eight of twelve

The thing about Junmyeon is that she never wishes for anything that evokes a feeling.  

 Growing up in an environment where every material thing is given upon her behest and realizing that the little non-material things, the things she craved and needed, wouldn’t be given as easily as the physical ones, she has long learned to stop wishing.  

But when she wakes up, body slotted against Yifan’s warm embrace, she begins to wish. Waking up to a partially darkened room with someone she can gladly spend the rest of her life with, Junmyeon desperately wants. At the back of her mind there’s an insidious whisper: she can have this, if she is willing to put his happiness on the line, if she is brave enough to grit her teeth and hide the truth from him.

The whole thing is comparable with wanting to put the entire ocean in a paper cup, impossible.

Eventually, she removes herself from his hold. Yifan startles, wakes and stares at her with bleary eyes. There’s a half-asleep smile on his face and Junmyeon’s heart breaks a little.

Yifan says, “good morning” and pulls her back. He holds Junmyeon and she sinks into his embrace just a little bit more. She can fool herself, maybe if she closes her eyes this would last.

He presses a kiss to her hair, whispers, “I adore you” in his native Mandarin. Junmyeon fists the sheets and forces herself to move away. He must have forgotten that she speaks the same language as fluently as he does. Junmyeon pretends to not have heard it, pretends to ignore the heartbreaking sincerity of his affections so easily portrayed amid the morning calm.

“Good morning.” Junmyeon grabs her underclothing from the floor, the bedsheets around her bare skin fall off. She doesn’t really care that Yifan can probably see her whole ness.

Warm palms slide down her waist, and a pair of lips whispers against the junction of her neck and shoulder, “Stop stripping.” Yifan chuckles. His voice is deep and soothing. Junmyeon turns, cups his stubbled jaw and kisses him squarely on the mouth. “I’m . Where’d the hell did you toss my bra?”

They stare at each other and after processing the seemingly normal, almost mundane question, the two, laugh. Junmyeon’s life is in a complete utter chaos, spiraling out of control so fast she couldn’t even begin to dream of putting an impermanent pause to it. But there’s this moment of nothing but familiarity, of complete and utter normalcy, and her life felt right for once.

“I lost it between the sitting room and the hallway.” Yifan smirks, “I may or may have not done that on purpose.”

Junmyeon playfully narrows her eyes at him. “Definitely on purpose. I didn’t think you were one of those guys who liked braless women parading around wearing your big shirts.”

“Not everyone.” Yifan kisses her again, “Just you.”

Junmyeon melts into his touches. Maybe breakfast can wait.

Kim Jongdae is in the kitchen when Junmyeon comes down. The engineering student is glaring holes on his laptop screen and to the unfinished blueprint on his drafting board.

“Rough day?” Junmyeon goes straight to the coffeemaker and pours herself the remaining concoction inside the jug. It’s almost midday – what was supposed to have been a brief make-out session had turned into something so much more. Jongdae hums, sighs and after making a face at his laptop, tosses his pencil to the table. “I don’t think I can get through this. The calculations are driving me nuts. It’s too much stress for a Saturday morning to be quite honest.”

Junmyeon glances at the man’s laptop which seems to be running some sort of structure design software. On the blueprint is an unfinished draft and a bunch of numerical scribbles running down on each side of the wide parchment.

“Need help?”

Jongdae chuckles, “Every help possible.”

Junmyeon deciphers the numbers. The calculations remind her of the more challenging trigonometry problems she did during her own engineering days but nothing near impossible. She does finish it. Jongdae is more than surprised when she inputs the right numbers into the software. “Where’d you learn that?”

Junmyeon shrugs, “I have a PhD in engineering.”

“But aren’t you in finance?”

“Yes.”

“Holy . Wait, are you the one answering the problems in front of the engineering building?”

She nods. Jongdae would have figured it out anyway.

“You and hyung will produce scarily intelligent children. He has photographic memory and you’re basically a genius.”

Yifan, her, and children it seemed like a great thought but isn’t completely feasible otherwise.

Junmyeon smiles sadly. Family would have been beautiful.

“I think you’re really good for him.” Jongdae remarks.

 “Why do you say that?”

Jongdae finishes the rest of the calculations, grabs his errant T-square from the floor and finally completes the draft. “Because for the first time since I met him, he’s finally learning to enjoy… living. There hasn’t been a major change in our lives, so I think it’s got to be you who’s been making him happy.”

“I’m glad then.” Junmyeon says.

It never occurred to her that what she’s planning all along will have the capacity to potentially devastate him.

Junmyeon has always been selfish, and for the next few days she would remain so. She fooled herself and strung Yifan along because she needed to feel loved, to have something she could hold on to.

It never occurred to her, not once, that what she will do to the both of them might negatively impact Yifan in the long run. Because it wasn’t a charade, he loved her. Junmyeon didn’t think, she took all he could offer and never looked back.

In reality, she wasn’t saving him; she was saving herself.

~*~

When Junmyeon closes her eyes, she could still hear the near perfect rendition of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring echoing through the walls of the dusty music hall.

The music hall has always been their space. It was testament and witness to numerous realizations not necessarily about love but about life in general. It’s where Junmyeon first noticed that her pulse gets a little erratic whenever Yifan is near, it’s where Junmyeon first realized that she must be in love with him.

She didn’t want to taint this place with a bitter memory but it seemed appropriate somehow, that this be the place where she tells him everything. She would be ready to face his anger and it wouldn’t be a bitter memory.

If it’s with him, she would be fine with everything. Even the painful ones would be cherished, because at least she would have proof that once upon a time, she loved, and she was loved too. 

Earlier, a representative from the Trinity College Cambridge called to confirm her re-enrollment. Junmyeon had rolled her eyes, they knew her, but what they want is the complete solution to the existing Navier-Stokes problem. She started working on a counterexample for Navier-Stokes’ existence and smoothness after acquiring her engineering PhD, but had it botched a year and half after completely losing interest over it. She was twenty, far too young to be stressing over something that wizened scientists have worked over for decades.

And for once, she’s studying economics not Mathematics nor theoretical Physics. Boring[SR1] she knows,[SR2] but what the master puppeteer wants, he gets.

Nonetheless, the manuscripts are gathering dust inside Junmyeon’s file cabinets, hundreds of papers containing scribbled notes and equations folding upon each other. It gives her migraine, but maybe getting her heart shattered would move her forward.

“Why’d you want to meet in this dusty place?”

Junmyeon felt like she’s drowning in thin air. “I wanted to hear you play. Will you?”

Yifan stares at her in amusement, hopelessly obliviously to the tempest that she tried so hard to hide.  The man finally sat before the piano and played a symphony for Junmyeon to hear. The piece was haunting and yet impossibly calming. It drew her in like his own soft touches.

“That was definitely not Debussy.” She says after the final note echoes into a finish. Yifan turns around, his back to the piano. “For you?”

Junmyeon smiles at him. She loves him, so much.

“You wanted to tell me something?”

There it was, the ultimatum. At the end of the day, everything would boil down to this. Junmyeon’s not ready, in fact she’s terrified. She admitted her fears and Yifan, ever sweetly, held her close and told her that it’s alright.

“Whatever it is, it’s okay. I understand.”

The words gave her reassurance and maybe a big splash of blind courage.

 Junmyeon began to talk and Yifan’s phone rang. An emergency call from the hospice had taken her last chance to tell him the truth.

He stood up. Junmyeon panicked, she was watching him leave like fine sand through her fingers.

 “It’s a patient. They need me.”

No, no, no. Her flight was in a few hours and Yifan was leaving and he knew nothing.

Blind courage propelled her forward, a palm closed around his arm and pulled him back. Junmyeon kissed him, poured every unsaid apology, every hidden feeling into that one kiss. It was more than idiotic to think that it would be enough.

“I love you.” Blind courage.

She knew her declaration would be nearly meaningless. At the end of the day, she left and told him nothing.

Not even a goodbye.  

Yifan looked far too happy. “I love you too.”

Junmyeon had to sit after watching him go. Her breath was coming in short gasps, it was a borderline panic attack and she had to force air into her lungs to breathe.

She never noticed the wetness on her face from the tears she obliviously shed.

~*~

Growing up, Junmyeon never had a best friend.

At five, she was acquainted with this odd kid that helped with the gardening in the Kim family’s estate – a mansion hidden in the outskirts of Seoul. The boy wasn’t a kid, he was seven years older than Junmyeon and only humored her because she entertained him with knowledge she wasn’t aware she possessed.

Jungsu was always with her and for two summers they remained great friends, until his father ceased working for the Kims. Junmyeon never saw him again. Up until she was shipped halfway across the globe, the only companion Junmyeon called a friend was a hyper golden retriever named Panggi.

It was a life of relative solitude until Byun Baekhyun came into the picture. 

The Byuns were Korean expats in the UK. Junmyeon first met their youngest son, Baekhyun, in genius cram school. The boy, while not nearly as intelligent as Junmyeon herself, was a genius in his own right and quite hilarious.

Junmyeon and Baekhyun were great friends, sticking with each other and ploughing through equally disdainful subjects that shouldn’t have been taught to kids their age regardless of their high IQs.

He was his best friend and family rolled into one. Baekhyun knew her like the back of his hand and Junmyeon can unravel Baekhyun like he’s a complicated partial derivative.

And Byun Baekhyun is very gay. His humor and lighthearted sass have always been there through Junmyeon’s darkest days.

 She still remembers how Baekhyun came out to her: he panicked through the phone because he kissed a boy and loved it and Junmyeon had to fly herself to London to calm him down.

They had good memories and currently said Byun Baekhyun paces through her spacious sitting room ranting in his accented Korean.

It’s been a month since leaving Seoul and Junmyeon feels hollow. She’s not sad, she doesn’t feel anything at all. She wakes, tries to feed herself and goes about everyday life like she hadn’t left her soul in that dusty music hall in Seoul National University’s old liberal arts building.

It’s an understatement to say that she misses Yifan.

The first few days were the most terrible. It’s like dealing with a death of a loved one though the reality is far from it. Junmyeon isn’t really versed on the ways of coping so in the unhealthiest way, she had suppressed her grief.

The thing is, when Junmyeon is sad she drinks herself to oblivion, but when she’s empty, she studies. Mathematics is a good distraction.

Books, papers, pencils and unwashed mugs littered the previously pristine space.  Junmyeon did not stop until she passed out from sleeplessness and exhaustion. If it weren’t for Baekhyun, she would have actually managed to kill herself.

When she came about, she’s in the hospital with an IV line pumping nutrients into her bloodstream. The tall doctor reminded her of Yifan and it’s all too much. Baekhyun didn’t say anything when he sat beside her on the hospital bed and allowed her to weep into his neck.

It hurts.

~*~

“Do you like,” the way Baekhyun flips through the finished pages of the Navier-Stokes’ counterexample implied that he is more than confused, the man’s eyebrows are furrowed. “understand this? I mean it’s all so nauseating. I know you’re a descendant of Archimedes or some like that but now I’m pretty sure you’re not even human.”

Junmyeon chuckles, “Do I look relatively inhuman to you? Damn, I thought you think I’m pretty. You wound me Baek.”

“Shut up Myeon. I’m serious. This stuff is legit, do you plan to publish? I have the connections just say the word.”

Junmyeon grabs her coffee mug and finishes the rest of the remaining liquid. “I don’t know. It’s partially finished, I still have to check with the professors, experiment a little and kiss a few asses. I’m tired Baek and we both know theoretical mathematics isn’t really my cup of tea.”

“Then why don’t you just go for what you like and ‘em for once. It’s been years Junmyeon and you’re still strung up like a puppet. Don’t get me wrong, I love you and all, but you really need to stand up for yourself.”

Always easier said than done. Junmyeon appreciates his effort though.

“Not everyone’s like you Baekhyun. You know they have me in a chokehold.”

Baekhyun puts the manuscript on the coffee table and stares at Junmyeon like he can see through her, he probably can. She has well kept secrets but when it’s with Baekhyun, she’s an open book with words jumping off its pages. “No, you’re just afraid to let go. I think deep inside you’re still craving for their validation that’s why you’re here, studying something you loathe and distracting yourself with things that never interest you. Stop lying to yourself Myeon, and maybe things will work out.”

Junmyeon gives him a sardonic laugh. What Baekhyun said cut too close to home and it’s ironic how the truth is almost hilarious when it happens to be painful.

Maybe he’s right, maybe Junmyeon needs validation because she’s been ignored and casted aside for most of her life. Is it wrong to crave for a fragment of affection from people who’s supposed to have loved her for who she really is?

How ing tragic then.

“I don’t know Baekhyun.”

“But that’s not the problem here.” The man says.

Junmyeon knows exactly where this conversation is heading. They’ve both been ignoring the elephant in the room all the while Junmyeon had simmered in her own misery. At least Baekhyun didn’t want to scratch out the wound when it’s still fresh and bleeding.

“You hate a lot of things because you’re such a cynical sometimes, but I don’t think knowledge, in any form, would cause you this much grief. Now, tell me what exactly happened with Yifan.”

Junmyeon sighs and finally talks. She tells Baekhyun about the hospice and the underlying threat in her father’s words, the last fourteen days and just how much she loved him.

Baekhyun doesn’t talk for the longest time. He sits there and processes the words Junmyeon told him with an impassive expression. When he finally opens his mouth, it’s with a flat voice that asks Junmyeon a question she didn’t know how to answer.

“Did you really love him?”

Junmyeon looks away. “I thought it’s clear enough that I did.”

“No, just answer the question. It’s a yes or no.”

“Yes, Baekhyun. I love him.”

“Then why the did you leave him?”

“Because I – “

“Because what?”

Junmyeon left because she wanted him to be happy. Did she do the right thing?

Maybe she didn’t.

What she had with Yifan – feelings, love the whole nine yards – though beautiful, had also been strangling her and she had been so helplessly oblivious. She’s blinded by her love for Yifan that she feels compelled to save him.

Save him from what?

It’s never clear from the beginning. The parents had never implicitly announced that they intend to do something horrifying to Yifan, in the first place they never really cared about Junmyeon nor the people she chooses to interact with. Junmyeon had made hasty decisions regarding her relationship – or lack thereof – to Yifan. It never occurred to her that maybe, she should have asked him. After all she wanted to shield him from the hurt.

She approached the situation completely on impulse, she never stopped for one minute and thought that maybe her family wasn’t the threat to her own happiness. Her family hadn’t been the threat to her and Yifan.

It was her own fears.

“Cat got your tongue?” Baekhyun moves to sit beside her. Junmyeon invades his space and exhales as she listens to him talk. “You’re the most intelligent person I know but you’re so ing daft when it’s about the emotional side of things. It should’ve been so easy Junmyeon, you just had to talk to him.” Baekhyun sighs. “Even if you loved him, you had no right to dictate where his happiness should be. And what you did in those fourteen days was selfish Myeon, and cruel. I know you have reasons, but you shouldn’t have just left without telling him anything. You don’t abandon the people you claim to love.”

“I wanted to tell him.”

“And you’ve been here a month, nothing’s stopping you.”

“I can’t.”

“See. You can Junmyeon, but you choose not to. It’s love Junmyeon, it’s not some nauseating, unanswered mathematical theorem. It doesn’t have to be that complicated and lastly, it doesn’t have to hurt.”

Junmyeon remains sitting there, long after Baekhyun leaves for his own classes at King’s. She decides to ditch her own lectures in favor of mulling over the epiphany her best friend had just left her.

Baekhyun’s right and wrong at the same time. Emotions are complicated period, but it also shouldn’t hurt this badly.

Did you love him?

Junmyeon asks herself again and like the first time no concrete ‘yes’ pops into her head like she assumed. She wonders why it’s hard to admit that yes, she did love Wu Yifan. There shouldn’t have been a moment’s hesitation.

She remembers that conversation they had on school grounds. It’s not easy to fall in love with a person and not just the idea of love. It was poignant, beautiful and all too vague. Junmyeon never really understood what Yifan meant by falling in love with the idea of love but maybe this was it. She loved him but more than that, she was also in love with the feelings that came with him. Yifan made her feel appreciated, gave her existence a purpose, a validation. Junmyeon had basked in everything he had to offer.

 Junmyeon thought he was perfect though Yifan made it clear from the beginning that everyone is flawed. She put Yifan up on such a high pedestal, saw him through rose tinted glasses to protect one facet of his being –  the facet she fell in love with.

“.”

Junmyeon realizes the reason why she fears the moment he learns the truth about her, because by then Yifan would have shattered that own image. He would have loathed her and in the image that Junmyeon saw him in, Yifan didn’t have the capability to hate someone, more so if it’s her.

In the end, Junmyeon did love Yifan, but she was only in love with the Yifan that was willing to offer the moon to her, with the Yifan that loved her too much. She’s not sure if she could also be in love with Yifan’s less than beautiful sides, with the Yifan that’s flawed and imperfect, with the Yifan that she never really saw.

Baekhyun is right, Junmyeon can undo everything. She can come back, fall to her knees and beg for his forgiveness but in the end, she chooses not to because she’s afraid.

She really didn’t save him, she saved herself.

Junmyeon is selfish, always has been.

~*~

“You are awfully quiet and honestly, it is freaking me out sis.”

Baekhyun had his arms around her waist and Junmyeon is too lost in her thoughts that she does nothing to stop Baekhyun from invading her personal space, he’s always been such a clingy monster.

“I was thinking about what you told me yesterday.” They stop in the middle of the street and Junmyeon stares at all sorts of people going on about their business and she wonders if she’s the only one who feels like she’s lost in the middle of a wide desert.

Baekhyun stops in his tracks but his arm stays firmly around Junmyeon’s waist, as if he’s offering her comfort. Junmyeon appreciates the gesture.

“I loved him Baek, I really did, and I still do.”

“What’s stopping you then?”

“I’m selfish and I wanted to say he’s better off without me but we both know that’s my greatest excuse.”

Baekhyun gifts her with a smug smile. Junmyeon shakes her head, laughing amicably.

“I’m not coming back, well not yet. Maybe this time I need to figure myself out first, love myself a little bit more.”

Dramatically slapping his chest Baekhyun declares, “ah my child is learning. I have reached the pinnacle of my existence.”

Junmyeon smiles, “I’m leaving us to fate for now. After all, I do believe that if it’s meant to be then it’s meant to be.”

Baekhyun, touched, leans forward and leaves a sloppy kiss on Junmyeon’s cheek. The latter rolls her eyes at the exaggerated emotions playing on the man’s face.

“Look, since you’ve finally reached an epiphany we need to celebrate. I’m visiting the parents later and you need to come with me. Let’s eat good food, sing pop songs and get unbelievably faced we forget our names. Sound good?”

“Sound good.”

Junmyeon needed to learn how to love herself first. After all, how can she love someone else if she can’t even love herself?

~*~

//

It’s a known fact that time moves excruciatingly slow for someone who’s anticipating something.

 Days, weeks, months, years and countless hours spent in libraries, coffee shops and orphanages, pass. It’s been two whole years and in under seven hundred days, Junmyeon relearns herself.

She steps into her own closet of skeletons and cleans it, bit by bit. It’s hard to find balance when faced with the demons she ignored half her lifetime and at times she just wanted to run away from it all.

Predictably, she starts seeing her doctor again. Junmyeon never really felt comfortable with someone sifting through her flaws and baring it out to her in less than flowery language. She’s too prideful, unprepared and far too scared to face her own problems but she realized that she needed someone to point them out and paint them clearer than a spring day. It’s a rigorous process but otherwise, soul cleansing.

Junmyeon learns that she can’t always hide behind a mask, pretending that everything’s alright. Over time, she finally admits that she’s not wholly fine perpetually standing behind her own brother’s overwhelming shadow and she admits that it hurt far too much when her own parents largely ignored her that through the years she had learned to numb herself. This suppressed grief negatively impacted her life and it’s the root cause of her own demotivation and cynical tendencies. Despite literally having everything from money to brains, connection and heartbreaking beauty – or as what countless people tell her – she still went about life like it was a dreaded cycle of unending inanity. Nothing was there that made living worthwhile.

She thought she protected herself by caring less but in reality, she merely held it in and eventually this perspective affected not only herself but also the way she interacted with people and her relationships.

It was a long way to healing but at least the road was paved and Baekhyun was consistent in his assistance, he was there through and through.

Junmyeon is flawed and that’s okay. It took so long to really acknowledge her imperfection but, in the end, she realizes that despite her metaphorical cuts and bruises, she is still capable of loving herself and in turn loving someone else.

Maybe this time, she can finally reciprocate Yifan’s affections without expecting anything less than perfect from a man as flawed as she is.

Wu Yifan.

Junmyeon never really moved on. She thinks about the doctor constantly and thoughts of him would always bring a bittersweet smile to Junmyeon’s lips.

She really had been cruel, and like slow acting poison in her blood, Junmyeon is always thoroughly reminded of her selfish, reckless and idiotic decision. She quells these thoughts down though. In the moment they meet again, she wouldn’t begrudge him for not wanting to have anything to do with her, but if there’s a sliver of chance that he wants her back in his life then Junmyeon would fight for that chance with everything she’s got.

Just another year, she’s going to finally return home and hopefully, to Yifan as well.

~*~

Six months later, Junmyeon prematurely returns to Seoul. She’s a few weeks shy of completing her education, and to be completely honest, she’s more than ready to handle the reins of Kim Mixed Industries without wanting to raze it to the ground. She’s different now, equipped with a world perspective that isn’t as selfish.

It was a call that pushed her well thought plans into a domino of chaos.

 “Your father had a heart attack.” 

Junmyeon hasn’t heard her mother’s voice in years. Miran remains the ever-sophisticated socialite as she relays the news. Junmyeon knew she tried to sound unaffected but her voice trembled even through the phone.

“We need you to come home.”

Left without a choice, Junmyeon hurriedly says good bye to Baekhyun and to the life she’s gotten quite used to.

To be back in her homeland is a jarring experience. In three years, nothing really changed much but she changed, Junmyeon changed a lot.

When she stares at the mirror she doesn’t really find the person she used to be, anymore. A year and half ago, she had her waist length locks chopped and she hadn’t felt anything as her bright red hair fell unto the ground.

She looks better, professional…grown up. She’s finally the person whom her mother can look upon and nod in approval.

Junmyeon has decided to accept her fate and she has long ceased on running away from her problems. Two years ago, she hated the very prospect of inheriting her father’s position, but the thing is, she has been built for it. Junmyeon held no passion for anything but she admits, economics, business and money in general come to her like second nature.

And Jongin doesn’t really want anything to do with the conglomerate just yet. Her younger brother graduated from his own business program and is currently harnessing his dancing talents in his quest to move on from Jung Soojung. Jongin won’t be back for another five years and Junmyeon’s ready to take on his position for the meantime.

~*~

Kim Jihoon, Junmyeon’s father, doesn’t look fragile at all – pale perhaps.

Junmyeon had been indifferent to her own parents growing up, she didn’t hate them, she didn’t particularly like them either. She just wanted to be away from them.

But seeing her father, lying pleasantly unbothered on his hospital bed, Junmyeon realizes that the apathy she had towards him, is merely concealed hatred. To be quite honest, she loathes her father.

This man treated Junmyeon like a well-oiled machine than a daughter. She never heard him speak to her until his wife recognized that Junmyeon harbored an intellectual capacity fit for a genius.

 You need to be the best.

And Junmyeon was the best. But did her father even say the littlest of his appreciation? A small smile, I’m proud of you. God, Junmyeon would have been so happy.

But he never did and Junmyeon allowed her life to spiral out of control because maybe she wanted him to notice. Junmyeon was the best, her father didn’t care; Junmyeon ed up, he didn’t care. Nothing really mattered but the business he helped build from scratch.

And now, it’s like nothing can undo this hatred, it’s like a disease that has no cure.

The man on the bed finally opens his eyes, he directs his gaze at Junmyeon and somehow, there’s a smile on his face.

“I’m surprised you came home.”

Junmyeon scoffs, “Your wife instructed me too. Need someone else to sit on your throne now, father? The doctors tell me you almost popped an artery.”

The man looks away, “Cold as ever. You are like your mother.”

Junmyeon crosses the room and sits on the sofa near the man’s hospital bed. She scoffs before she says, “Were you waiting if I’d fall to my knees and cry then? Don’t expect too much, I don’t think I would have shed a tear if you actually died. And I’m sure, you would be the same if it was me.”

“I don’t harbor such thoughts.” Kim Jihoon partially rises from his reclined form. “You are still my daughter after all. But I wouldn’t begrudge if you don’t see me as your father.”

“Stop lying to yourself. We both know that you, nor mother, don’t think of me as your child. You just didn’t care enough.” Junmyeon stands up and heads for the door. The conversation is stifling. Just as she’s about to turn the doorknob, the ailing man tells her the words that conveniently stops her in her tracks.

“For what it’s worth, I am sorry.”

Junmyeon doesn’t turn. “I don’t need your apologies father, I just needed you but it’s too late for that now, I suppose.”

“No, I apologize. Your mother and I pushed you too much. You have potentials that can give you so much more than money, so much more than what we had. We wanted you to pursue that more than anything else. It’s what’s best for you.”

Junmyeon, unable to contain the anger brewing inside her, turns and laughs, mocking and indignant. “What’s best for me?”

Anger is such a complex emotion. One can be crying whilst angry and Junmyeon happens to be one. She hates that her anger turns into tears.

“Do you know how ridiculous that was, father? Even in my craziest imaginations, I never thought you’d say that. How can you know what’s best for me when you don’t even know me? To you I existed, somewhat, but more than that, did I even mean anything other than the person you forced me to be?”

Kim Jihoon, pale and almost fragile, smiles. It’s a vague expression, it wasn’t really a happy smile, more than anything else, it was sad. “And for all that you’ve said, I am sorry. I think you are right, I do not really know you, and I am very sorry it took me all this time to apologize for what we did. I do not expect you to forgive me, nor am I forcing you to. I just want you to know that I am truly sorry, at least by this, I have done one thing right as your father.”

Junmyeon looks away. She doesn’t really know how to categorize the maelstrom of emotions swirling inside her like a damned hurricane.

“If you were given the chance to do it all over again, would you have treated me like your daughter?”

Jihoon does not reply for a long time.

“At the end of the day, I am me, and you are you. I will always push you to greater things because I know you are capable of so much more. You can instigate a change in the world.”

Junmyeon does not understand why the words lanced. She’s used to it, but why does it still hurt so much?

“Yes, I guess at the end of the day, it’ll still boil down to this.” Junmyeon finally turns for the exit, and as she twists the doorknob open, she tells her father. “Don’t worry, you don’t need to tell me anything else. I will sit as interim for both of your positions until you recuperate. Jongin isn’t going to come back soon so I’m taking over for him too. Good bye, Chairman Kim.”

As soon as her father can’t see her, Junmyeon allows herself to release the breath she’d been holding. She looks ahead and not a minute later, cries.

It’s hard to accept what the old Kim had said. To be rejected twice by the family she thought she had is another stab to the heart. She wants to blame the universe for giving her to people who never wanted her in the first place. She wants to blame the universe for being born.

It’s with this state that the woman meanders aimlessly around the hospital. The pristine white halls and the cloying scent of disinfectant are fantastic distractions. She passively thinks of Yifan. The same man she selfishly abandoned without explanation, the same man she never wanted to hurt but she still did anyway. Junmyeon’s far too good at ing up non-harmful relationships.

Yifan finished medical school a year and half ago. Junmyeon had read about him and the study he published in a respected medical journal. The last she heard, Yifan is the youngest head of neurosurgery in a private hospital in Seoul.

 She’d been so proud of the man he became. She wonders if Yifan’s moved on from her, and from all the joy and pain they brought into each other’s lives. Junmyeon constantly thinks of him. She never really allowed herself into somebody else’s life while she’d been away. It would have been selfish to barge on another human being just to seek for something she associates with Yifan alone.

She’s selfish, but not enough to use other people as rebound for her idiotic decision.

Is he married now?

Junmyeon would have been happy, nonetheless. He deserves someone who loves as intensely as he does, someone who will never break his heart. Junmyeon will be happy for him even if it hurts her.

Junmyeon continues to aimlessly wander. She’s standing on the manicured lawn shadowed by the enormous hospital building. Wheelchair bound people are being chaperoned by staff decked in hospital scrubs of varying colors.

It’s here, after almost three years, that she sees Yifan again.

Junmyeon quits walking and stares. Yifan is wearing royal blue scrubs under his immaculate white coat. What used to be auburn hair is now jet black and, cropped short. The chunky glasses are gone replaced by frameless spectacles. Junmyeon smiles, there’s the man she loved and still loves.

Suddenly, Junmyeon wants to run to him and have him hold her. She hadn’t been actively thinking of the things she’d do and the words she’d say if she ever meets him again. She thought there would have been elaborate words and grandiose gestures but now that they’re here, Junmyeon just wants Yifan’s touch, the most basic human instinct of needing to be close to someone we hold dear.

But for now, Junmyeon manages to content herself by watching him speak with his wheelchair bound patient.

 Then suddenly, Yifan looks to her direction, Junmyeon freezes. Did he see her?

She wants to cry for a second time, nothing would have prepared her for this. Junmyeon screws her eyes shut and inhales, and just as she’s about to open them. She hears someone call, “Doc Wu!” from behind her.

There’s a woman – a female doctor – appearing from behind her. Yifan must have looked up when he noticed the other doctor. Junmyeon hides the clear hurt by an awkward chuckle. “Of course, of course.”

The female doctor hands Yifan a chart. She tells him something that makes Yifan smile. The other doctor looks at him with an expression of adoration, it’s evident on her pretty face.

Junmyeon turns away from the scene and mumbles, “Of course, of course.”

There’s pain emanating from her chest. She ignores it.

~*~

The board of directors comprises fifteen people. Mostly balding men that should have retired long ago, sat around the long conference table. They’re clearly appraising Junmyeon and the latter refuses to back down.

These are old men, experienced but far too incompetent. Her father knew this, thus consequently wanting to put Jongin into the highest position available as soon as he’s willing, to avoid these old men from bringing Kim Mixed Industries unto the ground.

They don’t like her, and that’s okay. She isn’t in the position to lord over people’s opinion of her. They can all think for themselves and if they want to associate Junmyeon with the terrible reputation that precedes her, then so be it.

What’s important is growth. The conglomerate is a formidable force to be reckoned with, but it won’t stay in that position if these old timers vote to stay in their comfort zones. No growth happens without risk and Junmyeon’s far too willing to take a risk.

Currently a younger director is propositioning a field that KMI’s never toyed with. The prospects excite Junmyeon but at the back of her mind, she knew she wanted this for other ulterior motives. The rest of the directors furrow their eyebrows, clearly not wanting to venture into foreign territory with an interim commander in position. They don’t trust Junmyeon. Unfortunately for them, even though Junmyeon doesn’t share a warm, familial relationship with her father, the old man trusts her enough as a business partner. And what the master puppeteer wants, he gets.

The presentation finishes. Junmyeon leans unto the table and places her chin on top of her fingers. “Let’s go into healthcare.”

If she successfully conquers this field, then she and Yifan might have their chance, another chance, and hopefully this time, her luck won’t run out as quickly as it did.

The directors stare at her, and one by one, an agreement is made.

~*~

On the frosted glass door to the office of the CEO, a golden plaque with an inscription is emblazoned. The plaque says:

JUNMYEON KIM

CEO and Chairman

Kim Mixed Industries and Co.

Junmyeon stares at her name and smiles.