Chapter 1 (2/2)

‘She doesn’t know the world in which she must now live alone, so please

She is unaware of this hellish reality. So, I wanted you to protect that child…’ he could see the wet streaks on the face of the begging man.

Every person who fell into despair always made the same face. Thinking that he had a similar face to that, Lee Ha-jin turned around and tried to leave the hospital room.

The end of those who knew despair was always the same, and he was not the kind of person who sympathised with it or felt sorry for it.

‘Yeah, I’m sure it was.’

Stopping dead in his tracks, Lee Ha-Jin looked down at the man who was crying silently. The hazy memories were slowly flooding into his mind.

I was on my way home from the deal. Dae-joon, who was driving, glanced at the rear-view mirror anxiously. ‘Boss, The car in the back isn’t showing any signs of slowing down.’

I opened my tired eyes, told him to let it pass us, and then closed them back again.

I had a premonition that something stil was amiss. And at the next moment, ‘Fuck!’ When I opened my eyes reflexively to Dae-joon’s loud voice, the car drove through the guardrail and crashed seemingly because it had been hit hard from the back.

Oh, this is how I’m going to die.

Lee Ha-jin remembered the last part of his dream. Closeby, the man, who had clearly crashed into his car, was crying sadly with a bloody face. The man from his dream was identical to the man who is crying in front of him now.

Get out of here!

His head flooded with thoughts of danger. Yeah, I have to go. Then he tried to move slowly, but he couldn’t move as if his foot was stuck to the floor, as he heard the sound of the man’s voice again.

‘I am so weak that I have no confidence to live any longer, but still someone,

someone please protect this child.

Please, somebody… Please please….’

It resembled a prayer. The flow of tears showed no signs of stopping, and the man’s cheeks were soaked. When he felt that he couldn’t wait any longer, the legs he could not move previously finally left their position.

The man’s cry grew louder as he walked without hesitation toward the closed door. In the afternoon in the hospital room, by the window where the sun shines, where only the two of them spend time together.

His hand stretched out.

***

His palms were soaked in tears, not knowing that they were actually mercy for the rest of his life.

‘I got it. Don’t cry.’

Lee Ha-jin’s hand headed to the man’s cheek instead of the doorknob in the hospital room. The man, who was crying, raised his head at his awkward voice as he clumsily wiped his wet cheeks.

Their eyes met, and looking at Lee Ha-jin, the man smiled with a wet face as if he had witnessed kindness for the first time in his life. The man smiled sadly and his face started to slowly fade away.

Everything began to spin dizzyingly as if the space around them was breaking, and in between, a man’s cracking voice could be heard over and over again. ‘Thank you, thank you. And….’ his vision is getting darker. The sound is gradually disappearing.

‘And… I’m sorry.’

After those words, everything went black.