Checking the copy of my residency registration, I doubted my own eyes.
“What is this?”
There was no way I would have pulled up Joo Minhyuk’s registration.
So why was the name Joo Minhyuk on my registration?
Even if there were many things I didn’t know, I at least knew that a divorced former spouse does not remain on one’s residency registration.
Where is my address registered?
My eyes rapidly darted across the paper, searching for the current address.
The address was listed as the Imperial Palace.
In an instant, my mind went blank and grew distant, leaving me utterly unable to think of anything else.
All I could do was stare vacantly at the sheet of paper.
As my blank senses slowly returned, a cold sweat began to break out, and my hands trembled violently.
Something was wrong here.
Ah, is it because I didn’t separate my household registration?
It must be because I was supposed to report a move-in after getting divorced, but I couldn’t pay attention to that while running away.
I tried to guess that because we were registered under the same address, Joo Minhyuk might still remain as the head of the household on my registration copy.
“It might be like this because I printed it at home, and if I go directly to the community center tomorrow to check, it might come out differently. Right. It’s probably because I applied online.”
If I visit the center and print out a fresh registration copy, will it come out properly?
It should, right?
I had no idea what on earth I did wrong for Joo Minhyuk to be sitting so prominently as the head of the household.
I tried hard to organize my mind, which was becoming cluttered with all sorts of conjectures, wanting desperately to deny the reality unfolding before my eyes.
Calm down, be composed.
It’s probably no big deal.
It’s just because this is the first time I’m looking at a residency registration copy.
There must be some reason Joo Minhyuk’s name is right there with mine.
Let’s think logically and calmly.
Let’s read it over meticulously again.
Squeezing my eyes shut and opening them once more, I began to thoroughly read down the registration copy from the very beginning.
My name was listed under the applicant.
Right, well, this made sense since I was the one who applied for it.
However, the other parts were completely incomprehensible.
Name of the Head of Household: Joo Minhyuk.
I mean, why is the head of the household Joo Minhyuk?
Just why?
“Ah!”
Was it because I was stressing over it too much?
A sudden, throbbing pain flared up in my heart.
My blood pressure must have shot up as well, as the back of my neck began to feel stiff.
Cha Haejoo, calm down.
Closing my eyes, I settled my dizzy head.
I repeated inhaling and exhaling deeply, but it didn’t improve much.
I felt like something terrible might happen if I kept staying alone like this, so I forced strength into my trembling legs and went to find Hanbin Hyung.
It was shameless of me to wake Hyung up when he was probably asleep just to show him this pathetic state, but right now, I desperately needed someone’s help.
“Hy-Hyung.”
Failing to even think about knocking, I called out to Hyung in a dying voice.
Right at the moment when my hands lacked strength, causing me to repeatedly slip on the doorknob, the door swung wide open from the inside.
“Haejoo? Haejoo, what’s wrong!”
As if he had gotten up in an extreme rush, Hyung, who had knocked the blanket from his bed all the way to the floor, discovered me collapsed beside the doorway and raised his voice urgently.
At the loud noise echoing in the dead of night, dad and Seojoo, who had been resting in their respective rooms, rushed outside as well.
“Haejoo! What’s wrong? Are you sick somewhere?”
Dad, who had turned on the living room light and dashed over, examined my face and placed his hand on my forehead.
I weakly shook my head to indicate I wasn’t sick, but to anyone looking, my condition was clearly abnormal.
While Seojoo went to fetch some water, dad carried me over to the sofa.
A commotion had erupted in the middle of the night because of me.
“You were perfectly fine up until dinner. Did you get indigestion? Should we go to the hospital? Your physical condition hasn’t been bad lately, so why all of a sudden…”
“Hyung, did you get indigestion because I gave you too many wraps earlier? There isn’t a single drop of color in your face and lips!”
Soothing the two who were fraught with anxiety, Hanbin Hyung continuously monitored me as I sat leaning against the sofa.
Looking at the family members while drinking the water Seojoo handed me, the terrified feeling in my heart calmed down slightly, and I could finally breathe.
Once my body felt a bit better, I extended the registration copy toward Hyung.
“…Hyung, dad. Please look at this.”
“What is this?”
Taking the registration copy with a puzzled expression to look it over, Hyung’s face gradually turned pale.
His pupils shook as he verified the document multiple times, his complexion shifting drastically.
Seeing Hyung’s face change so noticeably, a concerned dad looked at Hyung this time.
“What on earth is it for you to react like that? A certified copy of a residency registration?”
“…Check it for yourself.”
Hyung handed over the paper and spoke quietly.
As dad took the registration copy with a tense expression to examine it, a look of sheer bewilderment became evident on his face.
“No, what on earth does this…”
Dad didn’t seem able to utter any other words either, continuously repeating ‘what on earth’ over and over.
Right.
What on earth is going on.
Judging by how everyone’s reactions were identical, it wasn’t that I had misread the text.
Something was definitely wrong.
Seojoo, who had been wiping the sweat from my face, also checked the registration copy dad extended and his face hardened instantly.
“This is strange, isn’t it? Why am I still listed as Joo Minhyuk’s spouse? Is it because I didn’t report a move-in or anything after the divorce? Since the house and the cafe right now are all under dad’s name… Because I didn’t personally separate my household registration… No, but the lawyers explicitly said they would handle all of those things.”
“Hyung. Did you deliver the divorce papers directly to His Majesty? Did you verify it?”
“No. I was going to deliver them but couldn’t, and then that incident happened that very night. I left the documents in my pavilion and was just too busy fleeing frantically.”
Recalling the events of that time, I reviewed the situation.
Under normal circumstances, I would have handed the documents to Joo Minhyuk and matters would have proceeded seamlessly.
If only I hadn’t been ambushed that night.
“Then, you didn’t manage to verify anything? You didn’t even know how far along the process went or whether the divorce was finalized for sure? Setting that aside, you don’t even know if the documents were delivered to the court, or rather, whether His Majesty even discovered the divorce papers or not, right? But you just assumed the divorce went through?”
“…Yeah.”
Seojoo would surely know that I lacked the composure to verify anything back then.
Because we had been frantically escaping to save our skins.
“Isn’t that only natural? We didn’t have the peace of mind to check anything, and the imperial family officially publicized the separation. It would be stranger to think the divorce didn’t go through. All of us understood it that way…”
Just as dad said, since there was an official announcement, we naturally thought the divorce was finalized.
Our end had concluded on such terrible terms, and because the divorce was something Joo Minhyuk had promised, I hadn’t even doubted it.
There was absolutely no reason for our relationship to be maintained.
If the divorce didn’t go through, then how on earth did Joo Minhyuk intend to welcome an Empress?
Since he had abolished the concubine system with his own hands, if we were still a legal married couple, Joo Minhyuk couldn’t bring in an Empress.
I still had no way of knowing what was inside that head of his or what he was thinking.
“…It seems your divorce didn’t go through, Haejoo.”
While we were rambling incoherently to one another, Hyung, who had been sitting quietly lost in thought, opened his mouth.
At Hyung’s single sentence, the already sunken atmosphere grew even quieter, as if cold water had been poured over it.
Dad let out a long sigh at Hyung’s words.
“Hyung! But you know too, Hyung. Back then, I clearly filled out all the divorce papers and had them ready. Or did they fail to find the divorce papers because the pavilion became a total mess on the day we fled? Is that why they didn’t report the divorce? They said the lawyers would handle it once the seal was stamped, right? Or during the process, because I was missing from running away…”
“Haejoo…”
“Surely His Majesty doesn’t know that our divorce wasn’t finalized either, right? Otherwise, how could there be no action whatsoever for this long? There’s clearly an error…”
As a thoroughly panicked me rambled out my thoughts, Hyung shook his head.
“Haejoo. No. It’s not.”
Unable to watch any longer, Hyung grabbed my wrists with a thoroughly serious face to calm me down.
“Haejoo. This right now is something His Majesty did intentionally. On purpose. Deliberately.”
Intentionally, deliberately? Hyung’s resolute words pierced my ears.
The look in Hyung’s eyes was telling me.
To calm down and think carefully again about what kind of person Joo Minhyuk was.
I quietly pondered.
If it were that man, Joo Minhyuk… he was more than capable of doing this.
Because he was a man who merely watched me get beaten up just to secure evidence, even though I could have died from the beating.
“You know just how meticulous his personality is, and I know it very well too. Though I don’t know what his intention was in making this kind of decision yet, one thing is certain. The fact that the divorce didn’t go through is entirely His Majesty’s will.”
The thing I had desperately hoped wasn’t true had happened.
The divorce hadn’t gone through. And like a complete idiot, I had been utterly oblivious to it.
Not just for a day or two, but for several years. How absurd must that have been on their end?
Joo Minhyuk had made a fool out of me once again.
That son of a bitch.
Joo Minhyuk was that kind of person.
The presence of Joo Minhyuk, which I had strived so hard to forget, vividly surged back to life.
“No wonder I felt something was strange. With his personality, it was too bizarre for him to just lose you and stay quiet. But this is it. This was it. As expected of his relentless nature, he isn’t someone who would stay still without any cards up his sleeve.”
Hyung let out a hollow laugh as if deflated, shaking his head.
“In truth, I was anxious deep down. Why is nothing happening, why is His Majesty leaving us alone so quietly. Why dad, and why Seojoo.”
Pausing his words for a brief moment, Hyung quietly gazed at dad and Seojoo.
“He is a person who is more than capable of already figuring out exactly how many people moved with you, Haejoo, and who they are. He surely found out everything. Down to what kind of families they are, and even how many spoons are in the house. And more specifically, exactly what kind of relationship we share as well.”
The moment I heard those words, goosebumps broke out across my skin.
Hyung’s words stabbed into my chest as coldly as a dagger.
will you update this anytime soon?