Chapter 18  

When I followed Lee JiHan to the kitchen, I found the table set with two bottles of wine and two glasses. In addition, there was a bowl filled with fruit and cheese.

“It’s the first day at my house, so in the spirit of welcoming you, I thought we could talk and celebrate with a drink.”

Lee JiHan pulled out the chair for me, then went to sit at the opposite side. Now what is he up to...I sat down nervously with my guard up, when JiHan’s phone rang. I glanced at the phone and saw that it was JiKyung. JiHan checked the screen, but when he realized it was JiKyung, he looked disturbed then turned off the phone.

“Why aren’t you answering?” I asked, seeing this unexpected action.

“It’s nothing,” he answered apathetically. “Let’s just drink some wine.” JiHan opened the wine bottle.

“It looked like it was a call from JiKyung...”

The moment I pointed that out, Lee JiHan stopped for a moment, but soon went back to pouring the wine into my glass.

“I don’t have anything to say to my brother right now.”

“What does that mean?”

While I sat confused, JiHan started to pour himself some wine.

“Right now, I need to talk to you,” he said forcefully. “Right now, I need to deal with you.”

It sounded as if I was a criminal needing to be dealt with. I balled up my fists and placed them on my lap, waiting for the worst.

“Here, cheers.” JiHan calmly lifted his glass toward mine, but I was unable to place my hand on the glass.

What if he put something in the glass? What if there was something mixed in with the wine? With my suspicions on high alert, I regarded the glass warily. JiHan looked a bit hurt by my reaction.

“Why aren’t you lifting your glass?” he asked. “My hand is getting embarrassed.”

“Oh, I...” I turned my head and looked Lee JiHan in the eye.

He put his glass closer to mine. His insistence on toasting our glasses together made me sweat. Why is he so adamant? Did he really put something in there? My ever-increasing suspicions encouraged me to think outside the box.

“I...I’ll drink that one.” I grabbed at the wine glass that Lee JiHan was holding, and handed mine to him. “Your’s just looks tastier.”

JiHan thought through my excuse, but in the end his nodded. “Do as you wish.”

He lifted my wine glass without a second thought, and with it, he again he waited to clink glasses. I was comforted by this action and slightly touched my glass with his. JiHan turned his head slightly and took a sip of wine, but all I did was watch him. I wanted to know if there was anything wrong with the wine he gave me. I will watch him until the very end.

JiHan sipped his wine and glanced slightly in my direction. Then, squeezing his eyes shut, he gulped down the rest of it in one shot. Thinking this action strange, I continued to watch him. When he put down his glass, he asked me a question.

“This proves it, right? That I didn’t tamper with your drink.”

I was lost for words at his keen observation.

“Now that you know it’s safe, you can drink without worrying,” he said softly.

He then went to pour the wine into his empty glass. Seeing that there was no imminent danger, I decided to trust him. But...Lee JiHan might have anticipated I switch the wine glass with him.

I glared at my original glass, trying to figure out if I should call his bluff. Suspicion feeding on suspicion, I rode the mobius strip of my doubt until it made me dizzy. Even though I hadn’t drunk a single drop of alcohol, I still felt drunk from how much my head was spinning.

Even so, I persisted. JiHan suddenly swooped in and took my glass.

“Seriously.” JiHan clicked his tongue and drank out of the glass.

*Gulp, gulp.* He swallowed all its contents. As if to prove a point, he emptied both glasses without a drop left in either.

“There. Now we’ve confirmed this one also.” JiHan flipped the glass over and showed me, then he put it back down on the table. “I didn’t put anything weird in either of the glasses. Would you stop suspecting me and just drink.”

He poured more of the wine from the bottle.

“I think it’s time now for you to trust me and drink,” he said and handed me a half-full glass.

Cleared of all suspicions, I accepted the glass as he filled his own. With forced smiles, we toasted, and I swallowed the tiniest of drops. JiHan opened his mouth to speak as he saw this.

“I want to hear this directly from you.”

“Hear what?”

“My brother, what do you like about him?”

“Huh?”

“Well, there are different kinds of love, and I want to know what kind of love you two have. How did you start dating my brother, and why did you decide to marry him?”

Not feeling badgered at all, I answered him as casually as he had asked. Finally! The time had come for me to tell the fabricated love story between Lee JiKyung and myself. Knowing that I would eventually have to tell such a story, I calmly, without getting frazzled, unraveled the scenario I had concocted in my head. I began to recite my story.

“JiKyung and I have been friends since we were very young. When I was in middle school, my father was running away from loan collectors, and so we had to move out to the countryside. I lost contact with JiKyung.”

Up to this point, it was the truth, so it was easy to continue on.

“But four years ago, I got a lead part for the first time in my life. It was the first day of the show.”

This too, was truth. Remembering that time, I folded my hands together and smiled. The play had failed miserably, and as a consequence, I hadn’t been paid a dime, but still, that was the happiest moment of my life.

“JiKyung had come to see the play and recognized me.”

Lost in my fantasy, I became drawn to the fiction I was writing.

“From that day, JiKyung came to see the play every day for a month. The play only lasted for a month, so he had seen every single show.”

Although in actuality, JiKyung had come to see Lim DaeChul. But that play was my play also. Imagining that Lee JiKyung had really come to see me, I erased Lim DaeChul from my mind.

“And every time he came, he brought me flowers.”

This was just my hope.

“He told me he was enchanted by my acting, that he was a fan. He came to support me every day.”

If there really had been a person like that, I would have immediately proposed. However hard I tried, the person who would make my story a reality had never shown up. Only in my dreams, and my fake story, did this person exist.

“That’s why I like him. Back then, I really needed someone to tell me that I could keep going on this path. That it wasn’t too late. That everything was going to work out.

No, JiKyung had never said those things to me before. In middle school, thanks to my height and babyface, I never got a chance to play a mature role. However much I practiced my expression or my annunciation, the roles I was given were limited. I was always pushed to play an adolescent for the sole reason that I didn’t look right for any other parts. As I grew older, my options became even more limited. The parts I played never lined up with my actual age.

The only reason I was able to get the lead in DaeChul sunbae’s play was because the main character was a ten-year-old girl. At 19, this was probably my last chance at procuring a female lead in a play, and I’d had no choice but to accept this fact.

Of course, at one point, I had hoped that if this play did well, my life would improve, but the play’s reviews were abysmal. That’s my life. Just the fact that I’d had an opportunity to hope was something. Feeling a pang of sadness at this memory, I quickly turned my head away from JiHan and swallowed the wine. I gulped it down with my eyes closed, and with my thirst fully quenched, I readjusted my expression and returned to the story.

“I started to like him from that point. And I realized that this was in fact, love.”

JiHan was frowning at my love story. My beautifully woven story which had been fabricated with a mix of my hopes and dreams. He didn’t just look like he disliked the story, but he actually looked like it was causing him physical pain listening to it.

Well, I’m sure hearing the lovey-dovey story of someone else’s relationship is not something most people find pleasurable. Plus, this was about his brother. If he liked hearing it, that wouldn’t be JiHan.

Not paying much attention to Lee JiHan’s expression, I drank the remainder of my wine. Whether it was emotions or because it was expensive, the wine tasted sweet. I wondered how any wine could be this sweet and revelled in its deliciousness. I put my lips on the glass and took a long sip.

“So you’re saying, my brother seduced you first.” His serious voice almost made me do a spit take.

“So he planned it all along...” JiHan muttered deep in thought.

“Excuse me? What did you say?” I asked.

JiHan shook his head at my question, and looking heavily disturbed, he frowned with his arms crossed.

“So in conclusion, your love for my brother started because he was a person who could give you encouragement and recognition.”

“I guess...if you really have to put your finger on it, then probably.”

“Then you should have just become the president of his fan club, there’s no need to marry him,” JiHan reprimanded.

“Oh, you know. There’s no man on earth like JiKyung. He’s good-looking, sweet, talented...” I counted JiKyung’s positives on my fingers.

JiHan burst out, “I want to take them off.”

“What?!”

Unlike the flabbergasted me, JiHan responded in a calm and unemotional manner.

“Those rose-colored glasses.”

“Oh...”

Whew, I dodged a bullet there. Calming myself down, I gulped down the wine. Although, I would’ve drunk it even if I didn’t need to settle my nerves.

“My brother, on first glance, may look like the best husband material, but in reality, he’s not a good partner for marriage,” JiHan confessed as I downed my wine.

He had acted like his brother was some good looking Yoo Jae-Suk who was perfect in every way up until this point, but now he seemed to be bent on trying to persuade me of his faults. I stared at Lee JiHan, feeling something was off and untrustworthy, but he took the empty glass from my hand and poured me a new glass of wine.

“There are a lot of people who regret it after they get married,” he continued.

“I know. There are a lot of people like that,” I said.

“Don’t end up like one of those people and let’s give this up, this wedding,” JiHan said and handed me the half-filled wine glass.

“I lived for many years watching a mother who severely regretted getting married. From the time my mother got divorced when I was in elementary school, to the time of her death, I watched her live in regret. I learned plenty from that experience. You should not go into marriage thinking, ‘I will live happily ever after with this person.'”

Thinking of my mother made me crave alcohol even more.

“Then what should you be thinking going into marriage?” asked JiHan.

*Gulp.* I swallowed the rest of the wine and made eye-contact with him as I explained my logic.

“If I do end up divorcing this person, then I won’t have regrets.”

It was the truth. I didn’t believe there was a man that could forever and always be faithful and loving to his wife. There may be a man that loves many women, including his wife, but there was no man in my books that could, from beginning to end, love one woman.

My version of marriage always carried the real possibility of divorce. In truth, I wanted to marry a man that even in divorce, I would not regret. Someone who I would dream of being the wife of, even if it was just for one day. I wanted to marry someone I loved that much. That was my real fantasy of a marriage, but with my luck, that kind of man did not exist.

However, there was a man I could choose that I would not regret divorcing for a completely different reason.

“JiKyung is that kind of person to me. Even if we were to get divorced, I would have no regrets.”

My eyes filled with tears as I looked at JiHan and made a heart over my head. Yes, if JiKyung was my husband, I would have no regrets. I would have my money from the contract and pay. With that money, I could build a theater like I have always wanted. Why would I regret this marriage? Even in divorce, I’ll have no pain and a lot of money.

Lee JiHan breathed out deeply as if his insides were on fire and finished the wine in one go. Staring at the heart above my head, he glared at me.

“I really don’t like looking at that, so could you put down your hand,” he warned.

“Stop trying to scare me,” I said, but I lowered my arms and pulled the wine towards me.

JiHan grabbed my wrist to stop me. “If you pour wine like that, it won’t taste right.”

With one hand holding my wrist and the other taking the bottle from me, he poured the wine into my empty glass. Now that I was paying attention, I realized that JiHan was slightly twisting the bottle as he poured it.

“Oh...you look like some sort of expert.”

“Anyways, don’t be so naive. I’m not trying to scare you, I’m just trying to give you some advice. Some real-life advice. For your sake,” JiHan said sharply while handing me back my glass.

I received the glass with two hands and chugged it. I placed the empty glass back on the table. I smiled, languishing in the sweet buzz I was enjoying.

“I’m not naive. I’ve known JiKyung for ages. There isn’t anything left to know.”

“You may believe you know, but what you see is not necessarily all there is,” JiHan insisted.

“You’re trying to scare me off again!” My voice came out louder than I expected.

I pushed the empty glass toward JiHan again. “Stop trying to scare me, and just give me some more alcohol.”

He looked deeply troubled as he poured me another glass. A few moments later, JiHan replied back in a voice as troubled as his expression.

“I am just asking this as a precaution, but have you slept with my brother?”