Miho the Killer
Chapter 86: The Morning After

Chapter 86: The Morning After

Miho was right that she slept well that night.

She slept like a baby, deeper than she had done on any night leading up to the big job.

I, on the other hand, struggled.

I really struggled.

I was exhausted, and completely drained physically, mentally, and emotionally.

Yet, every time I closed my eyes all I could see was the bloodshed of the night at Club Volta.

I relived every single moment of the night again and again. Every stab, every slash, every fallen body. And it all ended with the lullaby of Miho and Detective Choi’s dead body on the ground.

Even in this safe house of Shin, I no longer felt safe. Perhaps there were no outside dangers heading our way, but the inescapable violence was now engraved in my mind. I knew I would probably never be able to erase these images from my mind again. And I wondered what kind of a monster I must be to be able to live a normal life with these memories.

Miho had been doing this for years now, yet still managed to smile and act as if everything was fine for her when she wasn’t actively doing the job. She was a true monster - my sweet little monster. But at the same time, ironically, it was a testament to her good nature that she still managed to maintain her kind and gentle side after all she’s been through.

Ironic indeed. The true test of one’s goodness is not in never committing evil, but in being able to not lose one’s good nature despite the evil deeds. We can’t trust a perfectly good person who’s never wronged, for he can always stray away from the path of virtue with the first sin he commits. Miho on the other hand proved that she will always come back to the good path no matter how far she strays away from it.

Just as I thought I’d probably end up staying up for the whole night with these thoughts, I blinked once, then opened my eyes again to realize that morning had come.

So I did manage to sleep after all.

Just as night passes and day comes regardless of what happens to us humans on the surface of the Earth, my cycle of life was to continue as if nothing happened, endlessly wheeling forward with all the broken pieces held by duct tape.

I walked out of the room to hear humming sounds coming from the kitchen. It was Miho.

"Good morning." I greeted.

"Good morning!" She greeted back, her face in full bloom with a smile.

Was this girl really hammering every single bone of a human body last night?

It was all so surreal that everything from yesterday might as well have been a dream.

"Where’s the old man?" I asked.

"He’s gone out. ’I have some work to do’, he said." Miho playfully mimicked Shin’s voice. She wasn’t good at it at all but that’s what made it sound so funny. It brought a short and unexpected laughter from me and she laughed too.

"What are you doing?"

"Just making some toast. You woke up at the right time. Let’s eat together."

"Thanks."

I sat at the table on my usual seat. By choice or by destiny, I still had my place in this family.

After another minute of Miho’s humming and me sitting in silence rubbing my temples, the toast announced its birth with a ding and it was promptly delivered to me.

"You start eating first, Sohee. I will make the next batch." She told me placing two pieces on my plate.

"It’s OK. Let’s eat together first. I don’t think I’m that hungry anyway."

"Right, right."

Miho sat across the table and proposed a toast with toast. We bumped them in the air. Giggles.

The hungry tigress then spread obscene amount of butter on her bread, topped with diabetes inducing portion of honey.

I didn’t feel so extravagant and settled for a thin spread of butter and jam.

When I took a bite though, the crunching sound of the toast as my teeth broke its brittle surface reminded me of the cracks of bones from the night before. I would have lost my appetite completely and given up eating there and then if it wasn’t for Miho’s clumsiness that caught my eye.

"Honey’s dripping from your toast, Miho. Please use a plate." I placed a plate on her side just in time to stop the thick sticky gold-colored blood from hitting the table.

"Oh, thanks."

As if nothing happened, she continued to eat her toast and so did I. I started to feel a bit better as my stomach filled. Strangely, despite the constant flashbacks of the massacre at the club, I didn’t feel like throwing up.

"So, shall we go to the sea today then?" She asked.

"You mean like a beach? All of a sudden?"

"Remember what you said yesterday? You said you want to go see the sea with me."

"Oh."

"Yeah, you did."

"You still feel like going?"

"Of course! You don’t want to go anymore?"

I didn’t feel like disappointing the girl who looked so rejuvenated and was beaming with enthusiasm. I did say I wanted to go with her, and obviously, I still did, but what happened between then and now was so overwhelming I had completely forgotten that this little wish I told Miho before we got to work yesterday.

"I suppose we can go. I did say it after all, you are right. How are we going to get there though?"

"We can take one of the old man’s rides. He has many."

"Is it safe for us to go out?"

"Why not?"

Because we just killed like - I don’t even know how many that was.

"Also... I don’t think Shin would accept me going around after what happened. Like... he set me up for it, but after all, I did snitch..."

"Nah, fuck that. It was all for the best."

"I’m still sorry. I put you in such a danger."

"No worries. It sure wasn’t easy, haha. But that sure was the best way to end my ’career’, so to say - if everything goes right from here, I hope."

Although Miho was ’back’ to being the killer she was before, I felt that something inside her also changed. The old Miho I knew, although we never talked about it in direct terms, probably wouldn’t have thought about ending her ’career’ in this ’industry’. But now I felt that she was looking forward to putting an end to it all, never to kill again.

I felt guilty and happy at the same time. Happy because what she was saying really sparked a hope that we could all move on from this permanently, guilty because it all came at the cost of so many lives.

"Oh, and by the way, you are fully in the team now. No need for a blindfold and all that when we go out. We are going to have a nice ride to the sea and you’ll enjoy it, hehe."

"The old man said no one can stand a potato peeler."

"Ha! If he tries to use a peeler on you I will fight him with a butterknife!"

She swung and stabbed the butterknife in the air. Luckily she licked the honey off it clean before so nothing splashed.

Seeing Miho, I thought one thing I learned from these two was that the more blunt a tool is, or not made for the purpose it is, the more pain it causes.

Perhaps weapons made for the purpose of killing are the most humane solution after all.

It didn’t take long for us to finish the toast. Miho talked with her mouthful - as she does, and I attentively listened - as I do.

As I listened to her and we shared this moment of peace, I started to wonder whether my fascination and obsession with Miho really had to do with being mesmerized by something extraordinary and spectacular at all - at least not anymore. It probably was at the start when she walked into my previous company branding knives and murdered President Park before my eyes, but now, I felt comfort and love in my heart as I shared mundane experiences with this extraordinary girl. It wasn’t what she did or showed, but rather, it was who she was that captivated me, a perfect embodiment of both life and death. She was a protector and a provider, but also a taker and destroyer.

I had changed ever since I met her, in ways that I never imagined. I got drawn closer to her world and who she was - a killer that could single-handedly dismantle the underworld. At the same time, I liked to think that she became closer to who she used to be - a carefree and innocent girl before all this started.

Since we met, we both traveled in opposite directions from where our lives were headed before, and somewhere along the way we converged and we were now branching out to a new trajectory perpendicular to the linear path that we were forced to tread.

I hope we will always travel together hand in hand.

And if we walked away for long and far enough, perhaps even the blood on our feet would dry out and we’d no longer mark our ways with the footprints of death.

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