Paranoid Love Affair 101
Paranoid Love Affair chapter 101

101
Is it possible to love the same person for 10 years?
Even between lovers who communicate with each other every day and confirm their affection, it is generally difficult for that feeling to last for two or three years at most.
By the way, is it really possible to have a feeling for someone you can’t even meet that lasts for such a long time?
Even if that’s possible… … . The shape of the mind will certainly not be the same as the first time.
Human beings are absurdly short-sighted creatures.
To put it in better words, it is a very strong short-term bias.
That is why, when there are sad events or happy events, the emotions of those moments will last for a very long time, and sometimes they think that they will rule their whole life.
But in reality it is not.
The sadness that seemed to never be able to escape, the joy that seemed to fill one’s whole life with brilliant light, fades as time passes.
It’s like the cold water that freezes to the bone, the 42 degree Celsius boiling water, where the skin is hot enough to crack, but only the grandfathers exclaim with exclamations, “Oh, that’s cool.”
Perhaps someday, the two will have a similar temperature.
Human emotions are designed to eventually converge to average levels over time.
If there was a transcendent being who drew blueprints, he would have had to pay special attention to that part.
If not, some may end their lives forever in sorrow and despair.
Others may squander their fortunes every day in a party mood.
If a person’s mind continues to be biased toward such an extreme emotional state, that person’s mind is obviously not normal.
That’s not what the designers intended.
it is a malfunction
If a broken heart is classified as a disease just like a physical breakdown such as pneumonia or cataract, what does Yun-woo’s existence mean for Hye-rim?
Like salmonella that causes typhoid and anthrax that causes the body to rot, should Yun-woo, who caused an abnormal state of mind, also be classified as a hospital?
However, to put them on the same line with those germs, for Hyerim, Yoon-woo was an excessively lovable existence.
Even if my heart continues to rot, to the extent that I never want to erase its existence from my life, to the extent that I think that if I do, even the meaning of life will disappear… … .
As I thought, over the past 10 years without Yoon-woo, Hye-rim’s life was losing its meaning.
In the meantime, nothing has appeared that will give Hye-rim a new meaning to her life.
If there was such a thing, would I have been able to forget Yun-woo?
Every morning when I woke up, the place where Hyerim was lying was someone else’s house.
A harmonious home created by a father and a stepmother.
There, Hyerim was living like an unwelcome guest.
In that house, the only person who talked to Hyerim was her father.
And Hyerim hated such a father.
‘What the hell did Dad do wrong?’
‘You didn’t love your mother.’
‘I did my best until the end. Until the last minute, I never betrayed your mother for a second.’
‘How can you be so blatantly… … If you say you love your mother, how can you immediately marry another woman as soon as your mother dies?’
‘What the hell is wrong with that?’
‘Aren’t you sad? The fact that there is no mother in this world now, that the person I love is no longer by my side.’
‘Of course it’s sad.’
‘But how… … .’
‘It’s sad, but that and remarriage are completely different stories.’
‘Why is that a separate story? If you say you love your mother, how can you meet someone else?’
‘You’re still young enough to say that.’
‘What’s the matter with me being young now!?’
‘You are still young, and you think of love and marriage as dreamlike stories from some fairy tale.’
‘… … What do you think Daddy thinks of that?’
‘Marriage is a contract. Love means faithfully keeping the contract. And I kept the contract better than anyone else.’
‘No, how can love be a contract?’
‘Then what do you think?’
‘that’s… … I can’t just cut and define it in other words, but… … At least it’s not as cold as a contract… … .’
‘look. Hyerim. How many boyfriends do you think you’ll have when you grow up? ten people? score? Will we meet endlessly until we get married?’
‘I wouldn’t.’
‘Is that so? The feeling of exhilaration of wanting to give the other person everything in the world is only momentary at first. In the end, there’s something I don’t like about something, so I end up breaking up. And soon, you’ll meet another new man. But according to you, isn’t that love?’
‘no!’
‘Everyone in the world lives that way. But, according to you, what kind of relationship can you call love?’
‘It’s just an exploration. The process of finding someone you really love, trial and error… … . Then I met a real person and got married… … . Isn’t that why daddy married mommy?’
‘What do you really love? What is a genuine person?’
‘that’s… … I only look at that person, and I want that person to be happy… … .’
‘It will still take a long time for you to get out of the fairyland.’
‘… … What do you think, Dad?’
‘Marriage is a process of writing the promises that were only made verbally when we were lovers in a legal document. It means that the relationship I have with the other person has been incorporated into the scope of the family law in the name of marriage.’
‘And?’
‘That’s it. Even if you say that’s all, that’s a huge change.’
‘… … Then why did your father marry your mother? If marriage is just a contract for your dad, why should it have to be your mother? Didn’t anyone else care?’
‘It doesn’t matter who. Hyerim. How important is choosing a contracting partner, how can anyone care? There are very few people in the world who faithfully keep their contracts.’
‘… … How can you speak so coldly? Mom until the end… … I thought daddy loved you… … .’
‘I loved you. Really.’
‘The love that Dad says is… … It’s not love.’
‘That’s just because you’re a teenager.’
‘… … .’
‘You’ll find out when you grow up. There are very few people in the world who are as faithful to each other as your father. I know that most of the people who talk about it with their mouths and don’t even follow the basics of the contract.’
Her mother died when Hyerim was in middle school.
Hyerim was too young to find any more plausible words to refute her father.
And unfortunately, the same goes for old age.
It didn’t change the idea that my father’s words were wrong, but it seemed that the world was full of justifications to reinforce his words.
It was a world of beasts.
If my mother hadn’t died when I was young, if I hadn’t been arguing with my father like that, would Hyerim have been able to live like everyone else?
Was it possible to live a pleasant life by meeting this person and that person, dating 10 or 20 boyfriends, leaving the memories of Yoon-woo as a little bitter growing pains of childhood?
Then could Hyerim not be lonely?
But no matter how you look at it, such a relationship seemed to be all lies in Hyerim’s eyes.
If I thought that the people who approached Hyerim were people who thought like fathers, or worse, if I thought that they were animals driven only by desires, I felt like I was going to get sick with disgust.
After that, Hyerim’s life was all gray.
There was nothing fun about it.
I couldn’t sleep at all because I was afraid that if I closed my eyes at night, I would repeat this boring and meaningless day again tomorrow.
At that time, I kept thinking of Yun-woo’s face.
That face, who was still in the fourth grade of elementary school, the only thing that Hyerim felt was his words and actions… … .
But memories of Yun-woo always end in a nightmare.
Contorting that pretty face, with that innocent look in her eyes full of hatred and staring at Hyerim… … .
Is there any chance that I will meet Yun-woo just because I live a little longer?
Can I apologize for my childhood?
can we talk?
That would be very unlikely.
When the thought reached there, the painful memory, the bitter thoughts came down from the head and passed through the throat to the stomach, and Hyerim’s insides were hurting as if there had been a hole in her stomach.
Then, Hyerim had to hold on to her bitter stomach and spend the long night in pain.
So, since high school, Hyerim had been unable to live her daily life without sleeping pills and antidepressants.
Because I couldn’t sleep without medication.
My father didn’t like Hyerim taking sleeping pills at a young age, but eventually convinced Hyerim that it was inevitable for her to study for the exam because her insomnia was so serious.
But Hyerim was skeptical.
Are college entrance exams really that important?
If you go to a good college, what will be different?
Life was like being in a prison.
A gray hell that repeats endlessly every day that cannot be escaped.
Even if she got better and stronger through exercise, even if she did well on the mock exams and received praise from her teachers, that did not become the meaning of Hyerim’s life.
There were people who talked to Hye-rim, but Hye-rim did not find any meaning in that conversation.
When he came home, Hyerim’s family was not there.
There was no longer Hyerim’s family in this world.
The stepmother wasn’t particularly bad, but she wasn’t particularly good either.
So, I didn’t really want to bother Hyerim, but I didn’t even try to get close to Hyerim.
She was an ordinary person whose children from her own belly mattered the most.
It was a spacious house, but the only place where Hyerim would be was her own room measuring about 3 pyeong.
Lying alone on the bed in that room, listening to the laughter of half-brothers laughing happily outside, I couldn’t help but think of that.
‘Why am I here?’
‘Eat, study, exercise, wash, sleep… … . What are you doing this for?’
‘Tomorrow must be as painful as today, but what is the meaning of living on? … .’
But if he died as it is, it was as if he was affirming his father’s words.
In front of Hye-rim’s body, it seemed that her father would laugh at her.
He said that Hyerim was an immature child, dreaming only of fairy tales, and then she couldn’t stand the cold reality and eventually ran away… … .
So what if you commit suicide?
That was the thought that Hyerim came up with after much deliberation.
It doesn’t matter whoever died together.
If only my father could see someone who collapsed like Hyerim, if only two bodies came out… … .
Wouldn’t that look like a sick and distorted love to people’s eyes, but much deeper than most lovers?
Of course, there is no love there.
it’s just a pretend
Hyerim just wanted to argue with her father.
‘see! Until the end, my life is completely different from my father!’
I thought that it would be good if I could finally refute my father’s words by ending the life that had no meaning anyway.
Looking at Hyerim’s body, I thought that my father would regret even a little that he betrayed his mother, that he did not miss his mother who died, and that he immediately started a new family.
I wanted to cause even a slight disturbance in his happy life.
However… … That plan also failed.
Because I couldn’t find anyone who really wanted to die.
While opening a 1:1 open chat room for companion suicide, Hyerim did not think that the people she would meet would be such people.
They were just hungry people.
People hungry for conversation, people hungry for human relationships, or people who come to see Hyerim as prey because they are hungry for sexuality… … .
They were so disgusting that Hyerim just changed her phone.
I just created a new KakaoTalk ID.
Because there was no human relationship I wanted to continue anyway… … .
In the end, the best choice Hyerim could make was to go to a school as far away from home as possible and live alone.
That was the reason why I left the university in Sinchon where I could apply with the same grades, and dared to apply to the university in Anam, far away.
It was because it seemed that if he left, he would at least not be able to hear his father’s new family laughing and chatting happily.
After passing the entrance exam, I was fortunate enough to think of turning on the cell phone again.
Good thing I didn’t delete the chat room.
It was like a miracle. The moment I turned on the old cell phone, the fact that someone entered the chat room that Hyerim had opened.
The person who uses the nickname ‘tofu soft tofu’, unlike other people so far, was really full of thoughts of dying, and surprisingly had no interest in Hyerim’s personal information.
He looked very depressed, everything in his life seemed to have been suppressed, and death seemed to be a definite fact in his mind.
Perhaps, in the eyes of ordinary people, he would appear to be a very serious patient.
But it was the person Hyerim was looking for.
Isn’t it better to be a genuine patient than to beasts full of lies, pretending to be patients?
He was a man worth dying for.
So, Hyerim’s first thought was, according to her partner’s wishes, that they would talk to each other for three years, and then they would smoke briquettes together and die.
However… … While talking on the phone with the other person from time to time, I started to feel that way more and more. That voice, that way of speaking, and everything he says reminds me of someone who is always standing in the depths of Hyerim’s heart… … .
Is that probabilistically possible?
But if this person really is Yunwoo… … Then Hyerim… … .
Paranoid Love Affair chapter 101

|
ToC
|