[One Sip of a Book] Why Is It Always Difficult to Understand Others?

Editor's NoteSome sentences encapsulate the entire content of a book, while others instantly reach the reader's heart, creating a connection with the book. We introduce such meaningful sentences excerpted from books.

Kiha and Jaeha, who briefly became siblings due to their parents' remarriage but never shared their hearts and ended up as strangers forever. This novel, in which their stories spanning past and present intertwine like warp and weft, offers warm yet profound comfort to anyone who has experienced relationships that don't go as planned and hearts that rarely cooperate. It explores with deeper insight and lyricism why understanding and accepting others is always unfamiliar and difficult, how one can part ways without regret with bonds and sorrows that can no longer be shared, and how failed understanding and unconnected sincerity do not vanish meaninglessly but remain as faintly shining memories.

Jaeha's mother did not show displeasure even when I called out "Excuse me." She did not force me to call her "mother." Without any fuss, she simply said yes like a straightforward person.

Perhaps because of that, Jaeha's mother felt like a guest to me. Someone who could leave anytime, someone who would leave someday. Maybe because I thought that way, even after time passed, it was always difficult to ask her for something or convey anything to her. (pp. 12-13)

On the days of check-ups, Jaeha talked more than usual and laughed louder. It was obvious he was desperately trying to hide his fear. Expressions of Jaeha I did not know. Whenever such glimpses appeared, the old misunderstandings and aversions I held toward him softened. Watching Jaeha eat noodles, I briefly imagined what it would have been like if he were my biological younger brother. If we could have been more intimate, bluntly and freely sharing our inner thoughts. If, despite being indifferent to each other, we could have shared a naturally emerging strong brotherly bond from the start. (p. 26)

I quickly got used to indifference, but kindness was something I could hardly accept. Like a mirage that suddenly appears and vanishes the moment you touch it, I was always hesitant, afraid it might evaporate or drift away. I could not get close.

Was I born knowing that expressing oneself without reservation and exposing one's depths is possible in some relationships but impossible in others? (p. 58)

Jaeha looked exhausted. I looked over his bloodshot eyes and darkened eye rims. Except that the redness had disappeared, his face was similar to when he was young, but his words and actions felt like a completely different person. It started with his conscious use of honorifics. Whenever he slipped into informal speech, he quickly corrected himself and showed politeness. Each time, I felt the weight of the time we had not communicated or checked on each other. (p. 102)

Left Behind Summer | Written by Seong Haena | Changbi | 172 pages | 14,000 KRW