Episode 1: Tragedy of the Black Spots

Episode 1: Hesitation in front of the refrigerator 5:12 in the morning. An old three-story multi-family house in Mangwon-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul, a one-room studio measuring about 7 pyeong located at the end of a narrow hallway leading to the rooftop. The dawn light seeping through the cracks in the window had not yet completely dispelled the remnants of the night, filling the room with heavy air mixed with cold blue and gray. A dual monitor on the desk was emitting a faint blue light, and the waveforms of dozens of audio tracks were tightly tangled in the audio sequencer DAW (digital audio workstation) window that filled the screen. Han Chae-won, a 28-year-old sound designer and indie musician, was sunk into her desk chair with headphones around her neck, and roughly rubbed her watery eyes with her palms. “Ha… I ended up staying up all night again.”

Chaewon's voice was as rough as sand, scratched by the cold coffee she drank all night and the dry early morning air. The clock at the bottom right of the monitor was ticking by the minutes and seconds. The deadline for the soundtrack for an outsourced mobile indie game was noon today. Because I hadn't had proper sleep for three days already, my mind was as heavy as a wet cotton ball, and my spine was as stiff as a solid cement pillar. Above all, after eating half a bowl of cup ramen last night, my stomach, which had not been able to properly swallow a sip of water, was sending sharp signals as if it was about to be torn apart.

Growling- Gurgling. Chaewon stood up from the creaky chair with her heavy body. In the corner of the room, next to the sink, there was an old, 180-liter small silver refrigerator with a whirring motor. Chaewon walked toward the refrigerator with languid steps, like a castaway looking for an oasis in the desert. Clap-

When I pulled the handle, I heard the sound of the rubber packing coming off, and the pale fluorescent light inside the refrigerator illuminated the dark kitchen coldly. The scene I encountered when I opened the refrigerator door was as bleak and cold as Chaewon's empty bank account balance. In the top compartment, there was a half-pack of non-fat milk that was three days past its expiration date, a jar of strawberry jam with a half-hard lid, and a jar of unidentifiable garlic pickles. In the middle compartment, there were two yellow plastic pickled radish packaging containers left over from delivery food and a bottle of bottled water from a convenience store. and…

At the very bottom, inside the clear plastic fresh vegetable compartment. In that dry, desolate cold, something shining as if it had the only clear warmth caught Chaewon's eye. It was a banana. To be exact, it was the 'last banana left' that I bought a handful at a local fruit shop four days ago and ate sparingly. The last banana boasted an unusually smooth and elegant curve. It was a little longer than an adult woman's palm, and was a perfect golden lemon yellow color with a hint of light green still remaining at the top.

There was not a single scratch on the surface, and it looked as if it had been freshly harvested and had maintained its freshness the day it was placed at the top of the fruit store shelf. Chaewon swallowed dry saliva unconsciously. The moment I looked at that banana, the sweet and soft texture of the flesh vividly came back to me. The unique fragrant aroma of tropical fruit that wafts out when you gently peel off the yellow peel.

The creamy texture that gently wraps around your tongue when you take a bite, and the enchanting sweetness of natural fructose that melts away fatigue in an instant! On a morning like now, when my stomach was sore and my sugar level was low, that one banana would have been a more perfect salvation than any other elixir in the world. Chaewon's finger suddenly entered the vegetable compartment. Just as I was about to pick up the round curve of the banana from the cold plastic drawer. Chaewon's fingertips stopped in midair. Chaewon's chronic illness, the terrible inner censor that had dominated her life for the past 28 years, had reared its head once again. '… wait for a sec. Chaewon, are you eating now?'

An inner voice whispered. ‘The main title theme song, which is supposed to be delivered at noon today, hasn’t even been finished mixing yet. I don't really like the arrangement of the second verse chorus, so I have to redo it. To eat it up like this, feeling tired and chased in a half-asleep state... Aren’t those bananas such a waste? That was the prettiest and most genuine girl in that store. There is only one perfect banana left... ' Chaewon's eyes wavered. She had one very unusual habit that had been ingrained in her since childhood. 'The best comes last.'

It was a kind of perfectionistic procrastination mentality that said, ‘I have to save precious things until the truly happy and perfect moment comes.’ When I was a child and received a birthday cake, I would save the biggest and reddish strawberry on the cake until the last, but in the end, the cream would become lukewarm and the strawberries would go soft and burst, making it tasteless. When I bought new crayons, I was a child who couldn't use my favorite colors of cobalt blue and emerald green because they were too precious, and used only black and brown ones until they became sticky pencils. Even as I became an adult, that habit did not change one bit. We hang up our favorite clothes in the closet to wear on ‘special occasions’ and look at them for years until they go out of style.

I saved the perfume I really liked until I had the 'perfect date' and then the alcohol ran out. And now, even in front of the last banana in the refrigerator, that terrible hesitation was holding me back. Chaewon slowly withdrew her hand that was trying to pick up a banana. The cold air coming out of the crack in the refrigerator door stung my knees wearing shorts. Although her stomach was growling and screaming, Chaewon began to make plausible excuses to herself.

'okay. If you eat now, you’re just satisfying your hunger. You won't even be able to enjoy the sweetness properly. At 11:30 am today, the final rendering file for the project was safely sent to the client! Once you get the OK confirmation, take a warm shower and come out! I carefully brew a cup of drip coffee and eat the banana very elegantly while soaking in the sunlight from the window. Yes, we are eating it as a celebration dinner for a successful closing! If I eat it then, that banana will be worth its full value, and I will be really happy.' Chaewon quietly glanced at the banana.

The smooth luster of the yellow shell glowed pitifully under the fluorescent light. Chaewon made a promise to the banana in her heart. ‘Wait a moment, banana. Just wait 6 hours. 'I'll eat you at the best moment.' Tak-

Chaewon closed the refrigerator door. The image of the banana shining brilliantly in the white cold disappeared into the darkness. Chaewon turned on the tap in the sink and gulped down a cup of cold water. The cold tap water flowed down the empty stomach wall and swept through my insides. I was flatulent, but my mind was still dizzy and my body was cold to the bone. Chaewon returned to the work chair in front of the desk and sat down. I put the headphones over my ears and pressed the space bar. Thump- Chi- Ta- Ta-

An unfinished 8-bit synthesizer beat hit my ears, but the notes on the monitor scattered like fish in a fishbowl. The yellow afterimage of the last remaining banana stuck to the back of the retina and did not come off. But Chaewon bit her lip and held the mouse. “Let’s focus, Han Chae-won. Finish first and eat. For the perfect moment.”

But Chaewon didn't know at the time. The cruel monster called time is a merciless law of the universe that never waits for human hesitation and perfectionism. Meanwhile, the exact moment when Chaewon closes the refrigerator door and turns around. Inside the dark, cold vegetable compartment of the refrigerator, a very small and wonderful breathing sound of life, inaudible to the human ear, was stirring. It was the ‘last banana’ ceremony that Chaewon cherished and hesitated so much about. '… The door is closed.'

Banana leaned back against the cold plastic wall in the dark and took a deep breath. His name is ‘Bana’. He grew up blessed with the warm sun and tropical rainforest of Davao, Philippines, and was the youngest of seven banana brothers who traveled far across the Pacific Ocean to the fruit store shelves in Mangwon-dong, Mapo-gu, Korea. Over the past three days, one by one, Bana's brothers became Chaewon's breakfast and passed away. My eldest brother was carried out in a bag on his busy commute to work on Monday morning.

The second and third children became a strong source of energy for Chaewon while she was working overtime on Tuesday nights.

The fourth and fifth were blended in a blender on Wednesday afternoon and turned into savory banana milk. All the departed brothers spoke proudly. ‘Bana, our Banana family has only one mission. It melts in the human mouth with the most perfectly soft sweetness, sweetly comforting them after a tiring day! That is the highest honor and perfection of a person born as a fruit!' Bana had the best physique among his brothers, and the color of his shell was dazzlingly beautiful. That's why Chaewon also cherished Bana the most and looked at her with ecstatic eyes every time she opened the refrigerator door.

Bana's heart also pounded every time Chaewon looked at her. 'That tired and fragile human girl... 'I want to throw my whole body on the tongue of that girl who sighs, her eyes red from making music every night, and give her the softest sweetness in the world!' However, just this morning, Chaewon had been fiddling with herself with her cold fingertips and ended up closing the door. Bana trembled with disappointment and anxiety. This is because the ‘biological clock’ running inside the banana’s body was already sounding a danger signal loudly.

Bananas are originally tropical fruits. The ideal post-ripening process occurs when ripening yellow in a cool, well-ventilated shade area between 15 and 20 degrees Celsius. However, Chaewon, with the naive delusion that she would keep the banana fresh longer, put it in the cold vegetable compartment of the refrigerator at 3 degrees Celsius. The cold of the refrigerator was like the bone-chilling Arctic frozen ground to bananas. The cold air was mercilessly contracting the cell walls, and the respiratory enzymes in the shell were screaming under extreme stress.

'no… There isn't much time... !'

Bana looked down at her yellow skin. On the outside, it was still a perfect golden lemon yellow, but deep inside the fine blood vessels of the skin, the tannin component was already oxidized and the brown melanin pigment was ready to explode. For bananas, brown spots called ‘sugar spots’ are, on the one hand, a sign of perfect maturity, indicating that the sugar content has reached its peak.

Rapid browning in a cold refrigerator was an irreversible time bomb that would soon lead to ‘collapse of the flesh’ and ‘spoilage’. Bana let out a silent cry through the crack in the refrigerator door in the darkness. 'miss! Don't hesitate! Don't skimp! The life of a fruit does not lie in waiting! Sweetness is not a piece of ice that stays still forever! now… If you don't eat me right now, I can no longer remain that sweet banana you love!' But beyond the tightly closed refrigerator door, the only sounds that could be heard were the dry mouse clicks of Chaewon absentmindedly tapping on the keyboard and the cold sound of the motor. The merciless clock in the refrigerator ticked cruelly,

Finally, the invisible shadow of death began to fall silently on Bana's clear and smooth yellow skin. Time passed brutally honestly and quickly. 6 AM, 8 AM, and 10 AM. The Seoul sky outside the window was peeling off the gray clouds and pouring in brilliant morning sunlight, but Chaewon's rooftop studio was in hellish chaos. It was because of a lightning-quick feedback email sent from the person in charge of an outsourced game company at 9:30 a.m. [Director Chaewon Han, the drum beat in the second half of the boss battle theme song you sent is too loose. Please raise the tempo to 135, re-record the entire brass session, and re-deliver it by 12 o'clock sharp. If you don't make it on time, the contract is canceled.] "What?! If you raise the tempo to 135, you have to change the entire arrangement again!"

Chaewon screamed and pulled out her head. If you miss this deadline, not only will your efforts over the past two months be in vain, but you will also have no way to pay next month's studio rent and loan interest. The sweet plan at dawn of taking a shower, making coffee elegantly, and eating bananas as a celebratory dinner was shattered. Chaewon was desperately pounding the keys and clicking the mouse, holding on to her tear-filled eyes. My knuckles were screaming, and my heart was pounding irregularly because I had downed three cups of coffee in quick succession. In that chaos, the existence of the banana in the refrigerator was pushed far into Chaewon's memory. And finally. 11:58 AM. With trembling hands, Chaewon attached the compressed final rendered WAV file to the email and pressed the ‘Send’ button. [The email has been sent successfully.]

The moment Chaewon saw the confirmation window that appeared on the monitor, all tension in Chaewon's body went away and she collapsed to the floor. “Haa… It’s over… It’s finally over…” The clock showed 12:05 in the afternoon. Although the sun was shining warmly on the floor, Chaewon's appearance was almost like that of a ghost. A skinny face, bloodless lips, and sunken eyes. Three days of sleep deprivation and extreme stress hit her all at once, and Chaewon stretched out on the floor and stared blankly at the ceiling. Behind the relief of surviving, a fierce and enormous feeling of hunger hit me like a tsunami. '… hungry. I really feel like I'm going to collapse.'

At that time, there was an image that passed through Chaewon's mind like lightning. '… banana!'

The golden banana in the vegetable compartment that I had so carefully saved at dawn! Now that the deadline was over, it was the moment of perfect happiness I had been waiting for so long. Chaewon got up as if crawling on the floor and staggered towards the refrigerator. Clap-

Chaewon's hand as she opened the refrigerator door was much more urgent and desperate than at dawn. Although Chaewon's eyes were spinning due to dizziness caused by an empty stomach, the anticipation of soon being able to take a bite of a sweet and soft banana made Chaewon's tired heart beat faster. Chaewon smiled brightly and extended her hand to the transparent vegetable compartment below. “Banana! I finally finished the deadline! It’s been a long time, right? Now it’s time to enjoy the perfect celebratory dinner with you…!” However, the very moment I opened the vegetable compartment drawer. The cheers that were about to burst from Chaewon's lips turned into frozen screams and were swallowed down her throat. “…Uh…? What… is this…?”

Chaewon's eyes shook violently, as if there had been an earthquake. The bottom of the plastic drawer where her eyes were frozen. The smooth, delicious bananas that had been a dazzling lemon yellow color just five or six hours ago were no longer there. Instead, lying there...

It was a dark red and mottled brown object that had been transformed into an indescribably grotesque and miserable sight. The beautiful golden light was nowhere to be found. The entire shell, from the top to the bottom, was charred to a pitch black brown color.

The bite was so severe that the surface of the bark was flabby and limp, like a thin plastic bag. Unable to withstand the harsh cold stress of the refrigerator, the banana's chlorophyll and cell membrane were completely destroyed, and the moisture and juice inside was stickily seeping out of the peel and soaking the bottom of the plastic drawer. Chaewon carefully picked up the brown object with trembling hands. The moment my fingertips touched the skin, I was startled and had chicken skin all over my body. The unique grip of bananas, which were hard and elastic, was nowhere to be found. The unpleasant, cool sensation of something squishy and weakly falling apart between your fingers, as if you were holding a lump of cold mud or melted jelly! The unique sweet and fresh banana aroma disappears,

What stung my nose was the sour smell of fermented alcohol and the sad, musty smell of decay. “This…what on earth is happening…?”

Chaewon's hands were shaking uncontrollably. “When I saw it in the morning… it was definitely yellow, hard and fresh… but how did it get like this in just five or six hours…?”

Chaewon looked blankly at the rotten banana in her hand. The black, rotten shell could not bear its weight and tore apart, and a lump of brown, mushy flesh inside fell out onto the kitchen floor. It was like the sound of something completely breaking apart in Chaewon's heart. The sound of the squishy piece of flesh falling to the ground and crushing it felt as if Chaewon's heart had fallen a thousand miles off a cliff. Dejected. A feeling of indescribable helplessness and self-destruction surged from my toes to the top of my head like cold ice water.

Chaewon's legs went limp, and she flopped down on the cold kitchen floor, holding a rotten banana. In the empty studio, only his own rough and irregular breathing echoed shabbily. The sound of the refrigerator's whirring motor pierced her ears, like a shrill laugh mocking her indecision.

‘I have a rotten banana in my hand…’

It doesn't have the sweetness I was hoping for...

In a reality that melts like a dream...

I said to myself, wondering if it was my fault… ' The lyrics and the wailing-like melody overflowed in Chaewon's head like a sad, minor lament. It was not just a trivial regret of losing a piece of damaged fruit. That rotten, brown banana was a mirror that clearly and cruelly reflected the twenty-eight years of Chae-won's life so far. So many choices that we've always put off, waiting for the perfect moment.

My first love, a senior, hesitated, saying he would confess 'when I was more fully prepared', but ended up becoming someone else's lover. I put off applying for the record label of my dreams, saying I would apply 'after I build a greater portfolio', but the document submission deadline passed. Friends from my hometown who I promised to see each other once 'this project is over', but have lost contact with for months and years.

My old parents couldn't come down even for the holidays, saying they would come see me later when I made a lot of money and was proud of myself. And this morning, even the last banana, which I had carefully saved ‘for a celebratory dinner at a happier end’, ended up heading to the trash can… ! Chaewon has consoled herself by saying that she is a sincere artist who pursues perfection, but

In reality, he was just a cowardly evader who did not have the courage to face the reality in front of him head-on and threw all his responsibilities into an uncertain drawer called 'the future'. The extreme myelopathy of youth that made today's self starve, mortgaging its happiness for tomorrow. The cruel law of the universe states that time does not wait for even a second for humans' arrogant hesitation and perfectionism.

The bone-piercing pain cut through my chest as the remains of the rotten banana stuck sticky to my palm. “It would be better… I would have just eaten it at dawn… If I had just munched on it when I was hungry, how sweet and hearty would it have been…”

A sob escaped from between Chaewon’s lips. “Why am I always like this… Why do I always cherish precious things right in front of me and then ruin them like this… A foolish life where I can’t enjoy something when it tastes the best and only shed tears of regret after it has rotted away…” Hot teardrops poured down Chaewon’s dry cheeks like rain. The teardrops fell onto the dark red banana peel in my hand and into the cracks in the torn flesh. The moment a teardrop touches the wounded surface of a rotten banana and seeps into it. Cheeeeeek-! An unbelievable and surreal phenomenon began to occur. Instead of the cold, sour smell of alcohol, golden smoke with the scent of freshly baked sweet caramel and vanilla began to rise from the rotten banana peel! At the same time, the fluorescent lights in the old one-room kitchen flickered like crazy and the voltage fluctuated.

The floorboard on the kitchen floor where Chaewon was sitting crumbled like sand, and the dry desert red sand wind began to swirl from all directions! The boundary between reality and fantasy was shattering, and the door to a strange and mysterious dimension led by a rotten banana was finally wide open.