Chapter Text
1994. 7
When Park Yeong-beom was sitting in the car on his birthday of all days, he knew his parents had been waiting for him at home. Maybe they'd called a few friends in with their daughters so that he could talk to them.
All so that his mother found happiness.
He still couldn't really help but think how things would've gone if he'd only fought harder. Still couldn't help but mull over Geum-young's words.
"Are you saying you're going to break off the engagement?" His mother asked her, before shoving a hand at her shoulder to try turning her around to face her. "Are you saying that?"
Looking at Geum-young's face, he knew she was as broken saying those words as much he was hearing them. She was holding back tears, swallowing down the lump in her throat, all because her pride wouldn't dare allow her to cry in front of his mother.
"Please. Stop it now. I need you to stop, please!" he remembered begging. Screaming at his mother for the first time in a long time.
"Why should I stop?" she screamed back at him, stunning him into silence. "You owe 80% of your life to me. You are my pride! You're my life!"
"It's his life," Geum-young's firm, soft voice interrupted the elder woman's monologue, causing her to look at her in bewilderment "The life that you say you're living... It belongs to Yeong-beom."
He could see her eye twitch at the statement. He couldn't help but look at the woman in awe, pride and relief brimming in his body. The words that he'd been longing to let out for so long had been said without any hesitation whatsoever.
He had fallen for her once again. It was all the more reason he wanted her to stay with him. To marry him. He wanted her to grow old with him.
An involuntary shiver caused him to bunch into his coat even more. He wondered if she was keeping well inside that small room of hers. There wasn't even a heater in there. He should get her one. It might not be enough to make her forgive him, but atleast she wouldn't be cold.
He couldn't quite see anything from his windows. It'd been hours sitting in his car, waiting for her, but he didn't care. He would try again and again. If it meant he'd win her back, he would try again and again and again.
There was a sudden knock at his window, and he looked to the side to see her, concerned and sad and soft bundled up in a sweater.
"It's cold," she said tenderly. "You'll freeze to death."
He opened the door as soon as she moved a bit away, a bouquet in his hand as some snow fell on his hair and coat. When he checked his watch he found that midnight had passed.
His birthday was over.
"It's past midnight," he said, a nervous smile making its way into his face as he held his bouquet up. "But, I can still give you flowers, right? Just flowers?"
She sighed before taking them. "Why would you give me flowers on your birthday?"
"It's a gift for myself," he said with another smile.
He looked down, noticing her open toes. He gave her a look of slight disbelief, crouching down on his knees to cover her open skin with his hands. "It's cold," he said, tears already welling up in his eyes. "It's freezing."
He didn't mind when the moisture seeped in through his pants to wet his knees. The cold didn't really deter him.
What could be more painful than the painful sword in his heart?
"Yeong-beom-ah," she called out softly, the bouquet paper rustling in her hands. He kept warming her feet to whatever extent he could as the phrase flowed out of her mouth. "You have to stop."
He looked up at her, his fingers still touching her feet. Her eyes held the finality that he'd been dreading to see since the day she broke off the engagement.
"I can't take it. It's too draining."
"Is it really over, then?" he asked her after standing up, neither being able to meet the other's eyes. "No matter what?"
He looked at her face, hoping for some kind of a sign. Praying, no begging for it to whatever God existed.
She could only press her mouth together, probably so that she could hold back her sobs.
"Don't you love me anymore?" he asked.
She scoffed in shock. "Of course I still love you. How can I not love you?"
"I still do love you a lot," she assured. "But I love myself a lot too. I feel so sorry for myself that I can't do it for myself."
"I'll cut off my family, okay?" he immediately declared. He didn't care about his mother anymore. To hell with all of it. He just needed his Geum-young.
"How will we live like that?" she asked. "You'll be sad. If you're aching then I'll also ache."
He couldn't stop himself from crying. He could already hear his mother chastising him for it. But, he still cried, because it was the only way he could voice his heartbreak. The only way he could tell the world that the knife in his heart was twisting.
"I think if we all became a family, we'll just end up hating each other a lot," she stated, urging him to understand.
"I can't let you go," he declared between sobs. "I just can't, what do I do?"
She smiled sadly, keeping the bouquet on top of the car and fixing his hair and wiping his eyes.
"What are you saying? Of course you can," She reassured as she swept his bangs aside before holding his face with a teary smile. "I always say this, don't I? Life goes on for the living."
Her voice cracked at the end, tears flowing down her cheek as well. She kept fussing with her hair as she apologized, "I'm so sorry I was mean to you at the end."
He shook his head lightly. He didn't deserve her apologies. He didn't deserve her.
His hands shot up to clutch her hand. "No, I'm sorry," he said between sobs. "I was so..." he trailed off as he emotions took over him. "So..."
Pathetic.
Hw couldn't say it, though. He was too overcome with sadness to say anything as her hands held his.
"Thank you," she said as his sobs got a bit louder. "Honestly, just... thank you for everything. Thank you for everything, Yeong-beom-ah."
"I'm happy that the first love that I'll always get to remember is going to be you," she said, making him cry even more. This was the end. He could feel it. He wasn't anywhere near ready for it to end, but he also knew he had to let it.
"Can't we just be like this, please? Does this really have to end?" he begged.
She opened her arms up for a hug. One last hug before they get out of each other's lives for good.
"Come on," she pressed.
He rubbed a hand down his face as he shook his head again. "I can't."
"But it's our last," she said with a sad, broken smile. "Hold me one last time?"
That smile. Lord, how he wanted to turn it into a happy one. But he only brought her closer, feeling her arms wrap around him as he buried his face in her sweater. They both cried in each other's arms, not wanting to let go, cursing fate for their end.
If only his mother wasn't so hell bent on having a rich daughter-in-law.
If only he could live life on his own terms.
If only.... If only he had stood up to her.
"I'll miss your smell," she cried into his coat.
"If anything happens, you give me a call, okay?" he told her. "You don't have anyone in Seoul. Promise me you'll call?"
"Okay," she sobbed. "I promise I'll call. I promise."
"So does this mean that we..." he trailed off, not wanting to say it. "Does this mean that we won't ever see each other again?"
"How can we see each other again?"
"How can we not?" he cried. "This is unfair.... this is so unfair..."
He didn't want to let her go, trying to trap her in his coat as she tried to part. She was his first love. His only love. The only person who'd ever seen him, not as his mother's pride, not as his father's son, but as Park Yeong-beom.
In the car as he was driving back, he could feel his body growing numb. He'd cried until he couldn't anymore. He had half a mind to crash somewhere and hope for his death, but he knew that if that happened, Geum-young would just be even more heartbroken. And his mother would blame it on her.
After all, his life was never his. He was just a kid that was had to be his mother's trophy to show off.
"Where are you coming from?" His mother asked when he entered the home, his movements sluggish due to his exhaustion. He didn't want to talk to anyone. But the woman still stood in his way, preventing him from just passing out in his room. "Where are you coming from this late in the night!? You went to her place, didn't you? How many times have I told you-"
"It's all done, Eomoni," he interrupted, his voice low and tired. "She ended it. We... ended it."
Her expression changed, her eyes turning from angry to relieved happiness. "Is that so? That's such good news, I'm so happy, son."
And then she moved forward to hug him, but he didn't let her. He couldn't trust himself not to strangle her, to not yell at her.
That was the first time he'd felt the distance that existed between them. That was the first time he'd accepted it with his whole heart.
♪✧♩●♪✧♩
1995. 3
Hearing his father's name had become difficult for him.
"Hey, Park Geum-young! It's hard to believe that you're retiring, man! It seems like yesterday when you were at your graduation saying that you'll work forever and ever!"
His father only laughed as he replied with just as much gusto as he recieved.
Yeong-beom, however, just wanted to drink the night away. He was inheriting his father's law firm, his mother was starting to look for marriage prospects again and...
And his Geum-young had moved on.
He could feel it in his heart somehow. With a sigh, he went to pour another glass of soju when lean graceful hands curled around the bottle, causing him to turn slightly as a woman sat down beside him.
"Pouring one's own glass brings bad luck," the woman said. She was beautiful, with silky, slightly wavy dark brown hair falling from her head, the tips just touching her neck.
"Did my mother send you?" he asked immediately, lazily casting his eyes around the ones to try to spot his mother's watchful ones.
"No," she said, pouring a glass for herself. "I came by myself. But, I guess it's fair that you don't remember me."
His gaze set upon her once more, this time with more curiosity than hostility. She didn't look offended, more.... disappointed.
"I'm Han Bi-na," she said, before clinking her glass against his and downing her alcohol. "I'm not interrupting, am I? I could go if I am. I just thought you could use some company."
He had enough alcohol in his system to have to think about it. And.... well. She wasn't trying to flirt. She wasn't trying to pry into his life. She was willing to just... be there. Maybe she'll just pour the soju in his glass and drink with him. He was alright with that.
After all, it was even more pathetic to be drinking alone in his father's retirement party.
"Park Yeong-beom-ssi," Bi-na called all of a sudden, pausing till he met her dark brown eyes with earthy green flecks in the center. "It's not pathetic to be drinking alone. I's just an experience of life that we all have to go through."
Oh.
He'd said that out loud.
"Sorry," he said with a tired chuckle as he downed his glass. "I'm just...."
"I know," she said with a gentle smile. "Breakups are hard."
Right. Of course she knew about it. The invitations had been distributed. It was the first time someone had mentioned it without any kind of mockery or pity.
He grabbed the bottle from her hand. "Pouring one's own glass brings bad luck," he simply repeated as he let the liquid flow into the glass.
"I believe that applies to others," she replied and this time, her smile held multitudes of many emotions. "My life is already so... shitty. Whether I please fate or not, it's only about to get shittier."
He laughed softly, maybe the first laugh that he's let out in months. He'd already forgotten what it sounded like, thinking that he wouldn't ever get a chance to feel mirth again.
"Amen to that," he said, raising his glass as a toast. She clinked her glass against his once more before they both drank.
Most people would just see a man and a woman, drinking their deepest sorrows away. But for the man, the woman would become the source of the freedom he craved, and for the woman, the man would become the warmth she so desperately needed.