Hana
The bathroom is too small. The air is too thick with the smell of iron and antiseptic. Min-ho's finger is a cold searing brand on my back, tracing the jagged ridge of a scar he shouldn't even know exists. I can feel him shaking. I can hear the way his breath catches—a hitched, jagged sound that makes my own heart hammer against my ribs.
"Hana," he whispers again. It's not a question. It's a plea. "How many times?"
"Enough times to know that a bullet feels like a punch before it feels like a burn," I say, my voice sounding like it's coming from the bottom of a well. I don't turn around. I can't let him see the tears I'm fighting. "Move, Min-ho. I need to finish this."
"You're stitching yourself like you're repairing a piece of luggage," he says, his voice rising with a frantic, misplaced anger. "You're sitting here, bleeding on the tile, and you're acting like it's just another Tuesday. Who are you?"
"I'm the woman who made sure you lived to forget me," I snap, finally turning my head.
The needle is still pinched in my fingers. I look at him—really look at him—and for a second, the 'Prosecutor' is gone. He looks like a boy lost in a storm. But before he can reach for the needle, before he can offer to help, the front door buzzer shrieks through the apartment.
It doesn't stop. It's an aggressive, rhythmic pounding.
"Min-ho!" a voice calls out from the foyer. A voice like silk and broken glass. "Min-ho, open up! I saw the news! I saw the police cars!"
So-hee.
Min-ho's face transforms. The confusion, the raw vulnerability I just saw—it vanishes behind a wall of relief that feels like a physical slap to my face. He pulls back, his hand dropping from my scar as if it had burned him.
"So-hee," he breathes.
He doesn't look at my wound again. He doesn't ask if I'm okay. He turns and sprints toward the living room, leaving me sitting on the edge of the tub, half-naked and bleeding, with a needle halfway through my skin.
~★~
So-hee
The penthouse is a mess. There's glass everywhere, a vulgar dusting of shards that ruins the aesthetic of the marble foyer. I step over a pile of grit, my Dior pumps clicking a sharp, territorial rhythm.
Min-ho is there, looking disheveled, his robe tied loosely. He looks haunted, but the moment he sees me, he reaches out. I let him pull me into his arms, burying my face in his chest. I can smell the Dakdoritang—that peasant stew she makes—and it makes me want to gag.
"I'm here, darling," I coo, my voice a perfect tremolo of concern. "I came as soon as I heard. I've brought my personal security team. They're downstairs now, vetting the building staff. You aren't safe here."
"The shooter... it was a professional," Min-ho mutters into my hair. "Hana says—"
"Hana says whatever keeps her in this house," I interrupt, pulling back to cup his face. I make sure my eyes are wide and shimmering with 'truth.' "Min-ho, look at this place. Look at the timing. My father's sources say the Park Group didn't authorize a hit. Why would they? You're no threat to them right now. You don't remember a thing."
Min-ho pales. "Then who was shooting?"
"Someone who needs you to believe you're in danger. Someone who needs to be your 'hero' again so you won't kick her out." I glance toward the hallway where the 'Protector' is finally emerging.
Hana looks like a ghost. She's pulled on a fresh t-shirt, but I can see the dark, damp patch of blood soaking through the side. Her face is ashen. She looks at me, and if looks could draw blood, I'd be a corpse.
"You," Hana rasps. "Get out. Now."
"I don't think so," I say, flashing a shark's smile that Min-ho can't see. I turn to him, my voice turning sweet as honey. "Min-ho, I can't leave you here with her. Not after this. If she's 'protecting' you, she's doing a terrible job. I've had my things brought up. I'm moving in."
"What?" Hana steps forward, her hand moving instinctively toward her hip where a holster would usually be. "This is a crime scene. This is my home."
"It's a glass house," I retort, walking past her into the living room. "And I'm the one who's going to make sure it's secure. Min-ho, tell her. Tell her I'm staying."
Min-ho looks between us. He looks at Hana's bleeding side, then at my perfectly manicured hands. He's drowning in a sea of conflicting evidence, but the '2021 Min-ho'—the one who loved me—is the one winning.
"She stays," Min-ho says, his voice cracking. "Hana, she's right. I don't know what happened tonight, but I know I don't trust you. I trust So-hee."
~★~
Hana
I watch So-hee move through my living room like an invasive species. She calls two men in suits—her 'security'—and starts giving orders.
"That," she says, pointing to the hand-painted vase from Gyeongju. "It's tacky. Throw it out. And those pillows—blue is such a cold color. Get rid of them."
"Stop," I growl, moving to block one of the men. "Don't touch that vase."
"It's just a piece of clay, Hana," So-hee says, walking to the bookshelf. She picks up the leather-bound copy of The Art of War—the anniversary gift. She flips to the front page, eyes the inscription I wrote with my own blood and tears, and drops it into a black trash bag one of her men is holding.
"That's mine!" I lung toward her, but the pain in my side flares so bright the world goes white. I stumble, clutching the counter.
"It's clutter," So-hee says, her eyes meeting mine with a terrifying, blank coldness. "Everything in this house is clutter. The memories you've invented, the life you've staged... it's all going in the trash. We're starting over. Min-ho needs a clean slate to remember the real truth."
"Min-ho!" I yell, looking at him. He's standing by the window, staring at the bullet hole in the pantry. "She's throwing away our life! Tell her to stop!"
Min-ho doesn't even turn around. "Maybe a clean slate is what I need. I look at those things and I feel... sick. It feels like someone else's life."
So-hee smirks. She walks into the master bedroom. I hear the sound of hangers sliding across a rod. A moment later, she emerges with an armful of my dresses—the silk one I wore to his promotion dinner, the sundress from Jeju.
She tosses them onto the floor in a heap of colorful fabric.
"These don't fit the 'new' aesthetic," she says. "And frankly, they smell like hospital and desperation. Pack them up, boys."
"You're a monster," I whisper.
"I'm a girlfriend who's reclaiming her territory," So-hee whispers back as she passes me to head to the kitchen. "You're just a squatter with a gun, Hana. How long did you think you could play house with a man who doesn't even like the way you breathe?"
The men are moving through the penthouse now, stripping it bare. They take our wedding photos off the wall. They take the dog's leash from the hook. They take the custom leather-bound planners Min-ho uses for his cases.
I stand in the middle of the carnage, the blood from my hip now dripping onto the floor they just polished. I feel like I'm being erased in real-time. My existence is being bagged and tagged for the incinerator.
"Wait," So-hee says, stopping one of the men who is carrying a box toward the door. She reaches in and pulls out the Golden Retriever's heated bed. "A dog? Min-ho, you told me you were allergic."
"I am," Min-ho says, finally walking over. He looks at the bed, his brow furrowed. "I don't know why that's even here."
"It's because you love him!" I cry out. "His name is Gureum! He's at the trainer's for the week because you didn't want him around the 'stress' of the trial!"
"Gureum," So-hee laughs, a sharp, metallic sound. "How poetic. A cloud that never existed. Min-ho, honey, she's even hallucinating pets now. This is getting dangerous."
She drops the dog bed onto the pile of trash.
"She has to go, Min-ho," So-hee says, wrapping her arms around his waist from behind. "She's unstable. She's bleeding on your floor and screaming about ghost dogs. For your safety, for our safety, she needs to leave this apartment tonight."
Min-ho looks at me. For a second, just a heartbeat, his eyes drop to my hip. He sees the needle I'm still clutching in my hand—the one I used to stitch myself because he was too busy greeting his 'enemy.'
The guilt flickers there, a tiny spark in the dark.
"She can't leave," Min-ho says.
So-hee freezes. "What?"
"She's right about one thing," Min-ho says, his voice regaining some of its 'Prosecutor' steel. "Someone shot at me tonight. The police haven't found them. If I kick her out, and she is a mercenary, she'll just go back to whoever hired her. And if she's telling the truth about being my 'shield'..." He looks at the bullet hole again. "...then I'm a dead man the second she walks out that door."
"Min-ho, you can't be serious!" So-hee shrieks. "You're going to let this woman sleep under the same roof as us? After she staged an assassination attempt?"
"I'm going to keep my enemies where I can see them," Min-ho says, turning to face me.
His eyes are no longer lost. They are hard. They are the eyes of a man who has decided to treat his own marriage like a high-stakes interrogation.
I feel a glimmer of hope. He's letting me stay. He's choosing the shield.
"Thank you, Min-ho," I breathe.
"Don't thank me yet," he says. He walks toward me, stopping just out of arm's reach. He looks at the heap of my clothes on the floor, then at the empty spaces on the walls where our memories used to hang. "So-hee is right about the clutter. This isn't your home anymore, Hana. You don't recognize the rules of this house, and I don't recognize you."
He gestures toward the back of the penthouse, toward the small, windowless room off the kitchen—the one meant for live-in help that we only ever used for storage.
"Since you're so worried about 'security,' you can stay. You can watch the doors and check the food," Min-ho says, his voice devoid of any warmth. "But you stay in the maid's quarters. And Hana? If I catch you in the master wing after dark, I won't call the police. I'll let So-hee's security team handle you. Do you understand?"
I look at So-hee. She is smiling—a triumphant, sickening glow. She's won. She's the lady of the manor, and I am the help.
I look at Min-ho. The man who once promised me that no matter where we were, as long as we were together, we were home.
"Well?" Min-ho asks, his eyes like flint. "Is the 'shield' willing to sleep with the mops, or was your love for me only worth the master suite?"