BIA Ch. 47

“Did you make him a drug mule or something?”

“None of your business.”

“Bran.”

“I’ll tell you if you become a member of our organization.”

At my words, Charlie got angry, saying that she was practically a member of my organization already.

“Looks like you don’t know, but if you were really a member of our organization, I wouldn’t have paid a single penny to this hospital.”

“You know, why do mafias talk like committing crimes is some kind of great right of theirs?”

“Because that’s what mafias do.”

I answered with a smile.

“You’re so great, really. Anyway, forcing him to remember is the worst. He might run away even further if you do that.”

“Then I guess I’ll just tie him up and make him remember.”

“Bran……”

Charlie sighed, saying that I always say things I don’t mean.

“Stop talking nonsense and think about what drove him to this point. If you don’t know, at least say something. Tell him he doesn’t have to worry about anything and to just relax. It’s important that you’re the one who tells him. Even in this situation, he trusts you a lot. He’s scared but wants to trust you and form a relationship of mutual trust.”

“I can say that, but…”

That’s such an obvious lie. I tilted my head.

“Isn’t that more like destroying the trust?”

“We need to get him stable first, even if it’s by doing that.”

Charlie clicked his tongue and said.

“So, isn’t the most urgent thing to get him to regain his identity quickly? That way, he’ll remember where he hid the drugs or whatever.”

Charlie was right. Right now, the top priority was to get Isaiah Diaz back to being Isaiah Cole. Only then could I put a fake gun or whatever in his hand.

After leaving the consultation room, I finished the payment and went down to the first floor with Isaiah. After getting the medicine from the designated pharmacy, we went straight to lunch. Isaiah was pouring a ton of salt on the fries that came with his burger.

“Isn’t that too salty?”

“Really? I like my fries a bit salty.”

“This is way too salty.”

“My mom always says that too.”

As soon as I saw him say that with a smile, I knew Charlie’s guess was right. Isaiah was imitating the Isaiah who lived next door to me, the Latino boy with the same name as him.

Pouring excessive amounts of salt on his fries was one of Isaiah Diez’s long-standing habits. And his mother would just say it in passing, as if she had given up every time she saw her son do that.

“Watch out for high blood pressure.”

“Ah, okay.”

As if he thought I would say something sarcastic, Isaiah finally straightened his hunched shoulders and ate his fries. I watched him eat the fries, which were so salty they made my tongue tingle, and thought. So that’s it. I met the Isaiah who lived next door to me. To the point where he’s even copying such a noticeable eating habit, he must have eaten with him.

Charlie said that Isaiah deliberately used a different last name, but I thought differently. Isaiah probably got the Diaz’s last name wrong from the start. It’s not a common last name. And he often had a lisp because of his big front teeth. So, Isaiah probably believed that his last name, Diez, was Diaz, one of the most common Latino last names.

And the reason this guy went all the way to Liberty Harbor to meet my neighbor, and yet completely erased his memories of me…

‘Bran. I’m sorry for killing Irina. But, but if a similar situation happens, I’ll make the same choice again.’

Is it for the same reason he made that choice?

I hoped it wasn’t.

But the moment I found that under his gun, I sadly realized that my guess was right.

The book, with its cover worn from being read so much, was a book I had left at my family home in Liberty Harbor. There was no doubt. It was a book I had held in my hands for almost ten years. No matter how much time had passed, or even if I found it somewhere far away, I would have recognized it immediately.

I took my book and Isaiah’s gun and went home. As soon as I entered my study, I threw the gun aside and looked at the book first. As soon as I turned the pages, a folded piece of paper was revealed in the middle. It wasn’t a page I had folded. I never marked my books in any way, including notes. This was folded by Isaiah Cole.

As soon as I read the sentence on the folded page, I realized why he had folded it. It was probably because of the expression “Bugs in Amber.”

‘You have bugs in your eyes too.’

Isaiah Cole remembered me. That’s why he didn’t kill me. He couldn’t kill me. Instead, he killed Irina, who was next to me.

I threw the book onto the desk and sank deep into my chair. My mouth was dry, but I didn’t even feel like drinking anything. The lump in my throat seemed to have gotten bigger.

I finally realized why I felt so bad after leaving the hypnosis consultation room. What I didn’t want to know wasn’t Isaiah’s abyss.

By delving into his abyss, I would eventually face Isaiah Cole’s true feelings and young Lee’s inner thoughts, and I hated that I would end up reliving them over and over again.

‘It was a bug that was on your body. Yeah. So you don’t have to send it anywhere else now. I’ll take good care of it. You know what I mean, right?’

‘Yeah… You have to take good care of it. Don’t let it out… don’t let it come to me….’

I pitied that child. Back then, I was still pure enough to feel compassion for someone, so there was no intention behind my feelings and actions towards that child. The only thing I wanted was for that child to find something that could save him, just like I did. So, I wanted him to live as long as possible.

But the truth was, I might have been that child’s only salvation. And now, I have to drive that child to the edge myself. Perhaps, to that child, I might have been his only salvation in life.

Can I do it?

“……”

I erased the thought that came to my mind. It wasn’t a question of whether I could, but that I had to. This wasn’t a matter of choice, but a matter of method.

The method was easy. All I had to do was suck up to Chester for three days and then carry out the plan on the day. In fact, it wasn’t just Isaiah Cole who could burst in with blanks, but Isaiah could do it too. It was something that even a nine-year-old elementary school student could do, not just a nineteen-year-old college student.

But–

“Hey, you homo bastard, you think you’re all that because your hole is selling well, huh? If you’re going to sell your hole in our territory, you gotta pay the protection money, right?”

“Damn it, let go……”

When I heard his desperate voice in the dark garden, when I saw him being dragged away helplessly by Gilman. For the first time, I thought that I might fail.

“All the other whores pay their dues and work, what the hell are you doing keeping your mouth shut? If you don’t have money, pay with your pussy, like the other bitches.”

No, it was certain. I would fail.

“I gotta taste your worn-out hole first,”

“Gilman.”

Isn’t that right? I couldn’t even stand this level of insult towards him, and I had shoved a gun into my subordinate’s chest. There was no way I could kill him with my own hands.

“Isaiah.”

I didn’t regret killing Gilman at all. However, when I saw Isaiah flinch and back away from my outstretched hand, I only felt regret about the location, thinking I should have taken him somewhere else to kill him. It was definitely too cruel of a scene for a nineteen-year-old.

I thought he was in shock, so I went to comfort him later, but he was sleeping peacefully as if nothing had happened. If a normal nineteen-year-old had gone through something like that, they wouldn’t have been able to sleep properly for at least two days because they would be scared. He was even sleeping so well with a corpse in the hallway. He seemed to be sleeping better than I was.

“So, being nineteen is a lie after all.”

I said with a smile as I sat on the bed. But his sleeping face was really that of a nineteen-year-old, or even an eighteen-year-old. This time, his mouth was slightly open, making him look even younger.

Every time he inhaled and exhaled, every time his chest rose and fell slightly, a bright red tongue seemed to appear and disappear between his red lips, beyond his white and even teeth. How irresponsible and intense that innocent temptation was. Looking at it, I was confused whether I should close his mouth, wake him up, or kiss him.

Fortunately, the moment of hesitation didn’t last long.

“Ugh…….”

A groan seemed to leak from his parted lips, and soon, his pupils began to move violently from side to side inside his thin eyelids. Instinctively realizing that he was having a nightmare, I quickly tapped his cheek to wake him up.

“Hey.”

Fortunately, Isaiah opened his eyes quickly. But his eyes were unfocused. His pupils were completely dilated, as if he had gone back to that time twenty years ago.

“Bugs……”

He mumbled, looking at me with the same dazed eyes as back then.

“Huh?”

“There are bugs in your eyes……”

I felt my fingertips go cold for a moment.