Chaeyoung visited the JYPE Headquarters to meet with Division 2, they will hold a meeting about Yuna's following comeback and her collab with another JYPE artist, Chaeyoung is asked to write her title track again for the collaboration. Thanks to Chaeyoung, Yuna's song hit Korean top charts, even though the song is still there in the top 20 after a month of the debut. Chan is trusting Yuna's music to Chaeyoung, it's part of the deal and contract anyway that Chaeyoung will produce music for Yuna for the next 3 years.
Chaeyoung meets people from A&R, discussing the next theme for Yuna's collaboration. She pitched some ideas to the agency. She got feedback as well from them. Chaeyoung will start to write a song again. Chaeyoung is done with the meeting, it's 5 pm already, she doesn't have any schedule left and planned to go back perhaps having a coffee from Eunwoo's place.
Chaeyoung took the elevator down and she met Jihyo in the hallway.
"Oh Eonnie, Hello!"
"Oh Chaeyoungie, long time no see!" Jihyo greeted him back.
"Yeah, I've been busy," Chaeyoung said while scratching her hair
"You had a meeting with A&R?"
Chaeyoung nods.
"I should congratulate you, you did a very good job for Yuna's debut. As expected, Ms. Ddalgiberry"
"Ah no no, not like that. JYPE also did their part in promoting Yuna's album. We're nobody without the company" Chaeyoung denied the compliments while giving two thumbs up for the company.
"Chaeyoung, have you eaten?" Jihyo asked.
"Not yet, Eonnie. I am planning to grab some food before I go home"
"You have no schedule after this?"
"Hem" Chaeyoung shook her head.
"Can we go eat somewhere? Honestly, I am starving and there's something I would like to tell you, Chaeyoung"
"Oh, okay Eonnie"
"Okay, let me grab my bag. You bring your car, right?"
"Yes"
"Okay, see you at the lobby, Chaeng"
Chaeyoung nods. Well, it's not odd for Chaeyoung to go with Jihyo, when Chaeyoung was a freshman, Jihyo always treated her theatre juniors, and Chaeyoung is one of them.
They both met at the lobby and Jihyo took Chaeyoung to a quiet Italian restaurant in Hannam, Jihyo's favorite neighborhood.
They both arrive and order something.
"So. how's work, Chaengie?"
"Well, it's been good so far Eonnie"
"How's Dahyun? I haven't met her in a while"
"She's doing great, she just recorded a program on KBS, you will soon see her face on the TV again"
"Wow nice"
"Yeah, our CEO as expected," Chaeyoung said while laughing.
Both then eat in silence, almost awkward to Chaeyoung because Jihyo is always the chatty type. But now, she's kind of quiet.
Maybe not today.
"Chaeyoung?" Jihyo then calls her name as soon as she is done with her meal.
Chaeyoung who's just playing with her food because she's full already, fixed her eyes to Jihyo
"Yes, Eonnie?"
Jihyo stares deeply in her eyes.
"Could you both stop, please?"
Chaeyoung stops twirling her spaghetti and puts the fork down.
She now can't look Jihyo in the eyes.
She's kind of afraid.
"Judging by you won't look me in the eyes, you must already know what am I talking about"
Chaeyoung knows it by guts. Mina mentioned Jihyo before, Jihyo has been Mina's best friend for years.
Even though maybe Mina didn't open up to new people. but she trusts her best friend so much.
"Eonnie, I............" Chaeyoung would like to explain, words are already there in her mind, but she can not suturing it into a sentence
"To be honest, I will never stop loving her, Eonnie" Chaeyoung said.
Jihyo chuckles.
"You do realize that you have a fiance and Mina has a family, you know that, right?"
"Yuna broke off our engagement," Chaeyoung said with a soft voice
"What? Was it because of Mina? Do you expect Mina would do the same for you?" Jihyo raises her tone a bit and makes sarcastic remarks.
"What? No" Chaeyoung feel offended, "I love her, but I know, I know it well and I am aware that I won't have her, I don't expect her to leave her family or something, Eonnie"
"Then what? You guys are going to keep fooling around like this?"
"Jihyo Eonnie..................."
Jihyo chuckles, half laughing. Jihyo sighing in disbelief.
"You remembered that you left Mina without a word 16 years ago, right?"
Chaeyoung lips are starting to tremble.
Chaeyoung remembers that she would never forget and forgive herself for leaving her, it haunts her.
"You son of a bitch left her without saying anything, without a letter, without any notice, without anything, and you just disappeared. You made a person feel so hard for you and you left her. And then all of sudden showed up again out of the blue and acted as you forget about things you have done in the past and once again you made this person fall for you. And what are you going to do after this, huh? You're going to leave her again or something?" Jihyo chuckles.
"You don't actually have the right to be with her again, Chaeyoung, you left with the biggest pain in her heart". Jihyo said while pointing her finger to her.
Chaeyoung tries to catch a breath, she feels suffocated.
"Look Chaeyoung, why are you here in the first place? Why are you coming into Mina's life again?"
Chaeyoung can't believe her question
"I......... I never planned this Eonnie, I never planned to meet her here, I didn't know a thing about her life, because I always thought Mina would end up, I don't know maybe Europe? I didn't know at all that she's Chan Sunbae's wife, it was all coincidence"
"Or maybe just fate" She whispered the last sentence because Chaeyoung never planned to even meet Mina in Seattle, but they met again there. Chaeyoung can't think about anything except that it was fate that brought them together again.
Jihyo then smirked, "Well, thanks for bringing that up, Chaeyoung. Yeah, I thought so too, whoa we both knew her since college and we knew how talented she is, right? The top of our class. All-rounder person, faculty members, and professors liked her, she was our star" Jihyo said with a smirk on her face.
"But did you know that you were the one who ruined her dream, Son Chaeyoung?" Jihyo's back at her villain mode. She shoots the question while looking at Chaeyoung's eyes, piercing the words in her heart.
Chaeyoung stares back, she's in a shocking state hearing what just came from Jihyo's mouth.
"Wh.......wh........what?"
Jihyo sighed.
"Guess I should tell you about this, so you could know your place, Son Chaeyoung"
Jihyo takes a deep breath, she knows that she's so wrong right now, she knows that she will ruin everything but Jihyo only wants Mina and Bang Chan to be happy. She knew it well that Mina would never live the way she is now without Bang Chan and Chan would never survive if Mina leaves him. Jihyo cares about Mina and Bang Chan.
So Jihyo thinks what she could think for both of them. They both should be still together.
Jihyo can't see both getting hurt. Jihyo is being Jihyo once again, putting someone else's happiness above her.
"Chaeyoung, we were one of few people that know that Mina wants to be an opera. She has this big dream to stand in front of the audience in Russia, Vienna, Berlin, Rome, you name it. You know it all, you know as much as I do. She always tried her best to maintain her voice, never take cold beverages, never drunk, never did something that could hurt her voice. Never. You know that she was always careful, she joined our theatre with lots of consideration and wanted to do it as long as it was an opera piece and that was what makes our theatre production different from the one they had in college. We took pride in our production because Mina and our seniors before set the bar this high"
That's all true, Chaeyoung knows that the university has also a theatre club but the one from the College of Music has the best performance, they created their own performance, they wrote original music, somehow the students are being cocky and didn't even want to compare their theatre performance with the university theatre club.
Chaeyoung doesn't quite follow Jihyo's explanation.
"Mina developed a heavy depression after you left, she lost herself and she started to do things that I never imagine that a person like Mina could do that"
Chaeyoung's jaw drops, she takes a big gulp, she can't believe what she just heard.
"She started being careless. First, drinking. I found her at the bar too many times, picking her up. Second, she started to smoke. I don't know where she found this new habit but this is super intolerable to Mina. And something that was super annoying to me was when she left our production and joined the university theatre club. Dean Jun was so mad at her, but she chose that and we can't stop her"
"It was just a shame that a professional person like Mina did things so unprofessional out of love. And it was so hard watching her falling apart as that" Jihyo explains, she almost in tears remembering those hurtful days.
Chaeyoung could only stare at the blank point, she can't imagine things Jihyo said. Chaeyoug knows that Mina would never do something like that, but she did it.
"Until at one point, she excitedly told me that she was cast to an indie movie production, it didn't require singing. It was totally not Mina. She only did acting with singing, you know that much, right? She took the job, and there were so many scenes where it required her to scream a lot, screamed from her lungs, screamed like a crazy person, and it took lots of takes" Jihyo stops and choking at her own tears.
"She hurt her vocal cords after, they found a nodule, because she pushed herself too hard for a fuckin' indie movie production," Jihyo said it slowly, slow enough to stab each word to Chaeyoung's heart.
Chaeyoung starts to tear.
"It was the worst thing that could happen to an opera singer like her. She needed to be operated as the doctor suggested, otherwise she could never sing again. Still, when the doctor knew that she's an opera singer, the doctor said that she couldn't have her high pitch back. She was crying almost every day before her surgery, and she hadn't recovered with her depression and things added up in her life, and both were majors to her"
Jihyo now starts to cry, Chaeyoung can't say a word, she only listens.
"I was there Chaeyoung when she realized that she can't sing anymore. By singing, you know I mean opera, and she can not do it. All the dreams that she built, it crumbled, she didn't eat anything, she refused to meet with people, she locked herself up" Jihyo lips tremble.
"And it was a winter night, I got a call from the hospital that Mina was found in her car, oversleeping with her AC on. She was in a critical condition and thank god her neighbor found her. She said to me that she overslept, with her ac on, in winter. She had carbon monoxide poisoning. Up until now, I didn't want to believe that Mina at some point was so depressed that she could................"
Jihyo can't continue.
"Knowing that she had been given a second chance in life, I begged her to use it, I begged her to hang on. I begged her to live her life. She did voice therapy, the doctors also cleared her that he could use her voice again. But she's too afraid, she knows that her vocal wasn't perfect as yesterday. She shut her world, she quit theatres, she quit opera, and she only did the bare minimum for her to be graduate"
Chaeyoung can't hold her tears anymore, every time she wipes it, it will come again and again.
"She lost herself, she gave up her dreams, she lived in a pit hole after you left Chaeyoung. And please don't be mad at me when I am blaming you on this. You ruined her life, Son Chaeyoung"
Chaeyoung could only gulp and she can't say anything. Choking at her own tears.
Now she could solve all the puzzles, it all explains Mina's cigarette break, Mina being a lecturer instead of performer, Mina taking alcohol, Mina being away from the stage, it all makes sense to Chaeyoung.
Chaeyoung never asked why Mina quit opera, Mina always said that she got bored. It wasn't Mina at all, got bored over something she really likes. She has put efforts since middle school, she took care of her voice ever since, and it wasn't like Mina that she gave up opera just because she got bored. It never occurred in Chaeyoung's mind.
Chaeyoung is the center of all of it, Chaeyoung ruined Mina's life, especially Mina's dream.
"So Chaeyoung, I am sorry but, you don't have the right to be with Mina. After everything you've done to her"
Chaeyoung snorts her nose, she's wiping her own tears
"Mina is fine now, she's happy with her family. Her family isn't perfect but without her family, she's just..........." Jihyo can't continue.
"She's fine now, that's all I need to know," Jihyo adds.
Chaeyoung could only listen once again. She's blaming herself. She didn't know that leaving her in the past would cost so much. Chaeyoung thought it was for the best, but Mina even lived miserably. Chaeyoung at least could have her dream back after years of being her father's puppet, but Mina, Mina would never get her dream back.
And it was all because of Chaeyoung.
Chaeyoung crushed Mina's dream.
"I do hope that you understand me, Chaeyoung-ah. I am done seeing her getting hurt. I've seen the past years that Mina is getting better, a lot lot better. So please, don't ruin her again, Chaeyoung-ah"
Chaeyoung drowns her face down and closes her eyes.
Chaeyoung loves Mina deeply. She loves her with all of her heart. Meeting her again was the joyest thing she could ever feel the last 16 years. Chaeyoung can't help but compare her life and Mina. She's living so much better after she left Korea, even though being Son and Son heir was hard, but she never suffers, she only suffers internally. But Mina, Mina had to give up all of her dreams
She didn't even realize that Jihyo is now gone, and she is still staring at the blank space in that Italian restaurant.
Jihyo was right, Chaeyoung doesn't deserve Mina's love.
She was just the girl who ruined Mina's dream.