[EXTENDED FLASHBACK – Age 17 to 18]
My day always started before the sun rose. While my classmates were probably still asleep in their warm beds, I was sweeping the floors, scrubbing the kitchen tiles, and boiling water for tea—burning my fingers when I got too slow. If breakfast wasn't ready by 6 a.m., mother would throw the plates again.
"Lazy girls grow up to be useless wives."
That line was carved into my brain, just like the fading bruise on my upper arm from the last time I fell behind on laundry. I went to school on foot—thirty minutes one way—because a bus pass was a "luxury." My shoes were torn on the sides, my bag was stitched by my own hands. Still, I always topped the class. Always.
But no one came to parent-teacher meetings. No one smiled when my name echoed in prize announcements. Instead, I got home to more chores. More yelling.
"We feed you, we clothe you, and this is how you repay us? With attitude?" they'd shout. I never even knew what I did wrong.
At seventeen, I started part-time work after school at a flower shop, just to save up for college. But when they found out? They took my earnings. Every single coin.
"You live under our roof. You'll give us what's ours," they said.
I washed clothes. Pressed my father's shirts. Cooked like a machine. And still, they called me a burden. Birthdays passed like any other day.
No cakes. No gifts. No hugs. Just a passing comment from my so-called mother: "Don't expect anything special. Be grateful we even raised you."
They never told me who I was. Never showed me a baby photo. No stories about the day I was born. Nothing. Just a girl with no name of her own… living someone else's punishment.
Then, they forced an engagement on me at eighteen. A man ten years older. Cold. Arrogant. Greedy. I was told to smile. Told to obey.
"You're lucky someone even agreed to marry you. Don't ruin this for us," they warned.
Lucky? I wasn't lucky. I was sold. And I couldn't run. I had no family. No money. No voice. So I did the only thing I knew how to do. I suffered in silence. Smiling at school, laughing with friends... then crying into a pillow in a store room at night.
[PRESENT DAY — Staring at Taehyun, alone in his room after the chaos]
And now he's here. This man I'm married to. Who claims he was watching me, protecting me, choosing me.
But… why?
Why would anyone choose a girl like me?
The broken girl. The discarded daughter. The sold-out soul. Even if my heart is beginning to fall... my mind is still trapped in that cold house, in that suffocating silence, in that echo of a lie:
"You are nothing."
I looked at Taehyun, his sleeping face looking so peaceful, so different from the monsters of my past. I reached out, my hand trembling, barely hovering over his cheek.
"Did you really see me back then?" I whispered, my voice cracking. "Or are you just another beautiful cage?"
[DREAM SEQUENCE – ethereal, slow motion]
It always begins the same.
A soft wind,
a dim golden streetlight,
the scent of coffee and wet earth.
And him.
A man.
Faceless.
Yet heartbreakingly familiar.
His silhouette always standing at a distance—
watching… guarding… loving.
Not with words.
But with presence.
Powerful. Unshakable. Eternal.
Like he was woven into the threads of my soul before I was born.
And beside him…
A girl.
She calls me by a name that feels like home.
Her voice is sunlight.
Her smile—pure, like spring mornings.
She holds my hand when I'm scared.
Brushes my hair when I cry.
Sings me lullabies I've never heard…
yet somehow, I remember every word.
My sister.
But… I don't have a sister.
Do I?
They both appear again and again in my dreams.
Different places.
Different ages.
But always together.
Always mine.
The man never speaks.
But he moves mountains behind my back.
At the café I used to work—
I'd hear whispers:
"Don't yell at her. The boss said she's off-limits."
"I saw a guy threatening the manager last night."
"She must have someone powerful watching over her."
I laughed it off.
Scolded by no one.
Protected by ghosts.
I thought I was just lucky.
But maybe…
I was being guarded.
From the shadows.
From a distance.
By someone who loved me more than I loved myself.
I never saw his face.
But every time I closed my eyes,
I felt his presence wrap around me—warm and invisible.
Not a dream.
Not memory.
Not even déjà vu.
More like…
A promise.
One I once made.
Or one that was made to me.
Maybe love doesn't always arrive in grand gestures.
Maybe, sometimes, it lingers in silence.
Like a red thread around your pinky—
tugging you gently back to your truth.
[INNER MONOLOGUE – late night, maybe after the dream or while looking at Taehyun sleeping beside ]
Why… why am I feeling like this?
I shouldn't be falling for Taehyung.
He's my husband now.
He's real.
He's here.
And yet… something in me aches like I'm betraying someone.
Someone…
from my past?
From a memory I no longer have?
A faceless man who haunts my dreams with warmth and silence?
What if I loved someone else before?
What if he's out there—still waiting for me, searching for me?
What if I already belonged to someone…
before Taehyun?
Then who am I?
Is this my real name?
Was Taehyun telling the truth—that those people I called "parents"… weren't mine?
If that's true…
Then who raised me?
Why was I treated like a burden, a pawn?
God… what's happening to me?
I feel strange…
Like I'm living someone else's life.
Like I've been split in two.
And now I'm caught between two men—
One who walks in my reality.
One who walks in my dreams.
One with eyes that burn like wildfire.
One whose touch I've never felt, but whose presence lingers like air.
Taehyun…
My husband.
The man who married me through blood and secrets.
The man I'm starting to trust.
Starting to fall for.
But the other?
I don't know his name.
I don't even know if he exists.
But I feel like… like my heart already knew him.
Is that possible?
Am I falling in love with two men?
No… No!
I hate love triangles.
I always have.
They're messy and painful and unfair to everyone.
So what is this?
Am I overthinking?
Am I just scared of accepting love—real love—from Taehyun?
Or…
Is that man from my past?
Or some past life?
But I don't even believe in past lives!
I believe in one life.
One truth.
One heart.
But now—
Even that one heart feels torn…
Between the dream and the reality.
Between fate and choice.
Between what I forgot…
and what I'm beginning to feel.
♡Late night, bedroom dimly lit.
The bedroom was dimly lit, the only sound the soft rustle of paper as Taehyun sat by the window. I walked in, clutching a glass of water, my knuckles white as I tried to hide the tremble in my hands. I sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the floor, trying to sound like I was just making conversation.
"Taehyun… do you think I had someone in my past?" I asked lightly.
"Hm?" He flipped a page, his tone just as casual. "What do you mean?"
I forced a small, hollow laugh. "Like… a lover? Ex? Husband? I mean… maybe I was in love before all this? Before you?"
His hands stopped moving. The silence that followed was heavy. He finally looked up at me, his brows slightly drawn, sensing the tension vibrating beneath my forced calm.
"Why are you asking that all of a sudden?" Taehyun asked.
"No reason!" I said quickly, taking a sip of water. "Just… curious. You know, amnesia and all that. I don't remember my childhood. My parents said it's because of some accident—medical amnesia. They even had a report." My voice dropped to a whisper.
"But sometimes… I feel like there's more. Like there's… someone I forgot."
He watched me in silence. I kept my eyes on the water in my glass, terrified of what he might see in them.
"I don't know if you had someone," Taehyun said calmly. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, closing the distance between us.
"But even if you did… he's not here now."
"What if he's waiting?" I whispered.
"Then he's late," Taehyun replied, his voice a little sharper, a little more jagged.
I finally looked up. His eyes were intense—not with anger, but with something that looked like a deep, old wound. Maybe even fear. He stood up, stepped closer, and knelt on the floor in front of me so we were eye-to-level.
"I don't know who you were before," Taehyun said softly. "I don't even know if you had someone. But I do know one thing. Whoever he was… he let you suffer. He didn't find you. He didn't protect you." His voice broke just slightly. "I did."
I clutched the glass tighter, my heart thudding against my ribs like a trapped bird.
"But… why do I feel like you and that man… are both pulling at my heart?" I asked, my voice barely audible.
He paused, his gaze searching mine, before he spoke the words that chilled me to the bone.
"Then maybe one of us is your present…"
Taehyun said. "…and the other is your fate."