I Don't Have the Confidence
If this was what it felt like to plunge into the abyss in a single instant—then this was it. And if they married knowing that even pregnancy might prove impossible, he wouldn't welcome that, either.
The rims of her eyes flushed red. She felt as though the walls had closed in on every side, as if she were trapped alone in the dark—a suffocation unlike anything she had felt in her entire life.
Until she had come here, her heart had already been so heavy. Now it was collapsing entirely.
Eun-jae forced her eyes wide, holding the tears at bay.
"What you just said. Did you mean it?"
"...Yes."
She drew a steadying breath and nodded.
"Alright. I understand what you meant, Miss Go Eun-jae."
He answered as if conceding the point. And yet why did that answer—that he understood—cut so unbearably deep?
Had she secretly hoped Mu-yeol would stop her, take hold of her anyway? How pathetic she was.
"I don't think either of us is in the mood for dinner. Let's go. I'll take you home."
"No. I can go on my own—I mean, the driver..."
"Don't make me say it twice. Get up."
He spoke as though pressing something down inside himself, then rose from his seat. Eun-jae had no choice but to stand, and the coat she had never quite managed to put on—left draped over her shoulders—slid to the floor.
"Ah..."
She stared down at it, dazed, and was just bending to reach for it when a large hand picked it up first.
"...!"
The great shadow closed in on her all at once. Eun-jae flinched, shoulders drawing in, and squeezed her eyes shut.
Mu-yeol stood before her and, without a word, settled the coat back over her shoulders. The touch of his hands against her was unexpectedly gentle, and a sharp ache bloomed in one corner of her heart.
"I understand perfectly well what you meant by all of it."
A heavy breath left him. She could hear it, deep and close.
Leaving only those words behind, Mu-yeol turned and walked ahead.
Eun-jae did not speak a single word the entire way to her house. She had nothing left to say, and he offered nothing either. She stared at the rain-washed window. Inside the hushed car, there was only the sound of the rain.
A faint fragrance brushed the tip of her nose. The scent that belonged to Cha Mu-yeol.
She would be leaving this house soon enough. The thought that her days of playing puppet were finally over brought a measure of relief, in its own way. If they had married, she would have had to live at his side wearing a new mask. Perhaps this was the better choice.
It stung that things had gone so wrong with the man she had liked. Still, she turned the thought over and over, telling herself it was for the best.
Before she knew it, his car had slowed to a stop before the front gate of her house.
"I had a comfortable ride, thanks to you. Thank you for bringing me home."
Before getting out, Eun-jae bowed her head toward the driver's seat.
She hesitated a moment, then slowly lifted her gaze to his face. Their eyes met at close range.
His hair, swept neatly back. The forehead it revealed. Sharp-cut eyes, and beneath them irises that seemed to hold far too many feelings at once—all of it filled her vision.
Eun-jae hesitated a little longer, then offered a faint smile.
"Thank you."
It was a greeting that held far more than those two words. At the hospital. Today. And that day before the flood. Today made three times he had given her comfort.
She had been standing alone with no one to lean on, lost and wandering—and at the end of that wandering she had met Cha Mu-yeol. By chance. As if it were fate.
It was pointless to think such things now. Still, she had wanted to thank him, this one last time.
"What could possibly warrant being thanked twice?"
When she thanked him again, Mu-yeol—who had no way of knowing what the greeting truly meant—let a faint smile slip.
"...Just because."
She couldn't explain it piece by piece, so Eun-jae let the words trail off.
He looked at her a moment longer, then got out of the car first. Eun-jae watched him, startled, and was just reaching urgently for the door when—
"Watch your step."
Mu-yeol opened the door himself and held an umbrella over her.
Flustered, Eun-jae looked up at him. He tipped his head, indicating she should get out. She swung her legs from the car and stepped slowly into the shelter of the umbrella he held.
The passenger door shut with a solid thud.
Rain drummed against the broad canopy of the umbrella. The distance between them was uncomfortably close. Eager to put space between them, Eun-jae lifted her own umbrella with her left hand, meaning to open it.
"Ah..."
But one hand was still bound in a cast, and even opening an umbrella was no simple task. Mu-yeol took the umbrella from her hand.
"Hold this a moment."
He spoke the words offhandedly and closed his hand around her small one. Warmth met the cold of her fingers. Eun-jae started at his touch, and before she could say a word he pressed the handle of his own umbrella into her grip.
She clutched the umbrella he had given her and rose onto her toes—trying to hold it over him, tall as he was.
Mu-yeol opened her umbrella for her in a swift motion, then let his gaze sweep over the woman fussing and straining in front of him.
"It's just... your clothes are getting soaked."
His frank stare was embarrassing enough that Eun-jae found herself making excuses. Though it wasn't really an excuse—it was the truth. In covering her, one of his shoulders had already grown wet.
He was so much taller that even on her toes she had to stretch her arm high just to get the umbrella over his head. She was lifting it a little higher when—
"Ah!"
Her body, in heels, lurched.
"...!"
Mu-yeol, who had been watching her in silence, caught her around the waist with one arm and drew her in as easily as if she weighed nothing. Eun-jae's eyes flew wide.
"That's why I told you to be careful not to fall."
With his other hand he closed over hers where she gripped the umbrella handle. Her eyes widened further still. Even in the dark, the fluster written across her face was plain to see.
How could anyone be so incapable of hiding what they felt? Eun-jae squirmed, trying to free the hand he held, but his grip was firm and she could not move an inch.
She glanced sideways. Because he had tilted the umbrella to cover her, rain was soaking into his shoulder.
"You're really getting drenched..."
"Stop worrying about my clothes."
Mu-yeol answered as if it were nothing. Then he looked steadily into her eyes and spoke.
"Take care of your treatment. Go to rehab without fail. Don't skip it just because it's a hassle."
He flicked a look at her, as if to ask whether she understood.
"You need to answer me."
When she still said nothing, he asked again, his voice low and gentle, making certain. Eun-jae gazed at him as if spellbound—at this man speaking so close she could feel his breath—and nodded before she knew what she was doing.
"Yes."
Only then did he set her down from his arms, take back his own umbrella, and hold hers out to her.
"Go inside."
Leaving only that, Mu-yeol climbed into the driver's seat. A moment later his car pulled away, fast. Eun-jae stood watching the receding shape of it.
Even after it had vanished from sight, she could not bring herself to leave that spot for a long time.
Just as she'd expected. The moment Eun-jae entered her room, she heard footsteps running toward her from a distance. With a weary face she shrugged off her coat and tossed it roughly over a chair.
"So? How did it go? You said no, right? You turned him down properly?"
Hye-ri burst in without knocking and demanded answers at once.
As if the only way it would count—the only way it would become hers—was if the refusal came from Eun-jae's own mouth. The thought of that mother and daughter sending her to the matchmaking meeting just so she could reject him herself made her skin crawl.
"Yeah."
"You mean it. If you're lying, I won't let it go."
Eun-jae looked quietly at Hye-ri, who was carrying on in front of her. Under that silent gaze, Hye-ri's expression flickered with unease.
"What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
"You got what you wanted. So could you leave now?"
"Oh, please. I was going to leave anyway. You think I want to be in here? Unbelievable."
She hadn't used to show this much of her true nature, had she? The way Hye-ri had done a complete about-face over a single matchmaking meeting with Cha Mu-yeol was almost laughable.
"Still, unnie, the only reason you even got a match with Cha Mu-yeol is because you were adopted into this house. Imagine if you'd stayed in that orphanage. Not a chance in hell. As if an orphan has any business going on a matchmaking date with the CEO of Chayeong Department Store."
Hye-ri poured out the vicious words without a shred of restraint. Eun-jae watched her sister's scathing face and did not respond at all, as if Hye-ri weren't even there. Reacting would only make her rage like a madwoman.
Eun-jae let out a thin breath. Her arm still hadn't fully healed, and pain lanced through it now and then. Each time that sharp ache swept through, it was intense enough that her face twisted of its own accord.
Going to a matchmaking meeting with one arm in a cast, holding an umbrella. It had clearly been too much. Exhaustion rolled over her in waves.
"Anyway. Looks like you're finally figuring out your place. It's not like you're a pianist anymore, so whatever."
At the remark that crossed every line, Eun-jae let out a hollow laugh. When she stared without a word, Hye-ri flinched, tossed out a few more words, and fled the room.
Eun-jae let out a long breath. Without even changing out of her clothes, she lifted the blanket and lay down on the bed. Even the short walk in through the garden had let the cold seep into her bones, and her body shivered with a deep, creeping chill.