swing.

She

looked at her mom’s expression. There was a longing smile on her face.

“It was quite chaotic back then. Do you still remember that you went around beating up all the boys in the neighborhood?”

“Me? No way.”

“You were the queen of the neighborhood. Why is a four-year-old so strong? Your mom’s daily work was to follow you around the whole day.”

“Looks like I was healthy.”

Crunch - the chocolate snack that entered

her

mouth broke down into pieces. Her mom also munched on the snack as she pressed the right arrow key to go to the next photo. The scenery changed along with the photo, but there was one thing that didn’t.

“There are no photos of you or dad?”

“There are almost none. Your dad really hated taking photos. He would cover his face with a jacket and run away the moment he heard photos being taken.”

“It was that bad?”

“Don’t even talk about it. Should I show you our wedding photo?”

“Yeah, I want to see.”

Her mom smiled and opened up another folder.

“But when did you have the time to transfer all the photos from the album?”

“It was when we just moved. I opened the album and saw that all the photos were discoloring. I thought that I should preserve them before it was too late, so I scanned them all.”

“Oh, so you did use the scanner.”

“We received it, so it’s a waste to throw it away.”

After opening up a folder titled ‘me’, her mom scrolled the mouse wheel a few times before opening a photo. It was taken from the right, and in the center was her mom wearing a white wedding dress, and on the left of her was her father with his face bright red. Just from the photo, it was obvious how fl.u.s.tered he was.

“This man, he was like that on the day of the wedding as well. Seriously, right? What’s so hard about getting a picture taken? Isn’t it supposed to be the other way round?”

“Dad is really red. He looks drunk.”

“My mom said something about him as well.”

“Grandma did?”

Her mom nodded and spoke.

“That Mr. Han is like a tomato. Your father became even redder after hearing that.”

Her mom chuckled.

Grandma. In her memories, her grandma was a kind person.

She

went down to her grandma’s house in Gwangju every summer during the school holidays when she was in elementary school. When

she

dozed off in the car, she would start smelling the smell of cow dung, and when the car door opened, her grandma always hugged her tightly. Her grandma always smelled of pleasant grass. The barley rice that she gave

her

every morning was good, and the watermelon she fed

her

after dipping it in some salt was also good. Every evening,

she

would eat some roasted sweet potatoes and play around with the dog that her grandma raised. That place was the greatest playground during the summer for

her

. Whenever the insects cried, her grandma always lit up some insect-repellent incense that looked like a snail, and even that smelled good.

She

liked everything about her grandma.

Once,

she

had the opportunity to live with her for a while. It was when

she

was in her first year of middle school, just