He fell asleep soon after. He slept like a baby, quiet and warm, tucked away soundly under the covers. An autumn rain fell heavily outside, racing down the windows behind the parted blinds. I moved away from him, not daring to lay in bed with him for even longer and put myself into work. I distracted myself by clearing the mess he’d made in the kitchen, and my heart shattered finding the TV remote in the meat compartment again while it should have been in the drawer under the TV stand. Afterwards I called my mother who’d have been awake even dead into the night, not for long conversations but out of obligations as she baby-sat my child.

“Yulhee’s asleep if you’re wondering” Said mum in a lowly voice as soon as I picked up. The past few weeks our conversations were brief. Either one of us were tired, or I just didn’t want to speak. Mum had never said a word, but I assumed she had so much to say. “How was your day?”

“Bad” I replied grimly as I recalled the events that passed; long day at work, Woohyun’s questioning gaze after the editorial meeting and a mysterious paper cup of warm coffee delivered to my desk with a post-it, and then coming home to a deranged, broken husband who had found out my infidelity and wasn’t even mad at me to make me leave. A divorce  instead, so easy, so simple. Exactly what I wanted. Now that I was granted that, I felt like a wish maker that had wished for something they regret.

My mum wasn’t even surprised by my tired voice. “No wonder, you keep working until so late in the night, Eunji. I wouldn’t even be upset if you drop dead in the middle like your father one day”

I smiled tightly, a heavy weight in my chest. My father died of a heart attack when I was in the second year of university, a few weeks before I met Sung Gyu who swept me off my feet and changed our world.  Mum adored him since then; the one who’d stepped in right after the greatest loss of our lives. Would she hear of the parting tonight, she would certainly disown me. 

“I’m fine” I sighed and rubbed my temple to ease the ringing in my head. “How was Yulhee? Did she trouble you?”

“No she was an angel” A moment, and- “She did scare off Missus Yoon again, talking about that cat in the sinking boat...she also mentioned a friend of yours whom she met and that they had a cat”

My breath caught up in my throat. “Did she?” I casually replied. There was no malice in her voice, no suspicion, just casual conversation.

“Hrmp, but I’m really worried for that child sometimes. She’d probably fly off to the army when she’s old enough, you wouldn’t be able to catch her”

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” I smiled. “How is your shop?”

We chatted for a while and I ran errands around the house as we did, frowning when I found things in odd places. Missus Lee had come around, cleaned things up so anything that I happen to find out of order, that’s long after she’d left. The call lasted for a few minutes until my mother yawned, followed by my own, and another from her end. It was nice for a while, talking to an oblivious mother who had not a hint of my marital troubles. I remembered something Sung Gyu had said when I set down the phone, and my heart tugged. It felt good, not knowing. As long as my mother stayed oblivious, the warmth of our love still lived.

I returned to our room later on and found Sung Gyu still sound asleep on his side. I pulled the covers up to his neck and fought the urge to brush his hair off his eyes. A week off in Manila, a vast lively city with so many streets and roads to be lost in. If he had driven around unable to find his way in roads that he had travelled all his life, what would he do in a place he barely knew?

Worry had already settled in my heart. It's been ages since his last diplomatic mission which he had attended in person. The situation in the country had hindered them and most were done online from home, half dressed in a suit and pajama pants. It was the first time he was travelling after a while, and my worry about seeing him away was justified. It was not the same Sung Gyu anymore. 

The least I could do was to ease his stay. Usually, back when he used to travel a lot, he had a small suitcase packed for his trips. He’d only had to change the clothes to match the season of his destination; softer cotton shirts and summer jackets for his work in India, thick cashmere jackets and sweaters for the cold, european falls. Manila was warm these days, I assumed, but also rainy. And he would certainly forget something if he packed his clothes on his own.

So I took out his suitcase from the corner of the closet it had been stored behind for years and packed it with all his essentials. Pressed jackets, T-shirts, cotton shirts, slacks, ties and underclothes; toiletries, sandals and newly polished shoes. A week was a long time and Manila was a long way from home. I could only wish it wasn’t going to be a time when he’d step out and wonder when and where he stood. Sung Gyu had a keen-eyed assistant, one who had the air of someone that could be trusted. She was new to her job and took it seriously as well; setting meetings, checking calendars and also knew Sung Gyu’s mess of a mind. I could only rely on her if he happened to lose his way, to put him back on track, remind his schedule, and fill in for his lost words. He was a wreck now, and I wasn’t sure if I could leave him like that.

I had thought I should run while I could. But now I wished I could shoot myself instead.

Sung Gyu was awake early the next morning, sitting in his room, his head in his hand while going through his paperwork. I quietly slipped in only to serve him his hangover soup which he was surprised to find. He looked up at me, tired, gloomy sunken eyes behind the glasses. He looked like he had thrown up several times. He thanked me regardless, a measly ventured word of gratitude and returned to his papers again. I wished him a safe flight, knowing that I may not see him before he left. He hummed, I closed the door behind my back and let out a sigh. He was prepared to leave me as much as he was prepared to leave the country for a week. Now, it was I who had mixed emotions in my heart.

They changed the slightest, however, when I killed the ignition in the parking lot of the Seobuk Commercial towers. Opposite to me was parked a familiar black sedan, bleaming under the fluorescent lights, and an equally bright smile. Woohyun smiled like summer; warm and brilliant. My heart fell and picked up at the same time.

“I wanted to say I am sorry” He told me as soon as I crossed the asphalt towards him. His voice was low, but still echoed in the vast space of the basement. There was a bouquet of lilies on the bonnet of the car, addressed to me was a small card hung on it with a pale blue ribbon.

“I said not so nice things, and when I thought about them again, I felt like an ” He explained to me. “I don’t know if flowers would fix anything, but I’d like to try”

It’s been forever since I last received flowers. Sung Gyu didn’t do flowers. He despised them, having followed four funerals and photographs surrounded by them. Woohyun was different, and a dozen white lilies definitely did fix the heaviness in my heart.

“I love them” I told him sincerely, ran my hands along their tender petals. “So pretty”

“I think so too” Woohyun mumbled, and when I looked up, his eyes were on me. He smiled, and my heart dropped.

“You don’t have to forgive me, I definitely did wrong-,” He continued, gravity in his tone, and I shook my head. We were too old and life was too short not to forgive and forget. Besides, he was giving me flowers.

“I understand you,” I replied, holding the flowers to my chest. “Besides, I am in the wrong as much as you are...or even worse”

He nodded, yet his eyes twinkled. “Things would change”

I didn’t know how that made me feel. But definitely something different when we deposited into the backseat of his car and made out until it was time to sign in to work. 

Yet, back in my cubicle, staring at the photograph of us on my table, I felt a sharp stab of pain in my chest. Sung Gyu was bright and happy in it, Yulhee, still a baby, seated in his arms. Yulhee made Sung Gyu the happiest, they were a match made in heaven, the perfect father and the perfect daughter. He may think she would get over it, and she might too, somehow, when her world was devoid of the father she knew, replaced with somebody all new. He may not be the same, but at least she had one.

Yet, would it be the same?

Sung Gyu had said it himself, it was for the best. He was sick, and he needed help. As long as he had Yulhee and I hung on his back, the possibilities that a sickness held would keep him back from seeking treatment, taking it a responsibility to put us first before himself. Perhaps the only way to let him heal and subside his pain was to go away. Leave me. He had said. Be happy. And it may be that he would be happier too when he no longer had Yulhee and I. When he had gotten better, when the world looked brighter for both of us, we may come across each other again. He would be a friend, he would be someone that I used to love. But at least he would be better by then, someone who no longer lost his way back home, someone who knew which time and day it was, someone that no longer mistepped his words. Perhaps, for that, ending our marriage was a risk that I had to take.

The first day of the week without him passed like that. I worked until evening, submitted my last article, earned a kiss from Woohyun in the parking lot and went back home. Sung Gyu had already left by the time I returned, not a slip of note or a word of goodbye. Not that I had expected any, but it still hurt. I went over to mum’s afterwards, picked up my daughter whom I hadn’t seen for longer than a day. She had a long face seeing that it was I who was picking her up.

“Not happy to see me?” I asked her with a laugh, pulling her into my arms.

“Where’s appa?” She asked me. The mention of him was a stab on my chest. I caressed her soft curls and gave her a smile. “Appa had to go to Manila on a diplomatic trip”

Her eyes brightened up. “Is Manila in Italy?” She asked. She did fairly know her countries and their popular cities but often got them mixed up.

“No sweets, Manila is in the Philippines. Its Milan which is in Italy”

“Oh…” She pouted. 

“Anyway, how was your day?”

We talked about her day with Yulhee dominating most of the conversation as mum fussed around in the store. Those were the busy hours and mum didn’t want me to get my clothes stained and hands dirty so I stayed with my daughter, listening to her happy tales, wishing I could tell the sad ones of mine until the day’s rush died down. Mum came back a few minutes later with a heaping load of buckwheat noodles for dinner.

“That’s food for ten people” I commented as she set the tray down on the stool. The night was slightly warmer than the rest, one of those odd days in the early autumn that still felt like summer. The air smelled thickly of sesame oil and burnt meat. Mum arranged an array of side dishes on the stool.

“Eat ten people’s food, you’re too skinny” She told me. “Where’s Sung Gyu-goon?”

I have come to understand by now that every time anyone mentioned my soon-to-be ex-husband, my heart would react in a certain way that was equivalent to a slow painful death. I shrugged and repeated the same thing that I had told my daughter.

Mum hummed. “Poor thing, Is he doing better now?”

I shook my head. “He’s alright, pretty much the same”

“Still forgetting things?” 

“A lot,” I sighed. It's been a while since we last talked about his state. But I was sure Yulhee had shared a lot with her grandmother over the course of the days. 

“Yulhee’s been telling me too” Went on my mum, answering my suspicions. “He must be pretty beat up, Eunji. He should take a break”

“I tried to tell him” I lied. “But he wouldn’t take it”

“That boy works too much” Mum sighed as if she was talking about a twenty year old trying to make their ends meet. “He came over several times, white as a sheet. I’d tried to make him stay for dinner, stayed a few times but didn’t speak much…”

I hummed and dug into my food.

“And I’ve been thinking about it too, whether I should be worried” mum went on. “He’s in an age where other sorts of trouble come in. You too…” a moment, and I sensed the staleness in the air. I looked at her across the table. She looked at me. “Are the two of you doing okay?”

I gripped my chopsticks and tried to appear unfazed as I returned to my food. “What do you mean?”

“You know, your relationship, your marriage”

I swallowed hard, the noodles seemed to have formed tangles in my throat. “Yeah, everything is fine,” I lied when ideally, I shouldn’t have. She would find out eventually, and it would be her looking after Yulhee for the most time when I no longer had Sung Gyu doing that. I probably wouldn’t even have the house, the house we had bought together, which meant that I would move in with mum, live under one roof, listening to her grumbling and sobbing about what a terrible wife I had been. But right now, with a week ahead of me left for contemplations, the last thing I wanted was her jumping into it prematurely.

My mum hummed, served a generous amount of rice into Yulhee’s bowl and wiped the oil off her cheek. “Well, even if you have...troubles, Eunji, those things are just normal. Couples fight all the time. Besides you both are nearing forty now aren’t you? Maybe you should start thinking about a second child and all those worries would go away”

“Not going to” I replied without a second thought. It was a resolve we both had agreed to after Yulhee. Childbirth was too painful for me, and Sung Gyu too couldn’t deal with the early days of child rearing with the perks of his job. One is enough, we both decided while we loved our one daughter with our full hearts. She could get all the love she could. But there’s never going to be a second.

“Why, he probably wants one”

I glared at her. “But I’d be the one to give birth” I turned back to my food. “And no, he doesn’t want any”

Mum tutted, shaking her head. “Young people these days. Getting married past their prime ages, having not more than one child. What’s the purpose of your lives?”

I had the urge to remind her that she also had one, but I didn’t. The truth was that she actually had two, but my good for nothing older brother fled with half the wealth dad had when he passed with not a sense of remorse, drank and casino-ed it all away. We all pretended that he was good as gone although mum still loved him dearly and she lost her head whenever anyone brought him up.

“Yulhee is perfect,” I told her as I caressed my daughter’s soft curls. “Why would we want more?”

“Maybe that would fix your troubles, Eunji,” Mum replied matter of factly. “You know, whatever the lovers’ quarrels you have”

I looked at her sharply, sensing that she may have sensed something too. “We don’t have lovers’ quarrels” 

Mum shrugged. “That’s exactly what people having lovers’ quarrels would say”' She twirled her chopsticks in the cold broth. “Anyway, when is Sung Gyu goon coming back?”

“Next week”

“Hope he’s not having it too tough over there” Mum went on, followed by a heavy sigh. “It gets too hot in Manila, they say”

“He’d be fine,” I replied. But in truth, the concerns that I had were even more.

♡♡♡

On the second day away from Sung Gyu, I woke up with a sense of intense withdrawal. I had slept with no Sung Gyu beside me, and I would have woken up to an empty bed if not for Yulhee whom I asked to sleep beside me. As comforting as it was to hug her and hold her as we slept, neither of us slept well. Yulhee talked for a long time and even wanted to chat with his father on the phone, but when we tried to ring him, he didn’t pick up and my heart sank. He sent a text saying that he was in a meeting and that he couldn’t call. But I felt he was lying, I felt he was taking our time apart quite so gravely that he was intending to cut contact with us in every way.

So the next day I went about feeling that pain and nostalgia hovering a rainy cloud over my head. I couldn't concentrate on my article as I stared at the family photograph on my table as if the images of us would move, and I texted Woohyun to tell him that I had too much to do when he sent a post-it asking to see me again. I needed time for myself, to get used to a life without Sung Gyu, and the beginning of it already wasn’t going very well. I finished work early that day, picked up Yulhee from mum’s and only stayed as long as mum took to wrap up dinner for us. It was after returning home to a slightly warm stone pot of Kimchi stew and freshly cooked rice did I realise that I hadn’t asked Missus Lee not to cook that night. Yulhee and I watched the news on TV. Yulhee got upset about a flood that had happened somewhere in the world claiming a lot of lives. We watched a variety show to cheer ourselves up after that harrowing discussion and when it didn’t work, Yulhee tried calling her father again. When he declined for a second time and claimed to have a meeting again, it no longer appeared a coincidence. He was actively pushing us away.

On the third day, I had lots of things to think about. I asked for a half day off work and Woohyun granted without question. I dropped Yulhee to school, went down to the market and filled up on the grocery needs midweek. I went up with bulging bags in my hand, imagining a life without Sung Gyu who had done this most of the time. It was missus Lee sometimes, but he didn’t want to trouble his long-time house-helper too much that he took the responsibility into his own hands. And he also knew which brand of tofu was the tenderest, which hand soap smelled the best. I didn’t have the intuition that he did. How was I going to survive in the wilderness of daily life without him?

I moved on to clean things up afterwards. I started from Yulhee’s room, rearranged everything entirely; moved the bed to the other end, her cupboard and desk aligned rather than facing each other on opposite ends. I replaced the shampoo and the soaps with something that smelled better, changed her sheets, rearranged her desk, and got my heartbroken when I found what Sung Gyu had given her on her fourth birthday. 

‘To my little peacemaker’ It said in his messy handwriting, a picture book on the most important historical events of the world. ‘From dad, with lots of love’

I sat down on her bed, clutching the book in my trembling hands and gasped. Who would pick thoughtful gifts for her like this after we leave? Would Woohyun do the same? Call her a peacemaker instead of ‘princess’? Give her books about world history instead of coloring pads? How would her world change without him?

I moved onto his study next, the den that had been abandoned, dark and wistful, for a week’s time untils it was left behind again. The entire room smelled like Sung Gyu; warm, breezy, citrusy. There was the scent of coffee, so much of crisp paper and unopened books. It was an absolute mess, hundreds of dissertations still lying in piles, the sofa cleared up with measly folded blankets resting on one end. His table looked like a storm had passed across it, and it was with much struggle that I located one of his forgotten portable computers. I arranged the scattered papers, just so he could find his way around without trouble. I touched nothing else, left everything as they were and stared longingly at the framed photograph of us on his desk. It appeared forgotten, left on the edge of the desk, lost among piles of paper. I left it at that, not intending to change anything else, and went on to clean the trash basket which overflowed.

Hundreds of balled up papers, each scribbled with things. There were names, dates, numbers and badly drawn maps of places which, upon closer look, I realised, was the road to places he often travelled to; home, Yulhee’s school, mum’s home, work. There were also the names of people around him, his TA, his assistant, fellow lecturers and advisors. Then there were speeches,  things to say at conferences and meetings. Sung Gyu who never required written prompters for speeches and had still delivered beautifully now required them written down word to word.

I left the trash bin exactly how it was, overflowing with papers of scribbled notes and places, stared longingly at where he would have sat, laid, and closed the door behind me. Then I headed to work, gave Woohyun my petty excuses, worked until late, stayed for dinner with mum and talked about stuff I hardly cared about.

That night too, Yulhee tried to call him, but to our disappointment, his phone was turned off. Yulhee was concerned, telling me that bad people might have caught him. I gently rubbed her head, unable to think of a word to say. “He’s probably too busy” I told her, unable to bring myself to admit the truth. “He’d call you when he can. He hadn’t forgotten or anything”

But deep down I thought he probably had.

The fourth day wasn’t much different from the last. I went about the day thinking, thinking why he hadn’t called us and imagining him lost in a place he barely knew. I looked up on Naver for any news about an international security advisor lost in the Manila streets while on a diplomatic mission, but there was only news of a diplomatic mission sent to Manila over a new Security deal, men in suits shaking hands, not a glimpse of Sung Gyu on the photographs as if he had vanished from earth.

But I didn’t want him to. I knew that we were going to be divorced, but he still had to be here, he still had to exist so he was right there, waiting, his arms open, eyes glimmering, waiting until we went running back to him. It was selfish of me to think that way, but what if I could still dream?

That night, Yulhee stayed with my mum. I went to Woohyun’s where he prepared dinner for me at home, nicely made steak and vegetables, surprising me with his limitless cooking skills. Later that night after we had dinner, we went up to his bedroom where he made love to me. He whispered sweet nothings in my ear and caressed my skin, captured my lips in long, warm kisses, and held me through the night until we’d held each other long enough. Upon returning home, on my phone I found a call from Sung Gyu that had rung for eighteen seconds. I went to sleep that night, grieving about missed chances.

“Is it possible to marry the same person you divorced?” I asked Hyejoo on day five. We were back at the bibimbap place, seated at a greasy table of the ever bustling food court, speaking in higher tones over the endless clamour of hundreds of people talking at once in the closed space. I was only nostalgic for the food that I loved. But I had lied to Hyejoo, telling that I felt too sick to walk. And she had interpreted this as me believing that they didn’t sell the best fried rice in the world. And I let her.

“Why would you ask?” Hyejoo ventured out through a mouthful.

“Nothing” I shrugged and looked back into my dish although it was everything that I have been worried about. Was divorce reversible? Could I marry the same person again if I wanted to?

“Couldn’t be nothing,” Hyejoo commented with thin, inquisitive eyes. “And you wanted to have bibimbap again”

“Quit speculating” I rolled my eyes. “The question is for an article I am doing, and yes, we’re having bibimbap only because I don’t want to walk”

Hyejoo stared at me, her spoon to her lips as if she’d seen me lying right through my teeth.

“Sure, I believe you” She sighed in the end and started scraping the rice from the bottom of the stone pot. “Anyway, I think you can marry the same person that you divorced. Like, after you’re divorced that makes you two different people”

“But divorce is not reversible?” I went on. I didn’t think Sung Gyu would want to marry me after we divorced. He wasn’t the type to make the same mistake twice, if I ever was one. 

“It is too” Hyejoo shrugged. “Like, when you’re on the verge of it and decide otherwise”

“But not after it happens”

Hyejoo looked at me as if I’d begun to grow two horns. “Why would anyone want to reverse their divorce if they wanted a divorce the first place?”

I let out a resigned sigh. “Yes, you’re right”

Hyejoo poured in a generous amount of chilli paste and started stirring her rice again. “What is this article about? I didn’t think your paper looked at that kind of stuff”

“Nothing. Just about this news on possibly changing marital laws” I lied and returned to my food. “Anyway, the rice is delicious!” I stuffed a spoonful of it in my mouth and felt like I was chewing sand. “Indeed the best bibimbap of the town”

Hyejoo gave me an odd look. “Funny how you’re actually eating today” She said. “I didn’t see you much these days, how is life going?”

We chatted for a while over a brief lunch, bought dessert as it was a warm day and returned to my cubicle. We walked there together, intending to sit down and chat away the remaining few minutes, but we both stopped midtrack, my heart pounding in my throat, hand clenched on the cup of soft serve in my hand. Across the line of cubicles, right in front of mine stood Nam Woohyun with a plastic box, a slice of cake on display, a cake that undoubtedly looked like a love heart. 

My soul left my body and I couldn’t dare bring myself to look at Hyejoo. 

“That’s-that’s not what you think it is” I replied quickly without a second thought and realised it's exactly what I shouldn’t have said. Woohyun tried to hide the cake behind his back, perhaps having thought he could sneak it in while almost the entirety of the office staff were outside. Like he had done with the coffee the other day, like he had done with post-it notes sometimes. But today he was caught red handed, a heart on a cake.

“I think it's exactly what I think it is,” Hyejoo replied.

A few minutes later, I found myself dragged into the women’s bathroom although it was way past the end of lunch hour. Woohyun left me to deal with the mess he made soon after, carrying the cake with a heart with him, and one look at Hyejoo I could tell she was not very happy with my choice of action. I had never seen her this worked up in my life.

She closed the bathroom door behind us and cornered me to a wall.

“I can explain,” I told her helplessly.

“Like what?” She breezed as if it was her own problem. “That you’re cheating on your perfect international politics scholar husband with Nam Woohyun?”

I lifted my hand, trying to explain, and then dropped them. “What’s wrong with Nam Woohyun?”

“Everything!” Hyejoo blasted as if I should have always known. “He’s the epitome of a bad choice of a boyfriend, unnie, you should have thought it through!”

I rested my hands on my waist, not exactly agreeing with her baseless claim. “What makes him a bad choice of a boyfriend, is it the fact that he’s my boss?”

“That’s just the cherry on top”

I frowned. It wasn’t like I was perfectly aware. “Why is it the cherry on top? If anything, that should be worst reason and the only reason, a whole senseless hullabaloo about conflict of interest-,”

“Unnie” Hyejoo interjected and placed her hands on my shoulders. “It's the cherry on top because he was married to my previous chief editor and they had a son as well; then she found out he’d been sleeping with one of the girls from the finance department and she dropped his sorry and flew to Japan. He’s a lying, cheating ”

I felt cold sweats under my collar, yet I was not about to easily believe things. I had worked for the Seoul Observer for nearly three years now, and it was the first time that I was hearing something like this. Rumours went across the floor like wildfire. After all, it was an agency of journalists, there was nothing else to expect.

“Then how come I have never heard of this?” I asked her accusingly and folded my arms on my chest.

“Because you never hear anything from anyone!” She replied. “I mean, lets face it, I’m the only friend you have here”

“Thanks” I rolled my eyes, feeling slightly hurt.

Hyejoo let out a sigh. “Unnie, I’m telling you as a friend because I care about you….I sincerely don’t think Nam Woohyun is the one you should be with”

But he had only been good to me. I wanted to tell her. He gave me compliments and flowers, he looked at me as if I was the only woman in the world. But he probably did that to everyone. A voice whispered in the back of my head. He probably did that to Hyejoo’s previous editor and the girl from Finance and all the other women he’d been with.

“I know that you’re having trouble in your marriage, but maybe you can work them out”

I looked up and stared at Hyejoo, Hyejoo, my only friend who didn’t know even half of what I’d been going through.

“There’s not working them out” I found myself telling her, my voice thick with emotion. “It’s done, it's over. Sung Gyu and I are getting divorced”

Hyejoo was quiet, gazing at me with her wide, inquisitive eyes. “That’s why you asked me if divorce can get reversed” She muttered in a mere whisper as realization hit  her. I said nothing, my head lowered and we allowed a moment of contemplative silence pass by. 

“Unnie” she called and reached out for my hand. “Unnie, you still love him. Have you realised that? You love your husband-,”

“But we can’t do it anymore” I replied, now my voice breaking, all the emotions I had held back for the past few weeks coming at me in multitudes. “We’re done trying Hyejoo, both oppa and I…” I wiped my eyes with the back of my sleeve, my hands trembling. “He’s sick; he keeps forgetting things, messing things up and when he gets angry he’s not himself. He need to get treated, but as long as he has Yulhee and I, he would never”

“Oh unnie…” She muttered and pulled me into her arms. Yulhee was taller than me despite the difference of our ages, and I fit right against her shoulder. “Did you ask him about it? Getting treated?”

I nodded into her jacket. “I told him so many times, but he’d only get angrier, make baseless accusations and we fight all the time” I took a deep breath and pulled away from her. “In fact, it was him who wanted to get divorced. He wanted Yulhee and me to leave, and I thought it was the only way to help him get better. As long as he had the responsibility of family with him, he never would''

Hyejoo lifted her hands and wiped the stains of tears on my cheeks. “I’m sorry I never knew all of this” She told me quietly, holding my face. “But unnie, no matter what you do, Nam Woohyun is not the man to leave your husband for. Be along, be a single mother, but not him”

“But he has changed,” I told her, and perhaps much more to myself. “He’d been absolutely nice to me and he’d been nice to Yulhee as well...he’s really trying, and I feel-I feel he’s putting real effort into it”

Hyejoo’s face was straight, unconvinced. “You had already gone through too much,” She said.

“I just want this to be over” I told her and rested my head on her jacket again. “I just want to be happy again”

Hyejoo told me nothing at this point but she held me. She held me and patted my back, caressed my hair as if it was the only comfort she could give me. No ‘You’ll be fine’, no ‘I believe you’ but silence. Silence as if she was already seeing the prospects of a disaster ahead.