A/N: I won't say much here because I'll leave a rather long note at the end of this post, since it's the last. But I wasn't really sure how I would write some parts so I apologize if it's half-baked or whatever. Also, I'm thankful to everyone who has read, commented, and supported this story all this time. Thank you so much! So without further ado, here's the last chapter. 

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“Are you sure this is the right size?” Seulgi remembers Wendy's hands, and by extension her fingers, being small. The amount of times she's held it makes her certain. This ring is too big.

“I'm not but my wife is. You know how crazy she is about details. She's never wrong, Seulgi.” Taeyeon replies.

“Ah, you're right.” Maybe she's just being paranoid. It's Tiffany after all. Taeyeon smiles.

“You got everything you need?” She asks.

Seulgi checks her pockets, nods.

“Alright. Don't worry about Yerim. We got you covered. Just focus on this one. Good luck, kiddo.” Taeyeon pats her on the head and sends her off.

--

“Seulgi, where on earth are you?” It’s a little past seven. It’s only been three months and Seungwan doesn’t like not being at home with their daughter when it gets dark and it shows in her voice. Actually, Seulgi knows this already. So why is she calling her to come to this park at this time? She’s not trying to wiggle out of her turn to make dinner, is she?

“I'm not telling you.” Seulgi teases.

“Yeah, you don't have to. Your location's on and I can tell.” She deadpans.

There's a frantic rustling from the other line which is evidence that Seulgi fell for her bluff. Seungwan laughs.

“You meanie. It's not.” Seulgi says. She can almost see her pouting. Cute.

“It's not. So where are you?” Seungwan presses, tries to get to the point.

“Why don’t you try and find me?”

As soon as Seulgi says it, Seungwan sees the tall walls of white fabric in bamboo frames, forming some sort of installation art maze on the park grounds just ahead of her. Neat and nicely constructed. There’s no question. Seulgi’s in there.

“Are we playing hide and seek now?” Seungwan asks. “Seulgi?” The line is cut.

Sighing, she puts away her phone in her pocket and walks closer to the maze. What is it this time? This girl is just so spontaneous and so full of surprises.

Upon approaching, a small picket sign staked to the ground greets her. The words ‘A Map of Kang Seulgi's Heart' are written in tasteful calligraphy. A small chain dangles from the sign to which a ring is attached and Seungwan has an inkling of what's going to happen next. With shaking fingers, she takes the ring.

A mixture of adrenaline, excitement, and curiosity courses through her veins as she steps into the maze. With each step that followed, her heart starts to feel like it would burst because upon the walls, hanging by a string, were numerous photos, illuminated by small white light bulbs that serve as a beacon to light her path as well.

And the photos, they were of her - from everywhere. From her childhood to her teenage years, from high school to university. Not missing anything. There were pictures of her with her family, with her friends, with Joohyun, with Yerim taken before and taken recently. It was like a documentation of her whole life. Where did Seulgi get all of these?

Her feet picks up more speed as she takes a left turn and then a right but it seems that whichever turn she takes only leads her to more photos and more walls.  But she doesn't stop and instead moves on, following her instincts until she gets past the middle and to the end where Seulgi stands, waiting for her.

“Really? An photo exhibit?” Was the first thing she could say, too overwhelmed to know where to even begin.

Seulgi shrugs. “I'm an artist. What do you expect?”

“Are you telling me there’s more to this than you sweeping me off my feet with what looks like a month’s worth of effort to making this?” Seungwan stops in front of her, feels her entire being on the brink of supernova. To think that Seulgi did all of this for her and more is too much to handle.

“Didn’t you read the sign? It’s a map of my heart.” Seulgi takes one step closer to Seungwan, grabs her hand that’s holding on to the ring with the chain. “I’ve waited for you for a long time and now that I’ve found you, you should know this.” She takes a deep breath, looks deeply into Seungwan’s eyes.

“It doesn’t matter if I was lost and that I couldn’t be found for long time because every ‘who’, every ‘what’, every ‘how’ and every ‘where’ I’ve been through has lead me to you.” Seulgi closes the distance between them, takes Seungwan’s hand and pulls from her pocket a ring (the ring from the picket sign wasn’t for her but for Seulgi).

“I’m saying that if my heart were to be mapped out… the start, the middle, the end, every turn left or right, north or south, all of it has brought me to you. And if I were to do it all over again, it will always lead me to you.”

So Seulgi’s telling Seungwan that she’s convinced that everything she went through before her, not just the pain, not just Soojung but her whole life, all of it was for the two of them to be with each other like this, to complete each other, to be in each other’s arms, to be everything the other could need.

Now, there’s only one way to go forward after knowing this truth. It’s something they can’t ignore and something that shouldn’t be held off any longer. It’s something Seungwan has to know and something that Seulgi has to ask.

With a confident voice, with her past behind her and her future in front of her, she asks “Son Seungwan, will you marry me?”

Seungwan’s eyes are b with tears. It’s all too much for her to keep on looking into Seulgi’s eyes. She gathers her courage and clears .

“For now let me say yes.”

“For now?” Seulgi sounds outraged.

Seungwan sighs exaggeratedly and Seulgi knows she’s joking. “You do all the work, you know?” She points out, pouts at her as she loosens the ring from the chain and puts it on Seulgi’s finger.

“I did tell you I would do more than stay so-” Seulgi tries to explain as she too puts the ring that she has on Seungwan.

“Still you should leave some for me to do.” Seungwan exclaims.

“I am. I’m leaving it up to you to say yes and to be happy.” To Seulgi, that’s all Seungwan really has to do because if she’s happy, then Seulgi is too.

“Oh, Seulgi.” There it is again, that helpless look. Then she feels the need to make things clear. “Yes, I will marry you.”

Seungwan throws her arms around Seulgi and holds her under the light of the moon and the stars and the numerous little light bulbs from her installation art. She holds her and kisses her and wishes never to part with her.

“Where did you even get all these pictures?”

“I had help from Suzy and the guys. And from your mom and your sister too.” Seulgi answers, suddenly shy.

“You talked to my family?” Seungwan asks, surprised.

“Yeah, they said they’ll be happy to fly here for the wedding.” Seulgi grins at her, takes her hand. “This is it, Seungwan-ah. This is the start of our happy ending.”

Seungwan smiles because what is there left to do but that. “The silver lining I refused to believe existed?”

“And now you’re seeing it with me.” Seulgi says. “So now, let’s go home to our daughter?”

Seungwan nods. She takes Seulgi’s hand and smiles at her. “Let’s do that.”

--

Months later…

The hotel room is full of activity this early morning. Four adults and one little girl are inside. One is stuffing her face with food. One is putting on makeup. One is sitting quietly one the corner with a balloon in her hand. One is doing the little girl’s hair as the little girl writes on a piece of paper with a yellow pencil.

Dear Joohyun unnie,

Or is it Joohyun umma now? Wan umma’s probably going to say it’s Hyun umma. Anyway, today’s the day! But I know you know that already. Aunt Taeyeon keeps on insisting I write you this letter even though you already know everything ‘cause I know you can see it from up there. She even bought a red balloon to take this letter to you. But I guess I’m writing this too because I want to. I miss you a lot, Joohyun umma.

 I’m doing fine here. I’m doing great actually! I’m going to a new school now. It’s the same school as Sooyoung unnie. We’re together all the time now. We only part when it’s time to go home but even then, she makes sure to walk me home. She’s my person, you know! Even she says I’m her person. I get really shy when she does and feel all giddy about it. But… can I ask you something? If a person kisses you, that mean they like you, right? What if they kiss you a lot of times already? Does that mean they really, really, really like you? Because Sooyoung unnie… well… I don’t want to ask Seulgi umma ‘cause she’s going to tell Wan umma and Wan umma’s going to freak out so I’m asking you. I can ask you this, right? Wan umma always tells me how lucky I am to have three moms when other kids only get one or two.

Anyway, aunt Chorong’s almost done with my hair now. She made it all pretty with pink ribbons. I really like the color pink now! Remember back then when I didn’t? Well, I like it now. I’m going to be the flower girl for today and Seulgi umma’s going to be the one to walk the aisle because Wan umma’s done it before with you. But who did you do it for? Will you do it for Wan umma when we all meet there?

Everyone’s just really happy right now. I bet you are too. You sent Seulgi umma for Wan umma after all. Aunt Bomi says this is our silver lining after a really long and dark night. Aunt Tiffany says it’s a metaphor. I don’t know much about metaphors yet but I bet it’s something good.  

So Aunt Taeyeon says I have to end this letter now. I’ll write to you again soon, Hyun umma. I really miss you! Until next time!

Love, Yerm  

Yerim folds the paper neatly just as Chorong moves toward Bomi on the other end of the room.

“What are you still doing eating? I told you to check on Seulgi!”

“I’m going to do that now, Rongie.”

Taeyeon walks up to Yerim with the balloon in her hand even as the two bicker in the background.

“Ready for take-off?” She asks Yerim. Yerim nods then helps her tie the letter to the string of the balloon. Taeyeon holds Yerim’s hand once they’re done. “Let’s send it to Hyun now.”

“Hurry up you two.” Tiffany calls from the doorway with a stern voice but Taeyeon only rolls her eyes at her.

“Forever can wait for just a bit, hon. It’s not going anywhere for Seulgi and Seungwan.” She says as takes one last look in the room and sees the brilliant sunrise outside.

Fin.

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A/N: Wow. Okay. Let me just process some things first. The foreword's published on the 13th day of September of the last year. It's August now and that means it almost took me a whole year to finish the story. This is not exactly how I planned things to go. I was following a timeline which I tried to sync real time but failed to do so. Like so many other things. For example, I wasn't able to develop the side pairings as much, especially Taeny. I intended for them to be the role model to the younger ships but that fell through because I got so absorbed into writing Seuldy. And I never got around to reply to your comments as much as I wanted to. Sorry for all of that. Sigh. I won't delve much deeper into what I regret not being able to do so I'll talk about something else.

I'm really, really thankful for all of your support! All the comments, the upvotes, and for just reading! I am sincerely thankful because I wrote this to express (express what, you say? Hmmm) more than anything. I wanted to write a story about loss and how it changes people. How after going through it people will never be the same. But at the same time, I wanted to show that there's hope underneath all that. I wanted to write a story that could connect to the people reading it. I wanted to make characters that are loveable and relatable. And I'm not sure if I got to do all of that but writing this has really helped me cope with my life so I guess I'm still happy with this. Again, thank you all for reading! Thank you all for staying! <3

I'd probably be on hiatus for some time because my studies are in the way right now. You'll probably see me every now and then lurking around AFF, commenting on other fics though. So, yeah. I have more stories waiting to be written so please anticipate my return. I'll continue to improve on my writing. And I'll really make an effort to communicate with my readers next time (Sorry, I have poor social skills). Till next time! 

- Bluekimchi