Chapter 9

A savory aroma woke Su-a early in the morning.

Feeling much lighter than before, Su-a tilted her head in confusion. There was no reason for such a smell to be coming from a house occupied by only herself and Woojin.

Had the housekeeper, who had been given time off, already returned to work?

Grrrrowl.

Come to think of it, she hadn’t eaten a proper meal while she had been sick.

The moment she smelled food, the hunger she had forgotten about came rushing back.

She also needed to eat properly if she was going to take her medicine.

Su-a quietly opened the bedroom door and stepped outside.

As expected, she could hear someone moving around in the kitchen.

“Why are you already up—”

Su-a had been speaking warmly when she suddenly stopped in surprise.

The person standing in front of the stove, preparing something, wasn’t the housekeeper.

To describe him precisely, he was a man taller than the housekeeper, with much broader shoulders.

Su-a sincerely hoped he hadn’t heard her greeting.

“The kitchen is a shared space, so I can use it, right?”

Unfortunately, Woojin turned around and spoke to her.

Su-a gave an awkward smile.

“Of course. Make yourself comfortable.”

Embarrassed by how terribly hoarse her voice sounded, Su-a turned around, intending to return to the bedroom.

“I made way too much porridge.”

Then she heard him muttering to himself, though his complaint was hardly quiet.

“I can’t exactly throw this away, either.”

Grrrrowl.

As if it had been waiting for that exact moment, Su-a’s stomach began growling again.

She clutched her stomach, only to meet Woojin’s dark eyes.

“Would you like to eat with me?”

His eyes were completely innocent, as though he had absolutely no ulterior motive.

Yet there probably wasn’t a single part of this unnatural situation in which he wasn’t involved.

“Is that your breakfast for today, Young Master?”

“I like porridge. I eat it from time to time.”

“……”

“What? Is the fact that I like porridge, or that I accidentally made two servings, another violation of your boundaries?”

His response was just as sharp as their conversation the day before.

Come to think of it, Su-a and Woojin had been rather awkward with each other since yesterday.

“No.”

After a moment, Su-a answered quietly.

“I was going to say that I’d be grateful if you shared some with me.”

She decided not to dwell on it.

She had already been firm enough with him yesterday. And when she thought about it, she had received so much help from him that she should have thanked him several times over.

“I was hungry.”

Su-a pulled out a chair and sat down.

Woojin, who had been standing there staring at her, ladled the finished porridge into a bowl and set it out for her.

A short while later, the two of them sat facing each other across the middle of the large dining table.

Su-a still wasn’t accustomed to sharing a daily life with Woojin.

Before Hajin died, she had never imagined that she would one day sit down and eat a meal alone with his younger brother.

“I’ll enjoy the meal.”

Before an awkward silence could settle over them, Su-a hurriedly picked up her spoon.

“……Huh?”

Her eyes widened in surprise.

“It’s good.”

Why is this actually good?

She had thought it would be enough simply to satisfy her hunger, but the porridge he had made was surprisingly delicious.

His cooking skills were good enough that she could have believed it came from a restaurant specializing in porridge.

It was unexpected.

Woojin had spent his entire life eating food prepared by other people. On top of that, he was more accustomed to foreign cultures than Korean ones.

And yet, he could make porridge this well.

“It’s really good.”

Su-a kept putting spoonful after spoonful into her mouth.

Her appetite was so vigorous that it was hard to believe she had been the one taken to the emergency room the night before because she was sick.

“Eat slowly. Unless you want to end up in the emergency room again because of indigestion.”

Woojin pushed a glass of water toward her.

His eyes remained fixed on her.

The man who supposedly liked porridge enough to make it himself hadn’t taken a single bite.

Only after she had emptied more than half her bowl did Su-a finally notice his persistent attention.

She cleared her throat.

“……Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Because you’re eating well. Unlike usual.”

“I normally eat well.”

“Liar. You barely eat one meal a day.”

Su-a tilted her head, feeling a strange sense of incongruity.

“That’s why I got sick. My body couldn’t keep up……”

“How did you know?”

Woojin’s upper body, which had been leaning toward Su-a, suddenly stiffened before he straightened.

“That I only eat one meal a day.”

Her brother-in-law was clearly suspicious.

After all, they had only crossed paths briefly at family events, yet he spoke as though he knew her eating habits extremely well.

Woojin hesitated for a moment.

Only after a brief pause did he open his mouth again.

“My brother mentioned it once.”

“I didn’t know you were close enough to Hajin to talk about me.”

It made sense that she would be surprised.

Hajin used to frown just from hearing Woojin’s name.

Of course, Su-a didn’t know whether there had been even the slightest bit of affection for his younger brother buried somewhere inside him.

But one thing was certain.

They had never been close enough for Hajin to casually discuss his wife with Woojin.

“I didn’t hear it from him directly. I overheard him telling our mother.”

Woojin quickly added,

“Oh……”

It was still a little strange that he would have told his mother something like that, but since there had been someone who actually heard him say it, Su-a could only nod.

She still didn’t have enough energy to seriously suspect that the man in front of her was Hajin.

“I didn’t know Hajin worried about me.”

Su-a let out a small laugh and lowered her gaze.

“He never seemed willing to let me get close to him. Still, after living together for a year, you’d think we would at least have grown attached to each other.”

There were things Su-a could never say to Hajin, so she found herself telling them to Woojin instead.

“How should I put it……? It felt like he deliberately erased me. I was right there, living and breathing, but being treated as though I didn’t exist was……sad.”

She wondered what kind of expression Woojin was making as he listened to her.

But she didn’t look.

“Even though we got married without love……”

“Then why didn’t you divorce my brother?”

Woojin suddenly asked in a dry voice.

“If it was really that difficult for you, you could have asked for a divorce first. After all, our parents had already gotten everything they could out of the marriage between the two of you.”

It was a sharp question that struck directly at the heart of the matter.

Caught completely off guard, Su-a fell silent for a moment.

Come to think of it, despite feeling so lonely, she had never considered divorcing him.

If he had asked her for a divorce first, she would have willingly agreed at any time.

But she had never once considered being the one to ask first.

“I suppose you’re right.”

Only after a long while did Su-a answer in a trembling voice.

“Maybe I didn’t want to stab him in the back first, after everything I owed him.”

No.

There had definitely been something more than that.

Something unrefined, undefined, and unsettling.

Some uncomfortable reason that had made it impossible for her to leave him.

But that was all she could say.

“Maybe I was putting off saying the things that were too difficult to say to him.”

Their eyes met belatedly.

A sharp jolt ran through Su-a, as though electricity had passed through her body.

The man staring intently at her wasn’t Woojin.

No matter how many times she denied it, he looked like Hajin again.

Su-a was confused by herself.

Why did her brother-in-law keep looking like her dead husband?

Could it be that the desperate longing still left inside her was making her project Hajin onto Woojin?

Was she deceiving herself simply to keep herself sane?

“I ate well.”

Afraid of how much more pathetic she might look if she stayed any longer, Su-a hurriedly put down her spoon and sprang to her feet.

“Maybe it’s because I’m sick. I keep saying things I normally wouldn’t.”

If she wanted to look at the situation rationally, getting her body healthy again had to come first.

She needed to accept Hajin’s death while she was in good health and acknowledge Woojin’s existence for what it was.

“Thank you for listening to my pointless rambling.”

She hurried out of the dining room as though fleeing.

Behind her, Woojin spoke in a calm voice.

“People……”

Su-a stopped for a moment but didn’t turn around.

“Sometimes, you have to live a little while saying pointless things, too.”

It sounded as though he was bluntly trying to comfort her for blaming herself.

Could that really be true?

If I had sometimes said pointless things to Hajin, would today have been different?

Would I have fewer regrets?

Even though she knew there was no way to go back, it was a day when she desperately wanted to.

Back to before you died.

The next day, Woojin was sitting on the living-room sofa, drinking coffee.

Just as Su-a came out of the bedroom and was about to awkwardly greet him, the doorbell rang.

Su-a absentmindedly checked the person on the other side through the intercom.

The moment she saw the familiar face, all the color drained from her face.

She turned toward Woojin, and he immediately understood the situation and sprang to his feet.

[Mom’s here, Su-a.]

Su-a silently mouthed the words to Woojin.

[I couldn’t get in touch with you properly, and I was so worried.]

Hurry and hide!