Don't Blame Me || Jeongcheol

Chapter 53

The house was quieter than Jeonghan had ever remembered it being. Not silent not in the suffocating way it had been before but peaceful. The kind of quiet that came from warmth instead of absence. It felt unfamiliar, yet not entirely unwelcome.

Seungcheol sat cross-legged on the living room floor, his face scrunched in exaggerated concentration as he balanced a set of wooden blocks into a wobbly tower. Haneul, sitting across from him, clutched his stuffed rabbit to his chest as he watched his uncle with rapt attention.

Jeonghwa sat on the couch, hands folded neatly in her lap, her expression unreadable as she observed the scene. She wasn’t tense, but there was something distant in her posture, as if she were both here and somewhere else at the same time.

Jeonghan lingered near the doorway, arms crossed, leaning against the frame. He didn’t speak, but when Jeonghwa glanced up, their eyes met. It was brief, fleeting, but in that short moment, they communicated something neither of them had the words for yet.

Uncertainty. Resentment. Hesitation.

And beneath it all… possibility.

Jeonghan wasn’t sure what had compelled him to let her stay in the guest room, to let her stay past the meeting, past the decisions that had closed a long and bloody chapter of their lives. Maybe it was Haneul. Maybe it was the way his son had accepted her without a question.

Or maybe it was the nagging feeling that if he didn’t try, he’d regret it.

Across the room, Seungcheol exhaled dramatically as his tower of blocks toppled over, earning a delighted giggle from Haneul.

“You did that on purpose.” Haneul accused, eyes bright with childish mischief.

“Did not!” Seungcheol defended, holding up his hands in mock innocence. “You just breathed too hard.”

Haneul pouted. “Did not.”

“Did too.” Seungcheol shot back playfully, reaching over to ruffle the boy’s hair. “Guess we’ll have to start over.”

Haneul huffed but didn’t protest, already reaching for another block.

Jeonghwa’s lips twitched, just barely, and Jeonghan caught the fleeting trace of amusement in her gaze before she looked away. It was strange, seeing her here, in his home. In his life.

She didn’t belong not yet. Not in the way Seungcheol did, not in the way Haneul so effortlessly did. But she was trying.

Jeonghwa hadn’t spoken much since she stayed. Jeonghan hadn’t expected her to.

She was watching, observing, the same way he had always done. He could see it in the way her eyes moved, the way she studied Seungcheol and Haneul, the way she held herself tense but not rigid, cautious but not closed off.

She was waiting. For what, he wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure what he was waiting for either.

Haneul suddenly clambered onto Seungcheol’s back, laughing as he declared himself the "King of the Mountain." Seungcheol groaned dramatically, pretending to collapse under the weight of a child who was barely half his size.

Jeonghwa’s gaze softened. Jeonghan caught it.

You miss this, don’t you?

She blinked, startled, as if she’d heard the unspoken words.

Her fingers curled slightly in her lap.

You didn’t have this growing up, did you?

A flicker of something crossed her face something raw, something almost painful. She looked away. Jeonghan exhaled slowly, running a hand through his hair.