NLFSD Chapter 126 – END

Chapter 126 – Call My Name IF Extra 10

Some time passed like that. After several rounds of sex, Jiwoon’s complexion cleared again. He even put a little weight back on. With proper pheromone supply, his condition improved astonishingly fast. His appetite returned, and he would sometimes slice fruit to eat on his own.

“Do you like mango?”

One day, Seo Taecheon asked that out of the blue. Jiwoon, a little surprised, nodded. That evening, Taecheon came home carrying a fruit basket.

“Here. Eat.”

“Huh?”

Wide-eyed, Jiwoon took the basket, hesitant.

“You seem to like fruit. I bought some.”

Jiwoon picked out a mango first and ate it. He didn’t know what had prompted Taecheon to bring it, but he was glad for that small piece of heart he hadn’t felt in a while.

Even so, they didn’t cross paths more inside the house. At some point, Jiwoon stopped setting out breakfast.

Staring at the empty table, Taecheon curled his hand into a fist. It was only a piece of bread and a cup of coffee gone, yet the emptiness gnawed at him. He’d always refused that breakfast and left, but now it tugged at him as if it mattered.

Maybe it meant there was no need to keep making breakfast since divorce was the premise anyway. He tried to see it that way, but the discomfort lingered.

When he came home early, he could sometimes catch Jiwoon — usually asleep.

As his belly grew, Jiwoon slept more and more. He would doze on the living room sofa or the armchair by the veranda, likely knocked out by sudden waves of drowsiness before making it to the bedroom.

Taecheon recalled something his mother once said.

When you’re pregnant, you sleep a lot.

She’d said she suffered because of sleep — how she hated the one who woke her….

He stood without touching him, studying the face.

It was like his parents’ story. As his mother had, this Omega would give birth and leave in a few months. The difference was that his parents had divorced after years of fighting, while with this Omega they planned a clean, agreed divorce. There would be no needless emotional drain.

He hadn’t told Jiwoon, but a few days earlier the neuro center had called. They’d found papers on patients with similar symptoms. Hoping for some positive case or solution, he had rushed over; the doctor’s news was grim.

“Regrettably, there’s no medication or therapy.”

Waiting for memory to return naturally was the best they could do — with no guarantee it would return at all. He was struck silent by futility, helplessness.

The doctor said he should be aware of negative possibilities, and outlined cases in the literature.

One patient, it said, never remembered his son until the day he died. He learned and recognized that the boy in front of him was his own and lived on like that. Another patient never recognized his mother again after the accident, to the end.

Cases of recovered memory were, sadly, almost nonexistent. The doctor called regaining memory “a miracle.”

On the way out, he wrestled with it.

If memory never returned, then “Jiwoon” would be excised from his life. Would that be a loss or a gain? He couldn’t judge.

The question returned to a single point: before the loss — did the past him love that Omega deeply?

From what his secretary said, the two had dated secretly at work. He was stunned to hear they’d lived together before the wedding — unthinkable for him.

A man who found even a polite meal with a match-introduced Omega burdensome had announced his relationship in a formal setting? However he looked at it, it was strange. For him to do something so out of character… had that Omega been that special?

Doubts spiraled — to the child in Jiwoon’s belly.

After divorce, how would Jiwoon live? He intended to pay alimony enough for comfort. As he’d said, he’d spare no expense for childcare and education. If the child wanted, he would meet and spend time. He wanted to fulfill the biological father’s responsibility.

But.

The car hit a red light. Hands on the wheel, he glanced out the window.

Is this the right path — to divorce like this?

The cases in the paper — those who couldn’t recognize their sons or mothers yet lived together to the end. Without memory, they still held family.

Could I… maintain a family like that?

He drove on, head tangled. Then, as if in slow motion, a roadside sculpture caught his eye. A deep green statue.

I’ve seen that. No — I know it.

Gooseflesh. He pulled over near it. The shape, the color — all familiar.

A parking sign loomed. He parked quickly and stepped out to look at the statue.

“…?”

His vision seemed to ripple. The building before him was so familiar. The sign said “Divorce Reflection Center, Seoul Gangnam Branch.” The lot, the scene — all too known.

He had been here — multiple times.

Faint images bloomed in color in his mind.

Jiwoon’s face fluttered past. No headache. Only his smile, brilliant sun, warm wind, the fresh scent that clung to him — all weaving into one impression.

Jiwoon.

Three syllables lodged firmly in his brain. He waited for his thoughts to align.

“Well now, at this hour, no one ever comes.”

A middle-aged man ambled out of the building, noticing the parked car.

“Oh? Look who it is. Long time no see!”

He recognized Taecheon’s face and beamed.

“Ah, sir.”

He knew this man. Not only the face, but the name.

He was… right — the officiant.

It was spring. The man, in a suit, declared the union. Before him stood a broadly smiling Seo Taecheon and a radiant Lee Jiwoon. Yet he couldn’t shake the sense that one corner of the puzzle still wasn’t flush.

The man asked,

“How are you? How’s married life?” he said with an easy grin.

“…We’re having a baby. Four months.”

Awkwardly, Taecheon answered — choosing the safest reply.

“Ah, that I know. You must be entering the stable period now. Last time you said three months.”

“Yes. Much more stable.”

“Wonderful. I’ve joined many couples, but none fit as well as you two.”

“Is that so?”

“Don’t play coy. You dote on your Omega shamelessly.”

He didn’t know what to say. So that’s how others saw them.

“You still have that portrait, right? That class caused such a stir. Fun times.”

“Ah, yes… I remember.”

He didn’t know what portrait, but he feigned memory.

“Time’s gotten away. I’ll be off.”

“Yes.”

“See you again. Don’t forget — you owe me a meal.”

“Yes, sir. Take care.”

The man waved and went inside.

Taecheon stood a moment, then turned for his car.

The word “portrait” stuck.

I painted a portrait?

Once, he had wanted to be a painter. A boy alone with his sketchbook for long hours — that was his only friend. He could draw favorite things forever without tiring — rabbits, planes, soccer balls.

Seeing his son’s talent, Chairman Seo sent him to an arts high school. He excelled there, too — energy overflowing as he lost hours before the canvas.

He had a rule: draw only what he loved. He captured beauty, loveliness, radiant moments — to heal his own loneliness. He didn’t want to draw the negative and dark. He loathed abstraction.

So when he chose business over fine art, he felt little regret; fame wasn’t the goal. If he could draw what he loved anytime, making it a job or not meant nothing.

“Portrait…”

He had never drawn one — no one had gotten into his heart like that. Without liking or loving others, he hadn’t painted them.

And yet I painted one?

He drove hard, parked, and ran to open the gate. Inside, he went to the study and rifled his shelves. No portrait. Not in the sketchbooks, not in any frame.

He kept things orderly — surely it was stored somewhere. Why couldn’t he find it?

Maybe… with Jiwoon.

He stepped out. Passing the dressing room, he heard soft sobs. Urgency spiking, he threw open the door — and froze.

Jiwoon was crouched on the floor, packing. He had stuffed a small carry-on so full he had to press it with his knee to force the zipper shut.

“Jiwoon. What are you doing?”

He glanced up, then back to the case.

“I’m leaving today.”

His voice was wet with tears, but firm.

“Leaving?”

“Yes. We can meet only when necessary. I’ll contact you.”

He sniffled and sniffed.

Taecheon had no idea how to answer. Jiwoon wasn’t wrong. But that he would leave this house — a black hole opened in his chest.

If he left — went somewhere else — then what? He wouldn’t see him asleep all over the house, undefended. He couldn’t throw a blanket over that thin body, lift his head onto a pillow, listen for tiny footfalls at night, or see the sheepish face with mussed morning hair.

“Why suddenly? Must you go?”

He asked, urgent. Jiwoon was firm.

“Yes. I don’t think it’s good for me or the baby to stay.”

Sniffling, he opened the case and began sorting again. Then — a frame on top of the clothes caught Taecheon’s eye. A rough sketch, but without doubt Jiwoon’s face. He had drawn it — the hand was his.

The fine hair and features were rendered with care; the harmless eyes glowed as if dreaming. Blushing cheeks and kind eyes — like a boy out of myth.

A shiver ran through him.

So that is the portrait.

He understood. He had loved Jiwoon fiercely. Every pencil stroke, every shade said so — that he had loved this person, this beautiful person, more than anyone.

The one and only portrait he had ever drawn — first and last — said so.

“Jiwoon…”

A choked voice broke out.

“Don’t go.”

Jiwoon looked up at him — disbelieving. Tears streamed from Taecheon’s eyes and fell to the floor.

“Please don’t go. I’m begging you. Stay by me.”

While Jiwoon was too startled to answer, Taecheon dropped to his knees.

Hope flickered in Jiwoon.

“Did… did you remember?”

At the urgent question, he shook his head.

“No, not all. I still don’t know you. I know I loved you — but I don’t remember the moments.”

Jiwoon’s face went still. But at what followed, he couldn’t hold back his tears.

“But this I can be sure of: I loved you to madness. And I’ve fallen in love again.”

A single tear slid from his eye. Jiwoon reached out and wiped it with his sleeve.

“Every morning, thinking your coffee would be gone — it makes me frantic. That we only face each other when we have relations… it wears me down. When I leave the room and you cry — if I hear it, I can’t sleep.”

“Taecheon…”

“…May I love you again?”

Jiwoon rose and fell into his arms. He hugged back, hard. Warmth spread through them.

“I know nothing. How we met, how deeply we loved — nothing.”

Sniffling in his arms, he stroked Jiwoon’s hair. Those fine strands that slid softly through his fingers — he must have loved them. He loved them still.

“So from now on — teach me.”

“Taecheon.”

“I’m sorry for everything until now.”

Hot tears burst from Jiwoon. Holding tight to each other, they stayed one for a long time.

That night, they lay side by side in the master bed and talked until dawn. Jiwoon carefully explained all that had happened. Quietly, Taecheon listened. Every story was unfamiliar — and all the more, he held Jiwoon’s gaze and nodded.

“…Taecheon.”

“Yes.”

“Who am I?”

The day in the ward, he had asked Jiwoon, Who are you? Now, Jiwoon would ask him: Who am I?

“Lee Jiwoon — my Omega.”

He brushed back the hair falling over Jiwoon’s brow and kissed it.

“…That’s what I wanted to hear.”

Burying his face in Taecheon’s chest, he sniffled, then closed his eyes.

Just before sleep took him, he whispered,

“I hope tomorrow comes quickly.”

May the first day we fall in love anew dawn soon.

“Sleep well, Jiwoon,” Taecheon answered, gentle and low. Then, holding the deeply sleeping Jiwoon, he closed his eyes. A very deep sleep wrapped them both.

The End

TL- Low-key sobbing. It went from soft vibes and fruit bowls to “divorce?” real quick, then looped back to love like a plot twist hug. My heart: bruised but healed.

Hope you loved it.