As True as a Dream – Chapter 73

Author: Dakku-san

As they got off the train and walked across the platform into Gyeongseong Station, people were walking frantically.

Through the gap, Hae-Joo saw a familiar wall with advertisements for sightseeing in Gyeongseong City.

As she stepped out of Gyeongseong Station, forklift drivers in tattered clothes flocked to customers carrying heavy luggage and hawked their wares.

As the sky darkened, streetlights lit up everywhere, and trams, cars, rickshaws, and horse-drawn carriages jostled for position, creating a busy yet energetic scene.

Finally feeling like she was back in Gyeongseong, Hae-Joo looked up at Yi Ho standing beside her.

“Boss, I have to make a stop on my way home, so let’s part here and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“I’ll be at Song Yue Pavilion at 11 am.”

“No, come with me.”

Yi Ho frowned, grabbed her shoulder and pulled her toward him.

Hae-Joo looked back.

A woman in a hanbok with a large bundle on her head was running frantically in the direction of the carriage, carrying a small child.

It looked as if she had almost collided with it.

One rickshaw after another passed the spot.

If she hadn’t been careful, she would have been crushed by a rickshaw.

“That could have been bad. Thank you.”

Hae-Joo wiped her surprised breast and looked up at Lee Ho.

Then Yi Ho, who had been frowning at the hustle and bustle around him, suddenly lifted the corners of his mouth and inclined his head toward her.

“If you want to thank me, you can lose the bet.”

His voice, low and soft, as if luring a child, was clear in her ears over the din of the marketplace.

“You’re a deadbeat. A thanks is a thanks, and a bet is a bet, but don’t try to sneak up on people like that anymore.”

Hae-Joo immediately put a hand over her ear as if to block out his voice.

Then Yi Ho leaned back and raised an eyebrow.

“Did I charm you? You haven’t charmed me yet.”

“I’m sure I will soon.”

Hae-Joo muttered to herself, as if to complain.

The constant flirtatiousness of Yi Ho’s behavior yesterday and today made her heart flutter in her chest.

If she hadn’t been so determined before, she would have lost the bet ten times over if her willpower hadn’t been so weak.

‘Pull yourself together, Hae-Joo!’

To shake off the seduction of the fox-like man, Hae-Joo turned her attention to her surroundings.

The station was crowded with people from all over Joseon and abroad, and it was getting dark, so she turned back to Yi Ho.

“I’m going, thank you for your trouble, and I’ll see you at your house tomorrow.”

Hae-Joo turned and walked five or six steps, then turned again and walked back to Yi Ho.

“Shall I call you a taxi?”

Yi Ho laughed in disbelief.

“You think I can’t find my way home?”

“Not really… but a taxi is the easiest way to get to Song Yue, and the bus… have you ever taken one?”

Come to think of it, she’d never seen this man use any form of transportation other than a car.

She thought he wouldn’t like buses or trams because they are so crowded.

“I’ll take the tram, it’s a quick trip, and the only thing I have in my bag is clothes, so it’s light. What about you, boss?”

“If you’re so worried, why don’t you take me to Song Yue?” Yi Ho asked, her lips curling into a teasing pout.

She wanted to, if only because she felt like it.

But it was closing time at the place she needed to go, so she was stuck.

Maybe I should ask her to come with me,” she thought.

“Come on,” Yi Ho added, reading the worried look on her face.

“You can go. I have some business to take care of in Song Yue.”

“Oh, then…”

The corner of Yi Ho’s mouth turned up as Hae-Joo took a few steps and turned back.

“I’ll take a taxi. You should take a taxi too. You made money earlier.”

Hae-Joo raised an eyebrow at his comment, wondering what he meant, then smiled sheepishly.

On the train, she drew another portrait of Yi Ho.

When she started to draw the trinket in her notebook, he looked at her shyly and said he’d pay her to draw him again.

Of course, it gave her great pleasure to draw his face so fairly.

Why shouldn’t she do something she likes and gets paid for?

“You’re pretty good at drawing, but have you ever thought about painting?”

“It’s a job that costs money rather than makes money, and it’s better to make a living at it than to spend the rest of my life doing something I’m only halfway good at.”

Yi Ho asked her, looking at her portrait, and she shook her head.

Her father, who taught her to draw, wasn’t always a forger.

He had once been an art student with a promising future.

But his family was poor, and he couldn’t even afford the paper he needed to draw.

Later, Hae-Joo asked him if he had ever thought about pursuing art seriously.

Yangbu laughed and said that he was not a genius enough to make a mark in history, and that if he did, it would be for forging things.

She doesn’t know if she was influenced by Yangbu, but Hae-Joo thought the same way.

In a well, the workmanship might be convincing, but when it came to rivers and oceans, it was just okay.

Even that was a skill she would not have had without Yangbu’s teaching.

With such mediocre skills and a mediocre mind, she knew that she couldn’t do anything.

“See you tomorrow.”

Hae-Joo woke up from her thoughts and saw Yi Ho holding the door of the taxi.

She thought he was going to take the cab, but he pushed her into the back seat.

Then he slammed the cab door shut, ignoring her wide-eyed expression.

“Boss!”

Hae-Joo hurriedly looked at Yi Ho through the back window of the car.

Fortunately, he got into the cab right behind her, and Hae-Joo was instantly relieved.

Normally, she wouldn’t have been so worried.

But his complexion, whiter and more tired than yesterday, bothered her, and she couldn’t help but make a fuss.

“Where do you want me to take you?”

“Uh, Bonjeongtong.”

Hae-Joo straightened her neck, which she had stretched out to look out of the back window and sat back in her seat.

* * *

After getting off at the entrance to Bonjeongtong, she went straight to Mrs. Na’s soup restaurant.

She had heard that there was a bounty on the head of the Guishan Dao.

Mrs. Na, whom she hadn’t seen in a long time, smiled at her as she entered the restaurant.

“Where have you been? What’s with the suitcase?”

“I was in Gonju for work. How have you been?”

“Oh, yes? You must be tired. Same old me.”

Mrs. Na was sitting at one of the tables in the empty restaurant, writing in a stack of worn notebooks.

It looked like a book.

“But what can I do, I’m out of ingredients and have no rice to serve.”

Mrs. Na closed her notebook and Hae-Joo shook her head and sat down in front of her.

“I’m not here to eat. I’m here today as a guest.”

“A guest?”

Mrs. Na, dressed in a red rose-printed blouse, tucked her short bob behind her ear and raised an eyebrow.

“I’m here to buy some information.”

A subtle smile tugged at the corners of Mrs. Na’s mouth as she spoke.

“You’re buying information? From me? What information? I thought you weren’t interested in that kind of work? I thought you said you wouldn’t forge anything because of Yangbu’s will.”

Mrs. Na looked at her curiously, attentively.

“It’s not a forgery job. I need you to find someone.”

“That’s not my specialty.”

Mrs. Na frowned at Hae-Joo’s next words and leaned forward again.

Her interest had waned.

“It’s not your specialty, but you’re the only one I can trust.”

“Only me? Why?”

“You know most of the people my father knew in Gyeongseong, most of my father’s work, most of his acquaintances, you said he asked you.”

“Did he tell you that?”

Mrs. Na shrugged her shoulders and tilted her head to the side, as if her words had surprised her.

“So who are you looking for?”

“An acquaintance of my father’s, I don’t know anything else… His name is Migratory Bird, do you know him?”