PEN Vol 3 Ch. 27

“Ha….”

Cheon Sejoo couldn’t hide it any longer. He wasn’t bad at keeping a poker face, but he couldn’t stay silent, thinking that it was Sejin’s only family member who was sick. He took one hand off the steering wheel, ran it over his face, and looked at Sejin while they were stopped at a red light.

Reflected in his somber eyes, Sejin looked completely different from when they first met, now a full-grown man. He had grown well over 10cm taller, his shoulders were broader than Cheon Sejoo’s, and his once small hands were now large enough to completely cover his own.

Nevertheless, to Cheon Sejoo’s eyes, Sejin still seemed like a child. He looked like the child who pleaded and cried because he wanted to see his mother.

His heart churned. Cheon Sejoo tried to tell himself that this matter wouldn’t be anything serious, that it might just be heatstroke because of the hot weather, but the things that had inadvertently crossed his mind made him wonder whether it really was. Cheon Sejoo swallowed a thin sigh and opened his mouth. He explained to Sejin in a low voice,

“Don’t be surprised, and listen. I got a call that your mom collapsed. She was unconscious, so they took her to the hospital, and we’re on our way there now.”

“…….”

Holding his breath, Sejin stared at Cheon Sejoo. His clear eyes trembled faintly.

“Why… Why did she collapse?”

His voice was faint as he asked. Cheon Sejoo pulled the car over to the side of the road and ran a frustrated hand through his hair. Then, he forced a calm voice and explained.

“I don’t know why either. But after she collapsed, she was groaning like she was in pain and then fainted. Your mom told them not to contact you, but I thought you should know, so I called you. I thought it would be right to go together.”

“…….”

Sejin blinked blankly, then closed his mouth for a moment and took a deep breath. Silence filled the car. Sejin closed his eyes as if to gather his thoughts, then opened them and gave Cheon Sejoo a faint smile.

“You surprised me. Mom often collapses in the summer. She has orthostatic hypotension, so she gets dizzy and faints while working standing up. I’ve seen it a few times. It’s probably the same this time. She probably hit something when she fell and it hurt. I know.”

“…Yeah.”

“Don’t make your voice sound so serious. It makes me feel unnecessarily worried.”

Sejin chided him in a sullen voice. 

Cheon Sejoo’s stomach churned again. He forced himself to swallow his words, winced, and smiled. “Sorry,” he apologized, reaching out to stroke Sejin’s hair, then started the car again.

The roads were clear because it was a little earlier than usual. They soon arrived at Gyeonggi Sarang Hospital near Ehwagak. He had a feeling from the name, and upon arriving, he saw that the hospital wasn’t that big.

Since Ehwagak was located in the mountains of Gyeonggi Province, even the nearby villages didn’t have a large population, which inevitably meant the hospital would be small.

Cheon Sejoo parked the car and headed to the emergency room with Sejin. He called Han Jiwon on the way and, hearing that she would come outside, waited in front of the emergency room.

“Sejin, Manager.”

Han Jiwon, emerging from inside the emergency room, greeted them with a pale face. She was wearing a light t-shirt and shorts, and considering her usually impeccable attire, it was clear how urgently she had left. Sejin greeted her and immediately asked about Kim Hyunkyung’s whereabouts.

“Hello. Where’s my mom?”

“Ah, Hyunkyung is over there in bed number 2. She’s on an IV and sleeping now. Do you want to go to her, Sejin?”

“…Yes.”

Sejin bowed his head politely and passed Han Jiwon, entering into the emergency room. Unlike just moments ago when he was smiling and saying he was needlessly worried, his steps were hurried.

Cheon Sejoo realized that Sejin had been suppressing his anxiety. As he watched him go, he heard Han Jiwon’s voice from in front of him.

“You arrived early.”

“Yes, there wasn’t any traffic…”

Cheon Sejoo, who had answered so, suddenly sensed something strange and turned his gaze. The eyes of the woman standing next to him were moist.

As if the tension had eased after Sejin left, even the deep sigh she let out seemed to tremble faintly. The area around her chest, which had been churning, cooled down. But soon, the words Han Jiwon uttered in a wet voice completely overturned Cheon Sejoo’s insides.

“The painkillers weren’t working… So they administered morphine.”

It was rare to use morphine for ordinary pain. There was no such thing as a crazy doctor who recklessly administered narcotic painkillers to a patient whose symptoms they didn’t even properly understand. Nevertheless, the fact that morphine had been administered meant that Kim Hyunkyung’s condition was bad enough to warrant it. It meant that she was suffering so much that ordinary painkillers couldn’t suppress the pain.

As Cheon Sejoo was unable to speak from the shock, Han Jiwon wiped her eyes and murmured.

“The hospital said they can’t do any tests today. So they couldn’t do an ultrasound, they just gave her painkillers and put her to sleep. But, Manager Cheon, my father passed away from cancer.”

Her voice became increasingly choked with sobs. As if it was difficult to hold back her tears, Han Jiwon finally wiped away the tears streaming down her cheeks roughly and continued.

“He had annual health checkups, but they couldn’t find it, so we only found out when it was stage 4. But even chemotherapy wasn’t effective, so he eventually passed away from cancer… Hyunkyung’s pained appearance looks exactly the same as back then…”

“It won’t be.”

Cheon Sejoo forced his mouth open.

“That can’t be.”

At his following resolute voice, Han Jiwon’s eyes widened as she looked up at him. She couldn’t say how shocked she was when she saw Kim Hyunkyung collapse, as it reminded her of the past. When Kim Hyunkyung ended up receiving morphine, the image of her father came to mind, and she couldn’t calm down easily.

In the midst of that, Cheon Sejoo’s firm assertion brought her indescribable comfort. Seeing his firm expression, which seemed like it would never crumble, she thought that she had been overly worried. Han Jiwon let out a deep sigh, placing her hand on her chest.

Then, as if she had said something unnecessary, she wiped her face and nodded vigorously.

“Right, it won’t be. It can’t be. I said something silly.”

Han Jiwon continued speaking with an awkward smile.”It’s probably just heatstroke. It was especially hot today, wasn’t it?” To her continuous excuses, Cheon Sejoo simply nodded without saying anything.

After a long while, when Han Jiwon calmed down, she excused herself, saying she would call Ehwagak. Only then did Cheon Sejoo go to find a doctor to hear about Kim Hyunkyung’s exact condition.

It wasn’t very common for a professor of emergency medicine to see a patient who came to the emergency room. It was easier to assume that those who handled the numerous patients were mostly interns or residents who had just graduated from college.

The doctor who examined Kim Hyunkyung was the same. The doctor with a youthful face looked like she might be in her mid-twenties.

“I’m the guardian of Kim Hyunkyung, patient in bed number 2. I’d like to hear about the patient’s condition.”

When Cheon Sejoo appeared, the doctor, who had been looking at her pager with a tired face, raised her head with a surprised expression. As if she suddenly came to her senses, her eyes widened and stared at Cheon Sejoo, then belatedly understood what he had said and rummaged through the chart.

“Ah, yes. Just a moment. Number 2. Ah… The one who received morphine earlier.”

“Yes. I heard you haven’t been able to do any tests yet, when will they be possible? She seems to be experiencing abdominal pain, did you palpate?”

“Yes? Yes. I, I did, but…”

She stammered with a flustered expression at his unusually detailed questions. Then, she cleared her throat and explained.

“She was experiencing so much pain that conversation was impossible, and there was nothing I could find through palpation. I think she needs an ultrasound, but our hospital doesn’t have the equipment available every day…”

“Are you saying you can’t do an ultrasound today? What about a CT or MRI?”

“N-No…”

A short sigh escaped his lips. It seemed that the hospital was small and didn’t operate the examination rooms every day. Should he consider it fortunate that they even operated an emergency room in a place like this? Cheon Sejoo nodded with a dejected feeling and turned around.

Where his gaze landed was bed 2, where Kim Hyunkyung was lying. The moment he thought of Kim Hyunkyung sleeping inside, the curtain was pulled back and Sejin walked out.

His expression didn’t look too bad. This was probably possible because he arrived after she fell asleep and hadn’t seen how much pain Kim Hyunkyung had been in. Cheon Sejoo wondered if he should explain about the morphine to Sejin, but then closed his mouth. He didn’t want to cause him anxiety with his own words.

“What did the doctor say?”

“…It’d be good to try another hospital. They said this hospital is old and it’s difficult to do proper tests.”

At Cheon Sejoo’s words, Sejin frowned. He looked around and confirmed the state of the building, which looked at least 40 years old, then nodded his head in dissatisfaction.

“How should we go…? Should we go by car together when Mom wakes up?”

In Kim Hyunkyung’s case, it would probably be better to administer painkillers again before she woke up. It was better for Sejin not to see his mother in so much pain that she was unconscious. And somehow, Cheon Sejoo felt that Kim Hyunkyung would want that too, so he placed his hand on Sejin’s shoulder and explained.

“No, it’d be better to call an ambulance and transfer her while she’s asleep. I’ll look into it, so you go and sit down. Call the nurse as soon as your mom wakes up.”

“…Okay.”

Sejin, who answered softly, looked back at Cheon Sejoo before returning to Kim Hyunkyung’s bed. Sejoo stared intently at him, standing with his usual indifferent face, then smiled as if relieved, and belatedly went toward her.