32 Old Story

June 16, 2021

Emma's House

The noise coming from the direction of the door forced Emma, who was just about to lay down her body, to undo her intention. She paused for a moment and sharpened her hearing to make sure she hadn't misheard the noise.

"Open the door!"

"Ian?"

"Open the door!"

Emma immediately got out of bed after hearing the sound of the child screaming outside. She took his robe and put it on as she walked to the door. When the door was opened, the strong smell of alcohol immediately pierced Emma's sense of smell. Ian came in heavily drunk.

Unexpectedly for her, suddenly the young man grabbed her neck firmly. Emma's body was pushed by Ian back into the house until it hit the wall quite hard. The young man gave a sharp look right at Emma's two black beads. To be honest, this is the first time she's seen her son this angry.

"What do you do?" Emma asked with difficulty. She admitted that Ian's energy was still strong, even though he was drunk.

"You monster!" Ian swears as he strengthens his stranglehold on Emma. "You shouldn't have gone there when I said Soo Young canceled the meeting! You should have believed me back then!"

Emma is furious when Ian calls her a monster. She wanted to beat the boy, but she was also curious why Ian suddenly acted like this.

"Because of you, I have to go to the police station!" say Ian. "Because of you too, I will lose my friends! You really...."

Ian's speech was interrupted, and the stranglehold on Emma was released because his body immediately collapsed to the floor. Emma, who had escaped from the strangulation of the child, coughed. The female Gumiho looked at Ian, who was already unconscious.

"Police station? You went to the police station," Emma muttered. She sighed.

Emma dragged Ian's body to the young man's room with her strength. She let the body of the child lie on the floor because she could not raise the child on the bed. Emma still hadn't come out of the child's room when she noticed Ian sleeping. The young man's face was now not shrouded in anger, but now it showed sadness, making her feel a little guilty. Maybe she should have just believed the message Ian sent at that time so that the child would not suffer like this.

"Good night, son," Emma said before she left the room.

***

June 17, 2021

"Mom!"

"Soo Chan!"

Emma awakens from a dream about her past that occurred hundreds of years ago. The female Gumiho sat her body on the edge of the bed while trying to calm herself down. Her eyes then turned to a wooden box stored on top of her wardrobe. She got up from her bed and walked towards her closet. She took the wooden box by using a chair from her dressing table.

She sat down on a chair and opened the box. The contents of the box were a pair of white shoes with a black pattern. The shoes belonged to her late first son, whom she had kept for hundreds of years. A drop of tears flowed out of the corner of her eyes as she recalled what she had done to her first son.

The feeling of regret that took her son's life is still felt to this day. She had hoped that the presence of Ian, who had chosen to live, would take away her regret, but it did not. Perhaps this is a punishment for her as a mother who has taken the life of her own son. If she could go back in time, she would not kill her son, even if she chose to die.

"I'm sorry, Soo Chan ... I'm sorry," she said amid tears that finally broke out while hugging the shoe.

***

Ian groaned while holding his head, which was aching at the moment. The young man slowly opened his eyes when he faintly heard the sound of crying. In a semi-conscious state, Ian tried to stand up. He paused for a moment after standing up. His stomach feels uncomfortable, he seems to be drinking too much. He was about to step on his feet, but he realized something. He's not in his house. It's the second time he's woken up in someone's house after getting drunk, but this time he knows where he is.

The crying sound he had heard earlier came back, this time a little louder. Immediately he came out of his room to the source of the crying sound, which was Emma's room. Ian immediately opened the door without knocking on it first. His two eyes found Emma crying while hugging a pair of traditional men's shoes. He couldn't bear to see his mother cry like that. With cautious steps, he approached the mother, who seemed unaware of his presence. Ian's hand went up and immediately patted Emma's shoulder.

Feeling that someone was patting her on the shoulder, Emma immediately turned her head and found Ian watching her.

"Why are you crying?"

The question Ian asked was not answered by Emma at all. She actually hugged the child's body tightly, making the young man surprised.

***

Ian noticed Emma, who seemed to have drunk, even though she had only drunk half her beer. After the gumiho suddenly hugged him and cried for almost ten minutes in his arms, Emma took him out of the room for a beer. He felt a deep sadness for Emma.

"Ian," Emma said in a drunken tone. The woman noticed her son sitting right next to her. "You know what? You have an older brother."

Ian was silent, he did not respond to anything from the woman's speech. Because he doesn't know what to respond to. In addition, he only found out if this gumiho had been married before, he thought his father was the first human Emma married.

"A long time ago," she said, "Probably about two hundred years ago, I married for the first time to a human being and gave birth to a handsome boy. His name is Jung Soo Chan."

"My life at that time was the same as my initial life when I was with your bastard father," Emma was silent for a moment. "I lived happily because my husband, Soo Chan, also loved me very much. I thought maybe I could see my grandchildren."

Again, Emma was silent. The look on her face that originally looked happy when telling her story just disappeared. "But one day my first husband was found dead by a police chief. I was upset and went to the murderer's house and burned it down. He have a beautiful daughter, and I took her home.

"When I ate the girl's heart at home, Soo Chan saw it, which means he knew my true identity as a gumiho. After that, I gave the boy two options, similar to the question I asked you. He chose to die rather than continue his life."

After completing the old story, Emma fell asleep with her head resting on Ian's shoulder, because coincidentally when Emma's head almost fell Ian swiftly gave his shoulder as a backrest for his mother's head.

"Your old life turned out to be the same as your life with dad," Ian said.