I barely remembered anything after that.
Flash! A bright white light, feeling like I was floating, and a vague sensation that someone was calling my name.
– Yoo Seolhwa, Yoo Seolhwa…. Open your eyes…!
A man was looking down at me, crying. I felt a little tremble as he gripped my hand tightly to not let go.
– I’m sorry, I didn’t come to pick you up because I was busy writing…
Ah, it’s Do Hyeon.
But why is he crying?
I should be smiling since it’s my birthday today.
Ah, he must be upset because I couldn’t make him some rolled omelet.
– I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry…
There’s no need to apologize. Soon, I’ll get home and make him some delicious fluffy Yoo Seolhwa-style rolled omelet.
Wait, why can’t I speak?
I wanted to tell him that I’m okay.
But my mouth wouldn’t move. I couldn’t even imitate the sounds, just managed to raise the corners of my lips.
– You still haven’t caught the culprit? Damn it, you useless bastards. Are you police or what?!
Watching Han Dohyun grab someone by the collar and yell made Yoo Seolhwa frown. He rarely expressed himself like this.
Why was he pouring out his sadness like that?
Even when Seolhwa wanted to stop him, her body wouldn’t move. It felt as if everything below her waist had turned to stone.
It hurts. There’s a burning sensation, like I was stabbed with a hot iron skewer.
Trying to hold back the pain, a moan slipped through clenched teeth, biting down so hard I almost cracked my jaw.
Unable to voice why my body felt like this, she tasted the cold air of the operating room.
The weight pressing down on her chest was overwhelming, surrounded by a sea of doctors all looking at her with serious faces.
‘Oh, I had a car accident.’
In that moment, Seolhwa understood the seriousness of her situation.
She realized how critical it was, seeing nametags belonging to specialists in general and emergency medicine.
Doctors confirmed various X-rays, CTs, and even MRI results while checking something back and forth.
Soon, they shook their heads with a grim expression and took Seolhwa away somewhere peacefully.
Finally,
– We’re going to administer anesthesia. Breathe. One, two…
Bright light struck her vision, and an oxygen mask was placed over her mouth.
Before she could count to three, her consciousness started to fade, the coldness entering her veins made the pain coiling around her body start to ease up.
‘I should have told Dohyun it’s not his fault…’
As her eyelids grew heavier, her last thought before losing consciousness was so trivial.
========================================
When Seolhwa opened her eyes again, she found herself staring at a white ceiling, just like the beginning of a typical novel.
“Yoo Seolhwa…! You’re awake…!”
“Do Hyeon…?”
Han Dohyun, who looked like he had been sleeping next to her, had deep dark circles under his eyes, and they looked bloodshot.
“You’ve been unconscious for two days. I…I really thought you were dead…”
The face of the weary, gritty man melted upon seeing his loved one regain consciousness.
Such a foolish and naive guy.
Despite going through such a horrific past, he couldn’t shed his innocence towards the world.
“…With you here, there’s no way I could die, idiot.”
In response, Seolhwa attempted to move and embrace Dohyun, thinking there would be no pain since she felt fine after the accident.
She thought it would be so simple.
Life had always seemed positively inclined towards Seolhwa. No matter what misfortune came her way, she’d always been on the side of the ‘haves.’
The perfect idol with wealth, beauty, and grades, someone everyone admired.
She had let her guard down.
But then,
“W-What? Why can’t I move my arm…?”
Thud! Her right arm wouldn’t budge like a marionette whose strings had suddenly been cut. No matter how hard she tried to force it, she felt no sensation at all.
“…?”
Seolhwa couldn’t accept the sudden change in her body. Using her remaining arm to pull up the limp right arm was a struggle that seemed almost desperate.
Why did it have to be her right arm? If it were her left arm, it wouldn’t have been that big of a deal.
More than anything, losing the use of one arm was a severe penalty for a novelist.
Even though there were authors who wrote using voice recognition or typing with their feet or remaining hand,
“D-Doctor! Quickly, come here!!”
For the first time, Seolhwa hated being next to Dohyun. It felt like a bug frantically flipping over, desperately trying to escape.
“Do Hyeon, no! It’s nothing. I’m just a bit tired… yes, I’m definitely not feeling paralyzed.”
Even though she knew the truth about her body more than anyone, she kept making excuses towards her boyfriend.
========================================
Terminal illness always arrives suddenly.
Like a friend you’re not close to crashing your birthday party out of the blue.
It’s cruel, cold, and unpleasant in every sense.
They say trials only align with what one can overcome, but,
“You might end up paralyzed throughout your entire body. You had a severe shock to your cervical spine.”
Spinal cord ischemia.
A phenomenon where blood that should flow to the spinal cord gets cut off due to an accident, causing death to begin in the spinal cord.
“W-What? What do you mean…?”
“The prognosis is really not good. Even though the medical staff has done everything they can, since she is the granddaughter of a major sponsor of our hospital.”
The doctor adjusted his glasses and spoke in a serious tone. Medical staff typically only mention the worst outcomes, but,
“It seems you have about a year left…”
The following words were enough to break even the heart of someone with the most optimistic outlook.
“Please, Doctor… please… Our Seolhwa is just 20 years old. Do you know how hard she worked to support me? She just got accepted into the college she wanted to attend….”
It wasn’t just Yoo Seolhwa who was despairing at the cold hard reality. Han Dohyun began to plead with a choked voice.
“I’m sorry to say this, but the situation is indeed dire. To be honest, just surviving is already a miracle.”
But the doctor wasn’t a god. They were just weak humans who couldn’t bring back the deceased.
“…….”
“The hit-and-run suspect tried to ensure the patient was thoroughly killed to leave no evidence.”
Moreover, the severity of Seolhwa’s condition had another cause.
The culprit intended to kill her to leave no consequences for jumping in to save a child.
That child had also been hit by a car while trying to protect Seolhwa, so the guy was truly pure evil.
“Isn’t that guy still out there?”
Seolhwa couldn’t help but wonder about that.
Wasn’t it absurd that, after trying to kill the pampered granddaughter of a conglomerate and escaping without evidence?
“Yeah, but I’ll definitely catch him. Don’t worry too much.”
It seemed as if fate had decided to let her die, as there were no leads or descriptions to go by at all.
The only eyewitness, the child, was struggling for his life from the hit-and-run incident, and the CCTV was conveniently in a blind spot.
When coincidence overlaps with coincidence, it becomes destiny.
“No, but even if you catch him, what’s the point… I can’t write anymore. What good will that do?”
And that very fate was cornering Yoo Seolhwa into despair.
========================================
At first, Yoo Seolhwa held onto hope.
Humans are inherently optimistic, so they don’t give up easily once they see some progress.
“That’s it! You’re doing great! Just one more step!”
After the accident, all her bones were shattered, and though she had been tightly cast, she’d removed it and was practicing to walk forward while holding Dohyun’s hand.
‘Hah, of course. The world’s Yoo Seolhwa won’t give up.’
She confidently smiled, believing she would surpass the year the doctor mentioned.
Surely, plenty of terminal patients who had ventured into the wild were living well beyond the expectation of their lifespans.
The hopeful sight of Seolhwa and Dohyun had even gained a reputation among the physical therapists,
“Now you’re starting to look like our Seolhwa. I was really worried because you were so depressed for a while.”
“Hey, just wait and see!”
Neither of them minded the growing reputation. They could live happily like newlyweds in a place that could easily turn dreary.
Each time university ended early, Han Dohyun would care for Seolhwa with utmost devotion. Wiping away sweat with a towel, lifting her up when she struggled to move.
“Gahh…! Be gentle!”
“Our lady is as light as a feather; what do you want me to do?”
Even amid their misfortune, they worked hard to find happiness.
But then…
“W-What? Do Hyeon, what is this, enlistment notice…?”
The seed of misfortune that took everything away started with a single letter.
“…….”
As if some evil god deeply hated their smiling faces and cursed them.
========================================
After Han Dohyun left for military service, Yoo Seolhwa faced another shocking event.
The legs that seemed to be healing began to feel paralyzed. The legs that Dohyun had lovingly massaged and constantly helped through rehabilitation.
Even with a rehabilitation therapist coming home to help, they couldn’t reattach the severed nerves.
This incident occurred just a month after Dohyun enlisted.
[I miss Do Hyeon….]
With her unaccustomed left hand, Seolhwa typed on the laptop keyboard.
The car accident she had been in slowly began to break everything she had.
Not only had it turned the status, wealth, and reputation she had built up into worthless scraps of paper,
[I hear I can’t have a baby anymore. They said I’m completely infertile.]
It took away Seolhwa’s most cherished wish.
Two months after Dohyun enlisted, it was a truth she couldn’t bear to reveal to him. Unable to overcome the dreadful reality, her heart sank deeper into misery.
[I’m dying writing with one hand. It’s such a struggle now to write with my poor handwriting.]
Then the paralysis spreading from her right arm felt like it was trapping Seolhwa in a hard cocoon.
Preparing for the transformation, she couldn’t fly like a butterfly, her body felt heavier.
[Looks like I won’t be able to fly like a butterfly, Do Hyeon.]
Seolhwa could not fly like a butterfly!
Out of nowhere, she couldn’t move much anymore.
Even if she scowled and strained her hand, it wouldn’t move. It felt like trying to move a nonexistent sixth finger.
Like a soldier navigating a minefield, after losing sensation in her right hand and left leg, Yoo Seolhwa made a decision.
With a body growing ever more paralyzed, she could not maintain her dreams of being a novelist or even her position as Dohyun’s girlfriend.
She couldn’t even have the children she always dreamed of.
So,
[Today, I’ve decided to die.]
Seolhwa resolved to commit suicide. She knew very well that staying like this would only burden Dohyun.
[At least I wanted to die while my spirit as a writer was alive, while I still felt like a person.]
Thus, she wrote some lies in her farewell letter.
She knew that the man named Han Dohyun was so lovable that, if she left any regrets, he would be stuck holding onto them forever.
That way, he would live on alone in sadness, unable to forget a woman who couldn’t be with him for life or give him children.
[It feels like being buried alive.]
[It feels like someone is shoveling damp, hard dirt and heaping it on my head each day.]
[Even if I beg the gods to save me, nothing changes.]
With her unaccustomed left hand, she typed away on the laptop.
[The weight of death is so light. That’s why I’ve decided to die before I become even lighter….]
Seolhwa had resolved to act like a bad woman so that Dohyun could forget her.
[December 24, 20XX, Snow Flower, novelist Yoo Seolhwa to Han Dohyun.]
[PS. Let’s break up. Honestly, you’ll find someone better than me.]
After finishing her farewell letter, she sneakily exited the hospital room and slipped her crutch under her left armpit, moving away unsteadily.
========================================
In a large hospital, there exists an incline known as a walkway.
It’s a place intended for patients using wheelchairs to ascend levels, and just months ago, Seolhwa had fought the illness without losing her hope.
She thought that spinal cord ischemia was the only misfortune of her life.
‘That I’m infertile….’
When unfortunate incidents pile up, one learns to give up, it seems.
I’m sorry for being a bad woman.
I’m sorry for being a useless girlfriend.
Even now, every moment without you feels like hell, and I couldn’t see your face after you returned from service.
“Phew!”
Just covering to go to the bathroom, she ascended the stairs.
Passing through the dull and dark atmosphere of the adult ward,
She reached the floor of hope, where lights were still on, decorated with all sorts of colorful ornaments, even at this late hour.
The memories from the children’s ward still stirred nostalgia within Seolhwa. She had briefly suffered from leukemia during childhood.
Unfulfilled desires like wanting to eat hamburgers until bursting outside.
Hope that one day she would escape having a bald head and a knitted hat made by her mother.
With warm encouragement from the nurses and physical therapists to work hard in her rehabilitation, she had managed to overcome leukemia quite quickly.
‘It’s the opposite of now.’
She thought it would be the same this time, too.
Before she completely lost her ability to eat, she secretly called drivers to explore famous restaurants across the country.
As her body became paralyzed, she stopped writing in her diary, where she used to jot down everything she wanted to do daily.
She organized her friends, who were gradually contacting her less and less.
The partner she had promised forever rejected her through her farewell letter.
Her father, who had donated bone marrow for her at that time, had passed away from illness.
If she vanished in the middle of this world with a ‘pop’, nobody would even notice.
Clack-.
The rooftop door swung open.
========================================
“It’s cold, so cold.”
The December weather pierced Seolhwa’s skin like a knife.
The cold she felt through her thin patient gown made her feel more alive than ever.
I’m alive.
I’m alive.
Chattering her teeth, Seolhwa felt joy at being alive.
Due to the long battle with her illness, she had lost her sanity, or perhaps she found happiness in finally ending the drudgery of her life.
Her eyes became hot.
Her throat constricted, breathing uneven.
Her body teemed with energy, trembling.
“Sniff… Hic…”
Ah, I shouldn’t cry.
Maybe it was because she was staring at the cold concrete floor from a height of ten stories.
She suddenly recalled the unfinished dream.
‘I wanted to write a more memorable piece.’
Seolhwa was not just a patient hooked to IV and medication; she was still a writer with many dreams.
‘I wanted to build more memories with Do Hyeon and share love.’
Rather than a skeletal corpse, who looked like a withered twig, she was still a woman wanting love from her boyfriend.
“The stories I wrote with Do Hyeon… I wanted to see them published in a book one day… Ha, ha, ha…”
The sound she made right before falling off the rooftop was nothing more than this.
Just this.
Such a foolish statement that could be summarized in one sentence.
In reality, Yoo Seolhwa may have been desperately struggling against the idea of death.
====================================
“Oh dear. Poor little human girl.”
As Seolhwa crashed into the ground, turning into a puddle of blood and flesh, a visitor appeared.
“I thoroughly enjoyed the novel written by your boyfriend.”
It was Shub-Niggurath, the Mother of All and the goddess of the Universe, appearing in a grotesque form that mixed with black goats.
“Because of this, I will grant you an opportunity.”
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