Dawon Apartment Ep. 3 | 다원 아파트 3화

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Episode 3

JIHO

Sunday mornings belonged to stillness.
Or at least, they used to.

Jiho woke at 7:02 a.m. without the help of an alarm. Years of early flights and design deadlines had trained his body to open its eyes with precision. He lay there for a moment, listening—nothing but the faint whir of the ceiling fan and the city’s distant breathing.
No messages yet, no clients calling from other time zones. A rare, merciful pause.

He sat up and stretched. The apartment was modest—white walls, pale wood floors, one plant by the window trying its best to survive his travel schedule. He watered it first, because guilt was a better motivator than habit.

The kettle clicked on. While the water heated, he moved through a quiet choreography: folding the blanket, opening the window, smoothing the edges of his notes on the desk. The air outside was cool enough to wake his skin. Down below, the courtyard still slept—empty, except for Mandu curled under the tree.

Coffee next. Two scoops, pour, stir. No sugar.
He leaned against the counter, sipping, eyes tracing the familiar skyline: the narrow gap between the two villa buildings where morning light always wedged itself just so.

His phone buzzed with a work notification. He checked it, sighed, and set it face-down. Not today.

He opened his laptop anyway, more out of muscle memory than intent. The screen filled with half-finished blueprints—lines and measurements that had blurred into sameness after weeks of revisions.
He scrolled, added a note, deleted it.

That was when the first sound broke through.

A metallic clang echoed from below, followed by Mrs. Park’s unmistakable voice: “Buckets! We need more buckets!”

Jiho frowned, leaning toward the window. Another shout followed—Jiho’s this time—and then the high-pitched laugh of a child.

He exhaled, somewhere between amusement and resignation. So much for stillness.

Mandu lifted her head at the commotion, tail flicking. “Don’t look at me,” Jiho murmured. “I didn’t start it.”

Another burst of noise—footsteps, more voices, the splash of water. He recognized the pattern: villa clean-up day. It happened every couple of months, though he’d managed to miss the last few thanks to travel. Apparently, not this time.

He took another sip of coffee and debated pretending not to hear when the knock came.
Three firm raps—Mrs. Park’s signature.

He opened the door a fraction. “Good morning.”

“Morning? It’s already cleaning time! Gloves on, young man.”

He glanced at the rag and spray bottle in her hands. “I’m not young.”

She waved that off. “Perfect, then you can lift the heavy bins.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but she was already halfway down the hall, barking new orders.
Jiho looked at the steaming mug on his counter, then back toward the door. The cat below yawned.

“Traitor,” he muttered.

A moment later, he was pulling on old sneakers and following the noise downstairs. The courtyard was filling with sunlight and neighbors, all in mismatched aprons, brooms, and laughter.

He thought of his quiet apartment, the untouched blueprints waiting on his desk.

Then he heard it again—that easy, melodic laugh he didn’t recognize yet.
He glanced toward Building B, second-floor balcony, where a woman in a loose T-shirt leaned over the rail, hair catching the morning light.

For a moment, before anyone noticed him, Jiho let himself simply listen.

Then Mrs. Park spotted him and waved. “There he is! Everyone, our last volunteer!”

He sighed, setting down his mug on the steps. “Guess we’re doing this,” he murmured.

The villa answered with another clang of metal, and still half-smiling, he joined the noise.

HONEY

The first sound of Sunday wasn’t birds or the city—it was metal scraping concrete.

Honey blinked awake to the clang of a bucket outside her window and voices shouting cheerful orders. She rolled over, checked her phone. 9:07 a.m. No school, no alarm—so what on earth was happening?

She slid open the curtains. Below, the courtyard looked like a construction site staffed by neighbors in mismatched aprons. Mrs. Park stood in the middle like a general, one gloved hand pointing dramatically toward the stairwell.

“Wipe the rails! Jiho, less talking, more sweeping!”

Soojin, laughing, caught sight of Honey on the balcony and waved. “Villa cleaning day! Come down before she drafts you anyway!”

Honey grinned. “Do I get armor?”

“Only rubber gloves!”

She sighed theatrically, tied up her hair, and went to join the battle.

The smell of soap and wet pavement filled the air. Someone had mixed too much detergent into a bucket, and the bubbles were spreading like curious clouds.

Mrs. Park thrust a rag into Honey’s hand the moment she stepped into the courtyard. “You can wipe the second-floor rails, dear. Don’t fall!”

“Yes, ma’am.”

On the first-floor landing, Mr. Choi was already scrubbing with military precision, humming along to his crackling radio. Jiho leaned on his broom, pretending to help while filming for what he called “documentary evidence of forced labor.”

Minyoung appeared in full makeup, holding her phone out at selfie-angle. “Wait—everyone smile! ‘Good morning from Dawon Villa Cleanup Squad!’”

Half the group groaned; the other half posed.

Honey laughed under her breath. She’d spent years in apartments where she never learned her neighbors’ names; this chaos felt strangely comforting.

She wiped the railings alongside Soojin, who balanced a bucket on her hip.

“Do they do this every month?” Honey asked.

“Every other. It’s more excuse to talk than to clean.”

Below, Dabin zoomed by on his bike, declaring, “I’m cleaning with air power!”

Mrs. Park shouted up, “That counts!”

Honey leaned over the rail to watch him spin circles near the gate. For once, the villa didn’t look like two plain brick buildings—it looked alive.

Then Soojin nudged her. “C-2’s here, by the trash area.”

Honey followed her gaze. At the far corner of the courtyard, a tall man in rolled-sleeve shirt and black cap stacked recycling bins in neat columns. Even from a distance, his movements were deliberate, unhurried.

“Oh,” Honey said softly. “The quiet neighbor.”

“Mm-hmm.” Soojin smiled. “Mrs. Park bullied him into joining. She says community spirit builds muscle.”

Honey laughed, but her eyes lingered. It was the first time she’d seen him clearly. 

 JIHO

He hadn’t planned to spend his Sunday knee-deep in soda bottles.

He’d been organizing blueprints when the knock came—sharp, authoritative. “Community cleaning day!” Mrs. Park had declared before he could even reach the door. Ten minutes later, he found himself holding trash tongs like a captured soldier.

Now he stacked the plastic neatly, pretending efficiency could drown out the noise. It couldn’t. The courtyard was a hive: laughter, instructions, Jiho’s exaggerated groans, a child singing a dinosaur song.

Across the way, the new tenant—Honey—was wiping the railing. Sunlight slipped across her face as she worked, catching in the loose strands of her hair. Every so often she laughed at something Soojin said, the sound carrying lightly over the walls.

He didn’t mean to keep looking, but the brightness of it pulled at him. When Mandu darted between his feet, he murmured, “You too?” The cat ignored him, leaping onto the stair rail to watch her favorite human instead.

Jiho shook his head, smiling despite himself.

HONEY

By mid-morning the courtyard had turned into a kind of cooperative chaos. Every few minutes Mrs. Park reassigned jobs with the authority of a coach calling new plays.

“Jiho, hose duty! Honey, you’re with him—watch he doesn’t flood the stairs!”

“Hey, I’m responsible!” Jiho said, immediately proving himself wrong by spraying the hose before she was ready. A fine mist hit Honey’s shoulder.

She squeaked and laughed. “I thought you said you were responsible!”

“It was a demonstration.”
“Of what? Bad aim?”

Mr. Choi passed with a bucket, shaking his head. “This is why I bring my own tools.”

Honey offered him a smile. “Do you have any advice for a first-time villa cleaner?”

He hesitated, then handed her an extra scrubbing brush. “Circular motion. Less work that way.”

When he walked off, she caught a small upward twitch at the corner of his mouth. Progress.

Next came Soojin, who was sweeping near the stairwell while Dabin followed her, pretending the broom was a sword.

“Teacher Honey, watch out, there’s a monster!” he shouted, pointing the broom at a pile of leaves.

Honey gasped dramatically. “Save me, brave knight!”

He struck the pile and scattered dust everywhere. Soojin groaned. “My hero, you just undid twenty minutes of sweeping.”

Honey giggled, taking the broom. “I’ll fix the battlefield, don’t worry.”

A few meters away, Minyoung crouched with a rag, angling her phone for the perfect shot.
“Could you hold the sponge like you’re in a commercial?” she asked.

Honey blinked. “A cleaning commercial?”

“Exactly! Hashtag community goals!”

She obliged, holding the sponge while Minyoung snapped a few pictures, squealing.
“You’re a natural,” Minyoung said. “You could start a lifestyle account—Teacher Honey’s Home Hacks!”

“Please no. My only hack is buying snacks instead of cooking.”

Minyoung laughed so hard she almost dropped her phone.

By the time Mrs. Park checked their progress, Honey had somehow talked with almost everyone—laughed, shared tools, traded small stories. The courtyard felt less like a group of strangers and more like a messy orchestra finally learning to play in tune.

“Need more towels!” Mrs. Park called suddenly, holding up a dripping rag.
Every head turned toward Honey.

“You said you had extras, right?” Soojin asked.

Honey nodded. “Upstairs. In my closet.”

Before she could move, Mrs. Park clapped her hands. “Jiho-ssi! You’re tall, go help her carry them!”

Jiho looked up from where he was sorting bottles. “Me?”

“Yes, you. Two people are faster than one. Go, go!”

Honey tried not to smile at his expression—somewhere between polite surrender and mild disbelief. She motioned toward the stairs. “Come on, Consultant. Let’s retrieve the sacred towels.”

He followed, wiping his hands on his sleeves. The air grew quieter as they climbed, the courtyard noise fading behind them.

Inside her apartment, sunlight pooled across the floor. The faint scent of coffee and citrus filled the space.

“Nice place,” he said after a pause.

“Thanks. Still figuring out where everything goes.” She opened a closet and pulled out a basket stuffed with neatly folded towels. “Here, if you take a few—”

He stepped forward at the same time she turned, and they nearly collided. For a second, the basket pressed between them.

“Sorry,” she said quickly.

“All good.” He steadied it with one hand. “Heavy?”

“Not really. Just bulky.”

They started stacking the towels into two piles. Honey laughed under her breath. “I didn’t think ‘villa cleaning day’ would include inviting neighbors into my apartment.”

“You adapted fast.”

“That’s teacher training—constant improvisation.”

He glanced around the room: the books arranged by color, a few plants by the window, a half-finished mug of coffee on the counter. “Looks lived in already.”

“I try.” She hesitated. “You’ve been here a while, right?”

“Two years,” he said. “But I travel often. Sometimes the plants die before I come back.”

“That’s tragic,” she teased. “Maybe Mandu should check on them.”

He smiled. “She’d demand rent.”

When they reached the door, Honey shifted the basket to her hip. “Ready?”

“Yeah.”

They stepped back into the stairwell together, laughter and voices rising again from below. Halfway down, she heard Soojin calling, “Did you find them?”

“Mission complete!” Honey shouted.

The courtyard erupted in cheers and clapping that made her laugh.

Jiho shook his head, amused. “They celebrate everything here.”

“That’s the best part,” she said, and looked up at him. “You’ll see.”

For a moment, the noise seemed distant—the two of them standing side by side, towels between them, the scent of soap and sunlight curling in the air.

Then Mrs. Park yelled, “Hurry, my hands are shriveling!”

They both burst out laughing and descended the last steps.

An hour or two later, Mrs. Park declared the place “clean enough for government inspection” and ordered a break. Buckets were repurposed as stools, and soon an impromptu picnic spread covered the center of the courtyard—kimbap, sliced fruit, barley tea in mismatched cups.

Honey sat cross-legged on the pavement, brushing soap bubbles off her jeans. Across from her, Jiho accepted a cup from Mrs. Park with polite reluctance.

“Everyone, meet formally,” Mrs. Park announced. “This is Honey, our new English teacher. And that”—she pointed her cup like a weapon—“is Jiho, our mysterious designer who finally came out of hiding.”

“Consultant,” he corrected quietly.

“Designer, consultant—same thing,” she said.

Laughter rippled around them. Honey met his eyes over the rim of her cup. He looked exactly as she’d imagined: calm, tidy, faintly amused. When he smiled, it was small but real.

“Thanks for the tip about boiled chicken,” she said. “Mandu approved.”

“You actually tried it?”

“Of course. She’s picky.”

“She’s spoiled.”

“By all of us,” Soojin said, nudging him. “You included.”

Jiho raised his hands in surrender. “I accept partial guilt.”

“See?” Mrs. Park said. “Teamwork.”

The laughter came easily again. Honey realized she hadn’t felt this at ease with strangers in a long time.

JIHO

He ate the rice ball Mrs. Park handed him, pretending not to enjoy it. The courtyard buzzed around him—conversation blending with the faint hiss of someone’s radio.

He wasn’t used to this kind of noise. Usually, Sundays meant spreadsheets, flights, and silence. But there was something oddly grounding about it—the scrape of chopsticks against containers, the way Honey tilted her head when listening to others speak.

She asked Soojin questions about her students, about the neighborhood, about the best bakery nearby. Jiho noticed she never dominated the talk; she just wove herself into it until everyone seemed to orbit the same rhythm.

When she jotted something on a folded piece of paper, curiosity pricked. A shopping list? Later he’d spot the same handwriting online, under the title Villa Notes #3.

Mrs. Park shoved leftovers at him before he could escape. “Take it! Single men must eat properly.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said automatically, and realized the words felt less like surrender and more like belonging.

HONEY

By afternoon, the courtyard gleamed. Laundry flapped above like celebration flags. One by one, neighbors retreated indoors for naps or TV marathons.

Honey stayed behind to rehang the towels she’d washed that morning. Mandu followed her lazily, tail flicking.

She hummed without thinking—an old English lullaby she sometimes used in class. The echo sounded strange against the brick walls, softer than a song, more like a thought spoken aloud.

Across the courtyard, she caught a movement at C-2’s balcony: Jiho shaking out a blanket, sleeves rolled, expression peaceful. When he noticed her glance, he nodded once in greeting. She waved back, smile easy.

The villa, freshly cleaned, smelled of sunlight and soap. For the first time, she thought, maybe I really live here now.

That evening, the courtyard settled again—quiet but not empty. Honey sat at her desk, window open, listening to the faint clatter of dishes from Mrs. Park’s kitchen and Dabin’s bedtime protests drifting up from D-2.

The apartment was dim except for the soft pool of light from her desk lamp. The courtyard outside had gone quiet; only the faint hum of someone’s TV and the slow drip of water from a balcony above filled the stillness.

Honey rested her chin on her hand, staring at the open document on her laptop. The title bar blinked patiently:

Villa Notes #3 — Sunday Noise.

She began to type.

The courtyard smells like soap and sunlight.
Maybe that’s what fresh starts sound like—
brooms scraping concrete, neighbors laughing over spilled tea, and someone you don’t know yet smiling back through the noise.

Her cursor hovered halfway down the page.
She exhaled, typed:

And there was C-2, the man from across the courtyard, quietly sorting bottles like he’d done it his whole life. He barely spoke, but somehow felt like part of the music anyway.

She read it once, then frowned.
Too personal.

Delete.

She tried again.

One neighbor worked near the trash bins, keeping rhythm without realizing it.

Better, but dry.
She tapped the backspace again, erasing until only the blinking cursor remained.

“Ugh,” she muttered. “It’s not that deep, Honey.”

She sipped lukewarm tea, thinking. How did one write about a person without sounding like they were studying them? She just wanted to capture the mood — the quiet contrast between chaos and calm.

She typed another version:

Even the quietest ones contribute something — the steady movement, the pause between laughter, the sound of things being set in order.

She leaned back. “That’s… okay.”
Still, she hovered over the line, adding a period, deleting it, then adding it again.

Her phone buzzed beside the keyboard — a new message in the group chat.

BalconyQueen: post the blog already 😭 we’re refreshing like maniacs

Honey laughed quietly and replied:

B2Honey: give me ten minutes, perfection takes time

She turned back to the screen. Her eyes drifted to the last sentence again. Maybe she could keep one hint — something small, true, and harmless.

She added:

Sometimes you don’t need to say much to belong. Some people just have a presence that steadies the room.

She read it twice. It felt right. Not too specific, not too revealing — just honest enough to capture what she’d felt watching him stack bottles in calm silence while everyone else turned the courtyard into a circus.

She saved the draft and whispered, “Okay, C-2, that’s all you get.”

Outside, the wind shifted, brushing against the windows. The fairy lights reflected faintly in the glass, her own face overlapping with the soft glow from across the courtyard.

For a heartbeat, she wondered if he ever read her posts — then immediately shook her head. “No way,” she told herself, smiling.

Her fingers hovered over Publish.

Click.

Sundays at Dawon Villa aren’t peaceful. They’re loud, messy, and a little wonderful.

The day started with the sound of buckets clanking and Mrs. Park shouting like a drill sergeant. I leaned out my balcony to find the entire villa armed with brooms and rags—apparently, it was “community cleaning day.”

Within minutes, I was drafted.

There’s something oddly charming about cleaning with people you barely know. Jiho tried to turn the hose into a water gun, Soojin swept while keeping Dabin from turning her broom into a sword, and Minyoung took more selfies than she wiped surfaces. Mr. Choi grumbled about noise but still fixed the squeaky gate before anyone asked him to.

Mandu, of course, supervised from the wall like a queen.

We must have looked ridiculous—grown adults tripping over buckets, soap bubbles floating between buildings—but by the time the sun reached the courtyard, the place gleamed. Mrs. Park called it “a masterpiece,” then immediately declared a lunch break to celebrate.

We ate rice balls and fruit while sitting on overturned boxes, everyone talking at once. The conversation bounced between recipes, old villa gossip, and why Mandu refuses to eat store-brand tuna. I laughed so much my cheeks hurt.

There’s something comforting about ordinary chaos.

At some point, someone mentioned that the man from C-2 had come down to help. I hadn’t expected that. He’s quieter than the rest of us—steady, focused, the kind of person who listens more than he speaks.
He ended up across from me during lunch, sorting through leftovers Mrs. Park forced into his hands. We talked briefly—nothing deep—but I noticed how calm he seemed, even in the noise.

Sometimes you don’t need to say much to belong.
Some people just have a presence that steadies the room.

By the afternoon, the courtyard smelled like soap and sunlight. We’d hung new laundry, scrubbed every corner, and somehow managed to feel closer because of it. Maybe that’s what community is—a series of small, shared chores that turn strangers into something softer.

There’s a kind of music in days like this.
You start out holding separate brooms,
and by the end, you’re just one building making noise together.

#villalife #sundaynoise #smallmoments

Comments:

@breadmom: my radio does not lose to Dabin’s dinosaur roars 😤
@balconyqueen: c2 looked cute in that gray shirt tho 👀
@walkslowly: reading this while folding laundry 🩵

Anonymous: what’s going on with C2?

JIHO

The laptop screen glowed pale blue in the dark.
Jiho should’ve been reviewing schematics, but the cursor blinked in the search bar, waiting for something else.

He hesitated, then typed:
Villa Notes — Dawon Life Blog.

It appeared instantly. The familiar profile picture—a watercolor mug and plant—stared back at him. He hadn’t meant to look for it; it just happened after Mrs. Park mentioned “the teacher’s stories” earlier.

He clicked.

The first post loaded with cheerful handwriting-style headers and warm, candid photos of the courtyard. The tone was simple, conversational, but each line carried quiet observation.

“The courtyard smells like soap and sunlight…”

He read that line twice.

There were little things he’d missed today—the way she described Dabin’s roar as music, or how she noticed that even Mr. Choi’s radio joined the “chorus.” The words made the villa sound almost magical, as if the cracks in the wall were intentional brushstrokes.

Scrolling, he saw the earlier entries too.
Villa Notes #1: moving day.
Villa Notes #2: the cat incident.

He skimmed through, pausing when he reached his own name—or rather, the coded “C-2.”

“He speaks rarely, but when he does, it sounds like he’s finishing a thought that started in silence.”

He stared at that sentence for a long moment, a faint crease forming between his brows. He couldn’t tell if it embarrassed him or…something else.

Her writing wasn’t dramatic, just true in the way truth could sneak up on you.

He leaned back in his chair. Outside his window, the fairy lights across the courtyard blinked softly—the same ones that framed her balcony.

He found himself wondering what she was doing now. Probably asleep, or maybe still typing, chasing one last perfect sentence.

The hum of the refrigerator filled the silence. On the desk, his coffee had gone cold.

He clicked the browser closed but didn’t shut the laptop.

For a few seconds, he sat still, listening to the faint sounds of the villa—pipes ticking, a door closing somewhere, the quiet scrape of Mandu jumping onto a railing.

Through the thin wall came muffled laughter—Honey reading something aloud. He recognized the rhythm of her words even without hearing them clearly. In the comfort of her home she spoke in English, but out in the neighborhood she’d only ever used Korean. It impressed him how natural she was at it. He thought back to his own days of learning English in school, but it was a far cry from being fluent. He had focused more of his energy drawing than studying foreign languages which now made him feel silly. Even so, Honey was impressive in her own way for many reasons.

He leaned back, stretching. The day’s noise still echoed faintly in his head: broom bristles, Dabin’s bicycle, Mrs. Park’s jokes. For years, he’d treated weekends like an extension of work—quiet, controlled. Now the silence felt different—warmer somehow.

He closed his laptop and looked once more at B-2’s window.

He thought about the line she’d written earlier:

“You start out as strangers holding separate brooms, and by the end you’re just one building making noise together.”

A slow smile tugged at his lips.

Maybe noise wasn’t such a bad thing.