The Perfect Life

It's Not that Hard

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Namjoo didn't contact him for over the next few days. Didn't ask why he left her that night. He couldn't even lift up his phone to type in sorry. It was left as is like it never happened at all. Like it was perhaps some midnight dream. However many excuses he tried to give himself he still felt horrible about it.

That she had been giving away a bit of her heart and he hadn't been able to comfort her. And then he saw her several passing days later. At the market having a conversation with the same man behind the meat counter. She looked fine. Smiling, laughing, telling jokes he imagined. He didn't say hi and even if she noticed him she didn't come over. And that bothered him.

After finishing his shopping, he stopped at the coffee shop within the store. Last time Namjoo had said she'd be there. He waited forty minutes and then left.

†††††

"Will she be ok?"

What had been worst was that when Namjoo returned home from dinner was to see her grandmother wracking up a fever. Dinner Namjoo had prepared before heading out was still on the kitchen table, untouched and now cold.

Now they were in the hospital, Namjoo waiting for results. Guilt-ridden for leaving the only person who loved her most behind to have a meal with some guy. Concerned weaved through her like a never-ending thread of woeful tales. Down the hallway she could hear the echoes of heart monitors beeping, beeping, beeping and she wanted to shove her hands over her ears to mute them.

"There's swelling around her hip," the doctor informed. At this time of night, he looked impatient, fast to get out of here. Where wrinkles tugged the corners of his lips and another nurse called out for his help, Namjoo wanted to fasten him beside her grandmother because no one else was more important.

"It looks like we have to keep her in the hospital overnight." He looked straight into her eyes growing rounder by the second.

"What? Why?" Namjoo burst.

"Your grandmother is experiencing the early stages of pneumonia," the doctor went on without emotion in his voice. "You haven't noticed her loss of appetite or that she's been constantly fatigued? Other symptoms may include shortness of breath and chest pain."

Namjoo thought back to the short time spent with her grandmother. She had been away to Daejeon to visit Junmyeon. She'd been at work, she'd bought her grandmother meals but she hadn't been around to see her eating.

"We'd like to look over your grandmother until her fever lightens," the doctor explained. "I'd suggest you stock up on vitamins hence the bones become frail in old age. I'd even recommend it since she's recently broken her hip."

It felt like she was doing everything wrong suddenly. Namjoo didn't understand. She'd been trying to live happily, quietly.

How could this be happening to her now? She could not bear to bury her grandmother if she lost her. Fear of loss vibrated through her like an oncoming storm. Losing strength all emerging visions of death washed through her head. Namjoo saw herself knees up to her chest, arms around knees sobbing, crying alone as somewhere down the hall her step-mother mourned for the loss of her only son.

"Come here, child," her grandmother's hoarse voice called out when Namjoo walked toward her bed. Though aged, skin loose and dotted with age spots her grandmother's hand was always warm and welcoming. It felt like Namjoo had the entire world in her grasp when she held on tight, and she was assured that everything would turn out all right.

Namjoo held her hand tightly as she sat down. "They said they have to keep you overnight for observation."

"That's fine," her grandmother nodded. She had still stubbornly kept her cap on, still embarrassed of her balding head in this state. It made Namjoo feel warm that her grandmother still felt like a woman.