FALLING SLOWLY ||Complete||

Circle of fate

So does not believe it, when coach Park mentions that Miss Oh has treated him when he was young. But now he wonders why he even doubted to begin with. Something stirs within the mask of serenity that the woman wears with so much ease, a flicker of unease that she worries he might notice in her eyes, a tremble in her fingers when she touches him, a hitch in her breath, a twitch in her mouth.

She remembers him and she is disgusted.

It takes him no time to work it out, after all it is an expression his mother has perfected over the time. Monster - she calls him; the defected baby that brought her lifelong disgrace. He briefly wonders if Miss Oh had felt the same when she had cared for him as an infant, would she recoil and shudder just the same?

However the woman is more poise and elegance, only a flicker of unease in her practiced movements - just a fraction of a hesitation before she finally touches him. He puffs out a breath he has been unconsciously holding, when the physiotherapist moves to assess his recovery.

It is not only a debt of a lifetime between them. He thinks as the memories settle on his world weary shoulders like a fresh weight. They had both tried to protect the same girl - to lengths each could go to. He still remembered how the burden of being spared at the cost of her life had crushed Soo underneath its implications. She had never recovered from the loss of court lady Oh. It feels like a cruel joke, how they all circled the abyss to end up positioned as chess pieces awaiting a catastrophe.

Coach Park is still speaking talking about the surgeries and the PRP therapy that followed.

She turns away with a flinch and lips pressed in a sigh, scribbling something about swellings and inflammation. A routine of how they would go on with physical and manual therapy.

“We’ll begin with some basic stretches and move to restrained ones.” She comes to him once more. “But you’ll need manual therapy in the first week before the exercises -”

“Does it bother you Doc?” The woman jumps at his sudden question and her eyes snap into his. Her eyes are silvery warm like a gray dawn and he regrets the flicker of pain at his words. “Do I disgust you?”

“You are mistaken,” her voice sounds so polite, but he notes the stain, the suppressed shudder. “It is my normal day’s work.”

“Oh but you’d rather not be reminded of how pathetic I might have looked. I can practically see you swallowing the memory -” His tone is cold and for some reason he presses on, the words ooze out of him like puss from a wound. “You’d rather not take on this case - you’d rather see me leave.”

“So!” Coach Park warns him in a scathing tone and the woman flinches again. Her pale face whitens a bit more, and she squeezes her eyes shut, gripping the edge of the table with a white knuckled hand. “You will stay where you are and shut your mouth if you want me to coach you any longer…” the threat in his voice is real, but So has no eyes for him. He takes a good look at Miss Oh and he cannot tolerate anymore.

“I won’t do manual therapy. Give me the exercise schedule and I’ll do it. Have a good day!” He says as unfazed as he could manage and stumbles out before either of them could stop him.

At least she has a choice, unlike his mother. There is no point in pressing this woman to relive the worst times of her life when she had to take care of a disfigured infant. At least her, he can spare from what is to come; this time.

His chest tightens with the need of air and he limps away from the main compound, towards the open greenery and the rolling green gray of a water body. The stiff leg frustrates him on the top of every other depressing thought that tightens around his airway just a bit tighter.