Paradox (Red Velvet FF) | ON HOLD

God Damn Fine Print

The days that followed passed in a sluggish blur. Yerim didn't touch her computer once, even as emails that surely had something to do with her current debt came in one after another with insistent pings, opting instead to help her sister go through Sungjae's things. The cremation process was finished the eighth day, but when Sooyoung came home from the funeral home cradling a box to her chest - a box that was far too small to hold an urn - Yerim wrinkled her nose. Sooyoung produced the contents with something almost like a smile: a glass vial filled with small green and turquoise stones. As popular as the "death beads" trend had become, Yerim always found the idea a bit squirm-inducing. She didn't really want to wear her dead loved one in a necklace, and she sincerely hoped she wouldn't have to watch her sister do it either.

As if reading her mind, Sooyoung assured, "This isn't jewelry. It's just...comforting, I guess. To have him like this."

Yerim gazed at her sister, dumb lips not forming any word or sound. What was there to say? Who was she to tell Sooyoung how to grieve? She remembered reading somewhere that lovers - true lovers, ones that were joined by something almost cosmic in power - often died within a few months or years of each other. Their bodies just gave up, or perhaps it was their minds, having lost a piece that could never be replaced. With a shudder, she hoped Sooyoung wasn't like that. But hadn't she seen over the years how close they were? How perfectly in sync, how conjoined?

Pushing these thoughts away, Yerim trailed after Sooyoung to the lounge, watching as the elder placed the bottle next to a picture of Sungjae propped on the bookshelf. Her sister's apartment was luxurious compared to her own - clean white end tables free of food waste and wrappers, a bookshelf that held actual books and decorative knick knacks instead of retired hardware and empty pop cans, water pressure that never fluctuated. It always smelled of some sort of fragrance that usually coincided with the season or holiday, and even now Yerim caught the faint scent of artificial florals. Usually, the random smells that accompanied her sister and brother-in-law's home annoyed her. Now, she just wished they weren't quite so unnoticeable.

Sooyoung stayed put in front of the bookshelf, shoulders somehow both stiff and slumped all at once. She was a walking paradox, Yerim mused. Both physically healthy and irreparably broken. When she turned back to the younger, her dark eyes glimmered with dull emotion, no sign of the joy that earned her most beloved nickname. Could Yerim even call her it anymore?

No, she supposed not. But what did she expect? The woman's husband just died, and all that remained of him was sitting in a little glass vial on that godforsaken bookshelf.

Stupid Sungjae. Why couldn't he have just lived? Why did he have to fucking die?

Yerim found herself shuddering, and she bit her nails into her palms to distract herself with a more bearable pain. After the shakes came the tears, and she didn't think either of them could handle any more of those right now. Not after days and days of them, of quiet sniffles and loud wails and noses raw from cheap tissues.

Before the silence could become suffocating, the phone in Yerim's pocket chimed. She pulled it out with a sigh, reasoning that she'd have to deal with it at some point and right now she really could use an excuse to leave Sooyoung's presence. It seemed her debtors had moved from emails to private messages on one of the forum apps she frequented, and she didn't really want to think about how they could be so sure it was her account and not some random nobody on the internet. Instead, she offered her sister an apologetic shrug, nodding to her phone as if to say, what are ya gonna do? Sooyoung only pursed her lips, knowing damn well enough about her little sister's lifestyle to disapprove of any unexplained disappearances. But it's not like Yerim could just say, yeah, I bet about a hundred fifty million won more than I actually have, so now I have people riding my ass because I lost the round.