Chapter 18
After finishing the meal with the interns, Lee Yeon returned to the law firm office and bought coffee for Woo-kyung, who had probably just eaten lunch and come back.
*’This is something I only did with you.’*
Suddenly touching her moist lips, she unknowingly reminisced about what happened a few days prior.
Although she had been prepared for divorce at any time, the scale of her feelings for Woo-kyung had clearly changed without her realizing it. This change felt unfamiliar and overwhelming.
“Sigh, Yoo Lee Yeon, focus on your work now.”
Sighing as she comforted herself, Lee Yeon moved towards the door.
But the moment she reached the doorway, her steps halted. It was because of the low, firm voice coming from the crack in the door.
“I’m planning to go once this case is wrapped up. It’s only three years, after all.”
At the sound of Woo-kyung’s low voice continuing the call, Lee Yeon’s fingertips stilled slightly.
*Go where?*
That one phrase stuck peculiarly in her ears. Woo-kyung’s voice continued from inside.
“I’ll tell Lee Yeon next week, so please keep it a secret until then.”
The moment those words fell, Lee Yeon’s eyes widened.
*What on earth does that mean?* As curiosity washed over her, Lee Yeon carefully opened the door and went in.
“Yes, I’ll hang up now.”
As Lee Yeon entered the office, Woo-kyung, who had hurriedly ended the call, smiled as if nothing was wrong.
“What’s that?”
“You didn’t have coffee, right?”
“As expected, only Yoo Lee Yeon would do this.”
As she handed him the coffee, Lee Yeon cautiously asked,
“But I overheard a bit of your call earlier… May I ask what you were talking about?”
Woo-kyung, who had just taken a sip of coffee, chuckled and replied.
“It’s nothing. More importantly, are you free next week?”
“Is something going on?”
“Grandfather wants to have a meal together.”
“Yes, I don’t mind.”
Although she answered, her gaze lingered, her curiosity still unresolved. Woo-kyung tapped her white cheek with his fingertip and said.
“You’ll find out next week, so don’t worry about it too much.”
Lee Yeon smiled awkwardly, as if her inner thoughts had been discovered.
“Alright.”
“Oh, right, where did you put the documents Attorney Byeon delivered this morning?”
“Ah, that one, just a moment.”
As Lee Yeon hurriedly returned to her desk and began searching through the documents, her pocket vibrated.
Startled by the short, sharp sound, Lee Yeon fumbled in her jacket pocket.
A single unfamiliar number was blinking on her phone screen.
Hesitating whether to answer or not, Lee Yeon eventually pressed the answer button as the vibration didn’t stop.
“Hello?”
Before that short greeting could even dissipate into the air, Lee Yeon’s heart plummeted with a *thud*.
***
The rain forecast wasn’t wrong.
Lee Yeon, who had been looking up at the nearly grey sky through the car window, hurriedly got out of the taxi.
As Lee Yeon walked distractedly on the soggy ground and reached the hospital entrance, the glass doors were blurred, smeared with a mix of rainwater and moisture.
As Lee Yeon entered the hospital, rainwater dripped from the ends of her hair, and cold droplets fell drip by drip along the tip of her nose and her jawline.
Her wet clothes clung to her body, and her body temperature cooled rapidly.
A bloodless pallor spread across her face, and her eyes wandered through the air, having lost their focus.
“Oh my, how did it come to this?”
Following the sound of wailing coming from the center of the emergency room, Lee Yeon’s steps came to an abrupt halt.
“Are you Lee Yeon?”
A middle-aged man in shabby work clothes, his face looking distraught, hurriedly approached her.
“What happened?”
The tip of a foot protruding from under a white sheet at the end of the corridor.
That foot looked so familiar that her steps naturally stopped.
“Well… it seems your father was in a traffic accident.”
At first, Lee Yeon seemed not to understand what she was hearing, but as she faced reality, the color gradually drained from her face.
“A traffic accident?”
“Until just recently, he was working day and night on the Shin-Yu Construction job. He didn’t get a single penny in wages and even went out to protest. In the end, he kept pushing himself like that, grinding his body down every day, and on his way back… that’s what happened.”
Lee Yeon’s fingertips trembled slowly.
Her fingertips, hovering near the edge of the white sheet as if to touch it, wandered emptily through the air.
She wanted to hold onto that warmth even just once, but it was already far too late.
Only then did Lee Yeon realize how far she had come.
She believed that with her efforts, her father’s life, tired from debt and exhaustion, would improve somewhat.
But in reality, that very greed might have been what made her father lonely.
Amidst her mother’s cold admonitions and the weight of reality, Lee Yeon belatedly realized that she had been gradually erasing her father from her heart.
“Oh, here. Your dad left this for you, said he wanted to give it to you.”
The middle-aged man, his hands dusty from hard labor, pulled an envelope from his shabby pocket.
It was an old envelope.
Lee Yeon received the envelope and slowly opened it.
Inside were several crumpled banknotes and a piece of memo paper.
Crooked, scrawled handwriting entered Lee Yeon’s field of vision.
[*’Lee Yeon-ah, it’s not much, but use it for your studies. This father is always a sinner to you.’*]
The moment she read that line, Lee Yeon’s eyes, their rims reddening, shook violently.
Her breath caught as if struggling to get out, and her chest felt tight.
Her fingertips clenched the envelope more tightly, and finally, a tear that had gathered in the corner of her eye fell with a *plop*.
One tear after another fell in succession, smudging the ink.
And as Lee Yeon’s lowered gaze settled on the floor, the sound of sharp high heels scraping against the floor could be heard.
“Tsk. To think that instead of being any help in life, you end up like this even at the very end.”
Her elegant coat collar turned up, her mother who had just arrived had displeasure, rather than fatigue, clouding her eyes first.
***
The funeral was held quietly.
Lee Yeon did not answer the calls from Woo-kyung.
She made excuses, saying she had to attend the funeral of a relative she didn’t even know, who lived in the US.
“How did all this happen…?”
Yoo-jin, her eyes red and sniffling, entered the funeral hall.
Without even wiping her reddened eyes, Yoo-jin stood in front of Lee Yeon and tightly grabbed her hand.
“Lee Yeon-ah…!”
A sob burst out.
Finally, Lee Yeon’s stiff gaze slowly moved.
“You came? Thanks for coming.”
Holding Yoo-jin’s hand tightly, she bit her lip and barely held back her tears.
“Have you eaten?”
“Yeah.”
It was a lie.
During the funeral proceedings, she had lost her appetite and found it hard to swallow anything.
“Don’t worry, I kept it a secret that I came here.”
Yoo-jin was the only friend who knew about Lee Yeon’s marriage.
No, it was closer to having been found out.
The day after they saw the two of them on the bench when Woo-kyung had come to give a lecture, Yoo-jin cautiously asked her.
*’You, what’s your relationship with Attorney Cha Woo-kyung?’*
She could have denied it, but perhaps because she knew Yoo-jin wouldn’t spread rumors, Lee Yeon had been honest.
Since then, Yoo-jin had been the only person she could confide in.
“I should get going now. Make sure to eat properly, okay?”
As Yoo-jin, who had stayed for just over an hour, prepared to leave, Lee Yeon went outside the funeral hall to see her off. It was then that…
“I told you to be moderate, look at the mess you’ve made.”
Her mother, who had appeared after two days, clicked her tongue with a face full of dissatisfaction.
“Is that all you have to say after showing up now?”
“My, you inherited your father’s stubbornness.”
“Then just go. I’ll handle it myself.”
Lee Yeon quietly clenched her white fists and bit her lip tightly.
“Here, take this.”
Her mother rummaged in her handbag, pulled out an envelope, and handed it to Lee Yeon.
“This much shouldn’t be insufficient for covering the funeral costs.”
Lee Yeon let out a hollow laugh as she looked at the thickness of the obviously plump envelope.
“Even though you’re divorced, is there no affection left?”
“All the affection I had ran out while living with your father. And if you think about it, isn’t it thanks to me that you can live a decent life too?”
“Ah, so I should thank you for that?”
“No need to put me on a pedestal. Your step-father was concerned and provided it, so just take it without a fuss.”
Her mother forced the white envelope into Lee Yeon’s white hand, and at her following words, Lee Yeon was utterly dismayed.
“Oh, and your in-laws don’t know about this at all, so don’t ever tell them.”
Only then did she understand. The reason her mother had gone out of her way to put the envelope in her hand was to buy her silence.
“That’s what I want too.”
“Good that we’re on the same page, then. Anyway, wrap things up appropriately and go home. Don’t invite unnecessary suspicion.”
Leaving those cold words behind, her mother didn’t even enter the funeral hall and headed straight for the parking lot.
“Sigh…”
Clutching the crumpled white envelope tightly, Lee Yeon entered the funeral hall, where an agitated voice erupted.
“Hey, you bastards! A person has died, and is that all you care about? Is eating and living well so damn important?!”
A middle-aged man, reeking of alcohol, entered, his cheeks sunken and haggard. Bitter resentment laced every word.
“What’s this! Mr. Kim, calm down!”
Another man nearby hurriedly tried to stop him, but he went further and wailed.
“Oh, poor hyung-nim, I wonder if he can even rest in peace properly.”
The man, who had been crying loudly, was eventually dragged out of the funeral hall by the other people surrounding him.
“Miss, your phone is ringing.”
An employee handed a phone to Lee Yeon, who was standing dazedly.
Lee Yeon slowly lowered her gaze to check. The phone screen was filled with the name Cha Woo-kyung.
6 Missed Calls.
2 Unread Messages.
[Are you okay? I want to hear your voice, can I call you?]
[Lee Yeon-ah, please answer the phone.]
Soon, Lee Yeon’s hand holding the phone trembled slightly.
*What. Why do you want to see me.*
That phrase erupted from somewhere deep in her heart, but her lips remained tightly shut.
Finally slumping down, Lee Yeon fiddled with the screen for a moment before quietly turning off her phone.
