Unmatched

Part 1

For better, for worse.

For richer, for poorer.

In sickness, and in health.

To love, and to cherish.

Until death do you part.

A vow so sealed with a kiss had bound you to the man you loved for eternity, though it's no stretch to suppose he claimed your soul long before the eyes of church and state ever deigned to recognise it.

Marriage was blissful. Marriage was harmonious. Marriage would change you both, they'd said, make you a better person through the responsibilities it comes with, the duties of a wife to her husband, of a husband to his wife.

Those people didn't know you. They didn't know Minho either.

For if they did, they'd have saved such pearls of wisdom for the next couple coming through.

You don't think marriage has changed you. By all accounts, you're the same old person you always were.

Your lips purse to the same pout they always do. Your hair is the same colour it always was. Even your general outlook on life remains naïvely optimistic, irrespective of the inevitable bad days you occasionally suffer through.

Rolling your car to a gradual stop and firmly switching the ignition, you reangle the rear-view mirror, taking a second to assess presentability before you get out. It's by tucking a strand of loose hair behind your ear that you're momentarily blinded by a sharp glint; the silver wedding band on your ring finger, set with a single diamond that catches the dusky afternoon sunlight.

You admire it—the diamond demands that you must—spreading your fingers out, holding your hand under a dusted ray that beams through your car window. It sparkles, quietly reminding you that despite all the sameness, your life is vastly different now.

You suppose that if someone had informed you six months ago that you'd be married and relatively settled down by now, you'd have advised them in favour of industrial strength therapy and maybe a lobotomy or three.

Yet here you are; more than half a year into a marriage you never foresaw, with a man you can't well live without.

Perhaps more miraculously than any of that, however, is the fact that anything has yet to go wrong.

You're well aware that the undercurrent of surprise in relation to the success of your marriage is probably a cause for concern in itself, yet you know well enough when to pick your battles. Minho is hardly a poster husband, but then again, neither are you the perfect wife.

Staring at your wedding ring in a reverie of appreciation, you're struck with fond memories of the day. The ceremony itself had been modest, private, at a registry office in the city. Open to close friends only, because neither of you had any real family to speak of. With nobody to impress and being utterly impartial to gestures of grandeur, what you ended up with was perfectly tasteful. A simple union of two souls, a memory you'd cherish forever, and one that you'd drawn on every day since.

The shrill beep of a passing car horn pulls you from your rosy thoughts, it fades to silence with your recollection of the wedding march. Smiling, burying the warmth that blooms in your chest, you grab your handbag from the passenger seat and shove out of your car, locking it and rounding the bonnet.

Stilettos clacking abruptly against the stone cobbles of the alley, you cast a glance ahead, and suppose that there's a second thing about your life that constitutes a drastic change. One that was almost as difficult to accommodate as Minho.

Seventh Heaven.

The unlit neon sign sits above the large metal door, a somewhat ominous yet familiar indicator of the club entrance.