Four weeks later . . .

You swiftly tossed the white envelope onto the coffee table and laid flat on your back on the sofa. The sound of the front door closing woke you up from your short nap. As you sleepily rubbed your eyes, you noticed your mother walking into the room with a bundle of clothes in her hand.

“What’s that?” she asked pointing to the envelope.

“It’s nothing,” you muttered, trying to fall back asleep.

“Doesn’t look that way to me,” your mother stated when she placed the clothes on the table and grabbed the mail.

Your eyes immediately widened in shock. Jumping to your feet, you frantically waved your arms in front of her while screaming, “MOM, DON’T READ IT!”

It was far too late since she already pulled out the white card and began reading the front page. “What’s wrong Mei Ri? It’s just an invitation to . . . oh.”

You sighed and slouched back into the couch. “An invitation to his wedding,” you finished for her. Your heart burned with anguish and misery. It hurt so much even having to think about it. You knew this wasn’t his doing though. He would have known that sending this invite would only cause you to drown further into your depression. It must have been either Sica or Mrs. Lee. Women like those two, don’t care who they hurt as long as they remain victorious.

“On the 29th? That’s tomorrow!”

“Hmm . . . “ you muttered back while playing with your fingers.

Your mother joined you on the couch and wrapped her arms around you. Her eyes were filled with concern and sympathy, but mostly grief since she had to witness her daughter at such a state. “Mei Ri – ah, why on earth are you doing this?”

“Mom, I have to. I told you already.” It has been a month since you left Donghae. Ever since then, your phone continued buzzing with calls from Donghae, Bao Yu, and the rest of the boys but you never picked up. Not once. If you heard any of their voices, you knew that within a split second you would break down into tears and would be on the first bus back to Seoul. That was the last thing you wanted to happen. Your mother thought otherwise.

“You should go,” she said casually.

You lifted your face from her shoulder and stared into her warm, brown eyes. “Mom, are you crazy? I can’t!”

“You should go and talk to Mr. Lee to reach some sort of agreement.”

“Can we not talk about this anymore? I feel too guilty.”

“Guilty?” your mother asked completely flabbergasted and then realized what you meant, “Oh honey, I hope you don’t think that everything that happened to our family was your fault.”

You didn’t answer because deep down, you knew it was true no matter how one looked at the situation. “Of course it is. None of this would have even happened if I didn’t agree to the marriage in the first place. We were happy even without the money from Mr. Lee. And now, we not only lost the money but we lost our house. Mom, everything is falling apart because of me.”

Your mother brought you into her arms again and help you close to her chest. She ran her fingers through your smooth hair as she had always done to calm you down. You responded by wrapping your arms around her waist while trying to hold back your tears.

“Mei Ri – ah, I know everything seems unbearable right now. If anyone should be blamed, it should your father and me for forcing you into this. But on the bright side, you did end up falling in love with him.”

“Aish mom!” you exclaimed in embarrassment and covered your face with your petite hands to hide your reddened face. You had to admit though that the extent of love you had for Donghae was clearly visible through the past weeks of depression. In fact, your spirits were so dampened that your own parents couldn’t bear to even take one glimpse at you. You missed everything about him. His eyes. His sweet smile that made you grow weak in the knees. His protective hugs. His addictive kisses which made your heart flutter almost every single time his lips approached yours.

“This is your relationship and I am not going to tell you what to do or how to resolve it. That’s only up to you since this is your life and only you can choose what to do with it. But what I will tell you is that there are times when our mind says one thing and our heart says another. Trust you