Yoon Seo-ah's POV
The day didn't begin with warm sunshine or the promise of a fresh start.
It began with debt collectors pounding on my apartment door, each knock echoing through the empty rooms like festival drums, loud, relentless, impossible to ignore. They called my name again and again, demanding money I no longer had, while I stood on the other side of the door, barely daring to breathe.
By evening, the knocking had finally stopped.
But the silence that followed hurt even more.
My phone screen lit up with a notification.
Lee Hyun-woo has posted new photos.
Against my better judgment, I tapped on it.
There they were.
My ex-husband and my former best friend.
Smiling.
Laughing.
Wrapped in each other's happiness as they posed for their pre-wedding photographs.
The comments poured in beneath the post.
"You two look perfect together!"
"Congratulations!"
"Wishing you a lifetime of happiness!"
Thousands of likes.
Hundreds of blessings.
As if the world had forgotten how that happiness had been built.
I slowly lowered the phone onto the bed.
My hand drifted to my stomach.
I remained still for a long time, staring at it in silence.
In just a few hours, I would have to make a decision I never imagined making.
A decision that no mother should ever have to face.
That night, sleep never truly came.
I turned from one side of the bed to the other, my thoughts refusing to settle.
The apartment felt colder than usual.
My mind wandered through memories I had tried so hard to bury.
I wondered what life would have looked like…
If none of this had happened.
If I had made different choices.
If love had chosen me differently.
Kang Ji-hoon's POV
"How can I heal people…"
My voice faded into the empty office.
"…when I'm not healed inside?"
I stared down at my hands.
These hands had held beating hearts.
Closed wounds.
Saved countless lives.
Yet they had never learned how to mend the one carrying them.
A knock sounded against the door.
I looked up.
Nurse Kim stepped inside.
"Dr. Kang," she said gently, "it's almost time."
I gave a quiet nod.
"I'll be there."
She bowed slightly before leaving the office.
The room fell silent again.
I reached for the patient's file resting on my desk.
Yesterday had been unusually exhausting. Emergencies had kept me at the hospital long after midnight, and by the time I finally returned home, I had been too drained to review today's surgical cases properly.
I opened the file absentmindedly.
Then I froze.
My eyes remained fixed on the name.
Yoon Seo-ah.
For a long moment, I simply stared.
No…
It couldn't be.
Slowly, almost afraid to confirm it, I turned the page.
There, clipped neatly inside the file, was her patient photograph.
The world around me seemed to disappear.
Twelve years.
For twelve years, I had searched for traces of her whenever life allowed me to.
Wondering where she was.
Whether she was happy.
Whether someone had become her home.
Never once had I imagined that the next time I saw her name…
…it would be inside a hospital file.
I reached for my phone without taking my eyes off the photograph.
"Nurse Kim."
"Yes, Doctor?"
"Please… ask Ms. Yoon to come to my office before we begin."
"Right away."
I ended the call and looked back at the file.
My heart had already begun remembering a life I thought time had buried.
Yoon Seo-ah's POV
I stood outside the office door, my fingers tightening around the strap of my handbag.
When the nurse called my name, I assumed the doctor simply wanted to discuss the procedure.
I took a slow breath.
Then knocked softly.
"Come in."
I pushed the door open.
The man standing inside looked up.
The moment our eyes met…
Time stopped.
My feet refused to move.
The air caught in my throat.
His face.
A face I had searched for like someone searching for a lost piece of home.
"Kang…"
The name never fully left my lips.
Twelve years had changed him.
He looked older.
Calmer.
The boy I once knew had become a man.
Yet I would have recognized those eyes anywhere.
A cold sweat spread across my back.
Of all the places I had imagined meeting him again…
A hospital was never one of them.
And certainly not…
Like this.