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Chapter 10

People used to say that there is no one that is unable to survive one year of a marriage test. It means that however difficult it may be, as long as the time is short, it is possible to push through it. I’d like to meet the person who uttered those words. I cursed the person who spoke so easily of it. I had only endured a month of it and I’ve already become ragged. I told this to Lee JiKyung over the phone.

"Even this one month is killing me, how do you expect me to do this for a year? I’ll never last a whole year. It’s just a relief that it’s only for two months."

I was alone, other than the taxi driver. It had been the first time in a long time that I was able to speak my mind truthfully to JiKyung. A conversation that I could never utter in front of Lee JiHan.

"I feel like a prisoner with a month left of sentence before freedom. I put x’s on the calendar counting down the days until you return."

[Why did you choose to accept this useless challenge. You didn’t have to.]

"Who would have known it would be this bad? This is worse than the army! I have to wake up whenever he blows that whistle. There’s dust there, there’s a mosquito there. He nit-picks at everything and forces me to work all day! I’m starting to hear the whistle everywhere I go! I clean the house three times a day. Morning, afternoon, and night. Does this make sense? And yesterday...!"

[Yesterday?]

"He took out all your shirts and lined up the crooked buttons. He then told me to get rid of the dust between the button holes! Wow, seriously! Do you know how many shirts you have?! And if there is dust, how much possible dust could be on it! I wrapped a needle in a tissue and cleaned each button hole one by one. My hands are sore and my vision is all blurry now."

[Why do you bother doing all of that. Should I tell him off?]

"What, no! You can’t, you know nothing about this situation all right? If you act like you know, I’ll never get approval from your brother."

[You don’t have to get his approval? We can get married, no problem, without his approval.]

"No, I want to get it. I want to."

I remembered this time one month ago, where Lee JiHan’s tears had made me weak.

"The fact that you’re gay, I’m a fake, and we’re hiding everything and lying to get married is bad enough. I want to at least be a sister-in-law your brother accepts. That way, I can be at least a little bit okay with the situation as I walk down the aisle."

[Well...That will make it easier on me too. If you can make that happen, I will be thankful...but don’t overwork yourself.]

"What if I overwork myself a little? I only have a month left. If I do everything he asks of me, he will realize my efforts and change his mind. And its a $500,000 marriage, I can handle this much. Hey, if you go out into work life you get paid $50 and get stuck doing even worse things. For $500,000, it’s actually not that bad."

[Ok. But if you ever feel that you can’t handle it, let me know.]

"Okay. Oh, but there is one good thing that came out of it"

[What?]

"Eating the food your brother makes. Hey, your brother is such a good cook. Although he does flatter himself a lot, ‘I bet you’ve never tasted anything like this before?’ air. Anyways for the last month, Lee JiHan has been making me 3 meals a day from scratch. And I, like a farmhand hungry for a good meal after a hard day’s work, am devouring it graciously."

[His childhood dream was to be a chef. When he was young anyways. Just for a little while.]

"Looks like he definitely would have been great at it!"

[If you say that in front of my mother, she will throw you out.]

"What, why?"

[Our mother believes that her children have to continue the company’s legacy. She may be lenient on other aspects of life but on this, she won’t back down. So JiHan got rid of those thoughts a long time ago.]

"Oh...is that why? That must be why he ran away when I complimented his cooking. I thought he just didn’t like me complimenting him."

[You didn’t kiss up to him too obviously did you?]

"I wasn’t kissing up, that was real. I was afraid he would think that also so I tried to tone it down but it’s not easy for me. His food makes you lose your mind a little. It’s so good that my mouth blurts out compliments before my brain can stop it." Giving up his dream to be a chef because of his family fortune. He must have run away because my reactions reminded him of that time. My darn mouth. Why can’t you just stay quiet!

I chewed my bottom lip hard to teach it a lesson. The taxi arrived at its destination on college street. I checked to see if it was the place I recognized and told the driver to let me off here.

I took out my card from my wallet and handed it to him. The card transaction ended quickly.

[You said you were going to meet up with your theatre friends? Who are you meeting?]

"HeeKyung, JinShil..."

As I collected my card and answered JiKyung’s question, I frowned as a sudden realization hit me.

"You’re asking me this to see if DaeChul sunbae is coming, aren’t you?" I asked intuitively while leaving the taxi. "You’re wondering if sunbae will be coming out or not."

[Well obviously.] JiKyung replied calmly as if saying there was nothing to hide.

"Hey, do you take me for an idiot? You think I’m going to give the ex boyfriend of my future husband a wedding invitation?"

Lim DaeChul. My theatre’s senior alumnus and JiKyung’s ex boyfriend. Thinking of him made my blood boil.

"You have such low standards. What did you like about that pathetic con artist?"

Lim DaeChul was the reason I was able to make contact with Lee JiKyung after ten years. If JiKyung had not come to the theatre show to see that guy, we would probably have never met. I ended up seeing their public displays of affection. Remembering my friend of 10 years and my theatre senior secretly fooling around made me shudder.

I want to buy eyes that did not see that, for real.

[You’re thinking about that time again aren’t you?]

"Which time? The theatre bathroom, backstage, midnight practice room, or college bar rooftop? Which one?"

[You sure saw a lot.]

I had later confessed to JiKyung the fact that I knew about their relationship. As a favor, I requested that they please check their surroundings before doing all that stuff. Especially to make sure I was not there. The Lee JiKyung back then had asked me to keep their relationship under wraps, fearful it would make DaeChul uncomfortable. He asked me to keep my knowledge of them a secret even from DaeChul sunbae.

Of course I kept his secret, so DaeChul sunbae still doesn’t know that I ever knew about their relationship. I haven’t told anyone in the world about it, but that was only for my innocent friend Lee JiKyung. It was not for Lim DaeChul. Ah, that annoying con artist.

"Anyways don’t worry, that sunbae hasn’t been to the theatre for a long time, and all the theatre people have lost contact with him. I will not have to give him our wedding invitation and he will not show up at our wedding, never!"

After assuring JiKyung, we hung up and I went into the cafe where I had promised to meet my theatre friends. At the cafe entrance stood an unexpected figure.

"Wha... What are you doing here?" I asked Lee JiHan, surprised at his presence.

He was standing at the entrance with his arms crossed, as if he had been waiting for me.

"There is a saying that if you look at a person’s friends, you can tell how that person really is." JiHan said to a flustered me.

"So?"

"So I came to see your friends."

"Then...you should have told me when I left!"

"Why? So you can tell your friends what to say? I came here without telling you on purpose."

No wonder he asked me about the details of the meeting place.

"Well...if you must..." I said, displeased. Lee JiHan walked past me, opened the door, and stepped inside the cafe.

***

I handed out my wedding invitations to the three friends sitting opposite me. Nervous, I kept stealing glances at Lee JiHan who sat next to me. As always, Lee JiHan sat with his mouth tightly closed and watched us. He was civil, even at my introduction of him as my future brother-in-law, so I assumed he would just sit there and watch us quietly for the rest of the night.

If that’s the case, I would be so grateful. I stole glances at Lee JiHan from time to time.

"AhJung, your fiance is the guy that came to the theatre a long time ago, right?" JiSun opened up the dialogue from across the table and HeeKyung joined in.

"That’s right! He was friends with DaeChul sunbae and was glad to see you when he visited. Didn’t you say it had been a long time since your reunion?"

"So you started dating at that time?" my other friend piped up.

Because the 3 girls sitting opposite me took turns shooting questions, I started to feel frazzled.

"Not, not since then. Well...we were just continuing to keep in touch..." I began.

"Wow, then you are getting married thanks to DaeChul sunbae?"

"Oh yea. That sunbae is your matchmaker. I guess even that kind of scum can help another being out. Go figure."

" If it wasn’t for that sunbae, how could you have possibly met such a husband?"

I laughed awkwardly at the three women’s words.

At that moment, unexpectedly, Lee JiHan spoke up. "I’m curious about that DaeChul sunbae." Lee JiHan pounded the table with his fist. Then he turned his head, locked eyes with me and said, "I really hope to meet him someday."

I could feel his negative energy emanating from his chilling eyes.

"If it wasn’t for that guy...." To cover Lee JiHan’s voice, I hurriedly changed the subject.

"Uh, but JiKyung broke up...I mean doesn’t like that sunbae so he doesn’t want him to know about us getting married."

I had almost made a mistake because I was so flustered. Luckily, the three girls and Lee JiHan alike hadn’t paid attention to the slip up. I mean, who would suspect that the future groom whose name is stamped on a wedding invitation would be gay?

"Don’t worry about that. Even if you told us to tell him, we don’t want to contact him." At HeeKyung’s words, I was able to relax. I already knew this about them, but to hear it an additional time gave me a sense of relief.

I had forgotten that nothing in my life worked out that easily.

"Hey! Who do we have here?" I turned around at the voice from behind. And there he was, Lim DaeChul. "Isn’t it our blue theatre members?"

Lim DaeChul approached us with a smiling face and his arms spread wide.

"Sun.. Sunbae, I thought you went to England....." I muttered.

"I’m back for a little while. What a coincidence meeting you all here! What an interesting turn of events." Lim DaeChul wrapped his thick arms around my shoulders. "What are the chances!"

Why of all places would we meet him here. Why! In front of him! I broke into a sweat and stole glances at Lee JiHan. Lee JiHan suspiciously glared at Lim DaeChul’s hand on my shoulder. I quickly pushed Lim DaeChul off and spoke as if nothing was wrong.

"Ah, This is Lim DaeChul. Our theatre sunbae....

"Well, hello? I’m Lim DaeChul." Lim DaeChul greeted Lee JiHan with a bow. Then he questioned me. "But, who is this?"

"Ah, he’s...just someone I know."

"Just someone you know?" Lee JiHan interrupted, thinking something was off. I desperately pleaded with my eyes and begged him to not get involved.

"I haven’t known you for that long. I’ve known you about a month? So you don’t really have to greet each other."

Lee JiHan rolled his eyes in disbelief.

"It was nice to see you, sunbae. But I’m a bit busy right now. I have to leave right away. Um, it was nice to see you, good, good bye then."

"What’s up with you?" Lee JiHan asked, glaring at me.

"Oh, come on! Just come out!" Feeling rushed, I slapped at Lee JiHan’s arm. He gave me a ‘fierce look and stared me down.

Then, Lim DaeChul’s voice rang out. "Hey, isn’t this a wedding invitation? Who’s getting married?"

Turning my head, I saw Lim DaeChul’s hands reach for the wedding invitation in front of HeeKyung.

"Ah!" I quickly threw myself and grabbed the wedding invitation first.

While I was at it, I collected the other 2 invitations and hid them behind my back. Lim DaeChul looked at me incredulously.

"What the... Na AhJung, what’s wrong with you?"

"Uh, the wedding, wedding invitation came out wrong. I have to re, reprint it. I’ll give it to you next time you guys." I barely got the words out through my panic.

Frazzled, I waved at my three friends, and pulled at Lee JiHan’s arm. But Lee JiHan didn’t get up.

"Really, why are you acting like this?" he glared.

"Let’s go! We need to leave! Come on let’s go?!" In a state of panic, I pinched his side.

"Ow!" Lee JiHan crinkled his face and stood up. Not missing my chance, I grabbed his arm and headed for the door.