“Lee Sungyeol?” I asked tentatively. The young man looked at me as trying to gauge who I was before a sign of recognition in his eyes appeared, “Nam Woohyun! It’s been a very long time since I’ve seen you. It’s also been a while since I have answered to the name Lee Sungyeol, I go by Park Seungjae these days.”

“Oh I apologize, I should have read the name tag but I saw you and I had to be sure it was you! I’m here to open an account at the library. Need to take out some books for research. I’m in Busan for a little while on business. Say when do you have a break? Want to go for some coffee?” I asked in a bit of a rushed manner. I was a tad bit nervous, what if Sungyeol was the Unsub?

“I just took a break but I get off work at 5pm if you want to have some supper with me?” he counter-offered. I smiled, “Sounds good! So how about that account,” I said teasingly. “I need your name, birthdate, contact details. If you could please fill them in this form for me please,” he said professionally and indicated that I should do so by the other table.

Dinner was very normal with talk about the missing years, old interests and then some reminiscing. Although I didn’t notice anything unusual about Sungyeol’s behaviour when we talked about his biological family there was something off. He shrugged off the topic, which is understandable but there was an anger that was sparked off.

I sat in the hotel bed that we were provided with and read the one fiction book that I had taken out. I couldn’t put my finger on it but something was bothering me. I got up and walked around the room. Myungsoo had gone out to get some snacks so I was alone with no one to speak to. I looked at the faces of some of the missing persons. There were one or two familiar faces, but I couldn’t place them in context. Pacing around the room some more, I felt claustrophobic so I grabbed my jacket and left the room.

I thought about going to the rooftop for some air but I needed to clear my head. I went down to the lobby and walked out the hotel. I continued walking for a bit and stopped at some park. I had told Sungyeol about how I was told that he and his family had moved away because his father had found another job. I don’t remember there ever being any reported news of any kind about what happened. I had called my brother about it but he didn’t remember anything either. It seemed like everything had been buried and then forgotten. Nobody ever mentioned the Lee family again.

Mr. Lee was a government official specifically he worked for the mayor and was a public figure in some ways. The then mayor had recently been voted in and Mr. Lee was in charge of some of the speeches and so on. The mayor would have wanted to bury the deaths of the Lee family especially considering the report. Abuse. Mr. Lee was suspected to have abused his wife and quite possibly have killed his recently born child. He murdered his wife and committed suicide. That wasn’t exactly favourable to the mayor. Everyone who lived in that apartment building worked for the mayor in some way so they were likely made to keep their mouths shut. Although things seemed to fit, I couldn’t imagine the small boy who I played hide-and-seek with, could be capable of doing such cruel and heinous acts.

Then as I got up, someone came behind me and put a cloth to my nose. I struggled against the person. Then darkness came.