TMPW Ch 8 part 2

Her mother suddenly got up. They could hear the sound of a car stopping outside. Her father had come home. It sounded like another guest had arrived as well.

Yuan avoided her mother, who smelled faintly of alcohol, and tried to leave the room. However, her mother shot up and grabbed Yuan’s arm. She had the stubborn grip of a person who wasn’t completely sane.

“Mom!”

Even after hearing Yuan’s irritated voice, her mother still held on and stuffed her into the closet inside the room.

“Mom!”

“Watch and see. See what will unfold. See how I’ve been living up till now! See with your own eyes what the truth is. See what kind of monster Min DaeYup is… I’m begging you. Watch. See what kind of people they are. I’m asking you to see their true colors!”

Bang!

The closet door closed as the room to the bedroom opened. The closet door was a wooden louvered door. This meant that those outside couldn’t see in, but Yuan could clearly see out.

Why was she doing this? Why was she acting like an insane person?! Yuan wanted to yell out, but it was too late.

Yuan was trembling inside the closet. Shocked, she peeked out through the panels of door. For some reason, she felt a heavy dread that made it hard to breathe. Her father wasn’t alone. He was with a familiar man. She had seen this man a few times inside her home.

President Seo…? Why was President Seo inside her mother’s room with her father this late at night?

The men spoke for a bit. They laughed about something. They completely ignored her mother and continued to chat away. Her mother’s blank expression as she watched them looked strange to Yuan.

She couldn’t understand any of this. However, when her father left the room, leaving behind President Seo, Yuan couldn’t breathe.

No.

She heard scary sounds. She recalled all the strange men who visited their house. Their laughs, their glances… She remembered how they had shaken hands with her father.

No!

Yuan collapsed onto the floor.

She needed to leave this closet right away. She needed to leave, but… The bloodcurdling screams, the sound of clothes ripping, the click of a man’s belt unbuckling. The sound of the creaking bed!

No!

Yuan shook her head.

Her tears silently slid down her cheeks.

No, no.

No. No way. How could this… No. This can’t possibly be happening! This is a lie. There’s no way this is true. This is all a lie! Yuan closed her eyes and covered ears as she shook her head. There’s no way! This is all a lie!

She didn’t know how much time had passed by. Creak, the door opened. Her mother blankly stared down at Yuan. Yuan felt as if she was in hell. She couldn’t take it anymore. What happened just now? She couldn’t understand what she had just seen and heard. Yuan hated everything. Her mother, her father, and even herself for being fooled.

“Don’t cry, Min Yuan.”

Her mother spoke coldly as if she had really gone insane.

“If you cry, I’m going to gouge out your eyes.”

Yuan couldn’t believe it.

Yuan glared at her. She didn’t pity her. She didn’t pity her at all. She couldn’t understand why her mother continued to stay here even though she was being treated like this. Why didn’t she just run away? Yuan couldn’t forgive her.

“Dirty.”

With that one word, Yuan shoved her mother away and ran. From that room, from the house, from all these people. She threw it all away and ran barefoot. She didn’t know where she was going. She cried and screamed as she ran off into the night like a lunatic.

Her mother committed suicide.

Someone had seen Yuan running barefoot on the Han River Bridge and called the police. She was sitting in the cold police station, completely frozen, when TaeKyung came to get her. That’s when he told her.

Her mother had died. She had slit her wrists in the bathroom.

“I don’t know what you saw, but you can’t tell anyone, Yuan.”

TaeKyung flatly told her as he draped his suit jacket over her shoulders.

“It’s alright. You don’t know anything. You don’t need to know anything. I’ll do everything. I’ll take care of it all. You just need to stay silent, Yuan. Forget… about what happened to Mother. I’ll deal with it by myself. Forget it, Yuan.”

Forget what? Forget it how? Who are you? Who are you really? What about the words Mom blurted out as she was losing her mind?

Yuan didn’t say anything. No, actually, she couldn’t say anything. Due to shock, Yuan had gone mute and had to undergo treatment for 1 year. The truth had pierced her heart and took her mother and her voice away from her.

It was all because of her. This was all Yuan’s fault. The reason why her mother could no longer stand to live in this world was because of what Yuan had said. Because of what she’d done. Because of what had been done to her. When Yuan had condemned her as ‘dirty’, her mother couldn’t take it anymore.

This was all for Yuan’s sake… She had endured all this for the sake of her daughter… But at Yuan’s one word, her mother collapsed.

“Ugh!”

Hunched over the ground near the cold Han River, Yuan was throwing up all the food she had eaten at President Seo’s house. She couldn’t hold back the nausea that was making her body shake. Just seeing Seo JaeHyuk’s face was hard to endure.

So don’t cry.

Yuan fiercely told herself.

Don’t even look back.

Her vision was getting blurry. Even though she felt like she was going to collapse, Yuan used up all her strength to move further away from JoonHun.

Seo JoonHun is merely Seo JaeHyuk’s son. He is merely the son of that man. The man whose body she wanted to rip to shreds, and even then she wouldn’t be satisfied. The son of a bitch who had broken her mother until she was in that state. JoonHun was the son of that two-faced beast of a man.

JoonHun had seen her as a means to obtain his business contract. Likewise, Yuan had seen him as a means to have her revenge.

She had endured this marriage for two years. Within that time, there were hundreds of lies between them, but one thing remained true.

Seo JoonHun and Min Yuan could never fall in love with each other. They wouldn’t be able to become a real couple in this lifetime. Even if the skies collapsed and the earth shattered, Yuan would never be able to love him. Therefore, JoonHun must never love her. And he must never forgive her.

He could hate and loathe her all he wanted, but he shouldn’t love her.