Chapter Text
She loved him, she did. In her own way, Cha Soohyun loved her husband. Not necessarily in the traditional sense of the word, or perhaps not in the way others thought she should love Wooseok, but she did love him. Or, at least some form of love—the only one that was not foreign to her.
In her youth, everything had been an exchange. The love she craved came with a manual of terms and conditions and she always lost her place among the words.
She found out about the affair on a normal Tuesday. Not from him—he was too practiced in deceit for that but from the accidental slip of a hotel employee’s voice, and the damning clarity of a photograph that needed no explanation. The woman in the picture was young. Predictably so.
Beautiful, in that easy, untroubled way that youth often is. What struck Soohyun most was not the betrayal itself, but how unsurprised she was. It felt less like a revelation and more like confirmation, proof of a decay she had long pretended not to smell.
She remembered standing in the hotel corridor afterward, the photo still glowing on her phone screen, feeling nothing. Not anger. Not heartbreak. Just an odd hollowness, as if someone had quietly reached into her chest and stolen the last thing tethering her to the life she was supposed to want.
That was when the ennui set in. Not a dramatic sorrow, but a slow suffocation—like living underwater while the world above continued to spin in color and light. Everything felt duller. Food lost its taste. Music became noise. Days bled into each other, monochrome and indistinct. She would wake up and stare at the ceiling for hours before moving. Sometimes she would sit at her dressing table, hands resting in her lap, unable to remember what she was supposed to do next.
She had been broken for so long, but it wasn’t the affair that shattered her. That was only the final crack in a life already full of fractures. It was the realization that she had forgotten what it felt like to want something for herself. Not for the hotel, not for the shareholders, not for her father, Chairwoman Jung, or Wooseok’s reputation—but for herself.
The divorce wasn’t a declaration of war. It was a plea for release. She had finally been brave enough to ask for one. Not because she had stopped loving him—if anything, what she felt for him had long since drifted into something more like mourning—but because she had started, for the first time in years, to feel the stirrings of life inside her again.
She finally saw the light at the end of the tunnel. And with that came the painful truth she could not keep pretending to be happy in a life that never truly belonged to her. And then, just as the pieces of her old world were starting to crumble, she met a man who was like a bright light in Cuba.
Soohyun stepped inside her house, the door clicking softly behind her. The house felt quieter than usual, like a room holding its breath, waiting for the inevitable clash.
She had barely removed her shoes when her eyes caught the unmistakable sea of red packaging stacked across the entryway—rows upon rows of instant ramen. The neatly organized pallets and boxes were so perfectly arranged that it seemed almost absurd. Jin Ramen. Shin Ramen. Ramen of every possible brand and flavor, piled in neat columns like some kind of strange shrine to her supposed desires.
She felt a strange mix of exhaustion and disbelief. Of course, this was how Wooseok would handle it. His pride and his fragile ego could never confront the real issue. Instead, he’d resorted to this, grand gestures drenched in sarcasm, steeped in veiled criticisms.
“...What is all this?” Soohyun asked, her voice a little too steady, a little too calm, like she had practiced this moment a thousand times already. An overwhelming sense of weariness.
Wooseok was leaning against the far wall, his arms crossed as he watched her. He had the air of someone who had rehearsed his lines, waiting for her to come home so he could deliver them with perfect timing. His gaze lingered on her for a beat too long, before he finally spoke, the edge of his voice betraying an undercurrent of frustration, masked in his usual arrogance.
“You like this, right? Ramen? I mean, if you had to go all the way to some random highway rest stop to eat it, I thought I should buy it for you.” His words were carefully chosen, like knives hidden behind a veil of politeness. He stepped toward the closest pallet, running his fingers across the plastic of the ramen packs as if to emphasize their “thoughtful” nature. “You could have told me earlier you loved instant ramen so much.”
The words stung, but she refused to show it. Instead, she remained standing there, her heart sinking, eyes fixed on the stacked ramen like it was a shrine she no longer wanted to be part of. The ridiculousness of it all—his attempt to control desires, to pretend that he knew what she needed—made her want to laugh, though the sound of it would likely break something inside her.
She didn’t laugh. She just stared.
“I thought I should get you more,” Wooseok continued, his voice turning a little too bright, his tone colder than she wanted to acknowledge. “If it’s ramen you want, I’ll make sure you have it—anything you need. Hell, I could even buy a rest stop for you, so you can eat it there. You know, if that's what it takes to make you happy.”
The words sliced through her like glass. A rest stop. The irony wasn’t lost on her. She took a deep breath, trying to steady herself. Her gaze finally shifted to him, meeting his eyes with a kind of calm that only made his impatience grow sharper.
“Wooseok...” Her voice was quiet. “You think this... this is what I want? You think I need more ramen?”
He faltered for a moment, but quickly regained his composure. “It’s not about the ramen,” he said, though the strain in his voice was evident. “I know you’ve been upset. I’m trying, Soohyun. I’m trying to understand.”
She almost felt sorry for him. Almost.
“Do you, though?” Soohyun asked, her words sharp now, though she wasn’t sure where the anger was coming from. Maybe it was the realization that she no longer cared about his attempts.
“I’ve been trying to understand for years,” she added, her voice barely above a whisper now. “But I’ve never really felt seen by you, Wooseok. Or anyone in this house. And now—” She shook her head, unable to continue the thought, because she wasn’t even sure what she felt anymore. Was it betrayal? Disappointment? Or something deeper, more suffocating?
His eyes narrowed. “So you think I’m the one who doesn’t understand? You’re the one who’s been going around, meeting strangers—what about that, Soohyun?” He waved his hand in a vague gesture toward the stacks of ramen, as if everything had suddenly come to this moment, this accusation. “What about your little ramen date ? Who is he ? Who is that man ?”
The words hung in the air, raw and stinging. Soohyun could feel her heart beat faster, but she didn’t let herself react.
“I was returning a favor to someone who helped me.” she said slowly, her voice low, but unwavering. ”But that should not matter to you. We’re getting a divorce anyway, why do you still care ?”
“We are not divorced yet. Last I checked, you are still my wife and I am still your husband.”
”Now you think I’m your wife. Not when your mother lambasts me every chance she gets, not to the staff at the hotel, and not to you when you’re with Soo-Ah.”
For the first time in a long time, Wooseok didn’t have a response. The silence between them stretched long, like a taut wire, brittle and ready to snap. And Soohyun, for the first time in years, felt a small weight lift off her chest.
“I’m tired,” she said quietly, and this time, there was no softness in her tone. She was right, why should he still care. The marriage was about to end due to his infidelity and he had the nerve to question her who she was with.
And for the first time, she wondered if there was a way out of this life—one that didn’t require her to keep choking down his bitterness, or swallowing her own. The silence between them lingered for a few beats longer than necessary. Soohyun didn’t wait for a response.
She turned, slowly, and began to walk toward her room—not out of defeat, but to preserve what little dignity remained between them. Wooseok stood perfectly still until he heard the faint click of her bedroom door closing. The air shifted slightly. And then, as if on cue, the soft leather of the armchair sighed under his weight as he sat down.
He raised a hand and grasped his phone where it lay on the seat beside him. The familiar weight of it felt strangely grounding. With a few efficient swipes, the screen lit up and he opened a new message thread.
To: Secretary Kang
Look into this man my wife was with. The one from the rest stop photos.
His thumb paused for a second before he resumed typing, the calm precision of his words belying the fury simmering just beneath the surface.
Get me everything. His name. Family background. Do they own any land? Political connections? Educational history. Any affiliations or outstanding debts.
Another pause. His eyes flickered across the room, briefly resting on the towers of ramen still standing by the door. A scoff escaped him—low and bitter.
Send me a full report ASAP.
He hit send. The message flew out like a quiet declaration of war. And this—whatever had happened between Soohyun and that man—it wasn’t just a harmless lunch. It was an invitation. It was her stepping outside the carefully curated borders of their marriage, their public image. It was her slipping through his fingers. Her slowly moving past this contract of theirs while he would remain within the familiar terror of his life forever. That, he could not allow.
The door clicked softly behind her, and the room seemed to exhale a collective sigh. Soohyun stood by the window for a moment, her gaze unfocused as she stared out at the muted night beyond—neon lights flickering from the distant streets, but everything felt far away.
The house was eerily quiet, and the only sound that filled the space was the soft rustle of the air conditioning and the low hum of her own thoughts. She stepped away from the window, moving slowly toward the bed, her fingers grazing the edges of the fabric as she sank down onto it.
She let her head fall back into the pillow, closing her eyes, and a flash of memory swept over her—a memory she hadn't let herself think about in weeks.
Soohyun had always imagined that if her end came, it would be quiet. Neat. Without scandal or spectacle. A simple misstep off a crumbling edge. Maybe a slip on old stone steps. Perhaps a final sigh into the sea.
She hadn't come to Cuba to end her life. But she hadn’t come to live, either.
It was the first time she’d been truly alone. The itinerary had been mapped out in detail, and Wooseok had been the one to insist she go. He’d taken great pride in sending her abroad on his behalf, as though it were his way of proving her worth to the rest of the family.
But when she arrived, it felt like stepping into another dimension—one where no one knew who she was, no one cared about her status, and most importantly, no one knew she was married. The sun was setting, casting gold onto the worn rooftops of Havana.
Soohyun had wandered away from the itinerary, from her handlers, from herself. The narrow cobbled street led her to the edge of a fort that overlooked a beautiful sunset, where the buildings gave way to a sudden drop into the sea.
No rail. No warning sign. Just stone crumbling under time.
She sat on the ledge, toes nearing the void, the salty wind whipping her red dress around her frame. Her fingers clenched the strap of her bag—not because she feared the fall, but because she hadn't yet decided whether she wanted to take it.
And just as her body leaned the slightest fraction forward—
The voice came behind her—startled, breathless, real. Hands, warm and unfamiliar, grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her back with more gentleness than the moment deserved.
She stumbled, crashing into a chest. “Why did you stop me?” she asked, her voice low. No panic. Just genuine curiosity.
“Because… you looked like you needed someone to,” he replied. Simple. Unvarnished.
She didn’t give him her name. He didn’t ask. They ended up sitting on that ledge for a while. She wasn’t crying. She wasn’t talking. She just sat, staring out at the water like it could answer the questions she no longer dared ask.
He offered her water. Then silence. Then finally, his shoulder. She hadn’t meant to fall asleep. She hadn’t meant to trust anyone—especially not this kind, sun-warmed stranger. But something in her just… gave.
When she woke, the stars were out and her head rested gently on his shoulder. His jacket, thin and faded, was wrapped around her. He didn’t move. Not even when she stirred. Soohyun straightened, brushing her hair back, heart thudding quietly in her chest. “I should go,” she said. “They’ll be looking for me.”
“I don’t know if you’re hungry,” he said eventually, “but I was headed to a place I really like. You don’t have to come, of course. I can walk you back to wherever you are staying instead if you’d prefer that.”
She paused, letting the salt-kissed wind play with the hem of her dress. Her gaze found his—uncertain, patient, and astonishingly free of assumption.
“No,” she said softly. “Let’s go to your place.”
He blinked. “My place?”
“I mean—your favorite place. The one you were going to…”
He grinned, boyish and startled, and gestured down a narrow street. “This way then.”
He walked just a step ahead of her, occasionally glancing over his shoulder, unsure if she would still be there each time he turned. She followed, wordless but steady, her heels clicking against cobblestone like a metronome in a song only she could hear.
They turned a corner and found a courtyard strung with lights. It wasn’t fancy—wooden tables mismatched in shape, napkins folded without care. He pulled out a chair for her. She sat, smoothing her skirt over her lap, watching him as he chatted briefly with the waitress in broken Spanish.
His hands moved when he spoke, animated and unselfconscious. Dinner came—grilled snapper with lime and herbs, rice studded with beans, fried plantains that melted on her tongue. Soohyun took each bite slowly, as if she were relearning how to enjoy food.
“You eat like someone who’s always had to perform for her meals,” he said, not unkindly.
“I’ve never been this quiet at a table before,” she murmured. “Usually, there are cameras. Or stockholders. Or my mother-in-law. Or my husband.”
The word hung between them like a dropped glass. He didn’t flinch. “You don’t owe me an explanation.”
“I know.” She sipped her water. “But I think I want to give you one anyway.”
Jinhyuk didn’t speak. He just waited. And that was somehow more comforting than anything else could have been. She didn’t know his name yet.”
“Does your husband know you're having dinner with a stranger?”
“No,” she said simply. “But then again… my husband doesn’t know much about me at all.”
He studied her for a moment, and then leaned back in his chair, a soft smile tugging at his lips. “That’s oddly comforting,” he said.
"I can’t decide if this the most reckless or the most necessary thing I’ve done in years.” He smiled then, soft and warm. “Both things can be true. I’m not sure I even know what I want anymore."
He replied without hesitation. “You stayed. You wanted to stay. That must mean something.” They continued to eat, slowly now, as if prolonging the meal might delay the inevitable return to their separate, distant lives.
He watched her with quiet curiosity, like he was trying to memorize the way her mouth curved when she wasn’t guarding it. The air between them had shifted, though neither of them could quite name how or why. The world had shrunk to the table between them.
He reached for the last piece of plantain just as she did. Their fingers brushed—a whisper of a touch, but it landed with weight neither expected.
“You take it,” she said, retreating like it had burned.
He tilted his head, smiling. “I’m not brave enough to steal the last bite from a woman who could probably buy this whole restaurant.” She let out a low laugh, the kind that belonged to someone who had forgotten how to laugh and was slowly remembering.
“Is that what I seem like to you?
He asked suddenly, “What do you think you’d be doing right now if you weren’t married? If you weren’t… all this?”
She raised an eyebrow. “All this?”
“You know,” he gestured loosely, “Elegant. Controlled. Mysterious. Like someone who always knows where she’s going, even when she doesn’t want to be there.”
He cleared his throat gently, needing to shift the moment before it swallowed them whole. He looked at the big diamond on her finger, then to the stacks of gold and silver on her wrists. One of those pieces could probably change his life forever.
“So what about you?” she asked, flipping the question back. “If you weren’t here with me, if life hadn’t brought you to this table… where would you be?”
“Probably on the street taking pictures of strangers,” he said with a grin. “Or getting lost in a neighborhood I can’t pronounce. But I think this…” His voice softened again. “This was better.”
Soohyun glanced down, her fingers brushing against the edge of the table. “I don’t usually stay this long,” she said, almost to herself.
“I don’t usually invite people to eat with me,” he admitted. “But you didn’t feel like a stranger.”
Something in her chest twisted. She couldn’t tell if it was longing, or fear, or that dangerous place where the two met. She wasn’t used to being spoken to like this. “You’re very dangerous,” she said suddenly.
Jinhyuk blinked. “Me?” She nodded slowly.
“I think you're the dangerous one, I’m sitting across from a woman who looks like a poem I’ve never read before.”
Her breath caught.“You shouldn’t say things like that,” she finally managed, her voice low and almost brittle.
“Why not?”
“Because I remember them,” she said. “I store them away. Words like that—they stay with me longer than they should.”
Jinhyuk leaned back, hands around the base of his glass, eyes steady on her.
“Then I should be careful,” he said, a small, crooked smile tugging at his mouth. “But I’m not good at pretending this isn’t happening.”
“This?”
“This moment. This… strangeness between us. This sense that you’re someone I wasn’t supposed to meet, and yet—here you are. Sitting across from me like something fate dropped into my lap.”
Soohyun didn’t answer. She couldn’t. Her throat felt tight, like something unspoken was lodged there, daring to make itself known. But she wasn’t brave enough to speak it.
Instead, she stood slowly, smoothing the lines of her dress with practiced hands. “I should head back.” He rose too, but said nothing. He just walked beside her. The streets had grown quieter now, Havana settling into its bones for the night. The sky was deep indigo, stars glimmering above in gentle clusters. Jinhyuk didn’t try to make conversation. He just walked with her, their steps matching like they had done this before in another life.
Outside her hotel, they paused. She turned to face him, brushing her hair behind one ear. “Thank you. For dinner.”
“Thank you,” he replied. “For staying.” Their eyes met again—too long, too carefully.
”Let me repay you.” She stepped toward the doors, fingers hovering near the handle—when her gaze darted to the lobby inside. And froze.
Secretary Jang. Her assistant. Pacing. Glancing nervously toward the front desk. Phone in hand, mid-call. Looking for her. Soohyun inhaled sharply. Reflex. Her heart kicked against her ribs.
Jinhyuk noticed immediately. “What is it?”
“My secretary,” she whispered, eyes wide. “She’s … I didn’t tell anyone I was leaving the hotel earlier.” Jinhyuk didn’t ask questions. He just looked around—and spotted a narrow wooden door tucked off to the side near the lobby entrance. Likely a storage closet. Unmarked. Unnoticed.
“Come on,” he murmured, grabbing her wrist with the lightest touch. She didn’t protest. She let him pull her gently through the shadows and into the narrow space. The door clicked shut behind them with a soft finality.
Darkness. Silence. Then the soft scent of cedar and old coats. Their breathing—too loud. The rise and fall of it mingling in the small, shared air between them. It was impossibly tight. She could feel his chest near her shoulder, the brush of his arm every time either of them moved even slightly.
Her back pressed against the wall, her heels dangerously close to the toes of his sneakers. A laugh caught in her throat. It wasn’t amusement. It was disbelief. This was madness.She is a married woman, hiding in a supply closet with a man she barely knew.
“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she whispered, more to herself than to him.
“I can,” he replied, his voice low, almost reverent. “You’ve been holding your breath a long time. It makes sense you’d want to disappear for a moment.”
Her eyes adjusted slowly to the dark. She could just make out the curve of his jaw, the softness around his mouth, the shadow of something tender in his expression. He wasn’t watching her like a man who wanted to conquer. He was watching her like someone who had stumbled upon something breakable and rare. “I should go back out,” she whispered.
He didn’t move. Didn’t try to stop her. But he did say, “Not yet.” So she stayed. Seconds bled into moments. Her heart beat too loud. Her fingers curled at her sides, itching for something she couldn’t name. Her wedding ring, glinting faintly in the dark, felt heavier than ever. The air was heavy between them now—not just from the cramped space, or the quiet outside that pressed inward like a held breath—but from the unbearable stillness of two people standing too close, and thinking too much.
Soohyun could feel it. The heat of him, not quite touching her, but there. A breath away. A heartbeat. Her back against the wall, her chest rising and falling too quickly. Every small movement brought some part of her inches closer to him. Every breath deepened the gravity. “I should…” she whispered, but she didn’t finish.
What was there to say? That she should go? That she shouldn’t be here, shouldn’t feel this? That married women didn’t hide in coat closets with younger men whose eyes had begun to memorize the way her lips moved when she wasn’t lying to herself?
“You don’t have to explain,” Jinhyuk murmured, voice low and reverent, like the sound of something sacred unraveling. “Not to me.”
She looked up at him—really looked—and for the first time, saw the full weight of what had been blooming quietly beneath their conversations. His expression was unguarded. There was no game, no performance. Just him, a handsome young man standing in the dark with something like devotion stirring in his eyes. “I don’t know what this is,” she breathed, voice barely audible.
“I don’t either,” he said, “but it’s not nothing.” That undid her.
Her lips parted. She could feel the way her body had leaned in without asking her permission. She didn’t even know when it happened. His hand wasn’t touching her, but it hovered near her waist like it wanted to. And hers—grazing his arm now, whether by accident or intent she didn’t know.
Outside, footsteps passed. A murmur of voices. The front desk. But here, inside this small, forgotten space, the world had narrowed to the inches between their mouths. To the way he was looking at her like he’d found a secret he didn’t deserve to keep. He tilted his head slightly. Her eyes dropped to his lips.
Just once. Their breath mingled. Hers shaky. His steady. The faint scent of cedar, the warmth of shared space. Her pulse a hammer behind her ribs. And then—
He leaned in. So slowly it was almost painful. So gently it could’ve been mistaken for hesitation. Their noses brushed. Her hand rose—uncertain, trembling and grazed the collar of his shirt, like maybe if she just held on to something, it wouldn’t feel so dangerous. His lips hovered a breath from hers. And just when the space between them became unbearable.
She turned her face away. A fraction. A whisper of motion. But enough. Her forehead pressed to his shoulder, soft and trembling. Her body said yes even as her conscience whispered no. The ache between them didn’t vanish.
It only quieted. Buried. Deferred.
Jinhyuk didn’t move. He stayed still, his arms at his sides, breathing carefully, as if one wrong exhale might shatter her.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, voice small, fragile.
He shook his head, barely. “Don’t be.”
And in the dark, in that breathless sliver of the world where no one was watching—where she wasn’t the wife of a man who didn’t see her, or the face of a hotel empire—she let herself stay a moment longer. Her head still rested against his shoulder, the cotton of his shirt damp from her breath. She didn’t move, not right away. Neither did he. Even in the quiet, she could feel the rhythm of his heart, it was steady, grounding. It reminded her that she was still in her body. Still in her life. Still someone else's wife.
She straightened slowly, pulling back. Her eyes met his. They didn’t speak. They didn’t need to.
Quietly, Jinhyuk reached behind her and turned the handle. A soft click. The door creaked open, spilling warm yellow light from the hotel lobby into the dimness. Soohyun blinked, her eyes adjusting. She stepped out first, careful. The heels of her shoes clicking softly against the marble floor.
The lobby was quiet now—her secretary nowhere in sight. Likely convinced she'd slipped upstairs unnoticed. Likely convinced everything was still intact. Jinhyuk followed a step behind, but didn’t touch her. Didn’t even speak.
And somehow, that restraint made everything between them thrum louder. They stopped near the base of the staircase. She turned to him, and for a moment, she forgot the cameras, the weight of her name, the constant act of being composed.
“Thank you,” she said, her voice too soft for anyone else to hear.
“For what?”
“For not crossing a line.”
…
She sat on the edge of her bed in her pink slip, bare feet on cold tile. She closed her eyes—and there he was, the young man in Cuba. The way he’d looked at her in the dark. The way he hadn’t kissed her. The way his hand had hovered like a question he’d never dared to ask aloud. She pressed a hand to her mouth, as if that would keep the memory from flooding out.
It would have been so easy to kiss him. To let the moment tip forward. To fall. It would have been the most natural thing in the world—and perhaps the first thing she would’ve done entirely for herself. But she hadn’t. Not because she didn’t want it, but because she wanted it too much. And that scared her more than anything.