Prologue: The End of the Cuckoldry Drama
My girlfriend and I had been dating since our university days, but after we both landed jobs, our workplaces were far apart and we didn’t have the time to see each other except on weekends—a long-distance relationship.
Now we were so exhausted that we only contacted each other once or twice a month, yet she still reached out sometimes, as if wondering if I was still on her mind.
I had already written her off in my heart as a ghosting ex, but she was different.
My same-age girlfriend had been looking at me alone, never once taking off her rubber shoes, from the fresh-faced campus couple days all the way through my military service and discharge. She was the one who confirmed our compatibility during the job-hunting period when we lived together and our hearts matched perfectly.
Among my university classmates, the ones still in touch were those who had been dating for so long that they even told us, “You two haven’t gotten married yet, what are you doing?”
I had been in a relationship for eight years since I was twenty-one in university until now at twenty-eight.
It was a considerable length of time, and in a way, it was enough for adult men and women to have seen each other through to the end.
At one point, we had even thought about marriage, but after agonizing over it for so long, it had simply faded away.
By the time I finished my military service and got my job two years ago, we had already become distant.
That was when the excuse of “busy at work” started.
In the first year, I was still adjusting to the company, and in the second, I had no one else who could handle the work if I wasn’t there, so we became weekend couples after my job. Now that we were used to it, our relationship had drifted further, and there was no way to go back.
As my heart drifted away from the first love, Hye-yeong, I started looking for other love.
It was a woman from my workplace.
I had created an office wife.
The term “office wife” referred to an in-office mistress.
People say that when bodies drift apart, so do hearts, but compared to my girlfriend who I only saw on weekends, I was drawn to my boss, Kim Mina, who had been kind and helpful when she first came to the office and taught me the work.
Kim Mina, who had become my boss after three years as a new hire and was now my manager, was quite capable and thoughtful of her subordinates.
Unlike my immature girlfriend who acted on her whims, her mature, nurturing actions made my heart go to her, and it wasn’t inevitable, was it?
The first image I had of her was of a woman with glossy long black hair, a beauty mark under her right eye, and a somewhat melancholic atmosphere with slightly upturned eye corners, like someone who would frequent clubs. But in reality, I learned she wasn’t into clubs at all but was basically clueless about men and just a kind person to everyone.
I had been a virgin until I entered university.
I had been passively dating since receiving a confession from my current girlfriend and up until now, but I had just realized that this was the first time I had fallen for someone.
The feelings I had felt for my girlfriend until now were far from love, so I thought my feelings were correct.
Two months after starting work, on a business trip with Kim Mina alone, I confessed my love for the first time in my life.
Kim Mina—no, Mina—accepted my confession, and we had been dating for a year and ten months.
It was a secret from my original girlfriend.
I knew I was garbage, no matter how I looked at it.
Why was I thinking about this situation now?
It was because the mess of this cheating affair had finally been exposed, and I was trying to sort my thoughts.
Most people were in the evening after work.
In a place that could be the company office, loud voices were exchanged, and the surroundings were messy with broken items and documents.
Inside, a woman in an office look with long hair and a woman with short hair were tangled up, grabbing each other’s hair, cursing each other, and hitting at each other.
“You fucking slut, die!”
“Die, you bitch!”
It seemed they had been fighting for a while, as both were already beaten up.
“I dated Si-hyun for eight years, but what the hell are you doing, putting your hands on my man!”
“But now I’m dating Si-hyun and you, right? You were in a long-distance relationship and suddenly the contact was cut off. Why are you acting so pathetic!”
I felt sorry for Mina, but I had told Hye-yeong that the ex I broke up with naturally after the long-distance relationship ended, but in reality, the contact hadn’t been cut off; we were just contacting each other once a month.
Whether to call her my girlfriend or my female friend, I didn’t know.
The two women’s bodies were clashing more roughly, and their anger was even greater, but I couldn’t stop their fight.
Why?
Because when I had been pushed by the angry girlfriend earlier, I had hit my head on the desk and fell.
It was the shock of being exposed or the impact from hitting the desk; my body had no strength at all.
A feeling of coldness spreading through my body, and my head spinning violently.
My consciousness was sinking, and I felt my entire body, from head to toes, losing all strength.
And my thoughts began to stop.
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It hadn’t been long since the two women stopped fighting.
It was because Hye-yeong, who had been fighting, turned her back to Mina and her face hardened like someone who had seen something they shouldn’t have.
Suddenly, Hye-yeong’s startled expression made Mina feel a bad premonition, and she looked in the direction Hye-yeong was looking.
The shouts they had been screaming at each other about the woman who stole their man were no longer heard in the office.
Mina looked in the direction Hye-yeong’s gaze was going and screamed in shock.
What the two women who had been fighting had witnessed was Si-hyun lying on the ground, a pool of red liquid on the floor.
Red blood from Si-hyun’s head was spreading widely on the floor.
The spot where his head had hit earlier with a loud noise.
It was easy to realize that blood had started flowing when he hit the corner of the desk, as the liquid was also on the desk’s corner.
“Si-hyun? Kyaaaaaaaak!”
An unknown scream spread through the office.
However, Si-hyun couldn’t hear that voice.
He had already lost consciousness and his thoughts had sunk into a dark place like the depths of the sea.
From the moment his girlfriend Hye-yeong had pushed him for the first time, Si-hyun had already been dying.
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It was too dizzy, whether because of the chaotic situation or the shock from hitting his head.
Fortunately, the cold feeling I had felt in my body earlier was no longer there.
It was like being in a daze, as if just before waking from sleep.
If I woke up again in the emergency room like this, I would have to see both my ex-girlfriend and my current girlfriend.
I don’t want to wake up. I don’t know what to do now, I wish I could just fall asleep like this.
I hadn’t even thought of what excuse to make.
I am really an irredeemable piece of garbage...
It was too much even for myself to think.
I thought about how I had sandwiched my two female lovers between my legs.
The actions of acting like I had someone I wanted to date separately and someone I wanted to marry.
I hadn’t thought of dating both at the same time.
I had just been playing both sides, trying to choose the one I liked more between the two.
That thought was fleeting.
Although my consciousness had somewhat returned, my eyelids were heavy and I couldn’t lift them properly.
My consciousness was fluctuating like someone who is tired.
It was like repeatedly falling asleep and waking up.
But I felt an eerie sense that something was wrong.
In my occasionally opening eyes, the sizes of the surrounding objects looked enormously large.
As if I had become small...