Chapter 2

“Joohyun sweetheart? Can you hear me?”

She can her hear mother but it seems like her voice is coming from somewhere far away. She opened but is so dry that she can’t even make a sound so she tried her best to nod instead. She can hear machines on both sides of her, beeping one after another.

“Does it hurt anywhere?” was her mother’s next question. She would’ve wailed in pain if not for the blackness that’s creeping every now and then. It hurts everywhere!

That was the last that she had heard, the next was a snippet of her parent’s conversation.

“If we don’t do it now, I’m afraid the next time they’ll both be dead!” her mother argued.

“But atleast we wait for Joohyun to make a decision,” her dad countered.

“Can’t you see she is not in her right mind?”

“Well atleast let’s wait for her to say it herself.”

“Hyun appa, I think it’s best for Joohyun to stay away from Yonghwa. She needs a lot of growing up to do. What happened last week was just a preview of what can happen next. We have both of them alive and in our arms now, but what if we won’t be so lucky the next time?”

There was silence afterwards except for her mother’s sniffing when she heard the door opened. There were feet shuffling and hushed voices, she tried opening her eyes but she can’t, it feels so heavy that no amount of will power can make it move.

“I’m really sorry about Yonghwa,” it was her dad’s voice trembling.

“It was an accident. No one wanted that to happen,” yes, that was her samchon’s voice. “You’re Joohyun is in a much sadder state than our Yonghwa”

“But his legs.”

“The heavens are good Sajangnim, Yonghwa will walk again if the heaven permits it”

What do they mean by that? she thought.

Another round of suppressed sniffs.

Why can’t I open my eyes? Why can’t I move? What do they mean about Yong oppa’s legs?

And it was dark again.

“Joohyun,” her mom worriedly looked at her. Tears were running down her mother’s face, “we called off your wedding with Yonghwa.”

That was all that Mrs. Seo needed to say before her own tears began to fall. She found out that she had been in a coma for almost a month. Yonghwa is not fully recovered and is undergoing physical therapy for his legs. She hit her head so hard that the car window broke into pieces. Fragments of the glass also pierced her face and head. The impact was that bad that it broke both of Yonghwa’s legs. In between the time she was in a coma, she had cerebral edema that they had to put her into a medically induced coma. She was in the brink of death.

A week after she woke up, she was given the go signal to go home but not without close monitoring by her doctor. A lot has been running in her head. When she saw her parents tears, the moment she opened her eyes, she knew instantly that she had probably almost lost her own life, everything that she has and the life of the one man she loves.

It’s the guilt that been eating her up. She can’t even bring herself to ask how Yonghwa is. She feels she doesn’t have the right when it was her who put him in that state, though her state is no better, still, it should’ve not happened.

She looked at herself on her whole-body mirror. There are scratches on her face and she look so pale, extremely far from the last time she looked herself on the mirror, she also lost some weight and she’s now sitting on a wheelchair.

She wheeled herself to her bedside and transferred to her bed. She sat there in the dark until her phone lit up.

How are you?

It’s Yonghwa. She held her phone with both of her hands and just stared at it until tears fell. She can’t do it. She can’t talk to him; she can’t see him. She can’t have anything to do with him. She closed his message without replying. She lied in her bed without a thought of doing anything until she heard someone turning the door knob. She closed her eyes and lied on her side, pretending to be asleep. She could her two pairs of feet slowly approaching her bed. She felt a slight dip on the side of the bed and a light rub on her back.

“She ate little for dinner again and barely said anything.” Her mom shared. “I thought initially, she’s just adjusting but it has been almost 2 weeks since her discharge and she’s still the same.”

She heard her dad sigh, “I really think we should send her to Tina for now. I know that Tina owns a home for the elders but she has her own team of nurses and the environment is nice. New surrounding might be good for her.”

Her mother’s breath hitched, “but she will be too far from us. She has never been away from home for too long without any of us two.”

“I know, you can accompany her if you want but what about Yoona? If only the company is not undergoing major changes this season, then I would’ve gotten a long vacation.”

“I know that.”

“Think about it Joohyun eomma, and it’s not as if she’ll be there for a year. As soon as she’s able to recover then she can come home. And if we too are not too busy, we can always go there. I’m sure my sister won’t let anything bad happen to her.”

Yong-al clucked her tongue, “I know that! She loves our daughter as her own, why would I ever think that, I just can’t bear to have my babies too far from me, and at her condition, she needs me.”

Joohyun has been listening this whole time as tears keep falling from her eyes. She bit her lip and closed her eyes trying to