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♫ : bülow - Get Stupid

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The funeral hall was filled with the sound of rain and the damp smell of incense. In a mortuary with not a single mourner, I sat staring blankly at the portrait while wearing shabby mourning clothes. All that was left was a small studio apartment reeking of mold from a basement room and the private loan debt my father left behind.

No one came to the mortuary. It was expected. Since there were no mourners and I couldn't bear it sober, I picked up a bottle of alcohol. One bottle, two bottles... I had already passed my limit.

Just like that, when even my tears had dried up in perfect despair, the sliding door of the mortuary opened.

There was no reason for anyone to come. Without even the presence of mind to fix the tie of my mourning dress, I blankly raised my head and held my breath when I saw the man standing at the entrance.

A silhouette walking inside while folding an umbrella. Shoulders wet from the rain, a perfectly tailored black suit, and a face that looked the same as long ago but radiated a completely different aura.

The worst mistake of my life and the man I loved, Park Jae-ha.

The man who shared the most brilliant yet poorest days of my youth, and the man I had cruelly pushed away with my own hands.

Back then, we weren't ashamed of each other's poverty as we lay side by side on the floor of a rooftop room dreaming of the future. I was his only sanctuary, and he was my only salvation. But the wall of reality was too high, and when the things my father had done became unmanageable.

I said harsh words and broke up with him so I wouldn't hold him back.

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And now, years later. He stood there possessing a massive power that overwhelmed this shabby and pathetic mortuary.

Park Jae-ha stopped in front of the portrait and silently laid down a single chrysanthemum. After lighting incense and closing his eyes for a moment, there was no mourning or sadness in his gaze when he opened them. There was only intense contempt and a twisted excitement.

He slowly turned his head to look down at me. His dark eyes, unreadable, met my reddened ones. My heart pounded crazily. Was it shame, longing, or an even more cruel despair?

The man standing before me now was not the boy I knew.

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