Chapter 38

EP.38 Orphanage, Hungry Children, and Hawaiian Pizza

After walking quite a distance, I arrived at a place that was completely different from what I had imagined.

I looked around.

The first thing that caught my eye was a modest wall made of pinkish bricks intricately woven together.

As I walked a bit further inside, I saw various unnamed plants and small trees planted in suitable spots,

and beyond them, old buildings came into view.

For some reason, the atmosphere was strangely heavy,

and I noticed a plaque hanging on a corner of one of the building's outer walls,

taking in the words written on it.

Hanseong Orphanage.

“...”

I never thought I would see these five characters again.

There was nothing to hide or be ashamed of,

but I couldn't help feeling a bit flustered.

This place...

was where I had lived.

“You must be surprised. It's quite an unexpected place...”

The girl looked at my expression and said hesitantly.

Yes, that was exactly right.

I was surprised by how unexpected it was.

The path here felt strangely familiar,

but I never thought I would end up at an orphanage.

I should have realized it when I saw the high school girl carrying two boxes of school supplies, the kind usually used by elementary school students.

It must be for donations.

As I tried to calm my very troubled mind,

I suddenly felt someone's gaze.

I looked around.

Children in tattered clothes were watching us from various spots.

None of them tried to approach us.

Their ages varied widely.

There were toddlers who looked to be around five or six,

and there was a boy who was taller than I am now.

I consciously avoided the children's curious gazes.

“This way...”

Following the steps of the girl who was leading me,

I walked inside as if under a spell.

We opened the door of the old building,

took off our shoes, and walked down a narrow corridor painted in gray concrete.

The interior of the building was like a web of corridors.

It was unnecessarily complicated, and you would definitely get lost if you were here for the first time.

But it was familiar to me.

I knew the structure of everything.

Even though more than ten years had passed, everything was exactly the same.

Nothing had changed.

It looked as if time had stopped.

Perhaps it really hadn't flowed.

Was my mind still bound to this place?

I suddenly felt as if the events of the past ten years had vanished like a mirage.

It was an odd thought, but this place made me feel that way.

What snapped me out of my reverie was the appearance of a middle-aged woman who had suddenly appeared in front of us.

“Oh, this way, please.”

She was the director of the orphanage.

I involuntarily examined her appearance.

The first things I noticed were the deep wrinkles and thinning hair.

She had aged a lot.

More than the last time I saw her.

As I stared at her,

the girl who brought me here led me again.

We entered the room where the director had come from,

which was the director's office.

She put down the items she had brought and handed me the box I was carrying, which I also put down.

The director, watching this, said to the girl,

“Thank you so much for bringing these every time. Oh, your sister isn't here today, I see.”

“No, she had some matters to attend to.”

“Then this person is...”

The director's eyes glanced at me.

Not knowing what to say, I remained silent,

but the girl who brought me spoke up.

“She's a friend of mine. We ended up coming together.”

“I see.”

The director nodded and said to me,

“This is your first time at the orphanage, right?”

“...”

I didn't know how to answer.

No, actually, I'm a former resident of this orphanage, and I was even raised by you.

I couldn't say that.

But it would also be inappropriate to remain silent.

So I said yes.

The director nodded, as if she had expected that.

Then she invited me,

“Would you like to take a look around?”

Without waiting for my answer, she led us.

The middle-aged woman's back was slightly hunched.

I couldn't help but think about how much she must have suffered to end up like that.

Her shabby clothes and weary appearance.

When I was young and cynical,

when I was disillusioned with the world,

I couldn't trust even the person who had taken care of me all my life.

I thought her appearance was a deliberate act to elicit sympathy.

I firmly believed that she was secretly siphoning off the money she had collected through donations.

Because...

I was hungry.

Even though the government provided funds,

and sponsors frequently visited the orphanage,

I couldn't understand why the children, including myself, were always hungry.

With my young and immature mind, I imagined that the director was fattening herself with the orphanage's donations.

This misunderstanding persisted until I left the orphanage.

If it weren't for a passing comment my mother made later, I might still be harboring that misunderstanding.

“...”

As I was thinking about this,

the director was already standing in front of about a dozen children.

Some of them were the same children I had seen at the entrance of the orphanage.

Only children under ten were gathered there.

The director, who had gathered the children who were scattered around, introduced me.

The children's varied expressions turned into the same one when they saw me standing quietly behind the director.

They looked dazed, as if they were seeing something impossible,

and their faces turned red,

but they shyly turned their heads away, still stealing glances at me.

“Pretty...”

The tallest girl, who was still only about as tall as my waist, muttered, and the other children agreed.

It was a compliment I would expect to hear when someone sees a very well-made doll, and I didn't know how to react.

Whether she realized I was uncomfortable or not, more than a dozen pairs of eyes continued to look at me.

It was a bit burdensome for me, who was not used to such attention.

But the children, unlike the men I had encountered at convenience stores or office supply stores, or the high school boys who had taken food from me as a form of punishment, did not look at me with lustful eyes.

While they hadn't done anything wrong, at least now I felt the purity of the children, which was a good thing.

I inadvertently made eye contact with each of the children.

They were all quiet.

It wasn't because they were speechless at my beauty,

and at their age, they should have been making a lot of noise,

but they all sat quietly and obediently, as if it was natural to do so.

They were precocious.

Too mature for their age.

It wasn't a good thing to say about young children.

These children knew.

They knew that adults disliked noise.

They knew that causing unnecessary disturbances would make them disliked.

The environment had forced their inner selves to grow up.

My heart felt heavy.

Of course, my heart had always been heavy since I came to this body.

...

...

No, I'm not talking about physical heaviness.

Not the heavy chest that could make my shoulders drop,

but the inner chest.

Chest, not heart!

While I was having these strange thoughts, the silence continued.

The children were quiet, and so was I.

The awkward standoff continued.

Then, at some point,

Rumble—

A sound of a rumbling stomach came from one of the children.

At that moment, I felt a sense of déjà vu.

I had definitely experienced this scene before.

Of course, at that time, I was the one looking up at the sponsor.

I was in the same position as those children.

How did that situation unfold?

What did the woman who later gained custody of me do?

What did my mother do?

I acted on instinct.

“Are you hungry?”

The voice that came from my vocal cords was surprisingly gentle, even to me.

The voice of a saint, as always, was filled with compassion.

The child whose stomach had rumbled, blushing like a beet, looked down but answered my question honestly.

“Yes.”

That was enough.

I didn't resist the emotion that was budding deep in my heart.

I impulsively took out my phone and continued to ask,

“Do you like pizza?”

Of course, there was no "no" answer.

I quickly operated my smartphone.

I even felt a sense of mission to do this.

Standing in the middle of the children's cloud of anticipation,

my fingers moved even faster.

Then, the high school girl who brought me asked,

“Are you ordering it?”

“Yes.”

When I answered firmly, the children who had been looking forward to it cheered.

It's a time when the happiness of life can be felt just by eating something delicious.

The girl who had been looking at me with a moved expression,

naturally turned her gaze to my phone screen.

“Eh?”

With that exclamation, her moved expression quickly disappeared.

What is it, that expression as if she had seen something she couldn't bear to see.

It's the kind of face you would make if you saw a particularly disgusting, wriggling bug.

I looked at the screen again, wondering if there was a problem.

But there was nothing unusual.

I pressed the "purchase" button without hesitation.

The girl's expression,

became as bad as if she had put the wriggling bug in her mouth and chewed it.

Why is she reacting like that?

Author's Note

Thank you, Park Young-joon, for the 100 coins donation!

Thank you, Soxl, for the 100 coins donation!

Thank you, Rudyah, for the 100 coins donation!

Thank you, Papapopo, for the