-----

Bom watched involuntarily as the two co-workers made fond gestures in broad daylight. She searched for a wall clock, revealing that it was seven in the morning.

 

“Get a room.” Bom thought foolishly as she realized that she and the rest of her friends had occupied THEIR room.

 

“Ah, I better get home, I take it that I’m allowed a leave of absence today?” Jin-ri asked. Bom persistently eavesdropped on the conversation. “I just spent my wedding anniversary night with an obnoxious, perfectionist of a team mate who has only learned to appreciate team spirit today. And we’ve been together since when again?”

 

“Since I started in the company, I know.” Seung-hyun smirked fondly. “Send my regards your husband.”

 

Wedding anniversary? Husband? Bom felt her chest lighten. Perhaps the power of alcohol was leisurely leaving her? Perhaps not.

 

“Your regards? I’d rather not!” Jin-ri laughed as she started to pack up her laptop. “You heard how furious he was last night, right? How he would beat you up the next time he sees you?”

 

“Send my apologies, then.” he corrected himself lightly. “Although there’s not much to apologize for when it was your idea to stay over and finish the financials with me.”

 

“Yah, if I went home, you know I won’t be able to finish the financials you’re asking of me… You’ve been married, you know why. Last night was our anniversary night.”

 

Seung-hyun looked away shyly, his gaze darted at his bedroom. “Yeah, I know how I would feel if I were Min-ho and you went home on our anniversary night.”

 

Bom shut her eyes abruptly, hoping that he didn’t notice her wakening.

 

“Yah, Choi Seung-hyun.” Jin-ri grabbed his attention away. “This better not happen again, got it?”

 

“Oh. Yeah, sure next time I’ll handle the financials if—“

 

“I meant this.” Jin-ri shook her head left to right, her eyes scanning the entire condominium. “You said she has a boyfriend, right? If that boyfriend is half as dedicated as you were to her, you think he’ll be pleased to find out that she went out to party with some stranger, and ended up sleeping in her ex-husband’s home?”

 

Seung-hyun bowed his head low. His team mate made sense.

 

“They may not be married yet, but you need to set up boundaries.” Jin-ri advised as she placed the last of her documents into her luxuriously designed laptop bag. “If she wants you back, have it her way. But don’t purposely ruin their relationship by agreeing into situations like this.”

 

“You’re right.” Seung-hyun agreed sincerely. He was no gate crasher, because if the roles were switched, he wouldn’t want anyone gate crashing his relationship. Bom had to want him back naturally. They can’t start a new relationship knowing it was just the circumstances that had allowed for them to do so. “I need to be more careful.”

 

“You bet you do.” Jin-ri added. “Hey, I need to go. If you have really urgent questions about the financials, give me a call. Otherwise, just know that today I’m having a ‘we’ time with my husband, alright?”

 

“Arrasou, arrassou.” Seung-hyun nodded and walked his friend to the door. “Be careful on your way home.”

 

Bom still feigned sleeping, worried that an awkward conversation with Seung-hyun would ensue while the rest of her friends were asleep. She half-hoped someone would just wake up and realize that today was a Friday, and everyone had work.

 

Seung-hyun watched as Jin-ri left, closing the condominium door after and heading to his room. His mind ruminated on the best option for the morning: should he just wake them up and experience being battered by hypnagogic, wasted yuppies? Or should he just go ahead to work and leave a note for them?

 

He entered the room’s threshold; slightly tripping on Seung-ri’s left leg.

 

“Aish.” Seung-hyun held onto the edge of the bed for support.

 

Bom’s feet tingled as she felt the bed’s mattress move at Seung-hyun’s force. She tried to make herself look as comfortable as possible, but her heart beat was racing as though she was faking sleep for her life.

 

The tall guy straightened up and headed to his bedside drawer to get some medicine for his incessant headache. Aside from not having his daily dose of espresso, Seung-hyun has yet to recover from the migraine attack from yesterday. To add to that, he wasn’t able to get any sleep due to work. Basically, his headache was somewhat worse than the day before.

 

As he opened the drawer where his medicine kit was, Seung-hyun’s eyes travelled to Bom’s sleeping face.

 

Seung-hyun heaved a sigh as he studied Bom’s features. Her cheek bones were more pronounced and her eye bags were darker (though it may have been due to the night life exposure she has recently had). “Bom… You’re too thin now. He should take better care of you.”

 

Bom’s heart raced faster at the sound of his voice. She could feel her cheeks burning up, making it urgent for her to decide if it was best to ‘wake up’ or to continue ‘sleeping.’ D@mn these rosy cheeks, they were blowing up her cover.

 

The streaks of red evident in Bom’s cheek and  a few red dots around her face didn’t go unnoticed to Seung-hyun. He lightly placed his right palm on Bom’s forehead to identify if it was due to sickness. “Thank goodness.”

 

How could he be like this to someone who left him suddenly, without explanations?  Was what Bom thought at that moment. She always knew Seung-hyun’s heart was golden, but what surprised her was how his kindness continued even as she filed for divorce—and offering no explanation at that, and as she continued to hurt him afterwards with her coldness and her determination to have the divorce settled as soon as possible.

 

“ARIRANG!” Seung-ri screamed randomly in his sleep, startling Bom from her ‘sleep.’

 

“Aish, this maknae.” Seung-hyun mumbled.

 

 

-----

In the end, Seung-hyun decided to just set the alarm clock at eight o’clock and leave a note for the sleeping children. The president of his real estate company had decided to have their meeting with the other team heads at an earlier time; thus leaving him with an hour to get to work and prepare for the presentation.

 

At the instant that she knew it was safe to climb down from the bed, Bom went to the kitchen to drink some water.

 

I brought you all home last night, don’t worry.

The breakfast on the table is for you guys.

Next time don’t drink too much.

Lock the door when you leave.

- Seung-hyun (Seung-ri’s friend)

 

On top of the table were neatly arranged plates and utensils. In the middle were perfectly round pancakes together with syrup and butter on the side, bacon and sunny side up eggs, a pitcher of orange juice and, much to Bom’s delight, a plate full of corn.

 

Wasn’t he up all night working? When did he have time to make this? Bom thought.

 

The rest of the morning went quite smoothly for Seung-hyun. He was able to pitch in some properties with the team heads and the president without blunders and unanswered questions from the president. Due to his preparedness for the presentation, the president gave him the rest of the day of. Thus, the business developer had called up his favorite person in the world to celebrate.

 

To: Ajumma

Ajumma! Let me treat you today! Will be at the café in ten.

 

Yes, the coffee shop ajumma had been Seung-hyun’s rock during his separation with Bom. She was almost like his mom, since Seung-hyun’s birth mother and the rest of his family were islands away, in Jeju. Every week they would meet as often as possible to have coffee together, just to talk casually about life and marriage in general. She taught him the way to a woman’s heart; and he was always appreciative of all the lessons he taught her.

 

It was just yesterday that they had seen each other, but Seung-hyun already had so much to tell.

 

“What’s this? No reply from that ajumma? Aigoo.” Seung-hyun remarked. She usually would reply faster than the speed of light. He used to of not having friends aside from him, and frankly, she truly didn’t. It took Seung-hyun months to deduce that from her. She was lonely, he was lonely, and maybe that’s why it was easy for them to become friends.

 

To: Ajumma

Aigoo, were you mad that I wasn’t able to stay and chat with you yesterday? I’ll make up for it today! We’ll talk the whole afternoon if you want.

 

Still no reply. Seung-hyun had already reached their coffee shop, expectant that she would be sitting at her usual spot, drinking her usual order and waiting for him with her usual enthusiasm.

 

But she wasn’t.

 

“Hyung!” Lee Jong-suk, the mainstay barista of the coffee shop had called out from behind the counter. He was dressed in all black and not in the typical uniform of their café.

 

“Jong-suk!” Seung-hyun greeted gleefully. “Why are you dressed like that? Don’t tell me you’re going on a date in all black?”

 

“Ani.” Jong-suk replied, pulling him into an empty table. “We need to talk.”

 

“Waeyo? Ah, has Hae-suk ajumma left already? I was hoping to grab a cup of coffee with her.”

 

“About that…” Jong-suk fiddled with his phone nervously. “You see, yesterday… Ajumma wasn’t feeling well and after you left she… Well she said she wanted to go to the hospital and… I…”

 

“Is she in the hospital right now? Are you on your way to visit?”

 

“Ani hyung listen…” Jong-suk managed the courage to look at Seung-hyun’s eyes. “Hae-suk ajumma… she passed away yesterday. She died of old age, hyung. Doctors say she’s been visiting the hospital frequently the past few days because she hasn’t been well recently.I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you sooner. I realized that I didn’t have your number so I just waited for you today.”

 

Seung-hyun’s mind went blank. In that moment, he felt numb as he continued to stare blankly at Jong-hyun’s morose face. He was in disbelief. She and Seung-hyun were just talking yesterday. She didn’t look the least bit distressed then.

 

 

-----

 

“It can’t be helped, just take the day off.” Yoo In-na, YG fashion house’s artistic director, said over the phone. Chae-rin had just explained to her that she, Bom and Dara had allergic reactions to what was served to them last night. Now all three of them looked like they had measles. “Yah, I know it’s for a client, but can you tone it down next time?”

 

“I’m sorry, unnie. We should have known better.”

 

“Arrasou.” In-na hung up on her.

 

That morning, Bom was too preoccupied with Seung-hyun and Jin-ri that she barely noticed the relentless itchy feeling she felt all over her body. It was after she had sobered up and eaten breakfast that she noticed all three of them looking weird with dots of red all over their body.

 

“It’s all your fault! How could you not tell us that there was the peanuts we ate was soaked in shrimp!” Chae-rin pushed the sorry Seung-ri away from her. “And you even had to ask for Seung-hyun shi’s help to get us out of the place yesterday? Didn’t you say he was busy?”

 

“All three of you were too much! You should have seen yourselves!” Seung-ri defended himself. He dialed his hyung’s number to inform him that they were about to leave the house. “That’s weird. The office said he was given the day off, yet he’s not answering his phone again?”

 

“If it’s your number, what would you expect?” Dara presumed. “Let’s just go. We’ve finished cleaning the room, it’s a nuisance if he goes back and still finds us here.”

 

“This is hyung we’re talking about. He wouldn’t be mad even if we trashed the place.” Seung-ri retorted, but proceeded on heading towards the door anyway. As if on cue, Seung-hyun entered the apartment mechanically.

 

“Hyung! I was trying to contact you!” Seung-ri said, nudging the tall dark haired man who was obviously not in the mood to talk. “Did something happen? Heard the meeting went well.”

 

“Oh. It did.” Seung-hyun answered weakly. Amidst his mourning, the first thing he noticed was the red spots all over the three girls’ bodies. “You should have those checked.”

 

“Hyung?” Seung-ri called once more as he noticed Seung-hyun’s depressing expression. “Hey, what happened?”

 

“Nothing.” Seung-hyun shrugged and gazed at the floor. “You guys should go to the hospital now.”

 

“Ah, yes we will. Thanks for the hospitality, Seung-hyun shi!” Dara mentioned. “We’ll take our leave now. Kamsahamnida!”

 

“Yeah.” Seung-hyun replied somberly.

 

All four of them bowed at Seung-hyun and proceeded to the door.

 

Bom observed her ex-husband’s posture. His shoulders were hunched, and he had his hands in his pockets. He could only fixate his eyes on the floor and she knew why. He would have broken down in tears if he hadn’t.

 

“Unnie, let’s go.” Chae-rin called, bringing Bom back to reality. The latter noticed that she had been the only one left with Seung-hyun inside the room.

 

Bom decided to do the most bizarre gesture for an ex-wife: she walked towards the door and locked the rest of the people outside. She then headed to Seung-hyun and embraced him emphatically. “Let it out Seung-hyun, it’s just us now. Don’t keep it to yourself.”

 

At her touch, Seung-hyun sobbed pitifully; wrapping his arms tightly around her as though if he let go, she would disappear. Bom patted his back tenderly. Something tragic has happened. Ex-husband or not, Bom knew Seung-hyun would have kept it all to himself—a bad habit they both tried to correct when they were still together. He needed a confidante.

 

“Cry it all out.” Bom asked as Seung-hyun rested his head on her left shoulder. “And once you’re ready, tell me about it.”

 

Seung-hyun kept silent as he continued to cry quietly.