Sijin recited his love in a voice that could cut glass. His fiancé smiled, ever so faintly. No one could tell whether it was out of shyness or whether it was a smile of resignation.
Many more words were exchanged at the press conference, and several questions remained unanswered. But Sijin’s declaration that he had fallen for him at first sight remained an uncontested fact.
* * *
“Could you move away a little? It’s hot.”
Like two south poles, like two north poles repelling each other, the two of them drew apart. The moment they passed through the thick velvet curtain, the faces of the amicable couple changed entirely.
“Quick change, isn’t it. We haven’t even had the ceremony yet and I’m already getting the cold shoulder. My husband is incredible. The best, really. Absolutely the best.”
Gangwoo gave as good as he got. The two of them exchanged glances loaded with contempt and mutual exasperation.
Gangwoo cracked open a bottle of water. Sitting under the scorching stage lights had been grueling enough on its own, but the sight of Sijin made his blood run even hotter. He tipped the bottle back and drank straight from it. Gulp, gulp. His throat bobbed with each swallow. The contempt in Sijin’s eyes deepened.
“Ahhh, that’s good. That helps. There’s some left — want it?”
“No, thank you. I don’t drink after someone else’s mouth has been on it. ……More importantly, watch how you conduct yourself. There are still journalists outside.”
Between the two of them, there was no affection to speak of — not even the tiniest grain of goodwill. And what little might have existed, each was perfectly happy to decline from the other.
A press conference. An engagement. All of it was a show. A lie.
To find the motive behind this elaborate performance, one would have to rewind time by two weeks. Sijin had approved the announcement discontinuing treatments for five rare diseases, and Gangwoo had been in the middle of breaking into Sunshine Harbor Building.
The fiancé of Eaton Biotech’s CEO was a thief. Not just any thief — his true identity was “Jerry,” the name that made the wealthy of their city tremble: Hangdong Special Autonomous City, an international free-trade financial metropolis.
Scene #002 — Bluebird
D-15.
Gangwoo was sprinting across the rooftop of Sunshine Harbor Building, carrying inside his jacket the jewelry collection of Hangdong’s bank president — stolen ten minutes ago from a private vault six floors underground.
Freeze, Jerry! ICPO¹ investigator Oh Jinhwan, who had caught up behind him, issued the warning. Move and I’ll shoot!
Regrettably, there is no thief in the world who stops at those words. These days the police shoot even when you do stop. Surely because men like me have been pushing their patience to the breaking point for so long. Thinking this, he bore down harder on both legs.
“Fire!”
As expected, Jinhwan gave the order to shoot. Without looking back, Gangwoo zigzagged to dodge the bullets flying straight at him. Hack. A metallic smell rose from somewhere deep in his airways. Part of a nosebleed that had come on suddenly had run back down his throat.
Why now, of all times. There wasn’t even a moment to wipe the blood pouring from his lower face.
If even a single drop is left behind, that’s trouble. He clenched his molars. Running and rolling to dodge bullets while struggling to breathe through a bloody nose was a fairly taxing combination. Still, nimble as ever, he managed to climb up onto the railing he was aiming to leap from.
He had just been clearing his throat, trying to dislodge the clot of blood stuck in his airway. A bullet from Jinhwan’s barrel grazed his left shoulder.
“He’s hit, he’s hit!”
“No — it was a graze! Don’t lose focus, keep after him!”
A sensation like getting punched by a restaurant owner after trying to skip out on a tab — electric and searing — wrung every cell before slowly fading out. Gangwoo didn’t make a sound. If the pain he’d endured could be quantified, this level of hurt was barely a two out of ten.
Fortunately, he was standing on the railing. The bullet that had grazed his shoulder went sailing off toward the dark sea below. Drain every drop of the Yellow Sea and you still wouldn’t find that bullet.
As far as Gangwoo knew, the only evidence remaining was his footprints. But they had been trampled beyond any usable state by the mob of police officers who’d poured out after him.
Reassured, he turned to face the investigators and officers on his tail. Standing on a railing thinner than an adult’s forearm, he spread both arms wide. And then, as though lowering himself onto a soft bed, he threw himself into the dark.
The rooftop of Sunshine Harbor Building was on the 186th floor — nine hundred meters above ground.
He didn’t offer any parting words like “Well then, goodbye.” The childish alias “Jerry” was already embarrassing enough on its own. He had started out as nothing more than a nameless thief, but a nickname that had stuck by chance had somehow become the official designation the police themselves used.
Just before the fall, he thought he’d briefly caught Jinhwan’s eye. The gaze of the investigator who had spent years chasing Jerry through the dark flashed bright. He was ablaze with the determination to chase Jerry to the ends of the earth and arrest him.
So be it.
Surrendering his body to the pull of gravity and freefalling roughly fifty meters, Gangwoo inwardly laughed at Jinhwan. The wings of his wingsuit unfurled fully open, and he began to glide on the sea breeze toward the shore.
It wasn’t solely the pride of having committed over two hundred thefts across the past three years without ever once being caught. Gangwoo had intended the Sunshine Harbor Building private vault heist to be his last — his final act before walking away from crime for good.
So it didn’t matter anymore whether the police were fired up or not. The childish name ended tonight. He would never surface again in the world.
A wingsuit dyed in the darkest pigment in the world dissolved perfectly into the overcast night sky.
* * *
Gangwoo’s parachute touched down at the foot of Hangdong Coastal Park. Deep in the night, the park was loud with nothing but the crash of waves against the shore. Not even the scattered clusters of homeless people who usually spent the night there were to be seen.
Tonight was the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month — the Baekjungs tide. It was the day of the year with the greatest difference between high and low tide and the strongest water currents, which was why the seaside park had been closed for safety reasons several days prior.
Furthermore, it was currently high tide, the sea at its fullest. Not a homeless soul in sight — not even a police officer dared come near. Thanks to that, Gangwoo was able to pack up his parachute at his leisure and make his way home.
Gangwoo’s home was situated in the old district of Hangdong Special Autonomous City. Unlike the new district surrounding the airport — packed with skyscrapers that seemed to threaten the sky itself — the old district stretched long and inland, following the old harbor and the rail lines that originated there.
This place was like the gaps between tetrapods²—where everything washed in by the waves got tangled up and couldn’t find its way back out. Gangwoo himself, originally from the southern provinces, had drifted here four years ago this year.
A light came on on the fourth floor of a building with no elevator. The vinyl lettering on the windows spelling out “Seo’s Manpower Agency” — one character per pane — had cracked and split at the edges from heat and light.
Gangwoo was the vice president and sole employee of the manpower agency. The owner was the teacher who had taught him how to steal. One day he had simply vanished, leaving behind a note that said something to the effect of figure it out yourself, and ever since, Gangwoo had kept the place going alone.
As a cover, a manpower agency was quite useful. While connecting people to work, all manner of information converged there like an intersection.
The architectural blueprints of Sunshine Harbor Building — which he had just finished robbing — had come from a day laborer who’d dropped by looking for work. He might look like a grimy manual laborer from the outside, but there was no information more accurate than what came from the mouth of a man who had personally hauled cement bags and built the space with his own hands. Going by documents alone was a surefire way to get burned in the field.
He switched on the light in the living room, which doubled as a reception area. He dropped the parachute bag, bulletproof vest, and various other gear near the entrance like he was hurling them away. As he reached to peel off the cheap turtleneck that clung tight to his body, his hands moved to his chest.
Over the fabric, he felt the thick, solid shape of the leather pouch hanging inside. A quiet smile spread across Gangwoo’s lips. Today’s haul was in there. He could feel the flutter of his own heartbeat through his fingertips.
“No, no. None of that.”
Rule of Conduct Number Seven. Once a job is done, shake off the adrenaline as quickly as possible.
At any rate, his teacher had always had a particular fondness for rules. The Rules of Conduct his teacher had created — calling them the virtues a thief must uphold — numbered well over a hundred. More infuriating than the sheer count of them was the fact that most of them were right.
Calling up the memory of his teacher’s unhurried voice, he slipped a hand inside his clothing and unhooked the pouch. He set it on the table, then made his way to the cabinet his teacher had left behind. It was packed tight with records — part of his teacher’s collection.
Letting out a low grunt, he crouched down. After rummaging through the cabinet for a bit, Gangwoo rose with a Dexter Gordon album in hand.
He set the record on the turntable and lowered the needle. From outside the window came the sound of a fumigation truck winding through the alley, puffing out white smoke. The acrid rumble of the truck making its final rounds through every corner of Hangdong, ending here, blended with the thick, languid saxophone playing.
Listening to a melody that seemed to cling to a lover’s ankle and refuse to let go, Gangwoo headed to the bathroom. In his wake, a pair of 285mm suede walkers, a size 105 black turtleneck, 30-inch utility pants, and white military briefs fell to the floor one after another. The underwear was clean; the left shoulder of the turtleneck was soaked through with blood. The track was called “Cry Me a River.”
The song looped about five times. By the time Gangwoo emerged from the bathroom with a first aid kit tucked under his arm, the adrenaline had completely worn off. In its place was thirst. The kind of thirst that water couldn’t fix.
He padded over to the refrigerator, water dripping from his brown hair, and pulled it open. The refrigerator — no freezer compartment, standing about shoulder-height — was lined with cans of beer. Imported beer, the kind that was hard to come by in the old district. He grabbed the can at the very front. The expiration date printed vertically along the side was cutting it close.
He set the first aid kit and the beer can down on the table and dropped into the chair. He caught his breath, then — here we go — reached out for the beer can. The skin of his bare back peeled away from the chair back with a dry, tearing sound.
He cracked the tab. Carbonation hissed out with a crisp, clean sound. And yet, despite staring at the beer with unmistakably thirsty eyes, Gangwoo didn’t bring the can to his lips.
Instead, he smelled it. He drew a deep breath in through his nose and exhaled, like an addict inhaling cocaine, repeating this two or three times before setting the can back down. Then he examined his left shoulder where the bullet had grazed him.
The wound wasn’t serious. He was lucky — it was nothing more than a graze that didn’t even need stitches. But blood was still seeping out in a slow, steady trickle.
“Damn aspirin.”
Gangwoo muttered as he rummaged through the first aid kit.
It was because of his illness. The reason he couldn’t drink alcohol. The reason he took aspirin every day to prevent blood clots. The reason that once he started bleeding, it didn’t stop easily — all because of his illness.
And even the fact that he had to steal for money was because of the disease he suffered from — Allen-Park Syndrome.
It had been over four years since the diagnosis. Other people said it was about time he came to terms with it, but that was easy enough to say when it was someone else’s problem. When a disease puts restrictions on your every action, being cheerful about it simply isn’t an option.
