"I deserved it….. I did. It's karma, and this is exactly what I should get." He mutters it in a breathy, almost non-existent splice of words, still looking down and his hands, trembling the same way mine are. "It doesn't make it hurt any less…. or mess me up any less. That you've been lying this whole time…. Pretending… Making me hope…. Was this punishment? Revenge? Did it give you a kick to see me falling all over you and trying to rekindle past memories?" Jyeon finally raises his head, his eyes so steeped in sadness and betrayal that it cuts me deeply. His words are slow and etched with bitterness. Questioning me in his mind and coming up with so many reasons I would drag this charade out and pretend not to know. I can see why he would think it was a ploy to hurt him that it was vindictive and mocking. Despite everything he did back then, I never wanted to wound him this way, and it wasn't a manipulation of any sort.
"I..." I don't know what to say and shake my head. My words trail to silent air because I don't know how to explain when he's looking at me that way. As though I ripped the rug out from under his feet, stabbed him in the heart, and yet he doesn't explode. I wait for the mad and cruel to appear, the cold cutting words he can throw like spears, and instead stands a man grasping for reasons that the person he thought he knew could do this to him.
"I ... I know I have no right to be angry or hurt about it, after what I did ….. that I brought it on myself… but …. Sohla, you never once wanted to let me know you were okay? Even if you didn't want to come back? You didn't think about the pain we were in? How crazy we were going without you? You couldn't have given us a message even if we never knew where you were? Ended our suffering with one fucking text? I never stopped longing for you and hoping you were alive, yet you didn't give a shit about it." His voice breaks, and tears fill his eyes. His raw emotion is spilling out, and for the first time in a long time, my guilt racks through me at an insane depth. It's as heavy as steel and makes everything inside me throb. Seeing him break. Seeing him react this badly to something I assumed was a minor detail I could act my way out of. It's worse than I imagined it could be, and I lose all bravado.
"I thought you messed with the car. I thought you would hurt me if I came home. End it properly. I thought it was better for everyone if I died that night." I start to whimper, caving because I can't be the one to strike a blow like this to the man I love. Even back then, I was always so feeble when it came to hurting him, no matter what he did, and it hasn't changed. Regretting this and knowing Greta was right. I should have played this ruse to the end so I wouldn't have to deal with how he's looking at me now. This was so stupid. I don't know what I was thinking.
"Did I become that much of a monster in your eyes? Did you truly think I would fucking kill you? I couldn't even stand to see you hurt from catching me with her, so how the fuck could I plan to murder you?.... Didn't the way I always ended up bowing to you, chasing you, whenever you were hurt, never make you stop and think that I gave a shit?" His temper rises and swirls in the air, replacing his agony, but I know it's because I've wounded him. When he's in pain, he reverts to self-defense, and I knew this would be the outcome. It's what I hoped for in separating us. His wall is coming up, and our war is starting all over again. I am exactly the same.
"I know that now… I see it and that it wasn't you that messed with the car. I didn't back then. I only saw someone who hated me and wanted me out of his life for good. Someone who fell in love with someone else and didn't want me in the picture or messing with what was his."
"That's not true ….. I never wanted you gone, and I never loved her. I never hated you. I was caught up in pain and the inability to forgive. I asked you for a divorce because I was angry and reacting to our whole toxic mess, but I knew that it felt like shit to ask for one. We were so fucked up in every way, and both did things to maintain that wall between us until we hit the tipping point, Sol….. It doesn't mean I didn't care about you or that we couldn't have salvaged something once we stopped with the bullshit." He paces around in a circle, caught between anger and heartbreak, and I can only stand there like a dumb statue and watch him. Helpless.
Hearing his words and ashamed of myself for choosing this path to push him away. Stiff all over with the sheer effort of not crumbling at his feet and telling him I am sorry. Now I know tonight he didn't sit with her and be what she wanted or needed; it's changed my whole perspective again. Greta was right, and this was about her all along.
"I know that now." My voice is small and weak. My eyes shift to the floor as my legs give out on me. Hating what I started, but it can't be undone. The fight I used to possess, the cold and cruel viper that showed face whenever he wounded me, she's nowhere to be seen anymore. I'm not like I was before. And neither is Jyeon, not towards me. He's trying so hard to keep himself in check, even if I just did deliver a cutting blow.
"Then why keep lying to me these past two weeks? Why pretend you don't know… why wait until I feel like this? That something's between us before ripping my heart out?" Jyeon's temper flares higher and ignites the anger inside me that he really doesn't see my side of this and only recognizes how it affects his heart.
"You think that's what I'm trying to do?" I bite back, raising my voice in temper, simmering with so many conflicted feelings. "That I'm still that heartless and vindictive?" Offended that he thinks it.
"I don't know what this is. And yeah, it's who you used to be, and well…. still are, if tonight is any fucking indication. If you have always known, what have we been doing these past two weeks? Why go along with it and pretend? Why let me close? Why let me kiss you? Why not straight-up divorce me the second I rolled into your restaurant and put an end to it with one sentence and honesty? Why let me bring you home at all?" Jyeon scrubs his hands over his face to stem the building dam he's holding so tightly onto and turns away from me so I don't see his torment.
"It wasn't exactly planned. We've been navigating in the dark after you guys dropped into my life like that. Do you think I ever expected you to walk onto that island and see me? I didn't trust any of you or know what to do how to be. All of this has been confusing and emotionally draining, and I was scared. I still don't know what happened with the car…. it was a major factor, and someone wanted me gone. You have to understand how I was …how I felt. I went through hell that day… from you and her to the mess I made of everything, crashing in the water and walking alone on the island for twenty-four hours before Greta found me close to death. I was beyond mentally fucked up and so out of my depth." I clench my fists as it all comes pouring out at him. Minor hysteria building from within. Desperation mixed with resentment, and it's pouring out in verbal diarrhea.
"I always relied on you… loved you, looked to you, felt safe with you, and suddenly you were the enemy, and I was the person you wanted to cut out and remove as though I was nothing more than poison…. You even called me that. You broke my heart and kept adding wounds upon wounds. What else was I supposed to think?" I start to cry through my breathy words, my voice shaking and true emotions welling up and overspilling. "I was broken and wounded and suffering from shock and emotional devastation. I felt like everything that was my safety net, my life, had been ripped away, and I had nothing to go back for…. I intended to at some point, but then I heard on the radio how you found a body, and it cemented your guilt…. You killed me…. You erased me, and it hurt, Jyeon… it broke me all over again. I had only doubts and suspicion, and a destroyed, broken life in ruins behind me left."
There's a pause between us as he absorbs my words and all of this. His posture is straightening, and he shifts on his feet, uneasily still with his back to me. I can see the way his shoulders heave, and it tells me his breathing is shallow and erratic while he rationalizes everything I'm spilling out. My words touching a nerve.
"You know why I did that. I explained it. It wasn't like that." He turns slowly, and his red-rimmed shining eyes and furrowed brow are another slice to my already gaping wounded heart.
"How was I supposed to know anything? Our last encounter, you told me you never wanted to see me again, and you were moving in with her. You made it clear I would have a war on my hands over OLO."
"I'm an asshole who says stupid shit when he's backed against a wall, and no one knew how to stick a knife into me and twist it as you could. It was your gift to fuck me up and always leave me second-guessing all my decisions when it came to us. I said a lot of things that night that I never meant. I didn't expect it to be the last time I saw you….. I came back when I cooled down, hating myself for being like that, but you had taken my car and gone…. If I had known what was coming, Sohla, I would have held onto you. I would never have walked out. I would never have left you alone."
This is too hard for me. Dredging it all up and dissecting what can't be changed. He's wearing me down and creating more confusion in my mind and soul. I don't know what's up or down, and all my earlier decisions lie in ashes on the floor. This is what I hate the most about Jyeon. That he ruins my sanity and makes me want to believe in him. Despite everything, my heart wants to rely on his version of the truth. I want to put faith in his love and how he felt when he found out I was gone.
"I don't want to do this; we're going around in pointless circles and churning up old wounds that can't be changed. Pointing fingers and making this worse. I didn't want any of this."
"What is it you want then?" His low and quivering questions surprise me. The deflation in his tone at me backing away, and I wonder if he's told himself this was always about payback and that me coming clean is because I genuinely want it to end and go home. To leave him behind. "A divorce? Apologies? Me taking the blame for everything and delivering all that's yours to you wrapped up in a bow? If that's what you want and need, I'll give it to you. I would erase all of it if I could."
"I….. I don't know what I want. From one minute to the next, I'm in turmoil, confused, and scared of every time I let you close. I want to go home where it's safe, and you can't mess with my head. Where there's no Claire, no Sohla, no anyone who ever hurt me, and I can focus on taking one step at a time and looking for my sense of peace." It's as honest as I can be. No further in making any decisions but knowing my feeble self wants to run far away. My scars are not even close to healing, and I have no desire to dig in and make them deeper.
Jyeon moves back and crumples onto the couch behind him, exhaling heavily, and drops his hands between his legs as he slumps forward. Looking exhausted and so emotionally done with all of this. It's like all his fight dies a death, and his rage and fizzing energy he wears typically like a cloak disperses into the dim light around us.