The Problematic Helper (Completed Main Story) - Chapter 13

Pfft.

Do Um smiled, revealing her neatly aligned teeth.

“If you make me cry, I’ll cry; if you make me laugh, I’ll laugh. Didn’t we promise? That we’d each faithfully stay in our own places?”

After wiping Ji Wan’s forehead completely, Do Um withdrew her hand and met his eyes.

“So from now on, please don’t come running like this. Even if you make me cry, I’ll try not to cry and hold it in.”

The bold woman who had finished saying what she wanted to say walked ahead first.

Watching the woman gently stroking Woo Seok’s arm as if telling him not to worry while he waited anxiously made him feel ridiculous about himself.

Who would have thought that tiny woman would be this bold? The sight of him rushing over in one step without even imagining it.

Thinking he must have looked like some pathetic puppy desperate to pee, he deliberately ignored Woo Seok and got into the car with Ji Wan.

*****

Knock knock.

At the sound of knocking on the study door, Ji Wan looked up from his documents.

It was past 11 o’clock.

Because he had unintentionally left the company without finishing work, he had been stuck in the study for hours.

“It’s omija tea. The gardener gave us a huge basket of omija he picked this year, so I made some syrup with it.”

More than the vivid crimson color or the sweet fragrance, what caught Ji Wan’s eye was the couple’s cup they had bought together at the mountain.

“What do you think? Does it still look tacky when you see it again?”

“There’s no difference.”

He almost added “right?” but swallowed the rest, thinking of how disappointed she would be.

“How does it taste?”

She had only just taken a sip, yet she was already asking for his reaction—as if she might start stomping her feet impatiently, and worried that it would make his own heart flutter needlessly again, he answered quickly.

“Sweet.”

It was sweet.

Whether it was his imagination or really sweet, everything he ate with her tasted that way.

To the point of making his head spin.

“Now that I look at it, CEO-nim has a habit of frowning. I almost felt hurt thinking you only did it when you saw me.”

The woman who observed him obsessively only when looking at him found even his smallest reactions as fascinating as discovering a new insect or animal.

At first she couldn’t even meet his eyes out of fear, so maybe this was an improvement.

Bzzz, bzzz.

It was the vibration of the phone placed on the coffee table in the study.

Do Um, who had been standing in front of the desk, quickly turned and reached for the phone.

[Seol.]

His eyes read the name that appeared on the screen faster than her outstretched hand could reach it.

Congratulations on the marriage—he had even sent a gift to the newlywed home, so she must know he was with his wife at this hour—yet a call from that woman late at night was unwelcome.

Fortunately, the man probably hadn’t seen her smile freeze and turn cold.

He was the kind of man who had snapped that she shouldn’t interfere in his private life when she asked who Seol was, so Do Um forced a bright expression and turned around.

“Here you go.”

Less than five minutes after Do Um casually handed Ji Wan the phone and left the study, Ji Wan came out holding his jacket.

“…Where are you going?”

It had only been three and a half hours since he came home.

And right after receiving a call from that woman, Seol.

“Something came up at work. Don’t wait up—go to sleep.”

“Now… at this hour?”

It was strange.

His chest felt even more suffocating than when Chairwoman Jang of Anseo-dong had told him, “Just shake the man’s heart and leave.”

Even though there was nothing to feel wronged about, he felt wronged.

“…”

The sight of the man hurriedly leaving through the front door without answering shimmered like heat haze.

Even in front of the fearsome Chairwoman Jang, his heart had been calm, but now it was pounding as if it might burst.

Don’t wait—he had absolutely no intention of waiting.

*****

An entire floor of the VIP ward at Korea University Hospital was restricted to everyone except designated doctors and nurses.

“Not yet?”

Jung Hyuk, Lee Seol’s manager, approached Ji Wan as he strode quickly across the corridor.

Whenever things seemed quiet, the moment attention drifted even slightly, this became an annual event.

“For the past few days her mood has been down, and today again…”

Dr. Choi, Ji Wan’s personal physician and the doctor in charge of the VIP ward, approached Ji Wan who was roughly rubbing his face.

“We did pump her stomach, but she’s asleep because of the remaining effects of the drugs. She hasn’t been sleeping for days, so she kept increasing the dose one or two pills at a time—this must be the result. She’ll probably wake up in two or three hours. Do you want to see her face before you go?”

“I’ll wait until she wakes up and then leave.”

After Dr. Choi left and Jung Hyuk went to the office to check the situation,

Lee Seol opened her eyes.

“…Oppa?”

Ji Wan, who had been looking down at the dark city, turned around.

His arms crossed indifferently and his tightly closed lips revealed his displeasure perfectly.

“Um, that is…”

As Lee Seol tried to make excuses, her dry lips cracked and a trace of blood appeared.

“It’s not what oppa is thinking. I really couldn’t sleep— I didn’t do it on purpose…”

Even as he gently wiped her bloodstained lips with a tissue, his eyes remained utterly cold compared to the tender action.

“Every time you say it’s not true, I keep getting fooled and coming here anyway. You know that, and that’s why you do this, right?”

“I’m telling you it’s really not! I don’t want to be the subject of gossip anymore either. I really didn’t want that—I tried my best on my own!”

Lee Seol raised her voice as if she felt wronged.

“And who asked you to keep coming? Just pretend you don’t know and that’s it—why do you always show up and turn everything upside down!”

Ji Wan picked up the jacket he had taken off.

A trace of unreadable boredom appeared over his seemingly cold expression.

“Go ahead, try it. Let’s see how far you’ll go. Apparently the only thing I absolutely have to do for you is this.”

Knock knock.

Jung Hyuk, entering the room in the middle of the tense atmosphere, hesitated.

“The driver?”

“We couldn’t stop it. He got caught perfectly by ‘Dispatch’ who were camped out in front of the house.”

It was a notorious entertainment paparazzi outlet specializing in celebrity dating scandals.

Two years ago, they were also the first to publish photos of Ji Wan and Lee Seol meeting in Jeju.

“The company says to claim it was overwork from a packed schedule, but by now everyone probably knows, right? This isn’t the first or second time Lee Seol has done this.”

“Watch the situation and contact me. If it really gets bad, I’ll look into other options.”

As Ji Wan was about to leave the room, Lee Seol shouted after him.

“Why not just buy ‘Dispatch’?”

Even in this moment, it was a joke no one would laugh at.

Jung Hyuk glared at Lee Seol with hollow eyes.

“Then I’ll leave it to you.”

After entrusting Lee Seol to Jung Hyuk and leaving the room, the woman added one more thing to Ji Wan’s back.

“If buying doesn’t work, just bankrupt them completely! Huh?”

In the distance, Jung Hyuk’s sigh followed.

*****

Since it was already late, Ji Wan had intended to go to his officetel, but he returned to Hwaan-dong after 3 a.m.

He had told her not to wait, and since he had to go to work in a few hours anyway, going to his officetel in the city would have been far less exhausting—yet the reason he came back to Hwaan-dong was something he understood one moment and didn’t the next.

That incomprehensible thing became perfectly clear the instant he saw the woman asleep on the living room sofa, hugging her knees.

“…Ha.”

He had told her not to wait, but he knew she would.

That was why he had come here again, as if possessed.

Something hot surged deep in his lungs as the early morning air brushed past.

‘Yeah, this is what makes her Kang Do Um.’

He draped the jacket he was wearing over the shoulders of the woman who was shivering in the cold air from the air conditioner.

Did she think he would come?

Or did she wait even though she knew he wouldn’t?

Neither was what he wanted.

It was already a foregone conclusion.

A marriage that began with an end already decided would be nothing but endless uncertain waiting for her.

With all the many tasks and trials ahead of him, the only certainty he could give her was divorce in six months—at most a year.

This small woman should no longer have any expectations of him.

He shouldn’t come like this knowing she would wait even though he told her not to.

If he said don’t wait, then not waiting.

If he said don’t do anything for him, then doing nothing at all—that was all he wanted.

Giving her hope that would soon collapse wasn’t consideration; it was torture.

Ji Wan turned back the way he came and grabbed the steering wheel again.

Running through the pitch-black darkness, he had come to her and was now fleeing the same path again.

Before the awakened woman could ask with a clear face, “You’re here?”

Before he wanted to answer that question again.

*****

The man did not come all night.

More precisely, he had stopped by briefly, changed clothes, and left again.

Unless the jacket the man had worn had grown legs and come to her on its own—whether to that woman Seol or to the officetel where he used to live alone—he had definitely only taken off his jacket for her while she slept and then left.

He hadn’t even thought to wake her and send her to the bedroom, or to carry her to bed like before.

Just taking off his jacket and rushing out again.

‘Well, it must have been really urgent, huh? So urgent that someone like me didn’t even register in his eyes. Tch!’

Do Um put Ji Wan’s jacket in the air dresser and glared at it every time she passed by—that was her small revenge.

“Madam, are you feeling unwell somewhere? They say even dogs don’t catch colds in the sixth month, but you’ve been sniffling, and your eyes look so sunken. It really doesn’t look good.”

At the rough but sincere concern from Madam So Kyung, who had married from Jeolla Province to Chungcheong Province, the gardener Mr. Kim poked her side with a chuckle.

“This one and her way of speaking to the madam. I’m sorry, Madam. She’s lived all over the place, so her speech is a bit…”

Even if her speech was rough, her concern was genuine, so Do Um smiled at Madam So Kyung.

“What are you saying, ajumma? It’s because of your straightforward way of talking that we became close so quickly. I like it. I really like it, so please don’t keep scolding her.”

Only after Mr. Kim left did Do Um whisper into Madam So Kyung’s ear.

“Um, today is that day. The thing all women go through—she says I always make a big fuss every month like this.”

She had slept uncomfortably all night, and on top of that, it was the monthly cramps that reliably arrived equipped with headaches and body aches.

“Oh dear, I see. If you’re uncomfortable, don’t hold it in—tell me anytime. I’ll take care of everything, okay?”

“Yes, shall we start from the second floor?”

Tying her pure white apron tightly, Do Um stood up energetically.

As always, if she kept her body busy, she could forget everything, pitch black.

That was what she intended to do.

*****

[Eden Entertainment, Yoon Yi Seol. Rushed to emergency room due to sleeping pill overdose.] [Group’s second son Mr. A, whose relationship was heating up, reaches extreme stress over marriage news.] [Mr. A captured entering VIP ward at Korea Hospital.]

The agency’s plan to pass it off simply as accumulated fatigue collapsed under Dispatch’s persistence.

Not only did it dominate the front page of entertainment gossip, but all day long Ji Wan’s name and Bando Construction trended at the top of real-time search rankings.

“What should we do?”

Woo Seok cautiously asked Ji Wan, who hadn’t looked up from his documents.

“What is there to do?”

“Shouldn’t we at least have the PR team prepare a rebuttal article now…?”

“There’s nothing incorrect in the article, is there?”

“Yes?”

“It’s true that Seol overdosed on sleeping pills and that I went to Korea Hospital. That’s what I’m saying.”

Tap.

At the end of his calm voice, Ji Wan folded the documents he had finished signing and stood up.

“Let’s go.”

“Yes? W-where to…?”

“Who do you think? Before the HR director who will come to verify the facts, who do you think will summon me first?”

As if she had been waiting, the moment Ji Wan’s words ended, Team Leader Yoon from the secretarial office entered.

“Chairwoman Jang of Anseo-dong has summoned you.”

Perhaps it was later than expected—the man checking the time on his left wrist slightly frowned.