Jung Hyerim was twenty five years old when she rode a public bus for the first time in her life. It was too much a risk to walk back to Sung Gyu’s mother’s costume shop to retrieve his bike, and it was almost dawn now, that they could catch the last bus for the day. Hyerim had only seen buses on the road while sitting in the comfort of her car. And on the TV, in news. She had never gotten into one for the life of her.

Sung Gyu helped her into the bus, paid for her ticket and held her hand all the while as they made it to a seat. Although the bus is near empty, save for about two other lone passengers, Sung Gyu led her to the very end of the bus, the very last seat, and let her take the one by the window. She had never sat by a window so big in a vehicle. And so high up. She could see only the top of hoods of passing vehicles, and lines and lines of street lights burning away.

“I’d just assume this your very first time in a bus” Sung Gyu’s mild voice cut into her thoughts. When she glanced at him, he was smiling the kind of smile that did funny things to her heart. In fact, everything he said and did, did funny things to her heart. It was hopeful at times, but at most, painful. She was yet to figure out what these feelings even meant, but she did understand that a large chunk of her understood, after tonight, she will never meet him again. And another large chunk of her wanted him for herself. 

“I owe you big time” Hyerim said, turning back to the sight of the passing road. “Because of you, I’m having first time of everything…” She swallowed the lump in . “First and the last”

“The last?” Sung Gyu echoed. It was only when his fingers squeezed her hand that she realised he was still holding her; an uncomminicated bond between them.

She nodded, her eyes still set on the road. “You do realise I have to go back, right?”

He was quiet, so she turned to look at him. “This is just one night, Sung Gyu-Ssi. It’s like a dream that I hate to wake up from, but I have to”

The way Sung Gyu looked at her made her heart inflate. “You’re running away” He said. “You can figure out the rest, somehow. We can. I will help you”

She shook her head. Her reality was vastly different from what anyone could perceive. The power of Jung-Shim conglomerate, together with Suwon group was formidable; they could control the media, they could control politics. They could pretty much pull every string they get to hunt her down, bring her back, and destroy everything she loved in the process of that. And Kim Sung Gyu was pretty much all she cared about right now. It wasn’t a place she would ever let him fall too. He was too precious to her.

“You don’t have to go back, Hyerim-Ssi” Sung Gyu was telling her. “If it makes you unhappy-,”

“I’m married into the Suwon group, Sung Gyu-Ssi” She reminded him. “It doesn’t matter now if I’m unhappy in that marriage. It’s my life now”

There was a troubled look in his eyes, bewilderment. She hoped her placing a comforting hand on the one that held hers would make him feel better the slightest. “If anything, I had the best night of my life tonight, with you. For whatever reason you did this and stuck with me to the end, thank you…I’ll come home with you now, but come tomorrow, it will be hell for both of us. I would go back before then”

He stared at her as if he had more to tell her; other ways to convince her, more ways to stop her. Then he glanced once at their hands and seemed to give in. It was an odd situation they were in. A just-married woman and a man with so many mysteries; they had no future prospectus since the moment the night started. The entire time they had said things, done things; held hands, shared smiles and laughter, ignoring the elephants in the room. And now, at the edge of dawn when hints of lives left behind started to seep in, reality was coming knocking on their doors like ferocious beasts; it was time they both worked out how to face  and address them. But that wasn’t something she was prepared for. There was still a a little more to go for their night together, however it may end.

They were quiet for the rest of the bus ride. At some point, Hyerim had dozed off, unbeknownst to her. She didn’t realise she was dreaming when saw them; Sung Gyu and her, in the vast hall of her wedding reception, her in the rhinestone wedding dress, him in his smart suit, dancing away. His hands were in hers and on her waist; every time he twirled her around, she fell into his arms, and he’d look into her eyes as if she was the only woman in this world. Even in her dream, Hyerim wondered, myriad times, how things would have been if this was their reality. What if she had met him before tonight? What if she had fallen in love with him? Married him? How would her life be, then?

“Hyerim-Ssi” Sung Gyu’s voice, tender and quiet, was echoing in her ear. Hyerim woke up with a start,  only to realise she had been laying her head on his shoulder, holding onto his arm.

“It’s our stop next” Sung Gyu whispered. The proximity of him, in that dreamy stance of her made her want to pull him to her and kiss him on his lips.

“Okay…” She muttered and pulled herself from him. They got up, made their way to the door. They got down at their stop, which was the stop to where Sung Gyu lived. It was a slightly dark residential area, almost lifeless so deep into the night. But the streets were pleasant, with lines and lines of massive houses with high walls and street lights illuminating the dull colors of their rooves. Sung Gyu held her hand the whole time through the short walk. A few minutes, and they stopped at a house with brick walls and a high metal grilled gate; up front, the street light illuminated the tarmac ground.

“This is it?” Hyerim asked him. Until then she didn’t realise how exhausted she was. Seeing a house with possibly beds to sleep in, she felt suddenly tired than ever before.

“This is it” He nodded and pulled a set of keys out from his pocket, Hyerim patiently watched as he unlocked the gate and pushed it open; with merely a gesture of his hands, he invited her in.

Unlike the mansion that the Jung’s lived in, Sung Gyu’s place was small and minimalistic; the brick walls gave off a mysterious aura, but the well-kept home garden took that away. There was an adult sized crib, rooved with a wooden canopy to protect it from the rain, lush grass and rows of potted plants. The narrow stone steps up a little hill would take you to the front door. The front of the house had two large french windows, the door frame pannelled with glass. While Hyerim stood to a corner, wrapped in a scarf to fight the spring chill, Sung Gyu unlocked the front door. What invited her in was the rich, homely scent of Italian potpourri and a sense of warmth that she had never been welcomed with in her own home.

“Come on in” Sung Gyu said. She stepped inside, they took off their shoes and Sung Gyu turned all the lights on.

The house was open planned. The front door led straight to the living room, and beyond that was the kitchen cabinet, illuminated by the street lights coming through the parted curtains. A few steps led up to a patio laden with, what appeared in the dark, rows of books or records shelves, musical instruments and a bed. So it was Sung Gyu’s home, his life that she had stepped into. An odd feeling curled inside her, the deeper she walked in. A woman, a wife, a girlfriend, someone. What if it was a house that he shared with one of them?

And what if that was what she was walking into?

“Do you….” He started, looking around, appearing lost in his own house. “Do you want a drink or something? Something to eat? Anything at all?”

Hyerim was so lost in this unworldly place that it took a moment to realise it was all very real. Kim Sung gyu, the mysterious man she had just runaway with had invited her over to his house. Ideally, she should be terrified that she’d be his next victim bound by hands and feet in his basement. But she was not. Instead, she was praying, praying to heavens for whatever reasons, ‘Please let there be nobody else’.

It was for those clues she was looking for. Despite the fact that there lied absolutely no possibility of them ever being together, Hyerim was praying this was no their last night, that there was no life like hers that he had to walk back to.

“Hyerim-Ssi?” Sung Gyu called her, and he was leading the way across the living room, past the modern plush sofas and faux-fur carpets, to the kitchen. 

“Yeah?”

“Can I get you a drink?”

“Ugh…” She stared at the kitchen cabinets, at the way he opened one of them, grabbed a glass, picked a bottle of water from the cupboard, all of that. It came to her completely out of the blue. She was just that overwhelmed.

“Could we have Ramen, please?”

Sung Gyu looked at her all so suddenly, he nearly dropped the glass.

“What was that?”

“Ramen” Hyerim swallowed and slowly crept into the kitchen floor. “Do you have any? Ramen?”

Sung Gyu was gazing at her across the room in a way that sent sparks through her skin. He looked at her as if he knew something that she didn’t.

There was a playful edge to his voice. “I’m going to imagine you have no idea what you’re asking me”

Frankly, she did not. She moved past him towards the cabinets, opening one by one, searching for the ramen if he had any. Partly because she had skipped the wedding dinner altogether, and partly because she was starving and couldn’t remember the last time she had any.

“No, I just want-,” She opened the cupboard in the middle and found the prize, right on the tope shelf. “-Some ramen” She smiled.

“Am I to assume you have never had any before?”

“No, I-,”

And it happened so fast. Sung gyu was right behind her, reaching for the ramen on the top shelf. As ordinary as it was, Hyerim’s mind, when overwhelmed, reacted in a way that it had been programmed to; when a hand comes too close, when an arm reached above her head, when the posture of the opponent much larger than her inevitably mimicked someone that’s about to hurt her, she would retaliate to protect herself. Even at that moment, she flinched, she pulled herself away. She lowered her head, held two hands over her, and removed herself from his vicinity like he scalded her.

“Hyerim-Ssi” Sung Gyu called, perplexed. It took a moment for her to register what she had done.

It wasn’t him, Hyerim had to remind herself. Just Sung Gyu, just Kim Sung Gyu, who would never hurt her.

“Hyerim-Ssi…” He called gently and took two steps towards her. His eyes scanned her face, her posture, her bodily response. Then he paused, moved away. A strange, unreadable expression crossed his face. Then realisation. Then anger.

“He hit you” Sung Gyu said.

Hyerim stared back at him, completely speechless. She couldn’t deny, for it was the truth, hence her reaction. She couldn’t tell the truth, because he shouldn’t know a single thing.

Although he did seem to. But how? How would he know?

“He hit you, doesn’t he?” Sung Gyu repeated now, gentler now, more cautious, as he took a step towards her.

Hyerim pressed herself against the kitchen cabinet. “How would you know?”

“Just now” He explained, gesturing vaguely at the cupboards, between themselves. “When you…when I…”

She turned away. He shouldn’t know.

“He hurts you, Hyerim” Sung Gyu pushed on, his voice thick and determined. “And you’re telling me that you would still go back to him?”

She knew fully well what she was going back to. And it wouldn’t be just the beating now; after what she had done. She ran away with a man, and god knew what her husband imagined she had done, although the worse she’d done til now was hold his hand. He would punish her for that, nonetheless. Bound her to the bed posts, hurt her, lock her in the room. He’d call her a , he’d make her do things that would rip her dignity into unammendable shreds-,

“Please” Hyerim called, and she realised how her voice broke. “Let’s…let’s just have ramen now”

Sung Gyu stood there, helpless, wordless, but just for a moment too long. He seemed to come to. Nodding to himself, he picked out two packets of ramen from the shelf and got down to work. While he did, she slipped into a kitchen chair and tried  to pull herself together.

She found comfort in his quietness, and somehow in him knowing her truth. Wasn’t he her knight in shining armour? Wasn’t he always supposed to know what he was protecting her from? In that quietness, she wondered all the ways she could tell him the truth, tell him everything. She could build her safety net within him, would she ever have to run away again, bruised and ripped and destroyed. She could come here, running on her bare feet-

“Here you go” Sung Gyu called her, and she looked up, only to see him placing a piping hot pot of ramen on the table in front of her. The salty aroma felt so homely, a little magical. She gazed at the humes of smoke coming from the boiling pot, and through that, Sung Gyu’s generous smile.

“Thank you” She bowed her head. “I’ll eat well”

The Ramen tasted like a childhood memory she had never had. The hot, salty broth, the chewy texture of the noodles, how it was perfectly cooked, and his little addition of egg and abalone that made it burst with flavors she’d never known to exist. Hyerim didn’t realise she devoured it like a hungry child; yet, she was concious of the way Sung gyu was watching her. She invited him to join her; he merely shook his head, gestured her to eat. She couldn’t care less about what she must have looked like right then; there was no manners, no lady-like conciousness. Just fulfilling a hunger that she had had for too long.

It was during this time that Sung Gyu’s phone began to ring. An odd time of the day for a call. He picked up nonetheless. What she heard coming from his phone before he moved away from her, however, flipped her appetite upside down.

“She’s not Juri, Sung gyu! She’s not-!”

The voice of a man was loud and clear in the silence of that night before Sung Gyu panicked, took the phone with him and walked away.

Hyerim, meanwhile, sat paralysed to her seat.

 She’s not Juri.She’s not Juri.

Hyerim ran the words through her head.

Who is not Juri? Who is Juri?

The whole time Sung Gyu was on the phone, away from her sight, Hyerim ran all sorts of scenarios through her mind, but it all came down to one. Juri was a woman. Not just any woman, a woman that Sung Gyu loved. And who was not Juri? She was not Juri, Hyerim was not Juri. And whoever was on the phone with him now just wanted to remind him that.

It was a while later that Sung Gyu returned after the call. He looked exhausted, like he had aged a decade in a matter of few minutes. He gave her a tight lipped smile, not one that reached his eyes. His eyes always smiled; and if she had learned to read him enough during the few hours they spent together, Sung Gyu’s eyes refused to smile when he had too much in his mind.

She couldn’t stop herself from asking him;

“Is everything alright, Sung Gyu-Ssi?”

Hyerim thought he would say that they were. It must have been the exhaustion, it must have been the limited time they had left. Sung Gyu shook his head, laughing uncomfortably.

“I’m sorry…It was just my band manager” He said, avoiding meeting her eyes. “Since I have kidnapped their daughter, your father is refusing to pay the band…they’re not too happy about that”

“Oh” Hyerim pursed her lips, her heart falling through the floor. So that’s what he’d been on about back at the restaurant too. And Of course, and that was just the start of it. It was not the only length her father would go. 

“You know I could pay your band” She helpfully put in. “I have money. A heap of it. I don’t need it” She let out a heavy sigh. “And you know, its because of me that they’re not getting paid”

“I shouldn’t have told you” He sighed heavily, running a hand through his hair. “Don’t worry about it, I’m doing this because I want to” He tried to smile at her. “I’ll take care of it”

Hyerim nodded, nodded and nodded. Then she took a deep breath. She couldn’t keep it in any longer.

“Is it because of Juri?”

A quiet moment passed as he stared at her.

“What?” Sung Gyu called, his eyes bewildered.

“I heard…” Hyerim lowered her head, staring at the broth of the noodles in the pot. “...what your manager said, over the phone”

“Oh” Went Sung Gyu, and then silence.

“Is Juri the reason why you’re doing this?” Hyerim went on, because she just had to know. “If I’m right about what I heard, is she-?”

Sung Gyu took a breath so sharp and audible that he immediately silenced her. He nodded, fidgeting with his hands. 

“Remember when I told you…that I’m doing this for a reason as selfish as yours?”

She did. It was at the restaurant, when she changed her mind about inviting herself here. 

“I do”

He nodded. “It’s her, Juri. She’s my selfish reason…” 

She let his words sink into her mind.

“Who is Juri?”

Sung Gyu hesitated for a second, contemplating.

“She’s the reason why I could tell immediately, when you reacted to me at that moment, that he…hit you” He explained, his voice distant, quiet. “She was my first love, whom I foolsihly pushed away just because I wanted to protect our friendship. I let her go to a man whom I thought deserved her more…” He took a deep breath. “I was just twenty four. I just didn’t think, I just didn’t know that he would…”

Sung Gyu didn’t have to say it in so many words for her to understand, for it was her reality too. She just didn’t think and didn’t know.

“He was a monster” Hyerim put in. “Just like my husband”

Sung Gyu nodded, perhaps thankful that he didn’t have to explain. He took yet another sharp breath.

“There was no way that she could escape him for a long time. She didn’t tell anyone in the beginning, until I started seeing the scars…then I tried my best to rescue her. Made her report intimate partner violence, get restraining orders against him. I made her move out of town, start a new life…” 

He pressed his hands to his eyes, then let them fall to the table. The sad smile on his lips was heart-wrenching.

“It took me too long to finally find courage to ask her to choose me over him, and she had wanted nothing more. We were happy together. We strived together. I was an idol with a secret life to hide, and that was her, my little secret. She never seemed to mind. We made plans together; a home, kids, pets, a family. We thought it really was the end of that nightmare”

“Did he come back?” Hyerim asked him.

Sung Gyu nodded. “They always do, like parasites”

She couldn’t help the sad smile on her lips. It was why she knew she had no escape. 

“He came back” Sung Gyu continued, his voice thick with emotion.  “He found her, somehow. He had chased her down from god knows where. And then it happened…it happened all too soon”

The sound of the breath that he took, shaky, tearful, and deep, was enough implication to what had happened.

“I’m sorry” Hyerim whispered. Sung Gyu pressed his palms to his eyes and shook his head.

“I lost her” He worded it out to her, as if the implications weren’t clear enough. “He took her away from me. A part of me try to believe it wasn’t my fault. He was a monster, and they always come back. But I had let her choose him in the beginning, and it was I who couldn’t protect her…”

“Sung gyu-Ssi…”

“I still think about that night” He went on. “It was a night of one of my concerts, and I just wasn’t close enough to her, to see her, find her….” A moment of contemplative hesitance, and he took another shaky breath. “It will never go away. It will stay a part of me forever”

“Was it why it all happened?” She went on, finally connecting the dots. “Why you left the industry, why you’re not an idol anymore”

He nodded vigorously. She could tell how much weight he had carried despite his pretty smiles. How much he still blamed himself. “It’s been eight years since. But I still think about the what ifs of that night…What if I was not who I was? I could have protected her, I could have never let it happen”

Hyerim remained quiet, for she just didn’t know how she could comfort him. Could she say it wasn’t his fault? Although it wasn’t, nothing she said would convince him otherwise. Could she say she was sorry? No matter how many times she did, Juri would never come back, it would never heal his pain.

So she did the only thing she knew. Hyerim reached out a hand and slowly slipped it through his fingers. Almost naturally, Sung Gyu grabbed onto her. He grabbed her hand with both of his as if she was the only reassurance he need.

“At the wedding hall tonight. Even from the distance, I could see how unhappy you were, Hyerim” He told her, looked up and met her eyes. “When you left the hall, I saw your face, I saw your eyes, and I knew I had to find you”

“That’s why you stopped singing”

He smiled. “Bands never need a break”

“So you were there, intentionally waiting for me?”

“Fortunately you came to me” His eyes turned to crescent moons. “But if you hadn’t, I was ready to grab you and take off. I wanted to save you, if it was the last thing I could do”

And he did. He had saved her. Even for a night. Even for a few hours, he had saved her. Not only did he save her, he showed her things, wonderful things. He showed her prospects of an ordinary life; of happiness, tenderness and warmth, of family, of care, of belief and love. Even if she left this short lived dream behind, return to the despondence of her deserved life, she would still cherish everything she had lived tonight, and remind herself that she still had hope for a better life.

“Your reason” Hyerim told him, slowly, peaking into his eyes. “It’s not a selfish reason, Sung Gyu-Ssi….you still saved me, even if its just for tonight”

He nodded, his lips pursed. 

“I know its hard” Sung gyu continued. “I know its a decision you can’t make overnight. But leave him, Hyerim-Ssi. If he hurts you, its not a marriage worth going back for”

And she wished it was that easy. She wished she could just walk away. 

“I married Suwon group’s only son, Sung Gyu-Ssi” She smiled sadly and looked at their entwined hands. “You can imagine what he’s capable of”

“I’m not going to watch another monster take away a woman I care for”

The determined tone of his voice made her want to break down in his arms. Yet, she shook her head.

“This is my life, Sung Gyu-Ssi…and” She tried to smile. “Even if he hurt me, I know he wouldn’t dare kill me, so there’s that”

“Hyerim-Ssi…”

“Let’s just forget about that, for now” She went on, and slowly rubbed her thumb on the back of his hand. “And think about what the rest of this night could bring”

He squeezed her hand, he glanced up at her. “What are you thinking?”

She was thinking all the ways they could prolong this night. Sunrise was probably threatening at the horizon, but it was long before the rest of the world woke up to a new day. There were still possibilities, so many of them. And it was her wedding night. The night she was supposed to be cherished and loved. She’d rather have that with someone who could truly cherish her and love her than lose it on a man that broke her apart.

So Hyerim wasn’t hesitant, the slightest bit, when she told him; “I want to spend my wedding night with you”

Sung Gyu understood her. There was no way he couldn’t have, if the the way his eyes lit up couldn’t say otherwise.

“Hyerim-ah…”

The sound of his voice sent warmth through her veins.

“When I get back, he’s…he’s going to destroy me” Hyerim sighed, closed her eyes, hung her head. “In fact, he already had, and I know what it feels like”

Sunggyu’s hands squeezed her so tight, she could almost sense everything he felt.

“I want to feel loved, for once in my life. I want his touch to be erased from me, even if its just for tonight…”

“Do you understand…what you’re asking of me?” Sung Gyu asked her, quietly so, and she nodded.

“Do you also understand…that I can’t give you all that you expect?”

Hyerim looked up at him. “Why not?”

He breathed sharply, and brought her hand to his lips. He kissed her tenderly, lingering on her skin.

“He would know, Hyerim. If I…go all the way, he would know.” He answered her. “And if you were to go back to him, he would hurt you even more…as much as I want to stop you from going, I know its not that easy. So I would put myself a limit to…how far we could go”

Hyerim understood him, more than anything else. Her husband would know, he would definitely know. And that would only end up hurting him. She couldn’t  possibly put Sung Gyu deeper into this abyss than he already was.

“Okay” So she told him.

“Okay?”

“Okay” 

Sung Gyu nodded, gave it a second, perhaps two. Then he moved in, slid his fingers behind her head, in her hair, and kissed her on her lips. 

The moment their lips touched, the world seemed to come to a stand-still. He took a sharp breath against her, as everything in her melted into oblivion. Hyerim had kissed before, but no kiss had ever made her feel the things that she felt right then. He cradled her face, one arm curved around her waist. All she could do was follow him; the movement of his lips, gently tugging and coaxing her to open up for him, the hand in her hair, pressed onto her scalp. Hyerim allowed his tongue entwine with her and taste her; she breathed him in. Time had not passed, she thought, the whole while that he kissed her. When he finally pulled away from her, a large part of her heart had left, buried itself deep inside him. She didn’t know yet if she loved him. All she knew was that she didn’t want this night to end.