Jieun’s POV

            I sat in a consolidated room with my eyes closed as different girls picked at my hair and patted make up on my face. I tried not to move, imagining myself as a porcelain doll. Honestly, I haven’t been this dolled up since my university commencement, and even then I considered myself far from being a cake face. A part of me was scared to open my eyes, worried that the reflection I saw would be unrecognizable. I laughed in my head at the irony of all this. I was scared I wouldn’t see myself in my reflection, yet everything I did this past week was no less me. The fact that I was sitting here obediently now was a prime example of how distant I’d been with my beliefs and emotions. I tried to keep my mind from imagining a countdown clock of minutes left until I’d walk down the aisle.

            “Jieun! You look beautiful!” Hyosung’s voice rang from behind me. When I finally opened my eyes, I wanted to tear up again. In front of me was a mirror image of myself. When I turned my head to the side, it moved it accordance, yet the face did not smile back at me. It may have just been the lighting, but my sin looked more milky white than usual, and all the tiny blemishes and scars on my cheek were nowhere to be seen, as if a magical eraser had brushed them all away.

            “Thank you,” I sighed, looking up at Hyosung who placed a hand on my shoulder.

            “Smile, dear. This is a big day for you!” She insisted, but her eyes seemed to oppose every word she breathed. “It doesn’t matter how pretty your dress is or how well done your make up is. Everything is incomplete without a smile.” Suddenly, I felt apologetic and tried my best to feign a grin. It looked awkward on my face, and I knew it was because I wasn’t happy. The wedding veil was fastened snugly in my hair, and after a few seconds of examining my fabricated smile in the mirror, Hyosung brushed the veil over my face. It had obvious holes and I could still see my complexion clearly through the veil, but having a thin piece of fabric over me felt like another mask to hide the truth. After all, it was an ugly truth no one gathered here today would want to hear. The truth that I hate my father. The truth that I don’t love Daehyun. The truth that I’d rather be anywhere but here.

            The minutes seemed to fly by like seconds.

Daehyun’s POV

            I stood at the altar, observing the crowds of chaebols that gathered here today. At the end of the long walkway I watched Jieun’s father, standing straight as a pillar, his face clean shaven and his suit jacket neatly ironed. He looked more like a security member standing guard than a joyous father about to walk his one and only child down the wedding aisle. I had imagined such a day countless times growing up, and though the decorations were exactly as my mind portrayed, nothing about today felt right. There was a large clock with roman numerals hanging above the back doors where Jieun’s father stood. It was almost time.

 I glanced over to where my own family was sitting. My mother gave me a haughty wink and my father nudged her annoyingly on the shoulder. A little more to the back of the room, I spotted Youngjae sitting with his arms crossed, his eyes darting back at me. Sunhwa was in a flowery pink dress with her hair done up messily in a bun. When she caught my gaze, she quickly looked over to Youngjae and then copied his pose. They were siblings with a large , but their stare looked equally menacing.

The piano began to play the generic wedding song, and it snapped my attention away from the crowd. All eyes turned to the back door, suddenly opening with not so much as a creek. Jieun entered, her eyes looking down at the ground as the doors closed behind her. After a deep breath she looked up, and everyone in the wedding hall felt the need to applaud. She was breathtaking, and the closer she walked towards me, the guiltier I felt. Her head, as she walked, was always tilted away from her father. She was probably avoiding his eyes, but he didn’t care. What he wanted was finally happening at the cost of his daughter’s happiness. To him, it probably felt like a small price to pay.

            Jieun now stood before me. Her heels made her appear taller than usual, but I could still see the top of her head, where a small, diamond tiara sat atop her hair. I remembered how much she wanted to be a princess when she was a little girl. We played silly games, where she would pretend to be attacked by a dragon and I, as the ‘knight in shining armour’, would have to rescue her and slay the dragon. If she could somehow revert back to the little girl that she was, I could imagine how delighted she’d be to know she would grow up to be as beautiful as the princess she dreamed to be. I was dressed all in white, but I did not feel like a valiant knight at her side. Instead, I felt like a dirty thief, and no amount of apologies could condone for the wrong I’d done to her.

            “It’s time to say your vows.” The priest waited for a nod from both of us, but my eyes were rapidly scanning the crowd. There was someone missing—someone crucial to the success of my plan. Where was he? I’d given him a ticket to an early flight to Seoul, and he should have arrived late last night. There was no excuse for him to be absent. If he wasn’t here, my whole plan might end up as an embarrassing act of rebellion. The priest coughed roughly and eyed me. Everyone in the crowd was waiting anxiously, some started to shuffle around impatiently in their seats. Knowing that there was no more time to stall, I looked back at the priest and nodded.

            “Alright, do you, Jung Daehyun, take Song Jieun to be your lawfully wedded wife?” It was a simple question, and simple questions often had simple answers, but in a situation so complicated, a measly “I do” was not going to suffice. I paused, and watched Jieun’s face for a few seconds. Her eyes avoided mine, and I noticed that she had been holding her breath, something she often did to calm her anxiety when she was younger. The habit must have followed her through the years. She quickly noticed my silence and then darted her head back up to face me. In small, almost unnoticeable movements, she nodded slowly at me, as if urging me to say my vows quickly. I smiled back at her, a kind of witty grin to show I had something up my sleeve. She responded with a confused stare, and the priest coughed again in my direction, cutting our silent transfer of messages short.

            “I…” I paused again, dragging on the one syllable I had spoken as I scanned the crowd one last time. Behind one of the pillars by the back door, I saw a man peeking out from behind, dressed up in a black suit and a blue tie which complimented the color theme nicely. He was here, so my plan could work. The crowd looked uneasy now, eyes darting back and forth from Jieun to me, and I caught sight of Jieun’s father’s deadly gaze. The moment our eyes met, his teeth gritted like an angry bulldog about to charge at me.

            “… Do not.” I finished with a deep breath. The crowd gasped heavily and turned to one another, gossip quickly swallowed the atmosphere of the room. When I looked back at Jieun, she was ready to stomp on my foot with her five inch heels, confused at angry at my childish behavior. There was common saying she’d always whisper in my ear growing up, ‘guys are always so slow to mature’. I wanted to laugh at how true that statement was, but she would come to understand soon enough.

            “Jung Daehyun, what is the meaning of this?!” Jieun’s father angrily marched up to me, his fists clenched tight by his side. I winced once, my eyes closing shut as his shadow towered over me, afraid that he’d take a hit, but nothing happened. I slowly opened my left eye. He was fuming in front of me, his face red and angry as he demanded for an explanation. I took a few steps away from him and then grabbed the microphone from the stunned priest.

            “Ladies and Gentlemen,” I announced, quickly regrouping the crowd’s attention collectively.

            “I, Jung Daehyun, should not have the honour to stand at the altar with Song Jieun today. The man who should be at Song Jieun’s side… is him.” With both my arms outstretched, I directed the crowd’s attention to Yongguk, who stood confidently at the end of the hall with his hands resting casually in his pockets. No one in the room had other than Jieun and I had seen him before, and an even louder commotion arose.

            “Jung Daehyun you are not in the position to screw with me right now. What do you think you’re doing?!” Jieun’s father angrily slapped the microphone out of my hand, the sound of it thumping on the ground resonated through the room, and a loud high frequency shriek caused everyone to cover their ears until a technician turned off the mic.

            “Answer me.” He grabbed me by the collar, pulling me up so that my feet couldn’t touch the ground.

            “Just because your life is damned by your own sins doesn’t mean others should be dragged into hell along with you.” I choked out, watching his eyes grow wide with bewilderment. It was the first time I’d ever talked back to him.

            “Get your filthy hands off my son.” My mother’s angry voice screamed. In seconds, I was back on the ground and my parents were both giving Jieun’s dad heck for laying his hands on me. I glanced over to the end of the hall. Jieun was running towards him, her hands holding up her dress as the tail swept over the carpet she’d just walked over. For the first time in a long while, I felt happy that I’d done something on my own whim and that that something felt undeniably right.

Jieun’s POV

            Yongguk was here! He stood quietly at the back with his hands smug in his pockets, eyes looking sheepishly at me. Everything around me seemed to go blank, and I didn’t care that my father was here. I’d wanted to see Yongguk again so badly. I made childish wishes upon stars at night, I’ve tossed pennies into fountains, and even though I had a small shred of hope he’d come today I couldn’t believe my eyes that were seeing him now. As I ran towards him, I felt a chill down my spine, as if my conscience was telling me it was too good to be true. Maybe I was the one who was hallucinating now, and suddenly I could understand the doubtful fear and worry Yongguk had the day I’d come back to Vancouver from the airport, and why he was so hesitant to hug me. 

            As I neared him, I felt my left ankle roll a little as I myself forward. I was an expert with walking in heels, but running was a whole different story, but I never imagined I would trip on flat ground. As I found myself falling closer to the ground, Yongguk’s strong arms caught me and pulled me back up. He was smiling, and something in his smile melted all the ice around my heart. I wanted to push him away and pretend that I was angry at him for breaking his promise, but now that he was here, and I knew he was real, I couldn’t find the heart or energy to do that.

            “I’m sorry for leaving.” He whispered as I dug my head into his chest. I was crying uncontrollably, and I could only imagine how monstrous I’d looked with all that wedding make up smudging over my face.

            “Don’t ever do it again,” I demanded, sounding more like a whiny child than a grown woman who was almost married off today. Yongguk pulled away from me gently and handed me a handkerchief and a pocket mirror. Surprisingly, none of my make-up had run, and other than my wet cheeks, it didn’t look like I was crying. I quickly wiped the tears off my face and stood up straight, wincing from the pain that shot down in one of my ankles. It happened often in my gym classes when I was younger, and I knew I’d be okay in a moment.

            “I won’t.” He smiled, as I leaned against his shoulder for temporary support.

            “Thank you for coming back.”

            “You should thank Daehyun. He actually came up with this bizarre plan.” I glanced over to the altar where Daehyun stood, trying to create a bridge between his angry parents and my enraged father. It seemed like his entire life he’d been collecting burdens for my sake, and now for the sake of my happiness, he made my father hate him. I was both surprised and impressed by Daehyun. I thought my father had changed him to the point of no return, but at the last second he found something crazy that would redeem himself. Now I could see that he hadn’t changed at all, and that he was still the best friend who had always been looking out for me.

            “Would now be a good time for an introduction?” Youngjae suddenly came into sight, blocking my view of Daehyun and my father. He held Sunhwa’s hand as she brushed out the ruffles of her dress with her other. Just then I realized that Youngjae and Yongguk had never met before. I quickly introduced them, and explained to Yongguk how we had met. Sunhwa seemed to take a liking to him right away, and begged Yongguk for a piggy back ride.

            “Sunhwa, you can ask him later.” Youngjae scolded, pulling Sunhwa away as she tried desperately to cling to Yongguk’s legs. “I’m sorry about my hyperactive sister…”

            “It’s no problem.” Yongguk laughed, and then he knelt down in front of Sunhwa so that she could climb on his back. As they ascended, she cheered happily and clapped.

            “This is fun! You’re taller than Youngjae Oppa!” The four of us laughed. This was how their first visit should’ve been. It should have been somewhere more peaceful, not here. Many of the guests had already left, annoyed and angry for having wasted their time, coming from all over the world to a ceremony that didn’t finish properly.

            “Jieun Unnie,” Sunhwa smiled, there was a sparkle in her eyes and I had the feeling she was about to ask something.

            “Yes, Sunhwa?”

            “Since this was a fake wedding, can I be the flower girl at your real one?” As usual her questions were innocently blunt and shameless. Youngjae’s eyes shot open and he immediately grabbed Sunhwa from Yongguk’s shoulders, and then covered with his palm.

            “Sunhwa, that was rude. Apologize!” There was nervous sweat forming on his forehead as he glared at his little sister. 

            “Of course you can!” I beamed, nodding to Youngjae that it was fine. He let go of her and she jumped back into Yongguk’s arms, ecstatic about the sealed promise. She then looked up at him, and then back at me, similar to how she eyed Daehyun and I the time she came to the hotel. It lasted a few seconds, and then she looked at Yongguk with a smirk.

            “You better treat Jieun nice or Youngjae Oppa is going to steal her from you!” She threatened in all seriousness, but the three of us couldn’t help but laugh. Sunhwa was the best at placing Youngjae in awkward situations, and he clearly grew tired of trying to clean up after her.

            “I will, I promise.” Yongguk chuckled, holding up his pinky for to seal his promise with little Sunhwa. It all felt a little like a dream, but it felt right. All the loose ends seemed to be tying themselves up, but there was just one last person I needed to speak to, and that was Jung Daehyun.

-HALF A YEAR LATER- 

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            I stood at the front podium with my back facing the crowd. Behind me were a growing crowd of eager girls who were gently pushing and pulling back and forth as they waited. I stole a glance before lifting the neatly made bouquet of flowers up, positioning my throw before letting go. I could hear small shrieks and gasps as the girls reached out for the flying bouquet, and when I turned around, I was satisfied to see that they landed in Hyosung’s hands, just as I had aimed. She stood, dumbfounded for a moment, as the other young ladies surrounded her with congratulations, and I sent her a wink when she looked up at me. And she thought I was kidding when I said I’d throw it to her.

Suddenly, a shower of white flower petals washed over her, getting stuck in her hair and dress. Sunhwa stood behind her, happily dousing her with confetti and petals, emptying her small basket dutifully as the flower girl. Hyosung looked to the side as one of the groomsmen walked over to her and smiled,

“I guess this means we’re next.” Hyosung’s face flushed bright red and she turned away, but the other bridesmaids hollered enthusiastically.

As the night died down, I changed out of my wedding attire into a more comfortable and formfitting dress. A few friends helped me undo the tight bun that held my veil and fixed the curls in my hair. My father had already left immediately after walking me down the aisle. He still never accepted the embarrassment Daehyun had caused him that day, nor did he ever fully accept my decision to marry Yongguk. I was pleased, though, that after suffering such a huge blow to his pride, he never tried to convince me out of it.

When I was done, I headed back to the table where Yongguk was, and we gave a toast for the upcoming newlyweds at our table. Just a week prior to our wedding, Daehyun had finally given Hyosung the proposal she’d dreamt of for years, and they had been fiancés since. I always knew Hyosung had a thing for him, and she always kept quiet about it because she knew how he felt about me. I was overjoyed that things had changed for the better, and that Daehyun could finally be with a girl who would love him with everything she had.

“Jieun, this is your day. It’s time to stop pushing the spotlight onto me.” Hyosung looked at me with cunning eyes and then lifted a bowl and her pair of chopsticks. I gasped, immediately catching on to what she was about to do. Everyone at our table seemed to get the cue and did the same, and within seconds the entire banquet hall was clattering with the sound of utensils banging against glass dishware.

Hyosung’s eyes never left mine as she patiently waited for what would follow. I felt undeniably embarrassed, because now the attention of everything in the room was on Yongguk and I. As my face flushed tomato red, contrasting with the turquoise color theme, Yongguk pulled me closer to him and leaned in close enough that our faces almost touched. I suddenly hated wedding traditions for putting me on the spot like this. Hyosung must have planned this all along. Yongguk waited patiently, his lips just centimeters away, and panicking, I quickly pecked him on the cheek and pulled away. Dissatisfied, the clanging of bowls was immediately replaced with whining voices.

“Are you serious…” I mumbled, and I could have sworn I heard Hyosung laughing in the background. Just wait until it’s your turn. I’ll have my revenge.

            “Stand up! Stand up!” The crowd was now demanding, and Yongguk and I stood up as everyone else took a seat to watch. There was nothing more embarrassing than this! Once again, the clanging continued and I saw that Sunhwa and Youngjae were the ones to start it this time.

            “Kiss kiss kiss!” Sunhwa cheered, sitting on Youngjae’s lap at our table—she had ‘front row seats’.

            “You heard the girl,” Yongguk whispered with a mischievous smile that caught me off guard.

            “Wha—“ I was immediately interrupted by Yongguk’s lips pushing against mine, his arms holding me close to him by the waist. The clanging finally stopped and everyone was cheering, finally satisfied. I didn’t feel embarrassment anymore—just pure happiness. The only thing that could make this night any better was to have my grandfather here, but something in the air told me that my grandfather was indeed, watching me from above. 

A/N: Wow what a long chapter, this took me a few hours to write hahaha. I hope this was a satisfying ending. Daehyun's plan wasn't all that special, but it worked. (I mentioned it was crazy, after all!) Turns out mostly everyone gets a happy ending (: I'm such a er for happy endings.... Thank you to all my patient readers for being with me and this fanfic for an entire year! It's sad, especially for me, that it's ended now, but I'm so glad to have met and became friends with many of my amazing readers who made writing this much more funner than it would have been otherwise. Sorry for all the awkward kiss scenes in this fanfic--I can't write anything romantic to save my life... but I tried! Wanderlust has been a great pleasure to have written. 

Thank you!

SkyeLin