A Gangster Return To Highschool, Chapter 08
A Gangster Return To Highschool, Chapter 08
"I'm new here, so I don't know much. Do we sit by number?"
The group with which the girl was playing either hardened their expressions or tried to stifle their laughter, and Kim Deuk-pal sensed he had made a faux pas. But thanks to Song I-heon's likable appearance, he wasn't openly scorned. One girl, who had a pink blanket over her shoulders, leaned her elbow on Kim Deuk-pal's desk and propped her chin with curiosity, making him awkwardly push his chair back a bit.
"We haven't decided on seats yet. Sit wherever you like. But are you a transfer student?"
"Huh? ...No."
Kim Deuk-pal shook his head. He had Song I-heon’s school uniform, so he wasn't a transfer student.
"Really? I went to elementary and middle school in this area, so I know most of the kids in our grade. But you're a new face."
"Maybe he was in the old building."
"If he was in the old building, he would faint seeing the new building's bathroom."
Before he knew it, the girls had turned towards him, discussing among themselves. Not exactly included in the conversation but not excluded either, Kim Deuk-pal wore an ambiguous smile. His eyes were as sharp as blades, but his lips betrayed his tension by forcing a smile, which somehow made him likable. The smallest girl, who had been staring at him, suddenly asked.
"What's your name?"
"Me?"
When Kim Deuk-pal awkwardly pointed to himself as he did at the school gate, the girl pouted her lips and nodded.
"My name is-"
Bang, bang! Some noise interrupted him. The source of the noise was a young female teacher who struck the classroom door with the attendance book to gain everyone's attention.
"Kids, take your seats!"
Even the girls who were looking at Kim Deuk-pal sat down quickly, and students running around at the back of the classroom scrambled to find their seats, causing a ruckus. Once all the students were seated, the female teacher wrote her name on the blackboard and leaned on the lectern.
"Do you all know who I am?"
"Yes!"
She seemed to be a popular teacher as cheers erupted from the students. Only Kim Deuk-pal sat there, frozen stiff. After waiting for the students to quiet down, she gave a brief introduction.
"But to introduce myself, I am Jeong Eun-chae, the homeroom teacher for Class 1 of the third year. My subject is English, let's do well this year!"
As she finished her introduction crisply, the students clapped as if they had been waiting. Kim Deuk-pal, not understanding why, clapped along with the children, thinking she must be a good and well-liked young teacher.
"You all know each other, right?"
"Yes!"
No... Kim Deuk-pal pitifully denied this alone.
"Still, since it's the first day, let's call roll. Se-kyung is in our class but the teacher sent him on an errand..., number 1, Kang Woo-min!"
The boy sitting at the back answered and raised his hand high. So, that's how you respond. Kim Deuk-pal observed carefully while waiting for his turn. It seemed the boys' numbers were called first as only boys raised their hands one after another. When surnames starting with 'M' were called, Kim Deuk-pal tensed up, his arm trembling slightly in preparation to raise his hand. He cleared his throat, hoping not to make a mistake.
"Number 12, Song..."
The female teacher's eyes wavered as she read the attendance book. She hesitated, spacing out the pronunciation of the name.
"...I-heon!"
"Yes!"
Kim Deuk-pal raised his hand high. The classroom, which had been buzzing with excitement, suddenly became as silent as if cold water had been poured over it. Feeling the odd silence like a vacuum, Kim Deuk-pal looked around, and a chill ran down his spine as if he were watching a horror movie.
Not just the homeroom teacher, but every student in the class was staring at him.
Their eyes, spaced evenly like dots, watched him without blinking.
"...Number 13, Lee Jae-geun."
The homeroom teacher, with a stiff tongue, called the next number, and only then did the stares return to normal. However, the casual chatter was just a facade. The students were all on edge about Song I-heon.
In this classroom, there might be many who didn't know Song I-heon's face, but no one was unaware of Song I-heon. Not just in this classroom, but everyone in the school knew him.
Song I-heon, the gay student who was outed to the entire school.
Since the first day of high school, Song I-heon had been quietly ostracized for being unkempt and having an introverted personality. He was an easy target for bullying by Hong Jae-min's gang, making him a pariah, but the real reason he became notorious throughout the school was different.
Even if teenagers weren't entirely immune to the concept of sexual diversity, the abstract idea of 'homosexuality' was somewhat acceptable. However, if the homosexual had a specific object of affection, then the narrative changed. Especially if that object was a well-known figure with titles like 'student council president' or 'top student' in the school. The rumor that someone liked Choi Se-kyung, a famous person in the school, spread quickly like wildfire, accompanied by real-life disgust.
Everyone in school pitied Choi Se-kyung and avoided Song I-heon.
Perhaps because of this exclusionary atmosphere, Song I-heon did not attend the supplementary classes during winter break, claiming a traffic accident, but few believed that excuse.
And the person who outed Song I-heon was in this very class.
"Number 16, Choi Se-kyung, was sent on an errand. Number 17, Hong Jae-min." The bright yellow head at the back of the fourth group only raised an arm.
Song I-heon, Choi Se-kyung, and Hong Jae-min were all in the same class, which made the students' faces pale. They had tried to ignore Song I-heon being bullied to avoid being targeted by Hong Jae-min's gang, and they kept quiet to avoid any harm coming to Choi Se-kyung, resulting in this situation.
Thanks to the students' feigned ignorance, no teacher raised an issue with the class roster pairing these three together.
"Jae-min, fix your hair properly by tomorrow. Now, calling the girls."
A silence like that before a storm enveloped the room. While the homeroom teacher continued taking attendance, the students glanced back and forth between Song Iheon, who sat straight listening attentively at the end of the first group, and Hong Jaemin, glaring with gritted teeth at the end of the fourth.
The students' minds started working quickly.
If Song I-heon, the lowest in the pecking order, would quietly become the scapegoat, Hong Jae-min's gang would leave the other students alone, as it was in their second year. This would allow them to focus relatively quietly on their college entrance exams.
The problem was that Song I-heon, with his shaved head, didn't seem likely to become a quiet scapegoat.
Either Song I-heon would resist and return to being Hong Jae-min's lackey as before, or Hong Jae-min would find a new scapegoat. In the latter case, everyone had to be careful not to become that scapegoat themselves. Fortunately, with Choi Sekyung around, things might be better. He was likely to maintain peace in the classroom without disrupting college entrance preparations; even Hong Jae-min backed down in front of him.
"We're having regular classes today, so don't entertain false hopes." "Aw~."
The students, who had been assessing the situation, let out a collective groan of disappointment. The homeroom teacher spread her arms in disbelief.
"Kids, you're in your third year!"
"Ugh~."
"Everyone, attend the first period well, don't doze off. I'll ask the other teachers. See you at homeroom time. Since Se-kyung is the temporary class president, we'll skip introductions."
The homeroom teacher easily ignored the jeers and gathered her attendance register. Before she even left, the students were up, bustling towards their lockers. Only after the homeroom teacher had gone down the stairs and the noise was out of earshot did Hong Jae-min kick his chair and stand up.
Bang! The chair hit the empty desk in front of him and fell, the thin metal legs tangling together. When Hong Jae-min kicked the tangled desk and chair again, the kids around him flinched back. Whether the classmates frowned at his menacing atmosphere or not, Hong Jae-min acted according to his temper.
Walking through the back of the classroom, Song I-heon kicked everything that got in his way towards the end of the first row.
"Hey, Song I-heon, you crazy bastard. Is it you?"
"..."
Song I-heon, looking down at the chair that had come flying to his feet, had his head bowed. As expected, just because someone cuts their hair doesn't mean they change. He would be cornered like a mouse again, just like in the second year. The students surrounding Song I-heon and Hong Jae-min felt both relief and irritation:
relief that they wouldn't be the ones targeted by Hong Jae-min, and irritation at having to watch the strong bully the weak. There was also the discomfort of being a bystander, like a thorn in one's throat.
Song I-heon, who had been thought to be scared, slowly raised his head. Song Iheon, the pathetic one, the frustrating one, the crippled one. His face, always in the shadows, would be adorned with these limited adjectives. The image from last year, when he was trembling pitifully, his long bangs swaying as he looked for someone to help, overlapped with his now short-haired head.
But the long, shaggy bangs were gone now. A student who had been pacing the hallway, annoyed about whether to call a teacher, noticed Song I-heon and took a sharp breath.
Underneath the roughly sticking out short hair was a finely lined forehead. His eyebrows were distinct as if drawn with a brush, and his nose was sharp and slightly upturned, giving him delicate features. His flawless skin and well-defined features made him look fragile, yet his eyes burned with a desire to crush his opponent, worn down by adversity.
His true face was clearly revealed.
"It's you, Jae-min."
Surprisingly, Song I-heon was smiling with delight.
...
Jeong Eun-chae, the homeroom teacher for Grade 3, Class 1, never took students' greetings for granted. When she met a male student on the landing of the stairs leading to the third-floor faculty room and he bowed to her, she responded with an enthusiastic greeting, calling out the student's name. "Hello."
"Park Eun-seong! Did you study hard during the vacation? You look better since I last saw you."
Although the student was as large as a bear, Jeong Eun-chae patted his shoulder, which was higher than hers, as if he were a child. She was a teacher who had only been at the school for a few years, but she was bright and full of passion. She made an effort to memorize the students' names, and although she couldn't solve their problems, she tried to listen and empathize.
Her passion was matched by her sense of challenge; she had volunteered for the senior year homeroom position that young teachers were often not assigned to, and she was also responsible for English, one of the key subjects. Her good reputation among students led to her appointment as the homeroom teacher for Grade 3, Class 1 this year. However, before she could celebrate, her first mission as a homeroom teacher overwhelmed her.
'I am Song I-heon's guardian.'
It was the day before the new semester. An elegant middle-aged woman, dressed in a neat two-piece suit with her hair elegantly pinned up, came looking for Jeong Eunchae. Her attitude, clearly stating their relationship as 'guardian,' made it evident she didn't want any personal entanglement. The middle-aged woman, Lee Mi-kyung, got straight to the point. Song I-heon hadn't been in a traffic accident; he had jumped from an overpass.
It was more of a notification than a consultation, and Lee Mi-kyung left after saying that without further discussion.
Jeong Eun-chae hadn't even known who Song I-heon was until then, and she was dazed, unable to leave the counseling room for a while, not believing that this was all there was to it. He jumped, and that's the end of it? How does the family care for him? Jeong Eun-chae tried calling, but Lee Mi-kyung's attitude was consistent. When she was told to act as if she didn't know, Jeong Eun-chae realized that Song I-heon's family was not normal and that further probing would be pointless.
Jeong Eun-chae sought other solutions. Fortunately, the students generally followed her, and there were students in Song I-heon's year who were close to her. The day before the new semester, she called students who came for self-study to the counseling room under the guise of discussing grades and asked about Song I-heon. She had oneon-one meetings at different times, and the students' assessments of Song I-heon were similar.
In front of the teacher, the reputation of Song I-heon being quiet and shy was predominant, somewhat toned down.
There's no way he would jump from an overpass just because of that. Could there be issues at home? As she pondered deeply, one of the female students whispered in a hesitant, almost fearful manner as if she was afraid of retaliation.
'...Hong Jae-min's group is bullying Song I-heon.'
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