Work Text:
The first time they met, Tae Sumi noticed Woo Gwang-ho had sweaty hands when he introduced himself. When they shook hands, the smudge of stickiness coupled with his firm grip made it feel like part of him was still on her hand when he’d let go. He has hardworking hands, she thought. Dotted with ink, rough from work, firm and unyielding in their grip. Not softened with lotion, but the stickiness of sweat. Honest, hardworking hands. She resisted the urge to rub her fingers together for the rest of the day, the ghost of his touch lingering long after.
She washed her hands, but the feeling remained. It clung to her skin like a smear of crushed rice, under her perfectly manicured nails, in the crevices between her fingers, a feeling that intensified when she saw him in class, or remembered him out of it— but nothing was there.
She later learned he was the son of farmers, scrabbled his way to SNU with nothing but his head, his heart, and his own two hands. He stood at a precipice, the world truly wide and open before him. No paths marked out ahead, no safety net to catch him behind—a man well and truly alone. Tae Sumi was strong, and smart, but everything she had was someone else’s before it was hers. Everything followed a predetermined path for her, from her conception to her current enrollment at SNU Law School. Her place in her father’s firm was already set for when she graduated, the corner office in the East Wing all but marked with her name plaque. She had the world waiting for her once she left the cocoon of school. And yet, she thought, With his uncertain future, why is he more free than me? Why does everything he reaches feels like it is meant to be there in his hands, while everything in my hold feels like it is slipping away?
When he touched her, she thought back to the first time they’d met, of the tacky feeling like crushed rice, the feeling that part of him would be on her skin long after he let go. His hands were still honest, still clung to her skin, gentle but firm on her body. He held her, and she pretended for a moment that she belonged there in his hold.
It was a mistake. She had deviated from the path, and now there was a weight in her belly that she couldn’t feel yet, but clung to the edges of her heart even as it threatened to derail her entire life. Tae Sumi let the pregnancy test slip from her hands into the trash, and spent the next three hours in the shower, washing off everything, scrubbing it from her skin. She had never had the same kind of talent for holding on that he had. She would let it go, and return to herself, to her family, to her path.
The last time she saw him, she stayed out of reach. His hands were dirty, wet with mud, completely humbled— curled into fists on the asphalt. He knelt before her, begging. Hands that refused to let her go, now held onto the crumbling earth, like the foundations beneath his feet had given way. Perhaps they already had. And yet, gripping tightly to her umbrella, she felt the stickiness of crushed rice in her hands, an inability to let go. He would never touch her again with those hands. He promised to remove his presence from her life, promised to let her go and hold onto their—no, her— mistake. It was the first time Tae Sumi could feel the weight of Woo Gwang-Ju’s life in her hands. This is a mistake, she thought. She knew, deep down, that she would feel the weight of her life in his hands long after she let him go. But for all the things that slipped into and out of her hands—privileges and people and precious moments— this mistake would be hers.