Ever since Jiyeon left her home yesterday, Sojung had a bad premonition in her heart. Sure enough, that premonition has come true as Kim Hyunjung herself has come knocking on her door.
She sat upright with a stiff back as she tried to think of a way out. To sum it up in one sentence, what she had to do was deny everything and take it to the grave. She must protect Jiyeon.
She believed that Hyunjung had sniffed out a clue that something was wrong and came to her to interrogate her about it. This woman was probably trying to find someone to blame too. However, she had thought too much as Hyunjung just wanted to know what happened to Jiyeon at Sojung's house yesterday.
Nevertheless, after hearing Hyunjung's question, her heart which was finally calming down jumped into her throat again.
What should she say?!
Of course, she couldn’t say the truth, but even if she wanted to lie, she couldn’t. In the past, she never had a good experience with lying as she was discovered right away every time. Therefore, she chose to stay silent.
Although she has always been good at everything, what she was most bad at was lying. Jiyeon once commented on her lying skills as “so bad that it would destroy the heavens and anger the gods” and “it’s impossible to find someone worse at lying than you.”
“…..”
Maybe this is the so-called “complementary effect” between friends and that’s why Jiyeon's acting skills were so good = =
Hyunjung saw that the other party did not want to answer her and even looked like they were in a daydream. She raised her eyebrows and asked again. This time, Sojung finally answered her.
She stayed silent for another second before making a show of strength despite wanting to cry on the inside and glaring at her, “You should know what’s wrong with her yourself!”
After saying this one sentence, she didn’t give Hyunjung the time to react before she opened the car door behind her and walked out. Her high heels clacked loudly against the ground, a clear indication of how angry the owner was and Hyunjung watched her leave with a baffled expression. The agent who was standing to the side earlier heard the movements and quickly returned to the car.
“Was the conversation a bust?”
“….I’m not quite sure either.” Sojung had run away before she could even start making any threats or promises.
Sojung returned to the company at a breakneck speed and when she entered the building, she ran past the floor-to-ceiling windows to a place where a wall blocks the view from the outside. Only then did she let out a sigh of relief.
So close, at least she was able to fool the other person.
Not long after Hyunjung's agent came back, her manager also returned. She held a big bag of ice cream cones in her hand and then placed them in the mini-fridge in the back. She then sat down in the passenger seat, “Boss, why did the Section Chief leave so soon?”
Hyunjung was still mulling over the meaning behind Sojung's words so she didn’t notice her manager was talking to her. When the person opened her mouth again, the agent hurriedly stopped her and gestured for her to be quiet before mouthing silently to her, “The conversation broke down–”
Hyunjung was too lazy to bother with them and decided to ignore them instead. She shifted her posture and twisted her neck slightly. Just when she was about to ask her agent if there was anything she had to do today and if she could go home if there wasn’t any, her phone suddenly rang.
The number belonged to a teacher from kindergarten.
******
Jiyeon stayed at her old apartment all afternoon. By the time she remembered she had to leave, it was already dark outside. When she returned home, the hand on the clock had just passed seven.
As soon as she entered the house, Hyunjung walked downstairs to greet her. She was dressed in casual home clothes and her face was still just as cold as Jiyeon expected, but for some reason, it was a little different today.
She looked a little bit angry this time around.
Jiyeon failed to understand the meaning behind that expression and looked straight into the other’s eyes, causing Hyunjung to frown, “Why didn’t you pick up Juyeon today?”
“If you had something to do, you could have told me. If the teacher hadn’t called me, I wouldn’t have known that you didn’t go!”
The kindergarten teacher hadn’t called her right away and even waited for a full 15 minutes. However, when she saw no sign of Juyeon's parents coming, she decided to call Jiyeon first. But she did not answer so with no choice she had to call Hyunjung next.
“Why didn’t you bring your phone with you when you went out? Are you trying to pull a ‘disappearing act’ on me?”
As someone who had gone through rigorous education and training, Hyunjung did not yell even if she was angry. Her volume was the same as usual, only her tone was much heavier. However, even a mild reprimand was still a reprimand.
And so, Jiyeon's face turned dark, “What disappearing act? I just forgot to bring my phone with me, that’s all.”
“You went out all day, yet you didn’t bring your phone with you? Just where did you go?”
Jiyeon didn’t know that people nowadays have to carry their phones wherever they go. For to go out without your phone was akin to losing half of your body and most people would rather die than leave behind their phones. However, Jiyeon didn’t know about this and so she couldn’t understand why Hyunjung was so angry and replied in a harsh tone, “What does this have to do with you? Do I have to report my whereabouts to you every second of the day?”
The current Jiyeon has never experienced the event at the Hyatt hotel nor was she aware of the memories that occurred afterward. Therefore, she has never experienced Hyunjung's heart-warming words and her tender affections. To the current Jiyeon, she was just an actress who aroused her desire but not her heart. And is merely an idol who can only have an influence when the person is in a good mood. When a person is in a bad mood, even if ten actresses were standing in front of her right now, she wouldn’t have any interest in seeing them.
After two days of waking up and discovering she has amnesia, she had almost accepted that Hyunjung was her wife who was about to divorce her. However, although she could accept this situation, it does not mean that she can just simply step into this role.
Imagine for a second if someone who you have only known for a few days started scolding you. Would you just obediently stand there and let her discipline you?
The wrinkles between Hyunjung's brows deepened. She suddenly felt that something was wrong, so she didn’t reply. Instead, she fixed Jiyeon with a scrutinizing gaze. Jiyeon grew annoyed at her staring and simply put on her slippers before walking past Hyunjung and up the stairs.
Hyunjung did not follow after her and simply stood there with an unclear expression. A few minutes later, she turned around and looked at the mobile phone sitting in the living room. This was Jiyeon's phone. Earlier, she had called it a dozen times before the housekeeper had found it in Jiyeon's bedroom.
When she heard that Jiyeon didn’t go to pick up Juyeon, she asked someone else to go pick up the child and went looking for the missing Jiyeon herself.
She first asked the people who she was close to but none of them were with Jiyeon. She then used her connections to do a thorough search through the police’s database and the nearby hospitals. After confirming that Jiyeon's name was not in any of those databases, she was slightly relieved. At least she had not gotten into an accident.
And she was assured that while Juyeon was still here, Jiyeon would not leave without saying goodbye like last time.
She didn’t eat dinner either and waited for her wife to come back instead. After stewing in worry and frustration for so long, it was no wonder she grew angry with her.
While she was waiting, Hyunjung felt like she was going to explode. She was so angry and anxious and afraid that something bad had happened to her dear wife. She had originally planned to talk to Jiyeon about this and even prepared to fight a dragged-out battle of words with her. But now, her thoughts were on a different matter.
Something’s not quite right.
A person who couldn’t live without their mobile phone went a whole day without it.
A person who regarded Juyeon as the light of her world forgot to pick her up on the scheduled day.
A person who can drive and would usually never walk, unless she had to, actually used a taxi.
A person who would return one sentence with a hundred of her own passed up an opportunity to hurt her.
They had already passed the point of ‘something not quite right. No, something bad must have happened!
****
When Jiyeon arrived upstairs, she made her way to Juyeon's room. Her room was in the innermost part of the house and it was a very warm and cozy room. She was sitting at a desk and was currently drawing something with a crayon.
Jiyeon walked lightly until she was standing behind her child and looked at the strange symbols her child was drawing.
She hadn’t known that Hyunjung and her had worked out a set schedule for picking up their child. She had thought she just needed to fill in for Hyunjung's usual duty for one day yesterday. She wondered how long she made Juyeon wait at the kindergarten.
A small child waiting alone at the kindergarten, surrounded by an empty field while the other children had long gone. Yet she was the only one still waiting at the door for her mother to pick her up. Just imagining this scene made her cry with a guilty conscience.
She wanted to say a few words to Juyeon, but she didn’t know where to start and so she decided to start by commenting on Juyeon's drawing.
“What a beautiful little duck!” she exclaimed.
The child turned her head and looked up at her innocently, “Mama, this is a giraffe.”
Jiyeon: “….” Sure enough, an insincere comment would lead to karmic retribution.
No matter how she looked at it, she couldn’t tell that it was a giraffe. Since there was no going back, she decided to give up on the topic and just say what she wanted to say. Jiyeon opened her mouth and squatted beside Juyeon to sincerely apologize, “Mom did you wrong today. I’m sorry. Next time, Mom will pick you up on time.”
Student Juyeon tilted her head, “It’s okay, mama. I know you are busy. I’m already four, I’m not like the three-year-olds with no manners who cry and scream all the time. I know that you and Mommy will eventually come to pick me up in the end.
Jiyeon felt very touched and kissed her on the cheeks. The child’s skin was smooth and tender like milk, and because Juyeon did drink a glass of milk every day, there was a faint milky scent on her body. Although she doesn’t remember how she used to get along with her, she doesn’t need to remember as that milky scent was able to arouse the maternal side that was hidden within her for many years.
The more she looked at Juyeon, the cuter she felt the child was. So she picked her up like a stuffed toy and then cuddled the girl in her arms.
“Ahhhhh, why are you so cute? You truly are deserving to be my child!”
Juyeon: “……” Mama, you’re self-gloating again.
Juyeon matured earlier than other children. A few months ago she was still living abroad and had received some foreign education. She was used to playing with children her age all the time and doesn’t spend much time with her mother. However, she is still just a four-year-old child, so her favorite place to cling to was still the arms of her mother.
Meanwhile, Jiyeon's current mentality was much younger. She has not been brainwashed and influenced by those educational parent books. She no longer kept a restrained distance from Juyeon and played with her since she wanted to. And so, one adult and one child played happily for an hour before she bathed her and coaxed the child to sleep.
Juyeon's door is rarely closed. Even when she’s sleeping, whether it is Jiyeon or Hyunjung, they will leave a gap in the door and then turn on a night light for her to make her feel safe.
But today, when Jiyeon came out of her child's room, she directly closed the door before returning to her bedroom.
When Hyunjung heard the sound of two doors closing, she walked out of her room to look at Juyeon's closed door. She then squeezed the thing in her hand.
The object in her hand was none other than the photo frame that Jiyeon had picked up and looked at the other day. With the photo frame in her hand, she slowly walked over to Jiyeon's room and then gently knocked on the door.