Page 134 of Perfect Happiness

Wife rolled Eun-ho onto his back.He could feel his bound hands being lifted above his head.At the same time, he was able to crack open his eyes just slightly.A black shadow glimmered through the haze in his narrow vision.

“No matter how much I do for people, they always betray me.Even my own father.”

Wife grabbed Eun-ho by his bonds and stood up.Dragging him behind her, she started walking somewhere.

“For some reason, I thought you’d be different.”

Eun-ho was being dragged through the snow with his hands above his head like a sled.He could see the bright light extending into the darkness and stopping on the wheelbarrow.

“I guess I believed you were more honest than those other men.”

The wheelbarrow was standing upright, with its hull facing forward.It looked like its wheel had snagged on a rock or gotten stuck in a puddle.

“But now I know—you’re the worst of them all.”

Wife pushed him with her heel as she stuffed him into the wheelbarrow.A sharp pain pierced his stomach.As his head bent out of the wheelbarrow, he let out a sharp groan.

“Oh, you’re finally awake.”

This was the first time he was able to get a good look at her.Black boots, a black raincoat and hat, and a headlamp.Behind the light of her headlamp, Eun-ho could see two black, emotionless eyes.

“I know it hurts, but just wait a little longer.We’re almost there.”

Wife walked to the back of the wheelbarrow.She grabbed the handles and jumped up to let her weight lift the wheelbarrow with Eun-ho inside it.Once the wheelbarrow was upright again, they continued their journey.Eun-ho’s head bobbed with the jostling of the wheelbarrow.

“Earlier, I borrowed a play from your book.You know, using someone’s thumb while they’re sleeping to unlock their phone.But I shouldn’t have.Had I not looked at your phone, I might not have snapped like this.

Eun-ho’s narrow eyes widened in shock.All the things that could have made her snap flashed before his eyes.The pictures he stole from her phone, the recording of his and Min-young’s conversation, the email thread with his ex-wife.

“Didn’t you say that the phone call earlier this morning was from your lawyer?Didn’t you say you were going to meet him?I tried calling the number back.A very familiar voice answered.I didn’t know Jinu went to law school.I was so shocked I didn’t know what to say.But he was desperately calling out your name.Eun-ho Cha!Say something!Eun-ho Cha!It’s Jinu!”

Wife started cackling.It was that same cackle he heard at Lake Baikal, the same laugh that made all the hair on his body stand up.But right now, his hair stood up for a different reason.It stood up because he realized Wife had finally lost it.

“But you know what, honey?”

Wife’s laughing stopped as suddenly as it had begun.

“Why did you call Jane earlier this morning?She didn’t pick up, but you called her ten times in a row.”

What did she mean?Eun-ho was confused for a moment, but then he remembered what happened that morning.Jiyoo had borrowed his cellphone to make a call.She must have called Yuna’s sister, Jane.But why hadn’t Jane answered her phone?

“What could be so important that you would call my sister ten times in a row?And since when were you and Jane so close?Are you fucking my sister?Don’t tell me there’s another secret I don’t know!”

With every question, Wife’s voice was getting higher and higher.Eun-ho looked around with blurry vision.The only thing that Wife’s headlamp was illuminating was the snow on the ground.In desperation, he focused all his attention on his ears.But he heard no police sirens over the sound of the snow and wind.The earth seemed completely devoid of people and animals.It was just him, and this hysterical woman.

“So that got me thinking.I want to compose a masterpiece, something that will really knock the socks off the police.A story of star-crossed lovers, an adulterous man and his whore of a sister-in-law, who tragically commit suicide by drowning themselves.What do you think?”

The abandoned car down the street appeared in Eun-ho’s mind.The blue SUV covered in snow.

Then finally, Eun-ho realized that the loon in the attic wasn’t Joon-young; it was Jane.

And then he found the last piece to the puzzle.Yuna was taking him to the Half Moon Marsh to die.

*

A loon was crying just like before.But unlike that night, something scratched the wall between each call.The sound wasn’t very loud.It was secretive, like someone was trying to whisper in her ear, coaxing her to come closer.

Jiyoo pulled the blanket over her head.She covered her ears so she wouldn’t hear the sounds.But it was no use.The sound was too close.It was just beyond the wall next to her bed.