At first, Hojoon explained to people step by step because it was his mistake that they couldn’t understand it easily. But the more they heard his explanations, the likelier many of them would begin to regard him as a barbarian all of a sudden.
As there was more and more progress in science, it helped feng shui become more familiar to people by a lot.
For they could measure the spirit, namely the flow of energy, through all kinds of scientific devices. Nonetheless, feng shui was still simple superstition to the general public.
‘Oh, man! Please stop teaching me from the perspective of feng shui humanities!’ Arum appealed deep inside.
As it happened, Hojoon tried to change the topic.
At the same time, she asked seriously, “Can you really change one’s fate through feng shui?”
Interestingly enough, the business card she took out had a phrase that read, ‘Let me change your fate through feng shui.’
“Do you believe in myongdang?” Hojoon asked back.
“Well, when they talk about feng shui, they usually talk about it, right?” She tried to show him whatever knowledge she had about feng shui.
What she could recall to the best of her memory was myongdang, on the one hand, and paesanimsu or a mountain in the back and a river in the front.
Hojoon liked her facial expression when she was waiting for his reply expectantly.
He deeply wanted to see it more often.
“That’s a secret in this business.”
She was disappointed as she was expecting to hear it.
“Is the consulting fee expensive? Just let me know if this house is myongdang or not, will you?”
“Well…”
What’s more, Hojoon made sport of her by saying, “It looks like this house is not myongdang, given that hyungsa takes place often.”
“You bet. I agree. By the way, can you tell me more about hyungsa specifically?”
“Well, for example, breaking off engagements or forced entry.”
Arum felt embarrassed because she was the cause of all the accidents.
“But it looks like myongdang, given that my elder brother, a celibate, has gotten married.”
“Right. The woman who bought this house back then told me that this house would be her eldest son’s matrimonial home.”
Arum even remembered her name. She was a virtuous-looking woman in her late 50s.
“You should have a conscience,” Hojoon said abruptly.
“Why didn’t you tell me you broke off your engagement when you sold this house to me?” he said, starting to blame her.
“Why should I tell you about something bad?” she retorted, staring at him as if she thought that was ridiculous. And then she sharply continued, “Are you insisting that I should have told everybody I broke off my engagement?”
She felt that his logic was unfair.
When she had to sell her house, she felt devastated because of her separation. In such a situation, was it possible for her to tell the potential buyer, ‘Though I broke off my engagement while I was living in this house, please settle in and enjoy your life!?’
Hojoon replied calmly, “Well, this damned thing, the spirit, is still in this house. So, the potential buyer avoids a house where misfortunes took place. Who would buy the house when its owner died an accidental death, or its family member committed suicide or was evicted here? And that at a high price?”
Arum felt awkward upon hearing that.
“I wouldn’t ask for a high price,” she said in a faint voice.
“You were paid more than the market price of your villa, plus the moving expenses. That’s enough. Did you want more money from the buyer?”
She felt that he was mean and nasty as he spoke so eloquently.
Feeling that she was crestfallen, Hojoon felt sorry for her.
“Oh my god. Your cell phone!”
Both of them had been engrossed in the world of feng shui for a moment and now came back to reality.
“Give me your phone number,” said Hojoon, holding his cell phone. He touched the number on his cell phone as she gave her digits, and pressed the send button. But there was no ringing from her phone anywhere in the house.
She was now worried. Obviously, she had lost it if she couldn’t find it here. What about the pictures and video clips saved in the phone?
The smartphone with all the personal information was like one’s identity to a modern man. In particular, those free spirits who lost their cell phones with the passwords unlocked would be the perfect targets of hackers’ cyberattacks on their personal information.
“Can you call again?”
She felt impatient. She had to retrieve it by all means.
By mobilizing all the cells in her body, she pricked her ears and listened for the ringing.
She found her eyes more and more drawn to the refrigerator.
And she heard a familiar sound from inside.
No way!
The nearer she approached it, the more she became confident.
She couldn’t raise her face. Most likely, she had placed her cell phone in it when she took out water from the refrigerator.
‘How can I take it out without being caught?’ she thought hard.
At that moment, he abruptly passed by her to open the refrigerator.
“Don’t open it!”
Arum held his arm in spite of herself.
“Let me take it out.” But Hojoon, who was quick in movements, was already holding her cell phone, which was pretty cold.
“It’s fortunate that you didn’t put it in the freezing compartment,” he said, handing it to her with a sarcastic smile.
After receiving the phone, she vowed that she would never get entangled with this man ever again. Not only her surprising first encounter with this man, but also her second one, which made her seem stupid, were all ill-fated encounters.
This house must definitely be a haunted house!
Without looking back, she got out of Green Villa.
***
The next morning, Arum boldly reported to work, wearing the same dress she put on the previous day.
It was a publishing company near the City Hall metro station. Her company published a women’s magazine, company newsletters and books. It’s a publishing giant cited as one of the top companies in the field. She landed a job there at her second try, so it was special to her.
Though other students graduated late partly because they were on a leave of absence or went abroad for foreign language training, Arum graduated from college in four years. She took pains not to worry her parents, but she didn’t know how time passed so quickly as she was busy being in love.
When she felt as exhausted with her work as she did these days, she regretted it.
‘I wish I had been on a leave of absence at that time.’
‘I wish I had gone backpacking then.’
‘I wish I had gone abroad for foreign language training.’
But that was just useless daydreaming. As a feature editor with five years of experience, she couldn’t afford to spend time laboring under such a delusion.
She got annoyed at the elevator that she felt was moving pretty slowly today of all days.
Though she sent her supervisor Hong a text message that she would be late by one hour for personal reasons, it was her unilateral notice to him.
Wasn’t it okay to be late because reporters freely report to work and get off work?
No way. They have to report to work just like ordinary salaried men, except when they had an interview, a professional meeting, or a need to go outside for a coverage.
Right now, Arum was in a situation where she deserved Team Leader Hong’s reprimand.
She opened the thick glass door and walked up to her desk as stealthily as possible.
“Oh, you’re in. What happened?” Hong asked with a worried look.
He continued, “You look bad. Were you sick?”
At that moment, she wanted to say, ‘Yeha, I feel so awful that my heart is aching, Supervisor Hong.’ But she just showed her sad eyes instead.
“Where is the manager?” she asked.
Raising her head a bit, she looked around Manager Kyong’s desk. It was vacant.
“Oh, he was summoned by the editor.”
“Whew!”
“By the way, did you…” approaching her, Hong sniffed at her, “did you have drinks?”
“Nope.” She waved her hands, startled by his question.
“You put on the same attire, too.”
Hong was sharp in observing her dress.
“In fact…”
She couldn’t make any plausible excuse.
At that moment, she noticed a newspaper on Hong’s desk. What she saw was a cultural section of the paper.
Her eyes were drawn to the title of the article, ‘Feng shui is science!’ And there was a photo of the feng shui master she just met, Hojoon Lee.
“Is that guy famous?”
“Do you know him?”
“No, No.”
“Our manager is desperately looking for him.”
“For what? An interview with him? Or to cover him? Or any information about him?”
“I have no idea. Who cares about feng shui at all these days?”
“You bet. Feng shui.”
As if nothing happened, she went to her desk silently.
Translator’s note:
myongdang means a propitious site
hyungsa means unfortunate events