Chapter 160

What should I start the conversation with? While I was caught up in such a pointless dilemma, Jin Seo-hye spoke first.

[…Why are you silent? I’m hanging up.]

[Wait a moment.]

[Your voice… prank call?]

Ah, this brat’s voice. It was a voice that wouldn’t be strange to think of as a prank call. I wondered if she didn’t remember my voice after all. In the end, I hurriedly spoke up to reveal my identity.

[It’s not a prank call. I’m… Seol-guk.]

[…I’m hanging up.]

[Wait!]

Startled by her cutting off so sharply, I shouted, but the call had already ended. I immediately dialed again. After a long wait, she finally answered the phone.

[How did you get my number?]

[I heard it through others. I apologize if it offended you.]

[I don’t think we’re at the level where we can chat like this.]

[I think so too. However, I called because I have a question I need to ask.]

[Whatever it is, do you think I’ll answer?]

[It’s about an interview regarding Muk Ha-neul.]

[Ha, that girl? She sold a few books by luck. But I’m sorry, you have the wrong address. I haven’t left my house recently, nor have I contacted anyone.]

I didn’t say, “Well, you answered at least.” This woman wasn’t Senior Su-Young.

I pondered whether her words were true for a moment, but I still couldn’t tell. It was hard to discern lies over a phone call. The voice didn’t sound like a liar, but that wasn’t a certainty either.

[Even if it’s not an interview, I have more questions. There’s also a story related to Kang Seong-hye.]

[…Who do you think you are to call Seong-hye’s name?]

…Oh dear, did I touch a nerve?

[Because of you…! Because of you…!]

First, I needed something that Jin Seo-hye might know about. I couldn’t risk provoking her unnecessarily, ending up with nothing. So I spoke directly.

[Is there something you want?]

[…Apologize.]

[That’s impossible.]

I was willing to accommodate most requests, but this was an exception. Some might easily brush this off and give an insincere apology, but I wasn’t that accommodating. Everyone has a line they won’t cross. Even if I were to apologize, a hollow apology would just offend me more.

[And I suppose you didn’t think I would apologize?]

[Then why should I keep listening to you?]

Indeed. If I were in Jin Seo-hye’s position, I wouldn’t know that either. That said, I couldn’t simply say, “I see. Understood.” and hang up.

If there was no answer from me, I had to look for one from her. It couldn’t be helped.

[Is there something you want?]

[I told you.]

[Anything but an apology. I can’t guarantee anything, but I will consider it as best as I can. Is there nothing else?]

Jin Seo-hye didn’t reply immediately. This was a fairly positive sign. It meant she was contemplating making a demand.

[Any… will do?]

[If you ask for money, I will give you what I can at my level.]

[I don’t need that kind of thing.]

I thought she would say something like that.

[If you have something else, please say it.]

[…I want you.]

[…What?]

I said anything, but this answer was not what I expected. Had she been cooped up in her room for too long? The panic in my voice was palpable, and Jin Seo-hye added on.

[Don’t think weirdly. Just… once will be enough.]

How could I not think it was weird? Especially considering that the other person was a lesbian, and for the time being, I was a woman as well. Although there was no way she would do such a thing to me, a sense of fear inevitably arose.

[Just one hit is enough.]

Fortunately,

[Let me hit you. That will be sufficient.]

My worries had been for nothing.

…It wasn’t strange at all. And I thought it was quite a fitting reward. From the beginning, Jin Seo-hye’s anger wasn’t rational. She likely knew that well. She might have wanted to stop herself.

Because of ‘that incident’, because she did ‘that deed’, it was simply an unavoidable anger.

So Jin Seo-hye was demanding from me the closure of this anger, the conclusion of this story. I had done enough. I had worked hard enough. So, as long as there was a small reward, she could easily be satisfied.

This long, long self-hatred.

[Let’s accept it. Where shall we meet?]

[I’ll give you the address, come to my house. Anyway, I’m the only one here.]

[What about your family?]

[I’m an orphan.]

…Ah.

[It’s not the same as you. I grew up with my grandmother. And she has been unconscious for quite a while and passed away not long ago. Now I’m all alone. Not much different from you now.]

[Rest in peace.]

[…Yeah.]

Jin Seo-hye gave me her address. In this case, at least I wouldn’t have to worry about being blindsided once I went in. I couldn’t say for sure, but I felt I understood Jin Seo-hye’s psychology to a certain extent. I understood she wasn’t someone who’d create more problems here.

The appointment was for tomorrow. The address was a little far outside of Seoul, in Gyeonggi-do, but it wasn’t a place that would take too long to reach. After hanging up, I thought deeply.

And then I realized that I had thought too much and eased up a bit.

Only after clearing my head could I finally fall asleep.

~

Jin Seo-hye’s house was an apartment. If there is a class even among apartments, it was one that wouldn’t get a particularly high ranking.

There wasn’t even a separate lock on the communal entrance. I went up to this insecure apartment and rang the doorbell at Jin Seo-hye’s house.

And soon, she came out.

I had thought her state might be a mess since she had been holed up in her house, but she looked better than expected. Both her gaze and expression were not those of a healthy person, but at least there was nothing particularly abnormal about her appearance. Given that I was coming over, she probably wouldn’t want to show herself in a weird way. She must have tidied up to some extent.

“Come in.”

“Okay.”

Jin Seo-hye’s house was cleaner than I expected. Of course, she might have cleaned up because I was coming, but at a glance, it felt like she was keeping her house fairly well.

After seating me at a small dining table, Jin Seo-hye brought a glass of water.

And she placed it only in front of herself. When I looked at Jin Seo-hye for a moment, she smiled and said.

“What? We’re not the kind of people who would treat each other to a glass of water, right?”

Yeah, that’s a fair point. I wouldn’t mind if she didn’t offer me a glass of water. For now, I was content that her tone had returned to a level of politeness.

“That aside, it seems you’re living quite well. From the looks of it.”

“Not really.”

Of course, right now, aside from my hair color, I was just an ordinary girl, so Jin Seo-hye might find it quite hilarious. Given how much she loathed women.

“You’re cute.”

…She seemed to know exactly what words might make me angry. As expected, Jin Seo-hye continued to look at me with a mocking smile while saying this.

“So what are you so curious about?”

“Well, first off, it’s true you didn’t do the interview, right?”

“I got contacted, that’s true.”

That meant she didn’t do it.

“I told them to fuck off. Who would sell someone’s death….”

“Do you have any idea who might have done the interview?”

“Well, I don’t know. Muk Ha-neul is a real pain in the ass, but she didn’t have a particularly bad reputation, and there was no one she had a bad relationship with. I looked at some of the interviews; everything was made up except for one, and the one who sold Seong-hye might be someone who actually went to that university.”

As the topic became problematic, her tone immediately shifted again. It felt less like she was speaking to me and more like she was just venting. There was no reason for me to point that out.

“Is that true?”

“Are you stupid? Does that make sense?”

…Maybe it was a stupid question. I believed Muk Ha-neul, but I couldn’t move on to another question before addressing this one, so I had no choice. Someone listening might have nothing to say, but…

“If that girl had been a suicide teacher, I would have gone to see her before I even looked for you.”

But that was a lie. Jin Seo-hye’s hands were slightly trembling. Because the truth was, the exposure she did on me was, in fact, a ‘coincidence’.

If she hadn’t mistakenly taken on my interview, she likely wouldn’t have exposed me, nor would she have come to see me. Therefore, her exposing me was nothing more than a tragic coincidence.

“The direct cause of Seong-hye’s suicide was her parents.”

“Parents….”

“They were very devout Christians. They treated Seong-hye like a rat since she was little. But to find out that their daughter is actually a lesbian? Do you know what she must have gone through?”

“I don’t know.”

“At first, they took her to a church and baptized her with ice-cold water. It wasn’t a normal church, but that was fine up to that point. Then they took her to some psychiatric hospital, gave her weird medication, and, of course, there was violence too.”

“I see.”

“Your expression isn’t as shocked as I expected. Don’t you feel any guilt?”

“I guess you could say I’m an orphan too.”

“That’s not funny.”

Yeah.

It really wasn’t funny.

“So, the claim that she was a suicide teacher is a lie. Even if it were true, it wouldn’t matter. Whether she did or didn’t, Seong-hye would still be dead. There was just enough basis for such stories to be fabricated.”

“That was when I was on leave?”

“You know about that? Yeah. We fought heavily that day. With Muk Ha-neul.”

I had anticipated that the name Kang Seong-hye would come up. I had thought ahead, preparing myself for it.

However, Jin Seo-hye’s answer was unexpected.

“With me.”

“What?”

I received an answer I hadn’t imagined. Jin Seo-hye spoke with an angry expression. That anger was directed not at me or Muk Ha-neul, but at someone else entirely. And I felt I knew the direction of that anger.

“It was still before Seong-hye’s suicide. But at that time, Seong-hye was isolated in her department and was already almost broken.”

“No one went to see Seong-hye. Everyone’s attitudes changed. It must have been hard for her. She must have wanted to die. In the end, she did die.”

“…At first, the fight with Muk Ha-neul was a trivial matter. Just an everyday critique debate, something like that.”

“That day emotions ran high, and it escalated from critique to condemnation. Honestly, everyone knew that she was following you around, right? I think that made things worse.”

“The feelings had already soured for both of us. Then one day, we ran into each other somewhere and ended up fighting.”

“What did you talk about?”

“She knew.”

“…About what?”

“That I was Seong-hye’s girlfriend.”

Sure enough, ‘was’ a girlfriend.

Just as I expected.

“If you’re not an idiot, you would understand what that means. No one stayed with Seong-hye, and no one helped her. Not even me!! So, I fucking broke up with Seong-hye and acted like I didn’t know her to avoid being affected by her dying!!”

Yeah, that’s why she must have been so angry.

“I fucking… I just pretended I didn’t know until she died because I was scared. I was the same fucking girl! I didn’t want to end up like her! I pretended not to hear what others were whispering. When would I get exposed, what would I do if I ended up like that? I was just scared.”

She must have felt she needed to be angry.

“Honestly, I was a bit annoyed too. I didn’t want to keep listening to her whine at me all the time, and although she didn’t know I was an orphan, making rumors about you being an orphan was uncomfortable, and it was horrible to use me as her emotional trash can every time. I was really annoyed when I was dating her. But, but! But!!!”

Right, towards herself.

“I never imagined she would die….”

This was the secret that Jin Seo-hye had been hiding.

Guilt, burden, and responsibility for the mistakes she had committed, but wanting to run away, not wanting to be involved, and frightened, so she did nothing.

The enemy that she met after years, I couldn’t even imagine how her feelings had been shaken.

“…The most fucked up thing is, Seong-hye remained quiet till the end. I didn’t spread the rumors that I was a lesbian.”

“I abandoned that kid.”

“She didn’t abandon me.”

That’s why she had to do it.

To say that I have tried this hard, that I’ve done this for you, that it was for revenge, to make excuses. Without that, it would be impossible to be forgiven.

“Truly… Truly a piece of garbage I am.”

I listened to Jin Seo-hye’s piercing self-confession till the end. I had a responsibility to do so. I couldn’t apologize. But I could listen. I had to.

Because I had heard the story Senior Su-Young told me. That was why I came.

At that time, Kang Seong-hye had suffered all kinds of pains after it became known that she was a lesbian. However, during that period, ‘Jin Seo-hye’ suffered no incidents, nor did any rumors arise, as Senior Su-Young had conveyed.

Only after hearing that story could I understand Jin Seo-hye’s feelings and motives.

What Jin Seo-hye was truly angry at was herself.

I didn’t comfort her.

I didn’t say a word.

I simply listened.

Jin Seo-hye began to cry silently, without tears. I just listened to that quiet weeping.

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