“What is this?” Dara stared at the platters of food presented in front of her early in the morning when she went down to the dining room to get some hot chocolate before she go to work. She raised her brow at Donghae who smiled hesitantly. Mrs. Rey just standing in a corner holding a pitcher of juice.

“I… made you breakfast,” he answered hesitantly. “I just thought… you would want to eat first before going to work.”

Dara tried not to let her exasperation show but she failed. She sighed heavily. It has already been 6 months after they got married and if she didn’t know better, Donghae is acting like a doting husband. Just what is he playing at?

“I don’t like to eat breakfast,” Dara said flatly. Donghae nodded looking slightly hurt and disappointed and Dara smirked sarcastically. “You have got to be joking right?”

Donghae looked at her in question and Dara exhaled again in a puff. “Listen,” she said in a condescending tone. “Whatever we have agreed of this whole… farce... that still stands. I don’t care about what you do and you don’t care about what I do. You use me for your company’s music, I use you as a cover for this whole media mess. Simple as that. So please. Do not make this complicated.”

Donghae just looked at her in silence while she could see Mrs. Rey glaring at her at the corner of her eye. Dara continued trying to get her point across. “We only got married for business purposes. So for the love of god, do not act like… that.” She gestured at Donghae’s form. “It is freaking me out.”

Donghae continued looking at her face then said, “Is that all you think of me?”

Dara raised one of her eyebrows in question.

“A business partner? A cover?”

“What else should there be?” Dara looked confused at his question.

“I asked you to marry me because I want to,” Donghae said in a quiet tone. “Not because of a business venture or an investment. I asked you to marry me because I want you to be my wife.”

Dara’s look was frozen then turned turned incredulous and then she guffawed. “This has got to be a joke! A in’ dream I need to wake up from.” She tittered a bit more before looking at Donghae. “I seriously didn’t see that coming! I wake up in the morning, seeing you cooking breakfast, calling me for lunch, or dinner, or asking me how my day was…” Her smile fell. “It irritates me to no end. Stop. Just stop. I thought we are clear that this is purely business? Now you’re suddenly confessing to me?”

“No.” Donghae shook his head in a calm manner. “You thought I married you for business. But I didn’t.”

Dara really couldn’t believe this. She scratched the side of her head. “I don’t want to get married, Donghae,” she said bluntly thinking there’s no other way to put it mildly. “And especially not with you. I thought you would be the one to save me. I thought once we get married, the thing with the media would die down. But our marriage fueled it all the more. I don’t even know what I need to do anymore. The only good thing which came out of this whole mess, is that you know how to handle those rumors. You know how to take care of them. You know what to say to the reporters, to the media. You know how to play them. That’s one good thing about being married to you. But that’s it.”

“Are you still inlove with him?” Donghae suddenly asked.

Dara’s expression turned to surprise and she couldn’t speak for a minute. Donghae didn’t mention a name but he didn’t really need to for Dara to know who he meant. She responded with thin lips and narrowed eyes. “That is none of you business.”

Forget the hot chocolate. She turned around to walk out but she stopped and coldly said over her shoulder. “Don’t you ever mention that again.” Then she strode out the door and slammed it shut behind her.

Dara had spent a good full hour crying her eyes out. Bom looked exhausted trying to calm her down after she led her inside the house’s den. Dara was sputtering her apologies but Bom could hardly make out any words as Dara choked on her own sobs. Bom just let her get it all out while patting her back and saying, “It’s okay” every now and then. After she calmed down enough to tell Bom her apologies again, Bom told her she’ll just get some water after seeing her blotched face.

Now alone, Dara stared into space while she replayed every thing she had ever done in all those 15 years. Every mean, bad thing. She couldn’t believe Bom is still welcoming her at her home. Or even coming straight to her house when she found out Dara was looking for her. She let out a sob again. She must’ve sacrificed her life for the good of mankind in her past life to get a friend like Bom.

Her mind drifted to Donghae and she bit her lip from wailing. She remembered every detail on what happened after they got married like it was yesterday. She remembered how she had treated him. From the first day up until the last day of the time before she got amnesia. And why she filed for the divorce.

Bom came back followed by a maid holding a tray with a pitcher of water and some sandwiches. How Bom could think she could eat at a time like this, she have no idea. The maid laid down the tray at the table, bowed to both of them, and walked out without a word. Bom sat down beside her on the couch, putting an arm on the headrest while looking at Dara.

“Have you gotten your wits back yet?” Bom asked with an amused expression.

Dara sniffed trying to hold back the tears threatening to spill out again. “I’m so sorry Bom,” she apologized once again.

“You know, you have got to stop that,” Bom said smiling. “I think I’m going to pull my hair out if you apologized again.”

“But—“

“AH!” Bom put her hand up in Dara’s face like a stop sign. “Stop it. It was 3 years ago.” Then she smiled. “Do you honestly think I would let you enter my sacred home if i’m still mad at you?”

“It’s not a question of you being mad at me,” Dara said feeling miserable. “It’s the question of how I treated you and it was basically the direct gesture of shattering any friendship ever created in the history.”

Bom smiled even wider. “Well, whatever happened, I’m glad I got you back. Even with your memories… you are now the Dara I shared my adolescence with.”

Dara smiled sadly at Bom. “I just can’t believe….” She sighed heavily. “I felt like i have just watched  somebody else’s life running through my mind. Remembering somebody else’s memories. My parents, Jiyong, you, Donghae…. It’s like… It can’t be real. I mean… how could I think….”

Bom nodded but she kept silent while Dara ruminates of what her life is now. “I treated everyone like trash. Even my parents. My parents!  If that isn’t enough to make me a monster then I don’t know what is.”

“You were hurt,” Bom said seriously. “You built yourself to an ideal home, ideal family, ideal life, that finding out the truth hurts you so much you buried your pain in hate. That’s where you went wrong.”

Dara looked suspiciously at Bom. “You’ve been dying to use that line on me, didn’t you?”

Bom grinned. “Yes, I read that in a book and I can finally use it on you after 3 years.”

Dara rolled her eyes, laughing a little.

Bom continued. “Seriously Dara. I think that’s where you went wrong. That author’s right. You need to channel your emotions and not keep it bottled inside you. In the end, you erupted, trying to make  everybody as miserable as you were.”

“What did you do, memorize the entire book?”

“Only those which I think would be good to use on you,” Bom said.

Dara was silent after a moment, then said in a quiet voice. “What should I do?”

“Well first, you need to take a bath. You hair is totally all over the place and your face looked so red, your eyes, so puffy.”

Bom continued but Dara just sat there staring into space letting Bom drone on. She actually knew what she need to do. From the moment she’s got her memories and remembered Donghae, she knew what she had to do first. She just didn’t want to face it yet. But now, she had to.

“I need call my attorney for the divorce.”

Bom stopped whatever she is speaking of. She looked at Dara looking lost but with a determined expression on her face. “And I need to see Jiyong.”

The last statement raised Bom’s eyebrows.“Jiyong? Jiyong?” She didn’t speak for a moment. “So… you realized… you don’t really love Donghae?”

Dara turned her head to her and Bom could see her eyes filling with tears again. “No,” she said brokenly. “I do. I love Donghae. I love him so much that there’s no other way for me but to let him go.” She covered her face with her hands while she tried not cry but her tears fell silently.

Bom looked at her like she was crazy. “Uh…I understand but… huh?”

Dara didn’t speak for a minute trying to calm herself because she is close to breaking down again. When she think of what she is going to do, she felt like she’s losing everything. Exactly like the time right before her car accident. She fell apart then, now she’s falling apart again. She needs to focus to get this through. She took a deep breath before wiping her tears off her red, blotched face. She took in a shaky breath. She turned to look at Bom with her tear-streaked face.

“I’m ruining his life, Bom,” she sai, her voice cracking. “From the moment I married him… I… the media… the stocks… his company… his dad…. I just… I can’t….”. She had hurt him so many times. Now she’s going to hurt him again.

Bom looked exasperated. “Okay, hold up! Because I absolutely can’t understand what you are trying to say and where Jiyong fit into all this. Why don’t you start at the beginning?”

Dara sniffled and wiped a tear which had fell down on her eye.

“I was… angry,” Dara started. “Furious because the news….” She stifled a laugh realizing how ridiculous her reason was at the time. “You know I read comments and… all of them hated me.”

Bom’s mouth twitched as she is still not making any sense. Dara took a deep breath as she started from the beginning.

“You know that thing with Jiyong? It got out of hand,” Dara said remembering how she had messed up. “The rumors… people believed it. Like, I used Jiyong so I could start my company… I cheated Jiyong... Jiyong’s fans are creating those baseless rumors and… it got blown out of proportion. And It was my fault because I didn’t address them or do something and… I couldn’t do anything anymore because… people are now believing it. I was so mad I wanted to hunt them all down and just… “ She could remember how she had felt. That fury raging inside her, consuming her. “The anger I had felt then is so… irrational but I can’t… I can’t stop it. I felt like i need to prove them that they’re wrong. I need to show them they can’t bring me down. I need to show Jiyong how… I can make it even without him. I need to show them I would still be standing after all this. That need… it drove me crazy.

I came to the point when I wanted to do something that will shock all those people. And how to get even. Those reportes who are writing all these lies about me… those people sending me death threats and comments… I wanted nothing more than to get even with all them. Especially with Jiyong. That’s all I think about.” Dara stared off at a piece of lint at the coffee table remembering how it had felt. It was ugly but she had revelled on that emotion because it made her keep going. It protected her from feeling  the pain. It had become her primary motivation. Her dose of energy.

“When Donghae offered marriage, I  jumped at it. All the while thinking how shock the media would be, how… how I could show it to their faces… how I could show Jiyong I could find someone much better than him. Or how it would benefit me because I married the owner of the top entertainment company in the country. ” She felt tears gathering on her eyes again. “That’s all I was thinking about when I agreed to marry him… And I didn’t… even gave any importance on the reason why he asked to marry me. I had thought… he wants to use me to make music and… you know that’s okay because I could use him too. That’s what I had thought… And all that time… I had no idea that he asked to marry me because he loved me.”

Bom took out a handful of tissue and gave it to her. She blew her nose out noisily. “I was a total ,” she continued, her voice muffled by the tissue. Then she looked at Bom with red eyes. “You know what I did on our wedding night? After he took me in his house? I went out. To drink. All night. I didn’t even think he would be worried about me. I spent the entire night drinking and stayed in a hotel after. When I got up the next morning, I’ve got about 20 messages and 18 missed calls from Donghae. Worrying about me.  But did you know what I did? I ignored it. He spent the entire night worrying about me and I didn’t even gave a thought of calling him back. Or texting him. And you know what else? I got irritated because he used up all my battery calling me. Tell me if I’m not a total, complete and tell me why Donghae fell inlove with me in the first place?!”

Bom sighed. “You’re right. You were a and Donghae was a fool to have loved you at all.”

Dara scowled continuing how Donghae had went into SP just to check on her after that day and found her at her desk trying to get through  her hang-over. She didn’t notice it at that time but Donghae looked relieved she was still alive and breathing. It continued like that for a couple of days. Donghae trying to take care of her. Dara barely going at Donghae’s house and just staying in her unit. When she found out Donghae was inlove with her, she was beyond incredulous. She had never thought of Donghae as anything other than a media cover and someone whom Jiyong could feel inferior to. But there he was, telling her the reason he asked to marry her. And she just laughed in his face.  After that, she became less and less willing to go home, not wanting to see Donghae and became more and more cold to him at chances when they were both at the same place. It continued for almost a year where Donghae just kept on trying to reach out to her. She scoffed at his attempts, scowled at his gestures and even telling him in his face that what he is doing is useles because she would never see him as anything other than a business agreement. She doesn’t even remember any time then when she didn’t talk to him without a bite on her tone or even sarcasm.

“Okay, you are beyond evil,” Bom said simply.

“I was so mad at him. I was so mad at everybody. I was thinking I should never have agreed to marry him because it didn’t do anything good! They were now stating that we both used Jiyong. It’s all over the newspapers, the internet… I didn’t even consider that Jiyong’s fans was hating on him too. Because they thought he was in league with me in using Jiyong. And all I think about was I was the victim. The defamation… I don’t know… continued for, like, 6 months, and I didn’t think of anything other than, marrying him was a mistake. But Donghae… he just… it didn’t faze him or let it affect him. And I don’t know why but it made me more furious. I was blaming him.” She put her hands on her head at the recollection. God, Bom was right. She was beyond evil. No wonder fate made her understand she doesn’t deserve Donghae exactly at the time when she realized she already lost him.

When the news had died now, she was contemplating on filing for the divorce but when Jiyong dropped by her office to demand her reason for marrying Donghae, she changed her mind.

“Why did you marry him?” Jiyong demanded when he entered her office while she is preparing for a meeting.

She merely raised one of her eyebrows at him.

Jiyong looked angry. “Did you do this because of the money Hits is bring