____
Yuju
The condensation on my glass slid downward in slow, uneven trails, pooling at the base like something melting under pressure. It was the only thing colder than the silence that had settled over our table. I stared into the amber liquid of my beer, watching the light from the pub's overhead lamps fracture across its surface. The noise around us—laughter, clinking cutlery, the low hum of conversations—felt distant, muffled, as if I were sealed behind thick glass.
"Isn't this completely insane?"
Sora's voice cut through the haze, sharp and incredulous. I flinched almost imperceptibly.
"How could she do that when she knew you were in the group chat?"
She slammed her phone face-down onto the wooden table. The impact was louder than it should have been. I didn't need to look. I already knew what had been on the screen—the image that had been haunting my notifications for the past hour like a persistent bruise pressed again and again.
A wedding invitation.
Mobile. Polished. Immaculate.
Cha Eunseo & Do Hyun.
In the photo, they were smiling—radiant, effortless, perfectly composed. Dressed in wedding attire, framed in soft lighting that made everything look gentle, forgiving. As if nothing ugly had ever happened.
"I was seriously shocked when I saw it," Mina said quietly, her brows drawn together in genuine concern. "How can someone marry a friend's ex like that? And so soon?"
I kept my eyes fixed on the beer. If I looked up, I wasn't sure what would spill out of me—anger, humiliation, or something far worse.
"It's been exactly eight months," I murmured. My voice sounded hollow, unfamiliar, like it belonged to someone else.
"Exactly!" Mina leaned closer, her disbelief sharpening. "Didn't you two date for over three years?"
"Five," I corrected softly.
I took a slow sip, letting the bitterness coat my tongue. "We dated for five years."
The table fell silent.
Five years. Not just time, but history—shared routines, private jokes, holidays spent together, plans spoken aloud and believed in. Five years that had apparently dissolved into nothing in less than one. The realization settled heavily in my chest, pressing down until breathing felt deliberate.
Eunseo.
A colleague. A friend. Someone I had once trusted enough to sit beside me and listen as I spoke about him—about us. And now she was the one walking down the aisle with him.
"A bridal shower?" Sora muttered, scrolling again, disbelief widening her eyes. "She's joking, right? She works at the same company as you. It's actually amazing rumors haven't exploded yet. Should we post this online? People should know what kind of person she is."
"Nah," Mina sighed, shaking her head as she glanced at me. "Don't worry. None of us are going. Obviously."
I wrapped my fingers around the glass and set it down with a firmer thud than intended. The sound echoed my own irritation.
"I don't care," I said, forcing a smile that barely held together. "Go if you want. It's fine. Really."
The lie tasted worse than the beer.
Sora didn't respond right away. She stared at her phone, then back at me. Something in her expression shifted—anger melting into hesitation, then unease.
"Eunseo contacted me separately," she admitted finally, her voice dropping.
The words punched the air out of my lungs.
"She contacted you?"
Mina's head snapped toward her. "Are you out of your mind?" she hissed. "And you accepted the message? What's the point of being good at work if you're this stupid in real life, Sora? Seriously."
I barely heard the rest.
The realization was slow, sinking in like ice water. Eunseo wasn't just getting married. She was deliberately reaching into my inner circle, threading herself into places she knew would hurt. She wanted witnesses. Validation. Proof that she had won.
My hand trembled slightly as I reached for the glass again.
I remembered the phone call from earlier—the way my fingers had gripped my phone so tightly my knuckles turned white. Eunseo's voice had been calm, almost gentle, which somehow made it worse.
"Don't pretend to be the victim," she had said.
"What did you tell everyone about me?"
She had even suggested—casually, cruelly—that I hadn't liked Heojun that much anyway. As if five years could be rewritten so easily.
Back at the table, I forced myself to breathe evenly.
"If it was an apology, I wouldn't have accepted it," I said quietly, my gaze fixed on the wood grain beneath my hands. "She said she doesn't expect forgiveness. She just wanted to tell us… said we're the only high school friends she still has left."
The irony almost made me laugh.
I could feel their eyes on me—pity, confusion, restrained fury swirling together.
"Asking for permission is weird," I added, a brittle laugh slipping out before I could stop it. "And giving it is weird too. So I told her to do whatever she wants."
I exhaled slowly, then looked up, forcing myself to meet their gazes.
"Let's stop talking about depressing stuff," I said, trying to sound light. "We finally managed to meet after so long. It's hard enough to match schedules after work."
The words hung there, fragile and unconvincing.
But no one argued.
And just like that, the conversation moved on—leaving the weight of everything unsaid sitting firmly in my chest, waiting.
The condensation on my glass was the only thing grounding me as the world seemed to tilt subtly off its axis. Tiny droplets slid down the smooth surface, collecting at the base like something quietly unraveling. I stared into the amber liquid, its surface trembling slightly each time the table shifted, the overhead lights splintering into fractured reflections. The restaurant around us was alive—laughter bursting from nearby tables, plates clinking, servers calling out orders—but all of it felt distant, like I was listening from underwater.
"Isn't this completely insane?"
Sora's voice cut through the haze, sharp and indignant. It landed like a crack in glass.
"How could she do that when she knew you were in the group chat?"
She shoved her phone toward the center of the table with enough force that it rattled against the wood. My eyes flicked toward it before I could stop myself. There it was—clean, polished, merciless. A digital wedding invitation, pristine in design and tone, as if nothing about it was wrong.
By Do Hyun & Cha Eunseo.
In the photo, they were smiling, radiant in white and soft pastels, bodies angled toward each other in an effortless intimacy. They looked happy. Worse—they looked unquestioned. As if the world had already accepted this version of events.
"I was seriously shocked when I saw it," Mina said, her brows knitting together as she glanced between me and the screen. "How can someone marry a friend's ex like that? And so fast…"
I didn't look up. I couldn't trust my face. Instead, I watched the bubbles in my beer rise and burst, over and over, a quiet cycle of appearing and disappearing.
"Hasn't it even been a year?" Sora asked, her voice softening as she looked at me. "You and that guy broke up not long ago."
"Exactly eight months," I murmured.
The number lived permanently at the back of my mind, branded there without my consent. Eight months since the breakup. Eight months since everything I thought was stable quietly collapsed.
"Exactly!" Mina leaned forward, disbelief flashing across her face. "Didn't you two date for over three years?"
I lifted the glass and took a long, slow sip, letting the bitterness spread across my tongue and down my throat. It burned slightly, grounding me in a way nothing else could.
Five years, I corrected silently.
Half a decade.
Five birthdays. Five winters. Five years of shared routines, shared silences, shared futures spoken aloud as if saying them made them permanent.
All of it reduced to a footnote in someone else's happily-ever-after.
"A bridal shower?" Sora scoffed, scrolling again, her face flushing a deeper red with every second. "She's joking, right? She works at the same company as you—it's honestly shocking the rumors haven't exploded yet. Should we post this online? Let everyone know what she's really like?"
"Nah," Mina said firmly, shaking her head as she glanced at me. "Don't worry. None of us are going."
I set my glass down with a dull, solid thud. The sound felt heavier than it should have been, like punctuation.
"I don't care," I said. My voice surprised even me—steady, flat, almost calm. "Go if you want. It's fine."
The words were empty, but they were all I had.
The atmosphere shifted then, subtle but unmistakable. The air thickened. I looked up to see Sora no longer meeting my gaze. Her shoulders had drawn inward, her hands fidgeting in her lap.
"Eunseo contacted me separately," she said quietly.
The words settled slowly, painfully.
"She contacted you?" Mina's voice shot up, sharp and incredulous. "Are you out of your mind? And you accepted it? Are you stupid? What's the point of being good at work if you're this much of an idiot? Ugh, seriously."
Their voices overlapped, frustration and disbelief tangling together, but I barely heard them. My attention drifted back to the phone on the table, to the invitation glowing softly against the dim lighting.
Eunseo wasn't just moving on.
She was marking territory—testing boundaries, reaching into my social circle with deliberate precision, seeing who might bend, who might break, who might follow. It wasn't enough to take him. She wanted the context. The audience. The quiet confirmation that what she'd done would be accepted.
I felt strangely detached as I stared at the date at the bottom of the invitation.
May 23, 2025.
They were planning a future—venues, dresses, guest lists—while I was still sitting here, counting months, staring into a half-finished drink, trying to understand how something so solid had disappeared so completely.
The girl I thought I knew.
The friend I thought I had.
As I looked at the invitation one last time, a dull realization settled in my chest—not sharp enough to hurt, just heavy enough to stay.
That "friend" had never existed at all.
The Breaking Point
"That suffocated me, you know?"
The moment the words left my mouth, they felt heavier than I expected—like something rusted loose after being wedged inside me for years. My voice trembled, but it didn't waver. I finally looked at him properly, not through habit or hope, but with clarity. And in that clarity, the man I had once loved no longer resembled anyone familiar. He stood there, solid and unmoved, like a stranger occupying a face I used to trust.
"Even if it wasn't Cha Eunseo," I continued, the name burning as it passed my lips, "we were already done."
He didn't interrupt. He never did. He just stared at me with that same cold, unreadable expression—the one that used to make me swallow my words and retreat into myself. But this time, I didn't shrink. The fear that once held me in place had already cracked.
"Honestly," I said, my voice growing steadier with every word, "even without her, we were finished. We were only 'dating' in name. We never seriously prepared for marriage. We never did proper family introductions. We were just… a ghost of a couple."
The silence between us stretched, thick and oppressive. I could almost hear all the things we'd avoided saying piling up between our breaths.
"Do you remember how we didn't sleep together for over five months?" I let out a bitter laugh, one that scraped my throat raw. "I don't even know why you're so angry now." My chest tightened, but I didn't stop. "Did you ever treat me like a person even once?"
Something flickered in his eyes then—dark, volatile. It was a look I knew too well. The one that came right before his patience snapped, the one he never showed anyone else. For everyone else, he was controlled, polite, reasonable. With me, he didn't bother pretending.
"Do others know you're like this?" I pressed, my heart pounding harder now, adrenaline flooding my limbs. "One little shift in your mood and you explode. You spend your whole life acting nice in front of others, but with me—"
"Don't pretend to be the victim."
His voice was low, sharp, cutting through me as he stepped closer. The space between us collapsed instantly, the air turning dense, electric, filled with years of unspoken resentment. Before I could react, his hand shot out and clamped around my wrist.
I gasped.
The grip was tight—too tight. The heat of his hand burned against my skin, a violent contrast to the coldness of his words. Fear surged through me, immediate and undeniable.
"Don't touch me!" I shouted, panic ripping through my composure as I tried to wrench my arm free. "I'll scream! I swear to god, I'll scream!"
For a split second, his jaw tightened. His grip held. I could see it—the internal struggle etched into his face. Rage battling restraint. Control slipping. He hated this moment. Hated that I was no longer quiet. Hated that I was no longer afraid.
"Ha… damn…"
The sound escaped him, low and frustrated. Then, abruptly, he let go.
My wrist throbbed where he'd held me, the phantom heat of his fingers lingering even after the contact was gone. I took a step back, breath uneven, my whole body buzzing with the aftermath of fear and fury colliding.
He didn't look at me again. Without another word, he turned and walked toward his car, movements sharp and final. The engine roared to life, the sound slicing through the night like a last provocation.
"I'll consider it an appropriate wedding gift," he called out coldly, not turning back. "I'm leaving."
The door slammed. The car pulled away.
I stood frozen on the sidewalk, watching the red taillights shrink until they disappeared completely. The silence that followed was suffocating in a different way—heavy, absolute. My knees finally gave out, and I sank down onto the curb, pulling my knees to my chest as the weight of everything crashed down on me.
The wedding.
The irony of it all pressed painfully at my temples. If we were never serious—if we never prepared—then why had we chosen the same vendors? The contradiction throbbed like an old bruise.
My hands shook as I reached into my bag and pulled out a cigarette. The lighter clicked twice before it caught. The first drag burned my lungs, harsh and grounding. I welcomed the sting.
I glanced at my phone. A photo of us stared back at me—smiling, oblivious, frozen in a time when I still believed.
Is she kind? Cool? Or just stupid?
I could already hear the whispers, the judgments.
Cool? Not at all.
Even if I let it go, it would amount to nothing. I was doing well at work. I didn't need anyone's concern. Showing anger now would only make me look weak, pathetic.
Losing a long-term partner—and a ten-year friend—at the same time was miserable enough.
I didn't need pity.
I just needed to breathe.
The cold night air gnawed at my skin, slipping through the thin fabric of my coat, but it was nothing compared to the chill that had settled deep in my chest. That cold had been growing quietly for a long time now, spreading through me in slow, unnoticed layers. I looked at the man standing in front of me—someone I had shared years with, memories stacked so tightly they once felt inseparable—and all I felt was exhaustion. Bone-deep. Heavy. Final.
"That suffocated me, you know?"
The words left my mouth barely louder than a whisper, but they carried the weight of every argument I had swallowed, every apology I had made just to keep the peace. My voice didn't shake. It surprised me.
"Even if it wasn't Cha Eunseo, we were already done."
He didn't react. Not outwardly. He stood there with that familiar, practiced mask—the calm, controlled expression he wore so well in front of everyone else. The one that used to make me question myself instead.
"Honestly," I continued, something steady and unfamiliar anchoring me, "even without her, we were finished. We were just 'dating' in name only. We never seriously prepared for marriage. We never did the full family introductions. We were just going through the motions of a life we both knew was empty."
His jaw tightened. Just slightly. It was the only crack in the armor, but I saw it. I always did.
"Remember how we didn't sleep together for over five months?" The memory rose uninvited, absurd and painful all at once. I let out a breath that hovered somewhere between a laugh and a sob. "I honestly don't know why you're so angry now." My chest ached, but the words kept coming. "Did you ever treat me like a person even once? Or was I just a convenient habit you didn't know how to quit?"
"You act like you're fine with everyone else," he shot back, his voice low, sharp with that familiar bitterness. "But you can be mean to me. I didn't even expect anything from you."
Heat flared behind my eyes—not tears yet, but close. "Do others know you're like this?" I asked, the words cutting deeper now. "A tiny twist in your mood and you explode. You spend so much energy pretending to be nice in front of others, maintaining that perfect image."
"Don't pretend to be the victim."
He stepped toward me, his voice hissing the words like a warning.
Before I could step back, his hand shot out. His fingers clamped around my wrist, hard—too hard. The suddenness of it stole the air from my lungs. I looked down at his hand, then up at his face, and for the first time, I saw him without illusion. The raw anger he usually kept buried was right there, unfiltered and dangerous.
"Don't touch me," I snapped, fear and fury tangling together in my chest. I tried to pull away, but his grip tightened instead. "I'll scream. I swear, I'll scream right here."
For a moment, he didn't let go. His jaw clenched, the muscle jumping as if he were wrestling with himself.
"Ha… damn…"
The sound escaped him, low and frustrated. Then, abruptly, his hand released me, recoiling as if I had burned him.
I pulled my arm back instinctively, clutching it close to my body. My wrist throbbed where he had held it, the phantom heat of his fingers lingering long after the contact was gone. The silence that followed pressed in from all sides—thick, absolute, suffocating in a way words no longer could.
Whatever we once had ended there. Not with shouting. Not with tears. But with that silence—final and irreversible.
I sat on the cold concrete curb later, the chill seeping through my clothes, grounding me in the present. Between my fingers, a cigarette burned down slowly, its ember the only warmth I could feel. My phone buzzed against my ear, and the voice on the other end—one that used to comfort me—felt unbearably heavy.
"Oh, Yuju," she said brightly. "I… I couldn't tag you on Insta. Sorry. I felt weird the moment I posted, so I called. Did you see it?"
I stared at the asphalt, the yellow road lines blurring together. "Ah, no," I lied, my voice roughened by smoke. "I didn't."
"Yeah, I'm glad you're okay with it," she continued quickly, slipping into that defensive tone I recognized instantly. "I mean, Eunseo helped when my mom was sick. So… ugh, I really dislike her, but I can't shake the feeling because she helped."
My eyes closed. The smoke burned, but I welcomed it. I remembered those days too clearly. While Eunseo was being praised for "helping," I was the one who stayed. The one who waited in hospital corridors. The one who didn't leave.
"I was the one who stayed with her at the hospital the whole time," I muttered, mostly to myself.
"Yeah, yeah, I know," she replied, dismissive without meaning to be cruel. "Don't worry. But we're really on your side. You know that, right?"
The words made my chest ache. If they were on my side, why was I sitting alone in the dark while photos were being posted with someone I couldn't even look at?
"Ah, just go on a blind date," she added suddenly, her voice brightening. "I know a really good guy."
I didn't want a good guy.
I wanted loyalty.
I wanted honesty.
But I was too tired to explain that.
"Okay," I said quietly, my thumb already hovering over the screen. "Next time."
Click.
I stood up slowly, my joints stiff from the cold. I looked down at the cigarette—now just a filter and a fading spark—and flicked it into the bin.
I was tired.
Tired of speaking honestly only to be ignored. Tired of the emotional gymnastics required just to tolerate people. Tired of the exhausting effort it took to either like someone or fully hate them. In the end, it all felt the same—hollow.
I turned away from the curb and began to walk. The city lights stretched out ahead of me, glittering and artificial. Couples passed by, friends laughed in clusters, invisible threads of likes and tags floating between them.
Love isn't necessary anymore, I thought.
It's nothing special.
Luckily, in this era, romance is even more common than cigarette butts on the street.
And just as easily discarded.
Understood. Below is a strict expansion of the given passage only—same sequence, same information, same emotional endpoint.
No new scenes, no meeting with J, no future events added. The prose simply deepens what already exists.
---
I sat on the cold concrete curb, the chill seeping through the fabric of my coat and into my bones. A cigarette burned slowly between my fingers, its faint orange glow pulsing with each breath I took. The city hummed around me—engines idling, footsteps passing, distant laughter—but it all felt detached, like background noise in a life I was no longer fully inside.
My phone vibrated in my hand.
The screen lit up, and before I even answered, I saw it—the post I wasn't supposed to see, or at least wasn't meant to be included in. A group photo. Familiar faces. Bright smiles. Arms slung casually around one another. And there, unmistakably, was Eunseo—right in the center, radiant, accepted, untouched.
The call connected.
"Oh… I… I couldn't tag you on Insta. Sorry."
Her voice was light, almost cheerful, but threaded with just enough guilt to sound sincere. Not enough to stop her from posting, though. Not enough to make her take it down.
I didn't respond right away. I stared at the image on my screen, the laughter frozen in pixels, mocking in its permanence.
"I felt weird the moment I posted, so I called," she continued quickly, filling the silence. "Did you see it?"
"Ah, no," I lied, my voice dull and flat. "I didn't."
The cigarette trembled slightly between my fingers as ash dropped onto the pavement.
"Yeah… I'm glad you're okay with it," she said, relief slipping into her tone before it shifted again, defensive now. "I mean, Eunseo helped when my mom was sick. So… ugh, I really dislike her, but I can't shake the feeling because she helped."
I lowered my gaze to the glowing tip of the cigarette. Smoke curled upward, thinning as it disappeared into the night. My chest tightened, not with anger, but with something heavier—resignation.
"I was the one who stayed with her at the hospital the whole time," I muttered.
The words felt fragile as they left me, easily breakable, like they could vanish the moment they hit the air. I remembered the plastic chairs, the harsh hospital lighting, the hours that blurred into one another. I remembered being there when it mattered—quietly, consistently—without expecting anything in return.
"Yeah, I know. Don't worry," she replied quickly, brushing past it with practiced ease. "But we're really on your side. You know that, right?"
The contradiction made my stomach twist.
If they were on my side, why did it feel like I was the only one standing alone?
"Doesn't matter," I said under my breath.
"Oh! Just go on a blind date," she added suddenly, her voice brightening as if she'd found the perfect solution. "I know a really good guy."
I closed my eyes. Fatigue settled deep into my limbs, heavy and undeniable. I didn't want a good guy. I didn't want a replacement. I didn't want distraction disguised as concern.
"Okay," I said quietly. "Next time. Let's do it next time."
I ended the call before she could respond.
The silence afterward felt vast. Honest.
I stayed there for a while, watching the cigarette burn down to its filter. When it finally died, I flicked it into the bin beside me and stood up slowly, my joints stiff from the cold.
I was tired.
Tired of speaking honestly only to have my words softened, repackaged, or ignored. Tired of the exhausting binary—liking someone, or investing the energy it took to truly hate them. Both required effort. Both drained me the same way.
The crosswalk ahead flooded with people as the signal changed. Neon lights reflected off glass and asphalt, bathing the street in artificial color. Couples passed by, friends laughed, strangers brushed past each other without a second glance.
Love isn't necessary anymore, I thought.
It isn't rare. It isn't sacred.
It's nothing special.
I stepped forward and merged into the crowd, another figure swallowed by the city. In this era, romance was everywhere—cheap, abundant, and disposable.
Just like cigarette butts on the street.
And for the first time, I felt relieved that it was.
---
The shadowy corner of the alley felt like a different world, severed from the sterile brightness of the studio just a few meters away. The air here was damp and cold, carrying the faint metallic scent of rain-soaked concrete. Somewhere beyond the walls, the city continued to breathe—cars passing, voices overlapping, life unfolding—but none of it reached this narrow strip of darkness. I stood still for a moment, my heels grounded against the brick pavement, unsure whether I had stepped into a place I was never meant to see.
Then I saw him.
He wasn't where someone like him should have been. Not under the white lights, not surrounded by stylists and assistants, not framed by cameras waiting to immortalize his face. Instead, he was folded into the shadows, his tall frame hunched as though the darkness itself was pressing down on him. He looked smaller somehow, diminished—not by stature, but by grief.
"Hello," I said, my voice cutting through the silence more sharply than I intended. "Editor Han Yuju, from the magazine Seoura."
The words felt stiff, rehearsed, completely out of place here.
He didn't respond right away. He didn't even look up. For a second, I wondered if he had heard me at all. The faint light from the streetlamp caught the outline of his shoulders, the expensive fabric of his clothes creased in a way that suggested he had been there for a while. I felt an uncomfortable twist in my chest.
I was here to conduct an interview. To ask curated questions, to capture polished answers, to package a public image neatly onto glossy pages. But standing there, I realized with a dull shock that I hadn't even properly reviewed his profile before coming. I had only known the persona—the face, the reputation, the name everyone recognized. I had never stopped to consider the person behind it.
Then he shifted slightly, and the light betrayed him.
The glimmer on his cheeks wasn't sweat or rain.
He was crying.
The realization landed heavily, like something fragile cracking inside me. It was an almost cruel irony. Here was a man celebrated for his beauty, for his elaborate styling and immaculate makeup, for a face sculpted perfectly for admiration. Every public image of him was flawless, distant, untouchable. And yet, here he was—tears carving quiet paths through his makeup, unraveling in a place no one was supposed to notice.
"…You're the editor?" he finally asked. His voice was thick, restrained, as if every word had to be forced past something lodged painfully in his throat.
"Yes," I replied quickly, heat creeping up my neck. "But—I didn't follow you. I had something to take care of here. I was just about to go to the waiting room anyway…"
I stopped myself too late. I was rambling, trying to justify my presence as though I were the one who had done something wrong. The coincidence felt too sharp, too intrusive. His eyes lifted then, meeting mine, red-rimmed and unguarded. The sight made it difficult to breathe normally, let alone maintain any sense of professional distance.
He stood slowly, unfolding to his full height, and the alley suddenly felt narrower, the walls closer. Even hunched, even broken, his presence was overwhelming. I swallowed, my instincts as an editor surfacing—not to exploit, not to observe, but to protect the integrity of what came next.
I couldn't let him walk into a photoshoot like this. Cameras were merciless. They would capture every fracture, every tremor beneath the makeup. They would turn this moment into something permanent.
Almost without thinking, I reached into my bag and pulled out a clean handkerchief.
"If it's hard to control your emotions," I said, keeping my voice steady, gentle, "take a break."
I held it out to him. Our fingers didn't touch, but the space between us felt charged. His eyes lingered on my face, searching—judging. For a brief, suspended second, the titles dissolved. There was no editor, no talent, no hierarchy or spotlight. Just two people standing in a forgotten corner of the city, sharing a moment that was too raw, too human to belong anywhere else.
In that silence, I made a quiet promise to myself.
Whatever happened next, whatever words were exchanged later, this moment would stay here—unwritten, unseen, and untouched.