You Have Been Defended [EN]: Chapter 322

You Have Been Defended – Episode 322

[Singer Woo Jun, NBi, and actors Hwang Si-hyun and Jung Da-ul were caught using ecstasy and LSD at a club in Gangnam. During the investigation, the police confirmed that more than 10 other celebrities had gathered and used drugs together, and launched an investigation.]

“Tsk, tsk. Why are these kids like this these days? Why are young people getting involved with drugs?”

My father clicked his tongue as he picked up a piece of fruit, listening to the news report on television.

I put down the fork I was using to pick up fruit and focused on the report.

To think that idols and young actors at the peak of their careers in the entertainment industry were caught doing drugs.

Not even light drugs like marijuana, but hard drugs that ruin the mind and body.

I didn’t hear the details, but it looks like it’s going to turn into a major scandal.

There are a few cases every year where some celebrities are caught doing drugs, but this is the first time in my previous life that so many people, even more than 10 additional criminals, have been caught all at once.

“Instead of thinking about living diligently, why do they get involved in things like that?”

My mother added her voice, and the news finished the report by showing the celebrities being taken away with their heads bowed.

My mother and father clicked their tongues, saying that there were many young people doing drugs these days, and I naturally recalled the cases I had seen as a prosecutor.

Just then, the phone started ringing.

“Ju-han, you have a call.”

I had left my phone on the table, but my mother, faster than me, brought me the phone.

The caller was Choi Jong-hyun.

“Yes.”

I answered the phone and went out to the garden.

-Cha, did you see the breaking news? Celebrities and drugs.

“Yes, just now.”

-I’m hearing from reporters that they’re having a free-for-all, exposing each other. I don’t know if there was internal strife, or if they couldn’t be caught alone, but they’re telling the police about all the kids who did drugs with them. And they’re all popular idols and singers. All the kids are crazy about them.

“Is the case likely to become a big deal?”

-Looking at the size of the exposure, it seems like they’ll be able to find out who’s supplying the drugs. I heard that summonses have been issued to the owner and operators of the club where they gathered to do drugs.

“It’s a big scale.”

-Yeah. But why at this timing?

I couldn’t see him on the phone, but I lit a cigarette and nodded.

I was thinking the same thing.

If a dozen or so celebrities had gathered at a club to do drugs only once, I don’t think it would have gone this far.

A single drug party wouldn’t have caused such a ridiculous exposure at the police station, and if there was such a rift between them, the gathering must have continued for several times.

With this much information, Woo-shin or some reporters would have had it.

Thinking of using it someday.

-The timing is also like that. Yesterday, Lee Se-hyung cried on TV, telling a reporter that his father wasn’t the kind of person to do that.

A reporter went to the prison to see if there was anything to get from Lee Se-hyung, and Lee Se-hyung, who had been waiting for such an opportunity, gave a long interview and broadcast it.

Lee Se-hyung admitted and repented all the wrongdoings he had committed, and also claimed that his father, Lee Jung-chan, had also looked back on his life and went to see me to protect his last conscience.

He said that otherwise, he would not have met me, who had led Lee Jung-chan to ruin.

Of course, it was not me who led Lee Jung-chan to ruin on the surface, but Lee Se-hyung stubbornly expressed that it was me.

And in the process, Lee Se-hyung said that he usually accompanied Lee Jung-chan and Sung In-ho whenever they met, and that the atmosphere was always friendly.

He said that he would never have said such harsh things when they were alone, that his father always showed his honest side in front of him, and that he had never seen him speak ill of Sung In-ho.

Rather, he was furious that he had treated Sung In-ho, a subordinate of Ko Yun-soo, with the utmost respect, considering his relationship with Woo-shin.

On the one hand, it was also a statement admitting a kind of political-economic collusion [secret agreements or cooperation for illegal or dishonest purposes].

“People started paying attention to Lee Se-hyung after Lee Jung-chan died, but Woo-shin could have buried that level of exposure, so I wonder why they hid it by blowing up such a big deal.”

-I think the same way. The police will end the investigation at Sung In-ho’s level anyway, and they won’t be able to involve Ko Yun-soo anyway, so what are they so afraid of that they’re releasing such a big article? If they just bury this one, it’s over, but this drug case has a lot more to explode in the future. Isn’t it a waste? They don’t use it when they do something fishy later.

“It gives the impression that they are very eager to bury this matter. It seems that they are trying to minimize the damage to Ko Yun-soo.”

-Se-yeon seems to have found out who the reporter who was holding this drug case was, and that reporter recently paid off all his debts and treated the people around him to a big meal.

“They sold it to Woo-shin.”

-That’s right. Can we meet for a bit? I’m thinking of using it as a broadcast topic. We’ll go to your house. To see Cha’s new house.

“I’m down at my parents’ house right now.”

-Really? Hmm, today is the regular broadcast day, so we have to do it today. Then I’ll have to have a meeting with Bong-joon and Min-jae.

“Okay. I’ll make sure to watch the broadcast.”

-Okay. Cha, take a good rest and come back.

I hung up the phone and was about to go back inside, but my mother and father were standing behind me, looking at me.

I quietly hid the remaining cigarette behind my back and threw it in the ashtray.

It’s not that they don’t know I smoke, but for some reason, I thought it wasn’t right for a child to show their parents smoking.

Besides, my mother told me to quit smoking so many times that it was ingrained in my ears.

“Ju-han. Was that Choi Jong-hyun, that reporter, on the phone just now?”

But the words that came out of my father’s mouth were completely different.

“Ko Yun-soo this, Woo-shin that. Are you doing that dangerous thing again?”

“Father.”

“Ju-han. You said you wouldn’t. What does that celebrity drug case have to do with you, whether those guys blew it up or not? You just have to work as a lawyer. What does a lawyer do? They help people who are legally wronged, and so on. Exposing corporate corruption, investigating, that’s not your job.”

“I’m doing it to help people who are wronged.”

I couldn’t deny it in the end.

They heard everything I said on the phone, so it wouldn’t be funny to keep saying no here.

Then my mother sighed, touching her forehead.

“Ju-han!”

“Woo-shin killed Lee Jung-chan this time too. You two read the articles, so you know. Woo-shin is killing even those big-name politicians. The Antrozole case is the same. If I hadn’t stopped it, so many more people would have died of heart attacks. If being on those people’s side isn’t what a lawyer should do, then what is?”

“…….”

“I would have done the same thing if I had lived as a prosecutor. But you didn’t say that then. It’s the same thing. So don’t worry.”

You two weren’t there then, so you wouldn’t know, but I died then too.

Swallowing the words I couldn’t bring myself to say, I went inside.

I went into the room, closed the door, and sat down on the chair.

I didn’t intend to say this much.

In the first place, I’m not old enough to get my parents’ permission to work, and even if I wasn’t that old, I would have acted as I wanted.

But showing it as it is and packaging it well are different.

Of course, I didn’t think I could hide it forever, as I would have many opportunities to show my face in the media in the future.

But not today.

At least not today.

-Ju-han.

While I was lying in bed, lost in thought, I heard my mother’s voice from outside the door.

-Are you sleeping?

“No.”

-Come down for a minute. I have something to say.

When I went down to the first floor, my mother and father were sitting on the sofa.

They had a determined look on their faces, as if they had made a decision.

In a situation where I couldn’t guess what they would say, I sat on a single sofa a little further away.

“Ju-han. Your mother and father have been thinking about it, and it seems that you’re more focused on work because you live alone.”

……What are you talking about again?

“If you get married, start a family, and have children, you won’t do dangerous things. If you have precious people, you’ll know how precious your life is. You don’t know how your mother and father feel now because you’ve been alone until now.”

“Ha…….”

I sighed.

They always told me to get married when I came home or when I talked to them on the phone, but I never thought this would turn out like this today.

When I didn’t say anything, my father took my hand.

“A few days before you came, someone I know said that there’s a lawyer in Seoul, and asked if you’d like to meet her. You know Young-nam, right? My friend. He said it’s his university junior’s daughter. I just contacted him, and they said it’s good. Meet her once. It’s a good thing. He said that girl is also a lawyer, so you two will get along well. She works at a big law firm in Seoul, near the Seoul National University of Education, where your office is. The distance is close, so it’s good.”

My ex-wife was also a lawyer.

I thought we had something in common, but we didn’t.

That’s why I got divorced.

I can’t count how many times I’ve swallowed the words I wanted to say today.

“Although I’ve been cleared of the charges, I’m still a person who was accused of being a murderer and suffered more disgrace than necessary. There are still people who think I’m a murderer. How can I meet someone in this situation?”

“They don’t care about that at all. They said it first.”

“Father, at least not now. It’s causing trouble for them too. At least after a few months, when people have forgotten a lot, then,”

“No, they said it’s okay, so why are you doing this? Just meet her once. Who’s telling you to get married to that girl right away? They’re just telling you to meet her. Is that so hard?”

Who are those people who are trying to set up a meeting with someone who was falsely accused of murder and ran away until recently?

* * *

“…….”

At the repeated words to go on a blind date, I first asked to know what kind of person the other person was and asked for their workplace and name, but my father and mother closed their mouths as if they had planned it.

They must have thought that after I found out myself, I would make excuses and say that I didn’t like this or that, and that I wouldn’t meet them.

In the end, I couldn’t even get the other person’s contact information.

So I am now sitting in a cafe on the first floor of a hotel to go on a blind date at this important time, having been unilaterally informed of the place and time of the appointment.

What made me move like this was my mother’s one word, ‘They say you grant the wishes of the dead, but can’t you grant your parents’ request?’

They say there are no parents who can beat their children, but I think there are no children who can beat their parents.

“Are you Cha Ju-han?”

I was sitting at the table, reading the menu boredly, when I heard a familiar woman’s voice from the side.

And at that moment, I felt chills down my spine.

“That’s right, you’re Cha Ju-han.”

No, why is it turning out like this?