The Trial of an Undomestic Barrister | JJK x PJM

✦6| Beginning of the end. End of the beginning✦

A/N: Thanks for opening this chapter. Do vote, and comment. Beginning of the end. End of the beginning: Owari no hajimari. Hajimari no owari

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unspoken - hurts

I walk through reception on autopilot.

Out onto the sunny lunchtime street, one foot in front of the other, just another individual among the midday crowds. Except I'm different. I've just lost this country a valuable mother figure. My employer a blood money penalty sum of 50 million Euros. Fifty million. 

The amount is like a drumbeat in my head.

Even now, I don't understand how it happened.

I don't fucking understand!

My mind keeps turning it over. Over and over, obsessively. 

How could I have not seen... how could I have overlooked... It must have been put on my desk, then covered up with something else. A file, a pile of contracts, a cup of coffee.

One mistake.

The only mistake I've ever made!

I want to wake up and this will all be a bad dream, it happened to someone else, it's a story I'm listening to in the club, a rumor, thanking my lucky stars it wasn't me... But it is me.

My career is over.

The last person at Supreme Court who made a mistake like this was unluckily Jeon SomSom, who lead a criminal to be released instead, with her very basic mistake of failing to differentiate between convicted and acquitted. This was in 1983. She was fired on the spot. Her license cancelled. End of story. She runs a clothing brand now.

And I've done something far more heinous than that. My chest feels tight; I feel like I'm being strangled.

I think I could be having a panic attack.

I sit down on a wooden bench set against some railings and wait to feel better.

Ok, I'm not feeling better.

Damn, I'm feeling worse.

Suddenly I jump in terror as my Samsung vibrates in my pocket. I pull it out and look at the caller ID. It's Bia.

I can't talk to her.

I can't talk to anybody. Not right now.

A moment later, the phone notifies that a message has been left. I lift the phone to my ear and press 1 to listen.

"Jeon!", Yoongi sounds cheery, "Where are you? We're all waiting with the champagne to make the big partnership announcement!"

Partnership.

I want to burst into tears.

But... I can't.

This mistake is too big for tears.

I thrust my phone in my pocket and get to my feet again. I begin to walk faster and faster, weaving through the pedestrians. My head is pounding and I have no idea where I'm going. I walk for what seems like hours, my head in a daze, my feet moving blindly. 

The sun is beating down, and the pavements are dusty, and after a while my head starts to throb. At some point my phones start to vibrate again, but I ignore them.

At last, when my legs are starting to ache, I slow down and come to a halt.

My mouth is dry. I'm totally dehydrated.