Chapter Text
Upon entering the highway, Soo-hyun rolled down his windows and felt the breeze hit his cheek as his car picked up speed. It took him a minute's worth of an epiphany after finishing all sixteen episodes of It's Okay for a second marathon to finally pick up his phone and give his eomma a call. He took a weekend off and drove to the countryside where he purchased a holiday home for her away from the hustle and bustle of Seoul.
"Soo-hyunah!" his mom greeted excitedly from the porch when his car pulled up the driveway. The place was quaint, but it was quiet - exactly what he needed. When Soo-hyun closed his car door, his mom almost knocked him over from a tight embrace, making him drop his two-week old Rieti sunglasses to the floor. "Nope, this is exactly what I need," Soo-hyun said quietly, much to his mother's confusion. She held up his face and inspected it from all angles, and he wondered if she too could sense the tension he's been holding in. "Aigoo, I can tell you've been eating more takeaway lately! Have you been drinking again?" she slapped Soo-hyun's cheek affectionately.
Soo-hyun caught her hand before she could tap his face again. "Eomma, that's why I came here, so you can cook for me." He grinned as his eomma looked at him suspiciously. "You really think I can't read you from a mile away," she said. " Tsk, tsk. I don't know how you win awards with a face that tells it all." Smiling, Soo-hyun pulled her in for another hug. "It's true though, I did miss you that's why I came." And he meant it. Sensing Soo-hyun's pulse quicken, his eomma's brows furrowed in worry at the memory of his surgery years ago. "Arasseo, as long as my son's here, whatever reason it is. Come, help me with the pork cutlets." They walked towards the house with Soo-hyun's bag in tow.
A few hours after lunch, Soo-hyun tucked his mom in as she slept on his shoulder while watching television. His feet brought him to the veranda overlooking the green mountains and clouds mooring over the horizon, a storm foreboding. He snapped a photo, making a mental note to post it at some point that week. He always loved looking up and seeing the skies in all its unique iterations, but Soo-hyun knew his poignant fascination with it recently had a different cause. He sat down on the grass and recounted his conversation with her only a few months back.
"Why do you like taking pictures of the sky?" Yea-ji had asked him once as they walked down the seaside pavement towards the lighthouse. They had just finished shooting their scenes with the car for Episode 9 and were then given half an hour to enjoy the scenery before they packed up. "I don't know exactly," Soo-hyun said. He always struggled with his own words when articulating his interests, something that seemed so natural for her that he thought he at least ought to try. "But I find it fascinating that the sky always looks different in almost every photo."
Yea-ji perked up beside him, the corners of her mouth forming a smile. "Reminds you of infinity?" she followed up. "Infinity, yes, that's the word," Soo-hyun answered, his gaze landing upon her face. "Why, does it look like infinity to you too?" he asked.
"No, the opposite actually," Yea-ji bowed her head and played with her feet. "I heard a story back in college and since then, the sky reminds me… of limits," she slowly finished, bringing her eyes back to the horizon. Intrigued, Soo-hyun uttered, "Tell me."
"It's too long," she said. "Go, we've got time," Soo-hyun checked his watch and indeed they did. "As long as you promise you won't fall asleep like you did last time," Yea-ji's eyes sharply darted towards him and Soo-hyun quickly entangled his pinky with hers to make a quick promise. Pulling away shyly, Yea-ji smiled and continued, "I think you've heard of this before. It's about a craftsman who was locked away in the tower with his son named Icarus. The father made wings for both of them so they could escape."
"And they did, the end?" Soo-hyun hurriedly interrupted, pretending to stifle a yawn. "You promised, dumbass," Yea-ji hit him thrice before his "I was joking, go on!" sank in and she continued. "No, actually, only one of them did."
"What, why?" Soo-hyun inquired quizzically, genuinely piqued now. "The father told Icarus not to fly too high because the wings were made of wax, but his son got too excited with their newfound freedom that Icarus forgot what his father said. He flew high, too close to the sun, and that's how his father lost him," Yea-ji finished with a faint smile. "Damn. And you actually like that story?" Soo-hyun incredulously asked.
Yea-ji snickered. "I don't, but I keep it close to mind. So whenever I see the sky, it's always a reminder to me to know my place, to trust my pace. Not to rush things, you know, as long as I get there someday" she answered, eyes intently on him now. "Is that in the script?" Soo-hyun joked, attempting to lighten the mood much to her chagrin as Yea-ji chased him across the pavement, now wearing sneakers. Close to their calltime, they sat down near the rocks and Soo-hyun asked her sincerely, "what's infinity to you then?" Yea-ji smiled, her gaze fixed on him, studying his features like she did during their photoshoot for the drama. She answered, "People." Suddenly aware of what she was doing as her eyes darted to Soo-hyun's lips, she pulled back. "…and dogs, I guess." Clearing his throat from the heat only moments ago, Soo-hyun feebly said, "is that so?" He stood and helped her up. "Since there are no canines out here, how about you take photos of your infinity instead of the sky?" Soo-hyun handed her his phone and pointed at himself.
Yea-ji rolled her eyes at the man who just referred to himself as infinity. But she grabbed the camera anyway, and snapped several photos of him on the pavement overlooking the sea.
"These photos look great, you look happy," his mom pointed at the row of his seaside snapshots as she scrolled Soo-hyun's Instagram posts over dinner. He was recounting funny stories on set now with her, and she asked for photos just so she could visualize. But Soo-hyun had already transferred almost all the photos to one of the burner phones, the only one with its memory card still intact from his Yeye days, so Instagram it was. "Did she take these?" his mom suddenly asked. Soo-hyun's eyes looked down on his plate as he nodded slowly. His mom could tell; she knew what a heartbreak looked like just with a glance.
"Eomma, what do you think went wrong with you and appa?" Soo-hyun looked up and asked her pointedly. "Where do I start?" his mom put her finger to her chin, pretending to think pensively. Seeing her reaction, Soo-hyun grinned. "No, what I mean was, do you think you could have done something to make it work? Or do you think you were meant to break up from the start?"
His mom brought a glass to her mouth to take a sip of water before responding. "Well, I think it was already decided what we were meant to be," embedding the last three words in air quotes "…when we first started dating." Soo-hyun nudged her on as he continued eating. Taking her cue, his mom went on. "You know that moment when you feel like you've met the love of your life?" Soo-hyun smiled, the question closer to home than his mom probably realized. "And then you start a relationship based solely on that feeling? We did. I found it romantic that it's your appa and me against the world," she tsked at her younger self.
"But the world kept being kinder to him and harsher to me, though I never understood why, until I found myself alone in that fight against everyone else. He got tired of having to justify us, and I can't blame him for that, with his career taking off and all that." Soo-hyun felt his heart sink at his mom's revelation, and he found her tearing up as well at the recollection and the possibility that perhaps her son too was suffering from the same impasse. "That was the price we paid for choosing to stay together," she finished, shedding a tear before Soo-hyun stood up and embraced her.
Later that night lying awake beside his mom in slumber, Soo-hyun thought back to what Yea-ji said about the sky. His parents chose the path of Icarus, hence the literal falling out, among many other reasons. But Yea-ji never lost sight of the sun that threatened to engulf what they had in its fury. She spoke of limits not as abstractions, but realities within her grasp. And it was lost on him, who only thought of infinity since he was lucky enough to be where he was. But her choice made him hopeful, too, that at the end of her flying path was freedom, no matter how much time it took, even if he didn't have a place in her present. Soo-hyun wanted to tell her that he finally understood, that it didn't bother him as much. Skies, he decided, filing through his gallery. That's how she'll know.
"Why are you giving me all this?" Soo-hyun's mom was incredulous the next morning, seeing all the things her son was pulling out one by one from his bag. They were things he used from It's Okay and several other knickknacks he sneaked out from set - the small battery-powered fan that she'd lent him and he conveniently forgot to return, the scissors that Moon Kang-tae used to cut off Moon-young's hair, and the book for which he fought tooth-and-nail with her.
"They're not yours yet. I'll tell you when they are. For now, I just need a place where I won't see them all the time." Soo-hyun lifted his eyes from the hardbound in his hand and gave it to his mom. "This is my favorite among all the books from the drama." His mom inspected the original copy of Finding the Real Face with her own hands, saying "Really? Isn't this the last one? I thought you'd like the earlier ones more."
Soo-hyun smirked and nudged his mom's knee. "I thought so, too. But I like this one for a reason."
"Arasseo, we're doing a wide shot so the cameras will be about 20 feet away," Park PD instructed, script in hand, to Soo-hyun and Yea-ji dressed in pleats for their evening scene in front of the camping car for the finale. Despite the Cut! moments ago, they were still in each other's arms. Yea-ji leaned closer to Soo-hyun, barely holding back a chuckle as he made circling motions with his fingers on her knee.
Realizing that he has likely exhausted the attention span of the children in his care, Park PD waved a hand in front of them to whisk the pair away from their own little world. But he knew too that the two were the best at their jobs, whose tenure was ending sooner than they seemed to be ready for. So when they didn't budge, Park PD simply let them be and moved away near the cameras to instruct instead with his megaphone, "We won't hear you so can just talk, stare lovingly at each other…" biting back his tongue as he realized the two were already doing exactly that. "Anyway, just do your thing. 1, 2, 3, action!"
"What should we talk about?" Soo-hyun started and Yea-ji laughed loud. At what, he didn't know. "Cut, NG!" Park PD broke their mirth. "We've got enough material of you two laughing. Remember, Moon-young and Kang-tae just said I love you. Again: 1, 2 3, action!"
This time, they stared intently at each other and Soo-hyun's eyes went hot at the intensity of her gaze. "Did you really want it? The book, I mean," Yea-ji asked, eyes still locked firmly onto his. Soo-hyun bit back, "Why, did you think I only wanted it because you did? I'm not that immature…" A grin spread across her face as Yea-ji said, "Arasseo, all's fair." The bet was whoever does the more outrageous ad lib gets the book, and even Yea-ji agreed that nothing could top Soo-hyun's pathetic jump over the falling microphone during their storybook-reading scene.
Smiling at his victory, Soo-hyun tapped Yea-ji's arm gently and quizzed her, "And you? Why do you want it that much?" Yea-ji leaned into his neck, making the line between ad lib and reality blur for Soo-hyun. As if it could get any more obscure. Reading his reaction from the veins tightening as she leaned closer, Yea-ji finally responded, "It reminds me of a book I used to read to the kids at Sunday School."
"Oh no, did I just trigger story time?" Soo-hyun feigned a groan, and Yea-ji almost hit him before she remembered they were still being filmed. "Go on, just messing with you," Soo-hyun squeezed her shoulder in jest. "When will you grow up?" Yea-ji looked at him. "Why? You said you liked kids!" Soo-hyun was still irritatingly adorable that Yea-ji clenched her teeth at the sight of another irresistible retort. At the risk of another NG, Soo-hyun immediately tapped her arm, "Come on, tell me the story."
"Okay, promise you won't laugh." Yea-ji said. "As if I could even if I wanted to," he responded. "Go on, I'm listening," Soo-hyun added before she could shoot another quip his way. "Okay. It's about two sisters who were punished, and their faces were removed. The unnie thought the gods were being unfair because she didn’t want her sister to suffer, and the dongsaeng just endured it and followed the gods," she began.
Soo-hyun returned to drawing circles, now on her elbow, while she spoke. There was never a day when Yea-ji's voice would ever stop sending shivers down his spine. He interrupted, "Is there a pretty one and an ugly one? Just so I I can visualize…"
"There is, but that's not the point," Ye-ji snapped before continuing, "Anyway, the unnie kept having nightmares about some tasks she should do to atone. She lives a very successful life, but she isn't happy because she was separated from her dongsaeng for a long time. So she cried out at how unfair the gods are." She briefly looks up to check if Soo-hyun was still listening, and he was, his heart beating faster by the second. "Then one day, the two sisters reunite and the dongsaeng tells her sister that the nightmares she was having were actually the tasks she's had to do herself to atone for them both. But she was able to do them without complaining because her unnie carried the pain for her," Yea-ji ends with a smile, reminiscing about the children to whom she'd told the story many times.
Soo-hyun's heart went down a centigrade as her voice was drowned by silence. "That’s it?" he asked. "De, were you expecting something more?" Yea-ji said playfully, fiddling with the buttons on his shirt. "Wait, what does the story have to do with our book?"
Yea-ji smirked; she felt like she was back at Sunday School with the inquisitive young ones. "Well, the title is one. Then the dongsaeng is named Psyche. And then we…" He repeated her last words as a question, but then Yea-ji sighed and said, "I'll let you figure that out for yourself. That's why I'm letting you keep the book."
Soo-hyun laughed, breaking character, until he noticed that the cameras were already unmanned. "Park PD, do you think they noticed we already called Cut! for a while now? Should I call them?" one of the cameramen asked, coffee in his hand, as he stared at the pair from the foodtruck a mile away. "No, it's okay. They seem perfectly warm there anyway," the director answered, smiling wistfully at his twin flames fading out, though they didn't know it yet.
As he finished reading Finding the Real Face to his mom, who insisted on him doing it again and again until she fell asleep, Soo-hyun turned out the light in her room and went back outside. He opened his phone for a minute, then glanced at the book still in his hand. He perused it again, knowing that it was the last time he would. With everything that happened in the past month or so, her words finally began to make sense.
They were just like the two sisters in the other story, who were somewhat meant to separate despite their love. He cringed at the recall of the comments about them looking like brother and sister. But in the context, it fit kind of well. Soo-hyun was the incredulous older one who'd yelled at gods, fate, destiny for the cruelty that Yea-ji had to face; meanwhile, she was the younger one who trudged on without objection, knowing that atonement held the chance of their unity in an uncertain future. So that's what Yea-ji wanted? For me to carry her pain as she went on? Despite the questions still lingering in his head, Soo-hyun nodded to himself, satisfied with that conclusion for the time being.
The weekend ended and it was time for him to return to Seoul. Avoiding the city traffic before dawn, Soo-hyun held out his arms to enfold his beloved eomma, thanking her profusely for the healing experience that was the past few days. "Aish, when did my son get this mushy?" his mom remarked as Soo-hyun shed a few tears. "I really needed this, eomma, gomawo," he added before letting her go and entering the car. Waving as he pulled out of the driveway, Soo-hyun rolled up his windows and let go of the tears already building up in her arms.
"I know, son, I know," his mom belatedly replied as she saw the broken sunglasses on the driveway that both of them hadn't noticed. "It'll be okay," she smiled into the distance, her words forming a prayer.
As Soo-hyun drove into the highway again, he steadied his pace, recalling all the reminders his mom had repeated over and over during the weekend. He missed her so much that the parting was painful, and the thought of his mother made him calmer, more collected as he thought about all the other loves in the world for whom he's cried; she was special, but she is one among many loves that kept him going and losing her didn't mean losing all those other loves as well. His fans, Jung-se hyung, his cousin, Ji-ah and Jong-soo, and now his mom - those were the loves that saw him through the godforsaken month, and he did everything in his life until he met Yea-ji for loves like theirs. All the joyous moments with his mom from the weekend made him smile genuinely, for the first time since then, he felt. As the towering buildings of Seoul flooded his view, he indulged in one last memory like a lullaby to his broken heart. Lullabies, like I sang her that night.
The night they parted, Soo-hyun insisted upon staying at Yea-ji's flat after she uttered the words meant to let him go, just to see her peacefully asleep. With Yea-ji's head resting on a pillow atop his lap, he had already run out of stories to tell and she was still awake. Soo-hyun wanted to sing to her, but he thought it wasn't yet the right moment. Her mind was still buzzing; though inaudible, he could hear it from the way she responded to his lighthearted stories: by stifling a giggle, or holding a smile in before it erupted.
"Your turn," Soo-hyun softly spoke as they lay in silence. "Hmm? I thought you volunteered," she said calmly, eyelids fluttering. "Yeah, but you always liked telling stories," he answered, taking her hand and making a pinky promise. "I won't sleep, laugh, or interrupt you. Just tell me your best one, for old times' sake." She noticed Soo-hyun stumbling upon best as if he wanted to say last but hesitated. Letting the observation off the hook, Yea-ji simply nodded as she pulled her pinky away. Her request was for him to leave her life; his was a simple story, how in the world could she say no?
"Okay. This is actually my favorite. I saw it on my language exam and I looked it up when I got home," she said. Soo-hyun smiled at her enthusiasm as Yea-ji closed her eyes and began. "It's about a man named Orpheus, who was born as musical genius. He fell in love with a beautiful woman called Eurydice, who reciprocated his passion and so they got married. But then Eurydice was too beautiful that she was chased by men everywhere. Then one day, when she was out in the forest, a man chased her until she ran into a pit of snakes that bit her to death." Her eyes darted upwards, warning him not to laugh. He wasn't going to; Soo-hyun was simply drinking in the sight of her beauty and imagining his very own Eurydice in mind. Seeing her audience still enraptured, Yea-ji shut her eyelids again and continued.
"So Eurydice got trapped in the underworld, and life without her was meaningless so Orpheus took the risk to enter the land of the dead. Because of Orpheus' talent and the depth of his grief, he convinced the underworld's keeper to let him in and rescue his wife. But they had a deal. Eurydice was going to follow him in the entire journey back to the land of the living, but Orpheus wasn't allowed to turn around and check if she indeed followed until they arrived at their destination."
Yea-ji shifted her position, eyes towards the rest of her flat as she kept them open. "As they got nearer to the line that separated the lands of the living and the dead, Orpheus began to hear his wife's footsteps approaching. As soon as he stepped out of the underworld, Orpheus couldn't help his beating heart and so he turned around to embrace his wife, not knowing that she was still a few steps away. Because of his own passion, Orpheus couldn't stop Eurydice from fading away forever." Yea-ji turned her head towards Soo-hyun, whose eyes looked at her longingly in complete understanding.
Given a similar moment in a different time, Soo-hyun would have laughed at her, or would have chided Yea-ji about how tragic her favorite story was. But he didn't; that was the first time - and perhaps the last - that the subtext in her stories didn't need time to sink in. "So have faith in me," Yea-ji ended, cupping his cheek gently. "I love you now and I trust myself enough that this isn't the kind of love that will be gone when I wake up tomorrow, or years from now… even when I'm out of your sight."
Have faith in me. Those were Yea-ji's actual last words to him, Soo-hyun then remembered. It wasn't the inevitability of their parting, the buts that he thought she only wanted to escape from. It was a promise, more heartfelt than any of their pinkies managed, that was contained in those simple words. His heart finally at peace, Soo-hyun exited his car and made his way to the elevator from the basement parking. He found Jong-soo inside who greeted him and hesitantly inquired, "Hyung… about the coordinated posts that we scheduled, should I…" Soo-hyun smiled at him and responded, "gwenchana, go on with all the remaining ones as planned." No more puzzles, patterns, or whatnot.
With a chime, the doors opened again at the floor of the lobby, revealing a visibly stunned Seo Yea-ji holding an iced Americano in hand. Jong-soo greeted her good morning and she replied politely, not knowing how to approach Soo-hyun. As their made their way up, Soo-hyun finally let go of the final puzzle piece in his heart. After all, Yea-ji was not a puzzle to be solved, a mystery to be unraveled, a question that needed answers just so Soo-hyun could hold her in his arms again. She was a living, breathing, beautiful human being with the same infinity she saw in him - even if those multitudes also contained the possibility of never holding her or her future in his grasp, ever. He knew better now: love is too young to know what conscience is and what she needed was for him to happily let go. And so he did.
"Have you been doing well?" With his words, Soo-hyun built a bridge upon the chasm that before then was insurmountable. Yea-ji beamed genuinely, "De, gomawo. And you?"