Aokigahara (D.O focus) (4/4)
part three
When authorities find him asleep on the shore of Lake Saiko, one kicks him awake. Kyungsoo sits up, as if shocked, and looks scared. When he realizes that he’s near people that are alive, and that no, walking to Lake Saiko wasn’t a dream, Kyungsoo almost cries in front of the park officials.
“Foreigner?” One of the park officials look at his disheveled appearance, pity heavy in his eyes.
Everything bursts out of Kyungsoo. “I went into the forest to write, but I got lost and then I found five people dead-” Kyungsoo holds out his hands, five fingers splayed. “They killed themselves! They’re dead and I tried screaming for help but no one would come! You’ve got to help me!” Taking in the looks from the park officials makes Kyungsoo unsure if he is speaking Japanese, or using correct grammar. He calms down and swallows to wet his throat. “Five dead people,” he keeps repeating. The looks on the park officials’ faces tell him that they understand him.
“Where?” One of them asks. Kyungsoo doesn’t want to go back in the forest, so he points at the forest.
“Deep in there. There’s a small clearing and the smell will tell you. I tied a cloth around a tree trunk in case someone did.” Kyungsoo gives them as much information as he can, begging them to not let him go back into the forest. After what feels like a long time, two park officials head into the forest, with the remaining two leading Kyungsoo to the nearby rest stop for further questioning.
It feels like it’s been years since Kyungsoo has sat in a chair. It’s a basic collapsible metal chair, but Kyungsoo sinks into it as if it’s the lazy armchair back at home. The park officials have him fill out a statement, and one- named Official Hameda- hands him an apple, and Kyungsoo almost eats it out of his hand.
“So, explain to us how you found the bodies.” The other official, Shimizu, a female, says to Kyungsoo as he immediately finishes the apple.
Kyungsoo clears his throat. “I woke up one morning to the sound of several men outside my tent. I was confused what was happening, but then I realized that they were cutting down a man who hung himself on the tree above my tent-”
“Another body?” Hameda cuts in.
“It was taken away, by other park officials. One park official, Mochizuki, told me to head west and I’d hit the Aokigahara trail, and not far from it would be Lake Saiko. I’m not sure if he gave me wrong directions, because I was walking for at least a few hours when I found a clearing, and then I-”
“You found the bodies.” Shimizu’s pen darts across the page as she writes all of this down.
Kyungsoo nods, a lump forming in his throat. “Y-yeah, the bodies. Five of them. Two were foreigners, three Japanese. They died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds to the head. The night before they died, it was raining. I heard distant thunder, but I think- I think it was them shooting themselves ”
“Any suicide notes?”
“I don’t think so, I didn’t check. I tried to find help as best as I could.”
Shimizu reads over her handwriting. “So you ran into a Park Official Mochizuki?” She asks.
“Yeah.”
“We don’t know a Mochizuki that works here.”
“You don’t? He says he’s worked here for over twenty years.”
Hameda and Shimizu give each other pointed looks and turn to face Kyungsoo.
“We know all the park officials that oversee the protection of the forest,” Hameda states.
“I’ve worked here close to thirteen years,” Shimizu adds. “There’s no Mochizuki that works here.”
・
In a few hours Shimizu and Hameda get a call on their radios from the other officials. They have found the bodies, and have requested a retrieval team to get body bags. Kyungsoo is told that the bodies have been taken to the nearby morgue to be identified, and Kyungsoo wants to say he can tell them their names, but he abstains.
They take him to the Fuji View Hotel, which lives up to its name. It’s the best view a hotel can get of Mt. Fuji, and at sixty thousand Yen a night, it offers a widescreen view of the mountain in every room. Kyungsoo doesn’t stay there; he can barely afford it at the moment, but he splurges on a quick Kaiseki meal before the next bus comes at the entrance of the hotel. A couple of hikers in their designer leather and fleece gear walk in the restaurant and smell Kyungsoo before they see him. They grumble about how they pay an exorbitant amount of money to hike in luxury, and they have to deal with filthy mongers getting handouts from the restaurant. Kyungsoo just takes the gripes; he’s just happy they’re alive.
The bus comes and Kyungsoo hurries on it, sitting in the front seat. Two more people follow behind him, and he doesn’t notice how they wrinkle their nose at his appearance. The bus drives down a winding road, before hitting National 139 and Kyungsoo lays his head against the window, watching the trees get smaller and smaller behind him, yet Mt. Fuji stays the same. A gentle rain starts and pelts at the windows, lulling Kyungsoo to a power-nap.
---
The man carefully ties the rope on a thick limb of a tree adjacent to the clearing. Hee Young is still nailed to her cross, getting weaker by the minute, and the man can see her, and if Hee Young had the strength to turn her head to the right, she’d see him. The man swallows thickly and thinks about all the bad things that happened in his life, all the failures at work and in his social life have led him to do this, and he slowly puts his head through the noose. It’s not too tight, and his head isn’t going to slip out from it.
“Are you going?” Hee Young whispers and the man almost doesn’t hear her.
“Yes,” he whispers back.
“Ready when you are.”
The man braces himself, and then thinks about the months he spent with Hee Young, not only the first woman he’s ever loved, but the first woman who ever looked at him and actually want to deal with him. He remembers the smell of her hair, the unique taste of her kisses, the soggy gyoza dumplings she served in that dingy bar, the nights they spent talking and sharing and agreeing with each other. He pauses for a few moments, feeling something inside him stir. He can’t leave the world just yet. He hasn’t fully lived. The pain of heartbreak and failure, he’s experienced them all, and why is he throwing it all away?
The man sits on the boughs of the tree, preparing to jump off. It’s not even eight feet off the ground, but it looks like it’s an eighty foot drop. He shakes his head, sighing, and takes off the noose. He jumps down and the sound of the leaves muffle his fall, and Hee Young doesn’t make a sound. The man takes the hammer from the bag and wastes no time taking out the horseshoe nails. When the first one rips out of Hee Young’s hand, she cries out, surprisingly loud and piercing despite her parched throat. The man is glad she’s still alive, and take out the other one, fresh blood making his grip slippery, but he keeps at it.
“What are you doing!” Hee Young cries out, gasping as the man unties her arms and legs. She collapses in his arms, crying weakly. The man sets her down on the ground and hurriedly takes off his shirt and rips it into strips, tightly wrapping Hee Young’s hands.
“I’m sorry my love,” the man breathes. “But I can’t- we can’t do this. We may have had the worst lives, and no matter what we did, nothing good came to us. I was so set on dying with you, because I didn’t want to be alone when I crossed over, but we can’t die. Not now.”
“What are you talking about?”
“We’re going to go back home. I’m going to take care of you. I’m going to get a new job and we’ll be happy. We may struggle a bit but we’ll be happy together, because I love you, okay?” The man realizes he’s shouting, but he keeps at it. Hee Young is going to pass out from blood loss. “I love you Hee Young, please, we can’t die right now.” He gathers their food supply and bags, and with surprising strength he lifts Hee Young into his arms. She doesn’t resist, but rather nuzzles in his arms. The evening is settling into night, but the man wastes no time in leaving. Pumped with adrenaline, he endures the whipping of branches and vines twisting and slippery boulders. He covers a lot of ground before he hears Hee Young whimper in his arms. His body tells him to stop, so he sits down at by tree as the darkness thickens and the crickets begin chirping. He endures the chill and holds Hee Young close, thinking he hears her whisper “I love you,” before he drifts off into sleep
・
The bus drops Kyungsoo off at the stop near the small inn he stayed earlier. Standing there, he remembers the promise that he made with the innkeeper. It’s a two minute walk, and when he opens the door to the brightly lit standing area, he smells the simmering broth of the stew that the hostess made for him one night. He kicks off his boots and winces as his blisters come to contact with the wooden floor.
As soon as he sets his pack down, he hears the sound of feet hurrying to the front. “Hello?” Kyungsoo calls. The innkeeper pokes his head out from one of the rooms. When he recognizes Kyungsoo past the grime, he cries out and hugs Kyungsoo tightly to his frail body, surprising Kyungsoo, but he welcomes it all the same.
“Oh!” The innkeeper cries out, patting Kyungsoo’s back and squeezing him. “Oh, I thought you have forgotten! I thought you were lost forever!” Kyungsoo feels warmth and wetness drip on his shoulders, and realizes the innkeeper is crying. He doesn’t say anything, but returns the hug and blinks back tears.
He’s been in the forest for eight days.
・
A few days later, Kyungsoo is back in South Korea. When his phone is completely charged and updated, he listens to the dozens of voicemails left by Sulhee, and his colleagues, and one from a bill collector. When he gets home, he sets his stuff down and pulls out his writing pad, straightening out the pages that got crumpled on the plane ride. He listens to the voicemails, half of them from Sulhee and colleagues asking if he was okay, if his writing is finished, and to contact them as soon as possible. Halfway through the seventh voicemail, his phone rings. It’s Sulhee, and Kyungsoo lets it go straight to the answering machine.
“Kyungsoo yah, are you there?” Sulhee’s disembodied voice is loud even when Kyungsoo walks into another room. “You were supposed to contact us when you got back to Korea. I was going to pick you up from the airport yesterday, but you weren’t on the plane. I hope you’re back.” There is a pause, Sulhee sighs, and Kyungsoo walks to the bathroom to take a shower. “Anyway,” she continues. “Come tomorrow to show me your progress, okay? And answer your phone!” She hangs up after a moment, and the silence that follows it is cut by the sound of the water running.
・
Sulhee has a frown on her face when Kyungsoo just shows up without scheduling anything, but when she finds out he’s written more than half the novel, her frown dissipates when she reads Kyungsoo’s writing.
“Classic Do Kyungsoo material,” she says when she’s on page fifty-nine. “Gripping, a little bland in some parts, and on page forty-two you write in Japanese instead of Korean, but I’m not sure if that is what you’re going for.”
“I don’t really remember what I was writing.” Though Kyungsoo slept soundly last night, he still feels drained, and the dark circles around his eyes have Sulhee wanting to question what happened to him, but the look on Kyungsoo’s face keeps her quiet. When she gets to the scenes in the forest, the upbeat expression on her face slides off and she puts down her cup of coffee. The flipping of the pages permeates the palpable silence between them. Kyungsoo doesn’t bother looking at her.
In forty-five minutes, she finishes it, setting the writing pad down and lets out a huge breath. “Wow,” she breathes. “That was... heavy.”
“Heavy?”
“Incredibly gut-wrenching. This is something that we need in the literary culture. Budding romance with soft characters with deep insides-”
“You’re not making any sense to me.”
“This is perfect. This is going to be huge. With a bit of revising, this thing could be the best novel of the year, no, the decade.” Sulhee is excited and ignores the blank and exhausted look on Kyungsoo. “Let’s get started on this!” She makes a move to get up from her desk and head out of her office, but when Kyungsoo doesn’t follow, she turns back to him.
“I didn’t want to ask, because I don’t want to pry,” she crosses her arms, “but you’re not your usual upbeat self. Sure you’re quiet, but, you seemed incredibly drained.” She walks closer until they are facing each other, and she puts a reassuring hand on his shoulder.
“Did you witness something while you were out there?”
Kyungsoo just shakes his head. “I just got lost.” Is all he tells her.
・
Kyungsoo and team of editors spend the next five months proofreading, editing, adding paragraphs and cutting out chapters entirely. Kyungsoo writes a new ending, where the couple returns to Korea and the man returns to office work, along with four other scenes in the book. The woman never really gets full usage of her hands, and becomes handicapped. The editors ask if Kyungsoo ever thought about giving the male character a name, and Kyungsoo just blurts out Kwon Young Hae. They spend the bulk of that time finding an illustrator to create the book cover in time for the deadline. Apparently the publishing office created a frenzy among the newspapers and literary giants, telling them that Kyungsoo is going to write a new novel better than the last, while Kyungsoo was away. The final novel, after months of revising, has been condensed into a cohesive three hundred and ten pages. The illustrator is behind, but after a week he gives the publishing office a watercolor version of the sea of green. “A homage to Seicho Matsumoto’s Tower of Waves,” the illustrator hands Kyungsoo the copy of the artwork. “Your last book was fantastic, if I can say so myself.”
“Thanks.” Kyungsoo puts the cover on one of the copies of the books, while two others went to the printing press. The cover was a mix of sage, chartreuse, and emerald, with glossy white lettering, Find Me in the Green by Do Kyungsoo in giant fancy script. That super ecstatic feeling he gets whenever his writing gets published is replaced with shame. I’m Sorry, is what the title should be.
“This is beautiful.” He says to the illustrator. The illustrator beams at him.
・
When the book is sold in stores, it is a huge hit. Kyungsoo knows he’s popular and he tries to stay humble, but when the bookstores in Seoul and Busan run out of their fifty thousand copies, and then beg for Kyungsoo to do a book signing, Kyungsoo thinks it’s too much. It’s not long until he’s asked to do literature seminars in some of Korea’s most affluent universities, and he gives his agent at the publishing office the choice to pick which major newspaper gets to interview him. It hits the number one bestseller spot for books, and shortly it makes its way to Japan, China, and Malaysia. Kyungsoo gets to talk on a TV show about his book, and he musters up the courage to make stuff up on the fly about how proud he is of the book, how surprised he is that it’s better than the previous one. Critics say it’s a mix of tragedy and mortal compassion, a romance story that unhinges you and yet the average person can relate to. Others say it strikes controversy, that is it almost glorifies suicide, and online reading blogs agree with them as well. While they love the book, and are glad that the couple gives life another chance, there’s the risk of someone taking this literally and killing themselves.
“That’s the risk people take when they write,” is Kyungsoo’s answer when a news channel does a piece on him. “I don’t glorify suicide, I don’t glorify death, for death is something we all go through, but I wrote this purely because I could, because there’s someone out there who probably felt the same way the characters felt, and despite how close they were to dying, they decided to give life another shot. It’s basically what our lives are all about, don’t you think?”
The interviewer nods, gives a signal to have the cameraman focus on Kyungsoo’s face. “And the character’s names? What made you choose them? Hee Young sounds like a little girl.”
Kyungsoo chuckles lightly. “Hee Young is the name for eternal pleasure, and she’s Young Hae’s paradise, basically. His little flower.”
“And Young Hae?”
“Young Hae is the Korean name for Ryohei.” Kyungsoo just shrugs.
・
It is nearing Christmas Eve and Kyungsoo still gets recognized on the streets as the famous writer guy. So far, Find Me in the Green is already translated into English and German, and Korean, Japanese, and even a couple of production companies in Europe are trying to see who can make a film adaptation of the book. There’s already talks of a television mini series with some popular Korean idols playing the couple, but Kyungsoo doesn’t bother to offer help to them to get into character.
When he visits his parents house, his mother is in the kitchen brewing coffee, and his father has the latest copy of Kyungsoo’s book on the table. His father looks at him, and Kyungsoo can see the age lines from the entry in the door way.
“Father?” Kyungsoo asks quietly. His mother hears him and comes out of the kitchen. She offers a soft smile but says nothing.
“This book,” Kyungsoo’s father says finally, “hurts.”
Kyungsoo looks down and doesn’t meet his father’s gaze. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs. He’s been saying that a lot since he returned.
“I’ve never thought you’d write something so painful, so depressing, yet so uplifting.” His father takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes.
“You made your father cry.” Kyungsoo’s mother adds.
“I’m sorry.” Kyungsoo still doesn’t look up. “Did you... did you hate it?” He asks.
“Oh no, I didn’t. I’m in a mix of pride and shame though. I didn’t think you’d have the gumption to write this.”
“You’re ashamed?”
“I wasn’t aware my son wanted to glorify death.” His father sighs and his mother reaches over to pat his arm.
“It’s okay dear,” she says, “it’s fiction.”
“And fiction inspires people to do things.”
“Please just be proud that our son is making an honest successful living?” Kyungsoo’s mother looks at her son, and he lifts his head to look at her.
“We both read it from cover to cover,” she says.
“I’m sorry.”
“We both cried but we love it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Please know that we’re always proud of you and want you to continue doing what you love.”
“I never thought I’d be able to feel a mixture of every emotion while reading,” his father cuts in. “But answer this question: what do you think the dead have to say about this?”
Kyungsoo doesn’t have an answer. He leaves his parent’s house an hour later, unsure if he insulted the one person he wanted to impress.
・
The first week of March is damp and the remnants of February’s snow still hangs on when most of it has melted when Kyungsoo comes back to Aokigahara. The trees have clumps of snow on its branches, and a gentle wind creates a frigid breeze that bites through his coat. No one is in the parking lot, and a towing company picked up the abandoned vehicle already. Kyungsoo closes his eyes, ignoring his phone ringing in his pocket. He takes slow steps towards the entrance of the forest again, and in the corner of his eye he thinks he sees five hikers walking into the thick of the forest. When he turns his head, they are gone, and Kyungsoo expects that. The trees sway in the wind, the sound of wood creaking and the whooshing of leaves creating a vortex of sound that beckons Kyungsoo to come closer. It sounds angry, and he whispers “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. Please forgive me.” He’s in touching distance of the trees, and beyond is the sea of green and brown he once got lost in. Blinking once, Kyungsoo steps into the forest once more.
Kyungsoo doesn’t come back out.
・
- What the fuck did I write
-If I took someone's idea for this fic, know that I wasn't aiming for that, and I've been planning this fic for a really long time. I apologize if I had, I didn't steal any ideas from anyone (I don't think I did)
-I want to make a sad. did I achieve that?
-I've never written angst in my life and after this I don't plan to
-I like to apologize that the grammar is really sketchy I was writing this on Google Docs and they don't show you that you need to revise your grammar.
- Writing a story within a story is difficult how did Sir Richard Burton even deal
-usually I rush through my writing and I don't have it proofread. this time, it took me around 8 months to finish it, and I had 4 people read it for me replayourmakeup leorizanzel deferto_neminem, and Veli
-honestly that Ryohei scene was all Veli, if you have Tumblr or Twitter please follow him he is your new angst god.
-I love Veli
- I looked everywhere for the Korean translation for Ryohei's name and all I found was Younghae. not even sure if it's right ;~;
- Hee Young is a Korean name for eternal/eternity and pleasure. her Japanese counterpart is Emi (Ich glaube)
-I know Mochizuki sounds like I made it up but I looked it up and Mochizuki is the 3rd most common surname in the Yamanashi prefecture I'm not making this up! (Yamanashi Prefecture is where Aokigahara is)
-why did I write this
-here have a cute emoj ☀ヽ(◕ω ◕｀ヽ)
When authorities find him asleep on the shore of Lake Saiko, one kicks him awake. Kyungsoo sits up, as if shocked, and looks scared. When he realizes that he’s near people that are alive, and that no, walking to Lake Saiko wasn’t a dream, Kyungsoo almost cries in front of the park officials.
“Foreigner?” One of the park officials look at his disheveled appearance, pity heavy in his eyes.
Everything bursts out of Kyungsoo. “I went into the forest to write, but I got lost and then I found five people dead-” Kyungsoo holds out his hands, five fingers splayed. “They killed themselves! They’re dead and I tried screaming for help but no one would come! You’ve got to help me!” Taking in the looks from the park officials makes Kyungsoo unsure if he is speaking Japanese, or using correct grammar. He calms down and swallows to wet his throat. “Five dead people,” he keeps repeating. The looks on the park officials’ faces tell him that they understand him.
“Where?” One of them asks. Kyungsoo doesn’t want to go back in the forest, so he points at the forest.
“Deep in there. There’s a small clearing and the smell will tell you. I tied a cloth around a tree trunk in case someone did.” Kyungsoo gives them as much information as he can, begging them to not let him go back into the forest. After what feels like a long time, two park officials head into the forest, with the remaining two leading Kyungsoo to the nearby rest stop for further questioning.
It feels like it’s been years since Kyungsoo has sat in a chair. It’s a basic collapsible metal chair, but Kyungsoo sinks into it as if it’s the lazy armchair back at home. The park officials have him fill out a statement, and one- named Official Hameda- hands him an apple, and Kyungsoo almost eats it out of his hand.
“So, explain to us how you found the bodies.” The other official, Shimizu, a female, says to Kyungsoo as he immediately finishes the apple.
Kyungsoo clears his throat. “I woke up one morning to the sound of several men outside my tent. I was confused what was happening, but then I realized that they were cutting down a man who hung himself on the tree above my tent-”
“Another body?” Hameda cuts in.
“It was taken away, by other park officials. One park official, Mochizuki, told me to head west and I’d hit the Aokigahara trail, and not far from it would be Lake Saiko. I’m not sure if he gave me wrong directions, because I was walking for at least a few hours when I found a clearing, and then I-”
“You found the bodies.” Shimizu’s pen darts across the page as she writes all of this down.
Kyungsoo nods, a lump forming in his throat. “Y-yeah, the bodies. Five of them. Two were foreigners, three Japanese. They died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds to the head. The night before they died, it was raining. I heard distant thunder, but I think- I think it was them shooting themselves ”
“Any suicide notes?”
“I don’t think so, I didn’t check. I tried to find help as best as I could.”
Shimizu reads over her handwriting. “So you ran into a Park Official Mochizuki?” She asks.
“Yeah.”
“We don’t know a Mochizuki that works here.”
“You don’t? He says he’s worked here for over twenty years.”
Hameda and Shimizu give each other pointed looks and turn to face Kyungsoo.
“We know all the park officials that oversee the protection of the forest,” Hameda states.
“I’ve worked here close to thirteen years,” Shimizu adds. “There’s no Mochizuki that works here.”
・
In a few hours Shimizu and Hameda get a call on their radios from the other officials. They have found the bodies, and have requested a retrieval team to get body bags. Kyungsoo is told that the bodies have been taken to the nearby morgue to be identified, and Kyungsoo wants to say he can tell them their names, but he abstains.
They take him to the Fuji View Hotel, which lives up to its name. It’s the best view a hotel can get of Mt. Fuji, and at sixty thousand Yen a night, it offers a widescreen view of the mountain in every room. Kyungsoo doesn’t stay there; he can barely afford it at the moment, but he splurges on a quick Kaiseki meal before the next bus comes at the entrance of the hotel. A couple of hikers in their designer leather and fleece gear walk in the restaurant and smell Kyungsoo before they see him. They grumble about how they pay an exorbitant amount of money to hike in luxury, and they have to deal with filthy mongers getting handouts from the restaurant. Kyungsoo just takes the gripes; he’s just happy they’re alive.
The bus comes and Kyungsoo hurries on it, sitting in the front seat. Two more people follow behind him, and he doesn’t notice how they wrinkle their nose at his appearance. The bus drives down a winding road, before hitting National 139 and Kyungsoo lays his head against the window, watching the trees get smaller and smaller behind him, yet Mt. Fuji stays the same. A gentle rain starts and pelts at the windows, lulling Kyungsoo to a power-nap.
---
The man carefully ties the rope on a thick limb of a tree adjacent to the clearing. Hee Young is still nailed to her cross, getting weaker by the minute, and the man can see her, and if Hee Young had the strength to turn her head to the right, she’d see him. The man swallows thickly and thinks about all the bad things that happened in his life, all the failures at work and in his social life have led him to do this, and he slowly puts his head through the noose. It’s not too tight, and his head isn’t going to slip out from it.
“Are you going?” Hee Young whispers and the man almost doesn’t hear her.
“Yes,” he whispers back.
“Ready when you are.”
The man braces himself, and then thinks about the months he spent with Hee Young, not only the first woman he’s ever loved, but the first woman who ever looked at him and actually want to deal with him. He remembers the smell of her hair, the unique taste of her kisses, the soggy gyoza dumplings she served in that dingy bar, the nights they spent talking and sharing and agreeing with each other. He pauses for a few moments, feeling something inside him stir. He can’t leave the world just yet. He hasn’t fully lived. The pain of heartbreak and failure, he’s experienced them all, and why is he throwing it all away?
The man sits on the boughs of the tree, preparing to jump off. It’s not even eight feet off the ground, but it looks like it’s an eighty foot drop. He shakes his head, sighing, and takes off the noose. He jumps down and the sound of the leaves muffle his fall, and Hee Young doesn’t make a sound. The man takes the hammer from the bag and wastes no time taking out the horseshoe nails. When the first one rips out of Hee Young’s hand, she cries out, surprisingly loud and piercing despite her parched throat. The man is glad she’s still alive, and take out the other one, fresh blood making his grip slippery, but he keeps at it.
“What are you doing!” Hee Young cries out, gasping as the man unties her arms and legs. She collapses in his arms, crying weakly. The man sets her down on the ground and hurriedly takes off his shirt and rips it into strips, tightly wrapping Hee Young’s hands.
“I’m sorry my love,” the man breathes. “But I can’t- we can’t do this. We may have had the worst lives, and no matter what we did, nothing good came to us. I was so set on dying with you, because I didn’t want to be alone when I crossed over, but we can’t die. Not now.”
“What are you talking about?”
“We’re going to go back home. I’m going to take care of you. I’m going to get a new job and we’ll be happy. We may struggle a bit but we’ll be happy together, because I love you, okay?” The man realizes he’s shouting, but he keeps at it. Hee Young is going to pass out from blood loss. “I love you Hee Young, please, we can’t die right now.” He gathers their food supply and bags, and with surprising strength he lifts Hee Young into his arms. She doesn’t resist, but rather nuzzles in his arms. The evening is settling into night, but the man wastes no time in leaving. Pumped with adrenaline, he endures the whipping of branches and vines twisting and slippery boulders. He covers a lot of ground before he hears Hee Young whimper in his arms. His body tells him to stop, so he sits down at by tree as the darkness thickens and the crickets begin chirping. He endures the chill and holds Hee Young close, thinking he hears her whisper “I love you,” before he drifts off into sleep
・
The bus drops Kyungsoo off at the stop near the small inn he stayed earlier. Standing there, he remembers the promise that he made with the innkeeper. It’s a two minute walk, and when he opens the door to the brightly lit standing area, he smells the simmering broth of the stew that the hostess made for him one night. He kicks off his boots and winces as his blisters come to contact with the wooden floor.
As soon as he sets his pack down, he hears the sound of feet hurrying to the front. “Hello?” Kyungsoo calls. The innkeeper pokes his head out from one of the rooms. When he recognizes Kyungsoo past the grime, he cries out and hugs Kyungsoo tightly to his frail body, surprising Kyungsoo, but he welcomes it all the same.
“Oh!” The innkeeper cries out, patting Kyungsoo’s back and squeezing him. “Oh, I thought you have forgotten! I thought you were lost forever!” Kyungsoo feels warmth and wetness drip on his shoulders, and realizes the innkeeper is crying. He doesn’t say anything, but returns the hug and blinks back tears.
He’s been in the forest for eight days.
・
A few days later, Kyungsoo is back in South Korea. When his phone is completely charged and updated, he listens to the dozens of voicemails left by Sulhee, and his colleagues, and one from a bill collector. When he gets home, he sets his stuff down and pulls out his writing pad, straightening out the pages that got crumpled on the plane ride. He listens to the voicemails, half of them from Sulhee and colleagues asking if he was okay, if his writing is finished, and to contact them as soon as possible. Halfway through the seventh voicemail, his phone rings. It’s Sulhee, and Kyungsoo lets it go straight to the answering machine.
“Kyungsoo yah, are you there?” Sulhee’s disembodied voice is loud even when Kyungsoo walks into another room. “You were supposed to contact us when you got back to Korea. I was going to pick you up from the airport yesterday, but you weren’t on the plane. I hope you’re back.” There is a pause, Sulhee sighs, and Kyungsoo walks to the bathroom to take a shower. “Anyway,” she continues. “Come tomorrow to show me your progress, okay? And answer your phone!” She hangs up after a moment, and the silence that follows it is cut by the sound of the water running.
・
Sulhee has a frown on her face when Kyungsoo just shows up without scheduling anything, but when she finds out he’s written more than half the novel, her frown dissipates when she reads Kyungsoo’s writing.
“Classic Do Kyungsoo material,” she says when she’s on page fifty-nine. “Gripping, a little bland in some parts, and on page forty-two you write in Japanese instead of Korean, but I’m not sure if that is what you’re going for.”
“I don’t really remember what I was writing.” Though Kyungsoo slept soundly last night, he still feels drained, and the dark circles around his eyes have Sulhee wanting to question what happened to him, but the look on Kyungsoo’s face keeps her quiet. When she gets to the scenes in the forest, the upbeat expression on her face slides off and she puts down her cup of coffee. The flipping of the pages permeates the palpable silence between them. Kyungsoo doesn’t bother looking at her.
In forty-five minutes, she finishes it, setting the writing pad down and lets out a huge breath. “Wow,” she breathes. “That was... heavy.”
“Heavy?”
“Incredibly gut-wrenching. This is something that we need in the literary culture. Budding romance with soft characters with deep insides-”
“You’re not making any sense to me.”
“This is perfect. This is going to be huge. With a bit of revising, this thing could be the best novel of the year, no, the decade.” Sulhee is excited and ignores the blank and exhausted look on Kyungsoo. “Let’s get started on this!” She makes a move to get up from her desk and head out of her office, but when Kyungsoo doesn’t follow, she turns back to him.
“I didn’t want to ask, because I don’t want to pry,” she crosses her arms, “but you’re not your usual upbeat self. Sure you’re quiet, but, you seemed incredibly drained.” She walks closer until they are facing each other, and she puts a reassuring hand on his shoulder.
“Did you witness something while you were out there?”
Kyungsoo just shakes his head. “I just got lost.” Is all he tells her.
・
Kyungsoo and team of editors spend the next five months proofreading, editing, adding paragraphs and cutting out chapters entirely. Kyungsoo writes a new ending, where the couple returns to Korea and the man returns to office work, along with four other scenes in the book. The woman never really gets full usage of her hands, and becomes handicapped. The editors ask if Kyungsoo ever thought about giving the male character a name, and Kyungsoo just blurts out Kwon Young Hae. They spend the bulk of that time finding an illustrator to create the book cover in time for the deadline. Apparently the publishing office created a frenzy among the newspapers and literary giants, telling them that Kyungsoo is going to write a new novel better than the last, while Kyungsoo was away. The final novel, after months of revising, has been condensed into a cohesive three hundred and ten pages. The illustrator is behind, but after a week he gives the publishing office a watercolor version of the sea of green. “A homage to Seicho Matsumoto’s Tower of Waves,” the illustrator hands Kyungsoo the copy of the artwork. “Your last book was fantastic, if I can say so myself.”
“Thanks.” Kyungsoo puts the cover on one of the copies of the books, while two others went to the printing press. The cover was a mix of sage, chartreuse, and emerald, with glossy white lettering, Find Me in the Green by Do Kyungsoo in giant fancy script. That super ecstatic feeling he gets whenever his writing gets published is replaced with shame. I’m Sorry, is what the title should be.
“This is beautiful.” He says to the illustrator. The illustrator beams at him.
・
When the book is sold in stores, it is a huge hit. Kyungsoo knows he’s popular and he tries to stay humble, but when the bookstores in Seoul and Busan run out of their fifty thousand copies, and then beg for Kyungsoo to do a book signing, Kyungsoo thinks it’s too much. It’s not long until he’s asked to do literature seminars in some of Korea’s most affluent universities, and he gives his agent at the publishing office the choice to pick which major newspaper gets to interview him. It hits the number one bestseller spot for books, and shortly it makes its way to Japan, China, and Malaysia. Kyungsoo gets to talk on a TV show about his book, and he musters up the courage to make stuff up on the fly about how proud he is of the book, how surprised he is that it’s better than the previous one. Critics say it’s a mix of tragedy and mortal compassion, a romance story that unhinges you and yet the average person can relate to. Others say it strikes controversy, that is it almost glorifies suicide, and online reading blogs agree with them as well. While they love the book, and are glad that the couple gives life another chance, there’s the risk of someone taking this literally and killing themselves.
“That’s the risk people take when they write,” is Kyungsoo’s answer when a news channel does a piece on him. “I don’t glorify suicide, I don’t glorify death, for death is something we all go through, but I wrote this purely because I could, because there’s someone out there who probably felt the same way the characters felt, and despite how close they were to dying, they decided to give life another shot. It’s basically what our lives are all about, don’t you think?”
The interviewer nods, gives a signal to have the cameraman focus on Kyungsoo’s face. “And the character’s names? What made you choose them? Hee Young sounds like a little girl.”
Kyungsoo chuckles lightly. “Hee Young is the name for eternal pleasure, and she’s Young Hae’s paradise, basically. His little flower.”
“And Young Hae?”
“Young Hae is the Korean name for Ryohei.” Kyungsoo just shrugs.
・
It is nearing Christmas Eve and Kyungsoo still gets recognized on the streets as the famous writer guy. So far, Find Me in the Green is already translated into English and German, and Korean, Japanese, and even a couple of production companies in Europe are trying to see who can make a film adaptation of the book. There’s already talks of a television mini series with some popular Korean idols playing the couple, but Kyungsoo doesn’t bother to offer help to them to get into character.
When he visits his parents house, his mother is in the kitchen brewing coffee, and his father has the latest copy of Kyungsoo’s book on the table. His father looks at him, and Kyungsoo can see the age lines from the entry in the door way.
“Father?” Kyungsoo asks quietly. His mother hears him and comes out of the kitchen. She offers a soft smile but says nothing.
“This book,” Kyungsoo’s father says finally, “hurts.”
Kyungsoo looks down and doesn’t meet his father’s gaze. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs. He’s been saying that a lot since he returned.
“I’ve never thought you’d write something so painful, so depressing, yet so uplifting.” His father takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes.
“You made your father cry.” Kyungsoo’s mother adds.
“I’m sorry.” Kyungsoo still doesn’t look up. “Did you... did you hate it?” He asks.
“Oh no, I didn’t. I’m in a mix of pride and shame though. I didn’t think you’d have the gumption to write this.”
“You’re ashamed?”
“I wasn’t aware my son wanted to glorify death.” His father sighs and his mother reaches over to pat his arm.
“It’s okay dear,” she says, “it’s fiction.”
“And fiction inspires people to do things.”
“Please just be proud that our son is making an honest successful living?” Kyungsoo’s mother looks at her son, and he lifts his head to look at her.
“We both read it from cover to cover,” she says.
“I’m sorry.”
“We both cried but we love it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Please know that we’re always proud of you and want you to continue doing what you love.”
“I never thought I’d be able to feel a mixture of every emotion while reading,” his father cuts in. “But answer this question: what do you think the dead have to say about this?”
Kyungsoo doesn’t have an answer. He leaves his parent’s house an hour later, unsure if he insulted the one person he wanted to impress.
・
The first week of March is damp and the remnants of February’s snow still hangs on when most of it has melted when Kyungsoo comes back to Aokigahara. The trees have clumps of snow on its branches, and a gentle wind creates a frigid breeze that bites through his coat. No one is in the parking lot, and a towing company picked up the abandoned vehicle already. Kyungsoo closes his eyes, ignoring his phone ringing in his pocket. He takes slow steps towards the entrance of the forest again, and in the corner of his eye he thinks he sees five hikers walking into the thick of the forest. When he turns his head, they are gone, and Kyungsoo expects that. The trees sway in the wind, the sound of wood creaking and the whooshing of leaves creating a vortex of sound that beckons Kyungsoo to come closer. It sounds angry, and he whispers “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. Please forgive me.” He’s in touching distance of the trees, and beyond is the sea of green and brown he once got lost in. Blinking once, Kyungsoo steps into the forest once more.
Kyungsoo doesn’t come back out.
・
- What the fuck did I write
-If I took someone's idea for this fic, know that I wasn't aiming for that, and I've been planning this fic for a really long time. I apologize if I had, I didn't steal any ideas from anyone (I don't think I did)
-I want to make a sad. did I achieve that?
-I've never written angst in my life and after this I don't plan to
-I like to apologize that the grammar is really sketchy I was writing this on Google Docs and they don't show you that you need to revise your grammar.
- Writing a story within a story is difficult how did Sir Richard Burton even deal
-usually I rush through my writing and I don't have it proofread. this time, it took me around 8 months to finish it, and I had 4 people read it for me replayourmakeup leorizanzel deferto_neminem, and Veli
-honestly that Ryohei scene was all Veli, if you have Tumblr or Twitter please follow him he is your new angst god.
-I love Veli
- I looked everywhere for the Korean translation for Ryohei's name and all I found was Younghae. not even sure if it's right ;~;
- Hee Young is a Korean name for eternal/eternity and pleasure. her Japanese counterpart is Emi (Ich glaube)
-I know Mochizuki sounds like I made it up but I looked it up and Mochizuki is the 3rd most common surname in the Yamanashi prefecture I'm not making this up! (Yamanashi Prefecture is where Aokigahara is)
-why did I write this
-here have a cute emoj ☀ヽ(◕ω ◕｀ヽ)