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They say that you enter this world alone and will leave it alone. Not when you are a twin, though. Kang Sol’s life never started out alone, because she had her twin Kang Dan. In many stories, twins are a sign of bad luck. Some people say that it is the strength and mind of one person split into two, needing the other to be complete. If one twin had it good, the other would have it a lot worse. Sol never felt that way, though. Dan was and is a blessing to her life, even if there were days that life was lonely because of her.
As they grew up, it became clear that one twin did have it really good, and one had it really bad. Kang Dan was faster, smarter and more beautiful than Sol. They were identical twins but nobody had a problem telling them apart. Dan was often sought after by the boys around them, a bright and promising girl who went on to become one of the greatest legal scholars in the world. Sol, on the other hand, had completely no interest in greatness. She thought her life would be ordinary, working an ordinary desk job and providing for their small, single-parent and low-income family in the future. It was very easy to dismiss Sol as too erratic and impulsive compared to her elegant and poised sister, and she told herself that she did not mind.
That was a lie.
But that did not change that when it came to each other, there is nothing that Dan and Sol would not do. Dan’s potential attracted as many admirers as it did enemies. Sol wasted no time calling them out, daring them to fight her, and the rumors would die for another week before something else resurfaced again. When Sol struggled with school, Dan always took separate notes for herself and Sol, where the latter contained more comprehensive explanations of concepts that were more difficult. Those notes saved her from failing out of school altogether.
It seemed that their trajectories were set by then. Dan would be the shining star of their family, while Sol would be content with being the night sky that further illuminated Dan’s successes, supporting her and their mother while Dan goes out to achieve everything the world could offer.
And that all changed because their mother loved her two daughters. Deciding that Dan had too much potential to waste and Sol should have dreams for herself beyond survival, she married a man whom she thought was decent, and could help provide for her family. This man turned out to be absolute garbage. Of course, it did not appear that way at first. The first few years of their marriage was blissful, and her mother even got pregnant with her little sister Kang Byeol.
Then everything was no longer fine. Sol could not quite pinpoint the moment when everything fell apart. The man had picked up a gambling habit from his construction buddies, and frequently gambled in illegal dens into the late of night. With whatever money he did not lose, he spent it on alcohol, drinking himself stupid until he passed out on the sofa. Her mother’s attempts to coax him out of gambling were initially dismissed, until something in him snapped and he realized that if he hit her, she would shut up.
And that was what happened. Her mother, who Sol knew was brazen and headstrong, had gone silent at every slap, her cries muffled against drunken yells. Sol had tried to come in between them but was often met with the bottom of a soju bottle. That was when she first learnt to use concealer to hide the bruises.
“Sol you can’t keep getting yourself hurt like this,” Dan chided softly, wrapping a bandage around Sol’s bruised wrist after another night.
“Dan-ah, who else will defend mum? She’s pregnant with Byeol and I’m scared that scumbag will harm her and the baby.”
“I know,” Dan sighed. “But you getting hurt doesn’t solve anything. And seeing you retaliate makes him angrier and mum gets hurt even more. We need to be smart about this.”
“How can I be smart about this, Dan?” she asked indignantly. “How could you just stand there and watch our mum take all those hits from that man?!”
That was really the essential difference between Dan and Sol. Sol would rush into a problem headfirst and tackle it with her arms if she could. Dan would wait and observe, see the best possible outcome and make her decision. Sol used to think that Dan could never make bad choices and she could only make them. After all, it always seemed like Dan inherited all the brains, including all the rationality. But when Sol grew up, she realized that Dan was perfectly capable of making bad choices, just like her.
A girl Sol cannot remember the name of tried to set Dan’s hair on fire, which really at that point is just a regular Tuesday with an added spice. The obvious solution for Sol was to punch the girl and end the immediate problem. The problem that she did not see coming was that the assaulter was the Chief Prosecutor’s daughter and after presumably some crocodile tears and an alternative retelling of the events to her father, Sol ended up in juvenile detention for three years as a result. Those years away from her family scared Sol so much. Now, no one was going to protect Dan from jealous people like her. No one was going to shield their mother from that man’s beatings. In the quiet of the night, where she could let go of her tough and brazen exterior in juvie, she quietly but desperately prayed every night of those three years that her little sister would at least be born safely and that Dan would survive high school without her.
Strangely enough, technically her prayers were answered. But, I would like to think that the universe schemed to be as unkind to Sol as possible. This charitable wish only brought about more pain.
When Sol was released and went back home, the house was silent. The man and his belongings were nowhere to be seen. Sol had foolishly rejoiced, thinking that the universe had finally been kind to her and her family. Seeing her mother without the tell-tale bruises on her wrists and her new little sister showing no signs of abuse filled her with relief and the guilt of not being there for them while she was in juvie washed away.
But of course, there was someone else she was not seeing.
“Eomma, where’s Dan?”
She was then told that a few months before she was released, Dan had packed one suitcase and left without a word. But after she had left, that man too, disappeared from their life. Her mother had tried to explain away this coincidence, claiming that the man finally got tired of her and Byeol and left one night and never came back and that Dan had just left all on her own. Years later, Sol would find out that Dan had made a devil’s bargain to end her mother’s suffering, in a story that would be a little too difficult to explain now.
Sol’s life and everything she knew shattered at that one revelation. It was the first time after juvie she allowed herself to cry. She looked back to that punch she took on a girl she can no longer remember and how it had cost her the remaining time she had with Dan, when she was just defending her. Were it not for the kind prosecutor who handed her the most lenient sentence possible, she would have no idea that her mother is back to supporting herself and Byeol, struggling to make ends meet after the man had gambled all their money away.
So, Sol wiped her tears away and had to reset her trajectory, to a life where Dan was no longer a part of hers. She had no idea what that looked like. All her life, they had gone to the same school, had the same homework, and were around the same people.
When she asked her mother what Dan had been up to before she left, her mum had told her that Dan got into Hankuk Law School on a merit scholarship. Ah, she had forgotten that while at juvie and having completed her CSAT while in detention, Dan must have moved on with her life, went into a university doing a major Sol definitely would not have been interested in. She could not even say goodbye to the moment when their paths would split and would have to settle for imagining what it would feel like to be under the cherry blossoms together, high school diplomas in one hand and a bouquet of congratulatory flowers in another.
She tried to sell the textbooks Dan left behind off at a nearby second-hand bookstore. It felt like a fresh start for her, to get rid of Dan’s remaining possessions in her house to finally make that reality sink in. Of course, since the world treated Sol’s life like a practical joke, she struggled to sell them off for a good price. She had mentally cursed Dan for leaving the books so worn and heavily annotated. As if it’s any use to Sol, these law textbooks she would never comprehend any word of.
A customer in that store beside her was turning the volume of the store TV so loud that it drowned her attempts to haggle. Sol was feeling particularly prickly that day; after all she went through she really just wanted some cash to make the most of whatever was left of her life with her family. Balancing the books in one hand, she snatched the remote from the customer and switched off the TV.
“50,000 won, please?” she asked the store owner in her sweetest tone, which she now realised that after only interacting with juvie youngsters for the past few years, came out more thuggish than it did charmingly persuasive.
“I’ll buy your books for 50,000 won so please just give me back the remote,” a voice chimed beside hers. It was the other customer who was watching the TV, clad in a baseball cap looking very annoyed at her.
“You don’t need these books, you’re not a law student,” Sol scoffed. The scammer shall not be the scammee.
“I am,” this guy replied exasperatedly. “I’m going to Hankuk Law, and if the books are as good as you say, sunbae,” he added in deadpan, “I could use all the help I can get.”
You see, this is not the meet-cute Kang Sol envisioned for herself when she met her future husband, Han Joon Hwi, but neither of them knew it yet. He was still just a stranger to her, and she would realize much further down the road, that fate really had a way of closing one door and opening another. The door to the life that she thought she would live shut firmly in her face, and an uncertain life beckoned. And meeting her at that newly-opened door, was Han Joon Hwi.
She did get the 50,000 won for all of 10 minutes. The stranger she met was perceptive, and her little sister Byeol , who had accompanied her to the bookstore, was not taught the national no-snitching policy just yet. He had promised to get into Hankuk Law without her textbooks when he took his money back with a look so smug that Sol had scoffed.
“Bet you can’t get into law school, since you’re selling these books away,” he jibed, waving the 50,000 won in her face cheekily.
For some reason, for someone that claimed to have no ambition other than for a simple and stable life, that comment really irked her. This was going to be a familiar feeling with Han Joon Hwi: irritation. She had hurriedly hoisted the textbooks up her arms to run up the bus she was waiting for, filled with some sort of new determination.
If the law took away her precious time with her sister because she was too poor and not knowledgable enough, she was going to not let anyone go through that exact same experience. She had told the Hankuk Law examiners exactly this for her admissions interview, saying it with as much conviction she could muster.
And so she ended up in Hankuk Law on a financial assistance scholarship, determined and hopeful. Already, she could tell that there was a much higher learning curve she had to overcome. The quietness of law school was oppressing and the silence felt like it could cut her throat in her sleep. She later found out that Han Joon Hwi was in her cohort and was the legendary Second Round Judicial Exam Passer, which at the time, felt like another huge practical joke from the universe.
Of course the person she dissed is the only law freshman to have passed the second round of the judicial exams.
The students wasted no time treating her short of vermin. It was clear that she struggled to score for her tests, do recitations and worst of all, she was loud, and law students hated loud people. In a way, it felt familiar to how she was treated beside Dan, like she did not deserve to walk the same floors as that of future judges, prosecutors and lawyers or breathe the same air as the ones shining with potential. That point was definitely driven home when she realized that there was another Kang Sol in her cohort, who was also coincidentally her roommate.
The other Kang Sol, dubbed as Kang Sol B in law school was also a genius. If she could, Sol would make a living out of stumbling into genius after genius without making herself one. Her entire study group comprised the top students of her cohort and it was shocking at all that she was allowed in. Of course, now, Sol’s study group is her found family that would protect her no matter what happened and she would not hesitate to do the same. But, then, she could not shake the feeling that they regarded her as a charity case that Han Joon Hwi, who started the study group, let in.
Sol B, after all, had made it extremely clear that she did not think Sol deserved a place in Hankuk Law, if the times that Sol B did not bother to wake her roommate up for the same classes or chose to tune her out like white noise whenever Sol attempts a conversation were any indication. It would seem strange to think that in a few months, Sol B would come to regularly call her unnie and in her rare moments of weakness, confide in Sol her many problems over water-bottle drinks that were definitely not water.
Until then, Sol’s ideals felt like a hazy mirage that drifted from her fingers like sand in the wind.
“Is this it?” she found herself asking toward the statue of Lady Justice in their university lobby one lonely night, drunk on Sol B’s not-water. “Is this how far I go?” She thought of Dan as her vision blurred, thinking that she must be in some faraway country doing whatever smart people like her do. She hoped that Dan, in whatever life she was living, thought of their family and how they were. Maybe she would laugh when she finds out that Sol got into the most prestigious law school in South Korea.
Dan did not, and genuinely did congratulate her when she found out, but more on that later.
This is when Han Joon Hwi came in and appeared at another crossroad in her life. In the beginning of the semester, he had (childishly) set up a petition against his uncle’s professorship with the university in exchange for spots in his study group. His uncle was former Chief Prosecutor Seo Byung Ju, who was recently acquitted of bribery and had donated a sizable portion of his supposed gift to building a mock trial court in the university.
“Joon Hwi, take that petition down! Are you going to endanger your entire future because you have something against your uncle?” she had asked exasperatedly.
Han Joon Hwi was stubborn and had a death wish. “No, Sol. I’m going to see it through because people should know that my uncle is suspicious.”
“And,” he added on, placing a bound compilation of defamation cases from the last ten years on the table, “I would appreciate it if you could act as my defense attorney in the mock trial.”
“The same mock trial determining your expulsion?” Sol spluttered. “You could not have asked a worse person.”
Joon Hwi ignored her, and flashed one of his signature grins. “I leave me in your care!” before heading off. She watched his retreating figure leave the copy room, and remembered thinking that perhaps smart people just have the privilege of tempting fate.
But Sol did defend him, and she won, albeit on a technicality. All the late nights spent reading through every single defamation case paid off and had real consequences to someone’s life. That was a moment of empowerment for her, that perhaps, if she worked hard enough, she could actually fulfill her first real dream.
Han Joon Hwi also reminded her that she did well in the smallest ways. Not long after, she came across a defamation case involving a defendant sued for publishing the personal information of all parents who failed to pay child support in the legal clinic she volunteered in.
“Ah, another defamation case?” a voice said behind her.
Sol jolted, but quickly shook it off when she realized it was Joon Hwi. “Yes, and it’s hard to argue what the defendant did is out of public interest,” she sighed, slumping against her chair.
“Well, but aren’t you the defamation expert now?” he chuckled. “I’m still here because of you, and you’re the only one who got defamation case in the Criminal Code midterm completely right. Are you not going to defend her?”
It was things like this, that he said in a teasing manner that riled her up, but after the irritation wore off, she perceived the hidden compliment and encouragement. She smiled to herself often whenever words like these cross her mind while studying or if she had half the mind to drop out of law school. Sol would never tell Joon Hwi this, but his encouragements were the reason why she pushed her body beyond its physical limits all too often in their 1L. That somehow, seeing her improve would be a way to show him that she deserved the encouragement and compliments. Of course, as she grew older, she realised she never really needed to do that; Joon Hwi would still say she did a good job as long as she tried her utmost best.
It should be mentioned that at this point, there was an ongoing murder investigation to the death of Joon Hwi’s uncle. And she was convinced that when most of her study group were suspects in that investigation, the universe just hated her. As if Lady Justice had answered her earlier query in the most extreme way possible, all these situations forced her to be extremely adaptable to sudden unwarranted arrests and to use everything she had learnt (in a year, no less!) to make sure her friends did not go to jail.
And the other students went on with their lives as if none of this was happening, which was absolutely crazy. My God, if Sol had 100 won for every time a law student had made a snippy remark about how she should focus on actually passing her exams instead of saving her friends from incarceration, she would not have needed a scholarship to stay in Hankuk Law.
At the very end of it, who she was then and who she was at the beginning of 1L were completely different people. Sol went from someone who cannot go through a recitation without feeling nauseous, to someone that understood the law so well that she could contribute significantly to getting her best friend a rare self-defense conviction against her abusive and influential boyfriend. She noticed that when she started being able to complete a full recitation, or perform better in smaller tests that the insults directly hurled at her had quietened. It probably also had to do with the fact that her study group, who had grown to respect her in some sense, had started to stand up for her as well.
It was also around this time that Kang Dan suddenly returned into her life, in a story that would be too convoluted to explain right now. To summarize, Sol had discovered that Dan had not left willingly, that she left because she was a political whistleblower, but the corrupt politician she was working for offered her a deal she could not refuse: leave Korea for a restraining order against the man that abused their family. Truly, her life is just a really big makjang at this point.
And so Dan left with no explanation, and she finally understood why her mother never told her the full details. Her daughters were everything and it was because she married that man that her daughters had to split up and be embroiled in South Korea’s political drama years later. There was no explaining the emotion Sol felt seeing Dan again, and she was surprised that there was no crying, no anger or no joy. A part of her thought she may be in denial, but a more plausible explanation was that even after many years and all their differences, Dan and Sol never really needed words to explain themselves to each other. Somehow Sol knew from one look in Dan’s eyes that Dan did what she thought was best for her family, and that was enough then.
There will soon be time to catch up in the future, and to tell Dan about her own dreams and the first friends she made that truly loved her (or more accurately, grown to love her despite their best efforts). Right now, she was beginning to enjoy the life she had built for herself; one separate from her identity as Dan’s twin sister. She never needed to be Dan’s night sky; the sky is big enough for the two of them.
“What are you doing? Are you drinking more non-water?” a familiar voice called out behind her. She turned and laughed. There he was, peeking from behind the statue of Lady Justice, as always Han Joon Hwi.
“I swear, Sol B is a genius for thinking to hide alcohol in water bottles. I guess strict parents bring out more creative ways for truancy.”
“Or you could drink alcohol from normal bottles in your room or in the field?” Joon Hwi remarked with an eyebrow raised. She did not miss the hidden caring intent of his words: you will be safer if you drink in those places.
“No,” she waved him off, “sitting at the foot of Lady Justice is just the right vibes for tonight. Plus, Sol B is sleeping right now and I don’t want to disturb her.”
“What are the ‘vibes’ needed for tonight?” he asked teasingly.
“Oh you know, I can’t believe I managed to pass 1L, come so close to winning my first mock trial competition, while also making sure my friends stay out of jail, and catch your uncle’s murderer” she listed with her fingers. “It feels more appropriate to drink with the lady behind me for all that she put me through.”
In the night, she could Joon Hwi’s eyes twinkle with mischief. It was a sight, she realised, for all his public cheekiness, he never quite revealed to others. Most of the study group saw him as a caring older brother who could tackle anything with a cool-headed mind. Sol did too, until she saw the time when Joon Hwi almost burst into tears on the day he asked her to be his defense attorney on the mock trial deciding his expulsion. Or the mix of concern and anger when Ye Seul’s ex-boyfriend had groped Sol thinking it was Ye Seul. Or even the lopsided smile he only showed to her whenever she got excited over something. His eyes told a hundred stories that she could never stop reading, all revolving around her.
That was when she realized that smart people like Joon Hwi and Dan were probably just better at hiding how they truly felt. And if it took years to figure Dan out and only months for Joon Hwi, it can only mean that he felt safe enough to let her see his composure break.
And she was grateful for that.
Now, contrary to what this story is implying, Sol was not purposefully ignoring Joon Hwi’s very blatant feelings for her. In the back of her mind, she knew there was something more than just friendship between them. But, between the murder case and everything else that happened as a result, starting a relationship was really not one of her priorities.
It would be more accurate to say that Sol was purposefully ignoring her feelings for him.
But in her drunken vulnerability, she found herself softly asking, “Ya, Han Joon Hwi, why did you let me in to the study group in the first place? Was it because I represented you in that mock trial against the school?”
His eyes widened, and he seemed to consider that question for a moment as he took a seat beside her. “Well, I guess you can say that was part of the reason.”
“What were the other reasons? I mean you could have invited someone who had better grades,” she slurred.
“Well,” he laughed, walking over to take a seat beside her. “The fact of the matter is that I play the main tutor in our study group, so there really is no need for the group to be the smartest of the smartest. Plus, I don’t see how they need my help, but it’s just a coincidence that our study group do have top scorers.”
“As to why I let you in,” he paused, then without warning, looked her dead in the eye and winked, “I think it’s more accurate to say you let yourself in. You’ve always done that.”
She felt a little affronted by the statement. “What do you mean?”
“Well, how do I put it?” he pondered. “You were always someone that would take any means possible to get what you wanted. If you got stuck trying to find ways to defend our friends, you’d stay up all night to find precedents and ways to put out a solid argument no one can refute. If you struggled with your grades, you’d eventually find your way here and decide that you’re going to get the best help you can.”
“Plus,” he added, grinning. “That is what I like about you, Sol. I guess in some way, when you’re so determined like that, it’s hard to not want to open any door in your way, and I find myself letting you in to a lot of things once you say the word.”
Under the dim moonlight, it was hard to tell if Joon Hwi could see her blush. She felt him softly hook his pinky from hers, and using his free hand to rub the back of his neck. Perhaps she was seeing things, but she could almost see a tint of pink at the tip of his ears.
“One more thing, why don’t you call me Kang Sol A?” Sol asked, pretending she was completely unfazed by his earlier reply. She did notice that only Joon Hwi did not call the two Kang Sols by Kang Sol A or Kang Sol B. Though the qualifiers are a little ironic given their grades, they stuck and everybody used them. When the study group gathered in the copy room, Joon Hwi was the only one that never used the qualifier for her. At first, both Kang Sols would respond and then there would be this brief moment of eye contact that gets really awkward before Joon Hwi clarified.
Sol B has stopped responding to just Kang Sol whenever Joon Hwi calls, which to Sol, did not feel very nice, especially since Sol B had an obvious crush on him at the time. This was the little detail that irked her and she did not know why. She did not like Joon Hwi acting all aloof with Sol B but acting this affectionate with her but had claimed in a separate incident that he wanted to look out for Sol B specifically.
Granted, ‘looking out’ does have a lot of meanings and implications but really, what else could it have meant? One way Sol had coped with denying her feelings for Joon Hwi was to convince herself that he was just a serial flirt or just naturally affectionate privately with other people. Maybe he spent long nights with Sol B that she never knew about, or maybe sometimes, he would brush hands or interlock pinkies with Sol B and they would mean absolutely nothing.
Maybe when he looked at her, his eyes would swim with emotion like the way they do when he looked at her. Maybe Sol B would get lost in them for many moments, just like she did and wonder what kind of stories she can read from his eyes.
“Well, I’m only with you now,” he answered simply.
“Yeah, but Kang Sol B is also in our study group but you still just call me Kang Sol there too.” Sol frowned.
“I call her Sol B, and you just Sol. So, nothing is confusing.”
“Why?”
“The qualifier is not necessary,” he replied firmly. “You are the only Kang Sol I’m calling out for.”
Sol’s eyes widened, and she was suddenly sober. If Han Joon Hwi really was just a serial flirt, he was not going to see heaven and Sol would make sure of it. She tried to muster her reply but the part of her brain that makes coherent sentences must have logged off for the night and she ended up spluttering like an idiot.
“Of course,” Joon Hwi began cheekily, quickly unhooking his pinky from hers, “if you’d prefer me to call you sunbae, that’s also — ow!” he laughed, flinching as Sol had smacked his arm. Sol would notice moments like these occurring far more frequently, where she finds herself put on the spot by Joon Hwi’s feelings, and Joon Hwi himself saving her from that situation. Given everything that was happening, she really could not give him a proper answer. And for some reason, she felt that he knew and never pushed her to the point of having to respond.
She was going to be selfish for a while longer and take advantage of his kindness. But that did not mean that feigning ignorance to the growing tension between them was any easier.
Sol was surprised when she found that 2L was somehow less stressful than her 1L. Perhaps the baptism by fire that was Seo Byung Ju’s murder trial did well to ease her into the next year. But even she was surprised when she outperformed her study group-mates in some modules, which Seo Ji Ho, Joon Hwi’s roommate took great offence to.
(She knew that in the deep trenches of Ji Ho’s heart that he was mildly impressed with her. Joon Hwi told her some time later that Ji Ho had blamed Joon Hwi’s loud pining for Sol for distracting him.)
But, as she no longer needed to stab her hand with a pen to stay awake, or pull crazy all-nighters till her nose bled in order to barely keep up, she started to have time to think about her status with Joon Hwi. It also did not help that her little sister Byeol was completely enamoured by him.
“Unnie, you can’t let a good man like Joon Hwi oppa go,” she chided. Byeol, who was 9 at the time, saw Joon Hwi as an older brother she never had. Given the terrible male influences in their lives, Sol was happy that Byeol could look up to someone like him and he would waste no time spoiling her. His relationship with Byeol had become so close that their mother would call in Joon Hwi whenever Sol would be too busy to babysit and invite him regularly for family dinners.
She did not miss how Joon Hwi would tenderly hold her hand walking across the street, sit beside her on the park bench listening to whatever Byeol wanted to say and the mischievous twinkle in his eyes when he whispers something into her ear and she giggles.
Sol, at the time, had thought that if he ever married Sol B, he would be a much better father than whatever male figure Sol had in her life. And that made her more irritated. It was as if he was parading how good of a boyfriend he would be right in front of her and her family.
Sol would find out sometime later that he was in fact, parading how good of a boyfriend he would be to her and her family.
“Is this what they teach you in school now?” Sol muttered while cleaning the dishes.
“No, but I have eyes unnie! I can tell the both of you really like each other.”
When did she grow up to be so witty? Was it Joon Hwi’s influence that she was so cheeky? Sol could not help but laugh at the thought of Joon Hwi at their little dinner table, whispering all sorts of nonsense to Byeol to make her laugh. It was nice to not feel like the floor would give way every time she feels her heart grow lighter. In this newfound free time she had, she spent it thinking about how Joon Hwi showed her exactly what she was capable of. All the progress she made in her academics, her quick thinking, her growing confidence; he was there when she had nothing to show for it.
As she turned the faucet off, she stepped out the front door, sitting at the steps of their house. She could grow as far as she did because someone believed in her. Because someone said that she could do it, her dream to make the law apologize for all the hurt she went through felt more and more tangible.
“There’s only one Kang Sol I’m calling out for.”
How did those words still stick with her after months? Never in her life was she ever set apart. There was Kang Dan and Kang Sol, and even after Dan left, there were two Kang Sols. It was as if the universe wanted her to blur out from significance, and she would have if she let the enormous pile of schoolwork and the stress of the Seo Byung Ju trials wash her out of law school. But throughout, there was someone calling her name, looking just for her. And with that belief, she refused to be drowned or to stay in the background.
She was going to make sure she mattered. And at the very least, she mattered to this one person who matters the most to her.
She had chosen to return to school in the dead of night after her mother came home from the night shift. Nighttime seemed to be the best time to think about impending life and friendship-altering choices. Of course, as she had just stepped foot into the university lobby, she heard heavy footsteps heading towards her direction from behind and panting.
“Ah Sol, there you are, I want to talk to you.”
Sol almost laughed. It seemed that Joon Hwi appeared, yet again, at every crossroad in her life. Down to the beginning when she had impulsively thought that she could go to law school like Dan and be more intelligent than anyone pegged her for, he, a stranger, was already egging her on down that path. The whirlwind of events that brought her to where she was today, he was at the centre of that storm.
It seemed this moment was sealed with some finality; that nothing was going to be the same between them after that night.
“I’m in love with you, Kang Sol.”
There was 1,001 ways in which she thought about responding to this ever since the night by the Lady Justice statue. A lot of things have happened since then, and she thought that by now, she would be able to give him a proper yes. But she did not. Her mouth had a mind of its own, forming the words to politely reject him but he stopped her from doing so.
In the back of her mind as she watched him try again to convince her, she was still battling a little annoying voice in her head that told her she would never measure up to Kang Dan or Kang Sol B. Had Joon Hwi met Dan instead, he would have loved her. Sol B was obviously a better match and —
— and it did not seem to matter when Sol looked into his eyes. A hundred stories swimming in his dark pupils, all centred around her. It struck her then that no one quite looked at her that way; that she was beholden in someone’s eyes. It could have been the way his eyes flickered, the slight pursing of his lips as he anticipated her answer, the furrowing of his eyebrows bracing for a rejection. She chuckled; even then he was still giving her a way out.
Whatever it was, the fears dissolved as she took the first step towards him, taking the hand that covered her mouth and kissed him.
For the first time in her life, she ran towards the love that was meant just for her.
—
“I didn’t peg you as the more serious storyteller out of the two of us,” Joon Hwi teased.
“You insisted on me telling my origin story,” she retorted. “I felt like there were a lot of serious things that happened.”
Joon Hwi chuckled, pulling Sol closer to him on their bed. “Also, you gave me a lot of flack for having you in 50% of my story, but I was probably in 50% of yours as well!”
“Like you said,” she scoffed in reply, “it is an origin story and the rest of the study group can have their own screen-time in their own stories. Plus, I did not want to repeat any details you’ve said, so I was going to give a different perspective to our story.” she mumbled, fighting to hide the blush forming on her cheeks.
“Ah,” he smiled, squeezing her lightly. “And what do you think our little child will take away from our stories?”
“That we magically became a prosecutor and attorney after falling in love,” she joked. Sol paused for a moment, snuggling closer to Joon Hwi, closing her eyes.
“I think our child should learn that love gives us hope for things we never thought were possible.”