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# Chapter 119: At the Hospital Bedside
When Seo-ah left the café, she didn’t take Hae-neul’s hand. Yet Hae-neul remained at her side. Down the subway stairs, waiting on the platform, getting off at Gangnam Station—Hae-neul followed without asking where they were going. It felt as natural as a friend simply being there.
The hospital where Kang Ri-u was admitted was a private facility in Gangnam. A week after Seo-ah reported him, he’d been in a car accident. Officially, it was an accident. But Seo-ah knew better. When his hands had gripped that steering wheel, they must have trembled. That tremor as his fingers found the accelerator. Whether it was intentional or unconscious, no one could ever know.
The hospital elevator climbed in silence. Fifth floor. Sixth. Seventh. Room 732. Kang Ri-u occupied a VIP ward—his father’s money had purchased privacy.
“You’re really going in?”
Hae-neul asked from the hallway outside his door. Seo-ah’s hands trembled, but not from stress this time. The hospital’s air conditioning refused to acknowledge that spring had come.
“Yes.”
“Alone?”
Seo-ah didn’t answer. Instead, she squeezed Hae-neul’s hand once—briefly, like a touch during a bow. The meaning was unmistakable. Thank you. But this is something I need to do.
Hae-neul understood. She always understood. That was why she was Seo-ah’s friend.
The door stood half-open. Seo-ah didn’t knock. She simply entered, moving as though this room belonged to her domain.
Kang Ri-u lay in bed, his right arm wrapped in a cast, a bandage on the left side of his face. But his eyes were open—as if he’d known she would come, or had been waiting for someone to arrive.
“Hi.”
His gaze held physical weight, like a stone pressing against her chest.
“My lawyer asked about you.”
Seo-ah continued.
“What?”
His voice was different from before—hollow, as if someone had drained everything from his vocal cords.
“Whether I saw you before I reported you. I couldn’t answer. The judge postponed the trial.”
When he closed his eyes, Seo-ah saw something she’d never noticed before—beneath that bandage, there was a wound. An internal one, as if his very soul were trying to pierce through his skin.
“You did see me.”
“Yes.”
Silence descended—but not the silence of a courtroom. This was different. This was a space they fell into together, where words weren’t needed. Everything had already been said before language.
“What did you say?”
Seo-ah looked toward the window, where Seoul’s skyline stretched across Gangnam. Between the towers, the Han River gleamed thinly—the river he’d wanted to take her to. Where they were both supposed to disappear.
“You said ‘I’m sorry.’ Over and over. While holding my hand. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’”
Her voice was flat, emotionless—as if recounting someone else’s story. But that made it heavier. Truth stripped of feeling carries more weight.
“Yes.”
“And I answered, ‘I know. I’m sorry too.’”
Tears slid down Kang Ri-u’s face without his wiping them away, as if they didn’t belong to him, or as if he had no right to touch them.
“Why did you come?”
“I don’t know.”
“Because of what the lawyer asked?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
Seo-ah took a moment. Why had she come? She’d sued him, yet here she stood at his bedside. She’d needed to harm him, yet here she was.
“I wanted to confirm something.”
“What?”
“Whether you were really sorry.”
He opened his eyes then, looking at her directly—as if seeing her for the last time.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?”
“Whether I’m sorry for hurting you, or for not being able to love you. Or if those things were actually the same all along.”
Seo-ah looked at his hands—those trembling hands wrapped in plaster. She knew when they’d started shaking. The exact moment hers had. As if their bodies resonated at the same frequency.
“Are you sorry?”
He asked.
“Yes. I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For believing in you. For loving you. And… for suing you.”
Her voice wavered.
He closed his eyes again and said nothing for a long time—as if silence was all he had left.
“About what my lawyer asked.”
He finally spoke.
“Yes?”
“I’ll answer for you. You saw me before you reported me. And you didn’t want to leave me then.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means my lawyer can argue that you weren’t actually a victim—that you wanted me instead. And that argument might work.”
Seo-ah felt something crack inside her. She’d made a terrible mistake by coming here, by seeing him. She’d weakened her own case.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because…”
He stopped.
“Because what?”
“Because I should feel guilty, but I feel something else stronger.”
“What?”
“Hope.”
“Hope for what?”
“That you don’t want me to be guilty. And that means… you still love me.”
The room began to spin. As if someone were turning the world inside out. As if she herself were spinning, losing her center.
“Help me.”
“What?”
“Make me innocent. Tell the court differently. Say I didn’t force you. That I didn’t threaten you. That we just… loved each other.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s not true.”
“Not true?”
“You forced me. You threatened me. And we… didn’t love each other. Not in any way that word can describe.”
His face changed—slowly, as if someone were erasing it. The sound of hope being erased. A sound that wasn’t physical, but she heard it anyway.
“Then why did you come?”
“I wanted to see if you were broken like me. If your hands shake like mine. If you can’t sleep at night. If you think everything is your fault.”
“Yes. I’m completely broken.”
He finally said.
“But what does that matter?”
Seo-ah asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Being broken doesn’t absolve you. You still hurt me. That doesn’t change. No matter how broken you are. No matter how sorry you feel. That fact remains.”
The silence that followed was different. This wasn’t a shared descent into depths. This was a line dividing them—clear and absolute. A line that could never be crossed again.
“Then there’s nothing I can do.”
“No.”
“What about you? What will you do now?”
“I’ll submit the evidence. I’ll fight.”
“And?”
“And… I’ll live.”
“Without me?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she left—opening the door and stepping through. And in that moment, he understood. That silence meant everything. And it would be forever.
Hae-neul was waiting in the hallway. She looked at Seo-ah’s face and asked nothing. She could see that her friend had lost something in that room. Not a trial, but hope itself.
“Let’s go.”
“Where?”
Seo-ah didn’t answer. She simply walked—down the hospital corridor, into the elevator, through the lobby, and out into the spring afternoon.
Seoul’s spring was still bright. The sunlight still cruel. But Seo-ah no longer blinked against it. She simply accepted it. All of it.
“Seo-ah.”
Hae-neul said beside her.
“Hmm?”
“You didn’t do anything wrong.”
In that moment, Seo-ah understood how many people were holding her up. Hae-neul. Her mother. Even her still-trembling fingers—they were all evidence that she was not alone.
Three weeks later, on the way back to court, Seo-ah’s hands still trembled. But it wasn’t weakness now. It was strength—like a string pulled taut, vibrating with perfect pitch.
In the courtroom, everyone held their breath. Like divers about to descend into water, not knowing when they’d surface again.
“I will now pronounce the sentence.”
The judge spoke. In that moment, Seo-ah’s fingers stopped shaking. Finally.
“The defendant, Kang Ri-u…”
Word count: 12,847 characters