Hexed Intention

The day Haein shoved Jian away with her cold, calculated words, Yoonmin stormed up to her and yelled in her face. He told her to stop being a piece of shit. Why? Well…

“I mean, it made me angry,” he said with a shrug.

“Why did it make you angry?” Jian asked evenly. She was sitting with her knees neatly together, eyes lowered.

Why did it make him angry? How could there be a simple answer to that?

“Isn’t it obvious? Anyone would get mad hearing someone talking to another person like that. It’s human nature.”

“What does ‘human nature’ mean?” Jian asked, tilting her head.

Seriously? Why don’t kids these days know basic words?

Yoonmin sighed and began to explain.

“So… Let’s say I slap you really hard. How would you feel? You’d be mad and confused, and you’d want to hit me back, right?”

“Probably.”

“It means that, in those kinds of situations, anyone would feel the same way. That’s what ‘human nature’ is.”

Jian thought for a moment and then said, “That doesn’t seem right.”

“What?”

“It doesn’t seem like human nature is a valid excuse. Because you weren’t the one getting hurt. Haein didn’t say those things to you, she said them to me. You weren’t the one experiencing it, so why did you get mad?”

Yoonmin had no idea how to respond to that.

“And, if it really were just human nature, why didn’t the other kids in the classroom react the same way? Why didn’t anyone else stand up, grab Haein, and yell at her? Why did they all just sit there, watching us, not doing anything?”

“Well… Maybe because they didn’t know the whole story?” Yoonmin suggested. He had a feeling he would not like where this was going.

Jian shook her head.

“Then what about Soyul, Jinsol, Yeeun, and Ahyoon? They all knew exactly what was happening between Haein and me, but they didn’t get mad either. Why did they just leave the classroom without saying anything?”

I don’t know, damn it. Why should I care?

“Most people don’t act like you do,” Jian continued. “If someone slaps another person, most people look away because they don’t want to get involved, even if the person getting hit is someone they care about.”

Yoonmin shook his head. This conversation was going in a bizarre direction. Jian was staring at him with those sparkling eyes. To be honest, Yoonmin had immediately regretted stepping in that day.

Jian went on, “My dad always said not to assume everyone is good, just because they seem to be doing good things—volunteering, fighting for social justice, donating… If you want to know whether someone is truly a good person, you have to see how empathetic they are. A good person is someone who genuinely gets angry when others are wronged, someone who feels sad when others are hurting. So, I think…”

“Please, stop with the over-the-top drama, Jian.” Yoonmin groaned, cutting her off. “I just had more reason to be pissed at Haein than other people did. If the other kids had the same history with her, they would’ve reacted the same way. Don’t go around calling me a martyr or something.”

He hated when people accused him of being a “good person.” How could he be? How long had he been studying black magic, learning how to curse others? How many evil spells had he actually carried out? To call someone like him “good”… Jian really was clueless.

“Well… Can’t you at least tell me what exactly your ‘more reason’ is?”

Jian shifted a little closer to Yoonmin. The small room in the comic book café, something they called a “den,” wasn’t very big. It barely fit three people. Being alone in that tight space with an attractive girl like Jian, and with her now sitting mere centimeters away made 15-year-old Yoonmin’s heart race.

Jian really was beautiful. Long, slender body lines, toned muscles, brown hair falling to her shoulders…

“The ‘more reason’ you were pissed… Does it have something to do with… me?” Jian whispered. But then, she shook her head. “No, never mind.”

Her demeanor struck Yoonmin as strange. Jian’s neck and cheeks were flushed red. The room was charged with an energy Yoomin didn’t fully understand, though he knew enough to feel incredibly awkward.

Jian muttered, “Whatever it is, it’s probably not that.”

Yoonmin stared hard at her. “Stop talking nonsense and read your comic.”

The tiny room fell silent again. Yoonmin lowered his gaze, trying to focus on the comic. It was a story where people kept dying, over and over again. The fact that Jian thought anyone who was into these kinds of books could be a “good person” was ridiculous.

Jian held a comic in her hands but kept looking at Yoonmin. He pretended not to notice. He felt uncomfortable and embarrassed somehow, like when you kick a can out of frustration, and it accidentally lands perfectly in the trash can, then someone praises you for your good aim.

At last, Jiyoo returned.

“Why are you so happy to see me?” Jiyoo asked, eying Yoonmin. He had never been more relieved to see his only friend. Her entrance felt like a needle on the bubble of discomfort in the room, popping it with ease.

“Why’d you take so long?” he asked, trying to keep the note of accusation out of his voice.
“What were you doing in the bathroom?”

“Well, they make you wear special slippers in the bathroom, but there was only one pair, so there was a long line.”

As Jiyoo sat back down, Jian lunged toward her.

“Aww, I missed you, Jiyooooooo.”

Jian threw her arms around Jiyoo as if nothing had happened.

***

“Do you guys hang out like this every day?” Jian asked as they were leaving the café.

“We don’t go to a comic book café every day.”

“Then what do you do? What do you usually do when you hang out?”

“We usually go to Jiyoo’s house and…”

Yoonmin realized he didn’t have much to add. Usually, he’d go to Jiyoo’s house, and read a book, while Jiyoo lay down playing mobile games. Sometimes they’d perform some kind of ritual together, order food, eat snacks, or just zone out. How could he describe that without sounding like a complete weirdo?

Jian detected his hesitation and paused before asking, “You said you two aren’t dating, right? But you still go to her house every day?”

“We’re friends, so yeah.”

“Well, maybe if we get to know each other better…” Jian trailed off, but Yoonmin could guess what she meant.

If we got to know each other better, could I come over to Jiyoo’s place every day, too?

Jian was acting so out of character today. Why was she trying so hard to hang out with Jiyoo and Yoonmin? She already had great friends. Even if she was tired of them and wanted new ones, surely there were people better-suited to her interests than Yoonmin and Jiyoo.

Was Jian misconstruing something he said? Even though she looked mature, she was still only 15. It was normal for teenagers to find meaning in meaningless events. Maybe Jian was reading too much into the fact that Yoonmin had gotten angry at Haein on her behalf.

Jian’s presence still made him uneasy. She was a core member of Haein’s friend group. She was often the center of attention in class. Jian was probably just curious about two people whose lives were totally different from her own. Once that curiosity was satisfied, she would drift away in search of someone else to entertain her.

That’s how relationships always were. Meeting and parting is inevitable, but Yoonmin hated that idea. Even if no relationship lasted forever, he wanted connections where he could at least believe they might. Was that a childish desire from someone who didn’t understand the ways of the world?

Yoonmin and Jiyoo’s relationship was special. Jiyoo probably wouldn’t appreciate Jian elbowing her way in. But how could he let Jian down gently?

I don’t want to get to know you better.

Yoonmin didn’t want to say something that blunt to Jian. Or rather, he didn’t want to be the kind of person who would say that to anyone. He didn’t want to voice the unspoken rejection that he had so often received from others

But then, what should he say?

“Jian, you can’t get closer to us.” Jiyoo startled him by being the one to answer.

“What?” Jian said, shocked. She’d probably never experienced rejection in her life. “Why not? We’ve been hanging out all afternoon…”

Her face began to crumple, and Jiyoo quickly corrected herself.

“No, I mean… there’s a limit to how well you can understand us.”

“Why?”

“Because Yoonmin and I connected by black magic.” Jiyoo said it like it was the most rational thing in the world.

“Black magic?” Jian’s eyes widened in surprise. “Is that… a game you two play together? If I play it too, then…”

“No, it’s not a game.”

Yoonmin finally cottoned on to Jiyoo’s plan. He felt a sudden appreciation for how much smarter Jiyoo was than him. She must have been thinking along the same lines as him, but she had found a solution much faster.

“We’re bonded by black magic,” Yoonmin repeated emphatically. “We study and perform black magic together.”

“Black magic…”

He wondered for a brief moment how Jian would react. Would she scoff, and call them immature for believing such childish things at their age? Or would she think they were out of their minds?

“Yeah,” Yoonmin said, praying this would work. “Black magic refers to any form of sorcery done for personal gain or to curse others. We’ve been working together, studying real black magic, to learn how to cast effective curses.”

“You asked what we usually do together. Well, this is it.” Jiyoo’s expression was probably intended to be threatening, but anyone with a round hamster face like hers could never quite pull it off. Regardless, the knowledge that Yoonmin and Jiyoo were black sorcerers should be enough, right?

But Jian didn’t react the way Yoonmin expected. She stood still, blinked a few times, and then said, “So you mean your hobby is studying the occult?”

“You say that like it’s a fun pastime,” Yoonmin snorted. “We’re trying to resolve the emotions that boil in our hearts like lava.”

As the sharp words left Yoonmin’s mouth, Jian’s eyes glittered instead.

“Does that really help? What do you do exactly?”

Yoonmin was dumbfounded.

“I want to try too. I want to join. Let’s do it together!” Jian was practically bouncing with excitement.

Yoonmin and Jiyoo exchanged glances.

“You… you don’t want to do it,” Jiyoo tried to argue, though her voice had lost its resolve. “It’s really disgusting and terrible…”

“How would you know what I can and can’t handle?” Jian shot back.

“Listen, most girls—”

“I’m not a normal girl, Jiyoo,” Jian responded. “I’m really strong. Seriously.”

Jiyoo seemed to deflate.

“The point is, if I can do black magic with you guys, you’ll see me as a closer friend, right? Let’s go try it now!”

Yoonmin and Jiyoo stared at each other blankly. There was no turning back now; they had run out of reasons to turn Jian down.

On the way to her house, Jiyoo whispered to Yoonmin,

“Please, pick out the worst one.”

Yoonmin nodded, already knowing exactly which curse he would choose.

***

“Ewwww! Gross!”

“Wait a minute.”

“That’s so disgusting, stop it!”

“Just hang on.”

“No no no! Go away! I said go away!”

It wasn’t Jian who was squealing. It was Jiyoo. A cockroach squirmed in Jian’s palm as she sat opposite Jiyoo.

“Didn’t you say that you guys do stuff like this all the time?” Jian asked Yoonmin.

“We do… Um… Jiyoo just isn’t feeling well today.”

Last time, they had dealt with maggots and corpse beetles, so Yoonmin thought his friend might have built some tolerance. But it was blatantly obvious that wasn’t the case.

What Yoonmin had selected for today was a luck spell. A simple, gross, and impactful ritual.

Holding a handful of uncooked rice, he would place an oiled cockroach on top, then set it on fire while chanting, “Bug, bug, as your life burns away, bring me luck in its stead.”

But as soon as Jiyoo saw the cockroach, she started panicking. She was almost in tears.

“Why do you catch it with your hands! Ugh…”

In the end, Yoonmin gave up on the spell and Jian comforted Jiyoo.

“Now, we can hang out together more often, right?”

Neither Jiyoo nor Yoonmin could think of an argument. Their friendship had been placed under the condition of “if you can endure black magic” and Jian had passed the test.

“Fine,” Jiyoo snapped, eyes still on the cockroach. “But please get that disgusting thing out of my room.”

The cockroach writhed around in its jar as if it could feel Jiyoo’s finger pointing at it.

“Okay, okay.”

Jian picked up the jar.

“But why, with Haein—” Yoonmin started to say.

“I’m hungry. What are you guys having for dinner? Ordering in?” Jian interrupted. Before they could answer, she headed outside to release the cockroach.