Chapter 30.2

Chapter 30.2

There were three days left until Christmas. Usually, they review right after New Year’s and release people within a week, so I could expect to be out in about two weeks, to be generous.

“Unnie, be careful of Yera.”

I stopped my thoughts and looked at Eyes. Eyes, about a handspan shorter than me, glanced towards a corner of the exercise yard and whispered. In the direction of her gaze, Yera and Wangnyeo’s group were snickering.

“That again?”

“That day, when you collapsed, Deputy Ki carried you back. Yera saw it and she’s been grinding her teeth.”

“…Well, he couldn’t exactly roll me back, could he? It’s such a fuss over nothing.”

“Yera likes Deputy Ki a lot. And she’s especially sharp-tongued towards you.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard this. Since it was something I could avoid by not engaging and being careful, I just nodded.

I didn’t want to dwell on what happened in the visitor’s room. Whenever I tried to recall Deputy Ki’s words, my words, the words floating in my head, the back of my head invariably began to ache.

If I collapsed again, it would be a disaster. So, I stopped thinking about it for too long. After all, there wasn’t much time left.

Beep! The alarm sounded, signaling the end of exercise time. Inmates scattered across the yard, including me, lined up at the guard post entrance to go back inside. Everyone seemed eager to get in quickly because of the cold, pushing to get ahead, so I just leisurely took my place at the back of the line.

One by one, we passed through the guard post and entered the building. Eyes went in, and a short while later, when it was finally my turn, I stepped through the door.

Inside the guard post, where a single kerosene heater was lit, there was a smell of oil. The warmth on my face instantly relaxed me, and at the same time, I realized my mistake. It was because the man standing there, rustling through documents, immediately caught my eye.

Deputy Ki was in charge of the exercise yard guard post today. He was with the guard in his twenties, the one who had raged at me to strip last time.

“Inmate No. 7059, shake your clothes off.”

At the young guard’s words, I hopped and vigorously shook my clothes.

“You didn’t hide anything and bring it in, did you?”

“No.”

The young guard, with an indifferent expression, nodded and continued nonchalantly.

“Then you can go—”

“Wait a moment.”

An ominous voice cut off the young guard’s words, speaking sternly.

“‘Didn’t hide anything and bring it in,’ you say. Do you believe everything they tell you?”

His gaze was fixed on me, but his reproachful voice was clearly directed at the young guard. It was absurd to hear him scolding the way he did, especially since he himself had done something similar to me last time, but the young guard seemed incredibly tense.

“I apologize!”

Tap, tap. Deputy Ki’s index finger drummed on the metal desk, as if assessing something.

“Lower your pants.”

“……”

“Inmate No. 7059, lower your pants. To your ankles.”

Is this some kind of revenge?

“Didn’t you hear? He told you to take off your bottoms!”

The young guard, like an annoying sister-in-law, threatened from beside me.

Instead of acting scared and subservient, a stubborn streak of pride, utterly out of place, surged within me. My truly difficult personality was something I simply couldn’t help.

I gritted my teeth and lowered my pants. My long top reached below my hips, sparing me the indignity of exposing my underwear. But I didn’t think Deputy Ki would be satisfied there.

He slowly approached, his boots thudding, and gently lifted my top with the tip of his police baton. My loose white pant!3s, plain and cinched at the waist with a simple elastic band—probably the same ones all the women in the hallway outside that door were wearing—were revealed.

“Stand with your legs a little wider apart.”

“……”

I shifted my feet, widening my stance. Deputy Ki, still holding up my top with the baton and looking down at my pant!3s, spoke in an utterly professional tone. As if there were no personal feelings involved, and this was just work.

“What did you hide in your pant!3s?”

“…N-nothing, there’s nothing like that.”

“Do you expect me to believe you just because you say there’s nothing?”

“……”

“Lower them.”

He prodded me with the tip of his baton, as if to hasten me. It was a gesture he hadn’t used before.

Even when I had slapped him and called him pathetic, he had never lost his characteristic composure. I had forgotten that he was in a position where he could be as cruel as he pleased.

“Must I pull them down myself?”

Damn it, damn it… It wasn’t a difficult thing to just pull down my pant!3s. I had shown Deputy Ki even more than that.

But I hated the sight of the young guard beside me, swallowing hard, his eyes red and bulging as if he were watching something at the zoo.

It was truly laughable. I was prepared to do anything to return to my original body, and with that determination, I’d even reeled in Deputy Ki. Yet, in front of other male guards, my body froze. Whenever they tried to say something to me, a wave of discomfort, disgust, and fear would wash over me.

I bit my lip until it bled, then made my decision. I hooked my thumbs into the waistband, which had a cheap elastic that wasn’t very flexible, and pulled them down.

Despite my resolve to pull them down in one swift motion, my pant!3s wouldn’t go further than below my navel.

I saw the police baton pressing firmly against my lower abdomen.

He surveyed my face, as if gauging my reaction. A brief silence, broken only by the gurgling water in the kettle on the kerosene heater.

“You, go wait outside.”

Deputy Ki instructed in a low voice, without taking his eyes off me.

Even in this situation, Deputy Ki must have been a truly formidable senior, for the young guard, without needing to be told twice, promptly exited through the door to the hallway. He even closed the wooden door neatly without being asked.