Chapter 44 - 43. Undeserving Indulgence
Just.
Hearing it like that, Sarah realized how ridiculous it was.
If someone could make her stay with her mother, even just one day? She would throw herself at that person, that entity, bowing until her knees buckled and her forehead bled.
"Thanks to you, she can go peacefully with laughter after spending three more years in this world," Hajin said gently, still wiping Sarah’s tears with her calloused hand. "Thanks to you, I don’t have to live being plagued with nightmares out of guilt."
Something that, unfortunately, Sarah was still afflicted with.
"It wasn’t ’just’, Lee Seul-ah," Hajin said firmly, even though he knew Sarah could no longer see it as such.
The stuttered breath that Sarah let out was enough proof.
"If it wasn’t for you, I’d live like a walking corpse--empty, without any goal, without a care in the world," Hajin continued, and Sarah couldn’t pretend she didn’t know because she saw it already; the Ryu Hajin that only moved to fulfill his duty, almost like an unfeeling robot. "I might not be able to contain my violent tendencies, and that violence might point at me in the end, killing myself."
Sarah bit her lips again because she couldn’t help but think about it. She knew Hajin disappeared from the mansion one day, and she still had no idea what happened to the man then. What if...
What if he didn’t disappear but...die? Whether it was during a mission, or he was getting too numb and just pulled the trigger of his own gun...
Hajin rubbed the bitten lips softly, forcing Sarah to stop making it bleed. He looked into the moist black eyes as he held the girl’s trembling hands.