The Prosecutor’s Office’s Proposal Chapter 46

I agreed. On the top left of the board, an unfamiliar case caught my eye.

The third one was the ‘Oh Jahyeon’s Husband Death Case.’ I drew a sharp breath in surprise.

“Oh Jahyeon’s husband died?”

“Yes, seven years ago, from a heart attack.”

Reading the case report briefly, there were no suspicious circumstances suggesting foul play.

“I guess it was concluded as a death by natural causes.”

“That’s right.”

And then, my eyes lingered on the last one—the bottom left. The final, fourth case.

Pinned there was a photo of my father, whom I had tried so hard to forget for so long.

It bore the title: ‘Kang Woosung Casino Owner Icepick Murder Case.’

Seeing the photo and name of Kang Woosung—my father’s high school friend—a wave of nausea surged up. My father’s face, which I hadn’t seen in a long time, was pulled into my wide-dilated pupils. I hadn’t looked for him after that incident, so it was the first time I’d seen him in 15 years—and the photo was none other than a mugshot.

A criminal photo used for intake records.

My breath came in gasps.

While Prosecutor Joo remained silent, I peeled off a small magnet stuck to my father’s newspaper article. The old paper was faded everywhere except for the spot where the round magnet had been.

What that color told me was clear. It wasn’t recently that Prosecutor Joo had become interested in my father’s case. He had been looking into this case over and over for such a long time that the newspaper had yellowed.

At the very least, it had been years. Much longer than the time since I was framed and investigated by Prosecutor Joo.

I couldn’t feel my fingertips as I pinned the article back into place. My fingers, which had been buzzing with excitement at being the first person invited to Prosecutor Joo’s home and blushing at the thought of being recognized by someone I respected, were now as pale and blue as a drowning man’s.

“Prosecutor…, I’ll be going now.”

Honestly, I couldn’t ignore the fact that I felt more than just respect for him anymore. Ever since that moment I first met Prosecutor Joo Taeson—whom I had only known through articles—as a police officer who had been framed.

That was why I crumbled more easily and quickly in front of Joo Taeson.

“Officer Lee.”

“I’ll be going.”

“What’s wrong?”

I couldn’t drag my father back into my life. I had spent so much time struggling to become a different person from him, to be evaluated as a separate individual, and to not look like Lee Gilyoung’s son.

“I’m not feeling well…. I’m sorry.”

I hurriedly turned around and walked out into the living room. I grabbed only the bag I had left on the sofa and fled Prosecutor Joo’s house as if running away. I didn’t even realize I’d left my coat behind until I stepped out of the apartment’s communal entrance.

As soon as I stepped outside, I ran frantically through the apartment complex. Prosecutor Joo hadn’t just set a trap for the Koryo-in Mr. Kim case. He had set one for me, too.

I had worked hard and tried my best to be recognized by Prosecutor Joo, only to walk into his house myself and witness the Lee Gilyoung incident all over again. It was too cruel.

In the sub-zero temperatures, the wind hitting my body, now without a coat, was piercingly cold. But there was warmth in the tears streaming down my cheeks.

I stopped running at the apartment gate, fearing that if I went near the residence and happened to run into another prosecution employee, rumors would spread that I’d been crying. Huddled and shivering, I hid in a children’s playground that I happened to see, trying to avoid people.

It was late at night, so there was no one in the playground. The swings, frozen by the wind, creaked as they swayed, calling out to me.

I sat on the swing and wiped away the uncontrollable flood of tears with my sleeve. I barely suppressed the sobbing that threatened to burst out. By the time my eyes began to swell, a heavy weight was placed on my shoulders. I turned around, startled, and saw Prosecutor Joo standing behind me; what he had placed on my shoulders was the coat I’d left behind.

“What are you doing, going out without even a coat?”

He stood in front of me as I sat crying on the swing. His fingers brushed against my cheeks where thick tears were rolling down.

But I didn’t need Joo Taeson’s consolation. I had navigated through more countless hardships on my own, and I had a hard shell to tuck away and hide my fragile heart. I stood up, fumbling to put on the coat he had draped over me.

“Prosecutor, you remember when you helped me when I was framed, right?”

“I told you I remember.”

“Did you ever trust me? Was Lee Gilyoung’s case included in the cases you were suspicious of, and that’s why you helped me—to use me?”

“…What on earth are you talking about? If anything, I didn’t want to drag Lee Gilyoung’s son into this mess. I couldn’t even trust him.”

His cruel words left a scratch on me, as casually as ever.

“But I judged that if it were Officer Lee, you would have the ability to see things objectively, even if a case involving your father was mixed in.”

“I don’t have that ability.”

“Don’t talk nonsense. If I had doubted your ability, Officer Lee, I wouldn’t have asked you to work with me in the first place. I wouldn’t have made that proposal if you were the type of person who just relied on the evidence sent over by the police and didn’t know how to be suspicious, like the other investigators.”

I looked directly at him with my blurry, tear-streaked eyes.

Suspicion. Yes. I was a person who knew how to be suspicious, and the one I was suspicious of right now was Joo Taeson.

I stepped closer to him. Close enough that our bodies were touching, just as Prosecutor Joo usually did. Then, I put all my strength into my voice and asked:

“What is behind these cases? You said the miners confessed falsely. Does that mean the Lee Gilyoung case is the same? Are you trying to plant hope in me that my father is innocent and use me like a racehorse? Is that why you approached me, pretending to recognize my skills, and had me move positions while taking flak at the Prosecutor’s Office?”

My entire body trembled with a sense of betrayal toward Prosecutor Joo. I hadn’t known; I’d thought things were going well this time. I hadn’t known he was just trying to use me.

It wasn’t the first time I’d met someone trying to utilize my circumstances for their own convenience. Cunning friends searching for prey would show just enough hatred for me, then occasionally treat me well when they needed something. That inconsistency made a son of a murderer, hungry for a sense of belonging, all the more desperate.

I did my best to be recognized and included in the group, but once my utility value dropped or they got bored, that was the end of my role. My struggles to adapt only devolved into an object of mockery.

Now that I saw it, Prosecutor Joo’s strategy was no different from theirs. That must be why he made it clear he knew about the Lee Gilyoung case on the rooftop where he first proposed the investigator position to me.

Not knowing that, foolish as I was, I repeated the mistakes of the past. I worked harder than anyone to be recognized, waiting for him to tell me what it was that made me necessary to Joo Taeson.

“I gave up on things like that a long time ago. Even if, deep down, I thought my father might not be a murderer, after that one time I shared my true feelings with a friend as a child and it turned into a knife that stabbed me in the back, I erased those kinds of suspicions from my head.”

“What kind of nonsense are you spouting? I don’t think Lee Gilyoung is innocent. I think he was instigated by Oh Jahyeon.”

Hearing Prosecutor Joo’s denial, the ground I was barely standing on felt like it was collapsing.

The truth was, while I said otherwise, I hadn’t been able to give up the hope that my father might have been framed. Deep, deep down in my heart, like the depths of the ocean.

“Hope? Don’t harbor such things, don’t even go near them. That kind of thing doesn’t exist in your world, Officer Lee, at the very least. From the moment your father killed that person, the past became a fixed value. It doesn’t change.”

“…What do you know. My dad wasn’t that kind of person.”

Feeling like my heart was about to burst, I spat it out through gritted teeth, knowing that my life at the Prosecutor’s Office had also come to an end.

People cannot hold things in forever. The seawall that had weakened after Prosecutor Joo kept poking at it since that proposal on the rooftop crumbled helplessly under the single, violent wave he crashed down today. Tears flooded my cheeks like waves soaking the sandy beach.

“Everyone said my dad was a murderer, but I can’t believe it. He was the kind of dad who, when my mom died early, would check my face one more time before heading to work just to see if I was lonely, who would make gimbap himself on field trip days and pack snacks for my friends, and who would even stop taxiing on rainy days to come pick me up in front of the school gate.”

“…”