Two Hearts in Separate Bloom

When I woke up, I found myself lying in a hospital room.

Levi was there, clutching my hand tightly. His eyes stared at me with the kind of intensity one might reserve for the rarest treasure in the world.

In that moment, a montage of beautiful memories flickered across my mind, each one stabbing a little deeper into my heart. Before I could stop myself, tears welled up, threatening to spill over.

Levi... he had been my junior back at university.

At the freshman orientation party, he had fallen for me at first sight and launched the kind of passionate pursuit that would make even the boldest suitor blush.

I, mindful of the age gap between us and the wide chasm between our family backgrounds, had rejected him time and again.

But Levi had never once given up.

The summer of my junior year, I interned in Reinstern City—and fell terribly ill. It was serious enough to land me in the hospital, and somehow, news of my condition traveled to him.

He had been on the verge of boarding a plane for an overseas holiday when he heard. Without a second thought, he canceled his trip and came straight to Reinstern City.

When I woke up in that hospital bed back then, the scene had looked exactly like this—him gripping my hand so tightly, his eyes rimmed red, looking every bit like a broken little puppy.

When he saw me open my eyes, he choked out, "Nikki, don't ever scare me like that again. I swear, I'll die."

At the time, I thought he was being melodramatic.

How long had we even known each other? How could things have gotten so life-and-death so quickly?

But then, he pressed his forehead to the back of my hand—and a moment later, a single, searingly warm tear fell onto my skin.

It didn't burn, and yet somehow, it left a scar.

There is nothing more powerful than the tear of a boy of eighteen or nineteen. It's the purest love confession there is.

After I was discharged, I finally said yes to him.

He was so ecstatic, he bought an entire truckload of roses and handed them out to everyone on the street, just to collect a thousand blessings of "forever and always." He believed those blessings would make our love sweeter and everlasting.

After graduation, he couldn't wait for another second. He proposed, and we were married in the blink of an eye.

He said there were just too many temptations in the world—he had to lock me down before someone else stole me away.

We had been married seven years, and every single day still felt like we were newlyweds.

Because of my complicated family background, I had always been afraid of having children. But Levi had never once pushed me.

He bore the brunt of our parents' relentless pressure all by himself, taking full responsibility without ever letting it touch me.

I couldn't bear to see him suffer. So I had quietly planned to get pregnant, hoping to surprise him with the greatest gift of all.

But I never imagined the man who once said he feared losing me to temptation would, in our seventh year of marriage, finally succumb to temptation himself.

Now, we sat in silence.

Finally, Levi averted his gaze and murmured, "I'll get the doctor. And your test results."

My heart lurched.

Panic gripped me—what if he discovered the pregnancy?

Quickly, I grabbed his wrist.

"No rush. Let's talk about the divorce first."

He froze. Then, large teardrops began rolling uncontrollably down his cheeks as he shook his head desperately.

"Nikki, please... don't say things you don't mean. I can't bear it..." His voice cracked, his eyes a pitiful red mess.

Once upon a time, the sight of him crying would have shattered me into pieces.

But now? Now I felt nothing but a hollow, cold disgust.

Expressionless, I stared at him.

"When you chose to sleep with another woman while I was mourning the death of my grandmother, did you think about whether I could bear it? When you stood there, gently touching her pregnant belly, looking forward to your child's birth... did you ever once think about whether I could bear it?"

It was as if someone had pressed pause on him. Levi gaped, speechless.

After a long, heavy silence, he mumbled feebly, "But Nikki... I'm only human. You have to allow me to make mistakes..."

How absurd. I let out a cold, brittle laugh.

"So I can make mistakes too, right? I can sleep with another man, get pregnant with another man's child, and come back asking you to raise it as your own?"

"Of course not!" Levi shouted.

I stared at him, my gaze icy, letting him hear the deafening silence that followed.

Realizing how ridiculous he sounded, he finally broke down and slumped at the side of my bed, his face buried in his hands.

"Nikki... my parents said if we didn't have a child soon, they'd force me to divorce you... I didn't want to pressure you, I didn't want to hurt you. I didn't know what else to do. The baby... it was a mistake. But if this mistake can save our marriage—Nikki, you know it—you know I can't live without you!"

By the end, he was sobbing uncontrollably, his grip on my hand growing almost painful, as if he could physically tether me to him and keep me from slipping away.