Sponsorship Stigma
Chapter 10
Chapter 10
Shattered Peace
Looking into the child’s earnest gaze sent a pang through Yeonjae’s heart.
Jiwoo had asked about the piano, but it was a topic deeply entwined with Jeheon.
She had always known she would have to tell him someday, but she hadn’t expected that day to be today.
How was she supposed to explain it?
Yeonjae struggled to find an answer, her lips parting and closing repeatedly.
“It’s not that I hate it… It’s just hard for Mommy to play the piano now.”
The sudden bouts of paralysis that overtook her whenever she played.
Even the hospital had said there was no clear physical cause, diagnosing it simply as a symptom of PTSD.
“Because it hurts my heart whenever I look at the keys.”
She had gotten much better, but she still trembled whenever she sat before a piano.
It was the lingering anxiety that the symptoms might strike without warning.
Therefore, the work of a pianist—which required such delicate mastery over every single note—was no longer possible.
Yet this was far too heavy a story to share with Jiwoo.
There was still so much the child didn’t know.
Who his father was, and what kind of life Yeonjae had lived.
Because Yeonjae wanted to show and teach him only beautiful things, she wanted to leave the past buried in the past for as long as possible.
“But, Mommy, you play the piano, don’t you?”
Staring at her intently, Jiwoo tilted his head.
He was talking about her part-time accompaniment work.
“Mommy just means it’s hard to play the kind of wonderful music you’re thinking of.”
The innocent look in the child’s eyes weighed heavily on Yeonjae’s heart.
Even after more than five years, speaking of the piano still brought an ache to her chest.
The piano she had once loved so dearly had now become a source of pain.
A bitter look shadowed Yeonjae’s eyes.
“The way Mommy plays now isn’t… wonderful anymore.”
Her voice spilled out, thick and damp with emotion.
She swallowed back the words that it was merely to make a living.
Jiwoo’s eyes darted back and forth.
His gaze wavered as if he were turning over Yeonjae’s incomprehensible words in his mind.
After several seconds of silence, the boy nodded vigorously.
“Then you don’t hate the piano?”
A fleeting thought passed through Yeonjae’s eyes.
It was a difficult question.
It was a painful presence in her life precisely because she had to strip away as much love as she had once held for it.
It was impossible to define clearly; she stood right on the razor-thin border between love and resentment.
At the child’s probing look, Yeonjae gave a small nod.
As if that were the very answer he had hoped for, Jiwoo’s face brightened noticeably.
“Then……”
As if trying to broach something difficult, Jiwoo squirmed and twisted his little body.
Then, he gently swung their clasped hands back and forth.
“Can Jiwoo play?”
“The piano?”
The boy nodded emphatically.
His eyes sparkled with pure anticipation.
Looking at the child brimming with hope, Yeonjae found it difficult to speak.
In truth, she had known for a while that Jiwoo was walking on eggshells around her.
Back when the days he played the beat-up piano in the master bedroom had grown frequent.
One day, Yeonjae had broken down and cried, unable to hold back her tears.
Because it felt like looking at her younger self.
“Mom, why can’t I learn? I’m better than the other kids. Kids who aren’t even as good as me go to academies. Why do I always have to hold back what I want to do?”
“Yeonjae-ya, do you know how expensive piano lessons are……?”
“Academy tuition isn’t that much! Why do you always say no to everything? I want to do it too!”
Even without knowing classical music, her mother must have realized that a prodigy like Yeonjae wouldn’t stop at just a neighborhood academy.
Now, Yeonjae finally understood her mother’s heart—how it broke to want to support her child with the piano, yet be unable to do so.
Her younger self had found that reality too difficult to accept.
And in the end, catching Myeonghee’s eye, she had entered the Foundation to play the piano.
She saw her past self reflected in Jiwoo.
As they say, no parent can ever win against their child.
Heartbroken that history might repeat itself, she had clung to Jiwoo and wept that day.
Ever since, the child had never touched the piano at home.
She had wanted to believe he simply lost interest. She had never imagined he thought she hated the piano.
Yeonjae’s chest tightened painfully.
What should she say? How could she explain it so her precious child wouldn’t be hurt?
“The piano at home is a mess. You can’t play properly on that one, Jiwoo-ya.”
After searching for words for a long time, Yeonjae’s lips finally parted.
“It’s too old to fix. And buying a new one is a bit too much of a burden for us right now.”
While it was true, it was also true that she had deliberately left it unrepaired.
She hadn’t wanted to torment the child with false hope.
Watching Yeonjae explain gently, Jiwoo shook his head.
“We don’t need a piano!”
Then, he gave an untainted, innocent smile.
“Mister said he’d teach me the piano. Mommy, he said it doesn’t cost any money. He said there are super expensive pianos there, and that I can play as much as I want.”
As the boy chattered on, Yeonjae’s mouth went bone-dry.
His excited voice and sparkling eyes pierced straight through her heart.
“Can Jiwoo learn the piano?”
How strikingly he resembled Jeheon today.
And the word ‘free’ slipping from the child’s lips felt particularly chilling.
Seeing that Jiwoo had fallen asleep, Yeonjae switched off the nightlight by the bed.
Stepping quietly into the living room so as not to wake the child, Yeonjae sat at the table.
The living room, which had been filled with noise until just moments ago, was dead silent.
After eating pizza, the boy had chattered late into the night, recounting everything that had happened today.
‘Mommy, that handsome mister said he’s a super important person.’
‘He said we can move to a bigger house.’
Only when Yeonjae saw that it was past ten and told him it was time for bed did Jiwoo finally quiet down.
He was naturally a bright child, but today he had been unusually animated.
It was probably because of the hope that he might be able to play the piano.
“Do you really love the piano that much?”
Genetics were a frightening thing; that bulldozer-like determination was the spitting image of Yeonjae.
A bitter smile touched Yeonjae’s lips.
She lifted her eyes and slowly scanned the apartment.
The one-bedroom unit with a small living room was dreadfully cramped.
While Jiwoo still liked sleeping beside his mother, they couldn’t live here forever.
She had been saving money so they could move to a larger home by the time the child entered elementary school.
With savings already stretching them thin, a piano was a distant dream.
People around her urged her to at least send Jiwoo to a neighborhood piano academy, but Yeonjae knew better than anyone.
Jiwoo wasn’t at a level that would stop at a simple academy.
If he learned at an academy, he would enter competitions; if he entered competitions, he would crave private masterclasses.
Then, he would naturally set his sights on majoring in music.
The future was all too clear: he would say he could learn at the Foundation, that he would play even if it meant taking sponsorship. Just as Yeonjae had done.
And if she had been an ordinary person, if she hadn’t experienced the Foundation firsthand, things would have been different.
She would have readily welcomed it, considering it an incredible opportunity that had found its way to Jiwoo.
Yeonjae let out a long, heavy sigh.
Lowering her gaze, her eyes caught the dark brown document envelope resting on a corner of the table.
Picking up the envelope, Yeonjae considered throwing it straight into the trash, then set it back down.
Even without opening it, she could vividly picture what was inside.
Leaning back against the chair as if collapsing into it, she closed her eyes.
Rushing around to work before Jiwoo got out of class, then picking him up when Kindergarten ended.
Coming home, chatting warmly with her child, and falling asleep—that was Yeonjae’s sole happiness.
It was a tranquility she had barely managed to reclaim.
It had taken five years to reach this point. Yet the moment she came face-to-face with that man, it had all crumbled, rendering those five years utterly meaningless.
At the sudden image of Jeheon rising before her eyes, Yeonjae’s eyelashes trembled.
The man who had coldly driven her away, only to reappear as if nothing had happened and speak of sponsorship. Where on earth was there a father who became his own son’s sponsor?
Yeonjae’s face contorted in agony as she swallowed back the words she could never speak aloud.
Now that the tension that had driven her all day had receded, a flood of thoughts rushed in.
Towering above all those endless worries was the existence of Jiwoo.
Right now, the most precious thing in the world to Yeonjae was her son.
Her precious Jiwoo, the apple of her eye.
Entering the Foundation meant catching Myeonghee’s eye.
If that happened, it would only be a matter of time before Jiwoo’s existence was exposed.
The sudden mental image of Myeonghee sent a chill of goosebumps across Yeonjae’s skin.
“Not the Foundation…… never.”
Myeonghee loathed her with a vengeance.
If she discovered that Yeonjae was the one who had given birth to her grandchild—perhaps her only grandchild—it was all too obvious what would happen.
Jeheon had no memories. Could a man who despised her really protect Jiwoo, a child who had suddenly appeared out of thin air?
And above all else, Jeheon already had a partner.
Whenever she grew curious about him, she had looked him up from time to time.
That was how she had stumbled upon the news of his engagement. Since she had seen that report years ago, it must have come to fruition by now.
This connection had to pass by just like this.
For everyone’s sake.
Her fluttering eyelashes slowly lifted, revealing Yeonjae’s brown eyes.
Yeonjae was just about to toss the envelope in her hand straight into the trash can.
Right then, the sound of a vibration sliced through the silence.
She stared down at the brightly glowing screen of her phone.
Though it was an unsaved number, Yeonjae recognized it at a single glance.
