World Chapter 6.2

As the car sped off, Heo Seok turned to me and gave me a meaningful smile. It was the same smile he had when he was young. A scornful smile, twisted with arrogance.

“…….”

The floor leader of the opposition party, a member of the Daehan Group family, a man at the pinnacle of power in our country.

I turned my head forward and sat. I gazed at the city streets where the sunlight was shattering.

Unconsciously, my fists clenched and anger rose.

Taewan had died foolishly, without even finding his love. Heo Seok, though he may have lost his love, did not lose himself. And he seized that power. Even though I had vowed so strongly to forget, even though I had poured out my resentment towards the spirits who had called me, seeing Heo Seok’s arrogant smile, my calmed heart finally crumbled and was once again in a tangled mess.

The car left the school and drove for a long time before stopping in front of a hotel. Both doors opened, and hotel staff bowed their heads in greeting.

Heo Seok got out of the car. In a daze, I followed him. It was a dazzling place I had never been to before. As I spun around, looking up at the splendidly decorated building, Secretary Kim stopped me and gestured with his chin.

Heo Seok was already walking far ahead. I hurried to follow him.

Perhaps because it was a weekday morning, the hotel restaurant was quiet. Heo Seok was already seated at a table by the window with a good view. I hesitantly sat down in front of him. Heo Seok said.

“Let’s order.”

“I’m not really in the mood.”

“Let’s just have a simple Korean set menu.”

It was a declaration. He wasn’t suggesting or asking. It was clearly Heo Seok. The waiter who took his order bowed politely and disappeared. Heo Seok’s secretary took a seat near us and scanned the surroundings with a keen eye.

“You don’t have to do this…….”

“I don’t know how many years I’ve been in politics. You become sensitive even to small things. You probably can’t even imagine how surprised I was by your words back then. I was seeing red.”

“……I won’t tell anyone.”

“I’m not trying to get any kind of confirmation with that. I told you. I want to apologize. Honestly, I was very surprised. I acted that way because I was so surprised.”

He gazed at me distantly. He wasn’t looking at me, but at something else.

We don’t look that much alike…….

My face felt hot under Heo Seok’s intense gaze.

Soon, a delicious-looking set meal was served. Even at a glance, there were many side dishes.

Heo Seok picked up his spoon and chopsticks, urging me to eat. My stomach was sore from drinking and passing out last night. I took a sip of the watery kimchi first to soothe my stomach. When I said it was the first time I’d had such an expensive and delicious meal, Heo Seok laughed out loud for the first time. The Heo Seok of the past, who would either embarrass me with his direct way of speaking, or praise me for eating well.

I was trying to escape from their shadows, but it was unsettling that my resolve was being rendered meaningless because of Heo Seok again, but in front of the delicious food, half of my reason flew away.

I soon let my guard down and asked him.

“You’re having a late breakfast. Do you always eat this late?”

“I had some work yesterday, so I couldn’t go home. As for you, Secretary Kim said you were very drunk.”

“I had something upsetting happen.”

“You shouldn’t drink like that just because you’re upset.”

“I know I shouldn’t, but I was craving a drink so badly.”

“I see. You have a very clear energy.”

I was shoveling rice into my mouth when I flinched and stopped, looking at him. I had a spoon in my mouth, a rather unsightly sight.

The same words……, he had said them to me.

“Hmm, have you never heard that before? It means you’re pure.”

“……I’ve heard it.”

“I guess I’m not the only one who thinks so.”

I’ve heard it. From you.

You said that to me.

He was definitely Heo Seok. The afterimage of Heo Seok suddenly created a huge ripple in my heart.

Damn it, stop thinking about it now. You said you would forget.

I shoveled the rest of the rice into my mouth. For dessert, there was sweet rice punch, sesame brittle, and fruit. Heo Seok said he was full, but I devoured it all like a glutton. Because of Hyungjo’s face encroaching on my mind. Because of Hanse’s voice that came to mind at the same time.

“It’s good to see you eat anything well. I can’t stand picky eaters.”

“Me too. Oh, I met Ji Sungjoon’s father.”

Heo Seok’s expression momentarily stiffened before relaxing.

“Did you?”

“Ji Sungjoon’s father still believes he’s missing. You said back then, Representative, that you personally saw Ji Sungjoon’s……, well, the moment he passed away.”

“Did I say that? I must have been angry.”

“You mean you don’t know if he’s dead or alive?”

“The fact that he’s dead is probably true. I just don’t believe it. You look gloomy. Is his father well?”

“He said you helped him a lot, Representative, and that he was grateful. His living situation is terrible. There’s no one to take care of him either…….”

“I had forgotten about his father. Is his health very poor?”

“His health is one thing, but someone needs to take care of him…….”

“I’ve forgotten. I’ll give the order. I should have him brought up here.”

I was surprised and my eyes widened. If Heo Seok did that, Ji Sungjoon’s father would be able to live out his old age in peace. That must have been what Sungjoon wanted.

Heo Seok, seeing my moved expression, said it was his duty and gestured for his secretary.

“I have a friend named Ji Sungjoon, and it seems his father is living alone now. Make arrangements to bring him to Seoul and have him stay in a good place. That……, there’s Gangdong Hospital, right? Contact that hospital.”

“……Yes.”

The secretary answered briefly and bowed his head. He walked to a distant spot and made a call.

It felt like a heavy burden I had been carrying on my shoulders was lifted in an instant. I was so grateful I couldn’t find the words to express it.

“Thank you, Representative. Really, really……, thank you.”

“What is there for you to be thankful for? It’s my fault for not taking care of it sooner.”

“I met Ji Sungjoon’s father a while ago, and I felt so bad. Thank you so much.”

“That aside.”

Heo Seok looked at me as if he had more to say. Overwhelmed with emotion, I met his gaze with sparkling eyes. The Heo Seok who had relentlessly slapped my cheek seemed to have been lost somewhere in my memory cells, not coming to mind at all.

Only the kind and gentle gentleman, Heo Seok, was in front of me.

“Are you close with Prosecutor Kim Hanse because of Professor Kim?”

At that question, I hesitated for no reason and answered falteringly.

“Ah, yes. We’re not that close. It’s just because of the professor, somehow……, I got to know him.”

“I see.”

He tapped his fingers on the table and gazed at me.

What is he looking at? Ji Sungjoon……? Or…….

“Shall we get going then?”

“Yes, thank you for the meal.”

“Oh, by any chance, have you thought about doing a part-time job?”

“Pardon?”

It seemed Heo Seok needed someone to work in his office. He said the work wasn’t difficult, I just needed to come after my classes and help with office assistance. He was very particular about who he hired, and wouldn’t have anyone in his office unless their identity and character were certain, and he asked for my thoughts.

Without even knowing what the job entailed, I readily accepted his offer, saying I would do it. It was because I thought he was offering it because he still wasn’t convinced by my words that I wouldn’t reveal his past.

In any case, I wanted to give him my trust. No, I wanted to give him more than trust. The way he treated Ji Sungjoon’s father moved me as much as my suspicion and distance towards him had.

Heo Seok said it was a good idea and asked me to come out today, and he dropped me off at school.

I ended up skipping my major class and attended the rest of my classes.

I ran into Park Junho at the student cafeteria. He saw me and immediately came over to question me about yesterday.

I mumbled that I had fallen asleep and quickly avoided him, returning to the dormitory.

I spent the whole afternoon doing overdue assignments. There was no one to contact me, but I kept fiddling with my phone for no reason. Hanse, who had slapped my cheek telling me to get a grip, kept coming to mind, and my head was a mess.

Hanse……, he was a man who had, at some point, come to occupy a place in my heart as significant as Hyungjo.

I finished my assignments roughly and left the dormitory to go to Heo Seok’s office. The sky had looked heavy since morning, and sure enough, rain was pouring down. The drizzling rain clinging to my feet today was particularly grating on my nerves.

I took a bus, then transferred to the subway, and arrived at Heo Seok’s office.

The receptionist I had seen before was sitting at the desk in front of Heo Seok’s office again today.

As I approached, the receptionist, having been instructed, recognized me right away. She said she had been waiting and guided me.

The quiet office was divided by partitions, and the low hum of people’s conversations flowed out.

The receptionist took me to Secretary Kim’s room. She said Heo Seok had a golf appointment and probably wouldn’t be returning to the office today.

The receptionist unceremoniously left me in Secretary Kim’s office and hurried back. Secretary Kim was on the phone. I stood there awkwardly in front of him.

Secretary Kim didn’t gesture with his hand or his eyes, just left me standing there as he continued his call.

I stood there awkwardly in front of him for a long time. When he finished his call, he approached me.

“There won’t be any particularly difficult work. It’s about organizing the data that comes in, but there are other part-time students, so you can ask them as you go. This way.”

I grabbed the hem of his clothes to stop him as he walked ahead. Secretary Kim turned to look at me with a “what is it” expression.

My eyes scanned the back of his hand. The bite mark I had left on the man’s hand had turned into a dark red bruise.

“I was sorry about that time.”

He turned away without a word and led the way.

I followed him, greeted the other part-time students who were working, and learned the general tasks.

The job was to organize statistical data from various affiliated organizations and deliver it to the aides, and another was to manage the internet homepage. I was told to select useful opinions and report them. It didn’t seem like a very difficult job. As I adapted quickly, Secretary Kim returned to his office.

It was still raining outside the window.

I, who had been completely indifferent to politics, had no idea what a member of the National Assembly did.

The job the part-time student handed me was for the national audit. It was to review and organize data from farmers’ organizations, and perhaps because of thoughts of my hometown, I worked without realizing how late it had gotten, engrossed in looking up related materials.

I was startled back to my senses when the bright surrounding lights suddenly went out. The lights in the hallway were being turned off one by one.

I hurriedly stood up and looked around. The security guard who managed the office saw me and spoke, saying he didn’t know anyone was there.

“I’m about to leave now. Is there no one left in the office? Has everyone gone?”

“The hallway lights are usually turned off after a certain time, so don’t worry too much.”

Reassured by his words, I sat back down in my chair and decided to finish organizing the materials before leaving, since it was already late.

I looked at the clock on the wall and saw that it was already past nine in the evening.

I stretched my tired body with a long yawn. The muscles that had been sitting all day ached dully. It was still raining outside the window.

One whole wall of the high-rise building was made of glass, so I stopped for a moment and stared blankly at the view.

The city’s night view, blurred by the rain flowing down the windowpane, sparkled like jewels. The brilliant lights should have been beautiful, but they weren’t. They were desolate, lonely lights. The loneliness of the city, the solitude of the city, seeing even beautiful things through the lens of solitude was the lyricism of the city.

I could see Namsan Tower in the distance. I placed my fingertips on the windowpane as if tracing the hazy Namsan Tower obscured by the rain, and moved them along its elongated shape.

“Not finished yet?”

I spun around, startled.

It was Secretary Kim.

There was solitude in his expressionless face too. That, too, seemed to be a facet of the city.

He was leaving work now, holding a briefcase in one hand and his suit jacket in the other.

The tie, tightly knotted around his neck in a way that looked suffocating, had a distinctly different feel from Hanse’s crooked tie. It showed in a single glance what a meticulous person he was.

I smiled slightly and answered.

“I’m about to leave now. Are you leaving now?”

“If you’re done, let’s leave together.”

“Yes. Then please wait a moment.”

I hurriedly tidied up my desk and followed him. It seemed we were the last ones left in the office, because as soon as we left the lobby and got on the elevator, all the lights in the office went out.

Leaning against the corner of the elevator, I watched him press the B1 button, then remembered and pressed the lobby button. He pressed the lobby button again, canceling my selection, and said.

“It’s raining, let’s take my car. Are you going to the dorms?”

“Yes.”

“I’m passing by there anyway.”

His tone was so formal it bordered on rigid.

“What is your name, Secretary Kim?”

“It’s Kim Youngil.”

“Ah, Kim Youngil……, Secretary-nim. You know my name, right? Hyunwoo, I’m Jung Hyunwoo.”

“I know, Jung Hyunwoo.”

The elevator, without stopping in between, went straight down and stopped at the B1 parking lot. The dark, damp underground parking lot made one shrink back. The unpleasant smell of gasoline or diesel, I couldn’t tell which, pierced my nostrils. To live in the city, one has to get used to smells like this. But it was a dank smell I didn’t want to get used to or know.

I got into Kim Youngil’s car. A faint scent of coffee lingered in the car. The car left the parking lot and entered the road. The land and buildings, battered by the rain, were soaked and had turned an even gloomier gray.

I looked at the rainy street and said.

“Seoul isn’t pretty when it rains. At my home, the colors become more vivid when it rains. The trees and flowers turn a brighter blue, a deeper green. Is it because it’s all monochrome here?”

“…….”

At my words, uttered to break the awkwardness, Kim Youngil didn’t even pretend to look out the window, let alone answer, and just turned the steering wheel.

“Secretary Kim, you’re Representative Heo’s executive secretary, right?”

“Please fasten your seatbelt.”

At his words, I hurriedly fastened my seatbelt. Whenever I got in Hanse’s car, I would fasten it first thing, but Kim Youngil’s driving was so smooth it was beyond excellent, and I had forgotten.

“I thought members of the National Assembly just wasted taxpayers’ money and lazed around, but they seem to have more work than I thought.”

“…….”

Kim Youngil’s indifferent side profile was heartless.

He didn’t offer a single word in response, so the one doing the talking was beyond embarrassed, to the point of being mortified. Usually in these situations, I would get angry and stubborn, and I would try even harder to talk to the other person.

“Secretary-nim, where is your home?”

“…….”

“Are you married? Are you single? How much is a secretary’s salary? Are secretaries civil servants too? At first, I thought you were a bodyguard, Secretary-nim. Because you look like one.”

“…….”

“I’m sorry about biting your hand back then. But you were dragging me away too, Secretary-nim. Since I’m not someone you could just knock down, I bit your hand, you know? But that hurt, right? It’s bruised, did it bleed? Even while I was biting, I was worried it might bleed.”

“…….”

“By the way, when you had breakfast with the Representative the other day, you were just standing there. So when do you eat? Do you just starve?”

“I eat while moving.”

Kim Youngil answered matter-of-factly. It was the first personal answer to my questions.

I grinned and opened my mouth.

“We do all this to make a living, but someone is eating delicious food next to you while you’re eating kimbap on the move. You have to take care of yourself, you know. You’re the only one who loses out.”

“…….”

“Come to think of it, I’m hungry.”

“If you work overtime, you should apply for a meal allowance.”

“Then do they give you food?”

“You get money.”

“You worked overtime today too, Secretary-nim, so you must have gotten paid?”

“…….”

“Let’s go eat something delicious. Huh? Please buy me something delicious. You said you got paid.”

When I ask for a favor, most people tend to agree and listen to me. Hyungjo did, and so did Hanse. But Kim Youngil ignored my words and kept driving, and soon we arrived at the dormitory.

He stopped the car right in front of the dorm. As I got out of the car, I said.

“I was hungry……. Well, goodbye. Drive safely.”

Just as I was about to open the car door and get out, Kim Youngil grabbed my wrist and forcefully sat me back down in the seat.

I looked at him, startled.

Kim Youngil’s dark eyes were staring at me, piercing me like sharp needles.

A heavy downpour began.

A long while later, after getting out of Kim Youngil’s car, I stood foolishly in front of the dormitory. My head and body were getting soaked by the rain.

What on earth did Kim Youngil say to me?