Prologue. Innocent Bride.

“Oppa. Heuu, am I not attractive as a woman?”

My friend’s younger sister, Song Ha-young.

Drunk, she sniffled and shed tears. While I vaguely understood Ha-young’s feelings after her engagement was broken off overnight due to her fiancé’s two-timing, I was at a loss for how to respond to a woman’s drunken self-pity.

Tears streamed down her face from eyes as red as a rabbit’s. I wondered if she might get dehydrated at this rate.

Ji-sung, uncharacteristically worried, held a glass of water to the lips of the drunk Ha-young.

“Why are you asking me that?”

Song Ha-young obediently took the glass and gulped down the water, making a smile spread across my lips. But then, her shoulders heaved as she sobbed sorrowfully, and my smile instantly vanished.

“Oppa is a man too… Heuu, what do you think of me from a man’s perspective?”

Ha-young wiped her alcohol-soaked lips with the back of her hand, persistently pressing Ji-sung for an answer.

“You’re drunk, Song Ha-young. Just go inside and sleep.”

Ji-sung, a prosecutor in the Criminal Division 3 of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office, had come to his friend Song Doo-young’s house late at night at his request. Ji-sung had come to introduce a lawyer to handle the annulment issue of Doo-young’s seven-year-younger sister, Song Ha-young, but was now unexpectedly dealing with her drunken rant.

While Doo-young had taken his parents on a trip to Jeju Island for their mother’s sixtieth birthday, Ha-young had been dumped by her fiancé in a ridiculous turn of events.

I knew it from the moment that little thing, who had barely started her social life, was making a fuss about getting married. Ignoring the objections of the elders in the family, she mistook her puppy love for the love of the century and even went on a hunger strike to get married. This is how flimsy the love of young men and women is.

“I’m not drunk. Heuu, oppa. Tell me. Am I really that bad?”

I couldn’t bring myself to refuse my one and only friend’s request, so I came to clean up the mess after his younger sister’s broken engagement after working late, but things were taking a strange turn.

Whether Song Ha-young was unattractive as a woman or not. It wasn’t even her fault that the engagement was broken off.

“Yeah. I absolutely hate it when you’re drunk.”

Ji-sung grabbed Ha-young’s hand as she reached for the glass again. He frowned for a moment at her slender wrist, which felt small even in his grasp. Was the aftermath of her heartbreak that severe? He felt angry at Song Ha-young, whose face had become gaunt in just one day, but at the same time, he felt sorry for her.

It was a well-known fact, but it was hard to believe that she was the younger sister of Song Doo-young, a high school physical education teacher who was also a former judo athlete, given her frail and thin body.

“Heuu. I knew it… Heuu, that’s why that jerk… Heuu, that other womaaaan….”

Ha-young started crying loudly like a child at Ji-sung’s casual remark, as if it had hurt her. After becoming an adult, she had acted reserved around Ji-sung, but now, drunk, she was acting like a child throwing a tantrum.

That sight brought back old memories, making Ji-sung fall into thought, but it only reaffirmed the fact that Ha-young was still too young to get married.

Ji-sung barely managed to endure and lifted Ha-young, who was sprawled out on the sofa.

“Ha, stop crying. Even your drunken ramblings are charming. Okay?”

“I, I want to die, heuu… It’s better to die….”

Ha-young, who seemed not to hear Ji-sung’s words and kept talking to herself while sobbing, staggered as she stood up, making matters worse.

“Song Ha-young. I told you to be careful.”

This is driving me crazy.

Was she planning to get a concussion by falling on the marble living room floor, as if being a jilted bride wasn’t enough?

It was her house anyway, so whether she was drunk or not, I could just turn around and leave. But I couldn’t bring myself to leave until she fell asleep, just in case the irrational Song Ha-young called her ex-fiancé and said something legally disadvantageous.

Ji-sung swallowed a sigh and snatched Ha-young, who was about to fall, lifting her up in his arms like a bride.

“Heuu, let go of me. I can walk…”

They say drunk people are heavy. Feeling Ha-young’s weight surprisingly light, he thought she was pitiful and strode towards her room.

Seeing Ha-young cry so sorrowfully like a child reminded him of their childhood. When did that elementary school kid who used to follow Doo-young around like a chick, crying because a boy scribbled on her pencil case, grow up to be engaged?

Of course, the engagement was broken off due to her fiancé’s outrageous two-timing, but the rapidly passing time flashed before his eyes like a revolving lantern.

That’s right. She should have dated to her heart’s content when she was young, why rush into marriage? And of all the guys, she had to pick a piece of trash.

Not just because she’s my friend’s sister, but Song Ha-young, you were way out of his league.

“Ha-young-ah. Please just stay still.”

I had frequented this house since childhood, practically wearing out the doorsteps, but it had been a long time since I last entered Ha-young’s room.

Her interior decorating taste, still favoring pink as it did in her school days, brought a fleeting smile to my face. A full-grown twenty-five-year-old. How could there be so many character dolls on her bed?

I barely managed to lay the drunkenly struggling Ha-young down on the bed when she suddenly grabbed Ji-sung’s tie with all her might.

“Gasp!”

His neck constricted by the tie, Ji-sung lost his balance and fell directly onto Ha-young’s body.

Should I get angry or not?

What good would it do to lecture Song Ha-young, who was completely drunk from the pain of her breakup and wouldn’t even understand? But Ji-sung was also slowly reaching his limit with her increasingly inappropriate behavior.

“Heuu, tell me quickly…”

Suddenly, the two men and women were awkwardly piled on top of each other on the bed in a suggestive position. But Song Ha-young, not in her right mind, didn’t even seem to realize how inappropriate and dangerous this situation was.

Song Ha-young’s face, viewed from an excessively close distance, felt unfamiliar.

Was she always this pretty? Come to think of it, there was a line of guys who liked Song Ha-young since our school days. Like a fluffy puppy, with eyes as clear as a calf’s, and as soft as a chick. I vividly remember how the neighborhood boys used to hover around Ha-young, drawn to her cute and innocent appearance that stirred protective instincts. Most of them couldn’t even confess their feelings and gave up preemptively, intimidated by her older brother Song Doo-young’s ironclad defense.

The tears that thoroughly wet Ha-young’s pure white face were like dewdrops. For some reason, I couldn’t take my eyes off her reddened eyelids.

I’m going crazy.

Thinking about it again, it wasn’t just Song Ha-young who was drunk. Listening to her complaints and downing one drink after another, Ji-sung himself, intoxicated, was harboring thoughts he shouldn’t have about his friend’s seven-year-younger sister.

“Let go of this.”

Ji-sung barely straightened his tie, but his body wouldn’t move, leaving the tearful Song Ha-young in place.

“Oppa is a man too. Heueup, am I really, heuu, really that unattractive?”

“Am I a man to you? I’m Song Doo-young’s friend. You’re asking the wrong person.”

“Don’t treat me like a kid. I’m not a child anymore. I’m a woman.”

“Okay, you’re a woman. I got it, so now go to sleep.”

As he was about to turn away, Ji-sung’s thoughts fractured at Song Ha-young’s next words.

“So, touch me.”

Did I hear that correctly?

Ji-sung’s bewildered eyes wavered.

“What did you say?”

What.

What should I do?

“I said, touch me.”

Haa….

Is she out of her mind?

Just as Ji-sung was about to get up from the bed, thinking that even if Song Ha-young had lost her mind due to the broken engagement, he had to stay sane, Ha-young’s hand suddenly grabbed his groin.

“Ha, shit.”

Unlike Kwon Ji-sung’s reason, which had frozen in bewilderment, his instincts began to swell with desire as if they had been waiting for this moment.