High on You (Choi Do Il x Oh In Joo - Little Women 작은 아씨들)

19

12 DAYS UNTIL THE GRAND GALA BALL

"Do-il-ah, go. You're wasting your time here, son." Ahn So-young was back at the hospital for more exams when it dawned on her that her son hadn't left her side for one moment since the day of her verified relapse.
"It's not wasted time being by your side while you go through all of this all over again."
"It's not like you can make it go away faster. Go, we'll catch up at the hotel, go tell your father the updates if you want and have the time to. But don't stay here, please." She eyed him pleadingly, and he watched her back, his eyes focusing in on hers, trying to detect a lie that wasn't there.
"Call me when you're done. I'm picking you up."
"Do-il-a-"
"Don't 'Do-il-ah' me when it's convenient to you, is that the correct way you put it last time?" he quickly interjected.
"Alright, alright... now go, though." Do-il stood up from the waiting room chairs of the hospital, squeezed his mom's hand, and went into the city.

If going to the hospital had been the first thing he had to do that morning, going to check on a new property for the client he had to meet in a couple of hours was the second. He was driving down to the area he had been texted when he noticed that the same white car that had left with him at the hospital was still behind him. Watching and controlling everything around him had always been an instinctive thing to do, back in his dark days. Not being in control or aware of a situation could have easily gotten him killed, and Won Sang-a and Park Jae-sang had tried doing that more than once. That instinct kicked in again in a matter of seconds. He accelerated just slightly to see how the other car would react, and soon enough, he noticed that the white vehicle was also accelerating. He then swerved to the right, changing lanes, and the car did the same. Do-il didn't know what to think. Could it be that someone was really chasing him? As remote as the possibility was – the Jeongran society was completely disintegrated, its servants now all dead apart from him and his parents, after all – it couldn't be ruled out completely. He then decided to change lanes again, but this time the white car stayed on the right, and it even turned on his turn signal to take the next freeway exit. He suddenly found himself alone again, and his heart, which had started beating furiously at the thought of being back to square one, found a little peace. He had been only 12 years old when Park Jae-sang and General Won had taken him under their wings, and since that moment he had had to find ways of keeping himself alive by being smarter than everyone else around him. Everything he had learned along the way was engraved in his soul, and he just couldn't dismiss that part of himself as if it were nothing, or worse, as if he were being paranoid.
He turned left, ready to head towards his final destination, an abandoned villa in Yongsan district. He had been taken by surprise when Mrs. Park, his client, had asked him to please go check on a property they had their eyes on, so they could start restoration work as soon as possible. That usually wasn't part of his job, but the lady wanted to know a rough estimate of how many won a year would be needed to maintain such a space. That wasn't part of his job either, and Do-il really had no idea how he would be able to estimate all that, but that was a problem for when he would get there.
Since he still had quite a bit of road ahead of him, he wasted no time and called the Seoul Detention Center.
"Seoul Detention Center, I'm speaking with?"
"Choi Do-il. I'm calling to speak with Choi Hee-jae, if he's available."
"Are you aware that the costs of the phone call are on you?"
"Yes, I'm aware."
"Please wait on the line, the prisoner will pick up shortly."
As Do-il waited, fewer and fewer kilometres separated him from the villa. Five minutes after the beginning of the call, his dad picked up.
"Do-il-ssi?" Hee-jae hadn't missed how his son had flinched the last time he had been informal with him. So he had decided to back up a little bit.
"It's me. Omma is okay with me sharing her medical details, so I called to tell you that she's fine. The cancer got 3 millimetres bigger than it was before, but the doctors told us it is progressing incredibly slowly, probably due to the medications she's been taking."
"Okay, that's good, right?"
"It is. She had more blood tests done, all of which came out negative as well, so for now, her stomach cancer is the only thing we're really worried about. Today she had a new appointment, I brought her there earlier, they're gonna talk with both the American and Greek teams, see what their opinions are."
"So they're going to talk in English? Your omma doesn't speak a word of it."
"She's learned some these past few years, she's still taking her online classes too. She knows the medical terms already, and even if she doesn't understand something, I asked her to record the meeting so I can listen to it later today."
"Smart move. Alright. Uhm... thank you."
"Yeah, no problem. I'll speak to you soon."
"Tell her I said hi. Bye."
As the line went silent, it was time for Do-il to park his car.