Angel & Devil | Heesun

Part I - Seventeen

Awkward and silent family dinners had become one of Sunoo's routines ever since he moved in here. It's torture for him honestly. Every single adult in here was either quiet or genuinely uninterested in talking. Especially his father. Sunoo couldn't get what's with the aura he's exuding this whole time. He seriously couldn't understand what kind of a person his father was. Was he nice? Or being uptight had been his default persona?

Sunoo was confused, really. Did he want him to be here or not? Why couldn't he at least show a tiny bit of affection at all?

He's not exaggerating, but when he said his grandfather was better at that, he really meant it. Even his stepmother did show some initiative to be close to him.

Well, maybe he was too quick to judge on that, but that was what he noticed from his observation.

Ever since he told his father about his decision to study at Sangje, he became more testy than usual. Sunoo still remembered the conversation his father had with his grandfather that one night (where he accidentally eavesdropped on them).

"How can you let him make such a decision, father?" asked Seok-kyu angrily. "Did you realize it's too dangerous for him?"

"He's at the age of curious about so many things," replied Young-gil calmly, flipping the book he was currently reading. "Let him discover the answer he's looking for on his own. That way he'll know how to judge and come out with his own solution."

"Can you please stop doing this?" Seok-kyu trailed off his words. There's an undeniably heavy frustration tinted in his voice. "Is it not enough that I lost a brother already? Yeonjae also died because of this, and now I lost one of my sons too! I cannot afford to lose another one this time! Sunoo even witnessed his mother's death! I don't want him to go through the same thing again!"

"He's capable of doing the unexpected. You just need to trust him," Young-gil replied stubbornly, still standing with his stance. "Your son is smarter and brave than you thought."

"But he's just a boy!"

It was a heated one. Sunoo swore he never heard his father raise his voice like that when he spoke before, because the man that he knew always talked collectively, despite the sharp statement he made. He never saw or thought of listening to that kind of emotion, more importantly, listening to the way his father was so protective over him.

However, what's bugging Sunoo's mind right now is the thing that his father said; about his late Uncle Seonho, his late mother and Seonjae.

Was there something that he missed looking at?

Could it be that their death connected?

But, how and why?

If it was true, then ... what was the triggering point?

Just how big was this puzzle to begin with?

And did his father already know that Seonjae was murdered?

If yes... why didn't he seem bothered to find the murderer and solve this case? Logically, what's the use of working in the law enforcement field if he couldn't do justice to his loved ones?

"You should eat more, my boy." Young-gil's raspy voice pulled Sunoo out of his train of thought immediately. "You barely touch your rice," he added, pointing at Sunoo's still-full bowl of rice with his chopstick.

Looking down at his bowl, Sunoo could see why his grandfather pointed that out. He only had a few spoons of his rice and only a little of the side dishes. But, in Sunoo's defence, he had a hard time eating his food due to the black beans in the rice that he needed to pick out, and that made him forget how to enjoy his dinner and about the delicious grilled meat.