Sehun felt numb in every part of his body. He just sat there lifeless, waiting for the doctor to say something. It had been a while since he had stopped crying. His hands had stopped shaking. His eyes were now itching because of the dried tears stains and his eyelashes were glued together with the remnants of his salty tears.

His mind was chanting the endless prayers that he had been doing since the time Yun Hee was taken to the emergency room. He remembered feeling helpless when he had held the unconscious Yun Hee in his arms, still in their living room. On their way to the hospital, he kept nudging her face while mumbling the two words “wake up” countlessly. When she didn’t respond to none of that, he buried her face in his chest and finally broke down into soundless cries.

And when she was being taken away by the doctors, he found himself haunted by the memories of their last conversation as an enormous guilt weighed him down. Some of the nurses recognized him from the times he had come to visit Yun Hee during her lunch times, but he didn't bother to hide his disheveled state. The sight of her teary eyes, the betrayed turned broken look on her face when he had told her about the kiss, kept stabbing his heart, deeper with each . Her closed eyes and pale face kept popping up every time he closed his eyes.

Once the doors were closed, his knees buckled under him as he dropped down on one of the seats and buried his face in his palms. Every moment, he found himself wishing to be in Yun Hee’s place, to take away all her sufferings and replace them with boundless happiness. The fact that he was the reason of her sufferings made Sehun want to crawl his way inside the ground and never come up.

And there was that nagging fear, a fear of losing someone very important, a fear that was much greater than any other fear he had ever felt in his life. It hurt a million times greater than it did when Jieun had broken up with him or when he realized that she was never coming back after hearing her engagement news.

The fear was there even then when he was sitting inside the doctor’s cabin, tired and numb from everything. He held his breath and waited for the doctor to speak. Each second felt like a lifetime. Seeing the doctor sigh and playing with her fingers was not helping at all.

“Mr Oh, your wife, I am afraid, has been suffering from severe malnutrition." What? Yun Hee was neglecting her health again? Was it because of the stress he was giving her?

"It was because of her extremely low blood pressure and sugar level that she collapsed. And given her situation…” The doctor seemed to hesitate. “…it became worse than it should have been.”

Sehun could only gape at her words. What kind of situation was she talking about? Suddenly his palms started sweating as all sorts of thoughts swirled around his mind.

As if sensing his confusion, the doctor continued. “Malnutrition and stress can be fatal during pregnancy, Mr Oh. And Dr Oh is still in her first trimester. The fetus is undoubtedly very…”

Sehun couldn’t hear anything she said after that as his mind was busy spiralling with that one news. Fetus? Pregnancy? Yun Hee was pregnant? Did he hear her right?

He probably said his thoughts aloud because the doctor said, “Yes, you did hear me right, Mr Oh. Dr Oh is around 8-9 weeks pregnant.”

Sehun didn’t know what to do, what to say or what to think. Too many questions were bubbling inside his mind. He was going to be a father? Him? A life that he and his wife had created? A part of him and Yun Hee?

Wait! 8 weeks? How come he didn't realize it? Did Yun Hee know? Had he missed the signs?

Suddenly he found himself having a breathing problem as his chest constricted painfully. His eyes that were dry from any moisture got filled with tears and he was crying again in no time. A series of vision played in his mind. He imagined Yun Hee cursing him for not getting her what she was craving, Yun Hee fondling her baby bump while reading a book, Yun Hee clutching his hand tightly while giving birth to their baby and lastly Yun Hee holding their baby for the first time with her eyes pouring down.

Lost in his thoughts, he turned to his left excitedly to find Yun Hee, only to get crushed with the reality. Yun Hee was not beside him. She was lying unconscious in one of the rooms of this depressing place, tired and vulnerable. A piece of news that they were supposed to celebrate together now felt bitter in her absence. They were supposed to hold each other's hands and shed tears of happiness together, then scream like the two crazy people they were and kiss like there was no tomorrow. He was supposed to take care of her even more. Instead, she was pushed to exhaustion by none other than him.

Suddenly her pale face that he had seen before she was taken inside the room flashed before his eyes. That paleness was a result of days and days of sufferings. She had been hurting for so long and he was only cooped up in his own world, trying to hide his conflicts and hurting her even more.

Sehun turned to the doctor who was now looking at him with sympathy. “How is Yun Hee doing, doctor?”

“She is fine, Mr Oh. Her blood pressure and sugar level are both stable now. Though she might remain unconscious for longer because of her fatigue, but otherwise she is fine.”

“And…”

“Your baby?” The doctor asked, making Sehun gulp. His baby. Even the sound of it was oddly pleasing. He really was going to be a father.

“Its heartbeat was really low, making it difficult for us to know what was actually wrong. For a moment, all of us had thought the baby to be dead.”

What? His baby was on the verge of…dying? He didn’t know if it was possible to feel tier than he was feeling then. At that moment, he didn’t want to do anything besides curling up against Yun Hee and apologize to her for failing both of them.

“It took us a while before we were able to detect the heartbeat Mr Oh. But the baby is fine now. Mrs Oh might remain unconscious for a little longer though, but you can meet her.”

Sehun took a seat beside the sleeping form of his wife. After a long dark night, the morning was finally making its way to the world. The room was slowly getting filled with sunlight and a ray of it fell on her face. Taking her limp hand, Sehun covered it with his palms and pressed it against his lips. Then he brushed away a strand of hair from her face and placed a feathery kiss on her forehead.

“We are having a baby, Hee. A baby. Can you believe it? A baby who will call you ‘mommy’ and me “dada”. He or she will be so beautiful. Just like you.”

He blinked away the tears that were pooling in his eyes before continuing. “I am so sorry, Hee. For everything. For hiding things from you, for making you worry, for…” He took a deep breath. “ever wanting to be back in my past. You make me so happy, you know. You make me feel as if I own the world. You have been taking such good care of me, of everything.”

Sehun clasped their fingers and leaned forward to look at Yun Hee properly. She was not hearing him, but he still felt the need to say all these. Because she deserved that, she deserved everything good in the world. “Now, it’s my turn, my turn to take care of you, my turn to give you my all for the sake of your happiness. I will do everything for you and…” He proceeded to place a kiss on her stomach that was covered by the hospital gown. “our bundle of joy. You will give me a chance, won’t you?”

He could only hope things would get better when Yun Hee would be awake.

Things definitely did not get better as he had hoped. When Yun Hee got up, all he got from her was radio silence. She didn’t respond to anything, only kept staring at the window. Even when he gave her the news of her pregnancy, she didn’t say anything. She just blinked away the tears that had formed in her eyes, but otherwise, nothing; not even a sound came out of her.

Going home with Yun Hee was no different. She was like a robot, did everything on her own without saying anything. Sehun didn’t lose his patience though. If anything, he was ecstatic because she was still there with him and they were going to have a baby together, their very first baby.

So even when she removed the ring he had given her on her birthday the very moment she entered their home, he didn’t say anything. He just picked it up and stored it in one of the drawers of their bedside table as a reminder of his mistakes. At least she still had her wedding ring.

Sehun was content with his life. He was okay with making sure Yun Hee had her meals timely, did her exercises properly and took care of herself in his absence without expecting anything from her in return. He had formed a new habit to keep his mind free of depressing thoughts, which was reading pregnancy-related books. And every time he would read a book, he would find himself wondering how he would be as a father. The thought scary, but still blissful.

Telling their family had been such a joyful occasion, especially because the idea was suggested by Yun Hee. Their moms had turned into a squealing mess, while their dads kept patting Sehun’s back and sharing proud looks. Chanyeol kept reminding Sehun how he had the never helped the poor guy from this embarrassing situation when Yun Yeong was pregnant with Ara. At the other side of the room, Yun Yeong kept talking to Ara and baby Ye Joon animatedly about how they were going to have a new cousin while teasingly nudging Yun Hee once in a while. Sehun laughed at the childish antics of their parents, but inside, he was melting into a poodle at the giddiness of being a father.

Later, Yun Hee had found herself surrounded by their moms who kept sharing every single bit of their own pregnancy experiences and advice while she kept listening to them with a smile on her face, laughing occasionally. When Yun Yeong saved her from them by calling her to help her in the kitchen, she gave her elder sister a grateful look and laughed delightfully. It had been so long since Sehun had seen her smiling. So even though everything was just an act, the feeling of having her close and talking with him normally meant everything to Sehun.

Telling their friends did not turn out to be so easy, since all of them were first-hand witnesses of their rocky relationship. Jongin had punched him at first sight, while Min Ah refused to give him even a glance. It was only Baekhyun who gave him an apologetic look on the behalf of his girlfriend, but didn’t say much to him afterwards. With them beside her, Yun Hee broke down completely and let out her feelings that she had been piling up for all those days. Min Ah gave him such a murderous a look when he tried to approach his crying wife that Sehun had to keep standing outside the room, watching Yun Hee cry in Jongin’s arm and his best friend trying to console her.

Things became more awkward after that day. Yun Hee was still avoiding him just like before so things were the same with her. It was actually Sehun who went through the changes. The thought of Yun Hee not wanting him beside her kept bugging him every moment so he started maintaining a certain distance from her. Yun Hee didn’t say anything about that which seemed to prove his thought right and hurt him even more.

Since he couldn’t go near Yun Hee and their baby at daytime, Sehun started talking to Yun Hee’s stomach every night. At first, he was careful enough to do that only after making sure that Yun Hee was fast asleep. And soon it became a routine he would never be willing to compromise, a bonding time between him and his ‘tadpole’. Sometimes he would talk about his day to his baby, sometimes he would introduce Gummy to him and sometimes he would just sit there while trying to stop his hand from touching Yun Hee's stomach, right where his baby was.

But at one point, even his patience had enough. So one night, he found himself sitting on the floor with his head laid on the bed, facing Yun Hee’s unvisible bump. He spent the whole night talking about how much he missed his baby momma and fell asleep while his mind kept figuring out if he had really seen Yun Hee shedding tears or it was just a dream.

Then the next day, Yun Hee talked to him for the first time in weeks, even though it was just for letting him know that she would be starting her shift at the hospital from that day. That morning, they had breakfast together and Yun Hee even accepted his offer to drop her off to her work with silence. When she got out of the car after reaching the hospital, Sehun let out a knowing smile before driving off. It was not a dream. She had really listened to him talking to their baby, those tears were not a figment of his dream.

The effect of expecting a baby was equally euphoric for Yun Hee since itt was not only Sehun who had formed new habits. For the soon-to-be mother, he often found her standing in front of the full length mirror of their bedroom and talking to her reflection in a childish voice while rubbing her stomach. It was such a warm sight that Sehun always found himself standing by their doorway watching that scene without interrupting it. He knew that Yun Hee could sense his presence. But just like he had kept quiet about her listening to him talking to their baby every night, she also kept that knowledge just to herself. It was a nice feeling, knowing things about each other without making a scene out of it.

Jieun was almost a forgotten issue. Though Sehun kept receiving calls and messages from her, he never once replied to them. With her break up news with her fiancé still being a hot topic, it was hard for her to approach Sehun and he was thankful for that. But one day, when Yun Hee answered his phone which was a call from Jieun while he was in the bathroom, he decided that blocking her number would be the best thing to do. He even regretted for not doing that earlier.

Soon came the day they were scheduled for their first prenatal visit and Sehun found himself excited to death. He kept jumping around the whole morning, tripping in his steps once in a while. His hands never had free time from shaking continuously because of his nervousness while waiting outside the doctors room. When they were inside the room, the doctor talked about Yun Hee’s diet for a while of which Sehun took a thorough mental note, did some tests and then prepared her for an ultrasound scan.

When the doctor pointed to a grey dot on the monitor and said, “That’s your baby”, Sehun was forced to consider all the special moment of his life.  He looked down to face Yun Hee, then looked up at the monitor once again. There it was, a new life, his new life inside the most amazing woman in the world, waiting to see the light of the world.

Then he heard something, a soft beating sound resonating through the whole room. He was about to ask the doctor but she seemed to sense his curiosity and replied to his impending question.

“That’s the heartbeat of your baby, Mr Oh.”

Sehun didn’t know he was crying until he felt Yun Hee clutching his right hand that she had been holding and buried her face in his chest. Together, they cried because of the unbound happiness they were feeling at that time, the sound of their baby's heartbeat still echoing through the room.

After returning home, Yun Hee went straight to the library room and didn’t come out until dinner. Something seemed wrong, but he brushed away that thought. Maybe she was feeling very overwhelmed. Sehun didn't pry because he himself was having a hard time coping with everything that was happening in their life. They were really going to have a baby and Yun Hee was slowly warming up to him. His day couldn’t get any better than this. If only he knew what was waiting for him at the end of the day.

Sehun approached his wife who was standing alone on the rooftop, gazing at the sky so intently as if she was trying to find something there. He had been waiting for Yun Hee to come to their bedroom after feeding Gummy when his mind got lost in the earlier events of the day for the umpteenth time. He had managed to spend the whole day in a daze yet he couldn’t get enough of it. He had heard the heartbeat of his baby – soft, rhythmic and pretty much real. His Tadpole had also grown from a simple dot to a very small and disfigured ball. He was so proud of her.

Sehun slapped his head lightly and let out a chuckle when he realized that he was dreaming of a baby girl again. If the past Yun Hee had been there, then she would have been the one smacking his head and muttering something like – “You and your baby girl dreams! What if it is a boy?”. Then she would be looking at him with a pout on her face and rubbing her bump that was barely there. Sehun would laugh and say something like - “We can keep trying until we get a girl” and get smacked again on his head, this time harder. He would burst into a laughter and go over to his grumpy wife, maybe try to pacify her with a few kisses and then end the night with her snuggled in his arms.

Sehun snapped out of his reverie and looked at their room that used to be their happy place, the pictures were the unavoidable proofs of that time. The room was still the same, but the people residing in the room had changed drastically. The bitterness of familiar melancholy stung his heart like a thousand angry bees. This is how he had been living his days, slipping in and out of fantasies that had very slim chances to be true.

His eyes fell on the clock when he realized Yun Hee had been gone for 20 minutes. Feeding Gummy wasn’t supposed to take that long, was it? Sehun went downstairs and saw the pup already done with his meal and looking cosy in his crate, but his wife was nowhere to be found.

He ended up searching the whole house, on to find her in the rooftop, looking at the sky silently while he was grasping for a breath, after running around for a while. It was one of those many moments he found himself regretting the largeness of their house.

Once his breathing became regular, Sehun slowly approached Yun Hee and stood right beside her, placing his hands on the railings and leaned his upper body towards it just like her. The night was a peaceful one, with gentle breeze soothing the heat of summer.

"Can't sleep?"

His wife looked so calm beside him that she didn’t even feel the need to answer his question. Sehun didn't min though. The sight of her brown hair shining under the moonlight and swaying in the wind, occasionally covering her face – Sehun found himself in a trance. Her very existence felt like a dream he was afraid of waking from - beautiful and out-worldly with the perfect tinge of sadness.

They stood there side by side, with no words exchanged for quite a while with Yun Hee looking at the sky and Sehun looking at her. After days of painful silence, the tranquillity of the moment seemed too good to be true for Sehun. Then, Yun Hee spoke up. After weeks of silent treatments and one-worded answers, she said something casual making Sehun feel like the god had finally answered to his pleas. And to his utter surprise, she even had a soft smile on her face.

“Sehun, remember the first time we were here together?”

She was still looking at the sky, so Sehun could only see her side profile. But he knew that she was also reliving the memory of their very first date, just like him. It was a simple, cosy dinner date, but to Sehun, it was a start. A start of some hardships that had later, led to the most beautiful months of his life, moments that were giving him the strength to endure their current hard times, memories that were more than enough for the rest of his life but still made him greedy for more.

“You know, you have asked me countless times about how I realized my feelings for you.” She let out a dreamy sigh before smiling wider. But Sehun sensed a sudden change in the mood. It didn't seem so casual to him anymore.

“That night when we were lying under the stars, with me tucked in your arms, I just looked at you and suddenly I got hit with multiple realizations – one of them being ‘Damn I want to spend the rest of life with this dude’. It was that simple for me.” Then she chuckled mockingly, like how one would do to make fun of his own self. “After days of thinking, fighting, struggling and losing, I finally realized that. So simple, right?”

Another silence prevailed. At least he hoped it was since he was failing badly in controlling the mad beating of his heart that would have leapt out of his heart if Yun Hee hadn’t said her next sentence by then.

“It was one of the most magical nights of my life…” She lingered, making him put all of his focus on her. Something about her tone was not right. “…which also became one of the most horrible ones. Happiness with you never seems to last very long, does it?”

Sehun felt a punch in his guts when he heard her last sentence. She was right. Happiness between them never lasted much long and it was always because of him.

He remembered spending the night in his study after putting Yun Hee to bed, crying and sobbing over the news of Jieun’s engagement. Now those days seemed so far away, as if they were just the figments of a nightmare, not actual events. Sehun wondered if he would even react anything like that if he were to face that situation again, not because he was used to it, but because he didn’t know if he cared enough.

The night when Jieun had kissed him, the only thing that was going through his mind was getting out of there and go back to Yun Hee. Which he did, after a while of crying and hitting himself for getting fazed by Jieun when he was in her garage. He never got to tell Yun Hee how sorry he was for everything.

“I am so sorry for that, Hee. I know…”

“No, Sehun.” She stopped him aprubtly, like the last thing she wanted from him was his apology. The bitter still lingered on her face. “Now that I think about it, Hun… It was actually my fault.” This time, Yun Hee looked at him.

Sehun didn’t know what to make out of her expression. Fear clouded his mind just like the night he had to her to the hospital, the fear of losing her. So he stayed still, as she kept saying thing she seemed to have been thinking for a while.

“We had a silent deal when we had agreed to give our marriage a chance. I was supposed to help you to heal first. Then if possible, maybe fall in love together. But silly me.”

She slapped the side of her head lightly before laughing slightly. “I went ahead like a fool and fell for you when you were not ready. You must have felt so burdened with the responsibility of returning my feelings, didn’t you?”

She was still smiling as if the whole thing was just a casual conversation for her whereas, Sehun felt his heart hammering against his ribcage. What did she mean? Yun Hee couldn’t probably regret loving him, could she?

“Hee, why are you saying things like that?”

His voice was failing him when he needed to ask the question. Clenching his fists, he willed his voice to come out and so it did, as hesitant as possible.

“Do you…regret…us?”

The smile in Yun Hee’s face faded as dejection graced her face. Sehun would have thought that her expression mirrored him, but there was no desperation in her face like he was feeling at that time. All she had was just a ghost of pain; as if she was determined to face whatever that was hurting her, including him.

She closed the distance between them and connected their forehead before taking his face in her hands. By that time, Sehun found himself shaking, on the verge of breaking down, not being able to take her calmness anymore. It was only her breath mingled with his that was still keeping him intact. But what she said next, took away even the last bit of his cool.

“You are one of the best things that has happened to me, Hun. I can never, ever regret anything about you.” Then she placed a brief kiss on his left cheek. “The foolish me loves you too much to still want to spend my life with you.”

“Then why do you sound like it's not possible?” Now the desperation inside him had reached his voice.

“Because it doesn’t matter what I want to do if that is something I cannot do. And I can’t do this, Hun.”

“Why?” Sehun’s voice cracked. He didn’t know he was crying until he felt a wetness when the pad of her thumbs met his cheekbone. His focus kept coming back and forth from her teary eyes to the beautiful smile adorning her lips. Something about those two seemed to match painfully. She moved her face away from his and focused on the sky once again.

“I can’t run away from the reality anymore, Hun. This marriage, us, the whole thing is a mistake, a beautiful mistake for which I could give my all. But now with Jieun in the picture, I can’t do this anymore.”

“There is no Jieun in any picture. It’s just you, me…” Then he placed held her shoulders and turned her to face him. “…and our baby, Hee. Nothing else matters anymore.”

He grasped her hand tightly and brought them to his lips, whipering his requests on them. “We can make this work, Hee. Please, don’t say things like that. You are scaring me.” Now he was begging, but he didn’t care.

“I want to believe you Hun, but I have reached my limits. I thought I could do this, but I can’t. I can’t live every second of my life in the fear of you leaving me someday. I can’t live in the fear of the day when my love alone won’t be enough. I can’t wake up one day feeling like the luckiest woman on the earth only to go to bed being crushed by you at the end of the day.” Yun Hee’s voice broke at the end and tears gushed out from her eyes. Both of them were crying now, with Sehun letting out constant huffs and Yun Hee shedding tears silently.

“Then what can I do to put your heart at rest? What can I do to get rid of this fear inside you?”, Sehun said, his tone was filled with despair. He would do anything, if only it meant Yun Hee would stay.

But what he heard next shattered all his hope, rendering him void of any kind of emotions except the anguish that was now burning everything. He regretted ever having a heart because, at that moment, he felt as if he would rather rip it out of his chest than feel the extreme pain it was giving him.

He let go of her hand and took a step back from her as she dropped down on the ground right after telling her answer.

“I want a divorce.”

Hello fellas. This is Anikasen.

I hope you haven't forgotten about this story. 

Sadly I have nothing else to say except complaining about my crappy days, so I will not say much. I hope you will enjoy this long chapter with not much happening. 

Take care, guys. I will come back as soon as I can. Love you all...