“Today, we’ll be role-playing as families,” announced Ms. Kim Hee-yeon to her first-grade class. “You’ll take turns playing the roles of mom, dad, and siblings, and afterwards, you’ll share your thoughts about the experience. Understand?”

“Yes!” the children chorused enthusiastically.

Despite feeling sympathy for ‘Julian’, whose circumstances were genuinely unfortunate, Ms. Hee-yeon knew that lessons had to proceed. After all, each child in her class of 32 had their own unique situations to handle.

Ms. Hee-yeon divided the class into groups of four or five, assigning them family roles, and allowed the children to choose which parts they wanted to play. The room soon filled with lively interactions as kids enthusiastically adopted roles of parents, uncles, grandparents, and siblings.

“Here, you can buy whatever you want,” one child playing the role of a father said grandly, mimicking handing over money—a hopeful reflection of their own desires.

“No, stop that. Don’t touch this; mommy told you not to! Why don’t you ever listen?” another sternly reprimanded, playing the mother role to the amusement of their classmates, who responded with applause and cheers.

“I need some money for a game,” one child declared.
“And which role are you playing?”
“I’m the uncle.”
“…”

Ms. Hee-yeon couldn’t help but smile wistfully.

When it was Julian’s group’s turn, surprisingly, Julian took on the role of the father. The group consisted of three girls playing the roles of mother, older sister, and younger sister. As the mother ‘cleaned’ the house and the older sister helped, the younger sister clung to her, pleading for snacks, causing the class to burst into laughter. Amid this, Julian was intriguingly detached, simulating chopping wood at a distance.

“I’m cutting wood to make a chair,” Julian explained when asked, which drew impressed exclamations from his classmates. Ms. Hee-yeon found it curious indeed—not just assembling but actually cutting the wood from scratch, a scene unimaginable within her frame of knowledge, as unauthorized logging is illegal in South Korea.

Then, a child blurted out, “How can you make a chair? You don’t have a dad. You’re lying.”
“…”

Such remarks, devoid of malice yet harsh, often surfaced unexpectedly among children this age, highlighting their inability to grasp the full implications of their words. With her three years of experience, Ms. Hee-yeon hesitated, caught off-guard by the comment.

“Our home backs onto a forest,” Julian began calmly, reclaiming attention. “About a thirty-minute walk leads to a stand of red cedar. We’d cut the trees there to make things.”

The classroom fell silent, all eyes on Julian as he continued.

“Red cedar has fewer knots, so it’s pretty and light yet strong, ideal for making chairs or tables.”

Ms. Hee-yeon didn’t interrupt; she saw no reason to.

“You have to cut the wood along the grain to make it strong. Cutting against the grain weakens it. Dad said if we use it to make a chair, it wouldn’t last long.”

As Julian paused, a respectful silence filled the room.

“Once you have the right pieces, you sand them down. I can help with that. Dad would oil the wood, and then we’d set it outside to dry for three days before sanding and oiling it again, twice more. After that, it’s strong enough for our family to use, warm to sit on.”

Julian’s gaze drifted downward as he finished, his head bowing low. No child spoke; the impact of his words lingered heavily in the air.

“Hmm, maybe he read about it somewhere?” suggested the librarian, Ms. Lee, as she and Ms. Hee-yeon discussed the incident over coffee.

“Could be, but it seemed too detailed, almost as if he’d experienced it himself,” Ms. Hee-yeon mused, sipping her overly sweet mixed coffee.

Ms. Lee lightly touched her lips to her cup, considering. “Well, I wasn’t there, so I can’t judge the feeling. But woodworking is something you can find in books here, too. However, I think it’s more likely that he’s just very bright and made it sound real. Like the Ripley syndrome, you know? Maybe he feels inferior because he doesn’t have parents, so he invents these grandiose tales. Who makes chairs from scratch nowadays? But to him, that’s his ideal father figure.”

Ms. Hee-yeon cut in before Ms. Lee could continue, sensing the librarian’s speculation might be partly true but difficult to accept emotionally. Yet, she considered whether she should share this story with the childcare staff at the orphanage.

Unaware of their teacher’s concerns, Julian quietly read in the classroom, waiting for the afternoon’s math lesson. His favorite subject after reading, elementary school math was like a magical discipline to him, revealing numbers and calculations he never knew existed, a stark contrast to his previous life’s simpler arithmetic. His rapid mastery of mathematics, far beyond his peers, was not just academic excellence but a refuge from his haunting memories.

In the back of the room, Kyung-eun, a girl from Julian’s class, watched him from a distance. She had recently become intrigued by the mysterious boy who seemed to know so much about woodworking. Though she had observed him from afar, today she mustered the courage to approach.

“Um…,” she started hesitantly, then blurted, “Plaster?”

Realizing her slip-up in using his nickname, her face flushed with embarrassment. But it had caught his attention, and Julian turned to look at her directly.