Chapter 8 – Bad Girl (Part 4)

‘Are you really tired of me?’

Was she tired of him? She didn’t know. She was just exhausted.

‘Do you, damn it, not love me anymore?’

If I didn’t love him, could I feel such pain? Could I hate Choi Dowook so much for meeting another woman? Could I still feel such intense passion even after all these years? Could he continue to love someone as selfish and bad as me?

Dowook hugged the crumbling Junhee.

“No, it’s my fault. I’m a very bad bastard, just like you said.”

“No, not that much….”

The words she didn’t say were muffled in his embrace.

“You’re right, I should have taken better care of you. I should have come to you sooner before you felt so lonely. I should have understood you before you got so distressed. Even if you abandoned me, I shouldn’t have gone to such places. It’s all my fault. I was selfish. You’re not at fault. So don’t be alone anymore.”

“…I can be alone. I can be fine alone. I can live well without you.”

She had to now. Even without her father, even without Choi Dowook, she had to learn to stand on her own.

“Then what should I do?”

Suddenly, Dowook’s voice turned somber, despite his earlier gentleness.

“Why do you keep pushing me away? Why are you so desperate to abandon me? I’m still the same, but why do you keep changing? Every time you do this, my blood runs dry. Do you know that?”

His face twisted pitifully as he asked. His eyes were confused and didn’t suit him. 

“Don’t change. Don’t push me away. Stay as you are, just.”

He said, reaching out to hug Junhee. He held her neck, stroking it delicately like handling an instrument, while gripping her tightly with a rough strength. Her breath tightened.

Don’t you pity me like this? 

Dowook whispered darkly.

Pity? Despite having so much. Without being able to hide his noble birth. With a shell so dazzling and enchanting that anyone would envy it, he acted pitifully as if he would crumble if Junhee didn’t accept him at that moment.

He knew his strengths and Junhee’s weaknesses too well.

Junhee felt his fiercely beating heart through their close bodies. Inevitably, she felt sorry for him. Despite knowing his family and background better than anyone, when he acted like this, she felt like he was a desolate man from a barren slum.

If she didn’t hug him, she felt she would be consumed by guilt and break herself. In the end, she whispered a small apology, but Dowook stopped her.

“No, it’s my fault.”

When your father died, when you failed the exam, I didn’t know you were struggling that much. I should have understood you better. So it’s all my fault.

His words, pouring out apologies recklessly, were familiar. This had happened a long time ago too.

She closed her blurry eyes. She quietly listened to his pleasant voice. Dowook, who knew Junhee inside out with just a gesture or a glance, endlessly poured out the words she wanted to hear.

With Dowook like that, Junhee couldn’t maintain her pride. She should have told him that it wasn’t his fault but that she was too weak and bad to handle him.

But there was no time to say that. It was overwhelming just to handle Dowook’s words flooding in. He hugged Junhee and placed his lips near her ear. His hot and moist breath poured out. The words of sincere and desperate apology flowed in Choi Dowook’s uniquely obscene voice.

The sounds falling into her ears tickled her chest and stirred her lower belly. She felt her heart beating strangely. The feeling wasn’t bad.

Listening to Dowook, it seemed like it really wasn’t her fault. The bad one was Choi Dowook, and Junhee just had to stay comfortably in his embrace like this.

This way, they were back to square one. Neither Dowook nor Junhee could move forward. Knowing this, she didn’t want to let him go.

Even though she knows they will never fully understand each other. Still, she thinks it’s okay.

Because that’s what love is. It’s impossible to perfectly understand another person, but wanting to understand each other despite that is love. Rationalizing and wanting to become blind.

Because she already loved him. Because she was already deeply loved by him.

She closed her eyes. Holding onto his collar as she nestled in his arms. Tears continuously welled up under her closed eyelids.

“Why do you like me so much? What am I that you do all this?”

Receiving his affection for so long, she had come to think it was natural, but sometimes the size and depth of his affection were so overwhelming that it frightened her.

As someone once said, Choi Dowook’s affection might cool down.

There is nothing eternal in this world, and with so many brilliant people around him, if he eventually got tired of Junhee. If one day, like her mom and dad, Choi Dowook suddenly disappeared from her world. She felt she wouldn’t be able to bear it. Losing Choi Dowook felt like her entire world would collapse.

The deeper his love grew, the greater her fear. She deliberately distanced herself, fearing the future that might come someday. She reduced expressions of affection, contact, and the days they met.

But as always, Dowook ruthlessly trampled on Junhee’s efforts.

He kissed her casually and urged for her affection and attention. During the day, he whined like a boy on Junhee’s lap, and at night, he bound her with his strong, hot body, confessing his love.

She liked such Choi Dowook.

The more her anxiety grew… After her father died, Junhee often imagined the end of their relationship. She thought that the end of a relationship could come suddenly without any preparation.

Ah.

Junhee realized another hidden feeling deep inside. She was afraid that he would get tired of such a pathetic person like her, so she abandoned him first.

“Because we promised.”

Dowook’s voice spread slowly.

“I said I would make you happy, and you promised to stay by my side. Did you forget?”

Dowook pressed his forehead against Junhee’s. With the eyes of a scoundrel, he gave the answer of a pure-hearted lover. But the gaze that quietly met hers was cold. It seemed to reproach Junhee for not remembering. With such cold eyes, he drew a faint smile on his lips. As if he had no choice.

“You’re stubborn, greedy, fickle, and your memory is this bad.”

Dowook pressed his lips against Junhee’s. His dry lips were hot, making her body flinch from the contrast.

“I’m still madly in love with you.”

The kiss was short. He met her gaze again. His eyes looked fierce, as if he would grab her neck and bite it. But the hand that stroked her back and entangled with her fingers was terrifyingly tender.

“Sometimes I want to make you crawl under me, but the thought of you hating me is terrifying. In the end, I’m the one crawling. See, I’m doing it right now.”

“…I, I.”

I didn’t want to make you crawl like that. I didn’t want to be such a heartless and bad lover.

“Junhee, don’t you still get it?”

He faintly but arrogantly smiled. With that smile, the desolate man from the slums disappeared in an instant. His eyes gleamed with a chilling and splendid light. Junhee knew how many women had clutched their chests and resented her because of those eyes.

“If you abandon me a hundred times, I’ll chase you a hundred and one times to bring you back. Whether you get tired of me, hate me, or find me disgusting, it doesn’t matter. Because I won’t. A hundred times, a thousand times, ten thousand times, I’ll bring you back and make you like me again. Because I decided to do that, Woo Junhee. Just give up.”

Dowook spoke with the face of an arrogant king. His eyes were filled with an absolute conviction that he must get what he wanted. Eyes that would make Junhee kneel and submit.

“Stop messing with me and come over here, Woo Junhee.”

With such eyes, with such a face, but in the end, his words were the language of a desperate plea.

Junhee’s head spun at his attitude of freely crossing between the poor and the rich according to need and understanding. Dowook kissed her gently again. Kissing her lips, nose, eyelids, temples, cheeks endlessly, he whispered. 

Remember. Remember our promise….