She always used to pick a bad hand. Her dad was hard-working but struggled to make ends meet. Gigi always felt sad—and guilty—for him.
Catch up: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11
In their tiny neighborhood, people talked about her and her dad just to pass the time.
She was the poor kid whose mom ran away, and their whispers hurt even more because she was going through puberty, already fragile and unsure of herself.
One rainy day, Gigi followed her dad and witnessed her mom with the man she’d left them for, playing the loving couple as they entered their house.
Her dad stood in the rain, getting soaked, watching from a distance. Gigi’s umbrella slipped from her hand and hit the ground in shock.
To keep going, she had to accept that this was just her life—one of the awful ones. There was no reason she shouldn’t be unlucky.
That was when she met Sue.
When everything is bad, anything good feels like salvation. Gigi was desperate for a hand reaching out—too desperate to check whether it was solid ground or a swamp.
But with her second chance, she was determined not to repeat the same mistake. She would fight, grow, and become happier than anyone else.
It was finally her turn to pick a good hand.
She believed she’d chosen right.
When the past knocks anyway
“I called to talk, but you wouldn’t pick up,” Arya says to Jay.
She’d planned to leave, but he might keep dodging her calls. So she waited.
Jay turns to Gigi, ready to explain. But Gigi’s hand slips from his grasp as she keeps staring at Arya.
She was wrong.
She only ever picks bad hands.
Dazed, Gigi leaves Jay with Arya and heads up to her unit. A call from Helen stops her—Mrs. Y has stomach cancer. Helen found out after reaching out when Gigi didn’t show up to the wedding.
Gigi collapses to her knees.
This is why life is hard. The future is a mystery.
While Gigi struggles to accept the path fate has chosen, Arya is weaving her own. She visits Jay’s grandfather, playing the role of the dutiful, kind-hearted child. She doesn’t love Jay—not really—but she hates sharing what she considers hers.
Seeing photos of him with another woman was enough to ignite her pride.
Borrowed time and borrowed strength
“You bought a car just to take me to the hospital,” Mrs. Y says gently. “How long has it been since you last drove?”
The test results aren’t good. The doctor’s schedule is full. Still, medicine has improved, so…
“I hate this,” Mrs. Y says, wiping away tears. “I get weak when I’m with you. I can endure it alone.”
Gigi pulls the car over.
“That’s why I stay with you. You can’t be mentally healthy while you’re in pain. Cry. Don’t hold it in. Cry in my arms.”
She knows what she’s saying.
But guilt gnaws at her. The cancer was supposed to be hers. Why did it go to Mrs. Y instead? And if so, why didn’t this end Mino’s marriage?
Back at work, another disaster unfolds: all the chefs cancel their contracts. Helen suspects Mr. K is spreading rumors and using his connections, growing increasingly erratic since Mrs. Y’s absences.
Jay asks to speak with Gigi in private.
“It’s not the time for me to be angry, but you won’t hear me out, and you made me call you like this at work,” Jay starts.
“Sorry, I needed time to sort my thoughts. I was confused,” Gigi replies. “I was given another chance, and I thought I just had to get Mino and Sue to marry. While I was doing it, you were like a gift to me.”
Jay holds her troubled gaze before looking down. “Did you ever hear that I was married? It gets sorted out in a few years anyway, I just sped up the process. Arya’s a family friend, I’ve known her since we were young, and thought I could marry her without any feelings.” But that wasn’t the case, so he ended things with her.
Can he marry someone without any feelings? Then again, there are marriages like that.
“To be honest, I didn’t know how I felt about you before your funeral. So I ended it when I got back, that’s all,” Jay tries to clarify.
Gigi wants to believe him, but everything he says only rings as an excuse to her ears. She’s not trying to blame him; she just realized she dreamed of something too happy.
“At the lake, you told me that having a family was a good thing. I wanted to start a family,” Jay tells her earnestly. He’s scared he’s losing her with every pained gaze she throws his way.
“My mom left home when I was fourteen because she found love. She endured for fourteen years because of me, but no matter how long you endure, those left behind get hurt. No matter what the relationship is, once it’s started, I don’t think it’s right for one person to end it one-sidedly,” she says as she makes to leave, but Jay stops her.
Jay takes out a card and gives it to Gigi. He recruited a doctor who specializes in stomach cancer. “I spent half a year on this. She’ll receive surgery as soon as possible,” he assures.
Gigi slowly accepts it, for this is a special chance for Mrs. Y, one she wished she’d been given in her past life.
Women at war
“I hate clichés like this,” Arya says from across the bar. Gigi came to meet the other woman after getting a text from her.
“In life, there are times when you accidentally stab someone, but saying you didn’t know and will never do it again doesn’t cut it,” Arya informs Gigi.
It bothers her that Jay broke off their engagement for Gigi despite Gigi’s promise to have nothing to do with him now that she knows.
Gigi asks quietly, “What do you want me to do?” She likes Jay; she didn’t mean to, but she fell for him. However, after she found out about them, she ended things.
Arya laughs. Seven years with a boyfriend, yet she fell for her boss? Was it because he’s U&K’s successor?
Gigi denies it—but words fail her.
Arya pushes her wine glass off the table. It shatters, startling Gigi.
“What I hate most are people like you,” she says. “Self-righteous nobodies. You pretend you didn’t know he could change your life.”
Gigi fires back. “Do you think everyone’s like you? You think it was important to me that he was U&K’s successor? It didn’t matter to me at all because my life changed without him.”
Having had the last word, she leaves.
Fate adjusts its aim
That night, Jay finds the necklace he gave Gigi outside his door.
Gigi returned it, then allowed herself some time to wallow in misery until she reminded herself to get a grip.
If the cancer moved to Mrs. Y, what happens now? A vision of her tragic end plays in front of her eyes; it couldn’t possibly mean that’s also part of the other woman’s fate.
And what if fate has something to do with Sue’s husband not being Mino?
The next day, Mrs. Y texts Gigi that she went to see the doctor Jay had provided and was informed she’d be able to get in for surgery. Poor Mrs. Y doesn’t know how she got lucky, but the doctor had left one spot open.
Gigi’s knowing eyes snap on Jay, who also happens to look up at that time from across the distance of the office.
Yet Gigi can’t help but puzzle over the course of events. Even though Sue married Mino, she’s different from her. Will she let them walk over her as Gigi had?
And she’s kinda right—Sue isn’t going to let things slide.
“What do you mean? There’s no what?” a shocked Mino stutters as he sits in the bedroom at his parents’ house alone with Sue.
“I had a miscarriage,” Sue informs him, playing all sad and broken-hearted. It was time to bring her pregnancy charade to an end. “When you threw your phone at me, my stomach started to hurt. I was so scared and didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to disappoint your mom, so I couldn’t tell you.”
Hey, no one said she couldn’t put an end with flair.
Was he a bit sad? Yes, he shed a few tears. So did she—fake ones while looking at the ultrasound she’d purchased online.
But Mino remembers that during their honeymoon, she’d said she craved beef because of the baby. Hadn’t she lost the baby then? Sue looks up at him, damn his memory for things that aren’t important.
Didn’t he also say he owned a house when he didn’t? Mino looks at her, what?
Truths, bloodlines, and old wounds
It’s yet another late working night for Gigi, which she doesn’t honestly mind, for she’d rather do the work she enjoys rather than trying to change fate all the time.
That said, she can’t help but be grateful when Helen shows up with some chips and drinks for them to share. Her friend admits it was, in fact, her brother who sent her over, knowing that Gigi might need them.
“He’s been hesitant and walking on eggshells lately. Is it because of Arya?” Helen asks. She doesn’t want to pry, but it’s been bothering her that Arya’s been seeing her grandpa a lot lately.
“But Gigi, whether he called off the engagement for you or because he came to his senses, I’m totally in favor. To tell you the truth, he got engaged because of me.”
Her brother had told her he should make a family firm enough to stand on like land. Jay had no interest in dating; he just seemed emotionless and always suppressed his emotions like a robot. He’s so different lately; he wasn’t like this at all.
“Arya may seem normal, but she’s a total whack job!” Helen goes on to reveal how Arya had had a young woman who had worked with Jay (and had apparently liked him) beaten badly enough to warrant a hospital visit. Her excuse? She doesn’t like others touching what’s hers.
Gigi interrupts, that’s enough. She knows Jay’s a good person, and this is all her fault, so they need to stop talking about it.
“Gigi,” Helen reaches out across the table, “I’m not actually his real younger sister. My brother was hurt badly because of me and my mom, so he could never cheat on anyone”.
The choice between love and survival
Arya is spiteful enough to let the bastard who cheated on his girlfriend with her bestie (Mino) and the bitch who married her bestie’s boyfriend (Sue) know exactly who Jay is.
Sue is infuriated when she finally realizes what Gigi meant when she thanked her for “picking up her trash.”
Mino’s not any better—his inferiority complex is taking over. What does Jay have over him other than a rich and powerful family?
“Are you jealous right now?” Sue asks in a monotone. Is he jealous that Gigi dumped him?
It wasn’t just trash, though, but trash without any pride; stupid trash that’s in perpetual debt.
They need money to get out of the debts Mino put them in. Now that she knows Gigi’s connections, Sue needs to make her provide the money they need.
That same evening, Gigi gets a text from her mom asking to meet. And she accepted the invite for how odd a request from a woman who hasn’t seen her or cared for her after all these years.
“I know it’s in the past now, but I never liked your father much. I was young and struggling, and he liked me so much that I thought I could like him too. Everyone got married like that back then, so I didn’t like you either,” her mother confesses, though she seems to catch herself on the last part.
She did like her, how could she not after all, since she’s her kid. Anyways, she’s sorry, she was immature. She’d had Gigi when she wasn’t ready, but still she missed her so much.
“Then why didn’t you come to see me? Forget my dad, you could’ve come to see me,” Gigi asks.
He hadn’t let her. Doesn’t Gigi know how much her dad cared for her?
“I know he was a good father to you. He was sweet, but he was so stubborn, he wasn’t considerate.” It was hard for her, too; she was only able to come see her after she heard he’d passed. It took courage.
“My father tried his best to raise me. Of course, your absence was big for me, I was just an adolescent girl,” Gigi adds. That’s why she’d become attached to the wrong people and hadn’t known how to express herself when they bullied her.
Since her mom expresses regret for not raising her like a mother should raise a child, Gigi invites her to spend time together the next day. They can go shopping.
So, Gigi picks up her mom, and they start the day much like any other mother-daughter good time. They take pics at a photo booth, Gigi buys one expensive gift after another, then they finally end at a restaurant. Her mom is surrounded by shopping bags; she’s so happy and lucky to have a daughter like Gigi!
“Since you date a rich man, you know how to spend…” the woman’s voice drifts off, for she realizes her mistake.
Gigi laughs, she knew it. “Even when I went to a good college and joined a big company, you never called. If you’re talking about Jay, I’m not seeing him. We broke up,” she informs the woman, who can be nothing more than just the woman who gave birth to her, despite all her wishes, she could be a “mom.”
What? Why on earth did she break up with him? Is she lying to her now? Why did she do it?
“Why? Then why did you run away? I didn’t want to believe it.” Gigi looks with suppressed disgust and full disappointment at the woman sitting across from her.
If she knew everything, then what’s with all the bags of gifts?
“I wanted to try it once, a date with my mom. A loved daughter, a good daughter; a happy mother and daughter. I wanted to try it once,” Gigi looks at her, “Now that I have, have a safe trip back.” She gets up to leave when a hand on her arms stops her. Does she have money?
A good college and a good company, does she have money? “I’ll never come to you again. Do you think I wanted to? You should understand me! Who else would understand her mom?”
“I have no money. I have no mother either. I didn’t before, and I won’t in the future. You chose to live as a woman instead of a mother, so live the rest of your life that way quietly. Don’t be greedy,” and with that, Gigi leaves.
She heads to the Judo studio where Jay is getting his frustration out on the mat. She wants to see him; she misses him so much. But she can’t bring herself to.
Troubled and needing to talk to someone, Gigi visits her dad. She wants to use the gift he gave her well this time, but why’s the world so hard for her?
“I hurt someone precious to me again. I really wanted to do well this time, but what do I do? What do I do in this case?” Gigi cries by his grave. She’s sorry she’s such a fool; her sobs become inconsolable.
As she later dries her tears inside the car and drives off, another car follows her. After some distance, she approaches an intersection.
A parked truck is lurking in the dark at that same intersection. The driver receives a call, then starts the engine.
Stopped at the light, Gigi gasps as she realizes the oncoming truck that’s speeding up right in front of her is heading her way with no intention to stop.
Suddenly, the car that was following her passes on the next lane and makes its way between her and the oncoming truck. Breathless in fear, Gigi locks eyes with the driver of the car that’s coming right in the middle of the impact point.
It’s Jay.
Then the speeding truck hits him.
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