I Only Bought Them a Triangle Kimbap on the Way Home from Work, But They Cried for a Long Time
A chance act of kindness transforms into mutual salvation when a stranger saves the narrator from a truck accident.
Each sentence was submitted separately and chosen by community vote before the next one could be written. Nobody knew how it would end.
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I had no interest in that person's 'long time' or their 'crying'—it was only cheap sympathy on my part.
Their pitiful grip on my collar annoyed me, yet my gaze kept lingering, wetting me with their falling tears.
I panicked, my hand hovering in the air, uncertain whether I should reach up and comfort them or not.
After an awkward stretch of time, that person thanked me repeatedly and insisted they would repay the favor.
Hmm, let go of my hand and just talk, will you? I laughed awkwardly, trying to send them away, and then it happened.
A truck crashed into the beverage boxes in front of the convenience store and barreled toward me at high speed.
While I stood confused, that person embraced me and leaped to the side, pulling me away from the truck.
I was dumbfounded, but the person seemed to have gotten hurt a little while saving me.
"Are you okay?" I asked, and they smiled calmly before looking at their own arm and crying out, "Oh no! Blood… I'm bleeding!"
The appearance from just moments before seemed to vanish in their clumsy panic and that strange, laughter-tinged voice, so I just
burst out laughing, unable to help myself, thinking this wasn't what I expected—that I would receive such a great repayment for the cheap sympathy I had given.
In that moment, I realized: true grace is not cheap sympathy, but the will to save each other.
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