Crash Landing on You - Edelweiss Diaries

Part 3 - The wrong train

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Ever since he returned home, the recurring dream of Se Ri standing on the Sigriswil, Panorama bridge kept him from falling asleep.

Tonight, he fought sleep, when the jolt from her stretched arm slipping away from his was much to bear.

Closing his eyes, he ran his fingers through his hair. The tears had stopped after the first night, but the emptiness remained. During such moments of duress, he found sanctuary at his bookshelf, as he gazed at the titles that she'd arranged to say 'I love you Ri Jeyong Hyuk." When wakefulness was a torment, and sleep was not an option either, he decided to read.

Picking up an old challenge from his school days, he settled back in bed. Possession by A.S. Byatt had been a tough read for him then between Piano lessons and lit classes. Over the years the book had become something of a test of his focus. He could never get past few pages in one sitting when Byatt's words outlined a fervency he was unfamiliar with. 

However, as he traced a finger over the lines that had ever held a draw but never sunk into him, Jeyong Hyuk felt a stillness grow in him.

"I cannot let you burn me up, nor can I resist you. No mere human can stand in a fire and not be consumed."

He read it again sensing an odd familiarity build up. Somehow it defined the constant heat that surfaced in his chest, every time he took her name. Yoon Se Ri. 

It was clear then that the sentiment was permanent, a fire that would consume him forever. 

The last of his qualms thawed. Over the course of the next few nights, he finished the book.

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"Do you know what you are getting into?" His father threw the application down onto the table. "The party steps are meant for men with ambitions; men who can live with depravity."

Turning away from the window, Jyeong Hyuk, returned to the dining chair next to his father. "I have ambitions too, abeonim. Just that my motivations are different."

"To work for the Central Military Commission is to have all eyes on you." His father appeared troubled now. 

"You said I should learn to disappear," he paused, recollecting their conversation from the first night he'd returned from the escapade. "Hiding in plain sight is disappearing too, abeonim"

Director Ri trained his eyes on him, studying the calmness that his son emanated. "Even I won't be able to save you if anything were to go wrong, Jyeong Hyuk. The General Political Bureau works for the Central Military Commission. Not the other way around."

"But blood is thicker than water, isn't it, abeonim?" He carefully attempted to suppress the anxiety that was beginning to creep into his voice as he broached his father's old wounds. "I'm still Uncle Ri's favorite nephew, even if you don't see him as your brother. I want you to call in a favor." 

General Ri Myeong Su, was the current Chief of General Staff and also held many other party positions in the Central Military Commission. Though the Ri brothers had fallen out over party policy, the families had remained in touch. With General Ri's son's death at an early age from a mystery illness, he'd taken to Ri Jyeong Hyuk and treated him no less than a son. 

His father held his silence for a while; the small tap of his finger over the chair handle anchored to the thoughts he would never reveal to his son.