When Your Pain Becomes Mine

***

As Gyeonhui left the hospital, his face looked severely distorted.

He struggled with the unbearable pain.

Soon, he felt a stuffy pain in his c.h.e.s.t, and he sat down on a bench beside the road.

"Are you okay?"

"... Don't talk to me."

He answered Ojae's question without hesitation.

Ojae had noticed Gyeonhui's severe condition and started to speak determinedly.

"Let's take a break here."

Ojae led Gyeonhui into a nearby café.

As Gyeonhui sat down, he leaned over the table and grabbed his stomach.

A short time later, Ojae brought a drink and sat across the table.

"I've ordered something warm for you. Take a sip at least."

"What good would happen if I drink it? Take it away."

Gyeonhui swung his finger, having no power to make any loud noise.

Ojae, who was sitting with his mouth closed, looked around.

Ojae's eyes were directed to a space full of young couples, each of them was exchanging their affection.

"... Haa…" Ojae sighed unwittingly.

Even his sigh made Gyeonhui irritated, so he scowled.

As Gyeonhui looked up and tried to say a word, an email arrived on his cell phone.

He wanted to confirm to see if it's an urgent email, but he found out that it was just a dormancy transition guide email sent from a photo storage website.

"What's this…"

"Photogenic?"

"Isn't it a photo storage website that young couples use a lot these days?" Ojae said.

"How do you know about this?"

"How do you think I know? Haa..."

Ojae sighed bitterly.

"Hmm."

Awkwardly coughing, Gyeonhui moved his gaze back to the email.

'Have I ever signed up to this?'

As he shook his head, he remembered the old days that he had forgotten.

'The last thing on your mind is photography. I know you don't want to be photographed, so I'll just upload the pictures to the archive on the site.'

It was a website that he reluctantly signed up for because of her

After a while, he picked his phone up again.

He was curious about these photos that he had never seen before.

He paused for a moment and pressed the access button on the site.

After a brief procedure, he noticed a folder of photos organized by date.

She seemed to have sorted out their anniversary in her own way.

When he inadvertently clicked on the folder, the familiar pictures of places they had been through unfolded.

"Let's look at them together." Ojae moved to the next seat.

"Go away."

Gyeonhui quickly turned his attention to his phone after, ignoring Ojae.

It contained photos of the Hannam-dong café, the scenery of the Han River, two cups of coffee, and pictures of her.

He could see her face smiling brightly for a long time.

"What's so funny…"

He looked uncomfortable, and he dropped the list of folders all the way down. The long folders contained memories of the two of them.

"Wait a minute."

At that time, Ojae, who had seen the pictures from the side, cried out in doubt.

"Why?"

"Wait..."

"Look at this, this."

Ojae pointed to the title of the folder one by one.

The 2nd anniversary, Gyeonhui's birthday, Get together after such a long time, and so on. It showed the name of the folder containing their anniversary.

"What about it?"

"Look at the date and the cycle, not the title!"

"Cycle?"

He picked up his phone again and checked the folder's name.

The second anniversary was on the 25th, and his birthday was on the 27th of the month before. The folder for the 'Get together after such a long time' was on the 26th of the month before.

Most of their anniversary get-together were between 28 and 35-days in cycles, when he reversed the time from the accident since he first began to feel her pain.

"It's all around when she had her period."

When he checked the date, his eyes shook.

Gyeonhui realized that, amid his ridiculous pain, she still took their anniversaries seriously. However, he had no idea that she was in pain.

'We don't know anything about each other. How sick, how sad, and how lonely I am. You don't know anything. So, don't pretend to know everything. I don't want to hear it.'

Her words came to mind.

"... She had loved you for a long time."

Upon hearing Ojae's words, Gyeonhui scowled without saying anything.

"Hah…" Ojae then sighed deeply.

"Why are you sighing?"

Gyeonhui asked in disgust. Ojae then pulled out his phone and shook it.

"Sarah... I haven't received any messages from her. How can she do this to me?"

Ojae shook his head with a bitter expression.

"That's because…"

Gyeonhui was about to say, 'You caught her cheating on you. How can she contact you?' However, Gyeonhui decided not to say anything instead.

'How am I supposed to answer in this situation?'

At one point, his thoughts became conflicted.

"... Oh, that's too bad." After a few rounds of contemplation, Gyeonhui spoke awkwardly. Ojae smiled as he watched Gyeonhui.

"... For what? What else?" Gyeonhui felt so awkward as Ojae asked those words.

"It feels like you've said a sort of comforting thing to me."

"What the hell is 'a sort of'?"

Gyeonhui looked at him, awkwardly, and muttered to himself.

"Hah... When I think about Sarah… Yes. Sarah didn't seem to love me."

"Isn't it too consequential?"

Upon hearing the end of his words, Ojae shook his head slowly.

"I think love is…. It's a sacrifice, but Sarah never liked that."

"Sacrifice? That's such an old fashioned idea."

After listening to Gyeonhui, Ojae paused for a moment before speaking again.

"Most people want to find out what they lack when they're in a relationship. If you don't have enough money, then you want a person with a lot of money; those who have no power would want someone with power. If you haven't gotten enough education, then you would want to be with a highly educated person. Still, that's actually just people taking advantage of each other to fill their own shortcomings."

"What's wrong with that? It's all about using others or being used by them. That's just like between you and me."

Gyeonhui replied, recalling his general theory of life.

When Ojae looked at him without saying anything, Gyeonhui felt uncomfortable and said, "Isn't it true? You are here because I give you money."

"Think back before. From the time we first met." Ojae said.

"... That. Hmm."

When his old memories came to his mind, he turned to himself because he had nothing to say.

"Of course, there are relationsh.i.p.s where you use others while they're using you in return. Maybe most of them do that to each other. However, love doesn't work that way. Love is a determination to sacrifice yourself and make concessions for the one you love." Ojae paused for a moment before continuing. "I once thought about it. What is a mother's instinctive love? If you are a woman, of course, are you obviously born with it, right? Is it something that would only manifest when you become a mother? Why did my mom abandoned me then?"

Gyeonhui was still listening to Ojae's words to listen to his pain.

"But when I thought about the meaning of love again, I realized that it was a decision. I'm going to give everything I have for this child from now on. I'm going to sacrifice myself for you. It's not just innate. It's something even greater. It's the love of a parent."

"... So what are you saying?" Gyeonhui asked.

"Lovers do the same. Without sacrificing for each other, there is only discontent and sadness. They hurt the other to satisfy their own d.e.s.i.r.es, but others would just end up dragging them around."

Upon hearing Ojae's words, Gyeonhui recalled what he had said to Sun.

'Wait. Until I get in touch with you again.'

Her empty eyes upon hearing his words came to his mind, and a bitter sigh came out of his mouth when he recalled her face at that time.

"In the end, Sarah didn't love me. She needed me for a while, but she had no intention of sacrificing for me. She left because she met someone who filled her up more." Ojae nodded bitterly. "... Let's go. There are so many couples here."

Ojae, with a look of contemplation, got up first from his seat.

Gyeonhui remembered the first time he met Sun.

He remembered her smiling as she reached out to him and handed him her hand. She was the first woman who didn't take advantage of him and the first woman he didn't' need to take advantage of in return.

Because of it, he looked at her and loved her.

He unwittingly approached her first, and he reached his hand out to her first.

"Hah…"

But he didn't know why their relationship ended up ruined like this. At some point, something frustrating bothered him, but he didn't know what it was. He didn't know the cause, so he couldn't even solve it.

He clenched his molars with a troubled mind.