Til Death Do Us Part

52

“We have nothing to talk about. It’s closing time. Can you go please?” I gesture past them once more, aiming an outstretched hand at the door. “Please go. Come back another time if it’s important.” A time when I can dodge them entirely and have Greta get rid of them once and for all.

Jyeon doesn’t say a word but opens his jacket and pulls out a rolled-up document he was keeping dry that he flips open and holds out to me with a raised brow. Hanging it between us, the front pages face me, yet I can’t read it in our dim lighting. My vision blurs because I am far from calm.

“What’s this.” I move back away from him, another step, not trusting him one bit and thinking distance is the only thing I have to combat him. A million things are racing through my mind at what this could be.

“Medical records and two background checks. On you…. and your friend.” Jyeon’s voice is huskier than usual, and a hint of emotion makes it almost raspy. His focus narrowed on me, and I can’t read what’s going on in his mind. I blink and stare at the white papers, everything swimming with the reality of what they are, and then push them away with disgust that they would dig around and invade someone’s life that way.

“Whatever bullshit this is, I’m sure it’s not even legal. … GRETA!!” I yell on my backup to come to me, hysteria evident in my raised voice and losing all composure. I thank my stars when I hear the distant scrape of a chair followed by footsteps coming to the stairs. Knowing she won’t ignore how I sound because it’s obvious I’m starting to panic.

“You were found wandering a road ten miles from here, around two years ago. Suffering from amnesia, hypothermia, concussion, along with minor cuts and lacerations. You were hospitalised for a week. You have a scar in your hairline from a head wound that could explain the memory loss, but no follow up to say you ever regained them. The doctor detailed that you seemed confused and dehydrated as though you had been through a traumatic accident or ordeal. A day after Sohla Park drove off a cliff. Background check says Greta Tarry is an only child who moved here seven years ago and bought this place with compensation for her child’s accidental death. She took you in, but you weren’t from here, and the name was given to you in place of Jane Doe. She’s not your sister, not a blood relation, and you have only lived here since the accident that took you from me. She found you and took responsibility for you….. You ARE Sohla Park. My wife! My Sohla!” His tone is heavy and precise, and not once does he take his eyes off me. Eating into my soul with the darkest of gazes.

Now I know why he left so easily and didn’t come back. He must have been pulling resources and getting someone to dig who knew how to access things like this. That commanding president is known to be ruthless and consistent when he puts his mind to something. I was stupid to think he would fade away back to his world.

I swallow hard, unable to formulate a refusal when it’s so apparent and in my face like this. I should have known our lie was flimsy. I never thought how easily they would be able to check out stories or our paper trails.

“I told you I would figure it out for myself. I knew who you were the second I laid eyes on you. I spent my life next to you, living with you. Do you really think I wouldn’t know you?”

I’m standing ridiculously still and blank. I can’t react, not because I’m not trying to, but there’s a weird sense of freefalling and airlessness because our well put together story is being ripped apart right in front of me. I’m dazed and speechless and can’t think of how to get out of this.

“What right do you have to dig up s**t like that?” Greta’s fierce and angry voice comes from behind me, and I’m tugged back harshly by her. Away from them, so she can put herself in between us. My little forcefield of bravery who is the type to throw herself in front of a moving car for me. She has no fear when she’s in protector mode.

“Did you know who she was? Did you keep her here in hopes you might be able to cash in when she figured it out and came to claim what’s hers? Did you hide her so you could make her dependent on you? Owe you.” Bryant is in the fight, thinking like a lawyer and only seeing motives and dishonesty as the reasons Greta would help me when she did. I know because I used to think the same way. In our world, that’s all we know, so someone being pure of heart and motivated only by kindness is beyond his mental capacity.

It's the wrong thing to accuse her of, and as much as it angers me, I know it will incense her to pure rage and wound her pride.

“You’re a scumbag to think I would ever do anything like that to her. Cash in? I don’t know a damn thing about her, so why would I hope to make any kind of gain. She’s Anna, the girl who works here and is as close as my sister. A poor soul I scraped off the ground, who seemed like her world had rolled over her. She needed help and someone to protect her because it didn’t seem like anyone had wherever she came from. That’s who she is to me.” Greta lurches forward in anger, her temper flashing, and I catch her in the nick of time by her wrist and pull her back. My heart is aching with her veiled accusation aimed at Jyeon.

I have no words because I know we can’t lie our way out of this no matter what story we think up. I never expected him to uncover it all, and it’s all too coincidental to keep up this ruse. They’re incriminating her, and I can’t let them. It’s stupid to keep denying it.

“No, she didn’t. We didn’t. I still don’t. You tell me you people know me, and you barge in here being this way, and I’m expected to listen to you and trust you. She’s trying to protect me. I don’t blame her, given my state when she found me. Why should we believe you or trust you, when you offer no proof or a reason I should even talk to you?”

Sticking with amnesia seems like the only sensible out for us. It takes away so many questions and motives. It hides my cowardice at never going back and saves me from accusing him of attempted murder. It’s a buffer.

Jyeon frowns and looks down at the papers in his hand and exhales heavily, self-calming, believing me, it seems. Maybe he’s here with fear in his heart that knowing I’m alive, I might point the finger at him one day, and he has to tie up those loose ends.

“Can we sit down and talk about all of this? About who you are. I can show you a million pictures and articles. Tell you a million things about you that only you and I know. Back home, I have your ID, license, credit cards that were all found in the wreckage.” Jyeon asks genuinely, softening his tone like he’s trying to appeal to me and never once takes his eyes from mine. His manner is still, yet I can feel something radiating from him that I can’t put my finger on. It tells me not to trust a word that comes from his mouth.

“Can’t you just accept she has a new life and identity and leave her alone? This is her home. She’s happy here, and she has friends that care about her. Who cares what she was before or where she came from? Can’t you go back to wherever, knowing she’s alive and let it go? It’s been two years. She’s settled here. She came to us in a mess and obviously didn’t want to be where she was.” Greta appeals to their softer side, and I know it’s not working as the thunderous storm moves into Jyeon’s eyes, and Bryant frowns deeply. Greta can’t say what she wants because it contradicts us not knowing anything about my past.

“She’s my wife. My wife…… Why would I walk away?” Jyeon emphasizes the word, and I’m so tempted to drop the forgetful act to confront him about the ridiculousness of that statement. The fact he would use it now is beyond madness.

“So, you intend to do what? Huh? Take her against her will? Kidnap her? Upend her entire existence and drag her off to be with strangers she doesn’t know. In a world she has no memory of.” Greta’s trying to drive it home, but Jyeon seems to be stuck on only seeing it from his perspective. What he wants, what he needs from me.

“She can’t remember because she’s had no stimulus from her past life. How can she remember when she’s here and away from everything and everyone she knows? She needs to come home to remember. She needs to be given back what she has a right to remember. Twenty-six years that are owed to her.”