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chapter 1
“How is your body feeling?”
“……”
The doctor asked cautiously, looking at the man staring out the window where not a single ray of light could seep through.
“It doesn’t hurt anymore.”
His face was extremely frail, drained of color, and looked as if he could collapse at any moment. Yet, his voice remained remarkably calm.
“Mr. Frédéric, that is…”
“Yes, I know.”
He knew without being told. Who else could understand the state of his own body better than he himself?
Seeing the doctor unable to hide his solemnity, the man quietly gestured for him not to worry.
“How is my condition? Do you think I’ll make it through tomorrow?”
“……It’s hard to say for certain.”
The doctor’s inability to be sure meant that the end was near. No, the doctor probably already knew—he could see the death waiting before the man. Still, the man chose to respond in kind to the doctor’s concern and continued speaking softly.
“Doctor… I have many regrets in my life.”
“Regrets?”
“Well… there are so many I’m not sure I could even list them all.”
“That’s alright. Speak freely. Where else would the attending physician go with the patient right in front of him?”
He was a man of principle. Observing the doctor’s dedication, staying late to accompany a patient whose days were numbered, the man quietly began to speak.
“What I regret most is the way I’ve lived my life.”
A common regret of those facing death. The doctor, having witnessed many deaths before, had vaguely anticipated this. Yet he listened to the man’s words with utmost seriousness.
“I was born with a weak nature, made many mistakes, and let myself be swayed by the currents of life.”
If only he had been stronger, more confident. If he had lived like his close friend Franz, perhaps life could have been better.
“Yet you accomplished many things.”
“I think I lost more than I gained. Cough!”
The man, now closer to death than life, began to cough violently.
“Doctor…”
“Yes, Mr. Frédéric?”
“What happens when a person dies?”
“……I do not know. Perhaps no one truly does.”
“I see. Cough! Cough!!”
How could the living understand death? Frédéric wiped the blood escaping from his lips, thinking he had asked a pointless question.
And then it happened. The doctor quietly added a statement he hadn’t expected to continue:
“Even so, I believe. I firmly believe that a second chance will come, even after death.”
It wasn’t knowledge; it was belief. The doctor, who knew more than anyone, spoke with conviction.
“……That’s… a good answer.”
Through the window, once thought to be dark, the night sky embroidered with countless stars reflected in the man’s eyes.
Midnight, October 17, 1849. A night that would only be remembered by Poland’s great musician Frédéric François Chopin and his attending physician.
A headache. The light hurts his eyes.
Perhaps because death was so close, his thoughts refused to flow smoothly. Every attempt to focus was blocked by a splitting headache.
Chopin stirred his drowsy consciousness to lift himself up.
He felt so faint that he feared he might forget who he was. He looked around.
Through the blurred vision, he saw a room with a desk and chairs.
He had never been there before, yet it felt oddly familiar. Chopin strained his struggling mind to organize his thoughts.
“Where… am I?”
His last memory was of closing his eyes for a brief rest, watched over by acquaintances.
“And then… what happened after that?”
A sharp headache suddenly blocked his thoughts again. Struggling against it, Chopin managed to regain his balance.
[Rustle—]
A faint sound of paper rustling came from beneath his feet.
Sheet music scattered across the floor.
Seeing the disorderly sheets, Chopin instinctively turned around.
Where there is sheet music, there is always an instrument.
Sure enough, behind him was a piano.
A plain black upright piano.
Why did this unremarkable piano appear so vividly amidst the haze?
Before he even thought, his feet moved toward it.
Where he was, or what had happened to him, no longer mattered.
A single rising desire had erased all other thoughts.
He wanted to play the piano.
Leaning on that desire alone, Chopin staggered and sat before the piano.
Immediately, the headache that had plagued him vanished.
As if it had never existed.
“How long has it been since I last felt such peace?”
No one else in the room.
A cool breeze from outside the window.
Silence that did not disturb his ears.
It felt as though the last time he had truly enjoyed all this was a very long time ago.
Now, he felt he could play anything.
A dazzling aria, an intense ballad, a serene nocturne.
And a mournful chaconne.
Bach’s Chaconne, always a pillar in his life.
The unaccompanied violin sonatas, Partitas No. 2, and the piano arrangement of the D minor Ciaccona.
Pieces that had comforted him during the hardships of life.
The mournful D minor melody echoed.
The feel of the keys beneath his fingers sparked a melody.
A funeral march left by a great musician. Life itself captured in music.
The sorrowful melody gradually became resolute, expressing rage over what had been lost.
“What was lost…?”
Thoughts and memories intertwined.
-Don’t come back to me, Chopin.
-I’m sorry, Minwoo. This month’s wages are delayed… I guess I have to quit the piano academy.
Memories of himself and others tangled together.
A man lost his lover. A boy lost his dream.
Anger at what was lost.
The man resented himself for not holding on.
The boy resented himself for abandoning his dream.
Yet anger never lasts.
Time flows on, wearing it away.
Once shattered, all that remains is loss.
The softest pianissimo continues relentlessly.
-Still, we must do something, Frédéric.
-At least study, Minwoo.
Even amidst loss, life continues. People must move forward.
For happiness that will one day return.
Memories began to untangle and pass through his mind.
A life of fame but full of regrets.
A life hindered by harsh realities but with a long journey ahead.
Two sets of memories.
Frédéric Chopin’s life began with happiness but did not end so.
What about Song Minwoo’s life?
It began in misfortune, but the end is not yet known.
Could this boy’s life conclude with happiness?
As if answering the subconscious question, the fervent melody gradually calmed, as though playing happiness after hardship.
Though life was full of mistakes and regrets, one realization emerged:
No matter how much hardship exists now, no matter how much past life was full of mistakes and regret, compared to the entirety of life, it is just a fleeting moment.
Even eternal sorrow, anger, or happiness eventually dissipates. Time, and the passing years, carry them away.
Thus, this Chaconne teaches that no matter the present predicament, it too shall pass.
And eventually, happiness will come.
Even if sorrow reappears.
“I will not stop. I will move forward.”
A performance that began in sadness ended with a fervent vow.
Sweat streamed down his face.
Breath, roughened by intense emotion, shook the air.
Chopin quietly lifted his gaze from the piano keys, holding his trembling hands.
Reflected on the black piano surface, he saw no memory of himself.
Only a boy, familiar yet unfamiliar, stared back.
“…It wasn’t a dream.”
He had sensed it mid-performance, yet indeed, this was no dream.
The cool wind from beyond the window.
His heart beating, proving he was alive.
And memories, vivid despite belonging to others.
Everything was too real to be a dream.
-But still, I believe. A second chance will come, even after death.
The final words exchanged with the doctor brushed past Chopin’s ears.
“A second chance, huh…”
He wasn’t sure if this was truly a second chance granted by heaven.
But one thing was certain.
The story of Frédéric Chopin had not yet ended.
Chopin—Song Minwoo—looked down at his trembling hands.
Though he hadn’t played intensely, his fingers seemed to scream.
It wasn’t just his fingers.
Even the eardrums protested the chaotic music.
Fingers sometimes tangled mid-passage.
Strength control failed to distinguish between crescent and poco (poco) crescendos. Imperfections seemed endless.
Yet, possibilities were visible.
He glimpsed a chance to surpass even his former heights.
Song Minwoo clenched his trembling hands.
A faint star had begun to shine again.
