Eighteen’s Bed Novel Completed - Chapter 185

Sometimes I felt despair, wondering if it had to be this way, but I couldn’t help it because my parents would suspect me if I tried to handle everything myself. All I could do was desperately wait for the vacuum cleaner to be turned off.

Even as I stared at the laptop on the dining table, my attention was still on Go Yohan’s room.

1. Go O-O is bad.

※Still, sometimes he’s kind to me. Only to me. Sometimes.

Is this perhaps self-consolation?

The thought that came to mind from the report made me flinch. It was a truth acknowledged by anyone who knew Go Yohan that he had been a bad guy from the beginning.

Go Yohan must have been a demon since birth. For such a Go Yohan, being born into a family that loved Jesus was a misfortune. A life under the Lord’s protection must have been a crueler treatment for Go Yohan than the fiery pits of hell. Perhaps Go Yohan even sweetly drank the sulfurous flames of hell.

※Presumed to be his original personality.

However, my self-consolation did not end. Go Yohan was born a demon because his father was a demon. Go Yohan was only guilty of inheriting the blood of a demon. Resembling his father is not a sin.

Oh, then if Go Yohan’s father also resembled his father, then it’s not a sin either?

“Huh?”

Come to think of it, that’s right. My own logic blocked me from continuing my thoughts. Even when the housekeeper turned off the vacuum cleaner and came out of Go Yohan’s room, and until she finished all the cleaning and prepared my lunch, I had to sit at the dining table, trying to devise other logic to break my own.

The conclusion ended in failure. I saw the housekeeper standing quietly in front of me after finishing the cooking.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I was thinking about something for my assignment.”

“Well, the boss asked me to make you a nourishing meal.”

“A nourishing meal?”

“Yes. Samgyetang.”

Ah, samgyetang is too heavy to eat. I was already full. Nevertheless, knowing why she had made me a nourishing meal, I couldn’t bring myself to say no and just smiled.

“Thank you.”

“No problem.”

“Could you give me just a little? I don’t think I can eat much.”

“Yes.”

I’ll clean up after you finish eating. The housekeeper never added the usual words that most people do. After placing the white broth and plump chicken leg in front of me, she just looked around the house, searching for anything left to do. I carefully drank the steaming broth. She cooks well.

How does one become good at cooking, anyway? How do experts figure out the “appropriate amount”? Wouldn’t adding a little at a time prevent you from finishing the dish on time? Then the broth would reduce or the food would burn.

I was so curious that I stopped drinking the broth and stole a glance at the housekeeper’s back. The housekeeper looked around my room again, then suddenly murmured to herself, “That’s right.”

What’s right? As soon as I felt something odd, the housekeeper went into my room and came out. Holding a large bowl. Inside, bright yellow tangerines, completely peeled of their white pith, were piled up like a mountain.

“What’s that?”

“It was on your desk.”

“It was on your desk—” Hearing that much, I put the meat that was between my chopsticks into my mouth. I couldn’t hold it forever. Chewing the mouthful of meat, I looked at the mountain of tangerines. Why was that in my room?

While I chewed for a long time, the housekeeper ran her hand over the tangerines, checking inside.

“Should I buy you more tangerines?”

I swallowed the now-small food and replied.

“No, if I want to eat them, I can just order them. Why?”

“Because it looked like you wanted to eat them.”

“Me?”

“Yes.”

“……Why?”

“Why?” repeated twice. Not like a seven-year-old child or anything. Since the housekeeper rarely asked questions, my curiosity seemed to have grown. At my question, the housekeeper placed the tangerines on the sink and said,

“Because all the tangerine pitch was peeled off.”

I rolled my eyes. Tangerine pitch? I didn’t quite understand the word. I must have frowned unconsciously, as the housekeeper looked at me and rubbed her forehead. Oops. I relaxed the tension in my forehead. Seeing my relaxed expression, the housekeeper took out some plastic wrap from the cupboard, which I didn’t even know we had, and said,

“Jun, you don’t usually eat the white part of tangerines, do you?”

“Did I?”

Did I? Well, I didn’t eat tangerines much, so I wouldn’t know if I disliked the white part. It wasn’t that I disliked the taste of tangerines. So, did I really not eat them because I was too lazy? Isn’t the premise wrong to begin with? I don’t think we had tangerines at home often. Anyway, so the white part was called tangerine pith. It had a name.

The plastic wrap was torn. The taut, transparent plastic covered the completely peeled tangerines. I forgot about eating and just watched the scene quietly. But wasn’t she going to answer my question?

“Yes.”

She did. I took a drink of water, feeling awkward.

Certainly, someone who talks little is better than someone who talks a lot. However, this housekeeper was among those who talked too little. She worked as a live-in housekeeper, but there was no one living in the house.

Suddenly, a question arose in my mind. Doesn’t this person’s mouth get dry? Doesn’t she have anything she wants to say? In the past, this wouldn’t have been a curious thing. It’s all because I have no friends. My brain feels like it’s loafing around because there’s nothing to use it for.

I rummaged through the meat in the samgyetang and said something impulsive. It was truly an unplanned remark.

“Ma’am, don’t you get bored? With no one home.”

Oops. Even after saying it, I thought I’d made a mistake. Damn it. What kind of habit is that?

I tend to be weak towards adults. I feel more guilt towards adults than peers when I make the same mistake. Thanks to that, my appetite, which wasn’t there to begin with, completely disappeared.

The good thing was that the housekeeper quickly replied to my muttering.

“It’s just so-so.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No problem.”

“My manners were a bit off, weren’t they?”

“No, they weren’t.”

Even hearing “no,” I couldn’t relax. After all, I was the employer, and she was the employee. Having lived my whole life watching others, I had a habit of not taking people’s words at face value.

In the silence, only the sound of chopsticks hitting the bowl could be heard. I kept scooping and spilling the broth. The housekeeper silently wiped the sink with a dishcloth for a long time, then suddenly opened her mouth.

“You’re a really good student.”

“……Me?”

“Yes.”

I heard it again. In fact, it wasn’t true at all. I somehow smiled, feeling uncomfortable.

“Not really.”

“Employers don’t usually know, but housekeepers in the neighborhood are close.”

“Ah, yes.”

That’s a relief. Should I say that? It was a moment of such contemplation. The housekeeper’s nonchalant tone continued after an awkward pause. It seemed like a sigh was mixed in between. Was it just my imagination?

“I was close with the housekeeper next door too.”

“……Next door?”

“She was fired last week.”

“……”

“She worked hard all this time.”

I closed my mouth with a sense of uneasiness washing over me, and scratched my head in embarrassment. Dishes like boiled pork and samgyetang seemed like the quiet protests of the silent housekeeper. Then I replayed the housekeeper’s words in my mind.

Next door, that’s Go Yohan’s house, isn’t it? The embarrassment vanished, and curiosity sparked. The impulsiveness I felt earlier was very slight. I put down my chopsticks completely and asked,

“Next door?”

“The student next door who often visited your house.”

“……”

My hand stopped abruptly. A silence deeper than silence descended. It was a silence in my head. My thoughts had completely stopped. With a blank mind, I looked at the now somewhat cooled samgyetang. Why was that topic coming up now?

The housekeeper scrubbed the sink until it squeaked. The sink was now spotless, without a single water stain. Anyway, if she washed the dishes I was eating from now, it would get dirty again.

As soon as I finished that thought, I knew. The housekeeper was also organizing her thoughts right now.

“I just happened to overhear it.”

Squeak, squeak. Light reflected off the gray metal plate.

The tip of my chopsticks trembled slightly. No, I was trembling.

The faucet was turned on. The housekeeper rinsed the dishcloth in lukewarm water. I couldn’t see her face from behind. She must be expressionless. As usual. But the housekeeper’s answer was a little slower than usual.

“That house’s housekeeper worked there for 20 years. In that house.”

“Ah, ……yes.”

“Because she was old.”

She was fired. The words didn’t follow. And the housekeeper turned around and looked at me. Her calm eyes seemed to be asking me. Will I be fired when I get old too? Or she might have been checking the amount I ate. It was always like that.

I swallowed dryly, like someone caught red-handed. It was because I knew my parents’ intentions, which had changed after I entered university and started living alone.

The housekeeper turned back around, wrung out the dishcloth, and continued speaking.

“She received a hefty severance package, but she practically raised the three siblings in that house.”

“……Ah.”

“So.”

The faucet was turned off. The dishcloth was twisted. Every time the rubber gloves moved, the distinct sound of rubber and water droplets splattering into the sink filled the kitchen. The housekeeper, after shaking her hands dry, said,

“So I heard. Since she was quitting anyway.”

“Ah, yes.”

“From that ……house.”

Squeak, squeak. The gloved hand ran over the sink. Was it that person, the one who the housekeeper had arbitrarily invited into the house? What was her intention in telling me this? I poked the cooling piece of meat with my chopsticks. Again, the answer was slow.

“They say the second child in that family was originally very smart.”

My ears perked up. A dense forest bloomed in my blank mind. As soon as I heard the word “second child,” my body reacted. My mouth went dry. I gripped my pants with my hand under the table.

“Really?”

“It was when he was in his second year of middle school, I think. They say he had the after-effects from an accident at that time, and his concentration dropped a lot.”

An accident? A gust of wind blew through the dense forest. This was the first I’d heard of it. I lifted my head and looked at the housekeeper. The housekeeper had both hands on the sink and was looking out the window attached to the kitchen.

“The family all thought it was an accident, but the housekeeper who raised him said…”

“……Said what?”

“She said it wasn’t an accident.”

“……”

“She said the chairman of that house burst the back of the second son’s head with a glass trophy in the early morning.”

“What did you say?”

“She said he burst the back of the second son’s head with the trophy plaque part.”

The housekeeper repeated it twice. It was an action to re-inform me of what I hadn’t heard. However, I hadn’t failed to hear it. With hands trembling uncontrollably, I barely managed to put my chopsticks down on the table. I tried desperately not to let my agitation be revealed by the sound of the chopsticks hitting the bowl.

“The housekeeper sent him to the emergency room in the early morning. She was afraid of being fired, so she couldn’t tell anyone.”

“……”

My head felt heavy. It was as if I had fallen into a fish tank full of water, and my breathing was stifled. Furthermore, the truth I never expected to hear choked my throat and left me confused.

“She lied to the madam, saying he fell down the stairs. The family apparently believes that the second son did something foolish and fell down the stairs that day. After that, the second son forgot his memories every day for a week, and he even forgot that he was hit with a trophy. So, only the chairman and the housekeeper know about that incident. After that, his concentration dropped extremely. He also failed his college entrance exams.”

They say there are no secrets in the world, and truth is revealed at unexpected times and places. This was exactly it.

“……Why? Why did he do that?”

The rubber gloves, soaked with water, tapped the sink.

“Well, I don’t know. But.”

But? I anxiously moistened my lips. If it ended with “but,” it meant there was more to add. I desperately waited for those words. Scratching the table with my fingernails.

“The housekeeper thought…”

The sound of me swallowing echoed in my ears. I wiped my damp palms on my pants. The food in front of me was already cold, but I had long forgotten about the food I was supposed to eat. I was only anxiously waiting for the housekeeper’s next words.

“She said he was just unlucky that day.”

“Huh?”

It was a hollow statement. The worry I had about some grand event collapsed like a ruined tower, leaving me feeling empty. Unlucky. Just because of that. It was absurd. All the tension drained out of me.

“What a remarkable father. Someone said that father loved his second son the most.”

“Ah.”

The housekeeper nodded to herself. Her front was still not visible, so I couldn’t see her expression. However, I knew for sure that her nod was an affirmation. The tension returned. Just in case. Perhaps the day had come when I would finally hear a third party’s opinion. The nodding housekeeper then offered a truly surprising opinion.

“That might be true.”

“……I don’t think so.”

Normally, I would have asked, “Really?” Because I was clearly aware that acting like I knew something here would be strange. However, I wanted to refute it. Even at my own risk, I wanted to blurt out, “There must be a reason for Go Yohan’s complex.”