What I remember: 16

“Shillang… is it true?” Hwang Bo asked as she finally mustered enough courage to ask the question that she never wanted to know the answer to. 

She was met with silence as Hyun Joong looked at the floor, unable to meet her eyes. Taking his silence as his answer, she felt her heart grow colder than the winter winds as she saw the trust she had in him disappearing before her. 

“Shillang…” 

“Bu In, believe me. I do love you. You are the best thing that has ever happened to me, and there is nobody else that I could love as much as I love you.” 

“But what he said is true then. That you allowed me to believe in a lie.” 

“Which eventually became the truth!” 

“But it still doesn’t erase the fact that it was a lie to begin with. How do I believe in something that was never what it was to begin with? I walked down this road with you based on the trust that I had in you. The faith that we were meant to be. But core of that trust is based on a lie? That all I was to you was a replacement??” Hwang Bo yelled at him, finally feeling the heat of her anger leaving her as she found the voice to speak out all her insecurities. 

“Bu In… that was a mistake that I made years ago! One that I regret every single day of my life, one which made me swear that I would never do you wrong, that I would treat you the best I can forever…” 

“Which means that now, everything that you have done for me so far has been out of guilt. Hyun Joong, please stop. At least allow me to believe that your actions have been sincere. Please.” Hwang Bo said as she looked away, numbed from the night. She knew that she was being unreasonable, but her heart refused to allow her head to think straight. Everything that she had feared was coming true. That she was too old for him. That she would hamper his success. That she would never be able to give him everything that he wanted. That she was just not good enough for him. 

In the end, all she could see was that they were just not meant to be. 

And all she could do was to just walk away.

What I remember: 15

‘It’s really happening. This really is happening…’ 

Hwang Bo couldn’t take her eyes off the screen in the waiting room as she watched Hyun Joong singing the one song that had been playing in her mind for the past two years. She felt the tears welling up in her eyes as she sang along with Hyun Joong, a million thoughts racing through her mind as the memories they once shared came back to her. 

The happiness they once shared was still so fresh in her memory; the joy that she felt would never leave her for as long as she was alive. So when she heard the heated exchange that Hyun Joong shared with his manager, her whole body froze when his manager threatened to spill the beans that would have shattered their lives. 

“Do you really want me to call her out now and tell her, Hyun Joong?” 

“Hyung… Please don’t do this. We can work things out, it doesn’t have to come this far… Hyung…” Hyun Joong pleaded but his manager was beyond all reason. 

“Hye Jung-ssi! Come out now! There is no point in hiding when we all need to let this out in the open! Hye Jung-ssi!” 

Hwang Bo stepped out of the darkness, only to face the thunderous anger that Hyun Joong’s manager unleashed upon her. 

“Hye Jung-ssi. I respect you as a person, and I feel that it’s no longer right for you to be living a lie.” 

“Hyung!!!” 

“Hyun Joong has been lying to you, Hye Jung-ssi. He never loved you the way you thought he did. Did you really believe in everything he said to you during your months in the show? It was a lie. The reason why he managed to get so close to you in such a short time was because he told everyone that he took it as if you were his ex-girlfriend, the one that he had no choice but to leave. That is the real reason why he suddenly became a different person. It was never what you thought it was. That he fell for you as you went through the experiences together. You were merely a replacement for him at the time. A replacement.” 

Unable to even breathe, all Hwang Bo could do was look at Hyun Joong as he crumbled to the floor. His manager looked on at the both of them before slowly stepping back, hit with the realization that he had hurt two of the best people in the world through his fit of rage.  Unable to say anything else, he turned and walked out the door as he left the both of them to sieve through the pieces of their lives together.