Since childhood, Do Haeshin and I were each other's only friends.

Back then, Do Haeshin was shorter than me, with a thin frame and no strength. He was a gentler and kinder child than anyone, someone who had never even thought of doing something bad.

Neither of us had ever received proper love from our parents. Because we understood each other's wounds best, we naturally relied on one another, and that reliance eventually turned into love, making us a couple.

At nineteen, the two of us lived together in a shabby, semi-basement one-room apartment.

Hot water didn't run properly, and bugs always crawled through the room. Wallpaper stained with mold, a room where a worn-out mattress without a bed was everything. It wasn't even soundproofed, so the shouts of drunks in the alley reached our ears all night long.

One day, when we were sharing a single piece of bread because we didn't even have money for a meal, I broke up with Do Haeshin.

"My life wouldn't have been this ruined if it weren't for you."

"I'm sick of every single day with you."

"Someone like you shouldn't be in my life."

"I can only breathe if you disappear."

I said those things because I believed that only if Do Haeshin left me would he eventually succeed and be happier than anyone else.

Ten years have passed, and now at twenty-nine, we have met again as debtor and creditor—

The most cruel relationship possible.*