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# Chapter 179: Before the Fire Goes Out
10:30 p.m. Seo-ah still sat on the bench in Hangang Park. Haneul scrolled through her phone beside her, the screen’s glow casting her face in pallid light. Seo-ah looked at Haneul’s profile picture—a photo with her tattoo shop teammates, all of them smiling. How long could that smile last? Seo-ah wondered. Every laugh eventually stops. Every fire eventually burns out.
“Do-hyun texted again.”
Haneul said, lowering the screen.
“What did he say?”
Seo-ah asked.
“’Noona, come to the hospital. Mom keeps asking for you. Please.’”
Haneul read aloud.
Seo-ah’s body went rigid. Her mother was looking for her. That meant she’d woken up. No—Seo-ah had already known. Her mother had woken. She’d said something. About who Seo-ah’s father was. Something about his voice. Seo-ah had wanted to escape that moment, which was exactly why she’d fled the hospital.
“We have to go.”
Haneul said. Not a question. A statement.
“Yeah.”
Seo-ah replied.
They both stood. The night in Hangang Park remained quiet. Yet something like tension thrummed through that silence. As if someone were holding their breath. As if the world waited on the edge of something about to break. Seo-ah looked at the river once more. The water was still dark, and the lights scattered across its surface still looked like tears.
They took a taxi. The driver was a middle-aged man, and the radio played the late-night news. Economic reports. Stock prices. Exchange rates. All the numbers of the world were falling. Seo-ah watched the city blur past the window. Seoul’s night landscape. Gangnam. Gangbuk. Gangdong. Every district seemed made of the same light.
“Is it near Olympic Park Station?”
The driver asked.
“Yeah. Seoul National University Hospital.”
Haneul answered.
The driver nodded and returned his attention to the radio. Seo-ah glanced at Haneul beside her. Her friend’s expression was grave, as if she understood how serious this was. As if she knew what Seo-ah’s mother had said.
“Tell me everything your mom said. All of it.”
Haneul said suddenly.
“I already told you.”
Seo-ah replied.
“No, you didn’t. You only told me half. You always tell only half. You keep the rest locked inside. But I know you, Seo-ah. You always do it. The more important something is, the more you hide it.”
Haneul said.
Seo-ah said nothing. Haneul was right. She always held back, always kept the most crucial parts buried. As if speaking them aloud would make them real. As if silence meant they were still just possibilities.
“Mom said Dad was afraid of his own voice. And that it… did something.”
Seo-ah said slowly.
“Did something?”
Haneul repeated.
“Yeah. I’m not exactly sure what. Mom didn’t explain clearly. But there was something in the way she said it… fear. Like she was talking about something dangerous.”
Seo-ah said.
The taxi sped along Gangbyeon-buk-ro. 10:45 p.m. Late, but cars still flowed like blood through the city’s veins. Seoul never sleeps. The city moves through the night as if it were day. As if the city itself burned bright, refusing to be extinguished.
“Can you… do something? With your voice?”
Haneul asked.
“Do what?”
Seo-ah asked.
“I don’t know. Something. Like affect people. Something.”
Haneul said.
Seo-ah thought about it. Her voice doing something. Did that even make sense? Her voice was just a voice. Songs sung at Club Underscore. Someone else’s music rendered through her throat. But if Haneul was right. If her voice could actually do something. Then perhaps her father’s fear made sense after all.
“Do you remember when we first met at Club Underscore?”
Haneul asked.
“Yeah.”
Seo-ah answered.
“You sang that night. And I felt… I don’t know how to explain it. It was like you weren’t singing at all. It was like you were touching someone’s soul. You were singing and I was crying. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Haneul said.
Seo-ah remembered that night. Two years ago. A small club in Hongdae. Blue neon light. Someone’s birthday party. She’d just been a session vocalist. But Haneul was right. Everyone who watched Seo-ah that night had been transformed. As if her voice was carrying them somewhere else. As if her voice had cracked open their chests.
“I’m not special.”
Seo-ah said.
“You are. You don’t see it, but you really are. And because of that—because of that gift—someone was afraid of you.”
Haneul said.
The taxi passed Olympic Park Station. The hospital was getting closer. Seo-ah’s heart quickened. Her body was reacting before her mind could catch up. Her fingers began to tremble. No—they’d always trembled. But this was a different kind of trembling. Fear mixed with something else. The body’s recognition that she stood at an important threshold.
“Seo-ah.”
Haneul called her name.
“Yeah?”
Seo-ah answered.
“Don’t do this alone. You understand?”
Haneul said.
“Yeah.”
Seo-ah answered.
But it was a lie. Seo-ah had always done everything alone. Sang alone. Suffered alone. Burned alone. She didn’t know how to do anything with someone else. Or didn’t want to know. Because only alone could her fire avoid burning someone else.
The taxi pulled up to the hospital entrance. 10:50 p.m. The hospital blazed with light. Emergency room lights. Intensive care lights. Every light burning. As if the building refused the night. As if it too were burning.
Seo-ah and Haneul got out. Haneul paid the fare. They walked toward the entrance. The automatic doors slid open. Hospital smell. Disinfectant. Someone’s pain. Someone’s death. All of it mixed together, greeting them.
“Fifth floor.”
Haneul said, walking toward the elevators.
Inside the elevator, mirror walls. Seo-ah saw her own reflection. How pale she looked. How empty her eyes were. As if she were already someone’s shadow. As if her fire had already burned out.
“When you came to the hospital and heard what your mom said—what did you do?”
Haneul asked.
“I just listened.”
Seo-ah answered.
“Just listened?”
Haneul pressed.
“Yeah.”
Seo-ah answered.
The elevator climbed. First floor. Second. Third. Fourth. A few seconds until the fifth. But those seconds felt like eternity. As if she were ascending toward something inevitable. As if she were moving toward a point from which there was no return.
The elevator doors opened.
The fifth-floor hallway. Fluorescent light. Room numbers. 505. 506. 507. Seo-ah followed the numbers. Haneul stayed beside her, as if understanding that Seo-ah might collapse and needed to be held up.
Room 510.
The door was half-open. Seo-ah looked inside. A bed. A person on the bed. Her mother. Her mother was sleeping. And beside the bed, Do-hyun sat with a pale face, as if he too had fallen ill.
“Noona!”
Do-hyun cried out when he saw Seo-ah.
Her mother’s eyes opened slowly. Like waking from a dream. Her mother’s eyes found Seo-ah. And there were tears in her eyes.
“Seo-ah.”
Her mother spoke. One word. Seo-ah’s name. But that single word contained everything. Her mother’s fear. Her mother’s regret. Her mother’s love. And her mother’s guilt.
Seo-ah walked to the bed slowly. As if by moving slowly, she could delay this moment, could avoid whatever came after. But her body moved forward anyway. Her body didn’t obey her mind. Her body always knew first what was necessary. What had to be done.
Seo-ah sat beside the bed. An arm’s distance from her mother. Close enough to reach out and touch. But Seo-ah didn’t reach out.
“I’m sorry.”
Her mother said.
“For what?”
Seo-ah asked in a voice she didn’t recognize.
“Everything. For what I should have told you. For what I hid from you. And…”
Her mother’s voice faded.
“And?”
Seo-ah pressed.
Her mother was silent. The silence stretched. Seo-ah studied her mother’s face. All those lines. So much exhaustion etched into her skin. Seo-ah looked at her mother’s hands. A diver’s hands. Hands that had worked in the sea. Now those hands showed white patches. Vitiligo. As if those hands too were trying to leave her.
“And I couldn’t protect you. I couldn’t keep you safe. I couldn’t protect you as yourself—not as someone’s daughter, but as you.”
Her mother said.
Seo-ah took her mother’s hand. Warm. Growing weaker. But still strong. A diver’s hand. Holding it, Seo-ah felt as if she too could breathe in deep water.
“What did you say? About Dad?”
Seo-ah asked.
“I’ll tell you that later. For now… for now, just look at me, okay? Just… look at your mother.”
Her mother said.
Seo-ah nodded. And stayed sitting there. Holding her mother’s hand. Do-hyun still sat across from them, and Haneul still stood by the door. They all remained silent. It wasn’t an uncomfortable silence. This was different. A silence where everyone felt the same thing. A silence where everyone saw the same fire.
11:10 p.m.
The fluorescent light in the room continued to burn. It lit her mother’s face. Seo-ah looked. Really looked. For the first time. As if trying to paint her mother into memory. Because she understood. How precious this moment was. How different everything would be after this. How much longer this light would stay on.
“Seo-ah.”
Her mother spoke again.
“Yeah?”
Seo-ah answered.
“Don’t keep burning yourself. Do you understand?”
Her mother said.
It was similar to what Haneul had said at Hangang Park. You keep burning. But her mother’s words were different. Her mother’s words were a command. Don’t keep burning. Stop. Stop now.
“Yeah.”
Seo-ah answered. This time it wasn’t a lie. She really did want to stop. She wanted to stop burning.
But she couldn’t.
Because there was something inside her—something even she didn’t understand—that kept burning. Her voice. Her power. Her existence. It kept burning her and everyone around her.
The hospital room fell silent again. But this was a different kind of silence. Understanding. Compassion. And above all—the silence of people who knew that nothing could change.
The night continued. The fluorescent light stayed on. And somewhere, someone’s fire kept burning.