“What are you going to do?” 

I grabbed his collar, almost choking him, my tears blurring my vision as I clenched my teeth. I wanted to kill him right then, but the thought of him dying filled me with even more hatred. 

“What are you going to do? Huh? What’s your plan? The police are on their way to my aunt’s house in Seoul. They already know where my brother Jae-yeol is. What are you going to do?” 

“I’m going to fix it.” 

He was holding my hand that hold his collar tightly and spoke with determination. 

“I’ll fix it.” 

I was at a loss for words. Slowly I let go of his collar. The rain poured down harder and thunder cracked through the sky. In a world that felt like it was falling apart, even the word ‘fix’ sounded absurd. 

“How do you fix it?” 

The police and the president were after them. How will he fix it?

“Is my brother stronger than them? Will he just keep on running? For how long? Where to?” 

It all sounded absurd. 

“Just get lost.” 

I looked at him and silently wished for his fiancée to take him away and for them to disappear.

“Run away, disappear, do whatever you want – but never come back to my house and never show yourself to me again.” 

I brushed past him and walked towards the house in a near frenzy. I had money. Not much, but it was the money I had painstakingly saved up over the past three years. I’d earned it by selling the seafood I’d painstakingly collected by diving and holding my breath underwater. It was my emergency fund. 

I’d take it to Agwi. Perhaps a bribe would persuade the police to overlook it. I’d beg him to use the money to save my brother Jae-yeon’s life. 

I hurried home, opened the door and rushed inside. Our house, devastated by the strong typhoon, was a mess – things were scattered everywhere. I immediately went to the attic door, opened it and eagerly searched under the pile of winter blankets. Luckily, the money I had saved was still there.

But for a moment an overwhelming feeling of emptiness washed over me. I turned and looked into the main room. Grandma wasn’t there. 

“Grandma?” 

I quickly tucked the money under my jacket and called for her. There was no answer. 

No… it can’t be. 

“Grandma?” 

I ran through the spare room, the kitchen, the garden and the shed. I ran around the house like a madman, shouting her name, but all I could hear was the deafening roar of the wind. 

No, this isn’t real. This can’t be happening. 

It couldn’t all be happening at once. 

“Grandma!” 

She wasn’t there. She was really gone. Had she gone next door? 

I ran to the neighbour’s house and called urgently for the neighbour’s wife. They were in the middle of dinner when they told me they hadn’t seen Grandma.

I panicked and ran back through the alley. My rubber shoe flew off on the slippery stone path, but I didn’t notice. 

In a world without my brother and without Woo-jin, I couldn’t bear to lose Grandma too. If I did, it would be the same as dying. 

“Grandma!” 

My screams were swallowed by the wind, carried away by its relentless howling. The once-beautiful, fragrant path I had walked with Woo-jin was now a chaotic pit of wild, black grass swirling madly. 

Could she have gone to the sea? Could she have followed her lifelong habit as a haenyeo, taking the familiar path she’d walked so many times to the ocean? 

It felt like she had. 

I ran as fast as I  can, my body exhausted but driven by an overwhelming desperation. At that moment, not even Jae-yeol, Woo-jin or Agwi could stop me.

“My child..”

Grandma, the one who held me when my parents died. 

“Hey, look! Grandma caught a giant octopus today!” 

Grandma, who would proudly show us the octopus she had caught! 

Please, Grandma, don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me! 

I was terrified. It was the scariest summer of my life – the summer that Jae-yeol, Woo-jin and Grandma all disappeared. Without them, I had no reason to go on. I might as well have died. I wanted to die. 

Then I saw something under the cliff, in the sea. For a moment it felt like time stood still – the raindrops, the crashing waves, even myself. 

The next moment I was running down the cliff, faster than I had ever run before. Towards the beach, towards the raging sea, I saw her – Grandma – dancing joyfully in the storm. 

“Grandma!” 

I called her name desperately as I waded out to sea after her. Lightning lit up the sky and the waves crashed violently, but she showed no fear. How could she dance and run into such a raging sea? 

” Grandma! Grandma!” 

The sea was pulling at me, threatening to pull me under. I struggled against it, my heavy limbs flailing, until I finally reached her. 

I begged her to come back, but it was no use. 

“My child is calling me. My child is calling me.”

“What are you talking about? Grandma! I am your child!” 

My parents were lost in the typhoon. 

Is Grandma looking for them? 

I cried and begged, trying desperately to stop her, but it was no use. The waves swallowed us up. 

I couldn’t let go of Grandma’s lifeless body. I couldn’t leave her like this. 

Whoosh! 

The waves crashed against us with terrifying force. In an instant I was dragged into the sea, instinctively holding my breath. But Grandma, sinking deeper, was too heavy to pull up. It felt like the ocean was going to swallow us whole. 

Grandma, please wake up. Grandma! 

As I struggled, the money hidden in my jacket slipped out. I realised how foolish I had been to keep it with me. The fluttering notes drifted away with my breath and it felt like it was really over, it was the end. 

Just then, a strong hand grabbed the back of my jacket and pulled me up to safety. My hand reached for Grandma, but another hand grabbed her as well.

The rain poured relentlessly, hissing as it hit the sea, and the waves roared with deafening force. In the chaos, Woo-jin pulled us both up, one in each hand, and pulled us out of the raging water.