Soojung's heart broke at her brother's appearence, his bruised skin, his messy hair, his eyes which looked as through their hopes and spirits had been crushed and his figure- he was even skinnier than when Soojung had last visited, to the point where he was beginning to look like a skeleton covered in a thin layer of skin and overhanging clothes. Whereas last time his skin was a greyish colour, now it was pale yellow, his lips were dry and cracked.

"What have they done to you," whispered Soojung.

Jiyong's dead eyes looked into Soojung's, "I told you I didn't want you to come here anymore."

"Oppa, them for what they've done to you, you look like you're going to drop at any moment."

"I might do Soojung."

"Don't talk like that."

"Soojung, if I die in here," she was about to protest, but her brother's eyes silenced her, "I need you to know some things before I do."

Soojung shuffled nervously in her seat, staring intently at Jiyong through the glass.

"Firstly, I've got some money stowed away. I was saving it for an emergency, but now I can't think of a bigger one, especially seeing as I don't know how long I can survive in here. You'll find it underneath the floorboards next to my bed at home."

Jiyong stopped for a moment, pressing his hand to his rib as a spasm of pain flashed across his face.

"Jiyong, you need to keep living, you're the only person I have left in this world."

Jiyong flashed a ghost of a smile, "No I'm not. You've been seeing Seunghyun, even though I forbid you to."

A lump formed in Soojung throat, the back of her neck suddenly becoming very sweaty, "I'm sorry."

"Soojung, you can't see Seunghyun anymore," even at his most weakest, there was an authority to Jiyong's voice that Soojung could not ignore.

"How did you find out?"

"Just tell me something, is he paying you?"

"What!?"

"For your services."

"It's not like that between us, he loves me Jiyong. You have no idea how lonely I've felt since dad died and you got arrested."

Jiyong's hard glare softened, "You need to let him go."

"Oppa, he's the only thing that kept my heart from breaking all these months."

Jiyong sighed, "Soojung, its inevitable that I'm probably going to die soon."

"No you're not."

"Yes I am, you don't understand what they do to people like us behind these bars. And whether you like it or not, Seunghyun is one of those people."

"No, he's different."

"No, he's not. Sooner or later, he's going to break your trust and your heart, in exactly the same way he did to mine."

Soojung didn't blink, "what do you mean?"

"Seunghyun is promised to someone else, he has been since he was fourteen.He's going to marry another girl that isn't you."

Soojung pressed a hand to her stomach to supress the desire to be sick, "What did he do to you Jiyong? What did he do to suddenly make you hate him so much?"

Jiyong's face scruched up in pain, trying to hold back the tears threatening to fall from his eyes.

"Seunghyun could have saved the lives of seven-hundred men including our father's in that mining explosion, but he chose not to."

*****

Seunghyun walked into his fathers office, only for his breath to hitch and for him to turn his back at the site of a woman sitting on the edge of his fathers desk, the man himself parked between her open legs.

"Father, you called for me," Seunghyun said, facing the door.

"Yes, I did. Sit down Seunghyun," his father reliped coolly.

"I'd rather stand to be honest," if his father could have on his desk, what was to stop him from cuming on his chairs.

"I'm sorry sir," the woman on his father's desk said to Seunghyun without looking at him. Her voice sounded young and embarrassed, "I'll be leaving now," she made a move to jump of the desk, but the old man squeezed his hands onto her thighs, signalling that he wasn't done with her yet.

"What was the reason you wished to speak to me father?"

"I have a meeting in parliament tomorrow, and I want you to join me."

"Father, I've told you. I don't want anything to do with your work. My morals won't allow it"

His father laughed, "That's funny, you didn't think of your morals when it came to those miners."

Seunghyun's skin crawled, anger supressed in his gut threatening to spill over, "You didn't give me a choice; do you not care for Mother, she can probably hear what you're doing in here."

"Well, I'm sure she just considers it background noise after all these years. Plus, maybe she'll have drunk so much that she doesn't mind."

"I'm ashamed to call you my father," spat Seunghyun, quickly leavin the room. As he did he could hear his father say to the e:

"You'll get your money when you've given me a ."

*****

"Now do you see why you have to leave him?" Jiyong said sadly, while Soojung stared at nothing.

"Why would Seunghyun do such a thing?" whispered Soojung with glassy eyes.

"Soojung, please leave him. Cut all contact with him, make sure you leave him with nothing binding you to him."

The tears built up in Soojung eyes fell. She thought of her missed cycle, her frequent vomiting, the tenderness and fullness of her s, her recent back pain; suddenly it all made sense.

"I don't think that's possible oppa."

"Why not?"

Soojung hesitated for a moment, avoiding her brother's eye, before saying in a hushed tone, "I think I'm pregnant."

Jiyong's eyes seemed to pop out of his skull, "How could you be so careless?"

Soojung sniffled in reply.

"Soojung, you do realise if Seunghyun's father gets even an inkling of your pregnancy, he will do everything in his power to get rid of your baby. How could you be so selfish?"

"I'm sorry," cried Soojung.

Jiyong groaned in annoyance, "Well there's no point in crying about it now, we need to think about how we're going to protect you."

Jiyong thought for a moment, "Seunghyun can't know bout this either."

"But the child is his," argued Soojung.

"And he's part of the reason our father is dead, we can't trust that he won't go telling his own dad. You're going to have to go into hiding before you start showing."

"Are you not going to ask me to get an abortion?" Soojung was surprised at how reasonable Jiyong was acting. While he was intially fuming, his tone had abated to a softer and more thoughtful tone.

"I'll admit, that was the first thing that ran through my mind," admitted Jiyong, "the idea of something growing inside you that's half upper-class makes me sick to my stomach. But don't you think too many innocent lives have been taken."

For a moment, Soojung saw the Jiyong she grew up with, the one filled with aspirations, hopes and dreams, not the one who was hurting, broken and hateful sat before her.

"Jiyong, what do they do to you in here," Soojung asked.

"It's best if you don't know."

*****

Numbness. That was the only thing she felt when Seunghyun kissed her.

He had arrived at her home after her visit with Jiyong, his arms open to embrace her. But he might as well have hugged a tree, Soojung had no strength nor desire to wrap her arm around his warm body.

"Soojung, are you okay," Seunghyun cupped Soojung's face in his hands. Her face was cold, unresponsive.

She wanted to be angry, shout, scream, anything to get rid of this numbness that was flooding her body. The feeling was foreign to her, even when she was bullied as a child, or when she'd lost a job, or lost her father, or seen her brother be arrested and watched him become thinner with each visit to the prison, she'd always felt some kind of negative emotion.

But never numb- not like this.

"Has something happened to Jiyong," Seunghyun said concernedly, "you went to go see him today, how is he?"

"They've completely broken him," replied Soojung flatly.

"What do you mean?"

Soojung removed his hands from her cheeks before saying, "Seunghyun, you need to leave and never come back here."

Seunghyun desperately searched Soojung's eyes for something, some sign that she was lying, joking or tricking him. But all he saw was blankness.

Her eyes were as dead as Jiyong's had been when she'd visited him.

"I'm not going," Seunghyun said firmly.

"Please go," Soojung's numbness was beginning to ebb away, to be replaced with a hint of desperation.

"No."

Soojung's jaw clenched; telling him to leave was harder than she wanted it to be. If he left, she would truly be lonely. She was angry at how things had become, why did the same man who was like medicine to soothe her breaking heart have to become her poison. He had become like heroine, initially soothing but now he had become detrimental to her.

"Why are you being like this," Seunghyun questioned, "I love you."

Why did it feel like he was pouring hot oil into her ears when he said those three words I love you. Those words which were once sweeter to her than poetry, that would feel like she was watching a metor shower unfold before her on her worst and darkest nights, were now so painful Soojung wanted to be sick.

"How much insurance," Soojung swallowed back her distaste, "did your father get from the mine explosion?"

Seunghyun stepped away from Soojung like she'd stabbed him, his expression one of disbelief.

"It was his property," Soojung continued, "and with so many workers and such a large area, he must have been compensated a lot for his loss."

Seunghyun turned his back on Soojung, unable to look at her. His eyes became moist.

Soojung kept speaking, "When the safety report came from the mines, your father read it because it had his signature. He knew those mines were a ticking time-bomb, that any day they would blow up. But he ignored it, and so did you."

"There were two signatures. I didn't want to believe it when Jiyong told me, so I went to the town hall after I went to go see him. I looked through the public records and found the safety report on the mines, and there was your father's signature," Soojung's voice cracked, "and yours."

"My dad forced me to do it," Seunghyun defended, still with his back to Soojung.

Soojung had to hold onto the door for a moment, dizziness suddenly coming over her, "my father's blood is on your hands."

He turned to look at her, Soojung noticed his tear stained cheeks, "I didn't want to do it. The love my father never gave to me in a lifetime your father would give me in a day. The last thing I ever wanted to do-"

"Don't you dare talk about my dad that way, you're the reason he's dead. All those times you used to come see Jiyong, it never once occured to you that you should warn my dad about what was to come."

"My dad was threatening my mothe-"

"Get out Seunghyun, get out of my house and get out of my life."

"I love you Soojung."

"I used to think the same thing," Soojung stated. What terrified Seunghyun the most about the way she spoke was that she was no longer crying. Her tone had become indifferent and flat, "but even if you leave today, you still have Yoona who you can with."

"Yoona?"

"Your fiancee, that you never told me about."