Phase 3. Mom Gyeong-ae (10)

In some rundown neighborhood sat a pool hall on its last legs.

Two young men stood with pool cues cocked over their shoulders like Guan Yu, cigarettes clenched between their teeth. Neither had dyed his hair—one slicked it back with pomade, the other simply blow-dried it into something neat—but their clothes told you everything about who they were. The serious pomade guy dressed dandy; the easygoing dry-hair guy wore casual clothes built for moving around.

"Byeong-il, we still got paid. Shouldn't we finish the job and then cut ties clean?"

Pomade exhaled a deep drag through his nose and mouth, speaking low. A man who put industry credit first, he was arguing they should at least wrap up the In & Out job before swearing never to work with them again.

Dry Hair just snorted and lit another cigarette.

"Fuck that. They only paid half—why the hell would we finish? Gas money alone doesn't cover it. Half, for fuck's sake! I had to call and fight like a dog just to get that much. That old bastard's still stuck on rates from ten years ago. I told you not to take In & Out's work, didn't I?"

"I wasn't gonna take it either, but Eun-hui called me herself."

"Eun-hui's still that old man's daughter, damn it! The business account that pays us sits under his name. Same shit, man."

"Mm."

For all his seriousness, Pomade looked a little outmatched. He argued hard, but Dry Hair just kept swearing him down until he had nothing left and backed off.

In & Out. The agency Eun-hui's father ran. Father and daughter were skilled enough that word of mouth had kept it a solid little outfit—until the old man started paying passion wages and skimming. Ten-year-old rates that didn't even track inflation, doled out like favors while he talked big: classic small-time boss mentality. Even Pomade and Dry Hair, who'd worked for him since they were kids, had eventually walked out shaking with disgust.

You little shits, I taught you every technique free of charge!

It wasn't just the two of them. Every other employee had quit too. All of it had happened in the few years Eun-hui stepped away to chase a little campus romance at university. And that "campus romance" of hers? It mostly meant falling for Gyeong-jun in a club and then stalking him with wiretaps and trackers.

"Who ordered the jajangmyeon~!"

A delivery guy in an iron box bag barged in shouting a catchphrase that had been dead for over twenty years. The only people in the place besides the owner were Pomade and Dry Hair at their table—why yell like that?

True to a delivery rider's wind-beaten look, he wore sunglasses and a towel under his nose. He shouted again.

"Two jajangmyeon plus free dumplings!"

"Hey, there's only one table here!"

"Ah, yes sir!"

Dry Hair snapped; the delivery guy scrambled over and popped the side lid of his bag. As he pulled out the noodles he grumbled,

"These days you don't get free dumplings with two jajangmyeon. I'm only doing it 'cause you're hyungs."

"Ten ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠years ago you did."

"And I priced these at ten-year-old rates too, huh?"

"What?"

"You demand free dumplings like it's ten years ago, so how come you won't take ten-year-old pay? Wait—no, you already took the money and ate it, right? You just never did the work."

Now that he mentioned it, this delivery guy was weirdly built for a rider.

"You two Byeong-il and Min-ji?"

Pomade was Min-ji. And for the record, yes—he was a guy.

"Who the fuck are you?"

Min-ji rose, still gripping his cue like Guan Yu. He barely got upright before a fist cracked into his temple. His head snapped sideways and he crumpled onto the sofa by the table.

"Who the fuck are you, talking like that."

Gyeong-hun peeled off the sunglasses and fixed Byeong-il with a stare.

"I'm the client, you pieces of shit. You ate my money and ghosted?"

"How the hell did you even find—"

"And this here is a time-honored former lawyer."

Zzzzzzt—

"Ghhhhh—!"

What he pulled from the bag last wasn't dumplings—it was a stun gun. He jammed it into the side of Byeong-il's neck and hit the button. The sound of electricity cracking across aluminum filled the room. That was all it took. Byeong-il seized up and went down hard.

The delivery guy toed both bodies, confirmed they weren't moving, then pulled out his phone and dialed.

"Where are you? They're down."

"Hang on! There's no parking—I've been circling!"

"Get here. If someone sees us hauling them out it's a pain in the ass."

"You think a detective agency's daughter wouldn't know that?"

"A detective agency's daughter who just got skimmed... ahh, my ten million won!"

"Okay, okay, I'm coming. And don't touch the owner. This used to be our hangout—he knows the score."

Gyeong-hun, already in a foul mood since morning, barked; Eun-hui immediately folded. Her own father had done the skimming, so she had nothing to say.

He grabbed Byeong-il and Min-ji by the scruffs and dragged them toward the entrance. His eyes met the owner's.

"Boss. Did you really used to give free dumplings with two jajangmyeon ten years ago?"

"Not once since the twenty-first century started. They earned that beating."

"..."

Footsteps.

"As a fellow small-business owner, I support you!"

Not a small-business owner—a stalker, Gyeong-hun thought, but he kept it to himself and hauled the two up the stairs himself.

He tossed them into the waiting car and climbed in. Eun-hui looked at him with pure admiration.

"You're actually good. Wanna work at our place?"

"Let's just go. I happen to have business at that shop."

"...Right away, valued client."

She had her own guilt, but Gyeong-hun's mood was especially black; she watched his face carefully as she drove.

"No. I can't give the money back."

"Dad!"

Thick stubble, a fedora mashed down even indoors, flattened hair sticking out underneath. Eun-hui's father looked rumpled yet somehow still dandy. You could tell exactly who Min-ji had been modeling his look after.

"Mm, still stylish."

"Fuck stylish—looks like the boss is the one who skimmed in the middle."

Byeong-il and Min-ji, wrists bound with table ties, each got a word in before father and daughter's shouting drowned them out.

"That's a fee. I'm never giving it back."

"Your daughter and her junior put the job in themselves—why are you skimming the cream?"

"That's exactly why I won't. You think being the boss's daughter means something? It was done under my office name. Of course there's a fee."

"This is too much! You keep bleeding fees like this and In & Out's going under!"

"Don't like it, open your own office under ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠your name."

"Ha...!"

Because he was her father she wasn't swearing, but you could see Eun-hui holding the last of her temper by a thread.

My pocket still held the awl I used for part-time work. When I first walked into the office I'd kept a hand on it just in case, but this was a family fight—no reason to step in—so I let it go. I could always squeeze the money out of Noona later. More importantly, a glance at the document title on the desk during their argument had already given me a pretty good idea what the old man was thinking.

The papers on the boss's desk were almost certainly the printout of the job Eun-hui had drawn up. You couldn't miss it when the big bold letters read Rescue Our Gyeong-jun Plan.

"You just gonna keep being petty?!"

"What? The kid who always sang about going independent suddenly finds it hard when I tell her to do it?"

"Once I save more capital—!"

"Capital? When you were little it was a million and you'd leave. Then five hundred, eight hundred, a thousand—you kept postponing. Now you've been cleaned out by your own dad and you're broke, and you're still talking independence and capital? You saved so hard you turned it into shit!"

Huh. That was aimed at Noona—why did it feel like it hit me too?

This wasn't working. No matter how much Eun-hui stomped and yelled, she had no leverage. Like the old man said—so what if she was the daughter? And this whole mess had only happened because she was his daughter.

"You two, get in there. Won't take long."

I opened a door off to the side that looked like a storage room and shoved Byeong-il and Min-ji inside.

"Uh, hyung. Even so, he's our teacher—please go easy on the violence."

"Yeah, fuck, we won't just sit still either."

Guys who'd taken money and ghosted now talking loyalty—it was so funny I just waved them in. If they came charging out again, putting them down wouldn't be hard.

I shut the storage door and walked over to father and daughter. Whether they kept arguing or not, I picked up the papers on the desk and read.

It had originally been a lot longer and more rambling, but that was the summary.

"Noona."

"Hey, Jo Gyeong-hun, stay out of this."

I held the papers out, speechless.

"What kind of father just green-lights a job where his daughter says she's going to screw a guy?"

"...L-lies are worse, you little shit! And Dad made this as a file—why the hell did you print it too?!"

Why? Because the old man left it out as a hint about why he'd skimmed the fee in the first place. Even an outsider like me had picked up on it; Noona hadn't. Looking at her now, her biggest flaw was that she never looked sideways—just charged straight ahead, blind and single-minded.

I had no choice but to explain it step by step. It wasn't even that long.

"End goal is at least dating Gyeong-jun, right?"

"No—marriage."

"..."

She crossed her arms and declared it so firmly that the old man and I looked at each other at the same time. Then we both sighed.

"Whatever it is, the point is making things work with Gyeong-jun."

"Right."

"Then we should handle it ourselves."

"How are two people supposed to stick to him twenty-four seven?!"

"Or you run it alone."

"Hey, fuck! Stop talking in circles."

I shot the old man a helpless look; he sighed again and nodded. We already had the principal's blessing, so I might as well lay it all out. Come to think of it, this noona had zero filter with swearing even in front of her own dad.

"Why would you expose the dirty laundry of the guy you want for a boyfriend to outsiders? And pay them for it?"

"Dirty laundry? I'm trying to save Gyeong-jun—"

Fine. I'd swear too.

"Jesus, do you even think? You wiretapped everything the pig bitch said and everything Gyeong-jun said. And you were just going to let other people hear all of it? Those guys are industry people. You want the rumor going around that the detective agency's daughter cleaned up after some loser and then giggled about how she got him?"

"Hey! You agreed and paid the money to hire people, didn't you? And I don't give a shit about rumors like that!"

"You're right—hiring people to 'save' him was shortsighted of me too, and I need to reflect. And—!"

I took a breath. A lot had already happened today. There was no shortage of things that pissed me off. I was human. If I got mad I was allowed to raise my voice a little. Right? I was human.

But there was an adult right next to me. Yelling in front of an elder was the kind of thing that made people curse your parents behind your back. My old man could go screw himself, but I didn't want Mom hearing anyone mutter that she'd raised her kid wrong.

I clenched my teeth and breathed again.

"And you think Gyeong-jun won't care?"

"I said I'm fine with it, so what?"

"Say the two of you actually work out. With Gyeong-jun's personality, do you think he'd walk around proud knowing his own fuck-ups made people whisper about you? He'd want to die from the guilt."

"That's..."

She hadn't thought that far. Her voice faded. Just imagining it seemed to disgust her; her face went dark fast. She snatched the papers from me, crushed them with everything she had, and glared.

"Fine. We were both shortsighted. We'll run it ourselves. But if we want this done right we might need extra hands depending on the situation."

"Okay that far."

"And I can't ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠stick to him twenty-four hours either. We should be working two-person teams to begin with. Let's at least sketch a rough rotation."

"Why me?"

"What? You fucking said the two of us would do it—you joking?"

Leaving Eun-hui's eyes turning dangerous behind me, I walked over to the old man. He'd been watching the whole show with interest; when he saw me he grinned.

Yeah—this guy was a thoroughly seasoned industry veteran.

I hesitated a second before saying it out loud, but his line about saving so hard you turn it into shit had stuck with me, so I decided to just ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠go for it.

"How much for you, ajusshi? Including every fee."

"Keh-keh-keh-keh. This one's better than you, Eun-hui."

The way he clapped in pure satisfaction made him look less like a dandy middle-aged man and more like a money-grubbing toad. He was a friend's dad, but he was so annoying I couldn't help thinking it.

"Customer, how high were you prepared to go?"

This toad of an old man, for real...!