Chapter 10b

Mr Yoon rushed into the chemistry lab. Immediately, he saw the person he’d gone there to see.

Mr Bang.

Out of all the teachers in the school, Mr Bang was the one who could deal best with the unruly youth population of the school, so if he needed help dealing with a presently unmanageable Pak JinYoung, Mr Bang would be the most adept.

Mr Bang, or Bang YongGuk had had his moments of being a troublemaker when he was at school. But, alongside his occasional bad behaviour, he had managed to have the highest grade point average in his district. After acing university entrance exams, he could have studied anything and been anything he wanted: his future was completely open, but he’d opted, against his parents’ hopes and expectations, to become, of all things, a teacher.

Why? Because it hadn’t been truancy officers, his parents or police officers who had made the difference in Bang YongGuk’s life, successfully steering him from his original ambition of becoming a syndicate leader to staying on the straight-and-narrow. It had been a teacher.

Mr Mun was, in one, the coolest, sharpest and smartest person YongGuk had ever met. He was strong, confident and didn’t take any from any of the smartass students he encountered on a daily basis. And although YongGuk was the smartest of the smartasses at his school, Mr Mun was always one step ahead of him. It was as though he could read his mind. And every time he routed YongGuk in whatever delinquency he was planning, he didn’t shout at or even punish him. Because he’d usually caught him before he’d had the chance to put his plans into action, there was no need real need to punish him, since, in fact, he hadn’t had the chance to do anything wrong. But on those rare occasions, sometimes even off the school property, when YongGuk did the wrong thing and Mr Mun came to hear of it, he addressed it. Physically.

Mr Mun was a man of few words. And he used those few words to the greatest advantage.

And along with the well-chosen words, came the physical discipline.

A detention spent with Mr Mun was a harrowing detention indeed. By the time he was finished with them: push-ups, pull-ups, squats, sprinting, lifting, and every type of endurance or balance exercise he could think of, the delinquent students were wishing they had never done, or planned to do, whatever it was they did.

Until the next time.

Because that’s what delinquents did. They waited for adults who claimed to care about them to give up on them. They pushed and pushed until the wall of patience ruptured and broke.

But, Mr Mun’s had never broken. And in standing strong, he was able to build up the lives of those who needed him.

So, when Bang YongGuk, with all possibilities open to him, considered what he wanted to do with his future, he decided that he wanted to be like Mr Mun.

It wasn’t easy and he wasn’t nearly as capable as Eric Mun had been, but he was determined to learn and try and keep doing his best.

Now, teaching high school students, Bang tried to inspire them with the desire to do their best so that they would have the chance to live a life that every kid, in his opinion, deserved to live. You couldn’t pick your parents and you couldn’t pick your past, but you could pick your future. And Mr Bang wanted all his students to know that.

So, when Mr Yoon came to his room that morning as he was setting up for the experiments his class would be conducting, and told him about having seen JinYoung, Bang YongGuk was all ears. JinYoung was one of those kids who had a future. And he wasn’t about to let him throw it away. So, he wrote a note, taped it to the door, locked the lab and left with his colleague to find Pak JinYoung.

*                                *                                *                                *                                *

“Your Markie-pooh has been missing you, JinYoung,” TaekMyun sang as he shoved JinYoung into the dark room. It was a section of basement that contained building supplies for structural maintenance only, and as a result, it was little used.

A fact that TaekMyun was well aware of.

KyungChul grabbed JinYoung and held his hands behind his back. JinYoung surveyed the room quickly and found what he was looking for. Mark.

JinYoung looked directly into his eyes. He was being held and his mouth was being covered by one of TaekMyun’s cronies. His eyes were full of fear as their eyes met.

“Pak JinYoung,” TaekMyun began, “a broken nose, changing classes, my teachers treating me like . . . even my parents . .  you owe me. And Markie here is going pay your bill.“

“Let him go,” JinYoung shouted, with steel lacing his voice as he struggled against KyungChul’s grip.

TaekMyun walked up to Mark and laced his fingers through his hair. Then he yanked Mark’s head back.

“I’m sure he’ll take your beating like a man,” TaekMyun said.

“Don’t you dare touch him,” JinYoung threatened as he struggled once again against KyungChul.

But just as the words left his lips, TaekMyun signalled that Mark should be pushed to his knees. Once he was down, TaekMyun kicked him hard in the stomach.

Mark crumpled from the force of the blow, and all JinYoung heard was a sharp gasp as the breath was knocked out of Mark’s body. He could make no other sound.

Then, he heard Mark desperately trying to snatch a breath of air. With little success. He writhed on the ground as much as he could while still being held, gasping for air.

KyungChul held JinYoung fast, but even as he did, his mind began to work. He was, in fact, shocked that TaekMyun had kicked Mark. He thought that he would, like KyunChul had that day, only scare him. He thought the plan was for TaekMyun to take out his venom directly on the person of Pak JinYoung, since he had such a grudge against him. And he thought that Mark was being held there as bait for JinYoung and so that Mark would have no chance to alert anyone to what was happening.

But this situation . . . this was fast becoming too much for him.

KyungChul was the kind of bully who liked to intimidate. He enjoyed the feeling of watching other people squirm as his words took effect: much as he had on the day he first encountered Mark. And it was true that he’d been involved in his share of fights, but those were with people he considered to be, at least somewhat, in his league. And even those were actually an infrequent occurrence. He preferred to shove people out of the way to announce his presence, or take someone’s place in line, but out-and-out brutality on someone like Mark, that wasn’t his style. Mark was obviously not the tough-guy type, so kicking the likes of someone like him with no chance of defending himself, went against his personal bully code of ethics.

JinYoung had a murderous look in his eye when he looked at TaekMyun. But it made TaekMyun simply laugh.

“So, do you want me to leave your little friend alone, JinYoung?”

“If you touch him again . . . “ he growled.

“What do you mean? Like this?” TaekMyun asked before he lifted Mark’s head by his hair and punched him full in the face. Mark flew backwards and hit the back of his head hard against the stone wall before he slumped to the floor.

KyungChul began to feel sick. This wasn’t supposed to be the deal. JinYoung was supposed to be the target. Here he was holding his arms behind his back and TaekMyun wasn’t even interested.  And the horrible cracking sound of Mark’s head as he hit the wall . . .

KyungChul's desire for self-preservation kicked in. He had never heard a sound like that before. It just kept echoing in his head.

He wasn't going to be locked away for severe assault or worse, killing someone, just because TaekMyun was getting out of control. A black eye here, a fat lip there may be overlooked by authorities as schoolboy hijinks, but serious injuries, like the one he suspected might have happened to Mark, wouldn't. Someone had to put a stop to this.

Everything was going too far. So he did the best thing he thought he could do.

He let go of Pak JinYoung’s arms.

And then all hell broke loose.

JinYoung sprang at TaekMyun like a tiger. He tackled him to the floor and struck him in the face . . . hard.

As TaekMyun rolled on the floor holding his face, JinYoung ran towards Mark.

He wasn’t moving.

“Get help!” he shouted to the boys standing around motionlessly. “Get help for him . . . please,” he said in a faltering voice as he moved Mark into the recovery position.

Only KyungChul had the presence of mind to move.

He ran from the underground room, and fairly leapt up the stairs. He emerged from the stairwell, looking desperately for someone to help.

It was then that his eyes fell on Mr Bang and Mr Yoon.

“Please, come quick!” he shouted.

The teachers immediately ran behind KyungChul, Mr Bang reaching him first. In a matter of moments they had burst into the downstairs room. Mr Bang went immediately to Mark and JinYoung and did his best to assess the situation. Mark lay unconscious and after examining him cursorily,  he noticed something that made his blood run cold. Blood was flowing from the back of his head, matting his hair. JinYoung, seemed not to have noticed as he held his hand gently. In his distress, he appeared to be unaware of the others in the room, he begged Mark in desperately-breathed whispers, “Please, Mark . . . please baby . . . wake up . . . “

“Call an ambulance,” Mr Bang croaked out. But Mr Yoon was already dialling.

TaekMyun was still on the floor, but he and his clique, now aware of the presence of the teachers, thought to run. But before any of the boys could flee the room Mr Bang’s voice boomed out.

“Don’t any of you dare move.”

Based only on the strength of Mr Bang’s voice, they stayed put. It would have done them no use to run away in any case, for each of these boys was well-acquainted with Mr Bang, and he with them, and making things worse for themselves would have been foolhardy at best. The only person who left the room was Mr Yoon, who went outside to meet the ambulance that was now on its way.

*                                *                                *                                *                                *

Soon, the sound of sirens filled the air and within minutes emergency personnel had been guided to the basement room. JinYoung was in a state of shock as he continued to kneel next to Mark holding his hand. It took several requests from the emergency workers before he was able to let go of him. With Mark moved, he looked down for the first time at the hand he’d used to support Mark’s head as he placed him into the first-aid side position.

It was smeared with blood.

Mark’s blood.

He felt nothing as hands wrapped him in a foil blanket.

He heard nothing as Mr Bang led him out of the room and into the sunlight outside.

The only thing he saw was Mark, pale with blood loss as his body was strapped onto a gurney and loaded into the rear of the ambulance.

Students and faculty members were beginning to clog the courtyard area. Mrs Nam made her way through the crowd.

“What’s happened?” she asked Mr Bang, when she spied him.

“Mr Yoon will tell you about it,” he said brusquely. “Right now I have to take JinYoung to the hospital,” he said before turning away from her and gathering up JinYoung in his arms. Then he strode through the throng, and carried him to his car.

*                                *                                *                                *                                *

Mr Bang stayed with JinYoung as he got checked over by hospital staff. Once it was ascertained that he was physically unharmed, they both moved to the waiting area to await news of Mark.

In the meantime, Mrs Nam had contacted the orphanage about the boys. Within minutes, Mrs Shin had arrived and took her place next to JinYoung.

In all the years she’d known him, they had never touched. But now, she put an arm around his shoulder, allowing him to lean on her. This one move was so touching, that JinYoung felt his shoulders convulse as, almost without his knowledge he began to sob.

No word could escape his lips in between sobs except . . . ‘Mark’ . . . .

“They’re doing all they can, JinYoung-ah,” Mrs Shin said reassuringly. Right then she wasn’t a director, but a comforter for a very frightened young man.

After a long while, the attending doctor came in.

“Are you here for Mark Tuan?” she asked.

“Yes, I’m his guardian,” Mrs Shin answered. “How is he?”

*                                *                                *                                *                                *

At Mrs Shin’s insistence, JinYoung was allowed to see Mark for a few minutes.

When he walked into the room, the sight that greeted him was one he wasn’t prepared for.

Mark lay there, motionless. His eyes closed. His head bandaged. Hooked up to machines.

JinYoung moved slowly towards him. His legs felt like lead as he crossed the floor between them.

He took one of Mark’s hands between his own and kissed it lightly. Then he bent to kiss Mark’s forehead lovingly.

“Mark . . . Mark . . . it’s me, JinYoung,” he said in a quiet voice still raw from crying. “Can you hear me, Mark? I’m here. They won’t let me stay long, baby. I’m not even supposed to be in here, but Mrs Shin convinced them.” He then smiled with tears in his eyes as he continued. “She’s on our side, Mark, so you don’t have anything to worry about. All you have to do is get better, Mark and then we can go home. That’s right . . . home. To our room.” His voice began to tremble as he continued. “They’re not going to separate us. We’ll be together. All you have to do is wake up, Mark. Wake up, please . . . please, baby . . . don’t leave me.”

Then, JinYoung began to cry.

“I’m so sorry I left you alone, Mark. It’s all my fault . . . I shouldn’t have . . . “ he said as tears began to choke his words. “But I promise you, if you wake up, I’ll never leave you again, Mark . . . never again . . . “

He kissed Mark’s hand again and again and rubbed his cheek against it.

Then the door opened.

“I’m sorry, but you’ll have to go now,” the nurse said. “The doctor has given permission for you to come and see him again tomorrow,” she added, when she noticed that JinYoung wasn’t making any effort to leave.

It wasn’t that he wanted to ignore her, it was just that everything was taking much longer to get through to him. Once he’d understood what she was saying, he reluctantly let go of Mark’s hand, gently relinquishing it once again to the pristine hospital sheets. He then stood looking down at Mark’s face for a moment, looking at the tubes in his mouth and nose and hand, before he leaned over and placed a soft kiss on his forehead.

The words he spoke were for Mark alone.

“I’ll be back tomorrow. Sleep well, Mark-Hyung. I love you,” he said quietly.

Then he kissed his forehead one last time before turning away.

Thank you for reading. Sorry it took me so long to update. I was having a bad case of writer's block.

Please don't forget to comment. Comments really motivate and inspire me. They keep me writing.

To keep abreast of updates, please subscribe.

If you like the story, please upvote.