Chapter 20
Kim, the teaching assistant, was as brazen as ever when I saw him again for the first time in months after my leave of absence.
No, maybe the mistake was deliberately coming to this bar, where department gatherings used to be held frequently, while tracing memories of Woo-kyung.
“Hey, look who it is. You guys still come here.”
He tried to naturally join our table as if this spot had been his all along.
“Have you been well?”
At Kim’s friendly greeting, Yujin laughed awkwardly and chose her words carefully, but Lee Yeon ignored him and averted her gaze. Nevertheless, the TA plopped down into a seat he hadn’t been invited to and raised his beer glass.
“Yoo Lee Yeon, now that I think about it, I heard you quit the internship at Jeongyul Law Firm too?”
When she submitted her resignation to the law firm, it caused quite a scene. The professor personally called Lee Yeon in to ask for her reason, and all sorts of rumors circulated among the TAs.
‘Why would she throw away such a good position?’
‘Do you think she messed up somehow?’
Lee Yeon didn’t bother to deny those rumors. There was no point in explaining; no one would understand anyway. In the end, silence became her only answer.
“Did you really cause some kind of trouble?”
Lee Yeon knew exactly why Kim was asking. He had coveted the position she left and had subtly asked the professor about it, only to be told, “We won’t be hiring for that position for a while.”
“What, can’t you answer? Did you really mess up?”
At his sarcastic, blunt question, Lee Yeon’s expression stiffened subtly. Sensing the shift in atmosphere, Yujin quickly cut in.
“TA-nim, we didn’t say you could join us.”
At that, the TA’s eyes narrowed slantwise and he snorted.
“Birds of a feather, I see. I’m only asking because I feel sorry for what happened to Yoo Lee Yeon. Don’t mistake my concern.”
The moment his brazenly outstretched fingers were about to brush near the line of Lee Yeon’s waist—
*Thwack.*
Lee Yeon coldly smacked his hand away.
“You were like this before, and you’re still the same. You haven’t changed one bit in being unpleasant.”
“What?”
The TA, his face displeased and brow furrowed, awkwardly brushed off the back of his hand she had hit.
“Yujin, let’s go.”
“Huh?”
“The mood’s ruined. I can’t drink anymore.”
“Okay.”
As Lee Yeon grabbed her bag and stood up, the TA spat out through gritted teeth at her retreating back.
“Is she insane?!”
As the atmosphere turned cold and fractured, one of the TA’s friends tried to calm him down, muttering softly.
“Hey, stop it. Why are you picking a fight for no reason?”
“No, she’s toying with people!”
“Let it go. By the way, did you hear? Attorney Cha Woo-kyung? I heard he went abroad a while ago.”
“Oh, really? Lucky him.”
At those words, Lee Yeon’s footsteps halted briefly as she was heading for the door.
A single word lodged in her ear, swirling in her head.
*So, he ended up going alone.*
It was a brief thought, but a chill settled in one side of her chest. The fact that he had left alone strangely shook her heart. It was clearly her own choice, yet she felt hollow, as if she were the one left behind alone.
But then, without a word, Lee Yeon pushed open the bar door and exited with Yujin.
Outside, dusk had already fallen, and a cold wind blew, lightly scattering Lee Yeon’s stray hairs.
“Hey, are you okay?” Yujin blinked, her eyes filled with worry as she looked at Lee Yeon.
Instead of answering, Lee Yeon quietly bowed her head. Shortly after, she approached a nearby bench and slumped down onto it. It seemed the alcohol was finally hitting her belatedly; she bent her knees and buried her head in her hands.
In the cool air, a muttering, close to drunken grumbling, spilled from between Lee Yeon’s lips.
“Cha Woo-kyung… he’s really not here anymore.”
The words, carried on the wind, scattered from her lips.
Yujin looked down at Lee Yeon silently for a moment before letting out a long sigh.
“Are you really okay…?”
In a corner of her mind, the thought flashed that maybe, someday, they might meet again, even if just by chance. But today was the day even that possibility completely vanished.
***
As she spent the next three years in a flash, Lee Yeon was introduced to her current law firm through Yujin.
*’Lee Yeon, remember? Senior Han Sung-hee. I heard she’s going independent and starting a new firm. She’s looking for people.’*
At first, Lee Yeon hesitated. She was anxious that she might mess up the opportunity Yujin had worked hard to get for her.
*’Lee Yeon, I really hope you give it a try. Who knows, you might figure something out along the way?’*
But eventually, worn down by Yujin’s persistent urging, Lee Yeon steadied her resolve and showed up for the interview. She hadn’t known that day would be her first step back out into the world.
Representative Han, who had already interviewed several people before her, looked at Lee Yeon with a curious glint in her eyes the moment she entered.
*’It’s Yoo Lee Yeon, right? You’re a junior from our school. I heard a lot about you from Yujin.’*
Representative Han closed the resume and smiled.
*’Your grades are obviously excellent, and if you build some law firm experience now, it’ll be a big help.’*
Representative Han reached out her hand for a handshake. Holding Representative Han’s hand that day, Lee Yeon began working at Beop-hyeon Law Firm.
It was then that she unexpectedly learned another fact.
About a month after Lee Yeon started at the firm, she got a call from her father’s former colleague.
*’Lee Yeon, about your father’s accident… It seems like it was covered up as a simple accident, but… I think someone caused it intentionally.’*
That’s when it began. When she started seriously looking for clues about her father’s accident.
*’Your father hadn’t been drinking that day, does it make sense that a car just happened to hit him by mistake as he was leaving the building normally?’*
But she always hit a wall. Gaining access to the case files wasn’t easy, and every time she tried to look into the people involved, she invariably felt someone blocking her.
Later, when she started working as Ju-ho’s partner, she learned that he had briefly worked in the legal team at Shin Yu Group in the past.
After all, she had been managing fine on her own until now.
The moment she turned off the shower, the stream of warm water stopped. Instantly, the air in the bathroom cooled, and steam condensed hazily on the mirror.
Lee Yeon dried her face with a towel.
“There’s no point in thinking about that now, is there.”
Muttering to herself, Lee Yeon shook her head vigorously.
It meant that even if Woo-kyung had returned, nothing about Lee Yeon’s situation would change.
Don’t remember.
It’s all in the past.
After her shower, Lee Yeon roughly wrapped her wet hair in a towel and walked out into the living room.
Lee Yeon picked up her cell phone from the nightstand beside her bed. The screen showed a missed call notification. The number seemed vaguely familiar.
“Who is it?”
Since it wasn’t a saved number, Lee Yeon dismissed it without much thought. But just as she was about to put the phone down, the screen lit up again.
*Ding.*
A new message notification appeared.
Her gaze drifted down indifferently, then froze solid.
[I assume you got in safely? I figured my number probably wasn’t saved, so I reached out. I asked the office manager for your number, worried it might have changed.]
She realized immediately that the familiar number belonged to Woo-kyung.
When she changed her phone, she had deliberately not saved his number. Yet, the mere fact that the number, faintly lingering in her memory, had surfaced made Lee Yeon feel suffocated.
Lee Yeon deliberately didn’t reply and closed the screen.
But the phone blinked again.
[Yoo Lee Yeon, I know you’re deliberately avoiding me. But I’m not backing down this time. Whether you like it or not, I’m going to do exactly what I want to do.]
This was why Cha Woo-kyung was so overwhelming.
He kept trying to drag out the emotions she had barely suppressed.
That’s why Lee Yeon wanted to avoid him at all costs. She knew all too well how weak she became in front of him.
Was she about to get swept up again by this clever man who left no opening untouched? It felt as if all the past was pushing its way back in, opening the door at this very moment.
But Lee Yeon had no intention of replying. She planned to turn the phone face down and not look at it again.
But the phone vibrated once more.
At the faint rattling sound from the table, Lee Yeon’s brow furrowed.
“This is driving me crazy. Did he really send another one?”
The moment she couldn’t take it anymore and was about to send a reply telling him to ‘stop,’ Lee Yeon checked the screen and gasped.
“Ha, what… is this?”
It was a short, concise sentence, but the meaning contained within it instantly turned her mind upside down.
