#Side Story 07
Side Story 2. The Color of My Wedding March is Black
Hwi-kyung entered the wedding hall with a dazed feeling. He knew this day would come eventually, but didn’t expect it to arrive so suddenly.
Is marriage ever an easy thing? Even if two people like each other, marriage can fall through due to family opposition. Since it’s a major life event, it’s not uncommon for weddings to be called off right before the ceremony.
The wedding hall located in the heart of Gangnam, Seoul was packed with people on the weekend. Looking at the crowded venue, news articles about young people avoiding marriage seemed like complete lies.
Hwi-kyung finally managed to enter the bride’s waiting room after passing through a mix of familiar and unfamiliar faces.
“You’re here?”
Se-young greeted Hwi-kyung from inside the bride’s waiting room. Despite not seeing each other for a long time, her greeting was dry. She didn’t even fully turn her head toward Hwi-kyung, worried that her hair, which had been styled for over an hour, might get ruined.
“Come a bit closer. My neck hurts from keeping my head fixed for the hairstyle.”
“…Congratulations on your marriage.”
“How much did you put in the envelope?”
“I put in enough not to disappoint you.”
“I’ll make sure to check yours later.”
“……”
“Are you upset that I’m getting married first?”
Though there was no enthusiastic welcome, Se-young was quite happy to see Hwi-kyung. As he approached, she reached out and grabbed his arm. Hwi-kyung couldn’t help but smile at her joke about how long it had been since they’d seen each other.
Se-young with her elaborate bridal makeup looked like a painting. She was already someone who dressed well, but now with bridal care, she was extraordinary. From head to toe, it was evident she had received professional attention.
Hwi-kyung had returned to Korea using all his accumulated vacation days because of Se-young’s wedding. Gyo-ha also had to return to Korea with Hwi-kyung. After all, Se-young’s marriage partner was Lee Sung-ha, Gyo-ha’s older brother.
“I’d have preferred to get married a bit later, but somehow I ended up going first.”
“…You’re not being forced, are you?”
“Oh my, Hwi-kyung. Do I look like someone who would be forced into marriage?”
“No.”
While someone might force others into marriage, Se-young was not one to enter an unwanted marriage. If she hadn’t liked Sung-ha, she would have ignored him even if he had pitifully clung to her, saying he was pathetic.
In a way, the bride and groom were a perfect match for each other. Sung-ha, like a crazy Chihuahua, and Se-young, who held his leash saying “Doesn’t our dog bark well? Hoho!” reminded Hwi-kyung of the saying that even straw sandals have their match.
But a few months ago, after Se-young had kicked Sung-ha to the curb just before the wedding, saying she would live as a shining single, Hwi-kyung thought she would never meet Sung-ha again. After all, Yoon Se-young was a woman who wouldn’t give a second glance to used goods unless she had a specific purpose…
No matter how much she liked rude personalities and handsome faces, Se-young wouldn’t give a second chance to Sung-ha, whom she had already sampled and enjoyed.
Honestly, Hwi-kyung thought Sung-ha deserved to be dumped. After all, who told him to walk on a carpet while wearing shoes?
However, not long after news of their breakup, the two reconciled. Gyo-ha claimed they were meant for each other, hearing that Sung-ha had even knelt down to hold onto Se-young. But Hwi-kyung thought differently.
No matter how you look at it, Se-young is just playing with Sung-ha.
“I was always going to marry him, but I tested him a bit. Someone like my darling is at a level where his personality can be forgiven because of money. Still, since his innate temperament is nasty, there’s a need to put him in his place.”
“Yes…”
“You have to make them anxious. That’s how they treat you well. Hwi-kyung, remember this well.”
“Remember? Testing them…”
“If you give things easily, they don’t know how desperate they should be.”
Se-young laughed softly as she expounded on 101 ways to tame an ill-mannered man. None of these were things a bride should be saying on her wedding day.
“You’ll catch my bouquet, right?”
“Is it okay for me to catch it? Won’t there be many others who want to catch it?”
“Well, it’s best if someone who’s about to get married catches it.”
“……”
“Besides, aren’t we family now? You’ll soon have to call me sister-in-law.”
The word ‘family’ felt unfamiliar. Even though Se-young wasn’t saying anything untrue. Hwi-kyung fidgeted with his fingertips.
Assuming they followed traditional Korean family titles after her marriage to Sung-ha, Hwi-kyung would have to call Se-young “sister-in-law.” That’s what would be correct on a family relationship chart.
It seemed unlikely that Se-young would enforce such outdated title customs, but Hwi-kyung felt somehow overwhelmed. He thought he would live his entire life with just his grandmother, but suddenly the concept of ‘family’ had expanded endlessly.
“I’ll aim the bouquet well when I throw it, so don’t miss it.”
“I’ll try my best.”
“Wow, look at that serious expression.”
Se-young extended her hand toward Hwi-kyung. Her hand was wrapped in see-through lace gloves. Above them shone a ring with diamonds of who knows how many carats. It was such elaborate craftsmanship that even Hwi-kyung, who knew nothing about gems, could tell it was expensive.
Yielding to Se-young’s pressure to take her hand quickly, Hwi-kyung grabbed it. Se-young’s hand was warmer than it looked. It even felt a bit hot, perhaps due to wedding nerves.
“I’ll be relying on you in the future too. As comrades in married life in wealthy families.”
The playful handshake lasted briefly.
One never knows what life has in store. Who would have thought that a coworker would become future family? To think that he would see Se-young bossing Sung-ha around with her foot during every holiday. Hwi-kyung left the bride’s waiting room with mixed feelings.
Se-young seemed to think that Hwi-kyung and Gyo-ha could get married as soon as tomorrow, but this ‘marriage’ was still a distant event for Hwi-kyung. After all, Gyo-ha’s graduation from graduate school was still far off.
Despite all efforts, Gyo-ha was still suffering in graduate school. Help! A person is trapped in graduate school! The professor keeps using the area-of-effect skill called assignments!
In reality, Lee Gyo-ha had taken more major courses than the major professor himself. He had graduated from graduate school more than ten times, and sometimes even balanced work with graduate school.
However, attending graduate school during this period was a first for him. It would be nice if graduate school were consistent regardless of when you attended. Unfortunately, the faculty and curriculum changed each semester.
As a result, Gyo-ha repeatedly tried and failed to graduate early. Even the professors had come to dread Gyo-ha. This guy! Why are you rambling about physics and philosophy in the business department?
Gyo-ha never let professors win. All academic disciplines are connected. Is there a law against thinking about regression in business studies? All humanities and social sciences are interconnected!
A graduate student speaking the truth, I see. Since you’re so impudent, I’ll make you a teaching assistant!
…And so Lee Gyo-ha fell from a position of early graduation to one where even regular graduation was in danger.
He could be considered scholarly in that he wrote useless papers despite knowing they wouldn’t be accepted. Although the problem was that he wasn’t a good scholar but some strange kind of scholar, Gyo-ha always did his best.
But there was a gap between doing one’s best and successfully graduating. Gyo-ha wanted to leave graduate school by the end of the year, but in Hwi-kyung’s view, graduation was a distant event.
Since they were already living together, they could get married later. Hwi-kyung actually had little interest in the wedding march. Even if they held a ceremony, he didn’t want it to be as grand as Se-young and Sung-ha’s.
They might not even be able to have a wedding ceremony in Korea. Even though the wedding industry might be progressive when it comes to money, having a wedding ceremony for two men with lots of guests was still a distant possibility.
That was rather fortunate for Hwi-kyung. Counting across all regression cycles, he knew many people, but in this sixteenth regression, there weren’t many who would attend if they got married. At most, a few employees from BK Entertainment might come. The rest of his colleagues were in America and unlikely to come all the way to Korea just to attend a wedding.
Isn’t it still a marriage if you just fill out paperwork and exchange rings? Hwi-kyung, who had not even an ant’s tear of romance about ‘marriage,’ thought that he and Gyo-ha were already in a quasi-marriage state.
Either getting on the family register through adoption, or processing paperwork in the United States. Hwi-kyung’s definition of marriage stopped at just that level.
The problem was that Gyo-ha, unlike Hwi-kyung, had excessively grand dreams about marriage. While writing papers that would get him summoned for professor consultations rather than graduating, Gyo-ha wanted to hold a ceremony with Hwi-kyung as soon as possible. It was quite an unconscionable attitude.
He had no concept of a small wedding. He only thought about wearing the best clothes at a grand, flashy venue and inviting lots of people. Although he hadn’t decided specifically how to do it, he was determined to make it bigger than Se-young and Sung-ha’s…
Whenever Gyo-ha rambled about the wedding, Hwi-kyung would insist that he should graduate first. If they had to have the lavish wedding that Gyo-ha described, Hwi-kyung was willing to personally prevent his graduation.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
