Chapter 223

Translator: Dreamscribe

Gyeo-ul slowly placed her hands on the keys.

Da da-dan dan-

Chopin's Nocturne No. 20 in C-sharp minor. [TL Note: Give it a listen: https://youtu.be/DqpPRj6UZqc?si=Aep6d5ivGuavvOoe]

A sorrowful melody in a minor key echoed through the hall.

Gyeo-ul had first played this piece when she was around eleven years old.

Her music teacher handed her the score and said,

“It's basically an easy piece. If it's you, Gyeo-ul, you could have it ready for the stage within a month.”

But things did not turn out as she had hoped.

Of course, her performance was flawless. She did not miss a single note, and her timing was precise. Her teacher even applauded and praised her.

“Well played! Perfect!”

But she knew.

Her performance had not captured any of the emotion Chopin had wanted to convey.

Much later, when she told Seon-hwa about it, Seon-hwa laughed and said,

“You figured that out already? Nocturne No. 20. It's a difficult piece. Some people might spend their whole lives trying and still never express it properly, while others might be able to play it well from the very beginning.”

Gyeo-ul could not understand.

The left hand repeated simple chords while the right laid a lyrical melody over them. It was easy enough that even an elementary school student could memorize it within a month.

So why was she unable to properly play a piece with such a simple structure?

Her competitive spirit flared up.

For the first time, she went to the library and searched for books about Chopin.

1830.

The year Chopin turned twenty.

The prevailing theory was that Nocturne No. 20 had been written on the night before he left Warsaw for Paris.

「Posthumous work. Chopin never published this piece during his lifetime.」

Her hand stopped turning the page.

‘Why?’

Chopin was not a prolific composer.

He was the kind of person who would revise a single piece dozens of times, pouring his heart and soul into it. Yet he had placed this completed work inside a drawer and hidden it for the rest of his life.

‘Did he not like the piece?’

That probably was not it.

Even though it was discovered and published only after his death, its quality was high enough for it to become one of his representative works.

The piece had no separate title. Chopin had never given it one.

Instead, when it was published, the performance direction ‘Lento con gran espressione’, meaning ‘slowly, but with deep expression’, came to be used like a title for convenience.

Whenever Gyeo-ul saw instructions like that on sheet music, she had simply focused on playing sadly, almost as though whispering. But perhaps there was a deeper meaning behind it that she did not yet understand.

One day, Seon-hwa saw Gyeo-ul playing Nocturne No. 20 in the practice room and burst out laughing.

“Gyeo-ul, what's with that face? You look hilarious!”

She had been trying to capture a sense of deep emotion, but the attempt had failed.

To Seon-hwa, Gyeo-ul furrowing her brows and putting on such a serious expression only made her look as cute as a seven-year-old.

“That's mean!”

Gyeo-ul pouted.

Seon-hwa gently stroked her hair and said,

“Gyeo-ul, even a master like Vladimir Horowitz hardly ever played Beethoven's late sonatas. Do you think he lacked technique? Of course not. There are simply some pieces that don't suit the life a performer has lived.”

Seon-hwa had wondered whether Gyeo-ul might go her entire life without ever being able to properly play Nocturne No. 20.

But when she met her again a year later, Gyeo-ul was playing the piece well enough to be quite listenable. It was not exceptional yet, but the emotion and tone had grown far deeper than before.

When Seon-hwa pressed her about what had happened, Gyeo-ul said that a close friend had left for America.

And today was the first time she was performing Nocturne No. 20 in a formal public setting.

Seon-hwa closed her eyes and surrendered herself to the music Gyeo-ul created.

‘Wonderful.’

Although she knew Gyeo-ul had struggled with the piece, she had never offered her any advice. Perhaps some part of her had even thought it might be better if Gyeo-ul could not play it.

The emotion Chopin had placed within this piece was loss.

November 1830.

Twenty-year-old Chopin wrote this piece on the night before he boarded a carriage.

From his window, he must have been able to see the streets of Warsaw that he loved. The familiar scenery, the language, and even the air. He was setting out for Paris in hopes of succeeding as a musician.

But whenever Seon-hwa, who held a master's degree in music history, listened to this piece, the same thought always came to mind.

Had he truly not known?

That perhaps he might never return for the rest of his life.

He left the sheet music with his older sister Ludwika, along with a short note.

「For practice before studying the second concerto.」

Was it not strange to call such heartrending music a practice piece?

Perhaps he simply could not bring himself to write the real reason. What he truly wanted to say might have been something like this.

‘Play this piece while I'm gone. My heart will still be here.’

Poland had long been under Russian rule.

The air of uprising filled every street. As an intelligent young man, he must surely have known what would become of the city after he left.

His premonition was not wrong. Not long after his departure, a massive uprising broke out. And inevitably, the Russian army mercilessly trampled Poland beneath its military boots. Countless people died, and the city was ravaged.

In a letter, he wrote,

‘I dreamed of the Vistula River. I miss the smell of the soil back home. I want to hear people singing in Polish.’

And Chopin eventually died in Paris at the age of thirty-nine.

He left behind a final wish. Even if his body could not return, he asked that at least his heart be buried in Polish soil. The sister who had received the piece carried out his final wish.

Ludwika removed his heart, placed it in a jar filled with cognac, and carried it back to their homeland.

So it was only natural that Gyeo-ul had once been unable to understand the feelings Chopin had poured into this piece.

What it meant to lose one's beloved homeland and family.

But now she had completely internalized the piece through emotions of her own. Every key she pressed carried an almost icy ache of loss.

‘What on earth had she gone through?’

Seon-hwa had been worried when Gyeo-ul suddenly said she wanted to change the piece the day before, but she had never expected to hear a performance like this.

Gyeo-ul was completely immersed in the music.

‘I think I finally understand.’

What Chopin must have felt when he wrote this piece.

That night, as she ran to the hospital, the terror that she might lose Seo-ha had nearly driven her out of her mind.

Perhaps some part of her had always sensed that a day like this might come. She had always been on edge, afraid that he might suddenly disappear.

She still had words she had not told him.

That day's experience had awakened the artistic soul within Gyeo-ul.

A piece that was neither difficult nor flashy.

Yet the audience felt a raging storm of emotion.

A middle-aged woman seated at the far end of the third floor took a handkerchief from her bag.

An idol group member who knew nothing about classical music uncrossed their arms and listened with an expression of complete absorption.

The feelings she had never spoken aloud.

Gyeo-ul poured her desperate sincerity into the music.

That she had liked him from the very first day they met.

That although her teacher had said she could take the math test using middle school-level problems, she had refused because she loved the time she spent learning from him.

That even after he left for America, she had gone to the music room every single day and sat in front of the piano for a long time before leaving.

‘During that short time I spent running to the hospital, I regretted it hundreds of times.’

Why had she never once told him honestly?

That just by being there, he made her happy.

So.

Yu Seo-ha.

‘Please, don't leave. Stay by my side.’

Ding-

The final note rang out.

Gyeo-ul held the pedal down longer than usual. The resonance spread throughout the hall. Like a wave, it rolled outward and washed over every corner of the audience.

The audience was swept up in the overwhelming weight of emotion she poured forth, unable even to breathe properly. Each of them recalled their own ‘Warsaw’, something they had buried deep within their hearts.

Gyeo-ul slowly lifted her hands from the keys.

Someone began applauding first, breaking the silence that seemed to have frozen time itself. Soon, thunderous cheers echoed through the hall.

Clap clap clap!

Waaaaah-

So-heon applauded and glanced to the side. Tae-jun's face was a mess from how much he had cried.

She teased him.

“Tsk, tsk! Think you can even write a proper article like that?”

“...Don't worry. I'll find some way to convey this emotion to the readers. That saying about how audiences don't come to hear technique. I finally understand exactly what it means.”

Only the first piece had ended, yet the cheers showed no sign of dying down.

So-heon thought that perhaps today's recital might go down in history as legendary.

The second piece was Schubert's Serenade.

It was the piece Gyeo-ul had been playing in the music room when Seo-ha first came looking for her.

Debussy's Clair de Lune, Liszt's Consolation, Handel's Passacaglia....

Except for the first piece, that day's program was Seo-ha's Stabilization Session itself, composed of the pieces Gyeo-ul had played for him all this time.

Gyeo-ul played each piece with all her heart, wishing desperately for him to find peace.

Thump, thump.

She could feel Seo-ha's heartbeat.

The rhythm was a little jumbled, as though he were flustered. Yet Gyeo-ul found comfort in it, because his heart was beating strongly and healthily without any sign of pain.

She was certain now.

At times, it was so difficult for his soul and mind to maintain their balance that it became dangerous. Gyeo-ul was grateful that her piano was the one refuge where his soul could truly rest.

She poured an earnest wish into every fingertip that pressed the keys.

His condition probably would not improve. Even today, it had been painfully obvious how much he was struggling. If that was the case, then at the very least, she wished she could share the weight of his burden.

Because they were connected.

The performance ended.

Amid the cheers filling the hall, Gyeo-ul's father, seated in the front row, applauded more enthusiastically than anyone else with a deeply satisfied expression.

‘I'm proud of you, my daughter! You've grown into an artist capable of moving so many people.’

His eyes reddened.

Then his gaze suddenly shifted to the side. It was a seat that had been bothering him for some time.

A young man in a tuxedo.

He had not looked bad in hospital clothes and slippers either, but today he had come properly dressed.

‘Hmph! Looks like that brat's parents must have done plenty of good deeds in a past life too.’

He raised his head.

After getting a clear look at Seo-ha's face, his expression turned puzzled. But soon his face crumpled into a scowl.

“You little punk?”

Seo-ha's face was as red as a carrot.

He was even squirming awkwardly in his seat, reacting like a middle school boy who had just received a confession from his crush.

The applause went on without end.

Gyeo-ul needed to greet the audience.

But she could not rise from her seat. The emotions that had swelled inside her throughout the recital had finally become impossible to contain.

Thump, thump.

Whose heartbeat was this?

She tried to hold it in, but as though a dam had burst, the emotions that had nowhere else to go flooded over her.

She stood.

“Han Gyeo-ul is the best!”

“Brava!”

Snapping back to her senses, she bowed deeply to the audience.

The cheers grew even louder.

Her gaze turned toward Seo-ha. And the moment she saw his face, Gyeo-ul knew instinctively.

‘It reached him!’

She could not hold back any longer.

Gyeo-ul gathered up the hem of her dress and stepped down from the stage. A brief gasp swept through the audience, but there was only one person in her eyes.

Gyeo-ul walked straight toward him without hesitation.

Neither her father's dumbfounded expression nor the exitement and cheers pouring from thousands of spectators could stop her.

Gyeo-ul stopped in front of Seo-ha.

A sense of expectation and tension, as though something were about to happen. By then, every member of the audience was silently watching them.

“Your answer?”

Seo-ha stammered with a flustered expression.

“I.. I...”

The reason he had remained indecisive until now.

It was because he feared his problems might make the people around him unhappy. But Gyeo-ul shook her head with an expression that said she understood everything.

“It's okay. No matter what happens from now on.”

That inexplicable confidence Gyeo-ul radiated.

Yet it somehow reassured Seo-ha, and before he even realized it, he found himself nodding.

“Yeah.”

Gyeo-ul smiled brightly, as though this proved her point.

Then she took one more step forward and wrapped her arms tightly around Seo-ha.

‘Is this really okay?’

A celebrated performer's Homecoming Recital.

An audience holding its breath.

Seo-ha raised his trembling hands and carefully wrapped them around her back.

Thump, thump.

Their two heartbeats merged into one.

Gyeo-ul buried her face against his shoulder and closed her eyes.

Click!

Click!

Camera shutters went off from every direction.

Fweeeet-

A whistle sounded from somewhere in the audience.

And as if that had been the signal, a roar even louder than the one during the performance swallowed the hall.

*****

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