Chapter Text
![[Jahe's Poster for Persistence]](https://64.media.tumblr.com/90f29ca53bb5deecfb7f66e23950086e/a952b60cb64670a7-c5/s640x960/fdce776580069e5aa08eec4b55f3936e0c96691e.jpg)
“Cassano byeonhosa-nim…” Cha Young mumbles the name she promised never to pronounce again. The confusion in her voice matches her fumbling with the file as she attempts to double-check the defense attorney’s name. What is this?
“Song Joo Hyeong,” Vincenzo chimes in, proffering a hand forward with all the certainty she lacks. “Olenmanieyo, Hong byeonhosa-nim.” He never loses his poise. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
——
As it turned out, Hong Cha Young, her father’s daughter and lawyer extraordinaire, wasn’t a villain.
Were her morals grey? There was no denial of that. Not relying on everything being fair and finding its own rightful course didn’t mean she didn’t believe in a greater good. She happened to know too much. Underneath the surface, things aren’t as pretty as they paint it. The path to justice is a long winding road that often derails. It twists and turns at any given moment, and, most of the time, it’s not even about the good guy. Needing justice alone never created the necessary awareness to understand the bigger picture. It can only stem from coming face to face with the facts: Sometimes, not even good and evil are enough to right the wrong. Justice is, at best, a consolation prize.
She had learned her lesson the hard way.
Yet, the main reason Hong Cha Young couldn’t see herself as a villain was because, confronted to the extreme reality of living on the edge, she had chosen to break up.
——
«Villains never break up because they’re tenacious, even when they love» was not the most conventional confession of all times. But even if Cha Young admitted theirs weren’t the most conventional circumstances ever, speaking about themselves in third person felt as if they were like characters in a book. Something so trivial made her realize their chances to have a life together, to share simple things, to even see each other again, were slim. She knew it would be a struggle, if the previous year had set a precedent, but, in his arms, she accepted it as she would accept rain pouring down on her, as a matter-of-fact.
It was inevitable.
She accepted it again later in the night while she watched him disappear behind a pillar, and even when she made it home and his absence hit her like a ton of gold bricks. She accepted it the following week when the memory of his lips and his promise began to fade, lost in the urgency of everyday life. She accepted it three weeks later when the following postcard arrived, depicting the same little island. The only difference now was that the island had a name.
Pagliuzza.
Hong Cha Young understood there was a tenacity in itself in sending the same image over and over. It wasn’t just a picture of their safe haven, but also a coded plea, a silent scream in the distance: «see this; remember this; hold on to this,» as to infuse her with a matching strength to endure their present adversity.
So she continued to accept it for the next two months even in the absence of everything else. The old days. The occupied chair. It was enough. It was just a matter of time for him to contact her with something more tangible. In the meantime, Mr. Ahn and Mr. Cho would work non-stop to find a way to allow him back in the country. A matter of time… «Hold on.» «We are tenacious.» Unyielding longing and lack of normalcy had her constantly grasping her last straw, dangling off of a precipice, but she was accomplishing it, that is, until the postcards stopped arriving altogether.
Radio silence.
One month passed. Two month passed. Another month passed. She could tell Mr. Nam falling to despair each time he went through the mail. Cha Young hated every single thing about it, especially his expression when he couldn’t avoid telling her what she already knew. There was nothing. For the first couple of months she held onto the hope a new way of communication might be coming soon, but reality disproved her. After three months of absolute blackout, she succumbed and decided to come clean to Mr. Ahn about the postcards, or, rather, the absence of them.
Mr. Ahn would have loved the intel a year ago, when the postcards were still arriving. He had the delicacy not to tell Cha Young outright, but she was well aware of how things worked in his field. The opportunity to track them down was long gone. He said he would investigate, but maybe that was another promise waiting to be broken if circumstances required it. More silence followed, from him, and neither the postcards resumed nor any other way of communication opened. It started to feel as if the face of the earth had swallowed him whole.
Inside Cha Young’s heart an ominous premonition began to creep. Against her brain—he cannot be killed—and her wishes, the idea that something had gone terribly awry installed itself on her very core. Like it happened during their fight with Babel, she became hyperaware of her surroundings, getting startled at anything, as if her body was trying to attune with the world in search of any fluctuation that could inform her of his fate. But no Babel war, no life experience, lawyer training or hyperawareness could prepare her for what was coming. When Mr. Ahn told her he had been in a coma for months after miraculously surviving an ambush that cost the life of all of his men, including Luca, Hong Cha Young knew she couldn’t do it anymore.
Vincenzo Cassano was the only person she had ever loved. He was much more than a man for her. His persona had reached a mythical status, almost God-like. At some point, she couldn’t even tell if she loved him anymore. He had become such a fundamental part of her she wasn’t sure of where he ended and she started within herself. Love was too small of a concept to begin to explain. He was the biggest part of her soul, so when she learned he had almost died, she was lost. The delicate balance inside of her shattered into a million pieces. None of this was sane. None of this was realistic. Did it matter if he had survived? How long would it last? How long before going through this for a second time? A third time? Would she be able to live through the dread and fear for both his life and her soul for the rest of her life? It was too much. Hong Cha Young found no other way to cope than uprooting him from her heart with her bare hands.
Learning it wasn’t the first time he had been at risk made it as clear as the sky. The vase in which she had kept the buds of their blossoming love was beyond repair. It had been folly. This dream was born from the heat of the battle, the adrenaline of victory pushing her to tie her hopes to something impossible. Hong Cha Young could be the sharpest, most brazen person in Asia, but she was only human. After all she had been through she needed to put the past to rest, and it wouldn’t happen as long as she didn’t let go.
«Part of me will always regret not being a villain. I am sorry I need to do this when you are at your lowest. I know you won’t resent me, because no matter what you think of yourself, you are a good man who cares too much. Thank you for allowing me justice. Thank you for reminding me who I am supposed to be. I’ll always remember you under a shower of confetti. I’ll tend to your mother’s grave as I tend to my father’s in this far corner of the world. I cannot live up to her will, but I’ll pray for her forgiveness with the diligence of a daughter. Please, take care of yourself. It’s the only thing I’ll ever ask of you.»
And just like that, it ended as quietly as it started. Hong Cha Young never knew if Mr. Ahn had managed to give him the letter, but she assumed he did. As if he read her mind, he stopped giving her any sort of feedback. She never received another postcard. She only knew what the universe told her. He was alive. That he couldn’t be killed wasn’t a certainty anymore, but she hoped. She hoped he would live and find solace. She hoped he could be in peace. She prayed for it daily. And she prayed for her healing too, for God to subside her pain and allow her to carry on with her own path, whatever the future was holding for her. She didn’t ask for much; only a new meaning to fill the void. Little did she know a soulmate is not something you can turn your back to.
For life had a plan of its own: To serve her the same bitter coffee twice.