Trouble with the Curve

Chapter One | First Impressions

Ryan Jae

Life sometimes was just one ironic joke after another. First is my health-nut mother getting sick with cancer, then it was me getting injured in my first season back in Seoul, and now, here I was staring like an absolute creep at the woman I hadn't officially met yet but was due to be my bride.

My mother's words have been haunting me since I had met Lee Soojin at the hospital three weeks before, but now, the confirmation from Lee Soojin herself was just too much too ignore.

***

Three Weeks Earlier...

Physical therapy with my arm was excruciating. It wasn't the pain that bothered me, but the lack of performance and improvement. Everything had to go slow. Everything had to be at the doctor's pace despite my desire to hurry things along. 'Time is healing' and all that crap.

Time doesn't heal crap. Just ask my mother.

"You're making significant progress for an injury of this magnitude," Doctor Bu says as he reviews my charts.

"Can I take the sling off yet?" I ask, looking down at the uncomfortable white bandages wrapped around my shoulders and back.

"Not yet."

I conceal a groan and look down at my feet, huffing my annoyance as I stare at my feet.

Once considered a 'sickening optimist' by my teammate Kang Il, I was now starting to understand why he had such a grumpy outlook on life. Or the outlook he had before his now-fiancé, Tae Men, had returned into his life.

"How much longer? I'm getting married in a few weeks and would love to not look like a medical test subject then," I say blandly, hopeful that the doc will have a touch of sympathy for my upcoming nuptials.

He doesn't need to know it's for my mother's sake, not pleasure after all. Marrying into Lee Industries is my father's choice, not mine.

"Three weeks, I'd say. Two at the minimum."

"That's at least a timeline," I sigh, trying to look at the bright side of the matter.

"Your bride won't be too worried about the injury if she loves you enough anyways," the doctor's joke and resulting chortle makes me flash a cringey smile, but I don't say anything else on the matter.

"Well, that's all for today. Are you going to see your mother?"

I nod, thinking about the absolute saint of a woman who was staying in the same hospital I was getting my rehabilitation done through. Unfortunately for her, she didn't get to escape the cold, sterile building after each session, but instead was confined to a hospital bed due to the cancer eating away at her body.

Cancer is the personification of the devil.

"Yeah, I wasn't sure I'd be able to make it today as she usually likes to take a nap right about now, but she sent me a guilt-ridden message saying she was going to drink her weight in energy drinks if it meant she got to see me today, so I promised her I'd come up once I was done with you."

"I won't keep you any longer; say hi to her for me," he hands me my exit paperwork and I practically run from the room, eager to get out of the hospital as quickly as possible.

I text Eomeoni that I'm on my way to her room and she redirects me to the Children's wing where she was apparently visiting her 'little friend.'

Eomeoni could find a friend in a paper bag, I swear.

I stop by the nurse's station and ask for directions to see San Mirae. The nurse bats her eyes at me and giggles as our hands brush across one another's when she hands me a mask to enter the children's ward. Thankful for the mask to hide my wince, I quickly leave the gawking nurse behind and go to Room 3003 where I hear my mother's booming laughter coming from. Giggles from a young girl echo her laughs and a sincere smile touches my lips at the sound of the two girls laughing together.