A Child Who Resembles Me [EN]: Chapter 31

31. Who Do I Look Like?

Jiheon hurriedly closed his office door.

His body moved before his mind could catch up. He ended up grabbing Jung-oh’s hand, which was clutching the doorknob.

After the door clicked shut, Jung-oh immediately pulled her hand away from Jiheon’s grasp.

She glared at him, and Jiheon was at a loss for words.

He had never met a woman like her before. Well, almost everything was a first for him since his memory loss.

He had only called her in to give her cookies, but somehow he found himself cornered.

She was fiercely glaring at him, demanding an apology with her eyes and expression.

There was no wavering in her gaze, which made Jiheon nervous. It seemed like she was really ready to throw everything away and leave the company.

Jung-oh truly had no regrets.

Threatening to quit the company was her last resort.

Now that she had once again accurately assessed what kind of person Jung Jiheon was, she thought she had no choice. For Yena’s sake, she decided it would be wise to give up on him now.

So, she was a little surprised when Jiheon urgently grabbed her.

Thus, this was the real last chance she was giving him.

She had a glimmer of hope again.

‘My existence may not mean much to you since you’ve lost your memory, but I am still a member of your headquarters,’ she thought.

He stared intently at her. He seemed angry.

He seemed to be thinking, ‘What’s with this girl?’

Although she spoke harshly, Jung-oh couldn’t help but feel intimidated by his gaze. Still, she didn’t back down.

An uncomfortable silence stretched between them. And then…

“I’m sorry.”

Finally, the words left his lips.

His expression was still awful, and his attitude was terrible, but for some reason, Jung-oh’s eyes welled up with tears.

“…What are you sorry for?”

She could have just accepted the apology, but she felt greedy for more. It was a bold question, but she couldn’t make her voice as bold, fearing he might explode.

After a moment, he replied again.

“I’m sorry for teasing Assistant Manager Lee Jung-oh.”

“And?”

“…I’m also sorry for making you work excessive overtime.”

His expression was sullen, and his pronunciation was precise.

The corners of her lips threatened to rise on their own. Her eyelids were getting hotter. She didn’t want to cry or laugh, but she was about to make a strange expression, smiling while crying. Jung-oh desperately tightened her lips.

“What are you going to do in the future?”

“Whatever you want.”

“Whatever I want? How do you know what I want?”

Jiheon sighed and turned his head slightly to the side, as if he didn’t want to make eye contact.

It was clear that he didn’t like this situation. Nevertheless, he was being quite compliant.

The power of a resignation notice is this great! Jung-oh was thrilled to have discovered his weakness. Just a moment ago, she had been in despair, but now she felt revitalized.

Since the tables had unexpectedly turned, she had to seize this opportunity.

“Please properly investigate the truth of the incident last Thursday. It’s really not my fault. Someone must have entered the conference room when I left my laptop there to take a call. I’d like you to find out who that was.”

“Okay.”

“And I definitely uploaded the file to the company cloud. Someone must have deleted that file. I’d like you to find that out too.”

Jiheon quietly nodded.

As he listened to her so well, her appetite, which had disappeared, returned.

“I’ll take the cookies. I’ll enjoy them with the team members.”

“You’re going to share them?”

“Yes. Is that not allowed?”

She asked back, finding it strange that his expression changed when she said she would share them.

“You didn’t put anything weird in the cookies, did you?”

“Do you think I’m that kind of guy?”

His retort was sharp.

If that’s the case, then he probably didn’t do anything suspicious to the cookies.

“Please only put cookies in the cookie box.”

‘Don’t put your heart in it.’

‘Don’t put any emotions in the cookies.’

‘Don’t try to sway me with food. It reminds me of a time seven years ago,’ she thought.

She gave him a light piece of advice and hugged the cookie box.

“Thank you. I’ll be going.”

Jung-oh was able to leave the office with a light heart, even while holding the heavy cookie box.

Click.

The door closed again.

Left alone in the office, Jiheon frowned and plopped down in his seat.

Lee Jung-oh. She has an extraordinary skill for manipulating people.

In the meantime, her words kept echoing in his ears.

“Even if you gave me everything you have, I wouldn’t trade it for everything I have.”

Everything she has.

Everything I have.

She drew a clear line, as if to say that you and I are completely different. She mentioned his everything, which he had never even counted, and made it seem insignificant.

Even though he resented that, Jiheon couldn’t say anything. He had a feeling that it might be true.

Even if he gave her everything he had, it seemed like she would never enter his world.

That’s why he blurted out an apology.

It wasn’t a sincere apology. It was just a means to keep her around.

Nevertheless, the moment he uttered the apology, a hint of regret did arise.

All of these phenomena, this existence called Lee Jung-oh, who was manipulating his heart, he hated and resented.

But the faint smile on her face as she took the cookies also covered everything up.

Jiheon was dumbfounded to find himself thinking that it didn’t matter as long as the result was good, and he let out a hollow laugh.

Jung-oh met Gihun and Eunju in the hallway. The two of them hadn’t returned to their seats and were waiting for Jung-oh to come out of the office.

“Were you waiting here?”

“Assistant Manager!”

Gihun exclaimed as if he had found a comrade he had lost in battle.

Eunju’s eyes widened when she saw the large box Jung-oh was carrying.

“What’s this?”

“Cookies and stuff. The director gave it to me because he felt sorry for making me work overtime last Thursday.”

“He gave you cookies because he felt sorry for making you work overtime?”

“Oh, he was going to throw them away.”

“He gave you something he was going to throw away?”

“That’s what he said, so I guess so?”

“Ugh, Director Jung is such a jerk. Aaaargh.”

As expected, Go Eunju, the aloof assistant manager, didn’t look kindly on Jiheon’s gift. Jung-oh shrugged.

‘Mr. Jung Jiheon, you need to manage your reputation a little better,’ she thought.

.*. *. *. *. *. *.

The cookies and chocolates that Jiheon gifted were an enormous amount. Even after sharing them with the team members, there was still quite a bit left, so she brought them home.

When Jung-oh took the cookies and chocolates out of her bag, Yena’s mouth widened.

“Mom, is this a present for Yena?”

“Of course.”

‘It’s a present from your dad,’ she thought.

“Yena, you can only eat one a day. Okay?”

“Can’t I eat two?”

“Okay. Two.”

Yena, having compromised with her mom, tore open the cookie wrapper.

The cookie was so big that Yena’s hands and face looked small.

Yena opened her small mouth wide and took a bite of the cookie. Crumbs got all over her mouth and fell to the floor. Yena wiped her mouth and smiled brightly.

“Delicious!”

“Eat a lot.”

“But Mom said to only eat two.”

“Two is a lot. How much more are you going to eat of this huge thing?”

“Ehehe.”

Yena smiled happily and took another dainty bite.

‘My daughter is eating something her dad gave her,’ Jung-oh thought.

Jung-oh felt strange watching Yena. It felt like someone was gently pressing down on her heart.

“Mom, who gave this to you?”

“The director at Mom’s company gave it to me.”

“Only to Mom?”

“Yeah. Only to Mom.”

“Does the director like Mom?”

“No. Mom got it because she worked a lot of overtime.”

Jung-oh wiped Yena’s mouth and answered.

“I wish he did like you.”

“Why?”

“Then he might give you more cookies.”

“Mom can buy cookies too. The ones Mom buys are more delicious.”

Seeing her daughter develop a liking for Jiheon just because she received cookies, without even knowing what kind of person he was, made her think that kids are just kids.

Jung-oh gazed endlessly at Yena, who had become happy with just one cookie.

“When you’re looking at your child, you don’t even notice the axe handle rotting” [a Korean proverb meaning you’re so engrossed in your child that you don’t notice time passing or other important things].

Yena, who met her gaze, asked.

“Mom, who do I look like?”

It was a sudden question.

Jung-oh, who had been thinking about Jiheon for a moment, was slightly flustered and stammered.

“Can’t, can’t you tell just by looking? You look like Mom.”

“But Mom is good at drawing.”

“Mom couldn’t draw when she was your age either. And how good do you need to be? You’re doing well for a seven-year-old. You look like Mom.”

Jung-oh said, pointing to the zoo frame that Yena had made at daycare.

Nevertheless, Yena retorted.

“Mom doesn’t have a salmon class [referring to a specific art class or skill].”

“That’s because you’re a baby. You’ll lose it when you grow up too. Mom doesn’t have it because she’s an adult.”

“Mom can’t play Go [a strategy board game].”

“Mom can do anything if she studies!”

Jung-oh’s voice finally rose at her daughter’s stinging remarks.

‘I was trying to encourage her, but she’s making fun of me,’ she thought.

Yena, pouting, tattled to Guksoun.

“Grandma, Mom yelled at Yena.”

“It’s because Mom feels guilty. Mom can’t play Go like our Yena.”

Yena burst into laughter, not knowing which part of her grandmother’s answer was the comedic element.

“Mom can’t play Go, hahaha, hahaha.” The child’s laughter filled the house.

Jung-oh ended up laughing along with her daughter’s laughter.

Sometimes, she brings worries from outside the house into the house.

Bringing work is quite common.

In moments when she’s racking her brain because she can’t think of a line of copy that perfectly pleases the advertiser, and she wants to be angry at everything in the world, Jung-oh pricks up her ears at the sound of laughter coming from the living room.

The clear laughter of the child, laughing so hard at something so funny, makes her put aside her work for a moment and chase after it. When she goes, she sees them laughing at a TV show that’s nothing special.

The difference in the sense of humor between the child and the adult, as different as their eye levels, makes it difficult to laugh along right away. But Jung-oh eventually laughs along with the child’s tireless laughter.

The fact that she had become a part of that laughter made her forget all her worries.

It was her everything.

The entirety of my life. The sound of my child’s laughter. My child’s happiness.

.*. *. *. *. *. *.

The next day, Jiheon called Jung-oh to his office.

Jiheon diligently carried out the task Jung-oh had given him.

Jiheon showed Jung-oh the security camera location data he had obtained from the security management office.

“As you can see, there are no cameras in the conference room where Assistant Manager Lee was.”

“There aren’t many places in the company with cameras installed.”

“It’s best to only install enough to identify if a thief breaks in. A surveillance atmosphere isn’t good.”

It was a valid point. The only security cameras were a few installed in the hallway. There were cameras in the conference room hallway as well, but they didn’t show the entrance to the conference room Jung-oh had used.

“It seems like you should install them so you can at least see the conference room entrance.”

Jung-oh gave her opinion, but Jiheon didn’t answer.

‘This man doesn’t answer when he feels like he’s losing,’ she thought.

‘He’s sly.’

For some reason, that point seemed to resemble Yena as well.

“Why are you smiling?”

“Huh? Was I smiling? I wasn’t smiling. Ahem.”

She had been thinking about Yena and unknowingly chuckled, but she was caught. When Jiheon pointed it out, Jung-oh cleared her throat.

Jiheon gave her a look and showed her the CCTV footage.

“Since there are no cameras near the conference room entrance, it’s difficult to figure out who the culprit is, or even if there is a culprit, but there is one significant piece of data.”

Jung-oh’s gaze moved to the CCTV screen that Jiheon was pointing to. People from Production Team 1 were gathered and talking. And soon after, the people scattered.

Soon, Jiheon showed her the CCTV from another hallway.

“If the person caught on camera 3 went this way, they should be caught on camera 4.”

“Ah… They’re not visible.”

Jung-oh also carefully watched the employee Jiheon pointed out.

The employee Jiheon pointed out was caught on camera 4 a long time later. Between cameras 3 and 4 was the conference room where Jung-oh had stayed on Thursday.

It was a colleague Jung-oh had had subtle conflicts with, so Jung-oh guessed that it could be them. But it was just a hunch, and she couldn’t push them without accurate evidence.

“Can we check the cloud records?”

At Jung-oh’s request, Jiheon typed on the laptop keyboard. And he showed her a screen with various symbols and numbers.

“There’s a record of Assistant Manager Lee uploading a file titled ‘Dawon Liquor First Proposal’ to the cloud. And there’s also a record of it being deleted. However, we can’t know who deleted it.”

“Ah… There’s no information on who deleted the file. They used a public computer instead of a personal computer.”

“They used the public computer in Printing Room C.”

The equipment in Printing Room C is old, so employees don’t use it often.

Someone who logged in with a public ID used a public computer to delete the data, so the culprit couldn’t be identified. Of course, there were no security cameras in Printing Room C either.

Jiheon, who had been silent for a while, got up from his seat.

“Let’s just ask the person we suspect directly.”

“That’s reckless! They’ll never admit it without evidence.”

If she rashly questioned them, Jiheon’s wickedness might become even more rumored [his bad reputation might worsen].

Jung-oh stopped Jiheon and smiled.

“I’ll take care of it from now on.”