Chapter 31

Her legs shook in shock. Now, watching her beg for s*x with a blank face, his gestures felt melancholy.

“But thinking back…”

Sungjun pressed his forehead.

“No matter how rational, Senior Executive Director never got involved with women.”

“…”

“I’ve seen all kinds of dirty things here. I’ve seen and heard enough about other third-generation chaebols doing similar things. But watching you, I always felt something was different. Senior Executive Director must have sensed that difference too. That’s why he couldn’t let you go.”

“…”

“If that difference I vaguely sensed is real, could you hold onto him? I dare to ask.”

Difference… ‘difference.’

She knew what he meant. The steps taken to pay off debt and the steps taken for something fundamentally different.

Her very old sincerity. Not wanting to be a burden, not wanting shame, not wanting pain—she’d hidden and run from it all her life, but could never throw it away…

She wanted to be proud of herself. She didn’t want to be hurt again. She didn’t want to hear, like in childhood, “You don’t belong, stay away from that man.”

Despite all those desperate desires…

“Sorry for showing up and messing up your happy ending.”

Tears welled up. This wasn’t her happy ending.

“I mean, I’m human too, so I guess I wanted to watch movies, eat, celebrate important days with a boyfriend, like my college friends do. But… it just wasn’t possible.”

Yes, she wanted to try dating. She’d always envied couples who could hold hands and love each other as equals, with no status or burden between them.

But… but even so, could she ever love that way? She was the kind of person who was relieved when Eun-gyu’s invitation for a date was canceled. With Eun-gyu, she didn’t have to make herself small, wouldn’t feel shabby in front of his family, and didn’t have a miserable or shameful past… She could have the ordinary romance she’d always dreamed of, yet she felt no desire for it.

She wanted to get far away from Ryu-il, but that didn’t mean a happy ending. Maybe in the past, but not anymore.

What she truly wanted…

“Oh my, we interrupted the lovers’ time.”

“Don’t be so silly in front of young people.”

“I just meant they look good together…”

On a day when they held hands and smiled shyly at an old lighthouse, they were just an ordinary couple in everyone’s eyes. That was what she wanted. More precisely, she wanted that with Ryu-il.

“To eat together again… go to the sea… bring flowers to your graduation…”

Maybe it was the same wish as Ryu-il’s.

She’d been afraid all her life. Her past, so shabby before love, the time she’d fallen to the bottom before him, remained as wounds, like mud.

Still, she couldn’t just end everything now. At the very least, she had to speak her ‘difference.’ Even if their hearts met, she didn’t expect a rosy future. But when she thought about the heart with which Ryu-il had held her and endured her tears, she couldn’t bear it.

“Actually, at the airport, when he was leaving for Dubai, Senior Executive Director waited for you.”

Sungjun looked at her and said,

“The Chairman knew everything and said he’d let you know about Senior Executive Director’s departure. He waited until the end, but when he heard you said you wanted to live a life unrelated to him, he left.”

She remembered that day vividly too—the day she was called to the Chairman.

“…Where is Senior Executive Director now?”

She asked in a broken voice.

“Where… is he? I… I want to go now. When is he going up to Seoul? Can I see him before then?”

She couldn’t leave the pharmacy for long, but at least she wanted to convey her feelings. To tell him she hadn’t gone to him just for money. That she’d liked him for a long time. That her feelings were so precious, she cried because she couldn’t be proud of her love. She had to say it. Sungjun replied as if he’d been waiting.

“Let’s go. There isn’t much time.”

She took off her pharmacist’s coat and nodded. Tears welled up as soon as she got into Sungjun’s car. Ryu-il had said he hated her tears, but she knew she’d cry before him again, and still…

“Hello, Young Master.”

She remembered the quiet face of the boy who had watched her sudden change.

“…Hello, Hee-won.”

Back then, they both must have been hurt.

“Hee-won, I love you.”

He spoke words different from those days, and now she could no longer run away, no matter how shabby or miserable she became.

Sungjun’s car sped down the country road. The speed picked up, but she wasn’t scared.

The car soon stopped in front of the best hotel in the area.

“He’s on the top floor. He probably hasn’t left yet because of me.”

She bowed to Sungjun and hurried out, pressing the button for the highest floor in the elevator. She thought of Ryu-il’s loneliness, waiting for her at the airport. She thought of the heaviness he must have felt, holding her even when he knew her words were lies.

She hadn’t been honest with him because she was afraid of her own misery.

Maybe it was him who had been even more miserable, being with her.

She had responded to the person who kept coming to her and saying he loved her with silence, making him feel even smaller.

More than ever, she hated herself.

She had always been afraid of even losing sight of the stars, but now she felt she could embrace that burning star and die.

She was anxious about missing him. The elevator to the top floor felt slower than anything in the world. As soon as the elevator doors opened, she knocked on the room door.

“Senior Executive Director.”

Her voice trembled.

“Senior Executive Director!”

She knocked harder and harder. Unable to wait, she cried out.

“Ryu-il-oppa!”

At the same time, the door opened with a click. Ryu-il looked at her with a face full of disbelief.

“…What is… what is this…”

She was shocked by the scene before her. She’d been to his places plenty of times, but never seen such a mess. Bottles and cigarettes were strewn across the wide, luxurious room. She was appalled. Seeing her face, Ryu-il hastily closed the door and came out into the narrow corridor.

“You…”

Ryu-il looked terrible. His beard was rough, his usually neat hair was a mess, his face was dark, his clothes were disheveled. If he went to the Chairman like this, he’d be sent abroad at once.

“…Hee-won, you… why…”

He frowned, then closed his eyes and muttered.

“I’m barely holding on, so why did you come?”

“…Why are you holding on, Senior Executive Director?”

“If you come… I’ll lose it and say something cruel, and you’ll cry.”

“Then just don’t say cruel things…”

“If I don’t, you won’t come to me.”

Ryu-il sighed and ran a large hand through his hair. Even in this depraved state, he looked like a fallen god—beautiful. She thought it pathetic that she could think that even now.

“…Meeting like this, you must hate it even more…”

“…”

“Why did you come without contacting me… sigh.”

He sounded a bit drunk, but still seemed lucid. She hadn’t come with a plan, and didn’t know what to say. So she decided to say what she wanted.

“…I couldn’t contact you.”

“What?”

“I don’t know your number.”

Even on the business card she’d received, there was only the company’s direct line. She took out her phone from her cardigan pocket.

“Give me your number, Ryu-il.”

“Jung Hee-won.”

“And…”

She tried to hold back, but tears streamed down. She sobbed.

“…Let’s eat together.”

She kept talking.

“Let’s go somewhere nice… get some fresh air…”

“What are you doing, Jung Hee-won?”

Without even wiping her tears, she answered as best she could.

“I’m… flirting with my first love.”

Maybe it was what they’d always wanted.

Rolling around in bed, trying to get closer to each other, always thinking the same thing.

“I like you.”

Tears rolled down her cheeks. In the way he hated most, she pleaded.

“I hated being so shabby before you, so I never said it.”

“…Jung Hee-won… I’m not high or anything, right? I really didn’t take anything…”

“If I can’t stand proudly by your side, I wanted to live a life unrelated to you… but I don’t think I can. I really can’t.”

She stepped closer and asked,

“I know we started wrong. So let’s start over. Not from me being forced into your room and undressing, but from this.”

Her hand, holding out her phone again, trembled.

“Aren’t you going to give me your number?”

Ryu-il stared at her. Then he reached out and wiped away her tears.

“Yeah.”

Warmth covered her cheek.

“Not now.”

He whispered as he brought his lips to hers.

“I’ll give it to you… just a little later…”

His soft tongue entered her. She closed her eyes and accepted him deeply.

It was the first kiss he’d initiated, and their first proud kiss.