* * * *
Ugh...
I woke up to a parched, burning sensation in my throat.
With my eyes still closed, I shouted.
"Oppa...! Give me some water...!"
Ahh... my head.
It felt as though my skull might split, as if I'd been beaten with a hammer.
It felt like I would die if I didn't drink water immediately.
My eyelids were impossibly heavy, no doubt from all the drinking.
But...
Why isn't he coming?
On any normal day, he would have already rushed over, even mixing honey water.
My husband was someone with that kind of sweet side.
Ah.
We fought yesterday.
Is he protesting because of that?
How petty.
I barely managed to lift my heavy eyelids.
The glaring sunlight stabbed my eyes.
....Huh?
Where... is this?
It wasn't the familiar ceiling of our bedroom at home.
White wallpaper I'd never seen before, and unfamiliar lighting.
Memories of last night flashed through my mind like a broken film strip.
Loud music...
Sweet cocktails...
And... Minjun's face.
My eyes shot open and I jolted upright.
"Wh... where is this!?"
On the floor where my gaze landed, the clothes and underwear I'd been wearing last night were strewn about haphazardly.
It felt like my heart had plummeted to the floor with a thud.
With trembling hands, I slightly lifted the blanket.
Not a single thread on me.
I was completely naked.
Ah....
Ahh....
My mind went blank.
"I'm in big trouble..."
I could feel every last drop of blood draining from my face.
* * * *
I was staying up with unblinking eyes.
It had already been several hours since my wife had stormed out the door.
I had called dozens of times, but she didn't answer.
Pacing the living room with an anxious heart, I eventually sat back down at my computer, and in the darkness, the monitor's glow was the only thing to welcome me.
I began my lament again under the same anonymous username I had used to write earlier.
[Wife still hasn't come home...]
— It's Pongpong, the one who wrote earlier. We fought and she went out, but it's already past midnight. She's not answering the phone either; is something going on? Is this normal? Do married women usually stay out all night after a fight? I'm really worried...
As expected, the Jugallum swarmed my post.
ㄴ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ she still hasn't come home?
ㄴ "I'm really worried" ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ he still hasn't come to his senses
ㄴ Your wife is probably fucking ecstatic right now
ㄴ Whatever you do, don't start a brawl when she gets back. Check her card statements first.
ㄴ fr ㅋㅋ make sure to check her cards
ㄴ You retard... just go to sleep... she ain't coming home tonight...
I read their comments with wide eyes as time passed.
Time flowed indifferently.
[It's 1 AM... she still hasn't come home...]
— ...
ㄴ He's lost it ㅋㅋ
ㄴ It feels so real I almost feel bad picking on him;
ㄴ Hang in there..
[It's 2. At this point, it's less worry and more anger.]
— Fuck...
ㄴ He's starting to blacken ㅋㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴ wtf ㅋㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴ dumbass ㅋㅋ
[It's 3. I'm just going to live-update here today.]
— ...
ㄴ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ who held a knife to your throat to make you get married?
ㄴ This is fascinating.
[It's 4. I'll keep going until sunrise.]
— ...
ㄴ This is legendary for real ㅋㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴ A bad premonition is never wrong ㅇㅇ
The outside was gradually brightening.
Thanks to the live-update I ran all night, I didn't feel lonely.
Countless Jugallum were staying up all night with me.
I watched the sun rise and wrote my final post.
[Dawn broke. The wife didn't come home.]
The next morning, the Stock Gallery was hotter than ever.
Jugallum who had been sleeping began logging into the gallery one by one.
And everyone did the same thing.
They carefully read the featured posts.
There, a certain anonymous user's desperate all-night live-report had been immortalized.
[Hey... my wife still hasn't come home...]
[It's 1 AM... she still hasn't come home...]
[The sun is up. She didn't come home.]
After the final post, there was no further word from him.
The Jugallum who had read through the posts erupted in laughter.
One man's family troubles had become a laughingstock overnight.
The gallery was plastered with Jihun's story.
[Summary + Analysis of Pongpong Hyung's Overnight Live Report]
— 1. Newlyweds in their first year of marriage
— 2. Sexless + separate bedrooms
— 3. Wife's card bills racked up on father-in-law's card
— 4. Fought, stayed out all night + out of contact
— Conclusion: She's the Hannyeo you chose. Endure through sheer spite and stubbornness. Yes yes
ㄴ Analysis upvote
ㄴ fr it's the textbook template itself ㅋㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴ What do you think this bastard is doing right now?
ㄴ The Han River is cold, bastard.
[Hey but what is Pongpong's wife doing right now?]
— Just imagining it is dizzying ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴ (Can't even imagine)
ㄴ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ stop!
ㄴ Sirs... isn't this too cruel...
ㄴ Reality is cruel to begin with ㅇㅇ
[I was with Pongpong's wife yesterday.]
— Taking questions.
ㄴ Get lost retard ㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ this bastard is the worst one
The Stock Gallery was filled with Jihun's story.
Everyone waited anxiously for his next update.
Would he choose divorce?
Or would he become a sweet guy once more and forgive his wife?
The Jugallum swallowed their saliva, waiting for fresh bait.
One man's tragedy was becoming everyone's comedy.
* * * *
By the time the sun had climbed to its zenith.
The sound of the front door code being cautiously entered rang out, and Jisu came inside with her head bowed.
And she met eyes with Jihun, who was sitting on the living room sofa.
His eyes were sunken and hollow, and his dark circles reached all the way down to his jaw.
He looked like he hadn't slept a wink all night.
Jisu gulped dryly.
Then, Jihun opened his mouth in a voice devoid of emotion.
"...You stayed out all night? Didn't answer my calls. Who were you with?"
At Jihun's cold tone, Jisu felt a surge of defiance for a moment.
It was clearly a situation where she was in the wrong.
But strangely, a strong feeling of not wanting to lose welled up inside her.
Minjun's face, as he had hit on her last night, floated into her mind.
Mixed with guilt was a strange sense of superiority.
'I'm a woman who deigns to live with him, and he can't even cut me some slack?'
That's right; she hadn't sobered up yet.
"I suppose you slept well? I got mad because of you, drank with a friend, and just passed out."
"Which friend?"
At those words, Jisu lashed out in annoyance, as if she had been waiting for it.
"What? Are you doubting me right now?"
Like a thief with a guilty conscience, Jisu went on the offensive instead.
At those words, Jihun didn't answer.
He simply stared fixedly at Jisu.
But inside, he was boiling over.
A heavy silence flowed.
Unable to endure the awkwardness, Jisu was the first to open her mouth.
"I'm tired. I'm going to wash up and sleep more."
She had already washed at the motel, but wanting to erase any lingering scents, Jisu hurried toward the master bedroom.
Then, Jihun's gaze fixed on her left hand.
'...No ring?'
A sprout of doubt took root in Jihun's heart.
Entering the master bedroom, Jisu quickly locked the bathroom door.
She looked in the mirror and swept her hand down her chest.
"Phew... he didn't catch on, right?"
She believed her lie had worked perfectly.
Even after Jisu disappeared into the master bedroom, Jihun sat there as if nailed to the spot for a long time.
His mind had gone cold.
The anxiety and rage that had tormented him all night disappeared, and only one word swirled in his mind.
'Evidence.'
He quietly turned on the computer and logged into DB Inside.
And left a final post on the live-report thread he had been running all night.
[Final. Wife came home.]
— She just came in. Stayed out all night. Says she drank and passed out, then got annoyed asking if I was doubting her and went to her room. But her wedding ring was gone. What the hell do I do now?
His final post was the spark that ignited the fuse.
The night crew who had run the live-report with him all night, and the daytime crew who had meticulously read the hot posts in the morning, all joined forces.
The comment section literally exploded.
At a speed incomparable to the early morning.
ㄴ "No ring" ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ case closed beyond doubt.
ㄴ The ring, fuck ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
ㄴ You absolutely cannot throw a fit right now!!!!!!!!!!!
ㄴ fr if you confront her now, she'll just insist she lost the ring and it's over. No evidence.
ㄴ Act like you don't know no matter what. Treat her sweetly like usual.
ㄴ Private investigator go go
ㄴ And look into a lawyer first. You have to protect your assets.
ㄴ Right. Nowadays even after 2 years of marriage they split assets in half on the news. Get a grip.
ㄴ Even the house your father-in-law bought can be considered joint property. Move before you get fucked.
ㄴ Now you're truly being reborn as a Jugallum...
ㄴ Watching this bastard's narrative unfold in real time... my chest swells with grandeur...
Jihun scrolled down and read every single comment.
His eyes no longer wavered.
Amid the Jugallum's taunting advice, he saw the path he needed to take.
First... evidence.
From the day after she stayed out all night, Jisu was inwardly anxious.
She acted as though nothing had happened, but her heart was constantly shrunk to the size of a bean.
A message arrived.
It was Minjun, the man she had spent the night with.
[Did you get home safe? Last night was fun. ^^]
Jisu blocked him and deleted the chat room the moment she read the message.
Yes, now she just had to keep her mouth shut.
Then no one would know.
The perfect crime.
But there was one thing Jisu didn't know.
Perhaps because she had been living so nervously.
She still hadn't realized that her left ring finger was bare.
That her wedding ring had disappeared.
Perhaps because of her surging guilt,
Jisu suddenly started paying attention to housework.
She did the piled-up laundry, cleaned up the messy living room,
and in the evening, she prepared a meal for Jihun herself.
But Jihun didn't say a word about that day.
At his silence, Jisu arbitrarily drew her own conclusion.
'Ah... looks like he's just going to let it slide. This man still loves me. He's scared I might leave him.'
Thinking that way put her mind at ease.
Her guilt melted away like snow, and her sense of superiority reared its head once more.
But Jisu truly didn't know.
That Jihun's silence was not forgiveness.
It was the calm before the storm.
That it was a step back for the sake of a step forward.
Jihun's trolling was not the crude sort that merely spewed shitposts.
At times, he held the entire gallery in his grip and shook it through elaborate fabricated posts.
A perfect fabrication required meticulous planning.
It was the same method his veteran user persona, Dotaenam, had used to toy with the Jugallum.
Provoking their rage by pretending to be a happy family using photos scavenged from the internet.
The planning skills he had honed to a sharp edge had not gone anywhere.
Jihun recited his creed to himself.
'Fabrication requires time for patience and suffering!'
There had been times in the past when he planned for days to achieve the perfect aggro.
Those who had consumed their fill of forum culture say
that when every detail lines up impossibly perfectly, that is fabrication.
On the other hand, they say that real life is truly a fucked-up story that would get the writer cursed out with "have you finally lost your mind?" if it were made into a drama.