Im Chaeyeon's Past (1)
In Chaeyeon's childhood, her family was famous for how harmonious it was.
The reason lay in her mother's extraordinary love for her father. Even years into the marriage, that love never cooled; it burned as fiercely as if they were still newlyweds.
"Chaeyeon, should we call Daddy and ask when he's coming home?"
"Yeah!"
Nearly every evening as quitting time approached, her mother would phone her father.
The way her mother lit up with anticipation while dialing was one of Chaeyeon's favorite sights in the world.
She hoped that someday she, too, would find someone who made her heart flutter just like that.
"Ah... looks like he's busy again today. All right, I'll put Chaeyeon to bed first."
After hanging up, Kim Suyeon quietly exhaled a sigh. Lately her husband had been coming home later and later, whether from work or something else.
"Is Daddy late again today?"
"I'm afraid so."
"Aww... then I won't get to see him at dinner."
At seven years old, Chaeyeon was still young enough that by the time her father returned she would already be deep in dreamland.
Suyeon stroked her disappointed daughter's hair and whispered gently,
"Year-end is almost here. How about we ask Daddy to take us to the amusement park on his next day off?"
"Really?"
"Of course. Mommy will tell him the moment he gets home. So Chaeyeon needs to go to sleep right away, okay?"
"Okay!"
It had been another peaceful day like any other. Suyeon finally managed to coax her daughter to sleep after listening to an endless stream of plans for what they would do at the amusement park.
"Good night, my little girl."
She pressed a soft kiss to the forehead of the child clutching a dolphin plushie, then slipped quietly out of the room.
Late that night.
Her husband came home soaked in alcohol. Even from a distance the reek of liquor rolled off him. Suyeon hurried over and steadied Im Changseok.
"I didn't hear anything about a company dinner tonight. Did something happen?"
Changseok gave no answer.
Assuming he was simply exhausted, Suyeon guided him to sit on the bed and hung his jacket on a hanger.
Then, from behind her, came her husband's low, heavy voice.
"Suyeon... I've been thinking about this for a long time..."
"About what?"
She stopped spraying fabric freshener and turned. His complicated gaze met hers.
He opened his mouth, closed it again, then finally spoke while fidgeting with his briefcase.
"Can we... just stop?"
"Stop? Stop what...?"
The solemn air around him, the look of a man who had already made up his mind—everything told her this was about divorce. The spray bottle slipped from her fingers.
"Honey... d-did I do something wrong? If I did, I'm sorry. I'll never do it again, so please just tell me honestly what's wrong."
"No. You didn't do anything wrong."
Changseok raked a rough hand through his hair.
"It's just... I'm trash. That's why."
"What are you talking about? Why would you—"
"I've been seeing another woman."
Suyeon's breath cut off mid-inhale. In the silence that followed his confession of infidelity, only stillness filled the room. After a moment she forced out a dry laugh and picked up the fallen bottle with trembling hands.
"...Stop with the unfunny jokes. You're going to wash up and sleep, right? I'll run a bath for you."
She tried to flee the room, but Changseok's guilt-laden voice stopped her.
"It's not a joke. We've been together for over a year already. The late nights lately..."
"Stop! Chaeyeon's father, please, I'm begging you—don't say another word."
She deliberately switched to the formal title, hoping to remind him he was the head of a family. Changseok understood the intent, yet—
"The late nights... were all because I was meeting her."
A man who had already decided on a new beginning could not be stopped. No matter how many chances Suyeon had given him to return to their home, he had chosen the other woman.
"Why are you doing this...? I love you more than anyone. You have a beautiful little girl still in kindergarten. What could you possibly be missing that you'd do something like this?!"
Suyeon's desperate cry rang through every corner of the house. Her resentful voice began to eat away at Changseok's chest.
"I'm sorry..."
"I don't want your apology. Chaeyeon's father. If you break it off with her right now, we can pretend tonight never happened. So please, come to your senses..."
"......."
Changseok said nothing and looked away. The silence itself was his answer: he could not. Unable to bear it, Suyeon seized both his shoulders.
"What kind of woman is she that you'd cling to her like this? Is she more precious than me and Chaeyeon? If you divorce us, what are we supposed to do?!"
"I'll send child support every month."
"That's not the point! Chaeyeon and I both still need your love more than anything... How can you do this to us...?!"
Suyeon slowly sank to the floor. The room filled with her broken sobs and Changseok's guilt-heavy sighs. Clutching his knees, she spoke in a trembling voice.
"Am I not enough...? I can treat you better than she ever could. I'll do whatever you ask—just please don't leave us..."
Changseok tilted his face toward the ceiling. The pitiful sight of his wife made his chest ache.
After a long silence he spoke again, voice grave.
"The new woman... she's lacking in every way compared to you. Looks, figure, personality—none of it measures up."
"Then why...?!"
"Because I got tired of you."
Suyeon's moist eyes lifted to him. Under the cruelty of those words, the bright light that had once shone in them turned muddy, as if someone had dumped swamp water into clear springs.
"At first it was wonderful. Being loved by a beautiful woman like you made me walk taller. It gave me a reason to live. But..."
He lowered his head and continued.
"As time went on, those feelings started to dull. Maybe I just got used to your devotion. My heart stopped racing. Sometimes I even found you... annoying."
Suyeon's boundless love and selfless care had turned her into something cheap in his eyes. By always accommodating him, she had left him with nothing left to expect, nothing new to feel.
"Ah... aah...!!"
A scream-like wail tore from Suyeon once more. Startled awake by the sound, little Chaeyeon flung open the door.
"Mommy...?"
Her long pitch-black hair was a tangled mess. On the floor her mother lay crumpled, sobbing.
It was the first time Chaeyeon had ever seen her mother fall apart. The woman who always stayed bright no matter what—what on earth could have done this to her?
"D-Daddy... did you fight with Mommy...? Why?"
Knowing nothing, Chaeyeon asked through tears. Changseok looked down at his daughter clutching her dolphin plushie with pitying eyes.
And then—
"Chaeyeon, the truth is..."
He tried to use his own daughter to pry Suyeon's love away.
"Shut your mouth! What do you think you're about to tell her?!"
Just as he had calculated, the fiercely maternal Suyeon took the bait at once. For the first time she felt pure hatred for the man who would destroy their family over some other woman.
"I can't stand the sight of you... Get out of our house right now...!"
Feeling as though she might vomit, she drove her husband from the home.
And when days like that one kept repeating, Suyeon finally could not endure it any longer and began the divorce proceedings.
Once Changseok was gone, Suyeon's life turned into a blank white canvas. No purpose, no will—just a hollow existence she forced herself to continue for her daughter's sake.
The tender light that had once filled her eyes whenever she looked at Chaeyeon grew clouded, as if storm clouds had settled there. She would tear up photographs of the ex-husband who had abandoned her, only to tape them back together later when the lingering attachment returned.
Unable to contain her own darkness, she eventually began to criticize Changseok in front of Chaeyeon. Before long those words planted a twisted belief in her daughter's heart.
"Chaeyeon. Even if you meet someone you love someday, you must never show him how you feel."
"Why...?"
Confusion clouded the little girl's bright eyes. She was still pure, her own values not yet formed.
Suyeon continued, praying her precious daughter would never repeat her mistake.
"The moment you show that you love him, he'll abandon you. Look at Mommy. Mommy loved Daddy so much... and this is what happened."
Her mother's voice sounded as if she were mocking herself.
At those gentle yet warped words, Chaeyeon shook her head hard.
The mother who used to plan little events for Daddy every day, who used to light up with excitement every time she called him—
That image, once Chaeyeon's ideal, was now being rejected by the very woman who had been her role model. She tried desperately to deny it, but...
"If Mommy had loved Daddy a little less—if she had never shown her heart at all—then Mommy and Chaeyeon could have lived with Daddy forever. Right?"
"Th-that's not true...!"
Young Chaeyeon had neither the ability nor the experience to refute her mother's logic. Living under the same roof, she had to listen to Suyeon's brainwashing-like words day after day.
No... that can't be right...
Deep down she knew her mother was wrong, yet the endless stories of pain, the sight of her mother wasting away—little by little Chaeyeon found herself being persuaded without even realizing it.
And when she agreed she received praise; when she disagreed she faced fiery persuasion. In the end she had no choice but to force herself to accept it.
"Daddy... Daddy..."
Even when she searched for the one person who might save them, she found only emptiness.
Every time she thought of the father who should have restored her mother—or rather, the father who had broken her mother this way—
It's just too cruel...
Chaeyeon's worldview twisted at terrifying speed.
By the time Chaeyeon reached sixth grade,
Suyeon, who had never touched the monthly child support Changseok sent, realized her savings were running low.
I have to provide for Chaeyeon.
For her lovely daughter she quickly found a job and threw herself into the work without complaint.
Even after the reclusive years that had left her gaunt, her striking beauty remained. Male coworkers constantly called her aside to confess their feelings.
"I'm sorry. I'm not interested in dating."
To a woman burned by a man, their confessions felt like nothing more than nauseating acts.
To her, men were weapons that could wound her at any moment.
She harshly rejected every persistent suitor and instead built smooth relationships with the women in the office.
Just as she was beginning to earn recognition at work and grow accustomed to social life again—
"Would you please go out with me?"
A man from another department confessed to her. As the office's infamous ice queen, it had been quite a while since anyone had approached her so boldly.
Whether it had been a long time or not, the result was the same: failure. Suyeon scathingly rejected Jeong Donghoon and turned her back.
I don't need a man...
As long as she had her daughter, that was enough. She resolved to live the rest of her life single. She swore to herself she would never again be swayed or hurt by a man—yet
that vow began to waver because of one man's existence.
"Suyeon, drink this while you work."
The cause was the very man who had confessed to her. Jeong Donghoon's love showed no sign of cooling even after years. No matter how fiercely she refused him, he continued to approach the woman he loved with gentle care.
What is wrong with this man...
His daily kindness gradually softened the thorns around Suyeon's heart. They began sharing meals now and then, and she found herself slowly falling for his considerate nature.
Donghoon...
She realized she had come to love him. His face kept rising unbidden in her mind. Just as he always watched her, she had begun following his retreating figure with her eyes without noticing.
I swore I'd never love again...
She resented her own runaway heart. She never wanted to suffer that pain a second time—so why had she allowed these feelings to take root?
Even while she wavered, Donghoon's affection never ceased. Believing she had opened her heart a little, he finally held out a ring without hesitation.
"I will spend the rest of my life looking only at you. So please... will you marry me?"
"You know I have a divorce behind me. And a daughter who's already in middle school..."
"I know. If it means I can be with you, Suyeon, I can accept anything."
What on earth was she that he would love her this much? A divorcée—harshly put, a used woman—yet somehow...
A dizzying sensation made Suyeon sway. She pressed a hand to her forehead and answered with a shallow sigh.
"Please give me some time to think."
Remarriage. She could not hide something so important from Chaeyeon.
After long deliberation she poured out her honest feelings to her daughter and asked for her opinion.
"I'm so glad a good person appeared for you, Mom... I'm fine with it, so do what you want."
"Chaeyeon, but..."
"You've suffered so much taking care of me. From now on, grab your own happiness, okay?"
Encouraged by her daughter's support, Suyeon remarried.
Chaeyeon had expected her remarried mother to regain the bright smile of the old days.
She believed that once Suyeon quit her job and devoted herself to being a housewife, she would once again call her husband with that same fluttering excitement every evening.
"Honey, I'm home~"
"Welcome back. Dinner's ready, so help yourself."
But contrary to every hope, no affectionate words ever left the remarried Suyeon's lips.
Far from gentle, her attitude remained cold.
She performed only the duties of a wife—or rather, of a housewife—and simply received Donghoon's love in silence.
I must never show my true feelings.
Being abandoned by the man she loved once was enough.
In her heart she longed to return every kiss her husband gave her—no, to give him even more—but if she did, he might one day say the same words her first husband had: that he was tired of her.
I have to hide that I love him until the very end.
Afraid that any half-hearted warmth might reveal her heart, Suyeon wrapped thorns around her love. She maintained a frosty demeanor so Donghoon would never realize how deeply she cared.
Mom...
Chaeyeon knew her mother's method was wrong, yet she also understood where that behavior came from, so she could not bring herself to interfere.
Besides—
"I'm sorry, honey. I'll do better from now on."
Despite Suyeon's flawed attitude, Donghoon's constant consideration kept the household peaceful.
It felt almost like the family before the divorce, and sometimes Chaeyeon even fell into the illusion that her mother's way was right.
That foolish thought shattered completely when Chaeyeon was a high-school sophomore.
"Why can't you just say it?! Is it that hard to tell me you like me—that you love me—even once?!"
Drunk, Donghoon finally poured out years of pent-up frustration on his wife. Three years into the remarriage, he had believed that if he simply kept loving her, her coldness would eventually melt. When she continued to keep her distance, anxiety had begun to eat at him.
"I understand you were deeply hurt by your ex-husband. But isn't it time you opened your heart a little...?"
At her husband's plea, Suyeon's breathing grew ragged. Open her heart? Say "I love you"?
The request struck straight at her trauma; she clutched her chest as if she might stop breathing.
Please don't do this...
If she gave in and was abandoned again... this time she would never return to society. She would truly live like a broken shell.
She had finally built a peaceful home. She could not let one wrong choice destroy it.
"You seem very drunk. You should go rest."
Suyeon lowered her eyes and tried to leave, but Donghoon caught her wrist.
"Chaeyeon's mother, please... just once is enough. Tell me you love me."
"Stop it! I already gave you the marriage you wanted so badly. What more do you want from me?"
"I'm really struggling... I can't be sure whether you truly love me or not..."
Tears threatened to spill from Suyeon's eyes at any second.
My husband is suffering this much... maybe I should finally show my true feelings.
She bit her lower lip hard and clenched trembling fists. She wanted nothing more than to pull the kneeling man into her arms and comfort him.
"I... I..."
Yes. Let everything go and be honest. Maybe only Changseok had been the trash...
Suyeon stroked her husband's bowed head. She was about to reveal the love she had hidden for years.
"I lo—"
But then—
The memory of her broken years flashed through her mind: the days she had longed for the husband who left her, the ugly face she had shown her daughter. All of it slammed the brakes on her confession.
"Lo..."
Her mouth opened; her voice worked. Yet somehow she could not force out that single word. Every time she tried, her chest constricted, oxygen vanished, and her consciousness began to fade.
"Honey...?"
Something was wrong with his wife. Her eyelids quivered; cold sweat beaded on her forehead. Worried, Donghoon reached to stroke her cheek—
Slap.
Suyeon struck his hand away hard and hurriedly covered her eyes. Turning her back so he would not see, she forced out the same cold voice as always.
"If you hate me like this, then divorce me... I'll give it to you whenever you want."
She said it knowing the man who loved her would never choose that option.
As expected, Donghoon promised never to do it again and left the house to clear his head. Suyeon, who had collapsed where she stood, staggered into her room on legs that threatened to give out at any moment.
After her parents' argument ended,
Chaeyeon, who had heard everything from her room, went to her mother the moment she heard her stepfather leave.
Creak—
A bleak atmosphere filled the space. The blanket covering Suyeon kept trembling in small, continuous shivers.
Seeing that her mother was suffering too, Chaeyeon spoke in a sorrowful voice.
"Mom, stop this already... You know Stepdad would never abandon you even if you showed your heart. So..."
"These past few years I've built a peaceful home without ever showing my feelings... Daddy gives love, and Mommy receives it. If Mommy accepts Daddy's love completely, our family can last forever."
Suyeon's twisted belief rode on her tearful voice. Chaeyeon watched her mother's pitiful form with aching eyes as the words continued.
"You'll understand someday too, Chaeyeon, when you meet someone you love. How terrifying it is to be abandoned by the person you'd give your whole life to."
With that, their brief conversation ended. Yet Suyeon's heartfelt words settled deep into one corner of Chaeyeon's chest.
And one day, after Chaeyeon had become a college student—
"If it's all right with you... would you go out with me?"
She met her first love, Kim Sihyun.