01. LOVE, REGRET, HATE.

There's a quote from Dante's Inferno which says,

"Do not be afraid; our fate 
Cannot be taken from us; it is a gift."

I always liked to think, that the worst that can happen is already set in stone. That we have nothing to fear, whether victory or loss. That we must simply accept, that we have been born with our beginning, and will live to carry out our end.

I once told Jungkook this, but he replied, "Yerim, I don't believe in fate."

Jungkook says that most things happen for a reason, and that everything that happens without reason is coincidental. He says it's why there's more bad than good in the world. That we, humans, are not helpless, and that is why research exists.

He returns to me a Latin proverb, which says, "If there is no wind, row."

And, in the true spirit of Jeon Jungkook, a poem by Hemingway:

"I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul."

—

I imagine, if a documentary was made about the story of my life, it'd be rather boring.

"Yah! Kim Yerim!"

The camera suddenly pans on a young woman with neatly chopped, muted-brown hair, wearing a stylish grey blazer and a matching tailored skirt. Her right eye is a bit red from being stabbed with a mascara wand first thing in the morning, and she's seated at her plaque-embellished desk, head bent over, guiltily stuffing her face with her third egg tart of the day.

That's me—Kim Yerim. Twenty-five years old, CEO-in-training of my father's Morpheus Luxury Hotels & Resorts, and still being called upon like a middle-school delinquent.

"I know what you're going to say." I protest in between hurried gulps of my breakfast, holding up a manicured finger in dull attempt to keep Joohyun's nagging at bay. "Type-2 diabetes, clogged arteries, heart attack, high cholesterol, et cetera et cetera—I've heard it all from Jungkook already."

The pretty—gorgeous—woman in front of me is my one and only secretary, Bae Joohyun.

Three years ago, she was hand-picked for me by my father, and I can see why. She's everything I want to be—an all-round perfectionist, from diet to wardrobe. She's got the face of an A-List actress, the body of a model, and the work ethic of a beaver during dam-building season.

She willingly eats kale salads, for God's sake.

"Mr. Jeon is right, Yerim." Joohyun huffs. She inhales sharply, as if it hurts to breathe around high-calorie content. "Your father—"

My father—Kim Minseok, the first man I ever came to love. Charming and handsome, even in his late fifties, who never quite lost his enigmatic streak.

When I was little, he'd sit me in the shotgun of his white car with red-leather seats, and take me out for a drive at sunset. There would be just the two of us, and the radio would play the heavy bass music that my mother hated. The wind would tangle my hair into knots, and he'd spend the hour after we got back sitting on a stool in my purple-wallpaper bathroom, comb in hand.

During that hour, I loved to ask my father questions.

"Dad, why don't I have a brother or sister?" I used to ask, "All my friends do."

His answer was always the same: "Because you, Kim Yerim, are all I ever wanted. You're Appa's little princess, and that's enough for me."

At the thought of my father, there's a slight pang in my chest. It's subtle, but I know it's there, like a lingering cloud of guilt.

I know my father won't particularly approve of my engagement to Jungkook.

It's not because he doesn't like Jungkook, and it doesn't have to do with petty family rivalries, either. My father doesn't judge people unfairly. He once said that Jungkook will go far, and I can see that he respects Jungkook's character for what it is.

The reason my father won't approve of us is because he knows that Jungkook doesn't love me.

He's always known.

"My father is in New York, unnie." I say as I stand from my seat, cleaning the crumbs from my desk.

If Joohyun notices the way my face falls, she doesn't mention it.

I take a sip of my coffee. "Now, when did you say that meeting was?"

That's when Joohyun checks her clipboard, on which a baby pink sticky-note is plastered above a stack of this week's memos.

"There isn't one." she informs me, pressing her lips into a thin line of red. "I actually pushed back your schedule today, at Mr. Jeon's request."

I don't remember a time where I didn't have a morning meeting—neither has Jungkook ever neglected an entire day of work just to see me.

I pull out my phone, tapping Jungkook's contact and dialing his number.

"You know, I've never seen your face this often." I joke when he picks up the phone, "Normally, you disappear long enough that I forget what you look like."

There's a short silence on the other end before I hear Jungkook's quiet, muffled laugh.

"Experiments don't run themselves, Yerim." His voice is a bit broken by static, which means he's still in his laboratory.

Two nights ago, he'd left my apartment at 4 A.M., after insisting I drink two glasses of water and putting me in bed. That night, I'd woken up countless times at fifteen-minute intervals, unable to fall into slumber.

Even now, I still wondered if it was all real—I hadn't expected Jungkook to contact Joohyun so soon, much less have time to spend the day with me.

I lean against my office chair, the five-inch heel of my stiletto tilting on the ground beneath my desk. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Joohyun giving me a sideways glance.

"Then, I hope I'm not taking up too much of your time today." I say, attempting to ward off Joohyun's attention. "I'm sure, uh, planning Jimin's birthday party won't take too long."

I can hear Jungkook's smirk through the phone. "Joohyun noona isn't with you, is she?"

I fidget with the fabric of my blouse. "She is." I grumble with a half-hearted retort, "My parents are out of the country until Saturday. They don't know about, ah, um, it yet."

Joohyun's already arched brow raises higher on her forehead.

I offer her a shrug as Jungkook says, "Don't worry about it. I know it might sound like a stretch, but I think I know how to win them over."

The assured tone underlying his voice causes me to gawk. "To hell you do. My mom's disliked you since before you were conceived." I say, but Jungkook doesn't sound any bit discouraged.

"I'm aware of that." he replies, calm as ever.

He's about to say something when his tone suddenly changes, speaking formally. "No, have them procure a quote first. These assays should be completed by tomorrow morning on the 0931 batch..."

Eventually, Jungkook tells me that he's sent someone to fetch me today.

I agree before bidding him good-bye, and it's only when I hang up that I notice Joohyun still standing near the door of my office.

We stare at each other, for the moment that follows, until Joohyun speaks.

"Yerim," she begins, and I wince unconsciously. "Are you and Mr. Jeon...dating?"

I muster an awkward laugh, which fades quickly into a hacking cough that sounds like a hyena with pneumonia.

"Actually, unnie, we're, ah, engaged."

—

Once in a while, I can get away with lying to a stranger. Sometimes a lie just slips out, because it's easier to avoid something than to confront it.

But, I can't lie to people I care about, and especially not to Joohyun.

Sometimes it's like she can see right through me.

She has that face on right now, the one that I never have the heart to look at straight in the eye. She's not smiling, and she looks a bit...worried.

"If I'm honest, Yerim, I'm just..." she trails off slightly, a sigh escaping her lips. "I'm just scared for you."

She reaches over and squeezes my hand.

I know what Joohyun's afraid of; I'm also afraid of it, too.

In a way, Jungkook and I have agreed to an exchange—a contract, of some sorts, one that seems very, very simple. But, because I love him, it's actually very complicated, and very dangerous.

Out of a hundred possible outcomes, I get hurt in ninety-nine.

There's a chance that I'll lose myself. There's a chance that I'll be unhappy for the rest of my life.

I know it'd be naïve of me to believe the words of Virgil, who once said, "Love conquers all."

I once read, that love doesn't always grow thornless flowers. Sometimes, it grows roses, and sometimes, it grows weeds.

If love and hate are opposites, then the bridge between them is regret.

But, it's a good thing, they say, to have had a broken heart.

It means that you've tried for something.

—

The house is pretty.

There's a narrow strip of greenery at the forefront of it, surrounded by glass, that leads with a stone pathway to the front door. It's filled with bamboo and pebble beds and short little evergreen trees, and the shrubs terrace to walls that interchange between glass and concrete, large diagonal beams supporting the second and third floors, which protrude from the sides like abstract geometry.

I've always felt that houses in themselves had a presence. This house definitely does—it's quiet, yet elegant, and more distinct than I'm used to—but I think it's comfortable. So I stand in front of this house, letting myself become absorbed in its detail.

"How long are you going to stand there in the driveway like that?"

I turn my head to see Jungkook behind me.

"How long have you been watching me stand here like this?" I say, watching as he approaches me from the driveway.

"A while." He answers, his hands stuffed in his pant pockets. I know he'd just came from work, because he's still dressed in a suit and tie. "I almost thought you'd been turned into a statue." He jokes as he gestures for me to follow him, and I walk beside him up the stone path.

I tsk my tongue against the roof of my mouth. "Well, it is an impressive place. If I didn't know better, I'd have thought you were taking me sightseeing."

The front door unlocks with a click when Jungkook types in the password. He peers at me with a knowing glint in his eye.

"You like this house." he says, with the type of certainty one would go about saying the sky is blue.

It isn't even a question.

I raise an eyebrow. "I do." I declare, shuffling in after him through the door.

The interior is as stunning as the outside. The windows are large and wide, and the sunlight spills through them. The walls are white, and there are wood stairs without risers, glass framing the sides.

"I assume you've bought this place for me, then?" I muse, tilting my head to observe the place.

Jungkook snorts pretentiously. "Of course not." he says, lips quirking into a grin.

"I bought it for us."

—

When it's evening, Jungkook takes me to the roof of the house.

After lunch, we'd spent the past five hours planning out our engagement, in between Skype meetings and a few business phone calls here and there.

I would greet his parents on this date, and he would greet mine on that date; we would register our marriage at the local district office on another date, and have our families plan out the rest. We agreed to sign prenuptial agreements, agreed on a move-in date to our new house, and conferred to each other about our respective lifestyles. Jungkook often had business trips to conventions and conferences almost once every three months. I had business trips biannually, but mine were more spontaneous. Since we had more than enough rooms to spare, we would each have a room to ourselves, but also a master bedroom to reside together in.

"You know, every time I'm on a high ground like this, I think about falling." I say as I eye the glass that separates me from life and oblivion.

We're sitting across from each other in the lounge area of the roof, where Jungkook had someone arrange dinner for us. There's a swimming pool beside us, and it reflects at me with cerulean blues.

"Every time I see a pool of water, I think about falling in, too." I add, in deep thought. "Not the dying part, though. Just the falling. But it's the same thing most of the time, I think. Dying and falling."

Jungkook listens to me, silently.

I tell him that there's this book called Kitchen, by Banana Yoshimoto. In the book, there's a moment where the main character, Mikage, says, "No matter what, I want to continue living with the awareness that I will die. Without that, I am not alive. This is what makes the life I have now possible."

I tell him that I also think the same.

We eat, then after a while, he says to me, "Yerim, have you ever read Norwegian Wood?"

I answer that I haven't, and that I might enlighten myself by reading it tonight.

He explains that what I said earlier, about falling, reminded him of it. He tells me that it's natural to think about death.

"In the words of Norwegian Wood, 'Death is not the opposite of life but an innate part of it.'" he says. And because he's always returned my own points two-fold, he adds, "But, Yann Martel, The Life of Pi—'Life will defend itself, no matter how small it is.'"

I laugh, nodding. "I'll make note of that." I say, watching as he stands from his seat.

He's in front of me suddenly, and my head tilts back to stare up at him.

"Jungkook—" I begin, frowning, but my words die in my throat when I see the determined expression on his face.

"I know you might not have asked for this, but..." he dips his head, biting the inside of his cheek. "We're getting married, Yerim....I owe you a proposal."

I blink. "B-but—"

Then I stare, wide-eyed, as he pulls out a black, velvety box from his pocket—and I try, urgently, then, to memorize everything about the moment in front of me.

His suit is dark blue, with thin, grey pinstripes, and his tie is black. He's wearing the gold cuff-links I bought him last year, for his twenty-sixth birthday, and his shirt is ed, at the collar.

The wind is blowing, the kind that tickles the back of my neck and carries the scent of the things around me—the faint trace of Seoul smoke, the distant tang of the sea from both sides. In the far corner of the sky, I see the faint crescent moon, reflecting in his eyes.

"B-but, aren't we already—" I stutter, standing from my seat.

Jungkook isn't deterred as he bends down on one knee. Suddenly, my neck is no longer straining to meet his eyes, but lowering slightly down at him.

He looks up at me, then, and in that fraction of a second, I blink—and realize my eyes are watering.

"Will you marry me?" he asks, opening the box with a ring inside.

I laugh, wiping a tear from the corner of my eye.

"You didn't have to, Jungkook." I say, my voice cracking.

He chuckles lowly as he stands back up, clutching that velvet box in his hand as he leans in close to me.

My head raises once more.

"Yerim, just say yes." he whispers in my ear, nose brushing my temple. When he pulls back a little, he's grinning so widely that his dimple surfaces on his cheek.

Jungkook has always been handsome to me. There are plenty of things about him that are blatantly attractive, both ually and platonically. It's undeniable.

But sometimes, in moments like these, his beauty is an unfathomable thing. It's delicate, but also so bold and demanding and harsh, all at once.

Jungkook has his own gravity, like he's the Earth and I'm his moon. I'm in his orbit, and I don't ever want to leave; I can't leave, even if I wanted to.

So I fall.

I reach out, tentatively, to sling my arms around his neck.

His hands gently grip my waist, keeping me from tripping as I stand on my tip-toes.

The space between us grows thin. Our noses touch, and I count his eyelashes, every single one.

I once read a striking passage by Natsume Soseki, who, in his book, Kokoro, expressed:

"Words uttered in passion contain a greater living truth than do those words which express thoughts rationally conceived. It is blood that moves the body. Words are not meant to stir the air only: they are capable of moving greater things."

Words.

One word.

"Yes." I say.

My heartbeat rings in my ears.

Three words.

I love you.

"Yes, I will."