The Guarantee

“Son.”

“Y-Yes?”

“Can’t you focus.”

The scarred man snapped his fingers with a sharp click.

When Ju Hayan jerked her head up, he stood there with his arms crossed, an annoyed look on his face.

As she shifted the leg braced against the floor, the phone near her feet was kicked and went skidding away.

Her gaze followed it reflexively, but when she saw another man pulling open a drawer and dumping its contents onto the floor, she hurriedly lowered her eyes.

A sharp click of the tongue sounded above her head.

“Ha. You really can’t get it together.”

The scarred man walked over step by step.

He was wearing dress shoes, and since he was stepping on the bedding, there shouldn’t have been any sound.

Even so, to Ju Hayan, it felt as if the footsteps were ringing loudly in her ears.

As she straightened her hunched body and retreated backward, the man approaching her raised his arm.

He spread his fingers wide, showing his palm.

And then—

Smack!

“Agh!”

Her seated body lurched violently to the side.

Ju Hayan lost her balance for a moment and braced herself against the floor.

It was the same hand she had scraped earlier, but the pain in her head was so severe that she couldn’t feel anything else.

Her brain rang, and the side of her head throbbed painfully.

“It’s better when you listen while I’m still talking nicely.”

“Why make it hurt.”

“Huh?”

The man clenched and unclenched his large hand once, then brushed it through the air as if shaking something off.

He crouched down in front of her.

Their eye levels evened out, and his face was right in front of hers.

“Get a grip.”

“Hh….”

“Next time, it’s your cheek.”

The scarred man poked Ju Hayan’s cheek with his index finger as he spoke.

Covering the side of her head and temple with her hands, Ju Hayan nodded and curled in on herself like an insect being crushed underfoot.

Physiological tears welled up no matter how tightly she bit down on her lips.

The spot she had been struck burned as if her flesh were being torn away.

Her ears had gone numb at the moment of impact, making it impossible for her to sit upright.

But Ju Hayan knew.

He hadn’t hit her with full force.

It had been an open palm, not a fist, and the angle of his arm hadn’t been large.

By the scarred man’s standards, it had been just enough to knock some sense into her.

If he had truly meant to hit her—

Her shoulders stiffened involuntarily.

Her throat tightened with tension, making it hard even to swallow.

“How old are you this year.”

“I-I just turned n-nineteen.”

“Then you’re not that young.”

Her body trembled like a quaking tree.

Her voice wavered so badly it was hard to understand, and she clamped her mouth shut for a moment, but it didn’t help.

Every time something was thrown or crashed behind her, her shoulders jolted.

Tears pooled until even her lower lashes were soaked.

Watching her, the scarred man clicked his tongue again and slipped a hand into the inner pocket of his suit jacket.

He pulled something out.

It was a few sheets of paper, slightly crumpled and folded in half twice.

He unfolded the papers and shoved them in front of Ju Hayan’s eyes, telling her to look carefully.

Her vision was too blurred to make out the words, so she blinked rapidly.

Tears fell like rain.

Once her vision cleared, she could finally see properly.

At the top of the densely written page was a short title.

‘Private Loan Guarantee Contract’

“You see that.”

“That name.”

It was full of complicated language.

The only things Ju Hayan could recognize were her father’s name, address, and resident registration number written at the bottom.

“Ju Gilwoo borrowed money from us six months ago.”

“He paid the interest properly for a few months, so I thought he wasn’t a total piece of trash.”

“Then three weeks ago, he suddenly stopped answering his phone.”

“……”

“We’re owed money.”

“The interest date passed, and he won’t answer calls.”

“……”

“We didn’t come here because we wanted to.”

“You understand, right.”

Just as he had taken out the papers, the scarred man fished a cigarette from his suit pocket and spoke with a slightly slurred pronunciation.

Click.

He flicked a lighter, and the tip of the cigarette glowed red.

A sharp, acrid smell filled the air.

“Usually, guys who go into hiding get caught somewhere around their neighborhood.”

“Gambling addicts only ever go to the same few places.”

“f*ck.”

“……”

“But Ju Gilwoo is nowhere to be found.”

“We even searched the gambling houses.”

“Tch.”

“He wouldn’t really abandon his kid and run, would he.”

Clicking his tongue, he muttered that it was making things difficult for them.

Ju Hayan couldn’t even bow her head as the man scanned her from head to toe, drawing deeply on his cigarette.

He exhaled.

Smoke was blown directly into her face.

Her eyes reddened, but she didn’t blink.

She kept her gaze fixed on the paper he was holding.

Only one thought echoed loudly in Ju Hayan’s mind.

‘Dad might have abandoned me.’

The man had probably said it casually.

He likely didn’t think it was the answer, even if he didn’t completely rule it out.

But Ju Hayan couldn’t shake her head and deny it outright.

It might be true.

The last day her father had come home.

‘I’m home.’

She remembered the traces he’d left behind when she opened the front door after greeting a house that wouldn’t answer her.

It had been exactly one week ago, on Saturday.

She had stood in the entryway, staring at the wrecked apartment.

It was never clean when her father came by, but this time it was worse than usual.

The miscellaneous items on the shelves were all knocked over.

Clothes had been pulled out from the bottom of the wardrobe, with a few folded pieces sticking out awkwardly.

Open drawers.

Disheveled bedding.

‘Ha….’

Useless in every possible way.

Coldly thinking that, Ju Hayan let out a single sigh to shake off the exhaustion threatening to collapse her on the spot and stepped inside.

Thud.

She dropped her heavy bag filled with essay prep books.

She cleaned the house first. She stood fallen items back up.

She pulled out and refolded clothes whose shape had been ruined.

When organizing the open drawer, she checked that her hidden bankbook was still there before closing it.

It took a full thirty minutes just to get things roughly in order.

Her throat felt dry from not having rested.

Heading to the corner of the room that barely qualified as a kitchen, she opened the fridge and took out a two-liter bottle of water.

She had already drunk almost all the water she’d bought and needed to buy more.

The saying that just breathing costs money felt painfully accurate.

“Hm?”

As she bent down to put the bottle back into the fridge, she noticed a white envelope sitting on the sink.

She opened it and turned it over.

Something fell into her palm with a soft thud.

It was a note.

‘I’m sorry.’

A short sentence, scribbled hastily.

Wondering if there was more, she flipped it over, but that was all.

She set the note down and shook the envelope again.

Four yellow bills fell out.

Two hundred thousand won.

She wondered what had come over him this time to leave all the money behind.

Ju Gilwoo did occasionally give her money, after all.

It was just that the frequency and amount were too meager to cover living expenses.

Still, once she entered middle school, she could at least do flyer distribution jobs, which made things bearable.

It had been ten days since his last visit.

The gap was longer than usual, and she had briefly found it strange.

Maybe he had been earning money somewhere.

She put the cash back into the envelope.

She folded the note again and set it aside.

Perhaps because they had failed each other for so long, even seeing a short letter now stirred no real emotion.

‘Two hundred thousand won….’

She should deposit everything except fifty thousand won.

Necessities always ran out all at once.

She needed to buy water, ramen, and soap.

Come to think of it, the detergent bottle was nearly empty too.

Thinking through what she needed immediately, Ju Hayan lay down under the blanket.

Even after the CSAT, the fatigue from preparing for essay exams had been overwhelming.

It was worse because she had only been able to apply to two universities due to lacking application fees.

If she was going to study again tomorrow, she needed to sleep first.

She would think about everything else tomorrow.

Everything surrounding Ju Hayan felt far too heavy for her right now.

“Ha.”

So that ‘I’m sorry’ had meant sorry for abandoning his child.

Ju Hayan clenched her teeth until her jaw trembled as she swallowed a hollow laugh.

The only family member who had been a burden and shackle for most of her life since gaining self-awareness had remained insincere until the very end.

She hadn’t expected a tear-soaked letter filled with explanations.

But just four characters.

She would apologize more sincerely to a stranger she bumped into on the street.

The surge of injustice clawed up her throat.

“If we can’t find Ju Gilwoo, you’ll have to pay all this debt.”

“You know that, right.”

“You’re his kid.”

“You’ve heard about kids inheriting their parents’ debts, haven’t you.”

“……”

“If that happens, it’s not just us who are screwed.”

“You’ll be in serious trouble too.”

The scarred man shoved Ju Hayan’s shoulder with his fist as he spoke.

His tone never changed, making it hard to tell whether he was coaxing her or threatening her.

Even without putting any force into it, her shoulder ached noticeably.

But to Ju Hayan, buried under her miserable suspicion, nothing else registered.

It might be a leap.

It might be the ugly imagination of a child.

Given how unreliable her father had always been, extreme doubt was natural.

Still, Ju Hayan knew.

She just knew.

This was real.

Not a terrifying fantasy born of anxiety or fear, but a tangible misfortune.

“Ha.”

“You’re so scrawny that even if I threw you onto a construction site, you’d just get in the way.”

Perhaps Ju Hayan had subconsciously expected this family’s hopeless ending.

Maybe it had been foretold back when she was still in elementary school, wandering from game room to game room looking for her father.

By that measure, they had lasted quite a long time.

“There’s nothing coming up.”

At the shaggy-haired man’s words after tearing the house apart, the scarred man looked around.

He glanced over the wardrobe with its contents spilled out and the drawers stuffed haphazardly.

Judging there was nothing more to see, he stood up.

“Oof.”

He groaned as he rose, brushing off the knee that had been on the floor.

“Here.”

“It’s just a copy, so keep it.”

“When Ju Gilwoo comes home, call the number written on there immediately.”

The scarred man held out the folded document to Ju Hayan.

She wiped at her still-streaming tears with the back of her hand and took it.

Don’t think too much.

The little one thinks too much.

He warned her as casually as if telling her to eat properly or drive safely.

He flicked the cigarette he’d been smoking onto the floor and crushed it under his shoe.

It landed on the blanket, leaving a round, black burn mark.

It looked like they were finally leaving.

Since the men had burst in, Ju Hayan’s stomach had churned nonstop, and she swallowed repeatedly.

She desperately hoped these thugs would just go.

She wanted to be left alone in the semi-basement apartment that barely got sunlight, reeking of mold and now saturated with cigarette smoke.

But as always, life never went the way Ju Hayan wished.

Click, creak—

“Is anyone here.”

Someone stood in the doorway she turned to look at.

(To be continued)