Chapter 3 (1/2)

The professor laughed dumbfoundedly. He was only a junior in middle school and yet he could predict cardiac arrest. No, that’s not a prediction, but a certain diagnosis. The student who had been brought to the emergency room arrived in an arrested heart condition. His heart was made to beat again, but his brain had already been damaged due to hypoxia. The sustained deep coma lead to the condition of a vegetative state.

“Your heart was arrested for more than five minutes. Is your dream to be a doctor?”

The professor, who was supposed to examine Suhyuk’s body closely, forgot his job briefly due to his irrelevant remarks. He just felt surprised and embarrassed by the fact that what he had to explain came out of the patient’s mouth one by one. Hearing the professor’s word, Suhyuk nodded his head as if he already knew it.

“I just do not know.”

‘Did I have any dream at all? What kind of dream was I dreaming? What was I dreaming to be?’

As he had lost his memory, he could not figure it out, but he had a vague idea that he certainly did not dream to be a doctor. It was because he felt very uncomfortable when he incised a patient’s abdomen with a scalpel in his dream. Of course, he pretty much got used to it over time.

“Do you see this?”

The professor picked up a pen and moved it left to right slowly. Suhyuk’s eye followed the pen at an appropriate speed. The professor confirmed his condition while speaking with him constantly, and he soon could present his own diagnosis. The student’s reaction and mind were perfectly normal. It was really doubtful whether he had been in a vegetative state.

Of course, he can find out the details with a thorough examination later.

At that moment, a middle-aged woman came into the patient’s room hastily. She was a woman in her late 40s, her hair tied back.

“Oh my god, Suhyuk!”

Suhyuk felt instinctively that it was his mom.

Although he can’t remember her face, he felt something sticky deep in his heart, with the same blood vein flowing between them.

“I knew it, my son. I knew my son would wake up soon.”

She was so joyful that she cried warm tears, caressing and touching Suhyuk’s face again and again.

“I think he had amnesia,” the professor said.

“What did you say?” she asked. The professor’s word made her eyes red-hot like a rabbit’s.

“Your son has lost all of his memories from before he had the accident.”

Her hands, touching Suhyuk’s face, shuddered.

“So, what will happen to my son, sir?”

“I have to check it out further, but my opinion is that his condition is all good except for his amnesia.” His condition is good? ‘Good’ is not enough to express his condition.

Even though he opened his eyes casually, he already had his brain damaged. That was a very natural outcome for any man who suffered disability. Nonetheless, the patient was unbelievably normal. Doctors say this is a miracle when they cannot come up with any proper medical explanation.

“It’s okay. If you are healthy, that’s more than enough for me. It’s alright, Suhyuk.”

With pitiful eyes toward son, she dragged his face to her chest. She patted him on the back and soothed him, who must have been surprised as well.

Suhyuk, who threw himself into his mom’s chest, could feel her heart beating hard. Is there a better melody in the world than this? His mother’s bosom was as warm and sweet as ever. If he closes his eyes while like this, feeling snug and warm enough in her chest, he could fall asleep instantly.

“Suhyuk!”

Suddenly, a middle-aged man came into the room. He was a slim, middle-aged man with a short sports hairstyle and height of about 165cm. A callus had formed on each of his fingers, suggesting he had done some hard labour.

‘Father…’

…………..……..……..……..……..……..……..…..

Suhyuk had to undergo rehabilitation treatment at the hospital. Since he had not used his body for a long time, he found it really hard to walk. Getting rehabilitation treatment quietly, however, he gathered information about himself. He had a family of three, namely father and mother, and himself, the only child.

His father and mother must have supported their only son materially and spiritually. His mother cleaned the building, and his father did rough manual labour on a daily basis with his hands full of calluses. Now he needed to identify one more person form his family.

‘Lee Suhyuk, what kind of guy were you?’

When he had no difficulty walking around after a little over a week’s treatment, Suhyuk went through the discharge process at the hospital.

“Go on a bus?” Suhyuk’s mother, Kim Myunghee, who just came out of the hospital along with her son, asked with a worried look. Because her son never used a bus normally. Still she asked it because her son might be scared of a taxi ride due to the after effects of his accident.

Suhyuk answered with a smile, “Doesn’t matter, taxi or bus.” As he didn’t know how to get back home anyway, and he was not sure about the taxi’s efficiency compared to the bus due to having lost his memory.

“Good for you!”

Kim Myunghee took a taxi her son liked. Soon they arrived at the destination and got off the taxi. It was an old four-story villa with corridors. She took a small sigh when Suhyuk slowly glanced at the villa. He could not recall anything about it.

“As the doctor said, sometimes your memory can come back quite soon. So, don’t be stressed, okay, son?”

As Suhyuk nodded his head, she started to walk ahead. As was the case with an old villa, there was no elevator. Suhyuk, who came up to the third floor, calmed his breathing with a deep breath. He felt short of breath even after walking up only a few stairs.

He apparently needed constant exercise in order to regain his normal condition.

Room 302. Kim Myunghee rolled up her sleeves and opened the door facing the kitchen.

“This is your room. Are you hungry? Let me cook the rolled egg you like very much. So, can you wait a bit?” she said.

“Take your time Mom,” said Suhyuk.

As he stepped over the threshold of the room, she stared silently at the back of her son. That gentle look and smiling face of her son’s. It has been quite a long time she saw it again. While she felt pitiful about her son who had an accident, she wore a warm smile on her face.

There was nothing special about the room. There was a bed, a desk, a computer, and a uniform on the hanger. Looking at the room slowly, Suhyuk approached the desk. Textbooks and notes lay here and there disorderly. Suhyuk pulled out a workbook from the bookshelf and quickly turned it over indifferently. At a glance he found the workbook filled with lots of notes. It was rugged as he used the book countless times.

“I think I should have studied very hard,” Suhyuk thought to himself.

Then he opened the desk drawer. Eraser, ruler, ink stone and all kinds of things were mingled in a messy way.

“I should have cleaned it up.”

When Suhyuk mumbled, he noticed something shining deep inside the drawer.

“What is it?”

It took him some time for him to take it out because it was buried deeply amongst lots of disordered things. It was a diary slightly larger than his palm. There was a toy-like lock shining on it. Giggling a bit, Suhyuk scouted around the room to find the small key. But it was not seen anywhere.