PSS - 60

Buzz, buzz.

Sitting in the family waiting room in front of the intensive care unit, Haein took out her constantly vibrating phone from her pocket. It was Seok Ji-hyung.

“Hello?”

As soon as she answered, Seok Ji-hyung asked in a very urgent voice.

-Are you at the hospital now?

“Yes. I’m waiting in front of the intensive care unit.”

-Could you please come up to the 7th floor right now?

“Now?”

-The Chairman is at the hospital.

Although his usual tone was low, Seok Ji-hyung’s voice was unusually subdued.

Hearing that Chairman Park was at the hospital and asking for her, Haein knew that what was coming had arrived. Haein’s gaze turned towards the glass door of the intensive care unit.

‘Just in case, please stay put, guardians.’

These were the words she had heard after the attending professor in charge of her sibling came down and examined their condition. Those words meant one thing.

Death was truly just around the corner.

Even now, every time the glass door of the intensive care unit opened and closed, and whenever unfamiliar medical staff came and went, the gazes of Haein and her family anxiously fixed on the glass door.

“M-Manager Seok... I don’t think I can leave my post right now.”

Her trembling voice was filled with tears. No matter how absolute Chairman Park’s power was, there was something Haein could never concede.

-Haa... Is it that serious?

The sharp-witted Manager Seok sighed at Haein’s words. He was in a position to urge her, but even Manager Seok couldn’t easily speak.

“Yes. The situation right now is...”

Just then, someone came out from inside the glass door and looked for the guardian of her sibling, Jungin. Leaving Haein, who was on the phone, Haein’s parents approached the medical staff.

The doctor who came out from inside explained something, then pressed their lips together and bowed their head. Hearing those words, Haein’s mother sank to the floor, and Haein’s father held his collapsed wife’s shoulders.

Watching that scene, Haein dropped the phone she was holding onto her lap.

-Hello? Hello?

She could hear Seok Ji-hyung calling her from the phone. But Haein, without even thinking of answering, stood up abruptly and approached her parents.

“Sob...”

“What can we do...”

The doctor’s words, as if waiting for a decision, and her mother crying without being able to answer, came into view.

“What’s wrong...”

“They’re asking us to decide whether to move Jungin back to a regular room. They said they might not make it through today...”

They might not make it through today. Today is the last day. Today.

Haein finally understood the meaning of her father’s words, which he had barely uttered while biting his lip, only after repeating them several times in her mind.

It meant that all possible treatments had failed. It was asking them to choose whether to continue meaningless treatments or to have time to prepare for the end.

“Ah...”

How much time had she spent preparing for this moment? How many times had she thought about this moment?

But despite her countless resolutions, when reality struck, her mind went blank.

“...Please move them to a regular room. We will prepare.”

Instead of Haein, who was trembling and unable to speak, or her mother, who had collapsed on the floor, Haein’s father answered the doctor. Her father’s voice buzzed in her ears like a dream and then faded away.

It was as if even the flow of air surrounding her had stopped, and for a moment, she heard nothing. Then, like a dam bursting, the surrounding noise rushed into her ears all at once. Goosebumps ran all over her body.

Today is the day.

What they were given, the time that remained for them, was actually a day that she couldn’t even begin to calculate. A time that might be a day, or perhaps just a few hours.

“Haein-ah. Let’s go. Let’s go and prepare. Honey, get up.”

She was walking unsteadily when the phone she didn’t even realize she was holding vibrated again.

Having barely returned to the front of the hospital room, Haein, while her parents went inside, picked up the phone that had been ringing incessantly. She answered the call in front of the door.

-Excuse me, would you happen to have even a moment?

As soon as she pressed the call button, Seok Ji-hyung asked in a much more urgent voice than before.

“I’m...”

She moved her lips as if to say something, but the sound crumbled inside her mouth without forming words.

“I...”

If she uttered even a single word, it felt like the something that was barely supporting her would shatter into pieces.

Amidst the tension that felt like someone was pulling her back hair, unable to continue speaking, a group of medical staff appeared, pushing the bed carrying her sibling.

-I’m sorry. Unless it’s a very urgent situation, I think you should see the Chairman even for a moment. The Chairman wants to personally confirm the madam’s pregnancy.

Even after hearing Seok Ji-hyung’s words, Haein didn’t even think of answering. Her gaze fixed on Jungin approaching her. Her sibling, adorned with dangling medical equipment, passed by Haein and went inside the hospital room.

Haein, forgetting that she had just been on the phone, mindlessly followed Jungin inside.

She saw her parents holding each other’s hands. Haein’s gaze turned again to her sibling lying on the bed.

Her sibling had never been able to grow their hair out beautifully during the long period of treatment. The hair that had been shaved close to the scalp was now just sprouting a little like grass.

“Jungin-ah. Jungin-ah. You’ve suffered so much all this time. For being born as Mom’s daughter... you’ve suffered so much... sob.”

Haein’s mother, who had been speaking calmly, finally burst into tears, clutching Jungin’s emaciated hand.

Haein couldn’t even bring herself to get close to her sibling’s side, standing rooted to the spot, her eyes blankly taking in everything within her sight.

“Haein-ah. Come here. You’ve suffered the most, you should say goodbye.”

Her father, his face covered in tears, called Haein. Only then did Haein take a shaky step forward in the dizziness that felt like her vision was spinning.

She had thought that if the day ever came when her sibling left, she would send them off with a smile.

She had intended to say that she had done her best for them and had no regrets.

“No. No... Jungin-ah. Not yet. Don’t go.”

The words Haein uttered at the moment of death were not a beautiful farewell. No, they couldn’t be. Death was not something that could end so beautifully.

There was no such thing as a beautiful goodbye in this world.

Haein ran to Jungin’s side as if collapsing and clung to her sibling’s hand. A bloodied IV needle was stuck in the back of a hand that was nothing but bone.

I told you I would buy you a pretty ring someday for this hand, and I would take your hand and buy you really delicious food, not hospital food. How can you just be born and die in this white, dreary hospital room?

What am I going to do about my poor Jungin?

Old memories they had shared shook her to her core, and she wept endlessly. It was as if a tight membrane had been placed over her throat, and the sobs that couldn’t escape churned in her stomach.

“No. Jungin-ah. Don’t go. Just a little longer, can’t you hold on just a little longer? Huh?”

“Heeuuuh...”

“Jungin-ah...”

Amidst the sound of the three people’s weeping, the hospital room door suddenly burst open.

Bang.

“Yoon Haein!”

Turning her eyes towards the source of the frantic sound, Haein saw an enraged Chairman Park standing there.

“You made me come all the way here! You must have lost your mind!”

His face was so red with anger that he looked like a demon, and Chairman Park strode into the hospital room, taking rough breaths.

“You! How dare you try to deceive me in front of whom!”

Seeing Chairman Park erupt in anger, Haein wondered if this was a dream or reality.

Haein’s parents, unable to grasp the situation, simply stared at Chairman Park with dumbfounded expressions before looking back at Jungin.

Haein, like someone who had lost her senses, stood by her sibling’s bedside and blankly stared at the furious Chairman Park. The unfolding situation felt so unreal it could have been a nightmare.

Behind Chairman Park stood Manager Seok, looking restless.

“Chairman, please... calm down a little...”

The moment Manager Seok, having grasped the situation, couldn’t bear it anymore and stepped forward, the warning sound of the medical device signaling vital signs inside the hospital room blared loudly.

Beep-

The medical staff who had rushed in from behind Chairman Park surrounded the bed and asked if they should administer the final treatment.

Beep. Beep.

At the moment the medical device loudly announced the end of a fading life.

“Jungin-ah!”

Jungin’s eyelids, which had been closed all along, fluttered and then slowly began to rise.

“Jungin-ah!”

Haein’s family rushed to Jungin and grabbed her hands.

Very slowly, Jungin, who had barely opened her eyes halfway, had tears welling up in her eyes, and a single drop of tear streamed down her cheek.

Goodbye.

It was the last farewell her sibling was sending with all her might.

Her eyes, which had momentarily sparkled as if seeing her family, cast a fleeting light and then clouded over again. And her eyelids, which seemed to have been barely lifted, slowly closed again.

***

‘Unnie.’

Her hazy eyes followed her sibling calling her.

‘Thank you. You’ve suffered so much because of me.’

Her beautiful and kind sibling smiled brightly and waved her hand.

‘Unnie. I love you.’

She wanted to go to her sibling, but her feet wouldn’t move at all.

Haein couldn’t discern where she was standing now, and why her sibling was standing there looking at her in such a healthy state.

She was simply standing alone with her sibling in a white space that seemed filled with light.

‘Now, live your share of life diligently too. Unnie. Unnie is...’

Her sibling moved her lips as if entrusting something to her, but the rest of the words were inaudible.

“Uh-uh...”

The sob that had been welling up in her throat couldn’t burst out and instead flowed out between her teeth as a groan.

Ah, had she seen something fleetingly?

For a moment, she heard nothing and saw nothing.

When she realized that the “uh-uh” sound was actually the sound of her own weeping, Haein saw the reality that had unfolded before her eyes in an instant.

The respirator had fallen out of her sibling’s mouth, and the dangling medical devices were being removed.

For some reason, she heard nothing. It was as if she had stepped into a vacuum, and everything was muted.

“...Yoon Jungin passed away at 3:13 PM.”

Only the sound of the doctor pronouncing the time of death pierced her ears. Every scene before her eyes moved slowly. The movements of people rippled as if they were dancing.

Beep.

She thought she heard tinnitus. What sound was it? Yes, it was the warning sound that her sibling’s breathing had stopped.

Ah. I see.

Her sibling died today.