a heart filled with showers

On the day everything went wrong, Shim Changmin was tending his wife's favorite violet posies on their picket-fenced little garden. It was a warm Wednesday afternoon and not a cloud in the sky gave a warning of darker days ahead.

A little boy passed by on his little bicycle, the rubber tires going 'squeak, squeak' against the rough asphalt road. Changmin looked up from his work, his voice quivered of more than eighty years worth of all he has learned from this earth.

“Minsuk, ask your father to add air to your tires. It's flat.”

The little boy named Minsuk swerved his bike on the sidewalk and hopped down. There's a spring on his footsteps as he walked to where the old man was sitting. On his little hands were a small basket, soft lilac fabric covering the insides of the container, concealing what was hidden beneath it.

“Good afternoon Changmin harabeoji, umma sent me to give this to halmoni.” the boy chirped happily. “She wants to say thanks to halmoni for teaching her how to knit curtains.”

The silver-haired man stood up with a bit more effort, washed his hands on the garden hose, and guided the little boy to their quaint home.

“Jagiyah, Minsuk is here.”

His voice echoed throughout the living room. No soul was in sight.

“She must be in the study room. Come.”

It was an interesting sight, an old man wobbling across the marble flooring leading a little child not a day older than eight. The ray of the afternoon sun passing through the glass windows created a wonderful reflection of their shadows into the shiny floor.

Shim Changmin opened the door to the study room and his hand fell numbly from the doorknob. It hang limply, letting go of little Minsuk's fingers, as he dashed forward to the sprawled form of his wife on the carpeted floor.


The most unfortunate news is the kind that you already know even before you actually hear it. The moment the white-robed man went out of the operating room, Changmin sprang on his feet only to feel his whole life drain out of him when he saw the grim expression on the doctor's face. The next words spoken by the man seemed no less indistinct than buzzing noises in his ear. It seemed like all sounds faded and nothing came through the thick, invisible silence that has shrouded itself around him. He heard nothing else but the thunderous breaking of his heart. The hospital floor felt cold and unfriendly against the thin fabric covering his skin but he made no effort to stand up. He can't.

On that empty corridor of white-washed walls and symmetrical tiles, Shim Changmin knelt on his knees and cried his heart out.


That night, sleeplessness hovered above the Shim household. The steady queue of visitors flooded in and out of the door to console the heartbroken elderly man. No eyes were dry and the candles lighted all over the house barely exuded any warmth.

A storm was brewing outside and umbrellas flopped open like a carpet of toadstools when the first drops of heavy rain came tumbling down from the sky. It was seven days of continuous downpour. The sun refused to shine and the violet posies blooming in the garden started to weep and die.

On the eighth day, the sun came out and dried away all the hopelessness and despair in the town. Shim Changmin went home after the last mourner left the cemetery. He folded his black umbrella and laid a wreath of her favorite flowers on her tomb before standing up and walking away. He walked past the gang of children playing near the road, past the busy streets, unto his fenced abode. He left his shoes outside the kitchen door and walked solemnly to that one part of the house he never visited after his wife left him: the study room.

Everything about that room reminded him of her. It was her favorite place. Her silent sanctuary. And for more than half a century that they've been together, he'd always find her there. For once, the porch and the garden seemed to lost its luster in her eyes that on their tenth year together, she picked up herself and made her own world in that cushy little room.

He had just stepped over the little space and he felt her presence lingering, ever so tangible, in the air again. The cream-colored walls welcomed him like the warmth of her embrace after a long day. He can still smell her; her scent drifting above the books, on the desk, on every nook and cranny of the room; and he felt his eyes start to water once more.

Her favorite pen was still on the desk. Beside it was her spectacles – the one she's most fond of – and he can still vividly remember how she looked every time the glasses slide down her nose and how she would adorably push them back with her fingers. The wind blew and the sound of pages flapping blended with the faint tinkling of the wind chimes near the window. His gaze fell on a thick book, pages dancing freely against the breeze. He picked up the thing, fingers tracing against the spine of the weary looking hardcover. He opened it carefully and the scrawny handwriting of his wife greeted him. The rain that has left the town came back and fell to earth as tears from his eyes. He felt his heart give a jolt and a hazy dimness started to fall upon him.

Later that evening, old friends came for a visit to check on the elderly widower but was met with a rather stirring sight. On the same study room where Choi Sooyoung took her last breath, lay a lifeless Shim Changmin. His head atop the desk, one hand hanging limply on his side and the other sandwiched between his chest and the wooden table. The man, still of vivid handsomeness despite the lines that marked his aged face, had traces of tears on his cheeks but his lips, pursed in a warm smile. Beside him a thick book lay open. Drops of his tears blotted out some words on the yellowed parchment but the rest of the sentences were still readable.
 

Summer 2038
Today is our 10th wedding anniversary.
We've made it through all the hard times but it seems that it was still not the end of it.

Today, the doctor told me that I had Alzheimer's. Changmin doesn't know. He doesn't need to. We are still young and our marriage has just started but he has suffered much already. He has done everything to make me happy and I will do my best to do the same to him.
Today is only the beginning of much happier days.

In this book, I will remember everything. I will make sure I will not forget anything.
I will not forget my love.