Chapter three: Start Anew

When they left the hospital, the sun was a few hours of setting. Cho Hee decided to let the two alone after she was assured her friend was okay. Doctor Seo made the exams required, took a tomography, and made blood tests and others. With the results she had so far it showed that Ha Jin didn’t had anything worrisome appearing, but some tests the results would be just out in the next week.

But she was cleared with recommendations to not tire herself, and if she felt anything different to come directly to the hospital. Yeon Hwa agreed with her senior doctor and added a few more recommendations.

So seemed more at ease after the words of the doctor, and was driving her somewhere. Ha Jin took that opportunity to look at him in his modern garments, she didn’t have the time to appreciate it before. He was dressed casually with clothes she knew were expensive by how they felt at her touch when she hugged him, and of course the presence of the brands in them.

He was wearing a dark gray long sleeved shirt, which he had rolled the sleeves until his elbows, with denim trousers. She felt conscious of how she was dressed. With a simple white oversized shirt, with golden buttons and lacy sleeves, and a black legging.

“What are you looking at?” his deep voice startled her and she looked ahead blushing. She heard him chuckle beside her. “But really, what is so interesting on me?”

She blushed more and cleared trying to stall a bit. But in the end, she answered.

“You look different with this clothes.” At the same time, they stopped at the red light and he looked at her curiously. “And I miss your hair… Your long hair I mean.”

“You look different too” he said. “But you are always beautiful, always.” His smiled almost blinded her with such honesty. And she smiled back. Before she could surprise him with something she wanted to do, the light turned green and he put the car on motion again.

“Where are we going?” she finally asked.

“You will see” he answered simply.

“You like to do this kind of things…” she said with an amused smile on her lips.

“It keeps it interesting.” He said, his tone denoting his joke.

He accelerated his car and turned the left, entering the street that was parallel to Han River, and realization hit Ha Jin.

“Are we going to Han River Park?” she asked looking in awe how the sun was so close of the waters of the river, the orange painting the dark waters. She heard him chuckle.

“Yes.” So stopped before of a crosswalk to let some people cross the street. “I know is not our lake… But I thought would be better to talk in a place close to that.”

Ha Jin felt her heart race in her chest just to remember the lake they spend so many hours together. A place that witnessed most of their love developing, and the place that witnessed so much heartbreak too. The car started again.

“Is a good idea.” She said softly, and the car made a turn to the right, entering the parking lot. “Considering our lake is in North Korea now.” She giggled, making him chuckle with her.

Soon the car stopped in an empty parking space. So turned off the engine and exited the car without saying anything, while Ha Jin was still unbuckling her seatbelt and grabbing her purse, to appear not long after opening the door for Ha Jin. He extended his hand to her. She looked at the extended hand remembering of the many times she refused it and the many times she took it.

With a smile, she took the hand, and he clasped it tight, helping her to exit his car. His smile was big and so sweet that she felt her heart race again. This time was all the feelings she had for him. All love she kept for a thousand years.

“Let’s go” he said after he closed her door and locked the car, she nodded. And still holding hands they started to walk, side by side.

They entered in one of the many trails that led the way into the waters of the river. They kept in a comfortable silence, enjoying the company of each other. Around them the day was turning even more dark, some stars already appearing in the indigo blue sky, and the sun was almost kissing the water of the river at their left. Some lights were starting to be . The beauty of the Han River Park at that time was breathtaking, almost magic. As it was their love.

They didn’t saw the time passing while they were just enjoying the contact of their hands, their fingers interlaced, their steps at the same rhythm. Their hearts beating for each other, as it was supposed to be. Their walk led them to a bench facing the river, where they sat. The sun was already half way into the waters. Ha Jin looked at So, the orange halo surrounding him, it made him even handsome in her eyes. His sharp eyes were looking directly at hers.

“How you end up in coma?”

“What your brothers meant as ‘that girl’?”

They asked at the same time. They stopped a bit surprised at the other’s question, but they laughed soon after. He nudged her to go ahead, and she sighed.

“I…” she started. She diverted her eyes of him and looked at their hands interviewed. She turned to look at him. “Do you remember that Hae Soo changed after her experience of drowning? You did hear about it, right?” He nodded, he remembered of hearing about it from Baek Ah. “Is because Hae Soo never came back from Damiwon… I did.”

So titled his head to the side and with a look of puzzlement he asked:

“What do you mean? And what it has to do with your coma?” he furrowed his browns. 

Ha Jin bit her bottom lip and played with his fingers, looking for the right words.

“Two years ago, … I discovered that people I trusted made me a fool, I lost my money, my house, my job, my best friend and my boyfriend” she recalled the events of that year. So was listening to her attentively although he felt a pang in his chest, he wasn’t the first in her heart again. But at the same time his blood boiled at the perspective of what happened to her. “I decided to burry my sorrow with a soju bottle in a park near a lagoon, there I met Jimong… Or beggar version of Jimong…” she furrowed, remembering the presenter version of the astronomer she met at the exhibit. “We had a bit of a chat about lives, and then when I saw a boy was drowning on the lagoon, no one has noticed, and I didn’t have any option than jump to save the boy. They just noticed it when I jumped.”

She paused and looked at the waters. The sun was slowly disappearing and the water were completely orange. So looked at the river too, two years… Two years ago, his memories started to appear at every time, not just in his dreams.

“A solar eclipse started to occur that moment, and then I just remember of pushing the boy over the boat his father paddled to there, and I started to drown… The last thing I saw was the eclipse and images of all bad that had happened to me.” She continued, still looking at the Han River. She felt him squeezing her hand. “And when I broke out of water, I was in Damiwon… In Hae Soo body.”

This made So look at her again.

“What?”

Ha Jin looked at him as well, with an apologetic look in her eyes.

“I don’t know what happened exactly… I just took over Hae Soo body. I don’t know if she was a doppelgänger of mine, or she was my previous incarnation… But my 21-century spirit traveled the past to that moment. Hae Soo was supposed to be dead that day. But I took over instead.” She saw how his face changed at her words, how his face passed to confusion to understanding.

“This make so much sense…” he chuckled in disbelief. “It makes sense all your ideas and ideals, your words… The emoticon.” He shook his head. “Jimong said you were from a different world, and indeed you were.” His eyes flashed all his fondness. “But you loved me, despite it all.”

Ha Jin smiled and reached his face with her free hand, caressing his cheek with her thumb.

“I love you.” She said softly. He leaned his face on her hand, enjoying her touch. “But… Being the 21-century girl I am, I committed the biggest mistakes too.” He was about to interrupt her, but she was quickly in continue. “Apparently travelling spiritually at the past like this, give you an especial treat… One that I think is more like a curse. We have visions, visions of the future of that time our spirit travels.”

So looked at her inquisitively, his eyes speaking so many questions and Ha Jin could see all of them.

“I had visions of Gwangjong” she said, she didn’t take her eyes of him.  She saw how his eyes showed his surprise. “I never was a good history student, so I remembered bit and pieces of Goryeo time, and when I had visions of Gwangjong going up to the throne, and how I remembered him, I got afraid, for all of you. I didn’t know who he would be at first…” She couldn’t read his expression anymore, he had his browns furrowed, but he seemed very concentrated in her words.

She sighed at the same time her heart clenched inside her chest. She knew that this moment would be the worst. She didn’t want to hurt him, no more than she had already did. But she needed to let it all go, to talk this all with him, for them to start anew.

“H-How did you remembered Gwangjong for?” He said before she did. His deep voice broken.

She looked at his eyes intently, looking for the right words to start what she knew would put so much things in a new perspective for him.

“Just say it” he said, and she could see that he was bracing himself for anything that would leave her lips.

“I just remembered Gwangjong… For being a b-bloody t-tyrant, that ascended to the t-throne k-killing his b-brothers.” She stuttered at the painful parts. So closed his eyes with a pained expression. “But now I know it isn’t true… Not because I saw it. I discovered the title they gave you were because of political disaffection. You received it after your death.”

The week prior, after she realizing all that dreams were memories she researched all she could about Wang So, in the process recovering more memories and details, and discovering how wrong she was. Although she was sure she played a great role in the changes on Gwangjong, she too remembered the things she heard at school about him, and she noticed she was such a fool.

“I still killed people, Ha Jin-ah.” He said, His eyes were still closed and the pain was visible on his tone.

“Yes…” she said. It was still a difficult matter for her, but after she studied so much the history, she was starting to be perceptive of how his period worked. He wasn’t crueler or less cruel than others of his time, he was acting according to his period. But still, as a 21-century girl it was a difficult thing to accept. “And my mistake was to be trapped in the future.”

At those words So finally opened his eyes again, his eyes still filled with pain.

“Like I said, I had visions about Gwangjong…” she continued, looking directly at his eyes, asking him to listen to her and look at her. To not leave her after she finished. “The first clear vision of him… You, was in the rain ritual, when you looked at me after the rain started…” she paused for a bit, this time she closed her eyes. “I saw you in emperor robes looking so cold, so somber… And I was so afraid. I couldn’t understand how could you be that way, why…” she paused again, she felt his hand cupping her cheeks again, wiping away the tears she didn’t know she was releasing. “All I could think was I didn’t want any of you to die, I didn’t want to any of you kill because of the throne...” she couldn’t say more.

“So, you tried to go away… From me. I remember.” He said softly, and she opened her eyes to meet his.

“But I couldn’t… I was drawn to you.” Ha Jin said sincerely. “I tried to fight it, but I couldn’t. You were already there in my heart, but I didn’t acknowledge…”

“You were with Wook…” So’s voice had an edge when he spoke. His eyes were a bit hard in thinking what happened in the past. How things ended.

Ha Jin shook her head, her lips forming a humorless smile.

“I didn’t know what was love until I met you So-yah,” she said smiling sincerely this time. “I deluded myself with Wook because was easy, he was too gentle, too sweet, the first person that extended his hand when I was feeling completely at lost, but now I noticed… I noticed I never was myself with him. I couldn’t be myself with, like I was with you.” She sighed. “I was completely myself with you, but I was too fool to noticed that…”

“You were afraid of me too, Ha Jin, I remember you saying it.” He cut her. He dropped one of his hands to his lap.

“Yes” she sighed. “The visions I had, didn’t had any context, it was just brief moments…” she held his hand that was still in her cheek. “I saw you killing Eunie at the day of his marriage… The exact scene that happened years later, when you actually had to kill him, but then I saw the truth… I was basing my reactions in things that weren’t accurate. I was living my life thinking of the future, that I lost the grasp of the present.” She sighed again. “I did what your father asked me not to do… The Emperor Taejo asked me to not live in the future, but the present, but I just did what he feared.” She laughed a laugh without humor.

“Eun’s death was my fault after all… Because If I had believed in you, I could have prevented it all…” now the pain was clear in her voice, and she felt him caressing her cheeks. “It was late in my life that I noticed I was doing everything wrong, I cut our time together short because I was stupid…”

“You were not stupid, Ha Jin-ah, you were human…” he assured her, smiling for a bit. “You were strong too, you put up with so much things, with us, with me… And I did change at the end. All that happened with us made me change, it made me more… Greedy, more ready to the vicious politics, I changed, I wasn’t Wang So anymore, I was Gwangjong.”

Ha Jin saw the regret, and the pain, and loneliness in those eyes she loved so much. So’s eyes still had that hidden boy suffering in them. The boy Wang So was once.

“I was hurt when you left me to marry Jung, I wanted to hate you. But I couldn’t… Even that I thought you had just Wook in your heart, my heart didn’t want to let me hate you.” He pressed his forehead on hers. “For a time, I received reports on you and Jung, and even went there myself… But you two were being so sweet that I couldn’t take it, I couldn’t take the thought of you two that I didn’t want to hear anything more about you… If I had I would probably hear about you dying, but I was selfish, I was afraid… And your letters, they had Jung’s name in their front, I didn’t read them… Not until I heard you were dead, and Jimong told me you were sending me letters.” He let all of his thoughts out, and Ha Jin was listening with tears threatening to fall from her eyes. “You waited for me, they said…”

“So…” she choked.

“But I read them. I went to see you, but was so late.” He continued. “And I understood why you left…” this time he choked. “I understood that you needed to go away, and when I met Seol, it was so clear… Even more when Jung said that it was your wish to her never live at the palace.”

Ha Ji gasped, the tears escaping her eyes completely with his words.

“You m-met her?”

“Y-Yes, I met our daughter.” Tears of his own streaming down his eyes. “She lived a happy life out the palace, my love, she lived happily… I know this for sure.”

“Did you h-hate me? B-because I never let you be her father?” she asked, fear coating her heart.

“No!” he said quickly. “Never… I understood more. I couldn’t be her father, she would be in danger… No, I couldn’t do that with her. I was better being the uncle.” She could see it pained him still.

“I’m sorry”

He shook his head, and now circled his arm that was in his lap in her waist, pulling her closer.

“I should be the one asking sorry…”

The sun was completely set. The starts and the street lamps illuminating their faces for them. The silence followed their last words, they spent the moment looking at each other, loving, healing, treasuring each other.

“We promised once to never lie to each other, let’s keep this, and add one more… Let’s not keep things of each other, never again.” So was the first one break the silence they were.

“I promise.” She said. “And you?”

“I promise…” He smiled. “And… How this explains your coma?” he asked.

And this made Ha Jin remember their previous talk.

“Oh well… When I died in Goryeo, I woke up back in my body in the 21-century, I had spent one year in coma after drowning, and for a long while I thought all those memories were just dreams, I dreamed about you every night the year after I woke up from my coma, but I discovered they were true when I was in the opening of that exhibition about Goryeo time last week.” She said, and he nodded, connecting some dots in his head. “And you will answer my question? Ah… Let me add one more, how did you remembered?”

He chuckled and caressed her cheek again.

“Well… I remember I am Wang So for as far as I remember, and like you my memories came on dreams, so I just thought they were dreams… Until that exhibition. I remembered it completely today.” He saw the surprise in Ha Jin’s doe eyes. “I had just realized my dreams were memories today, and I met you… All I wanted. But had a funny thing…” he said, furrowing a bit. “And it coincides with your accident… Two years ago, my so-called dreams started to appear in my mind every time of the day, with a lot of frequency when I was close to my brothers… I guess it was because you were coming, you are coming back to me.” His smile illuminated all his face.

Ha Jin smiled fondly and half hugged him too, making them even more close.

“So, you remembered about me all your life?”

“Yes…” he chuckled. “To the point that when I was a bit tipsy I would blab about you to Eun, and him being the wide mouth he is, told about you to my family other day.” He shook his head half amused half annoyed. “And at the time I thought you were just a dream, but I saw myself speaking of you to them, as someone I encountered long ago… What is not a lie, but it was not in this time.” He sighed. “That’s why they said you were ‘that girl’.”

“Ahhh” Ha Jin nodded in understanding. “I said to my friends I met you before, so… We just have to think of the details of how to put our relationship in this period.” She approached her face of his. “But… Before we discuss it, can I do something I really want to?”

So raised his brows, the question clear in his eyes. Ha Jin smiled mischievously. Without warning she leaped forward and her lips met his in a chaste kiss. He was startled first, but soon he was corresponding her, putting all his love, desire, longing in it. And she was doing the same. They separated when the air was necessary, but was just to catch the breath and soon their lips were on one another again, this time a full kiss with tongues exploring the other mouth and hands grabbing to pull the other closer.

The night as the witness of their love gaining a new layer, a new beginning. But the night wasn’t the only witness of the scene, three pairs of eyes were intently looking at that scene in front to them, hidden behind some trees out of the path the couple were.

The younger Kims were looking at that in utter shock. When they decided to follow their older brother to know more about that girl they didn’t expect to meet this scene later. Eun and Jung were the ones that had the brilliant idea to wait outside the Hospital for the couple to exit, and they dragged Baek Ah along, the latter tried to dissuade his brothers, but they simply bribed him with a new guitar, and so that’s why the wisest of the younger brothers were there as well.

They witnessed the talk the couple had minutes prior, although they couldn’t listen to what they were talking at the distance they were, they could see all the emotions the couple were demonstrating. And it let the brothers quite curious. But they felt relieved when the atmosphere changed again for something light again, and was when they saw the two started to kiss. Too passionately.

“They know they are in public, aren’t they?” Eun asked, he was hiding his eyes behind his hands, but he was watching the scene through his fingers.

“! I don’t think they mind it.” Jung answered.

Baek Ah whistled low and chuckled.

“Our hyung knows what he is doing, huh?”

Eun and Jung looked at Baek Ah as if another head had appeared on his neck.

“You two deserve this for being two curious cats.” He said and walked out, to give the couple some privacy, with his hands in his pockets.

“Yah! Hyung, wait for me!” Jung whispered in tone a bit more louder and run after Baek Ah.

Eun looked one last time to the couple, that were now looking at each other’s eyes again whispering to each other, and run after his younger brothers, he didn’t want to witness another make out session.

Later that night Ha Jin was laying down in her bed smiling giddily at the thought of the kisses she shared with So at the Han River Park. She turned around in her bed and hugged her teddy bear snuggling it, letting a giggle escape her lips.

“I will court you again” he said seriously, when letting her in front of the house she lived with her mother. “Wait for it, Ha Jin-ah”

Her smile grew bigger at the memory, she couldn’t wait to see what he would do. She snuggled Teddy bear even more and sighed in contentment.

She played with her comforter as she felt her eyelids heavy, and before she noticed she was sleeping with a smile in her lips, the taste of his still on them. And this time dreams of the future came to her, the future she wanted to have with her love. With her Emperor. With her Joon So.

N/A: And here it is the new chapter :D I hope the talk was what you were expecting, I confess I liked that part. I just hope I had conveyed all the feelings the characters were feeling, because they were as important as the talk itself.

Now we will have some time skips hahahaha Because the story will advance from now on. And we will have some development on their relationship. Brace yourself for the fluffiness!! Just to let you all know u.u

I really hope you have liked here so far, so don’t forget to leave a comment, if you want :3

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See you next chapter!

Nath :*