The Badge Feels Too Light

The reissued badge sat on my desk all evening, bright and official enough to make my old restrictions look like bad bookkeeping. I kept touching its edge. Publicly, it means I am cleared again. Privately, it feels like Baek reached into my life, edited my name out, and someone finally crossed out his lie. I should feel rescued. I feel marked.

Oh Gwangjin took his wife's token back without offering me the quickest payment. I respected that more than the money, though I am still furious that the clean solution would have been to surrender the brass and walk away. I wanted him to understand what his refusal cost him. I also wanted him to remember that I was the one who found it.

There is a cruel ranking underneath every job I take. Clients who trust me rank above clients who merely need me. Collectors rank below everyone except people preserving what their families placed in the world. Oh asked me to beat a deadline, not a person. That made the difference.

The auction ledger is not merely false. It is arranged so neatly that doubt would make me look rebellious. I am frightened that the records are better prepared than I am. More frightened that when I challenge them publicly, I may prove I am difficult, paranoid, and unsuitable for the path I abandoned.

I keep hearing the exchange director say Baek was the source. I keep imagining how many doors closed while I blamed my own failure. It would be easy to hate him tonight. Easier than wondering whether I became easy to blacklist because I chose this life instead of the company path everyone expected.