Chapter 81
Chapter 81
"You can do the right thing while still protecting the family business."
Lee Su-a said that to her father.
"And this 'right thing' is staying close to Ye Sa-ra?"
No.
Lee Su-a answered only in her head. Just staying friendly wasn't enough. She wanted to be a little closer than that, and to stay together for a long time.
She wanted to become more like her.
......And she hoped Sara would come to resemble her, too.
She thought that. But of course she couldn't say any of that out loud.
Her father was a good person. Her mother was as well. They were both busy, so she couldn't see them often, but when they did spend time together they always made those moments as happy and joyful as the time they'd missed with her.
Still, Lee Su-a's parents both had a somewhat conservative side.
Maybe it was because they ran one of the oldest companies in Korea. Maybe it was because their ancestors were people who earned respect, even if they never became the best in Korea or the world. Both of them wanted Lee Su-a to carry on the bloodline. Of course they'd never said it outright. It wasn't the kind of thing you needed to say outright to begin with.
It only came up in passing during conversation, remarks like, 'Someday when our Su-a gets married, when she has children...' and nothing more.
Lee Su-a had thought it was only natural, too.
She'd thought it was.
Her father was right that carrying on the family business mattered. Lee Su-a didn't want the company to fall apart, either. But as long as it didn't fall apart, there was no rule that she had to carry it on with her own two hands.
Her parents might have been conservative, but they weren't the type to oppress others. They didn't discriminate against gay people. Doing something like that in this day and age could shake the whole company. Lee Su-a didn't think her parents were that closed-minded, at least.
And that meant that even if the person she liked was a woman, her parents wouldn't oppose it outright.
They would, however, quietly hope she'd end up marrying a man anyway.
That was the truth. Two women couldn't have a child together. Same-sex marriage was legal, and same-sex couples could adopt and raise children in this world, but an adopted child wouldn't carry the bloodline.
She had an uncle and an aunt, but her parents would surely want to pass the company on to Lee Su-a herself. That weighed on her more than she let on. Ever since she was young, back when she didn't even have someone she liked.
......But that didn't mean she could throw the family business away just because of a whim.
Sara would never do something like that.
"Yes, that's what I think."
Lee Su-a spoke calmly.
Her heart had been racing a little, but the more she talked, the more it gradually slowed. Just thinking about it had been the hardest part. Once she actually started speaking, the tension began to ease.
Her father simply sat quietly, as if waiting for Lee Su-a to continue.
"......Do you know exactly what kind of situation Sara is in right now?"
"No, I don't."
The answer came at once.
"Then why did you tell me not to get close to her?"
"That is."
Her father started to speak, then paused. He shut his eyes as if troubled and stayed like that for a while. After tapping the desk lightly with his fingers, he let out a long sigh and finally opened his mouth.
"I heard that the chairwoman, the girl's adoptive mother, issued a warning herself."
'I heard.'
Lee Su-a doubted her own ears for a second. Was her father saying he'd been cooperating in ruining a child's life based on nothing but rumors?
......If that turned out to be true, then it would mean Lee Su-a had been going along with rumors she never even knew were true or false.
Her chest tightened, like someone had seized her heart and squeezed.
"No one ever said anything directly. I simply pieced together what I heard here and there. But there were definitely significant cases that backed up those rumors."
Her father said that and rubbed the back of his neck with one hand.
"A few years ago, a mid-sized company that was doing quite well disappeared without a trace. Unfortunately, they'd been a supplier for a major corporation, so that major corporation took a heavy hit as well. Countless subcontractors connected to the mid-sized company all went under at once. It was a huge scandal."
"......And how exactly is that incident connected to Sara?"
"The son of that company's owner was close to the girl called Ye Sa-ra."
"......."
Lee Su-a's mouth fell open slightly.
"That's not all."
Before Lee Su-a could say anything, her father went on.
"I'm not basing this on just that one case. Even before those children became friends, Ye Sa-ra had already begun to be isolated, I'm told. And there was a 'rumor' that someone was orchestrating that isolation."
A 'rumor' again.
"According to that 'rumor,' a massive amount of donations was flowing into the foundation of a certain school attended by the children of wealthy families. Because of that, no matter whether a certain child came to school or not, attendance was marked. Exams were graded on their own even without taking them, and the child could receive above-average marks."
"......."
"And if anyone tried to get close to that child, someone made absolutely certain they'd be ruined. The method was usually money. It wasn't just the son of that mid-sized company. There were supposedly a few families made into examples even before that. Smaller ones—children of a company president, something like that. And,"
Her father let out a light breath again.
"Remarkably, the company that the mid-sized firm supplied was one of the Yujin Group's subsidiaries...... or so the rumor goes."
Then he looked steadily at Lee Su-a and said,
"Yes, there's no proof. Someone covered it up thoroughly. They silenced the people who knew, intimidated them, probably threatened them too. If you had enough money to buy off every single one of them one by one, it would be even easier. And that's exactly why it remains a 'rumor.'"
Lee Su-a's father leaned slightly toward her and lowered his voice, as though someone might be listening.
"The 'rumor' says that they destroyed the entire mid-sized company even while accepting that a company within their own group would take a critical blow. And the 'rumor' says all kinds of filthy things happened in the process. The president was kidnapped and beaten until every limb was fractured. His wife went missing while coming home from grocery shopping and was found three days later, battered and naked. Someone set fire to the house. A thief broke into the factory warehouse. The company's most critical secrets were leaked. The 'rumor' says the culprit who was caught brazenly insisted no one put him up to it, went to prison as a lone offender, and after he got out lived in luxury off a sudden massive fortune that appeared out of nowhere."
He leaned back again and rested quietly against his chair.
"I'm told the only person in that family who came out unscathed was that one son—the one who'd been close to the daughter. Opinions are divided on why only the son was spared. Some say it was so he'd have to live the rest of his life looking at his ruined family."
"......But."
Lee Su-a, who had been listening, finally opened her mouth.
"But even so, our company is this big. We're in a completely different industry. And besides, that kind of method might work against a single target, but if you try it against countless people, it's bound to fail......"
"Su-a."
Her father sighed softly.
"The point here isn't simply that a company collapsed. What matters is that everything that happened in the process of that company's destruction could also happen to the people around that child. I don't know if I could stay sane if something happened to you."
"Ah......."
At those words, Lee Su-a could do nothing but close her mouth again.
Her heart, which had been calming, started pounding again. From tension. And from fear. The confidence she'd felt when she first began to speak was slowly draining away.
"This is a 'warning.' And a warning like this works best on people who have a lot to lose. It was never aimed at everyone. It's a warning aimed at anyone who tries to get close. Not 'It will definitely happen to you,' but the fear that 'It could happen to me too.' That fear is what keeps people from approaching that child."
Including us.
He didn't say that last part out loud, but Lee Su-a felt as if she could hear it anyway.
"......I don't want that."
Even after hearing all of that, Lee Su-a said it.
"Su-a."
"No matter what, there has to be a way."
"I'm not saying there's no way. I'm saying we don't have a reason we must be the ones to do it."
"Because you don't know what kind of wounds you might suffer if you try."
"No, I'm the one who has to do it."
Su-a clenched her teeth. The fear hadn't lessened at all. Neither had the tension. Her heart was still pounding.
But even so, she had to do it.
Because she was one of the people who'd gotten closest to Sara.
Because she was one of the people who'd uncovered a secret no one else knew.
"I have information. Something I found out."
"Hm."
Seeing that Lee Su-a wasn't backing down no matter what, her father fixed his gaze on his daughter.
"Is that so? Then can you tell me that information? If it's information that can actually help you, I'll allow you to stay by that child's side."
"......."
Lee Su-a thought for a moment. Was it really all right to tell her father this?
She wasn't hesitating because of the information's importance. It was because this was Sara's personal information, and she was seriously weighing whether she had the right to go around spreading it.
......Right. Let's set aside the matter of the letter and the sleeping pills for now.
Instead, she'd talk about what she'd seen with her own eyes.
Having decided that, Lee Su-a looked straight into her father's eyes and began to speak.
And she laid out the plan she had in mind.
Leaving out the single most important part.
*
In the end, she wasn't given permission to leave the house.
She'd expected as much. But that didn't mean she had any intention of giving up what she'd already resolved to do.
Lee Su-a's room was on the second floor.
She opened the window and tore down the curtains. Then, using a method she'd looked up on the internet, she tied the curtains together to make a rope.
She thought the rope turned out fairly well, but the problem was that Lee Su-a didn't have nearly enough strength to climb down it.
Fortunately, she landed on the grass, so the sound wasn't loud.
The whole left side of her body was a little scraped from the fall, but it wasn't bad enough to keep her from walking.
Choco, who had been sleeping, lifted its head and looked her way.
Lee Su-a walked over to him and stroked his head as she spoke.
"I'm going to be out for a while."
The old dog simply licked her hand weakly.
"I'll come back once everything's taken care of."
The old dog rested his chin on her hand and gazed up at her. She couldn't really tell what he was thinking.
Su-a straightened up.
Careful not to make any noise, she walked toward the gate.
She slipped through the front gate and stepped outside,
and began to run.
Toward where Sara was.