CH 60

“Something is going on between you two, isn’t there?” Lee-yeon raised the cup of coffee to her mouth.

She often seemed lost in thought and Kwon Chae-woo had no eyes for anything except her. Choo-ja was certain something had happened between them.

“What?” Lee-yeon asked. Her hands holding the coffee cup trembled slightly.

Choo-ja narrowed her eyes. “Did you do it with him?”

“What?”

“Was it good?”

“Choo-ja!”

“Looks like you perfectly know what I am talking about.” Choo-ja laughed. She smiled teasingly at Lee-yeon who was fanning herself and trying to hide her blushing cheeks.

Lee-yeon had been seventeen when her parents had run away. They had met their deaths on the same day. Choo-ja had met the girl at the funeral. She had been skinny and pale with long black hair. She had looked like a ghost herself.

Her father’s funeral had been in the room on the left and her mother’s, on the right. The girl had looked very lost in between. In the end, the girl had lowered her head and stood there frozen. The townspeople who came to pay their respects frowned at her.

Choo-ja, at that time, had just reunited with the love of her life. She had seen the girl at the funeral. Apparently, one of them was her fiancé’s distant relative. Ch—ja had glanced at the young girl while she helped with the funeral. Lee-yeon had stood there numb and frozen as though she couldn’t feel anything anymore.

Like a dead tree.

Nobody went near her or talked to her. Only the family that was in mourning directed at her a murderous look from time to time.

They looked at her as though they were going to cut down this dead tree if they had the chance. It was a bizarre moment.

However, Choo-ja was quick to see that no matter how they looked at her, Lee-yeon was the one who held the family together.

The family came together in shared hatred for her. Not love.

Choo-ja understood that someone who grew up in families like that would lack the ability to trust someone else. Despite being so young, she had looked so tired and despairing.

Choo-ja had been mesmerized by her at that time. Lee-yeon was kicked out of her family’s house after that and she kept transitioning between her distant relatives’ households. In the end, Choo-ja had asked the poor girl to come live with her and her lover. The three of them had lived happily. Until Choo-ja’s fiancé, the poet, had passed away from cancer.

He was the first and the last man Choo-ja gave her heart to. Lee-yeon had watched her live in love. This time Choo-ja wanted to do the same. She wanted to see Lee-yeon surrounded by love.

“Lee-yeon.”

“Yes?”

“Don’t be afraid.”

Lee-yeon stared at Choo-ja.

“I know you have grown up in a place without much love or happiness, but you are strong.” Sometimes, Choo-ja couldn’t figure out whether Lee-yeon was strong or actually foolish. She didn’t know whether Lee-yeon was frugal or hopeless. But Choo-ja wanted Lee-yeon, for once, to desire more for herself. She wanted Lee-yeon to take a chance in life with people.

Neither Hwaido nor the hospital, may she find the home she so misses, Choo-ja prayed.

“Love can sometimes appear like a natural disaster which destroys everything in its wake,” said Choo-ja. “But not everyone ends up like your parents.”

Lee-yeon’s face darkened at the mention of her parents.

“You already know the joy of love.”

“What?”

“Is it a singing tree?”

Lee-yeon’s eyes widened.

***

The little girl who isolated herself from everyone else in the world started to heal. She felt welcomed in the lush greenery, away from people.

“Lee-yeon, what are you thinking about?”

“Trees.”

Kwon Chae-woo raised his eyebrows at her answer.

This day was same as every other day except Choo-ja had gotten mad at her for leaving the celebrations in the middle. But the celebrations were days ago.

『Recently, illegal harvesting of forest products such as matsutake mushrooms, pine nuts, wild medicinal herbs, and wild ginseng has been on the rise. 』

The voice of the new reporter on the TV filled the living room. Lee-yeon hadn’t been herself after the celebrations. She often found herself spacing out and staring blankly at nothing in particular.

『Recently, their method has become more sophisticated. They began to move systematically to avoid crackdowns. Reporter Hwang Ji-yeon on the report』

Suddenly, the TV was turned off and static flared on the surface of the screen. It was only then that she was wrenched back to the present. Lee-yeon turned her head in confusion and met Kwon Chae-woo’s eyes, who held his chin up on his palm and looked at her.

“Why did you turn off the TV?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I need attention,” said Kwon Chae-woo. His eyes looked dreamy and he had a ready smile on his lips. It gave her goosebumps. “What should I do to get your attention? Should I bite your shoes and bark like a dog?” he leaned closer to Lee-yeon.

“You always leave me alone,” he said. “What are you thinking about so intensely? You seem more lost these days than ever before.”

“I…um…,” mumbled Lee-yeon. ‘I was thinking about a… tree.” Lee-yeon scratched her head. She wasn’t lying.

A singing tree…

Choo-ja had brought up precious memories from her past that Lee-yeon had forgotten. She had never expected for her past to come up.

“A tree…,” kwon Chae-woo frowned. “My wife seems to be lost in thought about thick trees and she can’t even spare a second to look at her husband’s d**k.”

“It’s not like that!” Lee-yeon protested.