The Unexpected Call at Dawn
That was when the accident happened to the head of the division.
……
“Mr. Jeong Seonwu, did you say you would become my wife? The first call I received after the accident came from you.”
Perhaps today’s afternoon had been the reason why this woman felt a chill run down her spine—his words about “my people.”
That was why she kept talking to him without an answer.
Shin Jaye had assumed Seonwu would never reply. But her guess proved completely off the mark.
“The most recent number in the call log was yours.”
“Did Chairman know my number?”
“Would I not know my wife’s number?”
Shin Jaye knew Seonwu’s phone number, yet she had never once called him.
She was cautious about unnecessary calls that would bother him, and she never created situations where his help as a guardian was needed.
In contrast, though Shin Jaye existed for Seonwu, she was nothing but an unnecessary existence, so he naturally would not know her number.
“Really? You really knew it?”
Shin Jaye pushed herself up from the bed and leaned toward Seonwu.
She knew it was rude to disturb a sleeping person, but she wondered if his words were true.
“What do you mean the most recent call log had me?”
Perhaps, at the time of the accident, he had wanted to hear her voice.
Shin Jaye knew it was absurd and pointless, yet she still harbored foolish hopes.
“Not sleeping?”
Seonwu frowned and looked at her, but Shin Jaye remained motionless while gazing at his face.
“I’m curious.”
Seonwu sighed briefly, then sat up from the bed and picked up the phone from the nightstand.
On his phone, Shin Jaye’s number was saved under the title “Wife.”
“Look. It’s my number, right?”
“Really? Then you really called me back then?”
“Yeah.”
Seonwu gave a short reply and lay back down on the bed.
It seemed he had just woken, but Shin Jaye could not let it go because she was curious why he had called and what he had wanted to say.
“When? I have no missed calls from the Chairman’s number. Why did you call?”
“You weren’t sleeping?”
Shin Jaye knew her husband was looking at her irritably, but she threw a tantrum unlike her usual self.
“I’m curious. Why did you call?”
“That morning I saw you walking to the bus stop and followed you while calling.”
“Ah…….”
Seonwu was talking about the time she took his car to school.
“I tried to tell you to get in the car over the phone, but the driver honked the horn. You turned around and hung up right away.”
Probably because he had cut the call before the ringing tone even started, so there were no missed calls on Shin Jaye’s phone.
“I see.”
“Now I can sleep, right?”
“But, Chairman.”
Shin Jaye grabbed his shoulder again.
“What now? You’re getting annoying.”
Seonwu answered with obvious irritation yet turned back toward her.
The two lay facing each other on the bed.
“That day I heard the Chairman’s accident news and rushed over, but the moment I arrived at the hospital you threw me out like I was a stranger. It was really too much. It’s just a dermatology treatment; I could have gotten it the next day.”
“I know. It’s something you could have done the next day.”
“No, Chairman treated me like a stranger and told me to leave.”
Shin Jaye had never clung to her husband and talked this long before, but perhaps because of his recent actions in her favor, her heart was swelling with emotion and she could no longer hold back.
“You didn’t know, so you threw me out at the hospital. You have no idea how heartbroken I was then.”
“You’re the one who only knows one thing and doesn’t know two.”
Seonwu reached out and gently covered Shin Jaye’s eyelids with his fingers.
“!”
The gesture was meant to make her close her eyes, yet the soap scent that rose from his hand was so pleasant it caused her heartbeat to race as a side effect.
“What single thing do I know and not the other?”
“If I had been there, my mother would have tried to eat you alive.”
“Ah…… So you were the one who stood by my side?”
Seonwu turned away without answering and pulled the blanket over them both.
“Tired. Sleep.”
“Chairman.”
Shin Jaye tried to speak again, but Seonwu raised his hand to stop her.
“You sleep too. I’m closing my eyes.”
“Yes…….”
Seonwu fell asleep within five minutes of turning over, his breathing even and regular.
Shin Jaye could not turn away for fear he would wake, so she quietly memorized his back.
Three years as a married couple, and after two more months they would divorce. From then on she would be alone for life.
In common parlance, the CEO of Samjeong Group was a man the president could not easily meet.
Under those circumstances, she, an ordinary civilian, would never see the heir of Samjeong Group again.
After they divorced they would never meet again…….
“Chairman, why did you marry me?”
That was why she asked the sleeping man his back.
Seonwu was a man who despised superstition. Yet he had eventually dropped that belief and accepted her as his wife.
“You hate shamans so much. Besides, I’m the daughter of a shaman. I could have refused until the end……”
She had not asked with any special hope.
They were as far apart as heaven and earth; they could never be together.
She only wondered why he had chosen this path.
“You know, Chairman. Still, even though it was only for a short time, becoming your wife was a great fortune. Chairman changed my life.”
Shin Jaye watched Seonwu’s chest rise and fall in a regular rhythm, then closed her eyes.
“Sleep well.”
After a few more minutes of tossing and turning, she fell asleep.
***
When soft, steady breathing began from Shin Jaye’s side, Seonwu opened his eyes and stared into the darkness of the room.
Shin Jaye’s question had been bothersome, so he had pretended to sleep, but he had never found sharing a bed with anyone else easy either.
Since he had not slept, Seonwu had heard every single word Shin Jaye said.
She had thought she was talking only to herself and believed he could not hear, yet everything she said reached him.
“Chairman, why did you marry me? You hate shamans so much. Besides, I’m the daughter of a shaman. I could have refused until the end……”
Shin Jaye was right—Talismans and the like were nonsense; he could have rejected them outright. If he had, Ji Okhyeon would have given up too.
But Seonwu had accepted that ridiculous plan and taken Shin Jaye as a contract wife.
It was out of pity.
Two years and eleven months ago, an innocent-faced Shin Jaye had begged him to take her as his wife.
In the mountain hermitage during the coldest day of that winter. She wore a faded red sweater that had been unpicked and resewn several times, her cheeks bright red with cold as she said,
“Please…… Let me get out of here.”
Seonwu’s gaze landed on her outstretched white hand.
Her hand was so pale the veins were visible and so thin it was heartbreaking. He could not refuse to touch it.
Seonwu, pretending to sleep, turned toward her.
Gazing at Shin Jaye with her eyes closed, he suddenly remembered the day two years and eleven months ago when he first met her.
***
In the Seonwu family line, long-lived individuals were extremely rare. Seonwu’s grandfather never reached fifty before dying, and Seonwu’s father left this world at barely sixty.
Seonwu’s grandfather died in an era of underdeveloped medicine, but President Jeong Geuncheol’s sudden death brought a considerable shock to Samjeong Group.
At the time of his father’s death, Seonwu was only nineteen years old.
Ten years after his father’s passing, when Seonwu turned twenty-nine, his mother called him and sat him down to speak about his husband’s death.
“There is a famous seonbi in Naju. She told me fifteen years ago that your father would struggle to overcome the three disasters on his sixtieth birthday.”
At the mention of a shaman, Seonwu sighed.
After his father’s death, his mother traveled around the eight provinces of the country looking for a shaman renowned for her abilities and prayed for the safety of the remaining family members.
Relatives joined in, performing rituals to check for good or bad fortune, and the annual cost reached hundreds of millions of won.
“If I had listened to the Naju seonbi back then, I could have stopped your father from leaving this world…… But listen, Seonwu.”
“If you’re telling me to go to the ritual hall, I’ll get up right now.”
Seonwu tried to rise, but Ji Okhyeon hurriedly grabbed him.
“This time, listen to what I say.”
“……”
“I found the shaman’s daughter of Naju. The shaman’s daughter lives in seclusion in the mountains, gathering divine spirits, and her power is said to be beyond words.”
“What does finding the shaman’s daughter have to do with me?”
“Starting this year, you will be the third disaster.”
Up until then, Seonwu had not even known he was the third disaster.
He had never imagined his life would change so drastically because of the three disasters.
“Let’s go see my mother and the shaman’s daughter of Naju.”
“If you’re saying we should go to the ritual hall, I’ll get up. I’ll take my leave now.”
Seonwu had attended the ritual hall only once, for his father’s peaceful afterlife.
What he saw there was a shaman clinging to his father’s spirit and wailing, and every time, his mother and relatives handing over envelopes.
Disgusted by the sight, Seonwu never went to the ritual hall again.
“Seonwu, listen to what I say.”
“Mother, please stop……”
“I cannot live without you. How did I give birth to you…… In our family, whenever a child is born with bad fortune, the baby dies in the womb. I performed three years of rites to receive you.”
Seonwu tried to cut off the words about going to the ritual hall, but Ji Okhyeon, tears in her eyes, stood her ground.
“Your father could not overcome the three disasters either. If you do as well, I cannot live. Just this one time, listen to my words, and I promise I will never say we should go to the ritual hall again.”
Among people who believed in folk beliefs, the fear inspired by the three disasters was immense.
On top of that, she never yielded when it came to her son, so Seonwu knew that by now no excuse would work.
A few days later, Seonwu went to see the shaman’s daughter of Naju with his mother.