SERIES: An Impure Reunion
CHAPTER: An Impure Reunion Chapter 30
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30.
“Good thing we don't have to waste any time, since she went and disappeared on her own.”
Smack. The moment Taejun finished speaking, a dull thud resonated in the space between him and Jian.
Taejun’s head was turned to the right, and Jian’s gaze, fixed upon him, was filled with contempt.
Jian bit down hard on her trembling lips, trying to still them.
The instant she heard Taejun’s words, a searing heat shot through her brain and flowed down her spine.
And in that moment, her body had moved on its own, and Taejun’s cheek was now stained red.
Feeling the sting in her palm from the impact, Jian clenched her fist and glared at him.
“How… how could you say something like that….”
How could he say it was a good thing that the child had disappeared?
It wasn't enough that he took her behind my back; if he was going to do that, he should have taken good care of her. How could he?
Furious at Taejun’s words, Jian’s body began to tremble violently.
When Taejun turned his head back, he was met with Jian’s rage-contorted face and let out a sneer.
“Heo Jian, hitting me.”
“Why? Is there a reason I can’t?”
“Right, why couldn’t you. But this is kind of a turn-on, isn’t it?”
Taejun snatched Jian’s wrist, gripped it tightly, and brought it to his own cheek.
“Hit me more, Jian.”
“You’re insane.”
“I said, hit me more. More, more.”
A glaring madness could be felt in his eyes as he told her to hit him more.
The gleam in Taejun’s eyes was so bizarrely sharp that Manager Ha, standing nearby, flinched in surprise.
“You’re crazy. Joo Taejun, you’re insane.”
But even facing him, Jian didn’t blink once.
Instead, she roughly shook off his hand and grabbed Taejun by the collar.
“You think I can’t hit you just because you tell me to?”
The rage of a mother who had lost her child was greater than the fury glinting in his eyes.
“I want to rip you to shreds right this instant. Do you have any idea how I feel?”
Jian’s eyes, expressing her fury, were unfocused and precarious.
“How could you… how could you….”
Her mind nearly numb, Jian shook Taejun by the collar and cried out frantically.
“You promised. You promised me two years!”
“……”
“Those two years, how much I… how much…!”
That damn two years you talked about, how precious I held those two years, how hard I was trying to send my child away without crying after those two years were over, What does that make me, who threw a fit just to keep that promise?
“How dare you try to take that away. You!”
Tears once again welled up in Jian’s eyes.
The more she shook Taejun, the more tears fell from her eyes.
Eventually, exhausted by her own outburst, Jian’s body went limp, and she sank to the floor.
“Where, just where….”
Where could her child be?
Where on earth did she go? Is she crying, looking for me?
A thousand different thoughts raced through Jian’s mind.
Just then, Jian’s silent phone began to ring.
Barely managing to operate it, she weakly brought the phone to her ear.
- Hello? Are you the guardian of a girl named Heo Seol-ah?
A man’s voice came through the receiver, and when he said Seol-ah’s name, Jian shot up from her spot.
“Who is this? My Seol-ah, do you have Seol-ah?”
- I’ve brought the child to the hospital. She suddenly ran out in front of my car…
The moment she heard the man say the child had suddenly run out in front of his car, the phone slipped from Jian’s grasp.
Startled by Jian’s sudden action, Taejun hurried toward her.
“Heo Jian.”
He was about to grab her shoulder.
Thump. Jian collapsed on the spot.
“Heo Jian!”
In her fading vision, she saw Taejun’s shocked expression.
Even in this situation, Jian closed her eyes with a self-mocking expression, thinking what an absurd fantasy it was to imagine Taejun was worried about her.
Standing on a boundary where reality and illusion were indistinguishable, Jian looked around.
The thick fog surrounding her confirmed this wasn’t reality, but the feeling was strange.
It felt as if she was about to lose something important.
‘Mom!’
At the sudden sound of Seol-ah’s voice calling for her, Jian’s gaze darted around more quickly.
And the instant her eyes landed on the child, she tried to move toward her.
‘What’s wrong with me?’
She needed to run to her right now, but Jian’s legs wouldn’t budge.
Just a moment ago, her legs had moved freely, but now it was as if her feet were glued to the ground.
‘Mommy, hurry!’
In the distance, the child was beckoning for her to come quickly.
Seeing this, Jian forced a smile and struggled with all her might to lift her feet.
But the more she struggled, the more firmly her feet seemed to stick to the ground, showing no sign of coming loose.
It was then.
‘Uh, Mom….’
Blood began to pour from the child’s nose.
Watching the scene, unable to move, Jian felt as if her heart were being torn to shreds.
‘Se-Seol-ah. It’s okay. So just a second. Just a second…’
Reading the shocked expression on the child’s face as blood streamed down it, Jian tried to tell her not to worry while desperately trying to move her legs.
But even as the blood from the child’s body flowed to her feet, Jian couldn’t lift them.
Soon, with a thud, the child collapsed.
‘Seo….’
Startled, Jian quickly tried to call the child’s name, but this time, even her voice wouldn’t come out.
She tried to raise her arm to touch her throat, but now she couldn’t even use her arms.
Then, even her vision went dark.
All her senses began to disappear one by one.
Amidst it all, only one remained.
‘Mom, it hurts… It hurts. Mom.’
Only her hearing was left, forced to listen to her child’s cries of pain.
She could feel the life draining from her child’s voice as she cried out in pain.
The more she felt it, the more Jian’s own heart began to stop.
‘Mom….’
Seol-ah.
Seol-ah, my Seol-ah.
“…om.”
My Seol-ah can’t be in pain.
She absolutely can’t be in pain.
“Mom!”
Suddenly, Jian’s eyes flew open.
The first thing she saw was a white hospital ceiling, and to her left, Seol-ah’s face.
“Seol-ah!”
Startled, Jian shot upright.
Grabbing the child’s shoulders, she frantically checked her over.
“Are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?”
“Hehe, I’m okay!”
As Seol-ah replied in a cheerful voice, Jian’s heart eased considerably.
It seemed that seeing Seol-ah bleeding profusely had indeed been a dream.
Seeing the child perfectly fine like this put her mind at ease.
After watching the beaming child for a while, Jian put on a deliberately stern expression and smacked her bottom.
“You, who told you to wander off alone, huh?”
“Mommmy….”
Surprised by the sudden smack from her mother, the child’s lips jutted out and she began to whimper.
Even seeing the child’s expression, Jian did not soften her stern look.
“And who told you to just wander around where there are cars! Didn’t you learn at preschool to look both ways and be careful where there are cars?”
“I did….”
“I told you to do that too! And what were you thinking, going off alone without a grown-up!”
When Jian smacked Seol-ah’s bottom one more time, the child’s body trembled as she burrowed into Jian’s arms.
“I’m sorryyy.”
Seeing the child jump into her arms and say she was sorry, Jian gently stroked her back.
Feeling her mother’s touch, Seol-ah finally began to sob out loud.
Patting Seol-ah’s back, Jian tried to hide the tears that were quietly welling in her own eyes.
This was the first time she had ever hit her child.
She had never so much as laid a hand on her, let alone scolded her harshly.
Seol-ah was a child who always did well on her own without needing to be scolded.
The fact that a day like this had come meant Jian’s heart could not be at peace.
After managing to swallow her tears, Jian lifted Seol-ah and sat her on her lap.
“Seol-ah.”
Sniffle
“yes.”
Wiping the tear-streaked face of her child, she held her gently in her arms.
“Don’t ever do that again. Okay?”
“Okay, I’ll listen to you from now on, Mommy.”
Seol-ah hugged Jian’s neck tightly and buried her face in her shoulder, nodding her head eagerly.
Feeling her shoulder grow damp with the child’s tears, Jian quietly stroked Seol-ah’s back.
Tears welled up in Jian’s eyes once more.
To be able to hold you in my arms again like this, could there be anything more fortunate?
Remembering how she had lost consciousness at the airport after hearing her child was gone, Jian could finally let out a sigh of relief.
‘Seol-ah. I don’t think I can send you away.’
I can’t let you go.
Only after my heart felt like it was breaking at the news of your disappearance do I realize it.
I felt it to my very bones that I couldn’t live for a single moment after sending you away.
‘Seol-ah, Seol-ah, what am I to do with you.’
Jian buried her face in Seol-ah’s shoulder and breathed in her scent.
As mother and daughter felt each other’s presence, the slightly ajar hospital room door clicked shut.
Author: Donggeurami (Son Yoon-seo)
Publisher: Toonplus
Email: [email protected]
ISBN: 9791157738274
© Donggeurami (Son Yoon-seo), 2022
※ This e-book is published by <Toonplus> under contract with the copyright holder. Unauthorized reproduction and distribution are prohibited. Violation may result in legal action.
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