Starting the day after being told not to go around alone, Dongmin had been standing in front of the office every time it was time to get off work.
At first, he pretended it was a coincidence. Starting on the second day, he just waited there openly.
"...Why are you here."
"I was just passing by."
"You did the same thing yesterday."
"...I’m just passing by again today, too."
The lies were getting less and less sincere.
Even after I told him over and over to stop coming, that was only ever for that moment. I even said he was making me uncomfortable, but the next day he was standing in that same spot again.
"...I really am fine, you know."
"...I know. I’m just not fine."
I had nothing to add to that.
And since it was true that ever since what happened in the alley, I’d become scared of walking alone, in the end I just started walking a few steps ahead without saying anything.
*
A few days later, Dongmin brought up Sunil Capital again.
"...I thought you said you’d stop digging into Sunil Capital."
"...I didn’t stop."
I answered honestly. I didn’t even have the energy to lie.
Dongmin let out a sigh, then lowered his voice.
"We also know that Manager Seongho is laundering money through Sunil Capital.
But we still haven’t figured out who’s above him. You can’t just recklessly poke at this case."
I hadn’t expected him to tell me this much.
"...Why are you telling me this?"
"...Because it’s better that you know what to be careful of, rather than digging into it alone and really getting yourself into danger."
The words were rational, but there was no reason for him to say something like that while going so far as to put his own company on the line.
I felt like I shouldn’t read too much into it, so I tried to brush it off as him just being the type to look after other people.
"...Aren’t you going to end up in trouble at work because of me?"
"...I’ll handle that myself. You don’t need to worry about my side."
His tone was firm. I didn’t want to think about what he was using that firmness for.
I felt like I had to cut this off for good before it went any further.
*
The next day, seeing Dongmin standing in front of the office again, I walked up to him first.
"...Please stop coming here now. I’ve told you several times that it makes me uncomfortable."
I said it on purpose, coldly. Dongmin looked at me in silence for a moment, then gave a short reply: he understood.
That day, there was really no one on the way home from work. The alley and the main road were both quiet. I told myself that meant it was over.
*
But the next morning, there was a strange envelope tucked into the office mailbox.
Neither the sender nor the recipient was written on it.
Inside was a single photo, with no explanation.
It showed the back view of us walking together from the convenience store to the main road on the night of what happened in the alley a few days ago.
The two people walking side by side were clearly captured in it.
My hands were shaking.
I was hesitating over whether I should show it when I happened to meet Dongmin’s eyes as he passed by.
When he saw the envelope in my hand, he came over first.
Dongmin’s face went rigid the moment he took the photo. After staring at it for a long time, he muttered in a low voice.
"...So both of us were photographed."
"...Exactly. Who would even do something like this, and why......."
"It’ll be someone on Seongho’s side. It means they already know I’m involved with you."
His voice had gone stiff.
He was the one who’d told me over and over to stop coming, yet in the end, he himself had given them the chance to take a photo like this.
*
A few days after that envelope incident, Dongmin wordlessly left a document related to Sunil Capital on my desk.
He must have decided there was no point pretending not to know anymore.
If Seongho’s people were already linking the two of us together, then letting me move around alone without knowing anything would probably be even more dangerous.
Every page was marked with a highlighter. Suspicious accounts, and small notes written beside them.
It was hard to even tell whether it was a warning.
If he was going to hand over this much information so casually, then he wouldn’t have had any reason to tell me to stop from the beginning.
I picked it up and put it back down a few times, thinking I’d return it, but in the end I put it in the drawer. By now, I couldn’t exactly pretend I hadn’t received it.
My resolve not to get involved in his affairs neither broke nor held; it just hung there, awkwardly in between.
When I got home, I fiddled with the watch on my wrist. Over the crack in the glass, the highlighter marks seemed to overlap.
