THE ONE I LOVED ‧₊ ᵎᵎ 🍒 ⋅ ˚✮
☆。 !¡ 박성훈 ꒰ park sunghoon ꒱ !¡
— genre; Angst ⋅ Romance ⋅ Tragedy ⋅ Realism ୨ৎ
cw; Infidelity ⋅ Emotional neglect ⋅ Open relationship (one-sided) ⋅ Divorce ⋅ Toxic dynamics ⟡
synopsis; After a golden summer romance, Y/N reunites with Park Sunghoon in university — now a notorious playboy. Against all odds, he wins her back, changes his ways, and marries her. But love begins to fade, replaced by silence, betrayal, and an unspoken longing for someone else. When Sunghoon chooses an open relationship over commitment, Y/N is forced to face a painful truth: some people come back, only to leave you worse than before. ୨ৎ
wc; 1.8k — masterlist ⭑.ᐟ
The second time, he loved me like forgetting was inevitable.
He just stopped loving me.
I met Sunghoon during the summer before our final year of high school.
He was in our small coastal town for vacation — the kind of place people visit to breathe for a while and then forget about. But that year, a fancy black car pulled up in front of my family’s old café, and out stepped a boy who looked too polished for our salt-rusted streets.
Even his name sounded expensive.
He held the door open for my grandmother when her cane slipped, helped my younger brother fix his bike chain, and one day, when it started pouring and I was stuck on my walk home, he pulled up beside me with an umbrella and a lazy, charming smile.I was seventeen, soaked from head to toe, cursing the broken bike I had ditched a few blocks back, when I turned and stared at him — tall, lean, with raindrops clinging to his eyelashes and a smile that was entirely too confident.
"Come on," he said, tilting the umbrella slightly more toward me. "I'll walk you."
"You’re not from here," I said warily. Everyone in our small coastal town knew everyone. He was clearly new.
"Nope," he replied. "Just here for summer. But I make a pretty good umbrella holder."
I didn’t smile. Not at first. But I didn’t walk away, either.
I rolled my eyes but accepted the umbrella. The truth? I was already a little bit in love.
He became the center of our sleepy little town that summer. Everyone talked about the city boy with the perfect face and effortless charm. But I didn’t care about all that — not really. I cared about the boy who helped my grandmother. The one who fixed my brother’s bike chain. The one who’d sit beside me on the pier at night and ask what I wanted to be when I left this place.
We spent that summer side by side. Nights by the ocean, laughter over melted ice cream, his fingers brushing mine like secrets. He told me I made the town feel like home. I told him not to forget me when he left.
“Don’t forget me,” I said once, quietly, afraid.
He looked at me, and his voice was soft. “How could I?”
We kissed for the first time a week before he left. His hands were cold from the sea breeze, his lips warm and hesitant. “I’ll find you again,” he promised, and I believed him.
Two years later, I started university in Seoul. A new city, a new life. I’d almost let go of the memory of that summer — until I heard his name in the cafeteria.
“Sunghoon? You mean Park Sunghoon?” one girl was whispering. “He’s so hot but, God, such a player. He’s slept with, like, half the dance department.”
I froze. My chest tightened.
I hadn’t seen him since that summer. But apparently, he was here — and he’d become someone else entirely.
I spent weeks avoiding him. Changed walking routes. Skipped events. Ignored the ache in my chest when someone mentioned his name. I wasn’t ready to find out he’d forgotten me after all.
Then one day, I walked into the library — and straight into his chest.
I looked up, stunned. He looked down, equally surprised. His mouth parted slightly.
I should’ve walked away. Should’ve pretended not to know him. But something about the way he said my name — like it still meant something — made my heart falter.
"You remember me?" I asked quietly.
He laughed. “You’re not exactly forgettable.”
I rolled my eyes, trying not to melt.
He followed me for days after that. Left coffee by my locker. Showed up outside my lectures. Called me ‘coastal girl’ like it was still 2018. I ignored him. Played hard to get. I wasn’t the girl from the pier anymore — I was older, smarter. I’d heard the stories. I wasn’t going to be another name on his list.
No more late-night parties. No more other girls. Just the two of us — study dates in cafes, movie nights curled up on tiny dorm beds, Mornings with shared toothbrushes, notes in my pockets, his hand on my waist like I was something precious, laughter that made my stomach hurt. He held my hand like it meant something. Like I meant something.
After graduation, he proposed.
We went back to the beach where we first met. He knelt in the sand, holding a simple silver ring, his voice shaking. “You’re the only thing I’ve ever been sure about. Marry me.”
I said yes through tears.
And we got married a year later in a quiet ceremony with salty wind in our hair and the sun in our eyes. My heart felt full — like I’d been waiting my whole life for that moment. Sunghoon made breakfast when I was tired. He texted me “come home safely” after work. He held me in bed like the world might steal me away if he let go.
I wish I could stop the story there.
But life isn’t kind like that.
At first, it was everything we dreamed of. Slow mornings. Laughter in the kitchen. Him sneaking kisses when I was brushing my teeth. The way he’d whisper, “I’m so lucky,” against my skin.
It happened gradually — like a slow leak in a tire. You don’t notice at first, but one day the whole thing’s flat.
It started with missed dinners. Then long silences. He started staying out late. Stopped texting when he’d be home. His kisses became distracted. His “I love you”s felt obligatory — like he was saying it out of habit, not feeling.
I tried to ignore it. Made excuses. He’s tired. Work is hard. Everyone goes through phases, right?
But then came the late nights. The hushed phone calls. The cold, unreadable expressions.
I tried to hold on. I begged silently with every meal I cooked, every joke I told just to make him laugh like he used to. I told myself he was tired. Stressed. That it would pass.
Until I saw her name light up on his phone.
I didn’t confront him right away. I watched, waited, hoped I was wrong.
He didn’t deny it. Not when I finally asked.
“We’ve been... talking,” he says. “It’s nothing serious.”
“I married you, Sunghoon. Is that not serious?”
He looks away. My voice breaks. “Is that what I am to you?”
He doesn’t answer. He didn’t answer.
I stared at him, a lump rising in my throat. “Why?”
He looked at me like he didn’t know. Or maybe he just didn’t care enough to explain. “I don’t know. I got scared. Everything started feeling so… permanent.”
I felt like I was falling down an elevator shaft.
“We are permanent, Sunghoon,” I said. “We’re married.”
“I didn’t think it’d feel like a cage.”
That hurt more than anything else. More than cheating. More than the silence. More than the damn perfume that lingered on his shirts.
“I thought I was your home,” I whispered.
“You are,” he said softly. “But I...” he had no answer.
He suggested an open marriage the next week.
“Maybe this could work if we’re just… honest with each other. No more hiding.”
I stared at him, completely shattered. “So you want to sleep with her. And come home to me?”
His voice was too calm. “I still love you. Just not… the same way. Maybe not in the way you want anymore.”
He comes home at 3 a.m. sometimes, the smell of her perfume still clinging to him. Doesn’t even try to hide it. The next morning, I find a bank transfer — always the same amount.
I stare at the notification, numb.
This is what I’m worth now?
I never asked for it. Never spent it. It just sat there, untouched guilt.
She showed up at a dinner party our mutual friend hosted. She recognized me instantly — the ring on my finger probably gave me away.
She smirked as she took a sip of wine. “He says he still loves you, you know.”
“But he texts me while you’re sleeping,” she added, leaning closer. “He says I make him feel alive.”
My hands shook around my glass.
“And every time he sees me, he wires you money like that’s enough to balance the guilt. So tell me, does it feel like love when he kisses you after he’s kissed me?”
I left before dessert. I didn’t cry until I got home.
The next morning, I printed the divorce papers.
When he got home, I left them on the kitchen table.
“I want a divorce,” I said.
He blinked like I’d spoken in another language. “What?”
He stares at me like he’s trying to read a language he once knew. But instead of fighting — instead of saying stay, please, we can fix this — he picks up a pen.
Like I’m not the girl he once kissed under the stars. The one he said forever to. The one he promised to find again.
I stared at him, heart burning.
“That’s it?” I asked. “You’re not even going to try?”
He looked at the door, then back at me. “Mina’s waiting.”
That’s the moment I knew I was alone. Had been for a long time.
We divorced a month later.
He didn’t call. Didn’t text.
I moved out. Left the apartment, the ring, the framed photo from our wedding day.
He kept everything. Or maybe he threw it all out — I’ll never know.
I saw a photo of them on social media a few weeks later. They were smiling. Sunghoon had his arm around her. He looked… happy.
Or at least, he didn’t look like someone who remembered the girl he once kissed under a pier. The girl he promised he’d never forget. And maybe that’s the part that hurts the most.
He wasn’t a villain. I wasn’t a saint. We were just two people who loved each other in different ways — and at the end, those ways weren’t enough.
I still wonder sometimes. Sometimes, late at night, I still wonder if he ever looks at the door and thinks of me the way I think of him — like something once golden, now rusted and forgotten.
Does he ever think about me?
Does he ever miss the girl who loved him before the world did? Who never asked him to be anyone but himself?
If he misses the girl who waited for him, even when she shouldn’t have.
But I’ll always remember him — not as the man who broke me, but as the boy who once held an umbrella over my head and made me believe in something soft and golden.
So if anyone ever asks me about Park Sunghoon, I’ll only say this: He was the one I once loved.
Sometimes, love doesn’t leave you with scars — it leaves you with silence.
A silence that says: I would’ve given you everything. But you asked for less.
And maybe that’s the saddest part of all.
⋆｡‧˚ʚ🍓ɞ˚‧｡⋆────୨ৎ────⋆｡‧˚ʚ🍓ɞ˚‧｡⋆
@mingzzang says;; i saw a reel and thought why not? i'm writing after a long long time. didn't proofread it but i hope it's okay
sending lots of love to you,
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