Chapter 2: 2.1

Woo-hyun sat in the car and stared silently at the scenery outside the window. The surroundings were so messed up that he wondered if this was what a landscape painted by a drunken painter, using roughly black and white colors, would look like.

There was old rubbish scattered by the wind, urination marks on the road made by someone, and a stray cat that lost its tail, walking slowly over the cracked walls.

The neighborhood, which was not managed due to the people’s indifference, was dark and murky as if all light and color had been taken away.

Woo-hyun knew this neighborhood well. A neighborhood centered on multi-unit housing, where most of the people have left after the redevelopment had been confirmed.

He also once lived in this place. By the time everyone left, Woo-hyun was the only one who remained and turned on the lights in the neighborhood. In the end, the last memory he had at that house was that of being grabbed by the neck by men in black suits.

After that, he stayed with his family in an inn room. Hearing someone moan through the thin walls every night. His father pretended not to hear, and his mother deliberately made useless noises to cover up the incoming moaning sounds, but it was in vain.

“Looks like someone is sick.”

In the end, with words that no one would believe, his mother decided to turn the situation around. All he could do, as a young man who knew everything but could not pretend to know, was to turn the TV on at a high volume for his sister, who was younger than him.

The young Eun-soo was puzzled, but because of the atmosphere, she just rolled her eyes without asking what it was.

Creak.

When the sound of the door opening was heard through the half-open window, Woo-hyun stopped his thoughts and turned his head. A woman opened the door and came out.

There was a garbage bag in the woman’s hand. The bag was tight as if it was about to burst. Whether the garbage bag was heavy, or she was weak, the woman staggered the whole time. The woman, who put the bag down in front of the gate, had her head bowed and he could not see her face.

Woo-hyun stared at that woman with cold eyes.

The woman was as gloomy, dark and shabby as the background surrounding her. The woman, who had been deprived of all light and color, only had a gray and gloomy atmosphere to her. Woo-hyun knew when such an atmosphere would come out of a human.

You can’t die because you don’t have the courage to do so, but you also have no hope of living. In those situations.

She could also be sick. However, he didn’t receive any report about the woman being ill. Maybe she was sick but was enduring it because she didn’t have the money to go to a hospital. No matter how good health insurance is, the poor people who lack a thousand won in their pockets are just like that.

Woo-hyun got out of the car and closed the door. Then, as he was about to take a step forward, the woman who was looking at the floor like a person with a broken neck raised her head and stared at the sky.

It was then that he saw the side of the woman’s face. The face of a young person overlapped over the face that was so pale that it was pitiful to look at.

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Woo-hyun couldn’t take a single step and stood still. When he received the report from Jun-kyung, he checked the name.

Kim Yoo-hwa.

He thought it was a different person with the same name. The Yoo-hwa he knew had no family except for her mother.

Above all, when he received a picture from Jun-kyung, showing only the side face of the woman standing at a distance, the atmosphere was so different that he thought it was surely a different person. However, the woman he knew was standing there, with an appearance that he had never imagined.

The woman who was staring at the gray sky staggered and turned around. It took her a long time to even walk a short distance.

The woman closed the door with an awful squeaking noise. Even after the woman disappeared, Woo-hyun could not move from his spot.

Then, a cool wind blew.

The air smelled like an old town.

***

“Must you really do that?”

Jun-kyung objected to Woo-hyun’s decision to directly keep watch near the woman’s house while waiting for Kim Yi-woon’s arrival. Seeing that Jun-kyung, who rarely opposes his decisions, raised his voice, he seemed to have made up his mind.

“I will put people around the house. As soon as we find Kim Yi-woon, we will have you catch him. There are plenty of people to make him kneel down in front of hyung-nim…”

“Aren’t there a lot of people running around these days? I know there’s a lot of work.”

Woo-hyun cut his words and asked dryly. Due to the explosive growth of the business, most of the available manpower was working outside. Jun-kyung flinched for a moment, then answered stubbornly.

“But I can’t let hyung-nim stay in that shabby place. Even if 100 people go out, it is more important for you to stay here.  Also, it’s true that the last place where Kim Yi-woon appeared was there, but there is no guarantee that he will appear again, hyung-nim. Also, you heard about that woman. She…!”

“Jun-kyung.”

When Woo-hyun called his name in a low voice, Jun-kyung was startled. It was rare for Woo-hyun to address him without his surname. Most of the time, when he called him like that, it meant that Woo-hyun was angry.

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