The Sun to my Moon

Chapter 14: Worries

Cha Dal-geon was quiet the next morning at breakfast, Go Hae-ri noticed, surveying him over the top of her coffee cup. He had barely made a fuss over the lamentable state of the diner's tea selection, and he wasn't even providing a running commentary on his analysis of any of the waitresses or the other customers.

"You okay?" she asked, taking a sip of her coffee.

"I'm fine," he said absently, staring out the window.

She sighed. She hated when he withdrew into himself and refused to talk to her. "Dal-geonssi," she said softly, hoping to rouse him out of his funk.

He looked back at her. "Mianhae," he said. He scrubbed his hand over his face. "I guess I'm just distracted this morning."

Her heart sank. "I'm sorry if going through all this again is bringing back bad memories."

"It's not that."

Hae-ri frowned. "What is it, then?"

He hesitated. "I was just thinking about Jeon Molly."

Hae-ri blinked. "What about her?"

"I was thinking about what you said to me, when we found her. You said we saved a girl's life."

"We did."

"But she's so unhappy. It's almost a year later and she's working at that terrible bar, wasting her potential because she's still mired in grief and loneliness."

"What are you saying? That we shouldn't have saved her?" Hae-ri said incredulously. "That we should have just left her to Jerome and whatever sick plan he had in mind for her?"

"Of course not. It just seems like it wasn't enough. What good are we doing, really, if that's all we can give? Just life. No return to her carefree past. No restoration of happiness. Is that really the best we can expect to give someone? Just the chance to keep breathing, with no promise of anything more?"

Hae-ri sighed. "It's a place to start, Dal-geonssi. You can't live other people's lives for them. All you can do is give them the opportunity to make their own way."

He looked down. "Yeah, well. Sometimes it just seems like we should be able to do more."

Hae-ri watched him brooding about Molly and felt a pang in her chest. This was what she liked about Dal-geon. This part of him that so few people ever saw. He liked to make fun of her for what he called her 'rigid view of justice,' but the truth was, she'd always had a better awareness than he did that life was most often presented itself in shades of gray. Dal-geon was the one who saw things in black and white. He believed good people deserved good things to happen to them, and bad people deserved bad things. She felt a rush of affection for him as she watched him sitting there worrying about this young girl he barely knew. She knew he cared more about their work and the people they encountered in the course of it than he ever let on. Despite his worldly air, deep down, there was a part of him that refused to accept the reality that usually there was some mix of the two on both ends. His brand of justice was to take note of when it seemed 'bad' people were putting one over on 'good' people, and making it his business to restore what he perceived to be the rightful order of things. She didn't always agree with the way he went about it, but she knew that his heart really was in the right place, most of the time. She hated seeing him discouraged like this. "Sometimes it just takes time, Dal-geonssi," she said gently. "Molly's young. She'll bounce back. You'll see."

He sighed. "I hope so."

She smiled at him. "Now, come on. Haven't you got townsfolk to annoy? Surely that will cheer you up."

He brightened. "True. Not only that, Hae-rissi, but I have a poker game to play."

"More poker?" she said, exasperated. "Don't you think you already won quite enough at the casino last night?"