A ghost bought a car from my lot. I have the CCTV footage.

I wasn't going to post this but I genuinely can't stop thinking about it.

I'm a used car dealer in Yeongdo-gu, Busan. Been doing this for 15 years, right near Taejongdae. I know this area. I know this business. So when I tell you something was wrong with this guy, I mean it.

September 2023. Early fall. I'm just doing my usual thing, sorting inventory on the lot, when this guy walks in. Mid-50s, clean suit, very put-together. He comes straight up and says he needs a car TODAY.

"Black YF Sonata. Under 100,000km. I want the title transfer done before end of day."

YF Sonatas aren't exactly hot sellers right now but I happened to have one. Just bought it from a dealer up in Yangsan, engine was solid. Guy barely even looked at it before signing the contract.

No haggling. Paid the FULL AMOUNT in cash.

And then he asked me to register the title under the name "the late Kim Jeong-woo." Like, deceased. That's what 故 means. The character you put in front of dead people's names.

I was like. Okay. "Is this a family member?"

He just smiled and said "I'd appreciate if you didn't ask."

I checked, it wasn't technically illegal, so I processed it. Car went out that afternoon.

Three days later my coworker calls me.

"Hey. Did you sell a black YF Sonata last week?"

"Yeah why."

His voice was shaking.

"They found it this morning near Yeongdo Bridge. Burned. Like, completely."

I ran over there. Police were already on scene. The car was basically a skeleton, license plate melted down to nothing.

When they ran the registration? Kim Jeong-woo. Died 2018.

And then it got worse. They found human remains inside the car. The forensics came back saying the bones were from an unidentified male who had been dead for at LEAST three years.

At least. Three. Years.

I gave the police everything. The business card the guy left me, the contract. The phone number on the card? Doesn't exist. The address? Doesn't exist.

Then the CCTV results came in.

The man who came to my lot that day... was never there.

The footage shows me clearly. Walking around, talking, opening the trunk to show someone, holding out the keys.

To nobody. There's nobody there. I'm standing alone handing car keys to empty air.

Case got closed as arson. The title transfer stuff got quietly buried. Nobody wanted to deal with it.

But I still think about him every time I drive past Yeongdo Bridge. That suit. That smile.

And then a few days ago.

There was an old Sonata parked in front of my lot.

On the driver's seat was a note.

"Next time, silver please."