Jinhwan’s hands shook lightly as they rested in his lap. He tired to focus on what the emergency doctor was telling him but his mind was busy replaying the image of Yumi clutching her stomach as she crouched down on the kitchen floor. He didn’t know what to do and the trickle of blood that crept down her legs wasn’t helping. All Yumi kept saying was “no” repeatedly while she sobbed, and the fact that she refused to answer any of Jinhwan’s questions was merely adding insult to injury.

“She had a spontaneous abortion.”

Abortion was the only word Jinhwan heard the doctor say. She was pregnant?

“In other words, she had a miscarriage. According to her chart, she was about thirteen weeks pregnant.”

But she never said anything.

“It seems as though she was having a tough first trimester, her obstetrician also noted in her chart that she advised your wife to remain on bed rest.”

She was having a baby, and she didn’t say anything?

“No matter what, you need to make sure she understands that this wasn’t her fault. Things like this happen more often then you think.”

Not her fault – must tell her – okay. But how come she didn’t say anything?  “Is she okay?”

The fatigue was clearly visible on the emergency department’s doctor when he tried to make an attempt at a smile but failed miserably to eradicate Jinhwan’s worries. “Well physically, yes your wife is fine. The amount of blood she lost is the equivalent to a normal mensus, uh, her period. However, mentally, I’m not quiet sure.”

She’s safe, she’s okay. “Wait- what do you mean mentally?” He managed to croak out.

The doctor sighed. “Your wife just lost a child, Mr. Oh. There’s a multitude of emotions she’s feeling.”

Oh. Right.

Jinhwan was beside himself. The past hour had been a rollercoaster of emotions and he didn’t know what to do or how to react, let alone what to say when he walked into the private hospital room and stared back at Yumi. She had been crying nonstop since he found her in the kitchen and it seemed like she was never going to stop. Jinhwan shuffled his way into the room, taking the seat beside her on the bed.

“I called Hiromi, she’s on her way.” She’ll probably be of more help than me, Jinhwan figured. After all, it’s not like Yumi even told him she was pregnant in the first place. Jinhwan sighed, watching her unchanging expression as she stared blankly at the wall. He wanted to ask her why at least. Why didn’t she tell him she was pregnant? Was she worried about his reaction? Did she think he wouldn’t be happy about it?

“He’s gone, isn’t he?” She murmured, after the two of them had sat in silence for nearly twenty minutes. Yumi may have posed it as question, but the way she said it made it seem like she was trying to convince herself rather than anything else.

The night Yumi lost her baby everything changed. It was as though the string that had joined Jinhwan and her together had been severed, and suddenly their relationship took a turn for the worse. Communication was sparse and whenever they did speak to each other it was pointless. They either got into frivolous arguments or it was simply only one person talking while the other huffed in annoyance or cried.

Frustrations escalated and they were quickly drifting apart. Not because they weren’t communicating, but in actuality it was because they weren’t communicating that they were drifting apart.  Jinhwan had been consumed with money, thinking that their financial instability was the reason why Yumi chose to not tell him about the pregnancy and not heed their doctor’s warning. To an even greater extent than before the incident, Jinhwan became obsessed with ideas of success and used the pain he felt over the loss of his unborn child to fuel him. He secretly started working small jobs here and there to get money, even taking up the job as a ghostwriter for some of the biggest names in the industry to make extra money. Adhering to the emergency department doctor’s advice of ensuring Yumi gets her rest, Jinhwan went so far as to even begin sleeping in the other room in fear that him coming home late at night would wake her up.

A woman will always notice the small details; call it an attribute of the gentler gender, and Yumi was no exception. She noticed the increase in the amount of arguments they got into, and stressed over the fact that it seemed as though they couldn’t get through to each other. They could be in the same room together and yet feel so far apart. Complete strangers, and Yumi was to blame for all of it. Jinhwan despised her; at least that was what she thought. He would no longer eat meals with her, not even look at her - he doesn’t even want to touch me. I disgust him, the woman concluded. How could she be considered a good wife when she couldn’t even give him a child?

Yumi’s head continued to spin, her headache only worsening from all the tears she shed. She couldn’t deny she was relieved when she noticed that Hiromi had left when she finally decided to go back to the house, at least I’ll have some alone time. Although she herself wasn’t sure if being alone was the best of things for her, while memories of the past ran rampant in her mind.

“You, get up.” Taebin, her brother-in-law, said throwing a sweatshirt at her while she sat on the couch staring out into empty space.Startled, Yumi flinched when the soft fabric hit her face yet still managed to look back at him blankly. “Get up.” Repeating himself, this time his voice stern, no longer holding the same soft tone he had used earlier.

“Why?” She meekly asked back, not moving an inch off the couch.

Walking over to the side table by the front door, Taebin fished for his car keys in the small glass bowl. “Because today is Friday and Hiromi took Dongwoon to the Lee’s for their play date. There’s no food in the house and I doubt you are in any state to be slaving over the stove. So, come on, get up. I’ve had a hell of a week in court and I need a beer.”

With no other choice, Yumi let her brother-in-law drag her to a local restaurant for dinner. At first the young woman felt awkward to be out with him alone. It wasn’t like they were strangers, but she never really sat down and had a full-on conversation with the man alone. Considering how warm the weather was outside, despite the setting sun, Taebin decided to pick a table on the veranda curbside, where it was less crowded and noisy.

After the waitress left with their orders in hand, Yumi played with the straw in her glass of water while she watched Taebin intensely. He looked drowned in thought and the stress of his job as a lawyer seemed to be taking a toll on his once flawless face. Yumi had every right to call her brother-in-law the perfect husband. He was successful, made tons of money, was dependable and top it off, he seemed to tolerate Hiromi’s moodiness.

“You know,” Taebin started to say, his attention still directed at the people walking by on the street. “From the outside looking in, everyone seems happy don’t they?” He turned to check if Yumi was looking at what he was before diverting his attention back to a couple he was watching earlier. “I mean, look at those two over there. To you and me they seem happy. They are joking around and laughing, but we don’t actually know what’s going on do we? For all we know those two women could be the best of friends but secretly one is talking about the other behind their back.”

Yumi grimaced at the thought, but Taebin only continued. “Or that couple holding hands by the black Audi over there. They’re smiling, therefore of course they are happy and in love, right? But we don’t know that for sure, do we? One could actually be having a long term affair and the other doesn’t even know.” Her brother-in-law’s voice faded off and he turned to look back at her.

“See that’s the thing about being on the outside. The grass will always look greener but we won’t ever know for sure, unless we are actually part of the relationship.” He took a small swig of his beer and twisted his mouth in to a half-smile. “Same with me and your sister.” Yumi’s eyes revealed her slight confusion when mentioned his relationship with her sister. “Hiromi may walk around and act like we have this perfect life, but let me be honest with you. We don’t. Hiromi feels this need to maintain this perfect exterior just so your parents are happy. She’s done it for so long now that it’s practically second nature to her - she doesn’t even know when she’s doing it. Some people will go through their days not even aware of just how much pain she is in. She’s gotten so good at it that sometimes I feel like I can’t see the real her.”

Yumi sat in silence. How is it that she couldn’t see past the mask, she was her sister after all? Her uncertainty over Taebin’s words read easily on her face and the male continued to speak. “I get it, you know.” He said, his face contorting into a frown to mirror her expression. “What you’re feeling, I completely get it. I mean we may have not gone through the same experiences but I get the whole feeling of wanting to be acknowledged. But let me ask you something, have you ever thought about it from his side?”

Taebin just looked back at her, aware that she would have no answer for him. “When you lost the baby,” he paused momentarily to gauge her response over the mere mention of the loss. “When that happened, believe it or not but Jinhwan was in just as much of a mess as you were. But where you both went wrong, and I’m sure you know this, is you guys stopped talking. You both just shut down and pushed each other away thinking that you were each the source of the problem when in reality it was a combined effort. Yumi, a marriage takes two people. One person alone can’t take the weight and burden of responsibility that go along with it.”

As enlightening as Taebin may have thought his small talk was, Yumi on the other hand was getting annoyed. How can he understand my pain? “But you’re in the perfect marriage.” She found herself spitting out, without really thinking about how her words would sound to him. He’s only trying to help, she tried to reason but it did nothing to ease her growing agitation.

Not the least bit fazed by her outburst, Taebin shook his head before turning away to look back out onto the street. “Hiromi and I have been married for ten years now. You were busy with school when we first got hitched, so you actually don’t know all the nitty-gritty details of our marriage.” He replied, a hint of aggression in his voice that made Yumi hate herself even more for not thinking before speaking. “When we first got hitched it wasn’t easy, and to be honest it still isn’t. Hiromi is so obsessed with being so goddamned perfect it’s unnerving. She looks over every mistake I have ever made and still sticks by me.”

“Mistake? What did you do wrong?” Yumi interrupted. Great, let’s just stop thinking and say whatever pops into your head.

Taebin his suddenly dry lips and looked down into his beer before quietly speaking. He knew he had to tell her at one time or another, especially when he saw the direction her marriage was taking. “I cheated on her.”

“You what?” Yumi yelled out, nearly knocking over the glass of water that was in her hands.

Letting out a breath he had been holding since he spoke his last words, Taebin slowly raised his head to look Yumi in the eyes. “I was stupid and I regret it till this day, but that doesn’t change the past. It was when Hiromi was pregnant with Dongwoon. I had just won my first case and I got -faced drunk with a bunch of other colleagues. I’m not using that as an excuse but, yeah, I slept with one of the interns. I came clean with Hiromi right after it happened and I honestly thought she would have left me, but instead we worked things out. And do you know how?”

The young woman just sat there, this is too surreal. There she was staring back at her “perfect” brother-in-law, only to find out that he was actually far from it. “We talked things through.” Taebin answered his own question. “Look, no one is perfect and neither is our marriage. But we get through it together. You just have to tackle each hurdle as it comes. That’s what a marriage is, Yumi. I’m not trying to lecture you or criticize you for your decision, I’m pretty sure Hiromi has that department covered.”

He ignored the small huff that came out of Yumi’s mouth. “It’s just that, I overheard you and Hiromi getting into it real bad last night. And from the way she sounded on the phone when we were talking earlier, it seems like you got into another fight today. Remember what I said about the whole happy façade she always puts up? Well yeah, she’s not going to tell you exactly why you need to grow up, or why you should try and fight for your marriage. Because if she does that means she’s admitting that our marriage is flawed, and I swear to you, that is something she will never do. She wants to be that strong older sister for you, and if you knew about the we’ve been through, she thinks you’ll feel sorry for her or something. Honestly, I don’t understand you Choi sisters, and I don’t think I ever will.”

He chuckled lightly at the realization that the relationship between his wife and her sister will always be a mystery to him. “I’m a divorce lawyer, Yumi, I see couples that were once in love go at it all over a dog, there’s no love there. But you, I know you love Jinhwan and don’t even get me started on how much that guy loves you. He’s just an idiot when it comes to expressing it. I just want you look at the situation from all sides and ask yourself one question. Is it really that hard to give him another chance?”

Jinhwan walked out of the small record shop that Teddy took him to, or rather more like dragged him to. His friend figured that if they got their hands on some quality vinyl it would help take Jinhwan’s mind off his troubles.  Instead, the man was plagued with even more grief as his hand froze when he was about to open the passenger side door. He was probably still tipsy from the six-pack of beer he had chugged that morning, he figured, when he could have sworn he saw Yumi sitting at a small table across the street. After a doing a double take and a third for just for confirmation, he knew he wasn’t hallucinating. It was Yumi. The restaurant wasn’t directly across from the record store, so he could only see the back of the other person’s head but that was evidence enough to prove she was sharing a meal with another man.

A part of him died inside the moment he saw her laugh. There it was, the smile he hadn’t seen since what seemed like forever ago and while one part of him was remorseful the other was slowly filling up with anger. Am I the only one hurting?  For the past few days he had been drinking himself into oblivion and trying to get a hold of her, all the while she was happy and eating out with some guy?

However, the more time he spent simply standing there and watching her laugh, the quickly his anger fizzled away and all that remained was the stagnant pain he had felt since the day Yumi said she wanted a divorce. The same pain he was now drowning in, when the notion of if he could ever be able to make her happy again arose.

word count: 2804

thanks for reading!

Apparently I don't know how to count to ten. While going over my outline, I realized that I skipped the number eight. Lol

What does that mean? That means that there are actually only 13 chapters in this story....(I've also taken out the optional last chapter and made it part of the story...)