I Repaired It, But It Broke Down
Jia listened quietly, saying nothing.
"When I first got your call, I agonized over it. If I truly had no lingering feelings left, I would have refused you coldly. I would have told you not to come at all, or I would have left the house empty. That’s what I would have done."
"...Yes."
"In the end, when you arrived at the house, I had no choice but to open the door... Honestly, thinking about it now, I was just making excuses to myself. I told myself that if I didn't open the door, you'd break it down, or you'd cause a scene in front of the house and embarrass me in front of the whole neighborhood... I was just making excuses. In reality, I just wanted to open it, but I was afraid that if I opened that front door, I wouldn't be able to send you away again... Well, just as I thought... just as I expected, it turned out like this."
It was true. He had simply attached his own reasons to justify opening the door. It wasn't as if he had no feelings at all. They had lived together, sharing their lives, and before that, they had a dating period that lasted several times longer than their marriage.
"...So that was it. I'm... relieved. For me, at least."
"..."
"I'm sorry, truly. ...I'm really, so sorry. That I made you think that way..."
"...No, I told you that's all in the past, so stop—"
"No, Master. ...I think I took marriage, dating... I think I took a person named Han Suhyun far too lightly."
And then Jia said,
"After we divorced, I was crazy at the time, but... I just thought, isn't it okay to see each other once? We were married, we lived together, couldn't we see each other's faces once? I thought about it too easily."
"..."
"Usually, divorce means becoming strangers, even worse than strangers. I was so ignorant. ...Eunbyul cursed at me, but I didn't get angry because those words were low-class or shameful. It was just because everything she said was right. A girl younger than me was thinking so much more rationally than I ever did... That’s why I was so frustrated."
"...Yeah, listening to you, I think that was the case."
While Jia was speaking, she recalled what Eunbyul had said.
"What would you have done if the Senior had committed suicide because of you?"
"You're the one who made him that way. The Senior never used to drink alcohol."
"You made him run around outside."
Jia, who had lifted her hips slightly to press herself firmly against his side, said,
"...I thought you were staying outside because I was making things so hard for you... They say you're good at your job, Master, and that it's a position where working overtime is mandatory..."
"...I just did it because I liked the work..."
As they talked like that, he wondered if he had ever had such a long, deep conversation with Jia about love, dating, marriage, and human relationships before. Even while washing up, he thought about it and tried to retrace if they had ever had such a conversation in the past, but there was absolutely nothing like it.
'....It wasn't a bad thing.'
Perhaps they ended up like this because their communication had been cut off. However, she probably thought the same thing, and that was why they had reached the same conclusion.
'We didn't divorce for just one single reason.'
There were many reasons if you looked for them. Just like when writing a death certificate, listing the direct cause of death, the cause of the direct cause, and the cause of the cause of the direct cause.
As he organized his thoughts, he identified the direct cause as, '...Seo Jia constantly bringing up the word divorce, and my own decision to really just get divorced because I was tired. Seo Jia's attempt to make me submit, and Seo Jia's desire to engage in SM play. My own doubt about whether it was right to live under such confinement...'
As for the causes behind those, 'The lack of communication, so we never shared opinions on what kind of sex life we wanted. ...Every time we met at the in-laws, they made me feel more suffocated. The strange interference and advice I received while Jia was working.'
As he was thinking that, Jia knocked—tap, tap—and asked,
"....Are you sleeping, Master?"
"No. I was just spacing out by myself."
"...Could we sleep together?"
"Sigh..."
He said it indifferently, telling her to do whatever she wanted. At that one word, Jia hugged the pillow she had been clutching even tighter and slowly climbed into bed.
"Thank you for allowing me."
"..."
"I'll try my best. If I'm lacking, please always tell me. ...I'm so excited, I'm so happy..."
Her language skills were on the level of a toddler, but he thought this was better. If only she had expressed gratitude for even the smallest things like this before they divorced. If only she had been a little more considerate of him, and of herself. If she had done that, they wouldn't have divorced like this. ...He felt like he could have endured it a little more.
That’s what he thought.
"...Looking at you, I keep feeling regret. A sense of... longing, I suppose."
He said it because there was nothing to hide.
"What do you mean...?"
"Just, if you had... before we divorced... even if you didn't call me 'Master' like you do now, if you had just said 'thank you' once in a while. When I dropped you off, you would open the door and leave as soon as we arrived at the parking lot. If you had just said something warm like, 'Thank you for dropping me off today,' like you do now... I think that would have been nice..."
Hearing that, Jia’s eyes welled up with tears again.
"...I'm sorry, truly. I'll do that from now on."
"..."
"I think I just didn't have any emotional room to spare. That was really it, Master. ...I had so many things to worry about with work, I thought, do I really have to bother with things like that too... I thought that way. Even though that was more important than work..."
The more honestly he spoke, the more honestly she spoke back. It was a weekend where it was fortunate that she didn't suddenly explode like she used to, hiding everything, or suddenly threaten to stab someone to death.
"Ah, I'm sorry... I really slept too comfortably."
"...No, it's not like sleeping in is a once-in-a-blue-moon occurrence for you."
"Th...that's embarrassing. Um. ...Shall I bring you some coffee?"
"That would be good."
It’s awkward. This feeling.
"...Here, have this."
"Yeah. ....Thank you."
From the day after their honest conversation, he and she had become like this. He thought it had become this way after Eunbyul turned the house upside down once. Jia, likewise, said,
"...That vixen, no, Eunbyul... I'm actually glad she came."
"Why do you think that?"
"If she hadn't, you and I would have spent this weekend without saying a word again... Thinking about it that way, I feel it's fortunate."
Yeah. ...Ah, I have to see Eunbyul now.
As if Jia was having the same thought, she reminded him that Eunbyul was his secretary and said,
"...Haa, right. You have to go to work and see that woman again."
"She's my secretary, so it can't be helped."
"Th... are you going to do it at work, too?"
Do what, what am I doing at work—
"The secretary, having sex with her."
"...? No, absolutely not. What kind of strange... in a sacred workplace..."
"Don't mind me, if you want to... well, do it..."
What is this woman saying now?
"I want you to be happy, Master. I want you to be happy for a long, long time... If you're happy because I turn a blind eye, then I'm fine with anything. ...Actually, there's nothing to turn a blind eye to. We're divorced now, so legally we're strangers."
"....Look, I, at work..."
"But don't do it too much... You have to save some for me. Since you promised to do it with me too..."
Ah, right. Both of them love...
"...Do you hate it?"
"No, well, yeah. I have to do it. Eunbyul, she's a strange one too. A bit... scary."
"Why? I can understand her."
After she took the empty coffee cup and washed the dishes, she handed him the briefcase next to the sofa and said,
"She's a woman who has been looking at you for several years. I can feel it in her words. She seems like a woman who might love you even more than I do..."
"While I was dating you, I don't think I paid any attention to her at all... Actually, I was a bit flustered when your friends came over last time and I heard them talking about the fact that such a woman existed. I was very surprised. And I was also grateful. I had built such a strong wall that even when things like that happened, I had blocked it off so well that I didn't even know."
"I used to check your phone periodically, you know. I saw all the KakaoTalk messages too. ...Looking back now, that's even scarier. Anyway, she's that kind of woman. As a woman, I understand. You're in a relationship like this with a man you've had a crush on for years, so in that situation, what wouldn't you do..."
...Hearing it like that, it felt like I could understand.
Anyway, now to go to work,
"Waiting for 5 or 6 years, trying to make him her man by any means necessary... If I were Eunbyul, if I had been given such an opportunity, I would have tied you up with a rope, Master."
No, hey, wait a minute. Turn off the engine. Seriously.
"...Ro, rope...? Seo Jia, wait."
"After putting handcuffs on you, I'd put you in a room, no, I'd just buy a house and tie you up in a room there. And while I feed you three meals a day, as soon as you digest it, we'd have sex immediately... Is that what you call 'milking'?"
This woman is exploding again,
"I'd have sex like that and get pregnant right away. If it were me, I would. What kind of woman would stupidly let this opportunity slip by? The person I've loved continuously has finally shown interest in me for the first time, that fact alone is the end of it. If it were me... Yeah, I think it would be good to use a blindfold and a gag too. I'd only take the gag off when we kiss... And for meals, I'd definitely go with eel, and Samgyetang packed with octopus and ginseng..."
As expected, this woman is a woman who needs repairs.