Diary of a Murderer

by Young-Ha Kim

  She spoke as if Seojin himself were responsible for the beatings and the resulting shame. That it sounded as if she regretted meeting him—not her marriage, but meeting him—made him even more furious. He’d asked her repeatedly to get a divorce and start a new life with him instead, but Ina would wave her hand dismissively and say, “You think divorce is child’s play?”

  She said, “I often thought I’d end up dead if things kept on this way. Once he turned the gas range on and tried to shove my head over it. And one day he kicked me in the stomach and I flew three feet in the air. Sometimes I wish it were all over.”

  Frustrated, Seojin would offer all kinds of advice, from getting a medical report, to reporting her husband to the police, to going for counseling. But Ina only looked repulsed and dismissed his advice.

  She said, “Just stop it. These moments together are the only times I breathe freely, so why are you making the problem worse? Even if it’s only for a short while, being with you makes me happy. Can’t we just stay the way we are?”

  “How can I do nothing when the person I love is being pummeled every day?”

  Ina looked squarely in his eyes. “There’s a big difference between what you think you can do and what you can actually do. Most people are like that. Right now, you probably feel that you would do anything for me. Of course, I know you really mean it. But no hard and fast rule says you’ll act just because you really mean it.”

  Seojin sensed then that Ina had already repeatedly experienced such moments in the past, that she had lived through this scene they were playing out, and that it was merely one of many such moments in her future. Why would Ina, in such a troubled marriage, have opened up to him alone? Men before Seojin had made promises to her, then fled and abandoned her at crucial moments. Though Ina was the origin that Seojin returned to, wasn’t Seojin a shelter for her during the arduous trek of her life? Unlike the origin that she was for him, one might be tearfully grateful at the sight of a shelter, but there was always yet another shelter. Seojin fervently desired to be the one-and-only for Ina. But he wasn’t sure how to become that person.

  Seojin began each day with an early-morning run in the park surrounding the lake. The young saplings gave little shade, but the place was ideal for running. One lap around the lake equaled two and a half miles, and Seojin always did a fast two laps around it. One day he was nimbly doing a lap when a man sprang out abruptly from behind a group of spindle trees, and unable to dodge him, Seojin stumbled to the ground. When the man approached, Seojin assumed that he would offer him a hand and apologize. Instead, the man merely looked down at Seojin and gave him a nasty smile.

  After watching Seojin pick himself up, the man said, “Does this situation require an apology from me?”

  Seojin hadn’t expected such a response, and he wondered if he’d made the mistake. He found himself saying, “It’s fine, there’s no need.”

  “Well, then.”

  Without a word of apology, the man, wearing a tracksuit with a large Adidas logo emblazoned on the back, ran off in the opposite direction. After the man disappeared, Seojin stayed put and mulled over what had just happened. Adidas hadn’t made the slightest attempt to slow down and had charged like a quarterback running with a football. If the stranger hadn’t collided with Seojin, inertia would have sent him running straight into the lake. No matter how he considered it, the only possibility was that the man had deliberately attacked him. He checked himself over in case he had been mugged, but he’d carried nothing with him.

  “Does this situation require an apology from me?” That the perpetrator could coolly say this to his confused victim made Seojin feel increasingly annoyed and leery. The tumble had left his body creaking, and he felt sore from his neck down to his waist.

  From that day on, he began running into the man everywhere he went. He’d be at the bank and glimpse the man seated on a sofa, or on the way to work find himself in line in front of or behind the man at his regular coffee shop. Of course he wore a suit and not workout clothes. The man didn’t avoid his gaze, and each time their eyes met he would give Seojin the same nasty smile that sent the phrase “Does this situation require an apology from me?” echoing in Seojin’s head. One day he realized that the man might be Ina’s husband.

  Once he was entertaining hospital officials at a hostess bar when the man entered the private room and said, “This isn’t our room?”

  He glanced quickly at Seojin, then left. Seojin was drunk enough by then to jump up and follow him out. The man, who was going up the steps to the first floor, looked back at him.

  The man said, “What is it?” and stood in his way.

  Seojin felt a little afraid; one kick from the man would be enough to send him tumbling down. He tried moving up to the man’s level, but the stranger blocked his way as if taunting him.

  “I said, what is it?” The man pressed him again.

  Seojin had no choice but to confront him. He said, “Why are you following me? Who the hell are you?”

  “Let’s say I’m here about an emotional debt.”

  “You’re saying you owe me?”

  “No, you owe me. You owe me hugely.”

  “I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about.”

  He spat out through gritted teeth, “You’re fooling around with another man’s girl and you still don’t get it?”

  Seojin recalled the man’s words from the first run-in, and now he had an unbearable urge to repeat “Does this situation require an apology from me?” But he had more self-restraint than most, and instead said, “I think you’ve got the wrong person.”

  “I guess she never told you about my line of work. You can’t do my kind of work and pick the wrong person.”

  He pointed two fingers at his own eyes. It was as if his fingers were a well-sharpened knife.

  “I’ve got to be real good at getting the right person to make any progress at all. It’s the same when I loan money to people, and when I go after the shits who run without paying their debts.”

  So the husband who she’d said worked in finance was actually a loan shark. Seojin had never borrowed money from one of them, but knew of their notorious rep. He noted the man’s small but firm fists. From the lower step where he was standing, he was at eye level with those fists. A tattoo on one of the man’s wrists went up his forearm.

  Seojin only repeated, “You’ve got the wrong person,” as he slowly descended backwards down the steps and returned to his group. The man didn’t pursue him.

  Sleep didn’t come easily that night for Seojin. It felt as if the man would burst into his life anytime and destroy it. When he considered the high compound interest increasing daily on his emotional debt, the hair on the back of his neck stood up. How do you repay an emotional debt? Was there a cash equivalent for it? He had no idea.

  From that day on, Seojin avoided Ina’s calls. He said he was busy and barely texted back when she messaged him; he’d begun to suspect that Adidas was using high-tech surveillance gear to intercept his calls and texts. It might be difficult to pay back his loan, but he didn’t want to fall further into debt. His fear of Ina’s husband outweighed his longing to see her. Adidas would know that Seojin had reflected on his behavior and avoided meeting her, and he might even forgive him. At first Ina was bewildered by Seojin’s change of heart, but she seemed to slowly accept their breakup. Although Ina was resigned, she didn’t bother to hide her disappointment when he abruptly got off the phone. He felt guilty in those moments. Sometimes Ina sent him late-night texts hinting at her husband’s terrible violence:

  “Another nightmarish night. But I’ll have to overcome it. It makes me so sad to think there’s no one I can turn to, but what can I do? I chose this life. I won’t burden you. You don’t have to respond to this, just don’t erase my message. I feel stronger just knowing I can tell someone the truth.”

  He began habitually scoping out his surroundings wherever he went. He even quit jogging at dawn, since he’d start gasping fo
r breath at the thought that at any minute Adidas could hurtle into him. Thankfully, nothing had happened yet. Adidas seemed to know that he was no longer meeting Ina.

  Eventually Ina’s infrequent phone calls stopped altogether. He began to worry. Was she beaten so badly that she’d ended up in a hospital somewhere, or had something even worse happened? He was so anxious that his lips became parched and chapped, but he didn’t want to contact her first. For all he knew, Ina might have finally gotten over him. She would recover; she was a strong kid, he repeated to himself each night while drinking whiskey or brandy before bed.

  One day Ina contacted him out of the blue at around three in the morning. The text, unlike her typical messages, was terse: “Can you come over?”

  He felt apprehensive, but as usual he didn’t reply. Instead, he waited and had another two shots of whiskey, straight. His phone stayed silent as if he’d never received the text. Did the alcohol erode his usual self-control? He couldn’t wait any longer and called her, and when she answered, she repeated listlessly, “Can you come over?”

  He asked, “What’s the matter?”

  “I’m sorry. I had no one else to turn to. Help me—it’s the last thing I’ll ever ask you for. I won’t bother you anymore after this.”

  “Where are you?”

  She told him her address.

  “Isn’t that your home address?”

  “Yeah, I’m at home.”

  “Your husband?”

  “It’s okay. Just come over. I need help, fast.” She repeated, “It’s the last thing I’ll ever ask of you.”

  Seojin took his car and raced over to Ina’s apartment. Before he had a chance to ring the bell, the front door opened.

  Ina’s hair was knotty and her face puffy as if she had been beaten up. She said, “You really came.”

  The house was a mess. He saw bloodstains on the floor and guessed what had happened: he had walked into the kind of crime scene he’d seen only on the news. An abused wife had lost control and killed her husband, then gotten her lover involved.

  He said, “Where’s your husband?”

  She pointed toward the bedroom. Just inside he spotted the dusty galleon in a display cabinet, and he was a little startled by its puny size. He’d believed that he constructed an enormous, stately sailing ship, but it was merely a cheap kid’s toy. As soon as he entered the bedroom, his foot caught on a golf club. A four iron. He saw a man sprawled facedown at the bathroom door. As if her husband had been hit with the club, the crown of his head was caked in blood.

  Her voice trembling, Ina asked, “What should I do? Is this how my life ends?”

  Seojin looked bewildered and said, “What were you thinking, calling me after making this mess?”

  Ina faltered back, as if she had just discovered her husband’s murderer. Seojin grabbed her by the arm. “Where are you going?”

  Ina protested, asking, “Does this situation require an apology from me?”

  He let go of her arm.

  She said, “You work in the medical industry, so you know a lot of doctors, don’t you? So I just wanted to ask you. Can’t you give me an answer? You can’t do that much for me?”

  Seojin was astounded. Just as her husband the loan shark was in the finance industry, was a medical supply salesman part of the medical industry? Even if he were an actual doctor, what could he do in these circumstances?

  “Call 112. There’s no way out. Call and say that your husband was beating you, and you killed him in self-defense. What choice do you have? They’ll consider your circumstances. I told you before to keep the medical reports. If you submit those, you’ll be fine.”

  “Oh. Thanks for the advice,” she said. “You’re more pragmatic than I thought.”

  She collapsed onto the sofa, muttering, “I’m scared, so scared.”

  “You actually expected me to do something about the corpse? Make it disappear, like magic?”

  “Don’t get angry. I was just so scared.”

  As she burst into tears, Seojin sat down and held her. She began telling him why she’d had no choice but to defend herself. Only then Seojin began regretting his cool logical behavior. He still had feelings for her, and she had suffered so much. He was also a little proud that at the most crucial moment of her life, she had called him. He was with her at what would probably be her life’s single most critical juncture.

  He held her trembling body and made a rash promise: “At most you’ll get two or three years. It could be even shorter if they accept the self-defense plea. Once you’re out, let’s get married. I’ll wait for you.”

  She looked up tearfully at him. “Do you mean it?”

  “Of course. Forget the past. Consider it a long nightmare. After the trial I’ll visit you weekly while you’re in jail, make wedding preparations, get the house ready . . .”

  Her voice dropped as she said, “We should never have met.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We’ve both ended up unhappy. I’ll go to jail, and you’ll be stuck in the middle of all this, then end up being responsible for me.”

  A thud came from the bedroom, as if a hefty object had bumped into the door. Seojin and Ina stared at each other. Terrified, Ina buried her head in her knees, while Seojin cautiously approached the bedroom and pushed the door ajar. A man covered in blood was crawling out. Ina moaned. The man was using the doorknob to raise himself up when his eyes met Seojin’s. More shocking to Seojin than the dead man come to life was this: the man wasn’t the loan shark.

  “Oh my God. Oh my God.” Ina’s entire body trembled.

  The man just managed to stand. He stared suspiciously at Seojin. As Seojin slowly stepped back, the man tried to grab him but fell when his knees gave out. Seojin caught him in his arms and broke his fall. He laid him on the floor. The man had fainted again but his breathing was regular.

  “Who is this man?”

  “He’s my husband. Who else would he be?”

  Her eyes met Seojin’s. Her eyes were cold and frigid, as if she blamed Seojin for reviving her husband.

  “He is?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Nothing.”

  Ina continued gazing worriedly at her husband.

  “Call 119 now,” Seojin pressed her.

  “You just keep telling me to call someone, first the police, now an ambulance.” She sobbed and buried her head in her lap.

  “What do I do now? I mean, how do I go on? Have I no choice but to help him recover and then keep living with him?”

  There was nothing he could say to her. Even if he had something to say, he didn’t want to say it.

  “There’s no reason you would understand,” she said. “Life—we have to keep going even if sometimes we don’t have answers. It isn’t your life anyway. Once you leave, it’s over for you.”

  She looked resigned as she finally called 119 on her cell phone. She calmly fabricated a story about how her husband, drunk, had slipped in the bathroom and hurt his head. She said that he had come to for a moment, then fainted again.

  “Yes, his breathing is stable . . . Yes, he’s breathing. He’s unconscious.”

  She hung up and said, “You can go now. It’ll look bad if you’re here.”

  He was putting his shoes on when he turned back to Ina. “Oh, back there you said, ‘Does this situation require an apology from me?’”

  “I did?”

  “Yeah, I definitely heard you. Where did you first hear that?”

  “Does that matter right now? I don’t remember. It’s a pretty normal thing to say.”

  “You don’t think it’s unusual? It’s—”

  “Stop it, please. Just go.”

  “Look, something strange has been going on with me—”

  “I said leave. I think I hear an ambulance.”

  He took the elevator down to the underground parking lot. He sat in the car and thought. Something was truly off. Who was the man who hurtled into me at the lake, going on about an
emotional debt? He decided he had to find the man. As he drove home, the rays of streetlights ahead went filmy behind him. The lights resembled the life that had nearly been his. He drove past his life wedded to Ina after she finished her prison sentence, his life spent terrorized at the mere sight of the police after helping Ina get rid of the corpse, his life as a criminal after murdering Ina’s half-conscious husband. He imagined headlines such as “Unfaithful Housewife,” “Affair Behind Conspiracy,” “Husband Murdered, Then Reported Missing.” Only now, after he left those possibilities behind, he imagined Ina’s future. What would her husband do to a wife who had nearly killed him? On top of that, he’d run directly into his wife’s lover. She could end up dying at her husband’s hands. Seojin couldn’t block out the thought, but it was too late to go back.

  Ten days later, Ina jumped off her apartment balcony. It happened two days after her husband’s discharge from the hospital. The official police report was suicide, but Seojin didn’t believe it. The report stated, “The deceased, who was prone to depression, had several arguments with her husband after his hospital discharge. They were arguing about his home care when, in a rage, she threw herself off the balcony.”

  The thought that Ina’s habitually abusive husband had now murdered her made Seojin choke with rage. But a lover like him was incapable of doing anything. If he had choked the man to death that night, Ina would still be alive. But that was murder, not an easy decision to make. Anyway, he had hesitated, which led to Ina’s death, and he had lost his origin of life forever. It wasn’t as if he didn’t dream about getting revenge, but even if he did, it wouldn’t bring Ina back. Only, it was unbearable knowing that her cunning killer got off without punishment. He wanted to somehow destroy the man’s life.

  Seojin staked out their apartment and waited for her husband. First he would find the man’s weak spots by watching where and when he regularly went. The man might even break the law—for example, by frequenting studio apartments for prostitutes. Then Seojin could call the police and make life difficult for him. But as if her husband was still in poor shape, he didn’t exert himself. He’d wake up early and go for a walk in the park. At eight-thirty he showed up at an investment firm in the suburbs for work, bought a few items at a convenience store as he left the office, then remained at home until the next day. His apartment lights tended to stay on late into the night.