#08

Detective Oh smiled. After quickly chewing and swallowing what was in his mouth, he shared his thoughts.

“Well, they’re floundering, aren’t they? With the brain of Ilgwang Financial dead, it’s only natural.”

“Don’t you suspect anything?”

“Not yet. The people who were tailing him clearly saw the director get into that car, so even the great Lee Seok-doo will have to be fooled this time. Besides, the body was burned and severely mutilated. I hate to say it, but it’s unrecognizable. We’re currently checking the dental records to confirm if it’s Lee Seon-jae, and it will definitely come back as Lee Seon-jae.”

“That sounds easy.”

When Seon-jae expressed his honest feelings, Detective Oh waved his hand dismissively.

“Oh, don’t say that. You wouldn’t say such things if you knew how stressed we were.”

“Is that so?”

“Of course. It took us a full three months just to prepare. From contacting the director, it took over a year.”

Detective Oh candidly shared his thoughts on the grueling preparation period, which had been a source of stress for the past three months. He even mentioned events from ten years ago, referring to the incident that Seon-jae had already forgotten—or rather, had chosen to forget.

“I’m really sorry about that time. I was young and reckless, and the police atmosphere back then was very different from now. Still, it was a terrible thing to do to a kid who had just turned twenty.”

“That kid is already thirty-one now. Detective, it’s time to let it go; I’ve forgotten all about it.”

Seon-jae said this as he clinked glasses with Detective Oh.

“Thanks to that, I’ve been reborn like this.”

At Seon-jae’s words, Detective Oh smiled again, saying, “Is that so?” He was a man who smiled a lot, contrary to his appearance.

After finishing two bottles of liquor, the two parted ways around midnight.

“Take care.”

Seon-jae said.

“Yes, I will. You should rest easy, Director.”

Detective Oh bowed respectfully.

“Just follow the rules. We’ll take care of the rest.”

Worried that Seon-jae might feel uneasy, Detective Oh added this as he left the Safehouse.

Seon-jae was left alone.

Lee Seon-jae was dead. In just a few hours, he was reborn under the name of his uncle, who had lived for six years. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t be able to live long.

Kim Tae-heun.

Seon-jae whispered that name softly as he stared at the wall.

*

He thought things would change drastically. That dawn when he cried with a hood over his head, he was sure he would be reborn. Like a chick breaking out of an egg, like a snake shedding its skin, or at the very least, like a moth emerging from a cocoon, he imagined he would become a completely new person. He believed that the sleepless nights and days of lethargy would come to an end.

It was nothing but an illusion.

What could possibly change when his body remained the same?

Tae-heun yawned widely and sat up. His whole body ached. Sleeping on the floor instead of a bed was torture. After three days, he had barely managed to sleep for an hour, if that could even be called sleep.

Habitually checking his wristwatch, he sighed. Instead of the expensive watch he had been attached to, a cheap electronic watch he had bought when he enlisted in the military was now on his wrist.

Before entering here, he had been examined naked. They checked to see if he had smuggled anything in or if he had brought anything with him. That day, they took his watch. It wasn’t just the watch; they took everything and then, as if doing him a favor, gave him this electronic watch, a tracksuit, and a pair of three-stripe slippers.

In the palm-sized room, there was a mat and a blanket, a pile of underwear to change into, a mini-fridge, and a single telephone. There was no radio or TV, and no magazines or comic books to pass the time. The fluorescent light flickered as if it were dying, providing no sense of brightness. The air in the room was stale due to the lack of windows, and the poorly constructed door allowed foul smells to seep in. If it were a pleasant smell, he could have tolerated it, but it was a stench. It was the smell coming from the bathroom attached to the room. After escaping the fishy odor, he was greeted by an even worse stench.

What a beautiful life, he scoffed.

The layout of the house was simple. There was one room and a smelly bathroom that also served as a shower. When he opened the door and stepped out, the threshold led to a cement floor. Even if he put on the neatly arranged slippers and opened the sliding door made of aluminum, all he would find was a tall wall surrounded by barbed wire. The space between the wall and the sliding door was barely wide enough for an adult to pass through. Standing in that space and looking up, he could see a gloomy slate roof. He had been to slum areas and redevelopment zones, but he had never seen a house with such a structure. That was where Kim Tae-heun was.

Kim Tae-heun.

Even the name was incredibly difficult. On the first day, he often mistakenly called himself Tae-eun, and by the second day, he finally managed to say “Heun” without error, and only today did it start to feel like his name. He had spent three days muttering and repeating his name until it finally felt familiar.

When he became Lee Seon-jae at the age of ten, he didn’t even need to try to adapt to the new name. The family members he lived with called him Seon-jae without hesitation. In common terms, it was as if the ink on the household registration hadn’t even dried yet. His mother, who had sold her son in a three-room apartment, led the way. His father cowardly retreated as usual, pretending not to know.

At that time, Tae-heun was simply happy to be Lee Seon-jae. Compared to living in a one-room with five family members, the apartment felt like heaven. Moreover, his beloved aunt had become his mother in name, making it a dreamlike time.

“Kim Tae-heun. Director Kim.”

Tae-heun had no idea where he was. The person in charge of roll call said it wasn’t Seoul. He couldn’t provide any more information, claiming it was all for the sake of safety. Whose safety was this place for, anyway?

He thought he would be able to lie down and relax. He believed that sleeping and waking up would make passing the time a trivial matter. He never imagined that sleepless nights would continue, nor did he think he would be thrown into such a smelly place, no matter how unsuitable it was.

Damn it.

He scratched his eyebrows.

The phone rang once and then hung up. There was no next call after a minute. It was mealtime. He heard the sound of a metal container being lowered over the high wall. Meals were delivered in that manner twice a day, but he had only picked at it. The terrible smell from the bathroom made it feel like eating while sitting on a toilet, and he had no appetite whatsoever.

To quell his hunger from the meager meals, he drank water day and night. Drinking water made him feel the urge to go, and he would hold it until he couldn’t anymore before heading out. The wall was much cleaner than the bathroom, so he mostly urinated against it. No one would say anything if he walked around with his pants down.

There must have been a watcher somewhere, but he had never heard footsteps or voices. It was just silent. Sometimes, when he thought that the watcher might be in a better place, he felt a surge of frustration.

For three days, all Tae-heun had done was receive calls three times a day and pick at his food while drinking water. He had no cravings, so he left the meal choices entirely up to them. He didn’t request newspapers or radios. The person in charge of roll call asked cautiously during the morning check if he was okay. He even suggested bringing adult magazines. It was understandable since Tae-heun had been muttering his name all day without sleeping or eating.

“Please bring me a plate of sashimi. And some soju.”

He finally thought of something he wanted to eat.

Lying around and doing nothing had made his whole body feel sluggish. After three days, he felt the urge to exercise. He did 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups, and did other bodyweight exercises as they came to mind, leaving him drenched in sweat. He went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on himself. It only briefly jolted him awake, but he still felt lethargic.

“I want to die quickly.”

He muttered in a voice barely audible.

Of course, Lee Seon-jae was dead. He had died a glorious death, burned away. The day when he would be given a new life under the name Kim Tae-heun was fast approaching. Soon, his identification card and passport would be issued. He had died to live, but in truth, he wanted to die in his own way. What a paradox. He smiled bitterly.

Detective Oh still didn’t know. If he found out that the person he had worked so hard to save actually wanted to die, how empty would that feel? He felt a twinge of guilt.

He sat blankly, staring at the wall with the sliding door open. The day was overcast. It seemed like it might rain, as the air was thick with humidity.

His stomach growled. He grabbed a 2-liter bottle of water and gulped it down. As he crumpled the empty bottle, he felt the urge to urinate. Slowly getting up, he unzipped his pants and aimed at the wall. Come to think of it, it had been a while since he had done that. He tried to remember the last time he had relieved himself, but he couldn’t recall, so he gave up. The wall darkened from the urine he had released. Perhaps it was because he had been drinking so much water that there was no smell. Tomorrow, he thought whimsically, he would write his name in urine, and then he returned to the room and leaned against the wall.

The second roll call phone rang. Each time, a strange voice had called, but this time, a familiar and welcome voice spoke to him.

It’s me, Geobuk.

“It’s been a while.”

He was so happy that his voice unconsciously rose in pitch.

I heard you haven’t been eating much?

“Has the news spread that far already?”

The neighborhood is small, you know.

Tae-heun laughed at Detective Oh’s joke.