When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was a faint line of light seeping through. Slowly, I blinked open and shut my lids, focusing my blurry sight. The sheets, rustling softly as they clung to my skin, carried an unfamiliar scent. I traced back my memory, where was this place?
My body creaked like all its joints were worn down, but I barely managed to lift myself up. Sitting precariously on the edge of the bed, I gathered enough strength to take a step, when I suddenly noticed my bare legs. My gaze followed the shaft of light spilling in through a gap in the blackout curtains. Clothes were scattered across the floor, strewn everywhere. The path to the bed was laid bare in the trail of discarded pieces. The fragments littering the floor spoke for the intensity of how we got to the bed last night. The sight was too raw and overwhelming, so I squeezed my eyes shut.
Where had things gone wrong?
We’d finished the full course dining, right down to dessert. We’d emptied a whole bottle of alcohol. We’d been on our way home, satisfied, in good spirits. When the chauffeur’s car stopped and he told me to get out, I’d just thought it felt a little earlier than usual to be back home.
But what met my eyes outside wasn’t the familiar grandiose home, but an imposing strangeness. Before I could even falter or glance around, he had taken my wrist and pulled me forward, not stopping even once as we dashed through the lobby. Only when we reached the hotel room did he finally stop.
‘Ah… ugh!’
He had stripped me hastily, touching me with hands that had run out of patience. Clothes slipped from me one by one, leaving traces in our wake like wheel tracks. His lips never left mine, making even breathing laborious. I thought it was too much to handle, and yet I, too, was far more stirred than usual. Maybe I had been swept along by his fevered urgency. When he pushed me onto the bed and I collapsed beneath him, already naked with nothing left to cover me, I didn’t even have the chance to feel ashamed. When his tongue licked deeply through my mouth and teased me in secret places, I willingly parted my lips and met his tongue with my own, tightening my arms around his neck.
‘Mm… ah! Ahh, ngh!’
‘Haah, Yewoon.’
His hot breath grazed my ear, and my shoulders instinctively flinched. The memories of last night burst vividly behind my closed lids.
There was no one at home to interrupt us, and yet, at times, he chose to spend nights outside the house as if to avoid being disturbed. I didn’t dislike the unfamiliar thrill of a different setting. Thus, we had spent quite a few nights at hotels before, but never once had we abandoned the ride home halfway and burst into a hotel like this, unable to endure even a few more minutes. Even retracing it now, I couldn’t fathom what had drained his patience.
Was it the secret touches we’d exchanged in the car?
At first, it was just the brush of fingertips. Then his breath against my neck. Heat grew with each subtle touch, the confined space inside the car warming with it. Though we were enclosed, he seemed aware that we were still technically outside, so his touches remained light, however he was more insistent than usual, as if trying to fill a hunger that shallow contact couldn’t satisfy. Instead of pushing him away, I let him do as he pleased.
…Or maybe I had clung more to him unlike before. My mind had been hazy with alcohol, my judgment blurred. I recalled the short moment when my hand rested on his thigh, and how I had tilted after his lips when he pulled back after a gentle kiss, catching his mouth again with a laugh. The way our eyes had locked, the way my heart had swelled until I kissed the back of his hand holding mine. Could he really have been provoked by something so small? Compared to the sultry way his hands had ravaged me, my part seemed clumsy, almost laughable.
I stopped retracing memories and opened my eyes again. It was embarrassing enough to scan the mess of evidence and hunt for my clothes, but it looked like anything decent enough to cover myself was all the way by the door so I gave up. It would be faster to just open the curtains and retreat quickly back to bed. Just as I gathered strength in my legs to rise, I spotted a white shirt fallen right by the bed. Last night came back to me. While I had been stripped bare, he had only removed his suit jacket in his haste to undress me. It wasn’t my clothing, but the shirt seemed suitable enough to cover myself for a few steps.
“Uhh…”
As I bent down, pain shot through my whole body. Grimacing, I managed to snag the shirt and slip it on. Slowly, I fastened the buttons and pushed myself upright. I forced strength into my legs with each step so my knees wouldn’t give out, moving sluggishly.
At last, I flung the curtains wide open. The suffocating barrier that had blocked out the light was pushed away, and sunlight poured into the room. Keeping my gaze fixed on the ground far below, I stood still under the sun like a plant in need of photosynthesis. The aches throughout my body slowly loosened into languor. To support a body that could hardly hold itself up, I pressed my fingertips against the glass. I gauged the warmth, as if this spot had been left under the sun for ages, then shifted my eyes toward my wrist to check the time.
“…Ah.”
My gaze froze without warning.
Something else caught at the end of my sight.
It was the lettering embroidered along the cuff of the shirt sleeve, long enough to drape over the back of my hand, hiding everything except the tips of my fingers. Familiar yet strange, I stared at that writing for so long it was as though time itself had stopped. The thoughts that had been clouding my mind gradually unraveled and vanished.
[Song Ye Wun]*
After tracing the letters over and over with my eyes, without even blinking, my heart suddenly began to pound wildly.
So he’s still wearing this.
Maybe it was nothing significant, perhaps he just grabbed whichever shirt came to hand, and maybe this wasn’t something worth attaching any meaning to. Yet, shamelessly, I couldn’t stop the quiet hope from rising inside me. I wondered if he had worn it because today was our date.
I frequently spent time imagining the things I could do for him.
When I had nothing to do and wasted free periods in boredom, when I tossed and turned late into the night unable to sleep because he hadn’t yet returned home, when I happened to see a fellow couple I knew just by contact information exchanging small favors or gifts with delight. On days like that, those thoughts grew especially heavy and deep.
Yet not once did I ever reach a conclusion.
What could someone who had never possessed the slightest thing be able to offer to a man who could have anything he wanted with ease? I feared that if I kept receiving without giving, shamelessly, I would one day grow accustomed to it and begin to take it all for granted. And what if that side of me would disappoint him?
So preparing a birthday gift for him had been anything but easy. Especially the first time. What was ordinary, everyday deliberation for others weighed unbearably heavy on me. I had no experience, no common sense to rely on. Compared to all that he did for me, what I could give back was pitiful, whether in value or in thought. So much so that I didn’t dare even try. I must have worn out the threshold of the department store, circling it countless times, only to find nothing but things that looked like what he’d already seen in the man’s dressing room. It left me on the verge of despair, convinced that I would never find a gift that could satisfy him.
It was then, while I was carefully sliding shirts aside, shirts that all looked the same to my untrained eye, that I noticed the writing on the cuffs was different. It wasn’t just a brand mark.
‘Ah, this is an engraving service.’
‘Engraving…?’
‘Yes. We can embroider the name or initials of your choice. It makes for a meaningful gift. Usually, people in special relationships have each other’s names stitched on.’
Listening to the sales clerk who had been circling me all along, I traced the elegant embroidery with my fingertip.
Shirts were already overflowing in his dressing room. They were probably the most abundant item of all. So one more from me wouldn’t even stand out; I might not even notice whether he wore it. But shirts didn’t follow the seasons. He could wear it whenever he pleased, year-round. That was as far as my imagination could go, within my means.
And that was already two years ago.
In his dressing room, the wardrobe would get swapped out in its entirety every new season, but this shirt had still managed to hold its place.
My heart thrashed as though it would burst out of my chest. Maybe it wasn’t such a far-fetched assumption after all. He had chosen to wear this shirt especially for our date.
The coincidence thrilled me. To suddenly be confronted with the sight of him wearing my gift, so naturally, filled me with elation and excitement. For the first time, I thought I could understand the feeling behind the endless stream of gifts he always gave me.
*Translator’s note: Official romanization of Yewoon’s korean name in the novel!
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