The edge of us (final part)
Yena’s POV
The morning light is soft, gold spilling gently through the thin curtains. My head is pounding, but it’s not from the air — it’s from the chaos inside me. When I open my eyes, I see Tae sleeping right next to me, his face relaxed, but marked. His lips — God, his lips are bruised. Last night flashes in fragments: my shaking hands, his voice trembling, the tears, the kiss that wasn’t gentle but desperate.
I reach out, my fingertips brushing the small cut on his lower lip. He winces in his sleep and breathes my name — “Yena…” — like a prayer he can’t stop saying.
“Mr. Kim… I ruined your handsome face,” I whisper, half guilty, half awed. “I’m sorry.”
He stirs slightly, eyes still closed, and murmurs back, “It’s my fault too, Yena… I’m responsible too.”
Even in his dreams, he’s protecting me. That thought both warms and breaks me.
Before I can say anything more, small feet thump against the ground.
“Dad!” Sam’s voice cuts through the quiet. He runs straight to Tae, eyes wide.
“Mom, who hurt Dad?”
My heart skips. Tae looks too fragile to explain. I blink fast, forcing a smile and a small lie.
“It was a tigeress, Sam. I fought it off last night. We’re safe now,” I say, as if the monster wasn’t inside my own mind.
Sam nods, his little hands curling around Tae’s sleeve. “You’re brave, Mom.”
Brave. If only he knew what real bravery looked like.
Tae chuckles softly, pulling Sam into his lap. “Yena, we should go now,” he says. There’s something calm in his tone — a quiet strength that always grounds me.
“Coming,” I reply automatically, though a strange heaviness grips my chest.
But then… I don’t move forward. I turn instead — toward the cliff.
The same one that whispered to me last night.
The same one that promised peace.
“Yena!” Tae’s voice sharpens, breaking through the birdsong. “Don’t you dare.”
The wind bites my face. My hair dances wild in the air, like it’s trying to pull me back and forward all at once. I stare at the depth below — a wide, endless quiet.
“Not today, Tae,” I say softly. My voice trembles, but my feet don’t. “Let me end this today. You’ll be free too. You won’t have to carry my brokenness anymore. It’s not fair to you, Tae — this pain, this family chaos, this shame. You’re too good for it.”
He looks shattered, eyes flashing with disbelief and fury. “What mistake, Yena? That we fell in love? That we tried to be happy in a world that refused to let us?” His voice cracks. “If that’s a mistake, I made it too!”
My tears are hot against the cold wind. “Tae… am I not a good mother?”
He steps closer, trembling. “You’re the bravest mother I’ve ever seen. You carried a storm inside you and still smiled for your children. You think strength means never breaking — but Yena, strength is breaking and choosing to stand again.”
His words slice through the fog. I look at him — really look. His eyes are pleading, raw.
“Don’t do this, Yena. Don’t leave me to grow old alone. Remember the dream we had — a small garden, a wooden house, Sam playing in the yard, you making tea for me every morning. Remember?”
The image bursts into my mind — Tae older, smiling, me teasing him for his gray hair, Sam taller, all of us still laughing. For the first time in years, I feel something small but real bloom in my chest — hope.
A tear escapes me, but it’s different this time. It’s not despair — it’s release.
Then I see it — the depth behind me. I gasp. The cliff is too close. The world tilts.
“Ahh—Mr. Kim!” I scream.
He runs, arms out, grabbing me just as my knees buckle. I fall into him, my body shaking uncontrollably. His arms wrap around me, strong, desperate. His face buries into my shoulder, and I can feel him trembling too.
Neither of us speaks. We don’t need to.
The fear, the love, the relief — it all says what words can’t.
I clutch his shirt so tightly my nails dig in. His hand cradles my head, his lips trembling against my hair.
And there, in that trembling embrace, I realize something:
We’re both survivors of the same storm.
From a few steps away, Sam watches — wide-eyed, silent, absorbing everything.
He doesn’t understand everything, but he knows enough: his parents are fighting something heavy and invisible — and loving each other anyway.
For him, that’s enough
