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“Why did you call me?”
Eun-chae asked, her tone filled with skepticism.
“Well... it’s because...”
Because I was worried about you.
But she knew Eun-chae would only ask why he was worried.
Seokyeong stayed silent, choosing not to answer.
“Shouldn’t you be with your fiancée right now? Why are you here looking for me instead of being with her?”
When he didn’t respond to that either, Eun-chae let out a soft sigh and turned around. As she grabbed the doorknob and started to open the door, Seokyeong finally stepped in to stop her.
“Don’t worry about what other people think. They’ll forget about it soon enough. It’ll just be uncomfortable for a little while...”
“I don’t care,” Eun-chae replied coldly, her gaze piercing through him.
“What did you say?”
“What?”
“I’m someone from the past. People will see me as insignificant, and I don’t have the energy to react to every single look they give me.”
Seokyeong swallowed hard.
After staring at him silently for a moment, Eun-chae opened the door and walked into the building.
Left alone, it took Seokyeong a long time to snap out of his shock.
In the past, she might have cried, but something about Eun-chae had changed. He felt an icy chill run down his spine.
And her cutting words had grown even sharper.
“Am I really nothing to you?”
The voice that slipped out of his mouth carried no strength.
________________________________________
After losing the rooftop to Seokyeong, Eun-chae retreated to the restroom.
When she returned to the office, many curious eyes were on her, but thanks to some heads-up from Team Leader Park or Hyunwoo, no one dared to approach her.
This silence was worse than being confronted. She wished they would just ask outright.
Regardless, feeling uneasy about the situation, Eun-chae left as soon as the workday ended, saying goodbye to Team Leader Park before heading out.
Exhausted, she boarded the bus and arrived at her apartment. But the moment she stepped off the elevator and opened her front door, she froze in shock.
The lights were on inside her home, and a pair of unfamiliar shoes sat neatly by the entrance.
They were bright red stilettos—far too bold to belong to her.
“Who...?” she gasped.
As she hurried toward the living room, a familiar figure sitting on the couch caught her eye.
Slowly turning her head to face Eun-chae, Madam Cha’s glare cut like a blade.
“Oh… Mother-in-law? What are you doing here?”
“When you see an elder, shouldn’t greetings come first?”
“Ah, you’ve come—”
“That’s enough.” Madam Cha waved her hand dismissively, cutting Eun-chae off mid-sentence.
“Come sit over here.”
Goosebumps prickled all over Eun-chae’s body.
Just recently, when she went to meet Madam Cha, she hadn’t felt this nervous. But now, things were different.
Perhaps it was because Madam Cha knew this was where Eun-chae lived.
“How did you get here?”
“I have a spare emergency key to this place too.”
Madam Cha placed a card key on the table and smirked.
Her crimson dress perfectly matched the fiery red stilettos, making her pale skin appear even whiter. Her lips, painted in flawless scarlet lipstick, hinted at her unyielding personality.
“You said there’s nothing between you and Seokyeong, and that you’re not trying to hold him back? Yet he paid off your debts... So, what do you give him? Your body?”
Eun-chae clenched her teeth tightly.
She wanted to deny it, but lying wouldn’t change anything—it would only make her seem more pathetic.
“Are you seducing him now, even though you couldn’t manage it when he was married?”
“It’s not like that.”
“Not like that?”
“I haven’t seduced him.”
“Then is Seokyeong clinging to you unilaterally?”
Eun-chae fell silent again.
While it was true that Seokyeong had initiated their relationship and continued pursuing her, the person truly obsessed wasn’t him—it was her. She welcomed his fixation, almost craving it herself, which made answering difficult.
“Why can’t you answer? Is Seokyeong unilaterally infatuated with you?”
“No.”
“Then is it mutual?”
“No. Seokyeong feels nothing for me.”
“And you?”
“Other than physical attraction, I feel nothing either. Neither of us does.”
Admitting otherwise would be suicidal.
Though her cheeks burned with embarrassment, framing their connection as purely physical was safer.
“Joo-eun mentioned something interesting. If this marriage falls apart, she won’t let it go lightly.”
“Huh?”
“She must have sensed it too. Isn’t it always the wife who notices first when her husband has wandering thoughts? Though they aren’t officially married yet, Joo-eun is sharp. Of course, she’d catch on to whatever’s going on between you two.”
So that explained why she exposed my identity to everyone.
It wasn’t shocking—it fit the suspicions swirling around—but what truly stunned Eun-chae was hearing that Joo-eun had threatened Seokyeong.
“Choose now. Will you leave quietly, or do you want to leave branded with shame?”
There was no real choice to consider.
The only reason her lips trembled was...
“I’ll give you whatever you want. What do you desire? A house? A car? A building? Or maybe I’ll set up a small business so your father can take over once he’s released?”
Haa...
Hatred buried deep within, locked away in a box, began rattling its chains.
Finally, the lock broke, and a grotesque hand emerged.
“Hmm? What do you want?”
“I don’t want anything.”
“Nothing?”
Madam Cha raised an eyebrow, genuinely surprised.
“I won’t fall for the same trick twice.”
“What?”
“You don’t need to try manipulating me using my father as leverage.”
Though her bold words caused Madam Cha’s eyebrows to twitch slightly, her expression remained as cold as ever.
“If you say you want nothing, does that mean you plan to keep lingering around Seokyeong?”
“No, quite the opposite.”
Eun-chae answered firmly.
“This is the last time I’ll listen to such talk from you. I won’t see you again.”
“Hahaha!”
What began as amused laughter grew louder until Madam Cha doubled over, tears streaming down her face.
“Oh, this is hilarious.”
What could possibly be so funny?
“People grow up, don’t they? You used to act so naive—or maybe just dumb—that it irritated me whenever you stumbled along. But look at you now. Who would recognize the clumsy Eun-chae from three years ago?”
Eun-chae furrowed her brow.
While she admitted her younger self had been foolish and naive, hearing it directly from someone else—especially Madam Cha—stung deeply.
“Good for you. Learning from the past is a positive trait.”
Madam Cha picked up her bag and stood up from the couch.
“I’ll give you one week.”
“One week...?”
“Yes. That should be enough time for you to disappear completely from Seokyeong’s life, don’t you think?”
“...Yes, it’s sufficient.”
She planned to move out soon, and finding a new job wouldn’t be difficult if she lowered her standards.
Eun-chae nodded.
“Then let’s not meet again.”
With a cold smile, Madam Cha left.
Eun-chae waited until the sound of the closing door faded before exhaling the breath she’d been holding.
One week.
In just seven days, everything would end.
No, perhaps it was a beginning—a chance to start anew.
Back to ordinary days, days without Seokyeong, days too busy to dwell on ghosts of the past.
But why...
Eun-chae wiped away the tears streaming down her cheeks. No matter how many times she wiped them, more kept flowing.
Her heart ached. Her lungs felt crushed under the weight of pain.
Tears continued to fall, and breathing became impossible.
Each desperate gulp of air felt like swallowing shards of glass.
Why...?
“...I miss him.”
The reason was simple.
She missed Seokyeong.
How wonderful it would be to return to the day they reunited. Even if it meant drowning in debt, she would have rejected his proposal without hesitation.
But regrets couldn’t undo reality. Pain saturated every corner of her existence.
Just one last time.
She had treated him harshly, believing it was already the end. But now, with a deadline looming, her heart raced frantically.
Just one last embrace. One final time.
Truly the last.
________________________________________
Is it raining?
Seokyeong sat by the dimly lit window of a whiskey bar, nursing his drink. His gaze drifted toward the glass.
A flash of silver lightning tore across the sky, followed moments later by a deafening thunderclap that seemed to shake the heavens.
The faint patter of raindrops against the window had grown into a torrential downpour, pounding relentlessly against the glass.
“What did I say?”
“I’m someone from the past.”
Eun-chae’s resigned face atop the rooftop replayed in his mind.
What are you to me? Are you truly just a relic of the past, meaningless beyond that? Am I merely a fleeting memory to you?
Frustrated, Seokyeong rose from his seat and pressed closer to the window, gazing outside.
Rain-soaked Seoul swayed under the glow of streetlights, headlights, and neon signs. The Han River shimmered erratically.
No, the one swaying is me. I’ve had too much to drink.
Mocking himself, he reached to place his whiskey glass on the table. Just then, a small figure standing at the entrance of the high-rise apartment complex caught his eye.
He leaned closer to the window for a better look. A woman stood there, drenched in the pouring rain, gazing up at the building.
Recognizing her silhouette, Seokyeong staggered.
Could it be...
He quickly pulled out his wallet, left a check on the table, and rushed out of the bar.
The elevators were stuck on higher floors, so he sprinted down the emergency staircase instead.
By the time he reached the ground floor, he was gasping for breath, sweat dripping from his forehead and back like raindrops.
Still, he didn’t stop, charging straight out the door.
“President! It’s raining!”
The security guard tried to shield him with an umbrella, but Seokyeong ignored him, running straight into the storm.
He dashed toward where the woman had been standing.
Sure enough.
His hunch was right.
“Panting... What are you doing here?”
It was Eun-chae.
Catching his breath, he wiped away the mixture of sweat and rainwater with the back of his hand and asked.
But she didn’t answer. Lips pressed tightly together, soaked to the bone, arms wrapped around herself against the cold, she looked up at him with sad eyes, trembling.
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