Life, Once Again!

* * *“Yo, Maru.”Someone was waving their hand in front of Maru’s face. Only upon realizing that did Maru come back to reality. Dojin and Daemyung were looking at him worriedly.“Dude, are you really ok? You’ve been weird all week. Is there something wrong?”“You’re making us worried. Did something happen?”Maru shook his head. He pointed at his grinning face in response.“Does it look like something bad happened?”“No, but you’ve been in a daze for like, god knows how long. You were like this after the play, too.”“I just had something to think about. No problems.”“Really? Good to hear. Here’s your food. Shrimp burger.”“Thanks.”Dojin and Daemyung sat down next to him. They were at Marronnier park. Thanks to the warm weather, there were a lot of people performing on the streets. Some people were from theaters, while others were completely independent. There were countless buskers outside with their guitars, and there were even some people with very strange looking instruments.They even found a group of middle schoolers out on a field trip. Around half of them were looking at just one person. A man who was standing still in the middle of the park, in a clown makeup. The man only moved when money entered his pockets.Whenever the middle schoolers put 500 won bills into his pockets, he would sometimes move very naturally, or sometimes very stiffly to indicate some sort of a reaction. The kids kept putting more money in, seemingly very amused by the man’s movements.“Earning money’s hard, huh?” Dojin commented.Maru could only nod with a smile.“By the way, what did you talk about with the girls earlier?” Dojin asked with a grin.“I was just curious about something.”“Ohh! Maru, you’re a man, aren’tcha? Did you like one of them?”“I just wanted to confirm something.”“Confirm? Confirm what?”“You kids wouldn’t know.”“The hell? Just introduce me bro. Come to think of, they had pretty weird uniforms on. Don’t think I saw them around before.”“Yeah.”Daemyung butted into the conversation right then.“They’re from Myunghwa high.”“Myunghwa high?”It was the first Maru’s heard of them. Dojin seemed to know who they were, though. He pouted a little bit in annoyance.“Oh, so it was them.”“Yeah, I searched them up because I got curious.”The two seemed to know something. Did something happen?“What about Myunghwa high?”“Oh, right. You wouldn’t know, huh?”Daemyung started speaking as he folded up his burger wrapper.“They’re the ones who won the nationals this year. I tried not to think about it since we lost, but I kind of couldn’t. I found them when I searched for them online. They even have a video of their winning play. The one they performed at the Seoul Arts Center.”Seoul Arts Center. It was the place the students got to perform at, once they got up to nationals. They could only perform at the smaller theaters in the center, but being able to perform in the Seoul Arts Center was a great honor to begin with. ‘So she started acting around now.’He remembered the time they first met, almost as if he managed to find something he lost a long time ago inside a box. She used to be an actor of a certain theater, and he was a road manager constantly on the lookout for new jobs. His memories of the events that transpired afterwards were a little faint, but just having memories of her face, name and voice was enough to make him happy.As a matter of fact, he felt like he was being saved by someone. Just being able to see her again made him happy again. Just today, his worries about the future wouldn’t bother him anymore. “Man you seem happy now. What’s up with that?”Dojin whispered ‘I almost feel bad for worrying about you’ under his breath, as he put a hand over Maru’s shoulder.“So, you get her number?”Maru turned away from Dojin with an exasperated face, but he ended up being greeted with an even more expectant Daemyung.‘Look at these kids.’He understood why Dojin would be curious, but even Daemyung?“T-the girl at the end was cute.”“Good job, Daemyung! Yes, if you’re a man, you must have a right mindset like that. You go for the girl at the end. I’ll go with the one in the mid-”That’s where Maru put a hand over Dojin’s mouth. The one in the middle? Whose wife do you think you’re trying to steal over here?“Shush. Don’t even think about it.”“......”Dojin scanned Maru with narrowed eyes.“Oho oho, Mr. Han Maru. You’re worse than me, huh? You already have her marked down as your girlfriend? Or… Did you get her number already? Huh?”“No, I just wanted to ask her something.”“Ask her what?”“Her name.”“Name? Just her name? Really? What about her number?”“Well… I’ll get that next time.”“Ugh.”Maru was content with just seeing her. He didn’t want to mess things up by rushing into things. Surely, they would meet again some time again in the future. He shouldn’t try to hurry, if anything, he needs to act like a gentleman.‘I wonder if she’d accept my proposal again?’Wait. Did he go too far?“Dude, no matter how much you like her, if she doesn’t like you, it’s over.”Dojin’s playful words hit Maru like a hammer.“Y-you’re right.”“Hey, Maru.““You’re right. What do I do?”“W-what the hell? Dude, Daemyung! This guy’s getting weird!”“Ahh. How did I not even think about that? Hold on, what did my wife like again?”“Wife?”