“My head’s a mess.” I follow Greta around the market, picking up fruit to examine before tossing a mango into the bag she’s holding open.
“I told you, didn’t I…PI…or some hot detective who can look into your disappearance objectively.” After I'm done, she puts the bag in the cart and follows me to the next display shelves to pick up some bananas.
Jyeon made good on his promise to fill the apartment with food and necessities but going to an organic produce market together like this is a rare treat. All the island's fresh fruit and vegetables are shipped over to us. We rarely see anything non-seafood-related in quaint little setups like this. The whole area smells divine with the mingled scents of tropical fruits.
“I don’t know. I feel like I’m getting deeper and deeper into hot water the longer we’re here. Maybe I should have some episode and suddenly remember it all. So, we can leave.”
“Are you scared that you might want to stay? That your feelings for them are unresolved?” Greta eyes me up as she swings the cart in front of me to stop me in my tracks, and I sigh aloud. Knowing that penetrating gaze and the way her head’s going.
“I don’t know…. I don’t know…. I don’t fucking know.” I exhale in exasperation. I’m hypersensitive because I can’t sleep at night anymore, and the brief time I spent with Mother and Yoonha yesterday has me crazy. Jyeon had me at a clinic in the evening for a CT scan and an hour-long appointment with some head specialist, and I had to act my ass off and let Greta help with answers. Surprisingly, the doctor seemed to believe us. So sure he would figure it out while we sat there.
I am neither up nor down nor any clearer about his intentions with me beyond what he keeps drumming into my brain.
That he loves me and misses me.
That I don’t even know about the car anymore.
And what the hell is Claire in all of this?
Ughhhhhh.
“What time is Jyeon collecting you today? I swear that guy is relentless in his pursuit of you. Not a single day goes by that you get a break from seeing him.” Greta leans past me, grabs a carrot bag, and tosses them in, eyeing me up with a frown and a sulky demeanor.
“What exactly are we cooking that requires carrots? And in two hours, for the event.” I lift my brow at her, knowing fine and well we have some in the apartment, and throw them back on the shelf. She’s just tossing produce to vent her frustration. Being moody and a part of me is starting to suspect she’s jealous of Jyeon muscling between us and taking me away from her. She’s been clingy and possessive since we got here, and I know she’s afraid that I choose to stay behind when the time comes to go home.
“Jyeon stew…we need a big stock pot to boil up that asshole.” She pouts, and I break into a laugh and bop her on the head before nudging her cart onward. Ignoring her sulk and moving along with the topic.
“What are you going to do while he once again swans off with me? Stay home? Go out…. there’s a movie theatre nearby you could try. Jyeon deposited cash into our account this morning so go splurge, as he’s been generous.” I brighten with a genuine smile and link my arm to hers to wander the market without a real reason. We don’t need anything, but this is nice, and the crisp air, although a little cold, is refreshing. Most of the goods are imported, but the ambiance of a good old fashion market is relaxing.
“Don’t forget….. the accident, Sohla. Don’t relax so much and forget what we suspect. Stay alert. Jyeon is charming, smooth, and hot, and I know you still love him. I don’t trust your weak heart when you’re alone with him. Don’t forget what he did.”
“I know, Okay. You don’t need to remind me. I am more than aware. I don’t need a PI…we’re not staying here. Once this is done and we go home, I’ll forget all of it, and we can move on. With money… because we’ll have it. It’s sort of working out for the best.”
We walk along the aisle and turn to the next one, falling into companionable silence and moseying the array of choices. A familiar scent wafts by me, and I glance up automatically. A woman our height, with long red hair in a two-piece black suit, is walking ahead of us, leaving a trail of the expensive perfume I used to wear.
Looking at her from behind, I smile with amusement at how she could be me two years ago, apart from the hair color. Same arrogant catwalk way of walking. Killer heels, impeccable suit, and expertly groomed and preened to perfection. She has a cold suave aura of command as she stops and picks up a bag of strawberries. Her nails sharpened into red talons to match the underside of her shoes. She’s exceptionally pulled together, and yet, I have zero envy. I see a lonely and solitary closed-off woman who relies on no one but herself. No one gets close. A shadow of my past and a time I was undeniably miserable.
I don’t miss the uniform. Or the attitude I created to keep people at arm’s length. She looks icy and imposing from the rear, and I now get what it was that Jyeon hated so much whenever I entered his space. She has this solid shield of heartlessness.
“Excuse me, can you scoot over? You’re blocking the aisle.” Greta calls out to the woman as she’s parked her cart sideways, blocking the passageway, and we stop patiently for her to acknowledge us.
She turns and gives us an up-and-down snooty frown as though we’re the inconvenience, and I freeze. Faced with this bitch once more. An instant bubble of temper grows hot in the pit of my pelvis, and I bite my lip to curb the words that threaten to fall out of my mouth like missiles. My entire body bristles with goosebumps as my hair stands on end.
“So, it’s you.” Claire eyes me over, taking in my attire and friend with a smug snort, and turns back to the shelf before tossing the strawberries back with a smirk. “Jyeon mentioned he found you. So, it seems he was right. Welcome back, Miss Kim.” She turns to us entirely, smoothing back a strand of her hair from her face with polished precision, and crosses her arms over her chest to stare me straight on. Making a show of appraising what she sees and looking unimpressed.
It’s weird. It's like she spent the last two years remodeling herself to fit the gap I left behind, and now I’m faced with something creepily similar to the person I no longer want to be. I know this isn’t down to her job role, so maybe she’s been initiated into the Parks, and her mother has modeled my replacement. Although nothing of her was in the house, they never mentioned her.
“Who are you exactly?” Greta chimes in, instantly bristling with the snootiness of this girl’s attitude toward me. Having never seen her before.
“Claire White. Director of R and D at OLO.” She extends a mocking hand, the name registering in Greta’s mind, and gets it pushed away harshly. Greta stiffened to fight mode in the blink of an eye.
“Ahhhhh, the homewrecker and a shameless tramp who pursued a married man. How’s that working out for you?” Greta holds no punches, not even lowering her tone, tinged with venom. “Aren’t you a little too proud, considering you banged your boss to get this far? Hardly an achievement.”
“Greta…” I warn, cutting into her bitch fight that’s ready to roll and look Claire up and down with cool disinterest. Not going to allow Greta to make a public scene when news had only just hit of my miraculous appearance. This is all we would need. Someone filming us and posting it online.
“Apologies, my friend is very loyal and has a code of conduct that she lives by. Some things are just shamelessly abhorrent to her.” I smile sweetly, bile rising in my stomach when faced with this wench, yet I act perfectly. Crazy how, after two years of being back here, I found that mask I could pull out and stick on when faced with tramps like this. That old me can still pull the old trick out.
“Wow… you may look different, but you seem the same to me.” Claire yawns on cue as though bored by us and drops her arms to return them to her trolley.
“Don’t let us keep you. I’m sure you’re very busy making money for MY company. Wouldn’t want to delay you from doing that.” I raise a brow, catch the side of our cart and pull it to swerve around her, taking Greta with me.
“You don’t think your reappearance works in my favor?” She cattily laughs at our backs, and I freeze mid-walk, fighting the urge to turn and face her.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Greta bites for me. Too hot-tempered for her own good. I turn and look her way too. Spinning on the girl, I quickly glance around, looking for bystanders who might be paying us too much attention and seeing nothing.
“He held onto a ghost for two years and could never move forward. No one can battle a dead person who hangs over someone’s soul like a black cloud. But you’re here now….. he can let go of his guilt, remember why he left you, and finally move on. We can pick up where we left off, and my patience will be repaid.” She picks up a pack of cherries, tosses them in her cart, pulls it back to turn away, and smiles like an evil witch, a cat who got the cream, and it riles me.
“So, you two really are nothing? Like he said. I guess that sucks, given how hard you must have fought to get him in the first place. All I had to do was leave, and boom…. your boyfriend lost interest.” It’s an impulsive bitch response, fuelled by how different she seems now and how much more I dislike her. At least the old Claire was somewhat warm and innocent, with attractive qualities, but this version is everything Jyeon hated about me. I wonder if she modeled herself to try and coax him back to her side without really understanding what it was that drove him away from me. I guess he never actually told her in great detail why he didn’t love me back then.
“I stepped back to let him grieve. I’m still here, aren’t I? Supporting him, working with him, and being around him. I heard you would be signing divorce papers and trotting back to fantasia to live your sweet little island life before long…what do you think will happen when he has that kind of closure? I’ll be right here, and Jyeon is worth the wait.”
“You can have him. She hasn’t lost anything; she only gained a ton more. Look at you… there’s nothing so great about you at all…. You kinda remind me of the mess I picked up off the road two years ago. I'm pretty sure she got there because Jyeon hates your type, so I wouldn’t hold your breath, honey. If you gave yourself a sad makeover to win him round, you picked the wrong version of Sohla. Good luck with that.” Greta snorts at her, swings her ass back around, slides her arm in mine, and tugs me to make it clear we’re done here. I clamp my mouth shut to stop the oncoming giggling reaction to how harsh she just was. Loving my fiery demon for her ability to shut people down with brutal truths.
“Sohla?” her snooty voice brings me to a hesitant step, and I glance back over my shoulder.
“What?” I snap it out.
“Feels a little full circle, doesn’t it? Should I offer you money to sign the papers sooner and leave? Remind you how your presence only hurts his life? Ask you to consider him in this and his future?” She smiles in a twisty and self-satisfied way that only kicks up the anger inside me, and that low-dwelling Sohla of my soul pulls her claws out. The audacity she has to try and make this a mirror to back then and the requests I made. I still have the right, more than she does, to demand those things even now.
“The difference is…. you want him. I don’t. It’s Jyeon who won’t let me loose and is clinging on for dear life to make me stay with him. He never did that with you, not once. Did he ever tell you he loves you? Because he’s told me several times since he brought me home. That he wants a fresh start with me… If it’s about his future and the benefits… then I am a perfect choice, yet … I no longer care or prioritize his future.” I flick my hair back over my shoulder, enjoying the crumbling of her expression, and it gives me my answer. The wounding pain she can’t conceal and the instant watery glaze that shines in her eyes. There was truth in his revelation that he never loved her.
“He’s confused. He doesn’t know how he feels. The way you left was a mess. We didn’t have time to begin. He’s eaten with guilt and feels like a failure for not protecting you. For hurting you. It’s not love…. It’s responsibility. He feels obligated. He took the blame for everything about your entire relationship because you faked death and hurt him in ways you can never understand. Don’t hold your breath thinking his love has depth because it doesn’t, and he’ll soon figure it out the longer he’s around you again.” She’s seething, losing the grip on her temper, and her emotions and bitterness are flying free. She may look and act like the old me, but she misses the ability to hold it in, switch it off and deaden her heart when a scenario asks for it. She’s pathetic.
“Whatever it is… it doesn’t change a thing. I don’t remember him, and I have no feelings either way about him. You do whatever you need to do to hold onto the man who doesn’t want you. None of this hurts me in any way. I’ll happily walk out without you feeling the need to compensate. I’m a billionaire and own a huge chunk of OLO… that didn’t change. Jyeon could have kept it all by walking by me and pretending I didn’t exist, yet he brought me here to give it all back. I don’t need your pocket change. I’m sure I still earn more than a mere director of my own company without even getting out of bed.”
Greta grins, eyeing me up, and curbs her need to wade in. Seeing the person I can sometimes be, holding her own. My calm manner and careful, precise way of talking, without emotions. I haven’t lost it at all. I guess the two versions of me both still exist, but they found a way to live happily together after all inside one body. I turn on my heel, ready to truly be done with wasting time on this sad replica. A swelling pride in how good it feels to battle her head-on after the pain she caused me then.
“I never understood what he saw in you at all…… what held him back. What crazy witchcraft you had that could make him hate and love you to the point that he couldn’t leave and yet couldn’t stay. You messed with his head and made him crazy… You’re a demon. Just leave already and stop fucking with his life.” Her tears break, her voice wavering, and she’s desperately clinging to the handlebar of her cart so that her knuckles are white. Losing her composure.
“Jyeon needs to figure that out on his own. It’s nothing to do with me. I’m all set to leave as soon as he lets me.” I don’t raise my voice or bite. I nod, bidding her goodbye, and push Greta to get going again.
“Must be why she’s trying to be you now. In hopes she wins him back. So fucking weird.” Greta mumbles to me under her breath.
“Give it time, Sohla. He hated you once…. He will again. He’ll remember every fucking reason he came to me and found comfort in the arms of another woman. You’re no different at all. He will see that soon enough, and all his rose-tinted memories and fluffy ideas about a new start will wither to shit.”
“Whatever, you psychopathic weirdo…. You’re giving us a headache with your mindless whining. So long, deary. Have a nice day.” Greta waves her way, hooks her arm around my waist, and propels me onwards at speed so we can’t be stopped for any more dialogue with this wench.
“She’s something alright,” I whisper as we walk.
“You know, the petty part of me now wants you to seduce Jyeon …. just to piss her off. Take that smug pitch out of her annoying face.” Greta growls under her breath, grabs a massive bag of salted popcorn in passing, and dumps them in our cart. I'm shrugging, and I know she isn’t serious, but it does ding a response in my heart.
“Don’t tempt me. I still harbor a very real and deep scar from the existence of that woman in my past. I don’t need the head mess, though. Jyeon is a grey area for me. I’m not looking for revenge anymore because it’ll only hurt me in the long run.”
“I get it, and I know. I’m not encouraging it. I’m just saying,….. karma.”
That’s all I would need. Pouncing on him to exact revenge on them both and leaving his ass behind when I was done. Me of old would have jumped at the chance to screw them over this way and inflict maximum damage, but I can’t even contemplate it anymore. Not just because it’s twisted and petty, and I’ve grown as a person, but because Jyeon isn’t the same, and I can’t ignore how I’m softening to him. I don’t have it in me to play with fire. It’s too raw, too close to the surface, and my heart might screw me over if I allow myself to surrender to him.