Chapter 5
Irreplaceable [MAJOR EDITING]Dasom did not know what to feel.
How did one exactly process, in one sitting, the fact that one needed to marry one’s brother-in-law or else risk the family business go down the drain?
Whatever the answer was, Dasom did not have an inkling of it.
Her mind went blank, unable to recall what happened next after her mother dropped the bomb.
She knew how much it must have troubled her mother because of her apprehensive expression—she did not want this happening too. Dasom could imagine how desperate her mother, her dear parents, were to concede to Mr. Byun’s insane condition.
Dasom should be angry.
She should be standing on her two feet, throwing things or perhaps profanities towards the person she was talking to because this ing agreement deprived her of the freedom to choose who she’d wed whenever she wanted to state her vows in front of the altar.
She knew she had the right to curse the forces that brought her to this pathetic situation and for forcing her into a corner, leaving her with no other choice but to surrender.
But she didn’t do any of those things.
She made a promise to her parents. Dasom might be the second daughter, but that did not mean she wasn’t as morally uptight as her late sister. If she broke her promise, she could already imagine Hyunseo shaking her head at her with sheer disapproval in her eyes.
She did not want that.
So, it was with a heavy heart that Dasom found herself nodding to whatever her mother was telling her. And when it was finally time for her to go home, she found herself going in another direction, somewhere totally far from where she was residing at.
“You look like .”
That’s how Baekhyun greeted her when he opened the door to her rapid knocks at one in the morning.
Dasom did not care about the rudeness laced in his voice. She couldn’t even think straight in the moment. She should be on her way home, entering her own place and then drowning herself in self-misery with her jumbled thoughts, so why did her feet decide to bring her knocking on Baekhyun’s door at such a late hour?
The two of them remained standing at the doorway, watching the other, waiting for who would first make a move between them.
Baekhyun cleared his throat. “What brings you here?”
Dasom lowered her eyes, finding the floor to be more interesting than the confusion that settled on Baekhyun’s sleepless face.
“Yoon Dasom, it’s one in the morning. Go home. I’m not letting you crash my place—you’re going to wake Dahyun up if you keep this up, you know?”
That was the least of her worries. Dahyun had always been a heavy sleeper just like her mother. Dasom doubted that her niece would truly wake up if two adults conversed right outside her door.
“Dasom—”
She abruptly cut off Baekhyun’s words, meeting his annoyed stare. “Is that a way to talk to your fiancée?”
Baekhyun’s expression slowly morphed into the same one that Dasom sported when her mother told her about how she needed to marry the guy in front of her. However, unlike her, the emotion didn’t last that long in Baekhyun’s face. He was able to compose himself immediately, a feat she wasn’t able to do earlier in her mother’s office.
Much to Dasom’s surprise, Baekhyun opened the door. “Get in.”
Dasom raised a brow, “I thought you wanted me to go home?”
Baekhyun stepped sideways. “You are going home. We’re just going to have a quick talk before you leave.”
She shouldn’t be here in the first place. Dasom inwardly cursed herself for knocking on Baekhyun’s door, something she should have thought of before her feet led her here. The hallway was still pretty dark given that there was no one else outside except her.
Baekhyun, seeing that Dasom had no plans to do as he bid, started to close the door.
However, Dasom was able to stop the door from closing using her hand by wedging it in between the space just before it completely closed. It was a good thing that Baekhyun had quick reflexes or else, her hand would have been squished.
This caused Baekhyun to glower at Dasom. “You could’ve used your words to stop me from closing the door on you instead of using your hand,” he lectured using a flat tone.
His reaction made Dasom beam at him shamelessly. “Does the offer still stand? It’s a bit chilly out here.”
A beat.
“Just get inside.”
Dasom still remembered it all clearly—the first time her older sister sat down to eat dinner and converse with Baekhyun’s parents and how it didn’t go well as expected.
She was in her last year of high school and had come home from a really stressful research mock defense when she stumbled upon her sister drowning in tears. Hyunseo was crying in their spacious living room and was lucky enough that their parents were not home to witness her dire situation.
“What happened to you, unnie?”
Hyunseo leaned into Dasom’s arms and cried even more. It was a miracle that the former was still able to speak coherently amidst her weeping state. “They hate me.”
“Who hates you?” Dasom asked, disbelief in her voice.
Her sister was heaven-sent. Hyunseo was far kinder than her. Whenever they bump into a street child or just a random beggar in the streets, Hyunseo never hesitated to give whatever she could offer to the poor soul. If Dasom viewed the world as always second thinking about every person she bumped into, Hyunseo always saw the good in everything—and everyone. She had always been the optimistic daughter—so, seeing her in that crushed state broke Dasom’s heart.
Hyunseo took a moment before replying. “Baekhyun’s parents.”
Dasom blinked. “You met his parents already?”
When Hyunseo first went public with her relationship with Baekhyun, it worried Dasom because Baekhyun hailed from a very wealthy family who has a lot of connections around the world—the Byun family is the top name in South Korea’s advertising field. Even though their family owns a private universal bank, they still have a lot to do to be on top.
And this—Baekhyun’s parents looking down at her sister—was what Dasom had feared for her.
Dasom reached out for the nearest box of tissues and offered it to her sister whose tears had still not st
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