The piano's soft echo was the only sound in the room. It was always the same after Ji-hoon finished playing—a stillness that lingered long after the final note had dissipated into the empty space. He'd come to expect it, that silence, like an old friend who never spoke but always made their presence known. But today, the silence was different. It wasn't just the usual absence of sound, but a presence. One that weighed heavily in the air, thick with unspoken words.
Ji-hoon's fingers hovered above the keys, the lingering vibration of his song still vibrating in his bones. He was trying to process everything that had unfolded recently. Seol-ah's confession. The evidence that pointed directly to Si-wan. The darkness that had crept closer, inch by inch, suffocating everything in its path. But something kept nagging at the edges of his mind, like a faint echo he couldn't quite grasp.
"Ji-hoon?" The voice that broke through his thoughts was soft but sharp, a contrast to the quiet of the room. It wasn't Seol-ah this time. It was Ha-rin.
He turned his head slowly, almost instinctively, his heart skipping a beat as he saw her standing in the doorway. Ha-rin's eyes were focused on him, her hands loosely clasped in front of her. For a moment, he didn't say anything. There was something about her presence in this moment that seemed almost surreal. Ha-rin was always around, always the steady one. But today, she seemed different. There was a weight to her that hadn't been there before.
"Ha-rin," Ji-hoon greeted her, his voice still tight from the recent conversation with Seol-ah. "What are you doing here?"
Ha-rin took a step forward, her hands slightly trembling as she walked closer to him. She had always been graceful in everything she did, her movements a careful blend of elegance and control. But today, there was an unease in her steps, a tension in the way she carried herself. It unsettled Ji-hoon, though he couldn't quite place why.
"I came to talk," she said quietly, her gaze lingering on the piano keys. "You've been distant lately. I thought… maybe you'd want to talk about it. What's been happening."
The words struck a chord deep within him. Ha-rin had always been perceptive, her instincts sharp. She was one of the few people Ji-hoon could trust without question, yet, as he looked at her now, a sense of foreboding crept over him. He didn't know what it was, but there was something about the way Ha-rin was standing there, her hands still trembling ever so slightly, that felt like a warning.
"I'm fine," he replied, though the words tasted wrong in his mouth. "It's just… a lot to process right now. Things have been complicated. You know how it is."
Ha-rin didn't respond immediately. Instead, she took a few more steps toward him, until she was standing by his side, her presence quiet but undeniable. Her hands, which had been clasped in front of her earlier, were now resting at her sides, her fingers slightly curled as if she were holding something back. She didn't say anything for a long while, just stood there, waiting. Her silence spoke volumes, and Ji-hoon couldn't shake the feeling that she knew something he didn't.
"You don't have to carry this on your own," Ha-rin said softly, her voice breaking the silence like a gentle wave. She paused, her gaze falling to the piano keys beneath his fingers. "You know you don't have to, right?"
Ji-hoon didn't answer right away. His mind was still racing, trying to make sense of everything. The report. Seol-ah's revelations. Si-wan's involvement. And now Ha-rin was standing there, offering him her support, her steady hands ready to pull him from the storm that had been gathering around him. But for some reason, he couldn't bring himself to take that step, to trust her with the weight of everything he had been carrying.
Instead, his fingers brushed against the piano's keys, the soft hum of the strings under his touch giving him a momentary sense of clarity. Music had always been his escape, his way of dealing with the chaos in his life. But now, even the music felt suffocating, like it was too much to handle.
"Ha-rin," he began slowly, his voice low and filled with hesitation. "I… I don't know who I can trust anymore. Everything's falling apart, and I don't know how to fix it. I don't even know where to begin."
Ha-rin's gaze softened, and she moved closer, placing a hand gently on his shoulder. The warmth of her touch was reassuring, grounding him in the moment. "You don't have to fix everything alone, Ji-hoon. I'm here. We're all here for you."
The words should have been comforting, but instead, they stirred something deeper in him—something that felt both heavy and unsettling. Ha-rin had always been there, always a quiet support in the background, but now, standing beside her, Ji-hoon realized something. Something he hadn't allowed himself to think about until now. Ha-rin's presence in his life wasn't just out of friendship. It was something more.
"Ha-rin," he started again, his voice barely above a whisper. "You've always been there for me, but I… I don't know how to be there for you."
Ha-rin's expression flickered for a moment, a brief shadow crossing her face, before she quickly masked it with a smile. "I don't need you to be there for me, Ji-hoon," she said, though there was a subtle tightness to her voice that he didn't miss. "I just need you to let me help. That's enough."
Her words should have been reassuring, but instead, they only deepened his unease. There was something she wasn't saying. Something hidden in the way her hands were still slightly curled at her sides, as if she were holding something back from him. He had seen this before, in her quick glances, the moments when she thought he wasn't looking. It was a kind of tension he recognized all too well—a kind of pain she didn't want to show.
"Ha-rin, what's going on?" Ji-hoon asked, his voice tinged with concern. "You're not telling me everything. I can tell."
For a moment, Ha-rin didn't respond. She stood there, her eyes focused on the piano keys in front of her, as if trying to find the right words. But when she finally spoke, her voice was barely a whisper.
"I'm not sure how much longer I can keep this up," she admitted, her hands finally unclenching, revealing the slight tremble in her fingers. "The truth is… I've been hiding something too."
Ji-hoon's heart skipped a beat. The air between them shifted, charged with something darker now, as if a curtain had been pulled back, revealing something he wasn't ready to see.
"What do you mean?" he asked, his voice tense.
Ha-rin hesitated for a long moment before she spoke again, her gaze meeting his with a new kind of vulnerability. "It's not just you, Ji-hoon. I've been caught up in this too. I've been… trying to protect you. But I'm not sure I can anymore. I don't know how much longer I can keep pretending everything's okay."
The weight of her words settled heavily in the air between them. Ji-hoon's chest tightened as the realization began to sink in. Ha-rin had been hiding something—something important. Something that connected her to everything he had been trying to uncover.
"Ha-rin," he said, his voice a mixture of worry and confusion, "what's going on? What are you hiding from me?"
She took a deep breath, and for a moment, Ji-hoon thought she might not answer. But then, with a quiet resolve, Ha-rin finally spoke.
"I'm not who you think I am, Ji-hoon. None of us are."
And in that moment, Ji-hoon knew that everything had just changed.
Ji-hoon's breath caught in his throat, his heart pounding like a drum in his chest. The words Ha-rin had just spoken hung in the air, thick and heavy, like a fog he couldn't see through. He tried to grasp at them, to make sense of them, but it felt like something intangible slipping just out of reach.
"You're not who I think you are?" he repeated, his voice shaky, disbelief creeping into his tone. His mind reeled, trying to piece together the fragments of everything he'd known about Ha-rin. She had always been a constant—steady, reliable, with a quiet strength he'd admired for so long. But now, she was speaking in riddles, and it was like the ground was shifting beneath him.
Ha-rin closed her eyes briefly, and when she opened them again, there was something in her gaze that made him freeze. A vulnerability, yes, but also something darker. Something he couldn't quite identify.
"I didn't want to tell you this," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. "But the truth is… I've been hiding more than you think. And I'm scared—scared that if you find out, you'll never look at me the same way again."
Ji-hoon couldn't breathe. The tension in the room had become palpable, like the air had thickened with the weight of her words. He leaned forward, every muscle in his body tense, every nerve screaming for her to continue. "What do you mean?" he asked, his voice tight with urgency. "What are you hiding from me, Ha-rin?"
For a long moment, she didn't say anything. She just stood there, staring at him with that unreadable expression, her fingers still trembling at her sides. Ji-hoon's stomach churned with a growing sense of dread. There was something in the way Ha-rin was acting—something off. He could feel it, like an invisible barrier between them that hadn't been there before.
"Tell me," he pressed again, desperate. "Please. I need to understand."
Ha-rin took a shaky breath, her eyes flicking to the piano keys for a split second before meeting his gaze again. "I never told you the full story about why I became your therapist," she started, her voice low but steady. "I never told you how I ended up here, working with you. It wasn't just by chance, Ji-hoon. There's… there's a reason I'm here. And it's a reason I should have told you a long time ago."
Ji-hoon's mind raced, his chest tightening. "What reason?"
Ha-rin's lips parted as if she were about to speak, but no sound came out. She seemed lost in her thoughts, as if the words were getting tangled up in her head. After a long moment, she finally spoke again, her voice barely above a whisper.
"I'm not just your therapist, Ji-hoon," she said, her words slow and deliberate. "I'm part of something much bigger. Something dangerous. And I don't know how much longer I can keep it a secret from you."
The silence in the room was suffocating. Ji-hoon couldn't move, couldn't breathe. It was as if the world had stopped spinning, and all he could do was listen to the words echoing in his head.
"Dangerous?" His voice cracked as he spoke the word, his thoughts racing. "What are you talking about?"
Ha-rin closed her eyes again, her hands tightening into fists at her sides. "I… I never wanted you to get involved in any of this," she whispered, her voice shaking now. "But it's too late. You're already in it, Ji-hoon. The truth about your mother's death, about everything that's been happening… It's all connected. And I… I'm a part of it."
The room felt colder now, the temperature dropping as if the very air had turned ice-cold. Ji-hoon's thoughts were jumbled, his head spinning with the implications of what Ha-rin had just said. She was part of something bigger. Dangerous. Connected to everything that had been happening in his life, to his mother's murder, to Si-wan's twisted game.
"What do you mean, you're part of it?" he asked, his voice barely audible, but the panic in it unmistakable. He reached out for her, desperate for clarity, for understanding. "What are you not telling me, Ha-rin?"
She flinched at his touch, and for a moment, Ji-hoon saw something in her eyes—something raw, something terrified—that he had never seen before. It was like a wall had been broken, revealing a side of her that she had buried deep inside.
"I'm not who you think I am, Ji-hoon," she repeated, her voice barely above a whisper. "I'm not just your therapist. I'm—" She stopped herself abruptly, shaking her head as if she were trying to push the words back inside.
Ji-hoon's heart was pounding in his chest now, his mind racing to make sense of everything. "You're not just my therapist… then who are you?"
Ha-rin took a deep breath, her eyes flicking nervously to the door as if she expected someone to walk in. She hesitated, looking torn between saying something and holding it back. Then, with a grim determination, she spoke again.
"I'm part of a group," she confessed, her voice thick with emotion. "A group that's been keeping an eye on you. On everything. They… they have information. Information about your mother's death. About Si-wan. And they've been using me to get closer to you. To control what you know."
The words hit Ji-hoon like a punch to the gut. His world felt like it was unraveling before his eyes. Ha-rin, the one person he had trusted more than anyone, was a part of something dark and twisted. She had been playing him, manipulating him, and he hadn't even known.
"No…" Ji-hoon whispered, shaking his head in disbelief. "You're lying. You can't be a part of this."
"I wish I was lying," Ha-rin replied, her voice cracking. "But I'm not. They've been using me, Ji-hoon. And now… now I'm afraid they're coming for you. You've been too close to the truth for too long. And if they find out what you know…" She trailed off, her eyes full of fear.
Ji-hoon's stomach turned. The pieces of the puzzle were starting to come together, but the picture it painted was terrifying. Ha-rin, his trusted therapist, was not only connected to the dark forces he had been fighting against but was also the one pulling him closer to the truth, piece by piece.
"I don't know what to do anymore," Ha-rin whispered, her hands trembling as they reached out for him. "I never wanted to hurt you. But I can't keep hiding this from you. I just… I can't."
The room seemed to close in on him as the full weight of her words sank in. The air was thick with uncertainty, suffocating him. And in that moment, Ji-hoon realized that everything he had believed about Ha-rin—everything he had trusted—was a lie.