Jung Soo Jin was having a the worst day in her life.
She was a not unattractive 32 year old psychologist. She had been in a relationship for just over 7 years.
She and her partner had been trying to have kids for over 4 years, but due to a medical condition she couldn't have any kids. She thought that she and her husband had gotten over it, and that they would just be a different kind of family.
But apparently he didn't get over it. He had been seeing another woman behind her back, and she had just gotten pregnant.
And today he had informed her that he broke up with her and do "the right thing" and marry that woman!
She wondered if he had told his new soon to be wife that he was in a relationship with someone else when he got her pregnant, but she doubted that.
Soo Jin thought about her misery and felt the tears fall down her face.
She quickly pulled out a tissue and blew her nose "Stupid bastard." She screamed in the car and then a she heard a thud.
At first she sat frozen solid, her eyes were wide, her mouth hanging open in surprise, not realizing what exactly had happened.
Then suddenly someone turned the corner from the street and her misery was sent to the back of her mind.
She threw open the door of her car, and ran towards the still body. There was big pool of blood coming from his head. He must have cracked his skull when he hit the sidewalk.
She checked his pulse, "someone call an ambulance" she shouted at the crowd that was starting to form.
The pulse felt weak, but it was still there. She took off her coat to cover the body, so that he wouldn't be cold. She didn't dare touch him anymore for fear of making his injury worse.
It seemed like forever until the ambulance came. They took the child away on the gurney.
She followed them in the ambulance without thinking. No other adult was with the boy apparently, so she was the closest connection he got to a real adult, which was really fucked up.
They arrived at the hospital and the child was taken away to an operating room. She was sent to the reception to fill in some forms.
"But I'm not his family." She said to the woman behind the desk, "I was the one who hit him with the car." She said.
"Oh," the receptionists eyes went wide, "then you better take a seat, I'll inform the police".
"Thank you." Soo Jin said and took a seat.
She was still very nervous about the child, hoping that he would be okay, but she was also nervous about talking to the cops and taking responsibility for running the boy over. She called the insurance company, so that they could already start with the necessary forms.
The surgery was still going on when the 2 police agents arrived and took her somewhere private to talk to her.
The younger of the two took her social security card and jotted down the number and her name while the oldest of the 2 started questioning her.
"Can you describe what happened?" he asked her.
"I was driving home after work, and I was just looking away for a second. Then I heard a thud and he as lying there." She told the cops.
"And he was alone, no family or other people in the neighbourhood?".
"I can't remember0. Oh, there was a man who came from the same street as the boy came from. He looked as if he had been running." She said, tucking some hair behind her head.
They thanked her and sent her back to the waiting room.
"That was probably the shopkeeper. He had just caught the child shoplifting, and he was running away". The younger cop said, looking up from his notebook.
"Perhaps he's a runaway?" his senior said. "We'll take a sample of his DNA and run it through our system to see if he comes up in any of the missing children cases. It his comes up empty, we can signal his picture and hope his parents show up."
The cops went to the receptionist and asked her to inform the doctors that they would need a DNA sample and a picture when possible.
"And when he wakes up, could you please contact this number. Then we can try questioning for his identity." They gave her a card with the number of the precinct on it and she added it to the file, promising that they would hear from them very soon.
The operation ended after a few more hours, but the doctors didn't know when or if the child will wake up.
In the meantime the cops performed a DNA sample test and didn't find a match in any of the parents in the missing children's cases.
The spread out his pictures on television and social media, but they didn't find any of his family They were trying to find his guardians, but no one stepped forward.
Days passed and Jung Soo Jin came by every day to read to the child and keep company over his still body.
The doctors had operated and tried to fix as much as they could, but it was difficult to say with such injury if he would wake up and in what state.
Soo Jin kept on visiting every single day, at first because she felt guilty. She just sat by the bedside, telling about her day, sometimes she took her work with her, sometimes she just read out loud from a book or a magazine. After a while she started to like the company, even he was just lying there. She felt connected.
"What are they going do then? I mean, when they don't find his family?" she asked the nurse.
"We'll have to call in a social worker. If no family is found, he'll probably have to go to an orphanage." She said, frowning, "it's difficult to say, sometimes family does turn up. For now, we don't know if he is going to wake up." Or in what state, the nurse left unsaid.
After 3 weeks he finally woke up.
Soo Jin felt tears of relieve welling up in her eyes and a huge weight lifted from her shoulders. She hadn't killed him.
"Where am I?" she heard his soft voice ask.
Soo Jin looked up, startled. The dropped the papers she was holding and immediately pressed the 'call nurse' button.
"Hey there," she said, "take it easy." she supported him when he was trying to get up.
The nurse came in and immediately called a for a doctor when she saw the boy awakened.
Soo Jin was herded out of the room, but before she left, she could still hear a bit of the conversation.
"Can you tell us your name?" "I, I, don't remember.".
When she came back the other day, she heard from the nurse that he had amnesia and couldn't remember anything personal at all. She steeled herself and went in the room.
The boy looked up, his eyes wary, but he sat still, no fear present in his eyes.
"Hello there." She said with a smile. The boy stared at her.
"Do I know you?" he asked. She winced at the question.
"I would like to apologize. I was the one who got you in a car accident." She bowed low to him.
"Do you mind if I sit with you? Keep you company? Or do you prefer to be alone." She asked, leaving the choice to him.
The boy looked thoughtful.
"You can stay, but don't be too noisy, I'm tired." And then he laid down and pull the blankets over him.
This was the beginning of a strange relationship.
She came over every day and in the beginning she just sat in the room with him and would just work or read in silence. She brought him books and magazines, things she thought would interest children his age. She even bought him a book with names in there, so he could find something to call him that he really liked. So far they came up empty.
One day she came in when the social worker was visiting.
"The doctors have given their approval that you can leave the hospital. We have tried to search for your family, but so far we haven't found anyone. We have a children's centre that can take you in." she explained to the child, who didn't who any unease or sadness. But still, Soo Jin felt as if he didn't like it.
She waited outside until the social worker left and then slipped inside and greeted the child.
"I could take you in." was the first thing she said. They were both taken by surprise by these words, but once she had spoken them, she felt like she really meant them.
He seemed to think it over.
"Yes, I," he was searching for words.
"I would like that".
"Have you found a name you like?" she said, pointing to the naming book.
"I haven't found the right one yet. Do you have anything you like?"
She thought it over for a bit.
"My grandfather's name was Jung Ba Reum." She said.
"Jung Ba Reum, I like the sound of that".