You Have Been Defended [EN]: Chapter 67

“Was Jin-cheol doing well?”

“Hello.”

In a situation that had been utterly dark, a breakthrough had emerged, so with a somewhat relieved feeling, Kang Min-jae and I visited the hospital to see Jin-cheol.

“But why the long face? What’s wrong?”

Kang Min-jae sat next to Jin-cheol and spoke.

Jin-cheol sighed deeply and glanced at his watch.

“Lee Hyuk-min is coming to visit.”

The image of Jin-cheol’s transformation the moment the homeroom teacher mentioned a hospital visit flashed through my mind.

“If you don’t want to, you should have told him not to come.”

“I don’t have a good reason to refuse. Telling him to get lost over and over again is only good for so many times…….”

“If meeting them is going to upset you, it’s better not to meet them.”

At my words, Jin-cheol simply hung his head.

Quite some time has passed since the incident, and now he is gradually finding stability.

The violence that Jin-cheol showed was also slowly beginning to disappear, and from now on, all that remained was to heal his mind and body until the incident was resolved.

An unwanted hospital visit at such a time was not a good thing.

“……I thought it would look like I’m too scared of Lee Hyuk-min to meet him.”

Jin-cheol said with a deep sigh.

Kang Min-jae grabbed Jin-cheol’s shoulder and grinned.

“Ah, you can’t look scared. Let’s show those guys how unaffected you are. They’re not even worth a punch. We’ll be here for you!”

“……To be honest, they’re not exactly not worth a punch. I’d probably lose if we fought.”

“Ah, then we can make it 3 against 1, including us.”

Jin-cheol chuckled at Kang Min-jae’s jest.

The reason Jin-cheol kept glancing at his watch seemed to be because he was gauging the time Lee Hyuk-min would arrive.

“I’m curious about what that bad kid looks like, too.”

I had seen the photos Sang-gil had taken in advance, but I didn’t bother to chime in.

As the minute hand of the wall clock pointed to 12, Jin-cheol began to visibly fidget.

I suggested that Jin-cheol’s mother leave the room for a while while Lee Hyuk-min was visiting.

I thought she wouldn’t be able to control her emotions if she saw Lee Hyuk-min directly.

Creak.

It was then.

The hospital room door opened, and a group of four students in school uniforms entered the room.

A large fruit basket was with them.

“Jin-cheol.”

The tall student at the front approached the bed and said.

It was Lee Hyuk-min, whom I had seen in the photos.

The students following behind him were also his gang, whom I had encountered in the photos.

“Jin-cheol, are you feeling any better?”

Lee Hyuk-min, who was approaching the bed, suddenly stopped when he noticed me and Kang Min-jae.

“Who are these people?”

Jin-cheol didn’t answer Lee Hyuk-min’s question.

I added a word because the gap between the question and answer was getting longer and might arouse unnecessary suspicion.

“I’m Jin-cheol’s uncle, and this is my younger acquaintance. We stopped by on the way. Since Jin-cheol’s friends are coming, I was wondering if I should buy them dinner.”

“Ah, hello. I’m Lee Hyuk-min, Jin-cheol’s friend.”

Lee Hyuk-min bowed his head and greeted us.

With a friendly smiling face and polite greetings, he seemed like a well-educated student.

Hyuk-min placed the fruit basket next to Jin-cheol’s bed and said.

“We bought this by pooling our money. All the kids in our class wanted to come together, but I told them I’d just come with a few of us because I thought you’d be tired.”

Hyuk-min said, sitting in the caregiver’s chair.

However, Jin-cheol didn’t make eye contact with Hyuk-min and turned his head away.

I knew what their intentions were in visiting Jin-cheol.

First, since they claimed to be the closest group of friends, it wouldn’t look good if they didn’t visit him in the hospital at least once.

Second, they wanted to see with their own eyes how badly Jin-cheol was hurt, rather than just hearing about it.

Even though they had been constantly assaulting Jin-cheol, it wasn’t to the extent that he had to be hospitalized for a long time.

They might have been a little surprised.

And Jin-cheol might have told his parents the whole story of the accident, but the fact that they showed up so brazenly meant they were sure of something.

Since there had been no other action taken so far, they were confident that Jin-cheol hadn’t told his parents his story, as he had done before.

The fact that they only appeared now, quite some time after the incident occurred, was obviously to gauge the situation.

“Hyuk-min, was it?”

“Ah, yes.”

“You look like you study well.”

“Haha, thank you.”

“You must be very close to Jin-cheol. Now that I think about it, I think I’ve heard him mention you a few times.”

“Jin-cheol is my best friend. Ah, but has Jin-cheol ever talked about me?”

Hyuk-min looked at me with a sharp glint in his eyes.

I smiled faintly and replied.

“When I asked him if he was adjusting well after transferring, he mentioned you. So I thought you were a good friend, and now you’ve even come to visit. Thank you.”

“Ah, no. I’m sorry for coming so late. I should have come sooner, but I hesitated because I was worried I might be bothering you……. Jin-cheol, I’m sorry.”

Hyuk-min said cheerfully, tapping Jin-cheol on the shoulder.

When Jin-cheol didn’t say anything, Hyuk-min smiled awkwardly.

“Hey, why aren’t you saying anything? Are you still in a lot of pain?”

“……Yeah, still.”

Jin-cheol replied quietly.

Then Hyuk-min sighed.

“Ugh, that’s why I told you not to do it. Why did you play such a prank and get hurt? What’s so important about those slippers? You’re breaking my heart, you little rascal.”

“…….”

“Get well soon. We’re short one person when we play soccer without you. Lee Myung-joon is filling your spot right now, but he’s really bad. You need to come back soon.”

“…….”

Hyuk-min tapped Jin-cheol on the shoulder again and urged him to answer, saying, ‘Huh? Say something, huh?’

Jin-cheol bit his lip tightly and replied.

“……Okay.”

“Hyuk-min, Park Jin-cheol seems very tired. I think you’re bothering him too much.”

One of the students standing behind Hyuk-min said cautiously.

At those words, Hyuk-min looked at his watch for a moment and replied with a regretful expression.

“That’s right. It’s time for us to go to the academy [private tutoring or cram school].”

“Jin-cheol, we’ll be going now. Get well soon. Huh? It’s so boring without you.”

After each of the group said a word to Jin-cheol, they began to sling the bags they had put down over their shoulders.

“I was going to buy you dinner, but are you leaving already?”

When I asked, Hyuk-min waved his hand.

“No. We have to go to the academy anyway. We just stopped by before that. Thank you so much for the offer.”

Hyuk-min bowed his head and then shouted as he left the hospital room.

“Jin-cheol, we’re leaving. We’ll come back and hang out with you for a long time after the finals. Get some rest!”

After all the students left the hospital room, Jin-cheol released the lip he had been biting tightly and took a long breath.

“That son of a bitch…….”

With his eyes bloodshot, Jin-cheol muttered.

“Uncle, that’s all fake! That bastard is all lies. You can’t believe him, I really…….”

“I know.”

Jin-cheol, who was already tearing up, finally burst into tears.

“You held it in well. Thank you for doing as I said.”

After hearing the news that Hyuk-min was coming to visit, I had told Jin-cheol not to get excited.

If possible, we had to make it seem like Jin-cheol still hadn’t revealed the truth of the incident so that they wouldn’t prepare in advance.

“Uncle, is that bastard really going to be punished? You’re really going to make it happen, right?”

Jin-cheol asked, swallowing his sobs.

“Yes. Just wait a little longer.”

On the way back to the office, Kang Min-jae, who was driving, was so frustrated that pus and blood were about to come out of my ears.

“Seriously, look at how brazen that little Lee Hyuk-min is! Wow, if someone who didn’t know the situation well saw him, they’d think Lee Hyuk-min was really worried about Jin-cheol!”

The driving became even rougher each time Kang Min-jae thumped his chest.

“Drive a little slower.”

“Seriously, how can that young kid be so good at acting? I’m confused now whether the teachers were fooled or whether his dad is the superintendent of education and is covering for him? Ah, no. It could be both.”

“……I said drive slower.”

“Ah, I’m so angry! Ah! Seriously, how did a high school student learn such hypocrisy? Anyone who saw him would think he was the most polite, diligent, and studious model student in the world. It’s scary, scary. How can I send my kid to school with peace of mind? I really need to homeschool my own kid.”

“Kang Min-jae, you don’t have kids.”

“Ah, I need to expose this case quickly and reveal that bastard’s true identity to the whole world. How much hardship has Jin-cheol gone through? I feel like I’m Jin-cheol’s dad. Lee Hyuk-min is going to be a con artist when he grows up.”

“Red light.”

“Ah, am I wrong? Right? He’s a con artist in the making, right?”

“Red light!”

Kang Min-jae, who had been talking non-stop, widened his eyes as if surprised by my voice and slammed on the brakes.

“……I’m sorry.”

* * *

It was two days later that Tae-shik asked about the news.

Even though Tae-shik’s office clearly had a fax machine and a computer, he barged into the office without any notice.

Kang Min-jae was away for a while.

“Why don’t you call before you come?”

Tae-shik, who took off his jumper and sat on the consultation sofa, narrowed his eyes and said.

“Are you going to keep drawing lines between us so coldly? You know I brought good news.”

“What is ‘us’?”

I sat across from Tae-shik and handed him a cup of coffee.

He looked like a wet dog shivering from the cold.

“Ah, it’s bitter. Don’t you have any mix? Mix?”

“Just drink what you’re given.”

“Ah, you have no sense. Kang Min-jae gives me exactly what I want according to my taste.”

Tae-shik muttered and placed the file he had been holding in his arms on the table.

“There must be so many loan sharks. I was prepared to go around to the daily lenders in the neighborhood, but fortunately, I found it quickly after going to a few famous companies.”

I took the file from him.

There was only one piece of paper in it, but it contained enough information.

“Han Kyung-cheol had debts to loan sharks from 2001 to early 2003, but he repaid some in May 2003, some in July, and some again in October. And he paid it off completely in December 2003.”

2003 was definitely the first year of tutoring that we had confirmed in Kim Hak-sung’s file.

May and July were the months when the first semester midterms and finals were held, and October and December were the months when the second semester midterms and finals were held.

“Han Kyung-cheol…….”

I slowly rolled the name in my mouth and looked at the faculty list.

“It’s the principal.”