I Became the Lousy Side Top - Chap 41
Jaewoo dragged his feet, feeling like a cow being led to the slaughterhouse. But no matter how slowly he moved, the fact that his final destination was Mujin’s house didn’t change. The buses weren’t even crowded.
That’s how he arrived at the apartment building. As he slowly walked into the elevator and hit the button for Mujin’s floor, he saw a familiar person crossing the lobby.
It was Dongsoo, Mujin’s subordinate. Jaewoo stopped the elevator’s doors from closing without any hesitation and Dongsoo got in, carrying a box.
“Hello?”
Jaewoo greeted him and glanced at the box. He had no idea what it contained, but he somehow had the feeling it was bad news for him. He just felt it.
“Hello.”
After a moment, Dongsoo returned the greeting. Now that the pleasantries were over, Jaewoo hesitated, then mustered up the courage to ask.
“What is that?”
Surprisingly, Dongsoo answered easily.
“It’s a CCTV system.”
The expression on Jaewoo’s face changed at those words, but Dongsoo continued speaking.
“The boss told us to set up a security system because the damn dog that’s supposed to guard the house keeps running out the door.”
Jaewoo quickly figured out who the damn dog that was supposed to guard the house was.
‘Who’s he calling a dog!’
Some people were truly assholes. Jaewoo’s stomach was boiling with anger. He’d been terrified all this time, but now that fear had vanished. If the results were the same no matter what he did, then wouldn’t it be okay to rebel a bit more? Jaewoo made a resolution. Therefore, even after the elevator arrived at Mujin’s floor, he didn’t step off.
“Please let Mujin know I’m going to do a bit of grocery shopping.”
With that, Jaewoo ran out to the huge, luxury supermarket. There wasn’t anything they didn’t have there. He was able to easily find everything he wanted. He strengthened his fighting spirit and returned to Mujin’s apartment with a grocery bag.
“You’re late.”
As soon as Jaewoo arrived, Mujin scolded him in a cold voice as he looked at documents in the living room. But now that he had decided to rebel, Jaewoo wasn’t going to give in to his scolding. He cleared his throat and answered calmly.
“I stopped to buy groceries.”
While he had been out at the supermarket, it looked like Dongsoo had finished installed the CCTV, since Mujin was the only one at home.
“Did you?”
Mujin responded, still flipping through his documents. He didn’t even glance at Jaewoo. After some time, he returned to his office, documents in hand. He seemed like he worked better by himself.
‘Fool, you don’t know what’s coming.’
Jaewoo headed to the kitchen, full of bravery. He started by taking out the things he had bought at the supermarket one by one.
He’d bought the ingredients for more fermented soybean paste1 stew, as well as fermented fish mixed with rice2, and finally, the supermarket had also had skate3 for sale! The skate wasn’t fermented a lot, but the smell was still quite strong. Fortunately, Mujin had closed the door to his room, so he didn’t seem able to smell it immediately. There was no one to disturb his cooking.
Jaewoo started cooking with a lively hand. He boiled the fermented soybean paste with aged kimchi for a thick stew, while the fermented flounder and rice was just served plain on a plate. He dished up the skate, then quickly boiled some pork and served it with radish kimchi stir-fried in sesame oil. He also tried frying some of the leftovers. As for the taste, Jaewoo wasn’t sure. He’d never cooked skate before.
‘Fuck you.’
Jaewoo cooked each dish with great care while thinking that over and over. As the finished dishes were laid out one by one, a putrid smell took over the table.
“Come and eat!”
Not long after he shouted, Mujin left his room. As soon as he did, his nose wrinkled at the smell wafting into the living room. It smelled like fermented soybean paste stew again? Mujin had expected Jaewoo to whine because he’d been scolded a lot, but the sight of him trying to fight back was quite impressive.
After being so angry at Jaewoo before, his heart, which had been feeling strangely tense, suddenly felt relieved. Maybe it was because it was so fun to see Jaewoo struggling without giving up.
Mujin unconsciously smirked to himself as he stood in front of the table. He paused for a moment as he saw the parade of fermented foods. It was a meal that started with soybean paste stew and ended with fermented skate. When Mujin looked at Jaewoo, he was just putting the last plate down on the table with a triumphant expression.
“What is that?”
“Durian4.”
He’d really committed. Mujin looked at Jaewoo with a shocked expression. Jaewoo met his gaze head on and refused to back down.
“Are you hungry? Please help yourself.”
Mujin thought for a moment. Did he need to scold this cheeky dog even more? After debating it, he decided to just sit down at the table. It wasn’t like he particularly disliked fermented food. When he’d just been getting started as a gangster, he hadn’t had any choice about what he ate, so he just ate whatever was put in front of him without complaining. He might not like how it tasted, but all he needed was for it to fill his stomach.
When Mujin sat down, Jaewoo sat down as well. Even in this situation, were they still going to eat together? They’d done it so frequently, it seemed like it had become a habit. Since it wasn’t a bad thing, Mujin left it alone.
First, he tried the soybean paste stew. Jaewoo’s soybean paste stew was always delicious, and this was no exception. Then he tried the fermented flounder and rice mixture. The taste was fine, not good and not bad. The skate stank, but it didn’t prevent Mujin from eating it. It tasted better than a lot of things he’d eaten elsewhere. Mujin emptied his plate just like that.
Jaewoo, on the other hand, had only slurped at his soybean paste stew. He didn’t seem to like fermented food very much.
“Don’t mess around next time.”
When Mujin said that, Jaewoo, who’d been eating stew at the time, coughed.
“W-who said I was messing around?”
“Weren’t you?”
Jaewoo stared at the table and kept his mouth shut.
“From now on, don’t prepare anything you can’t eat.”
“You think I can’t eat it?”
Jaewoo immediately picked up a piece of skate with his chopsticks. Then he topped it with the stir-fried kimchi and the boiled pork and took a big bite. The smooth forehead suddenly became wrinkled, and Jaewoo’s eyes began watering, but he stubbornly chewed and swallowed.
“See, I can eat it!”
When Jaewoo opened his mouth, the characteristic smell of skate wafted out. It seemed like he was overcompensating, but Mujin had no intention of trying to convince him to stop. Jaewoo picked up more skate in his chopsticks and started eating it.
“It’s so tasty.”
Mujin wished Jaewoo could see his expression as he said that.
“Then you can finish the rest.”
Even though Mujin was done eating, he didn’t leave the table. Jaewoo was nearly crying as he ate the remaining skate with rice, intending to power through it and be done. His tongue felt sore.
‘I can’t handle skate.’
Jaewoo finished his meal, holding back the tears that threatened to well up. Only then did Mujin get up and go back to his room.
“Son of a bitch.”
Jaewoo cursed without realizing it, then remember the CCTV that had been installed and kept his mouth shut. Was he being filmed now? He looked around with anxious eyes and kept his curses inside his head this time.
‘You bastard.’
Jaewoo sniffled and cleared the table. It seemed like he couldn’t torture Mujin with fermented food after this.
‘And why was he speaking so informally5?”
Mujin had started using informal language when they argued before, and now it seemed like he didn’t have any intention of speaking politely again. Once again, Jaewoo had to bite back a curse. How old did Mujin think he was? Of course, his real age wasn’t the same as Jaewoo’s age. His original body wasn’t this young. But Mujin seemed to be the only one to speak to him so disrespectfully.
‘You crazy bastard!’
Jaewoo felt sad for no reason. He hoped Mujin would hurry up and fall in love with Hyunjin so that he could see him suffer for once. He wanted to see him kiss Hyunjin’s feet! Cursing up a storm mentally, Jaewoo thunked his head down on the empty table.
Even though Jaewoo still felt sad and grimy, the days passed steadily. Mujin was still speaking to Jaewoo coldly and impolitely, and Jaewoo was still waiting for an opportunity for revenge.
Eventually, the day of the children’s field trip arrived. How much time had Jaewoo spent planning for this day! Jaewoo grinned and took out a new yellow and green lunch box. There was a popular character drawn on the outside, and to make it even cuter, Jaewoo had bought adorable skewers, fish-shaped soy sauce containers, small foil bowls, and more.
Hyunjin was standing by his shoulder to help him make the lunch boxes.
“Okay then, let’s start with the tofu-wrapped rice balls6!”
First, they prepared the fried tofu, then Jaewoo chopped the waiting vegetables into small pieces and cooked them. Then they mixed them with pre-cooked rice to make the stuffing. Finally, they took an amount of rice that would be easy for a child to eat, stuffed it in the tofu wrapper, and sealed the entrance.
Next it was character decoration time.
The two turned on a phone and placed it in front of them, looking at Harold in detail.
“Great! Just like I thought, we can use cheese for the ears. We can make the other features by cutting seaweed into shape.”
Adding the ears wasn’t hard. The problem was creating the eyes, nose, and mouth. The two of them took kitchen scissors and began to carefully cut the seaweed. Jaewoo, who was good with his hands, ended up with some pretty decent pieces. But Hyunjin made a lot of mistakes that the two of them couldn’t help but laugh at.
“That nose is too big!”
Hyunjin put a lot of effort into cutting it with the scissors, but this time the nose was too small.
“I mean, some bears have small noses, I guess.”
Hyunjin smiled awkwardly and made an excuse. It was so cute that Jaewoo couldn’t even say anything.
“Let’s make the sandwich skewers!”
“Okay.”
Hyunjin calmly took one of the skewers. He placed ham and cheese on some bread, rolled it up, sliced it, and then skewered it to complete the sandwich. A few of them were also made with jam, since the kids liked that.
“I’ve finished two so far!”
Next came the sausage and ham! Jaewoo cut the sausages into octopus shapes and grilled them, then cut eyes and a mouth into them once they had cooled. Then he cut the thinly sliced ham into rectangles and tied it in the middle to make a ribbon shape. He wrapped them around some small egg rolls and used ketchup to add some color. He also decorated quail eggs with various shapes and added them as well.
With that, the main section of the lunch box was complete. Now, in a smaller section, various fruits were cut into small pieces and skewered as well.
“It’s perfect!”
They added some cherry tomatoes for a little more color, and the lunch boxes were done! While Jaewoo was fussing over the final details, Hyunjin stood next to him, staring at the lunch boxes with an unreadable expression. He looked happy, yet somehow sad as well. Looking at him, Jaewoo felt like he could guess at Hyunjin’s feelings.
Jaewoo took off the plastic gloves he was wearing and gently held Hyunjin’s hand. He felt like Hyunjin needed that right now.
“The kids will love them, right?”
Hyunjin slowly nodded at those words.
“They’ll be delicious.”
“I hope so.”
The two looked at each other and smiled.
Footnotes
청국장 – extra strong fermented soybean paste
식해 – Sikhae, fermented fish mixed with a grain (usually flounder and rice). Wikipedia, Youtube video
홍어 – skate. Skates are cartilaginous fishes similar to rays. Although the book doesn’t specify what sort of skate dish Jaewoo bought, it was likely 홍어회 or hongeo-hoe, a fermented dish made from skate that is said to smell like an out house. Skate Wikipedia, Hongeo-hoe Wikipedia, Recipe
두리안 – durian. An edible fruit with an overpowering odor. Some countries in Southeast Asia have banned it from public spaces. Wikipedia
Unfortunately, as someone who relies on google translate, the intricacies of Korean honorifics and formality levels don’t often come through. I’m sorry about that.
유부초밥 – rice or sushi wrapped with fried tofu. Namu Wiki, Recipe
