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Chapter 16: The Crossroads

"As I've told you, sir, we've already dispatched an ambulance," the police officer informs Jeong-hyeok on the phone "Since we don't know where she is exactly... it may take us some time to find her. If we do, you will hear from us soon." Something in his businesslike tone is irking Jeong-hyeok, even through the rising panic he feels inside his chest.

Pyo Chi-su and Cho Cheol-gang are staring at him from the other end of Jeong-hyeok's desk, listening to his every word. Cheol-gang had wandered in from downstairs. He received the news with an oddly calm demeanor, not that anyone noticed.

"When should I expect to hear from you?" Jeong-hyeok asks the police officer. But the man has already hung up.

Jeong-hyeok listens to the dial tone for a second, feeling anger and frustration fray his nerves. He meets Pyo Chi-su's nervous eyes, and goes over his options.

He could wait but he knows that that would be like. Battling with ineffectual police officers and endless bureaucracy, pacing around his office with his phone on speaker and time slipping by. Meanwhile Se-ri could be lying somewhere in a ditch and every second could mean her life.

He thinks about being too late once again. And a sense of steely determination comes over him.

"I'm going to find her," Jeong-hyeok says, moving away from the desk.

Cheol-gang gives a stunned laugh, glancing at Pyo Chi-su as if searching for agreement. "Jeong-hyeok-ah, don't be ridiculous. I know you're upset, but what are you going to do? Roam through the forest by foot? This isn't a melodrama, for Christ's sake."

"Daepyonim," Pyo Chi-su ventures. "Perhaps it would be wiser to wait -"

But Jeong-hyeok is already donning his blazer. "She needs us," he says. And to him, that's the beginning and end of the discussion.

Cho Cheol-gang's eyes darken at his words, but Jeong-hyeok doesn't see. He's already out the door. After a moment of silence, Pyo Chi-su hurries out behind him.

"I'll get Gwang-beom," he mutters as he leaves. "Daepyonim should not drive right now."

Cho Cheol-gang is left alone in the empty office, with only his morose thoughts to keep him company. He had celebrated a few minutes ago when he had heard the news of Yoon Se-ri's accident from the bugs he had placed in Jeong-hyeok's office. But what if she survived this?

Cheol-gang had initially thought that it would be the simplest thing in the world to break up a fake relationship. It was fake, after all. There wasn't supposed to be any emotion there.

But by Jeong-hyeok's actions tonight, his obvious attachment to the girl -- Cheol-gang realizes would need much more drastic measures than he had initially planned. That was, if she survived.

***

The lit streets of Seoul race past Jeong-hyeok in a blur. Time is both excruciatingly long and infinitesimally short. Every millisecond feels like a minute, and yet the minutes slip away like grains of sand.

Park Gwang-beom is driving with silent concentration beside him. Pyo Chi-su is in the back, Jeong-hyeok's cell phone in his hand as he waits anxiously for the police to call, with the news that could mean life or death.

Jeong-hyeok is staring straight ahead, willing every light to be green and every car to part to let them through.

How could it be? he can't help but wonder. One car accident was a tragedy, but two?

The thought crosses his mind that perhaps someone is methodically picking off the people closest to him.

Mu Hyeok's accident had been a freak incident, though, as Cheol-gang had told him; heavy rain above, a semi-truck coming at them head on in the wrong lane, a sudden swerve that caused his brother's car to hydroplane and crash into an electrical pole at the side of the road. It had been one of the hardest things to accept about the accident. He was still coming to terms with the fact that sometimes bad luck was just that: bad luck. Sometimes the universe tossed a coin and the person just got tails.