I had hopes that I would never see that damned woman again, but fate was rarely kind to me in the absence of my wife, and this seemed to have become my karma for the past when I made the wrong choice for all of us once again. From the moment I recognised her I instantly wanted to throw up and take my family the hell out of there before my wife, who was already fragile, laid eyes on her again and almost had a breakdown. And it was completely killing me that I had done this to her after all of these years; it was not easy to regain her trust in me again after all that I put her through. I had broken boundaries to obtain her and I almost gave up entirely, but I want't going to let an unfaithful concubine ruin the years of marriage that we had and tear apart al 5 of our children. I had just brought back to our home in my arms as soon as I could with all of the children out of sight so I could face what was waiting for me alone. "Why? Husband, why did she come again? Was it to find you? Is she going to take you away from me?" "No! Yeonnie, I love only you! It was always you from the start! I was just blinded by stupidity when we…I…" "See? You cannot even answer me properly! You still love her, don't you?" "Please do not do this my love, do you not remember what I did back then to have you? How many lines I crossed? How many battles I fought for you? Even with your own brother? How many times did I almost loose him because of you?" "You almost lost him because you took his woman away from him! After putting him on a boat to war after you cheated on the military exam!" "Don't you are bring that up! You know the full story, so do not twist the truth!" "She…Hui-Jee…she ran away from the palace to ruin this village! Husband, how many years have we worked on this place? How many years did you spend building our home here! Our children grew up here, and she is going to bring ruin to it all! No, I need to warn my brother…!" "WILL YOU STOP RUNNING AFTER HIM! WE ARE TALKING ABOUT US NOW, SO DO NOT CHANGE THE TOPIC!" Why did she always do this? Why did she always try to change the topic to try to act unaffected by the situation even though I knew that she was falling apart? Why did she always try to hide her emotions from me? Why did she always run away from the situation? From me? Hadn't everything I have done to prove my love for her mean anything to her at all?
"What do you want me to say? What do you want me to believe? She wants to take you down because she still cares about you. She will destroy out children because of you and burn down this village in her rage. No, no I must take my children away from here and find a home for the villagers…"
As my wife was going on a rant, I could only close my eyes in regret as I let my mind take me back to the awful memories that I had with a woman who didn't love me at all, didn't care about me and only used me for power. Even now, the memories of me chasing after my best friend's woman was a constant shame to me that seared my heart only for my brother-in-law who I had wronged more than once at the time. But it also ruined the foundation of my relationship with the only woman in this nation who looked at me as an equal, treated me with unconditional care without asking for anything in return and loved me to the bone even though I had hurt her over and over again. For over twenty years I managed to finally again some peace, some joy, some happiness and even love in my life after being neglected by society for being an illegitimate son to a monstrous father who had just lost his firstborn son who was his lifeline. And everyone hated me for it every single day that I breathed and lived. And I mistakenly thought that Hui-Jee was my relief from the unjust reality that I had to live through, and it looked like I was still paying for it now.
"So what? Are you just going to take the children and leave me here on my own?" "You need to stay here and fix the mess that you have made!" I haven't been this angry for a while, and I had to admit that I missed watching my wife tremble under me. Not for any sadistic reason, it just took me back to the time when we had just married and we were both doing everything we could to commit to each other without bringing up the past at all. "I just asked you a question wife, are you going to take our family and just leave me on my own? Like everyone else does?" "You are accusing me of abandoning you? When your ex has come for you?" "Are you going to leave me?" "Husband!" "Are you?" "I have never, for a single day, abandoned you, not even after everything that you have done to me!" "It wasn't my fault!" I was so enraged that it didn't even register with me that I had grabbed my own wife into my arms and had started shaking her. I had just barely let go of her when I realised what I was doing, but she made the mistake of running towards the door and away from me. I couldn't forgive her for that, not anymore. I knew it wasn't her fault because her memory was starting to suffer, but it still hurt all the same. That woman, that damned woman was the reason why my wife was indirectly hurting me, and I was going to make her pay for this with her life.
I took back my struggling wife back into my arms and into our bedroom, where memories of our children all playing together whilst we were still in bed hit me especially hard today. The first set of twins wouldn't leave us alone for a second unless we had someone watch over them for us, even when we were simply being to sleep. Many times, we had woken up to their feet in our faces, sitting on our chests, crawling all over us and Hana covering me in her mother's makeup when she decided that I had slept for far too long.
Hwan on the other hand, was a trouble-maker from the moment he could walk and constantly cried for attention. At least our second set of twins could at least play by themselves for hours on end until it was time to eat or sleep. But Hwan did take his first steps in this bedroom, Hana fell in love with art here and Hyuk had to constantly chase Hwan around the room and find other ways to entertain him so he wouldn't tear the room apart with his ever curious and destructive little hands.
"What are you doing? Let me go! Let me…" I had taken her arms above her head and pinned her against the wall so she couldn't struggle against me even more. "Wife, I need you to clam down and listen to me! I will never allow that woman to come here and destroy everything that we have built together! She will not take our children away, she cannot do anything to your brother at all, and I will not let her tear us apart! I just need you to tell me that you believe me and will stay by my side!" I as beyond desperate at this point for everyone's sake, but there was truly nothing that I could do if I didn't have my wife's support and trust in me. It was only because of her that I had managed to come this far in life without harm, it was because of her that I had this amazing additional family in her father's village, and my family had a safe place to go to when the matters in the place got overwhelming. And we had so many memories of just being a young married couple in love and always finding tie for each other. I had a home for the first time in my life, and I was not going to let it go that easily.
"Stay here, I must find her before your brother does something stupid. He needs my help, so I want you to stay here and wait for the children to arrive, you will need to put them to sleep, ok?" "No! No, don't leave me! Don't go to her! Please, stay with me! I'm sorry, I am so sorry. I promise you that I love you and I will never abandon you!" Panic and fear had overtaken my wife and I had began to reach dangerous new heights of anger. My wife was as strong woman who had been through things that most women of our era couldn't possibly survive, or they would be traumatised. Not even I had put her in such a state and I hoped to god that I will never have to again. "Stay here wife, and I will come back to you, I promise you." It was hard for me to look at her when I had so much gel cling its way up my throat, but I still couldn't help but smile a little when I finally heard the words that I had been longing to hear from the moment I was born. My wife loved me, she was sorry that she hurt me and she was waiting for me to return home.