This Love is Unfair

Somewhere in the Past...

“One day, my daughter, you will find someone to share the sunrise and sunsets with.” He said, his old and tired eyes crinkling with life as his daughter leaned her head onto his shoulder. She laughed, her smile shining bright under the orange sky. His daughter was beautiful and kind—a gift he’d cared for and loved oh-so delicately for years and years into womanhood. She reminded him of her mother, his beloved, and his heart filled with joy. “Someday… you’ll find someone and you won’t like to watch the sky with me anymore.”

“Don’t be silly, Father. I won’t love watching the sky with anyone else but you.” She replied absentmindedly, watching the sky’s changing colors. This was her favorite time of the day, when the sky fell slowly into passionate darkness and enveloped her with a sweet chill. Vaguely she wonders how much longer she would get to watch the sunset with her father and his ailing heart, and she bites back a sorrowful sigh.

Her father patted her head lovingly and sighed in her stead, looking back at the sky above them. “You will carry on in this world when I’m gone—” he spoke, pressing a kiss on his daughter’s temple to silence her when she moved to disagree. She was a feisty one, his daughter, oh- how he loved her so. It would be hard to let her go into life alone…

Letting the night’s gloom surround them, he continued, “And when that time comes… I want you to be with someone you love.”

~*~*~*~*~

“Good morning, Yoona.”

Yoona strained to keep her gaze forward and unflinching as Changmin sat down beside her on the breakfast table, dragging a newspaper in his hands and smiling. There he was again – casual in tone and not at all conscious of the conversation that had transpired between them the night before. Could she have simply imagined every word he’d breathed to her some nights ago? Because Changmin couldn’t possibly be this… calm and collected after telling her something like that. Something about her – Im Yoona, the young mistress of the Shim estate – as his only woman in all those years they’d spent together and apart. It couldn’t possibly be true. She’d heard the stories, had seen him wrapped in—No, no, no—

Changmin tapped her plate with his fork and raised an eyebrow at her, smirking. Yoona could only blink at him and turn her eyes away. God, she hated that smirk. She hated it so much she was sorely tempted to either beat him with her plate, or grab him by the lapels of his shirt and kiss him senseless. Neither scene was one she wanted to make early in the morning and so she settled on ignoring him once again. She wasn’t going to let him get to her today – not today of all days.

“It’s too early in the morning for your brows to be creased like that, Yoona.” He said, smiling as his eyes softened and he continued to stare at her. Changmin reached over to brush back the hair framing her face, his fingers tracing a line down her cheek as he did so. Yoona felt a warm shiver run down her side, swirling into her stomach as she pulled away – spearing her food with a fork as though his touch didn’t affect her (even though it did, it always have). If he’d notice any of this, Changmin didn’t let on. Instead, he pulled back as well and took a sip from his glass. “What are you up to today?”

“Oh, the usual. Shopping and embroidery, common activities for housewives like me.” Yoona said, sarcasm dripping from her tone. She spared him a look when he laughed heartily and fought back a tug of a smile on her lips.

“I’d expected you to go to your father’s today.” He replied simply, shrugging his shoulder. Her heart gave a squeeze at his words and she blinked at him in surprise. There was that air of confidence about him that was surprisingly comforting to witness, enveloping him as he leaned back and took another bite out of his breakfast. Changmin looked more settled in now than when he first came home – and rightly so, since he’d already been home for a little over two weeks now. He opened the newspaper in his hands, scanning an article quietly before responding (he probably felt her eyes staring at him).

“I didn’t forget what day it is today and how much it means to you, Yoona,” Changmin said, clearing his throat as he focused his eyes onto another article. She could tell that he wasn’t truly paying attention to what he was reading but said nothing in return; she was more interested in hearing what he’d say next. He gave her a small smile before continuing, “I offer a prayer to your father every year since I’d been gone… I was planning on going over there myself as well, in fact. With or without your permission, of course.”

He remembered? Yoona gripped the cloth of her skirt and pressed her lips together, containing the tears that threatened to form in her eyes. She felt the need to reach out to him and cry—but for what? Relief that he’d remembered a day close to her heart and was willing to share with her? Or perhaps, sadness that he’d known all along and had never once said so until now—at this moment when things were so difficult and confusing between them?

Her father, Im Seunghyun, died on a Sunday – a cool autumn day in the middle of October, when the leaves on trees were all completely yellowed and falling. It was a peaceful death, hardly anyone expected it to happen that day – he was so full of life hours before, playing chess and chatting with Changmin while she read a book in the corner. Changmin’s parents had been out of town in a meeting with a congregation they (and her father) were members of and had decided to catch a late ride back home, leaving her with her father and her new husband on a beautiful day in their shared home. It was just three days after their honeymoon, and it had been (in all accounts) good. Her father was overjoyed particularly to know that they’d gone and see the theater at least once before coming back, and to Yoona – seeing her father smile for her marriage was simply the best gift she could ever truly give him. The thought helped her through her nervousness on the wedding day… and now even more right after.

That Sunday, while they were sitting around in the living room and listening to soft music being played on the radio – Mr. Im was smiling and joking, telling Changmin stories about when Yoona was little that often times she would look up to laugh and argue with her father for embarrassing her when she’d “only just been married to him and he doesn’t know much about me yet”. It was really a very beautiful day, with the sun’s light peeking through the curtains and shining into the carpet.

“You know… I do think I made the right decision.” Her father had said, placing a rook into one of Changmin’s opponent knights and grinned. Yoona watched him hold the wooden horse in his hands, taking note of the dry roughness she was sure was there in his palms and listened to him speak. He had such a nice voice; she’d always loved it and would listen to him to tell her stories for hours on end. “Neither of you probably don’t know it yet since you’ve just been married but…” he trailed off, smiling at her and Changmin with his eyes, “I made the right choice. It won’t take long until both of you feel what I felt for your mother.”

Yoona blushed at his words and playfully shushed him, pouting as she closed her book. “Father, I think you need some air. We should take a walk a little later.”

“Don’t be so shy, Yoona,” he told her, grinning still as he nodded here and there at her husband’s next chess move. Changmin had just overtaken his rook with another knight and said