0
1. The Beginning of the End
After squeezing the water from the seaweed she had soaked in cold water, Seonha set it on the cutting board and chopped it into small pieces. Do-uk wasn’t a picky eater and ate just about anything, but for his sake—since he especially preferred meat—she cut some beef into suitable pieces as well, then tossed it in a pot with sesame oil and the seaweed, stir-frying them together.
She poured water into the pot once it was heated through and adjusted the flame. After adding the ingredients for the broth and letting it simmer gently, she shook in the perilla seed powder she had prepared in advance, and a rich, savory aroma rose in soft waves.
Even as Seonha set the table, her ears pricked toward the sounds outside the kitchen. She heard the bathroom door open and close with a dull thud; Do-uk must have finished showering.
Now he would change into his work clothes and come to the kitchen soon. Neatly tucking a slightly disheveled lock of hair behind her ear, she awkwardly peered into the pot where the appetizing perilla-seed seaweed soup was boiling. Belatedly, the thought came to her that it was a little funny to cook her own seaweed soup on her own birthday. ‘It’s like I’m asking him to notice it’s my birthday.’
This morning’s table was no different from usual. The number of side dishes was the same as yesterday, and she hadn’t put out any dish that required much effort. Without realizing it, she had been careful, afraid it might seem as if she were demanding that her birthday be treated as something special.
And yet, though she was timid enough not even to increase the number of side dishes, the reason she had ended up putting seaweed soup on the table was because she wanted to share a birthday meal with him.
Everything on the table had been prepared by her, and she probably wouldn’t be able to so much as open her mouth to tell him, “It’s my birthday today,” until the meal was over, but that was fine. Because she wasn’t alone—there were two of them. It wasn’t simply that she had escaped being lonely; for even a short while, she could spend her birthday with the man she loved. That alone was enough.
But even that small wish was mercilessly blown away by a single word from Do-uk.
“I think I’ll have to leave early.”
Seonha, startled by the words he called out without even entering the kitchen, hurried over with her apron still on.
Do-uk, dressed neatly in a suit, was already standing by the front door. When she approached, he held out the tie in his hand.
“Already?”
“I’ve got a morning meeting.”
“You don’t even have time for a quick breakfast?”
Instead of answering, Do-uk wrapped the tie around his neck with brisk hands. It felt as though he were pressing her, telling her he didn’t even have time to stand here and talk face-to-face like this. Or perhaps he simply found it bothersome.
Wiping her damp hands on her apron, she quickly reached out to him. She placed the tie around his neck and straightened the crisp collar of his dress shirt. If someone were to look only at this scene, they might appear to be quite the affectionate married couple.
Once, Seonha had mustered every bit of courage she had and asked him if she could try tying his necktie. On the surface, her tone had sounded like nothing more than light curiosity, so Do-uk had taught her how without any particular resistance. Encouraged by his reaction, she had grown greedier.
With that chilly reply, which carried his distinctive wall-like distance, he had made her shrink in on herself in an instant. And yet, the very next day, he had approached her as if nothing had happened and held out his tie.
To him, it had surely meant nothing. But to Seonha, the hurt from the previous day was washed clean away, and a soft, swelling warmth filled her chest. She became happy because of him so easily that she found herself thinking she really was a very simple woman. Of course, it was unfortunate that the opposite happened far more often.
From then on, tying her husband’s necktie gradually became one of her morning routines. On days when he wasn’t as pressed for time as he was today, it was also her job to choose a tie whose design and color matched his suit.
“You should have told me right away.”
Normally, she would have simply nodded and let it go, but the hurt that had been pressed quietly down inside her slipped out.
“I already set breakfast out.”
“You have to eat anyway, so what does it matter?”
Before they married, Do-uk had said he didn’t eat breakfast. Even after marriage, he had said he wouldn’t, but Seonha had stubbornly insisted that she would prepare it, so he should at least eat a little before leaving.
Afraid he would find it strange if he noticed her desire to imitate an ordinary wife despite the fact that they weren’t a real couple, she had even made up a story that she had always been in the habit of eating breakfast.
Do-uk, who had long been used to skipping breakfast, had found it a little bothersome at first, but now, if he didn’t have an especially busy morning schedule, he would naturally sit at the table she had carefully prepared without needing to be told.
“But I already set out your meal too, Do-uk…”
“Can’t you just put the rice and soup back? I didn’t use the spoon or chopsticks either, so you can just put them back as they were.”
It wasn’t as if she hadn’t expected such utterly indifferent words from him, but she couldn’t help feeling deflated.
“It’s not that I find that bothersome. It’s that you’ll be leaving on an empty stomach. If I’d known in advance, I could at least have prepared some juice separately…”
“I don’t need it.”
If it was a sin to love a man whose way of speaking was never gentle, then that was her sin. There were so many ways he could refuse softly—It’s all right, or No, it’s fine—but he would give such firm, almost cold answers, slicing at her heart again and again.
“You know I never ate breakfast in the first place.”
Do-uk picked up his black briefcase and slipped his feet into his glossy leather shoes.
Perhaps something had gone wrong at work; Do-uk, who was unconsciously furrowing his brow, looked busy even inside his head. She could see he was absorbed in other thoughts and not properly focusing on his conversation with her. Of course, even if he did have free time, it wasn’t as though he listened to her attentively.
“I’ll be late today.”
It meant they wouldn’t be able to have dinner together. Ever since his promotion, he had become even more pressed for time, and this was hardly the first or second time he would be late, but Seonha couldn’t hide the shadow that fell over her face. All she had wanted today was to share even one meal with him. It seemed even that had been too much to ask. She was so tired of spending her birthday alone…
“Very late?”
He was well over 180 centimeters tall, and he lowered his gaze at an angle toward her, who barely reached his chest.
“How late is ‘very’ to you?”
She glanced carefully at his expression and opened her mouth.
“Um… midnight?”
“I think I’ll be back earlier than that.”
At Do-uk’s matter-of-fact answer, Seonha gave a small nod. She felt relieved that he would come home before her birthday was over, and at the same time, she felt needlessly sorrowful because he had no idea what day it was.
“All right. Be careful on your way.”
Forcing a clear smile, Seonha gently brushed a tiny speck of dust from his shoulder with an affectionate hand.
“I’m going.”
Without even meeting her eyes, he left through the front door with that perfunctory farewell.
*
Seonha, who had been dozing at the dining table, started in surprise at the sudden sound of the doorbell ringing through the house, which had been as silent as death. Her eyes widening, she checked the wall clock. 10:45 p.m. There was still a little time left before her birthday ended.
Through the slightly open balcony door, the sound of rain falling steadily wound into her ears. The heavy autumn rain had begun around midday and had not stopped sharply striking the ground even at this late hour. She had thought it would stop once night deepened, but even now, after she had dozed off and woken from a shallow sleep, it was still soaking the earth without giving it a chance to dry.
The dining table, which she had cleared after forcing down the birthday meal she had prepared for herself that morning, tasteless and alone, had remained clean until now. For some reason, she had no appetite, so for lunch she had merely filled her stomach lightly by tearing into the stale plain bread left at home without even spreading jam on it, and for dinner she had stood in front of the sink and made do with a glass of milk.
It wasn’t that she wasn’t hungry after eating so poorly for two meals, but today of all days, she couldn’t bring herself to sit alone at the table and eat in loneliness. When she had swallowed the seaweed soup she had made that morning by herself, she had clearly felt that as her stomach filled, her chest, strangely enough, was emptying by just as much.
After spending the whole day wrapped in melancholy, she suddenly thought of how foolish she was. Because he hadn’t shared her birthday meal today, because he hadn’t noticed her birthday in the slightest, because he had tossed off his goodbye and left as if she didn’t matter to him at all, Seonha had been unable to shake off her gloomy mood all day, much like today’s weather. She had discovered how overly dependent she had become.
At some point, she had begun to react with excessive sensitivity to each and every small word and action from her husband.
Was it because, as time passed, her love for him did not diminish but only grew larger? Or was it because she had married as soon as she graduated from university, and in accordance with Chairman Choe’s wishes that she devote herself to supporting her husband, she had taken no job of her own, living a life in which he became the center?
Perhaps it was both.
Realizing that belatedly, Seonha shook her head hard and put strength into the shoulders she had let droop. Then, with the sudden expression of someone who had made up her mind, she picked up an umbrella and left the apartment. It was around 8 p.m.
Through the rain squeezed out with all the force of the murky sky, Seonha stopped by a famous franchise bakery near the apartment and chose a cake she liked with bright, shining eyes.
A young part-time worker, who looked fresh and green at a glance, approached her and asked. Since she couldn’t very well say honestly that she had come to buy her own birthday cake, Seonha answered with an appropriate smile instead.
She had convinced herself that it was foolish to feel hurt by him. Her husband was a man indifferent to everything except work. He even found it bothersome to celebrate his own birthday, so it would be stranger if he remembered hers.
Moreover, she had not told him herself that it was her birthday, so apart from wanting to share a meal with him, she had no right to blame him for his indifference that morning when he had barely even met her eyes. To him, today would be nothing more than another ordinary day.
‘You can just say it. Ask him to congratulate you.’
Seonha gently infused courage into her own heart, telling herself it was very simple. If she asked him to eat cake with her, a slightly bothered expression might pass over his face, but he would not flatly refuse. It was extremely rare for her to make such requests.
It was not strange at all. There would be no clue in this trivial request for him to notice her feelings. Though he would surely never understand her desire for someone’s congratulations badly enough that she had gone out and bought her own birthday cake.
Carefully holding two long candles, eight short candles, and the prettily boxed fresh cream cake, Seonha avoided the rain and headed home again. She put the cake box in one corner of the refrigerator and began waiting for him endlessly.
As she listened to the rain, hoping it would die down by the time he got off work, she had started nodding off, but when she woke, the rain had only grown heavier.
While Seonha briefly gathered her dazed senses, the doorbell, which had rung about twice, no longer sounded.
She hurriedly rose and headed toward the entrance, and Do-uk was already unlocking the door and stepping inside. As he propped his long umbrella against the shoe cabinet door with a thud, the ends of his hair were damp with rainwater.
“You didn’t open the door, so I thought you were sleeping. Did I wake you?”
Do-uk swept an indifferent gaze over Seonha’s face. There were no signs that she had been deeply asleep, but her long, loose hair was a little tousled.
Even on days when he came home past midnight, she always waited for him without going to sleep first. He was not sentimental enough to expect someone to warmly welcome him when he came home, and he thought it was no different from her wasting her own time unnecessarily.
But no matter how bluntly he told her there was no need to wait, Seonha would only nod at the time and then never listen. She would say something unbelievable, that she had not been waiting, but simply had not been able to fall asleep until now.
Perhaps because her ability to sense presence was exceptionally keen, even if she had gone into some corner of this large house, she would quickly realize the moment he arrived and rush over to welcome him. Before he knew it, he had developed the habit of ringing the doorbell instead of opening the door himself when he came home from work.
Today, as usual, he rang the bell out of habit and waited, but sensing the silent house, a strange feeling arose for a moment. The daily life in which someone waited at home and welcomed him had become so natural that it now felt newly unfamiliar.
Hiding the brief flicker of disturbance on his face by furrowing his brow, he quickly entered the passcode and came inside.
“I’m not. I wasn’t sleeping.”
Seonha shook her head, but a hint of drowsiness lingered at the slightly slackened outer corners of her eyes. At her defenseless, languid expression, Dowook’s jaw clenched tight.
It had already been about ten days since he had been unable to hold Seonha, who had begun “that day” which came once a month. They said it lasted about a week, so surely it must be completely over by now.
He always thought this, but the period when he couldn’t hold her amounted to a quarter of the month—a length of time long enough to gnaw away at his patience. After finishing several days of overtime or returning right from a business trip, his body was already endlessly heated from the unintended abstinence; when her menstrual period unfortunately coincided with it, disappointment would rush in enough to suddenly shatter his will to live.
When she was menstruating, Seonha would flinch as if struck by lightning if he merely reached his hand toward her, so he couldn’t even bring himself to attempt intimacy in ways other than penetration.
They say one becomes unusually sensitive when that day arrives, and she seemed to be the same. Though it had been quite difficult to endure not being able to touch so much as a fingertip until her period ended, he had also come to think anew that it was fortunate she never refused relations except during that time.
Dowook’s eyes, which had been scanning Seonha’s body, narrowed.
He was seized by the impulse to strip off the white-toned nightdress that suited her translucent skin as quickly as possible, not a minute or second to waste. He withdrew the heated gaze he had fixed on her, took off his jacket, and strode inside.
“Mr. Dowook, there’s something…”
Trailing after her husband’s large strides, she urgently called out to stop him.
“At least wash up first.”
Having entered the master bedroom, Dowook hurriedly took off his tie and dress shirt. Under the bright light, Seonha suddenly saw his bare upper body and quickly lowered her eyes.
“Just how long are you going to act like that? Three years should be enough to get used to it.”
Dowook’s voice grew heavy, as if suppressing something. He wrinkled his brow to its limit, staring at her almost glaringly. Withdrawing a gaze that seemed ready to burn her entire body at any moment, he exhaled low and unbuckled his belt with increasingly impatient hands.
Seonha flinched, her shoulders trembling at his fierce reaction. She wondered if he was annoyed because he thought she was putting on unnecessary modesty. Most men were said to like women who were proactive and seductive in bed—perhaps his taste was the same.
But what could she do about the fact that even though she saw his body every day, she still felt embarrassed every single day?
While Seonha hesitated, Dowook had already headed toward the bathroom inside the master bedroom. There had been no chance to stop him; his movements were feverishly impatient. It was nothing short of strange that he, who had been reasonably relaxed when he first entered through the front door after work, was suddenly acting as if chased by someone.
The door closed completely and the sound of water began.
Seonha checked the clock. 10:55. He had spent a long time outside and gotten wet in the rain, so he must feel uncomfortable in more ways than one; it would be better to ask him to eat the birthday cake together after he finished showering.
Before long, Dowook walked out of the bathroom filled with white steam.
Seonha, who had been sitting on the edge of the bed, was startled once to see him emerge with only a towel wrapped around his waist, and startled again when he approached with irresistible speed and crashed his lips against hers.
“Mr. Dowook, wa… wait a moment.”
Dowook didn’t even give her a chance to speak and greedily devoured her lips. The strength of his hand gripping her chin opened her lips, and his slick tongue abruptly invaded. He tilted his head slightly to the side, intertwining their tongues deeply.
“Mmph.”
Her breathing grew ragged because of Dowook roughly rummaging through every corner of her mouth. Seonha, whose eyes had been closing on their own, forced them open and pounded his chest.
“Wait… I have something to say…”
“Is it something more important than this right now?”
Pushing Seonha down onto the bed and climbing on top of her, Dowook lifted her sleepwear and asked with a displeased expression. He seemed greatly dissatisfied that she kept trying to stop him, unlike usual.
“Sex is important enough to me that I’d even give up sleeping time.”
“……”
“If it’s not that important, say it after we’re done.”
Not seeing Seonha’s hardened pupils, Dowook lasciviously licked her earlobe with his tongue. At the sensation of him biting and sucking her delicate earlobe, her body instinctively began to heat up, but Seonha bit her lower lip with a blurred face.
She couldn’t know whether her own birthday was more important to him than sex. No, if she were to ask him to stop this act and celebrate her birthday first, he might look at her with eyes that said she was being a nuisance.
Today, Dowook’s touch was especially rough. He hadn’t been the gentle type during sex to begin with, but normally he enjoyed foreplay just as much as penetration, driving her to the point where she would finally burst into tears. But today, his caresses were neither persistent nor delicate.
It was a desperation where the fact that this was sex devoid of emotion, solely for the purpose of fulfilling desire, was felt all the more strongly. Enough that the woman pinned beneath him felt her breath freeze in misery.
As if something terrible would happen if he didn’t enter her right away, he thrust his rigidly hardened member against her the moment she was somewhat wet. Feeling him roughly plunge in, she firmly closed her eyes, which felt as if they might shed tears.
*It was quite some time later that Dowook released Seonha from his embrace. Midnight had long since passed, and the clock hands were quietly racing through the late dawn.
Lying on her side on one edge of the bed, she blankly stared at the orange glow of the stand lamp placed on the nightstand when she sensed movement from beside her. As Dowook’s body approached, he wrapped his firm arm around her waist. The naked bodies of the man and woman still held the heat of their passionate affair.
“Didn’t you say you had something to tell me?”
The only moment this couple engaged in ordinary skinship was now—after sex.
When their relationship had only just begun, Dowook would get up right after sex and busy himself washing his sweat-stained body. But the first day he embraced her body “just because”—not for the sake of sex—Seonha had thought her heart would burst.
That night, she hadn’t been able to sleep properly. To think he held her so tenderly—what could it possibly mean? Could it be that he had come to like her too? Busy chasing such sweet dreams, her mind kept clearing, driving sleep away.
She realized that Dowook’s skinship held no meaning whatsoever when she saw his eyes and actions, no different than before. Dowook still didn’t approach her except when he wanted sex. She had no memory of even holding hands outside of bed, let alone sharing a light kiss.
The act of holding her like a sweet lover after their relations was merely done out of comfort, because they were a pair who shared even the deepest, most secret places without reservation. There was no emotion involved.
“……It’s nothing.”
“So what is this ‘nothing’?”
Feeling the warm body temperature enveloping her back, Seonha held a faint smile.
“I forgot.”
Dowook, who had been drifting into sleep, let out a short laugh. He murmured in a low, heavy voice.
“Guess it really was nothing.”
Having lightly set aside his curiosity, he loosened the arm wrapped around her waist, lay flat on his back, and closed his drowsy eyelids. As a man who always lacked sleep, drowsiness seemed to pour over him quickly. Soon after, without even a brief toss or turn, the sound of his neat, even breathing could be heard.
Seonha pulled the blanket all the way up to her neck, covering her bruised, mottled naked body as if to hide it. Her breasts and nipples, which he had obsessively licked and sucked, still throbbed, and her lower body, which he had ravaged countless times, also retained a dull burning sensation, as if remembering the intense act.
Her physical relationship with Dowook drove her into a dead end to the extent that it turned her into a completely different person, and Seonha always trembled with pleasure with not an ounce of falsehood, nestled in his broad embrace.
But after the sex that had been hot enough to shatter her body was entirely over, this hollow loneliness would come crashing into her chest like a tide. Today, that aching pain tormented her with unusual persistence, refusing to let her go.
It was her first birthday spent with family since her mother had passed away. Over the last two years, her birthday had cruelly overlapped with his business trips, so she hadn’t even been able to hope they could spend it together.
Perhaps the reason it felt so burdensome to inform him of just one birthday, even though they were in their third year of marriage, was because she had already let the two previous chances slip away in vain. She had let two years pass by just like that, and she hesitated, wondering if it wouldn’t seem laughable to suddenly ask him to remember her birthday this year.
*A birthday spent with family…*
Even if he might scoff at it, Seonha had treated the man named Dowook Choi, with whom she had even filed a marriage certificate, as her real husband and regarded him as family. Yet even now, lying so close to him in bed, the thought that she was still alone wouldn’t disappear.
To hide her trembling pupils, Seonha closed her eyes tightly, but unlike him, who fell asleep quickly, she had to toss and turn for quite a long time.
*Returning from grocery shopping for dinner and stepping into the house where warmth was rising, Seonha felt her frozen body slowly relaxing.
As if proving that winter had begun, the outside wind was fierce and biting. The weather had grown extremely chilly, and since the sun had already set, even though she had dressed carefully in layers, she could barely keep her stinging eyes open against the fiercely blowing wind.
She had heard Dowook scold her several times, telling her to have someone else do it, but Seonha had insisted on going grocery shopping herself.
Only after setting down the plastic bags filled with groceries beside the dining table legs could she breathe a sigh. The hand that had held the bags was red as if scalded. Rubbing her two hands together, she headed toward the cupboard, found a teacup, and drew hot water from the water purifier.
The water had filled to about two-thirds when she lifted the cup. She had planned to steep warm tea right away to warm her body quickly, but the moment she felt her hand slip, the cup fell to the floor.
Clang!
The sound of the teacup filled with water shattering filled the quiet house. It was a mistake caused by her frozen, numb hands that had yet to properly regain sensation.
Seonha, who had stiffened momentarily at the loud crashing sound, looked down at the miserable marble floor with a blank face. The cup had shattered into pieces, scattered here and there, and because it had held water, the floor was soaked.
“Stupid me…”
Seonha rebuked herself and crouched down on the spot. Dowook would soon arrive home from work, so she had no time to dawdle. She needed to quickly clean up the broken cup and prepare dinner.
“Ah!”
Perhaps because she was in a hurry. As Seonha hastily gathered the sharp glass shards, red blood welled up on her fingers and palm. Her breathing grew quiet as she carefully pulled out a small glass fragment embedded in her palm.
To think she had broken a cup and even injured her hand on top of that.
More than the pain of the cut from the glass, an ominous premonition eerily took root in her chest. When she was very young, she had carelessly dropped cups or bowls from her hands several times, but after growing up, she had almost never made such a mistake. But today, having broken a cup and even seen blood, an instinctive feeling that something bad would happen crept over her.
As if to further fuel that feeling of hers, the house phone suddenly began ringing loudly. In this day and age, the only ones who called the house directly instead of a mobile phone were Chairman Choi, Dowook’s grandfather, and Lady Cheongyang, who had long been in charge of the household affairs of that family—only those two.
She had already been thinking of visiting Chairman Choi’s house sometime tomorrow. Since retiring, he had had more time on his hands and often grew lonely; every time she went to see him, he would repeat that she needn’t trouble herself going back and forth for an old man’s sake, yet the corners of his mouth would lift in generous pleasure. She had even heard from Cheongyang-daek that he went around praising her, saying that his amiable granddaughter-in-law was far better than his utterly indifferent grandson.
Seonha learned baduk from Chairman Choi, admired the orchids he cherished and raised, and sometimes helped with his calligraphy by grinding ink beside him. She listened without the slightest boredom to the stories of his youth, which, once begun, easily went on for over an hour.
While learning to cook from Cheongyang-daek, she also came to know that the tastes of the grandfather and grandson, who were hardly affectionate toward each other, were almost identical.
Because her parents were orphans, Seonha had grown up without ever knowing the embrace of a grandmother or grandfather from the moment she was born. Perhaps that was why being with Chairman Choi made her feel the affection of a grandfather, warming her heart.
The endlessly ringing telephone sounded colder than usual as it stabbed at her ears. Forgetting that blood was flowing from the tip of her cut finger, Seonha straightened her bent knees and hurried toward the living room. Before the call could cut off, she hastily picked up the receiver.
“Hello?”
The person calling was Cheongyang-daek.
- The two of you need to come to the hospital at once.
Cheongyang-daek, whose voice was always slightly hoarse, spoke in an agitated tone. It was news like a bolt from the blue: the Chairman was in extremely critical condition, and it would be difficult for him to make it through the night. As she listened to the explanation, Seonha’s face gradually stiffened, turning white.
- Has the young master not arrived home yet? If it seems too hard for you to say it…… shall I contact him for you instead?
“……
No. It’s all right. I’ll tell him.”
After answering with difficulty, Seonha ended the call with Cheongyang-daek by saying she would go straight to the hospital. The hand with which she set down the receiver trembled faintly.
Chairman Choi, who had stepped back from the front line after being diagnosed with lung cancer, had seemed full of energy even when she visited him just a week ago. The sight of him gently saying that he would easily live long enough to see his great-grandchild’s antics, so they should hurry and place one in his arms regardless of gender, was vivid before her eyes.
Seonha steadied her ragged breathing and picked up the receiver again. There was no time to delay. She had to tell Douk this news quickly as well. Before the dial tone had gone on for long, Douk’s voice dug into her ear.
- What is it? I’m on my way now after leaving work.
Hearing the languor in his voice after finishing all his work, Seonha bit her lip. There was no doubt that her single sentence would now turn his everyday life, no different from yesterday’s, into chaos.
For a moment she regretted not accepting Cheongyang-daek’s offer, but after exhaling quietly, she opened her mouth as calmly as she could.
“I received a call saying the Chairman’s condition suddenly became critical. I think we need to leave for the hospital right now. ……
They say tonight is the turning point.”
There was no reply from Douk for a while after he understood what she meant. After a brief silence, he answered.
- I’ll arrive in ten minutes. Be ready and waiting downstairs on time. We’ll leave for the hospital immediately.
Unlike her, who was barely maintaining her composure, his voice was calm, without the slightest tremor. At that reaction, Seonha’s pity for him only deepened. Because she could picture the young him, abandoned by his family and forced to become numb in order to erase his wounds.
She had never heard the details directly from him, but thanks to Cheongyang-daek, she knew something of his childhood.
They said that when he was very young, he had been a mischievous boy who cried and laughed loudly over all sorts of things, his expressions as varied as could be. But after that child was driven out of the house and lived with his maternal relatives, where no one gave him affection, when he returned again after the deaths of the three members of his family, he had become like an adult—wearing a cold, expressionless face and showing no emotion at all.
When Douk’s father drove Douk out, Chairman Choi, who had failed to properly stop his son and had been too busy averting his eyes from the situation, would often look at Douk with eyes full of pity, unable to stop regretting the past. But by then, Douk no longer had any delicate emotions left with which to understand and care for the feelings of his aged grandfather.
Granting the pitiful wish of an old man who wanted to see his grandson’s spouse before closing his eyes was probably the best filial duty Douk was capable of.
“All right. I’ll come out without being late.”
Seonha headed to the dressing room to change her clothes.
She took off her ivory down-padded jumper and picked up a coat in a subdued color, only then noticing the blood that had seeped from her hand.
Perhaps the cut had been deeper than she had thought, because blood was still flowing. Her finger was only slightly cut, but she could see that the wound on her palm had split open sharply. The situation was urgent, but as long as it kept bleeding, she couldn’t leave it like this. Even if she couldn’t leisurely apply medicine, it seemed best to at least put on a bandage.
Seonha set down the coat and rummaged through the drawers against the wall facing the wardrobe. In the three years they had lived in this house, neither Douk nor she had ever been injured, not even in some surprisingly minor way. Thanks to that, the first-aid kit, having become useless, had ended up shoved into a corner of a dressing-room drawer.
She had even forgotten which drawer she had put the first-aid kit in, so she began pulling open the drawers from the top. Then, in that instant, her movements stopped.
She saw a familiar piece of stiff paper.
Her eyes froze. The reality she had, at some point, distanced even from her thoughts because she wanted to forget that her end with him had already been decided, now stood right before her eyes. Holding her breath, Seonha carefully lifted the contract that had begun her relationship with him.
“Seriously…… you’re the worst, Yu Seonha.”
With tears gathering in her eyes, she murmured in a low voice.
At a time like this…… what am I worrying about? In a situation where the Chairman might pass away, how can my attention be more drawn to this scrap of paper?
She truly was a horribly selfish woman.
「……
The contract period shall last from the date of contract until within thirty days after the death of Chairman Choi Gyeongman (Party A’s grandfather).」
One side of the paper in Seonha’s hand lost its original stiff shape and crumpled. Blood still flowing from her finger seeped into the paper printed with rigid letters. At last, from between Seonha’s dried lips, a sigh like a scream burst out.
「During the contract period, both parties shall bear in mind that this marriage is a contract and shall not demand unnecessary emotions from each other.」
The end that had been set for them from the very beginning thus announced its start.