Father (2)
Today, for some reason, Suho was in a poor mood.
Lately his days with Gaon had been a source of quiet joy, but tonight's dinner with his father felt inexplicably like sitting on a bed of nails. It wasn't that he minded seeing his father. It wasn't that his time with Gaon had stopped being pleasant, either. It was this table — this exact arrangement of people — that made him squirm inside.
She's beautiful even when she smiles.
Even allowing for the signature traits of ASCS — the sex change, the younger body, the looks that conformed to every conventional standard of beauty — the smile Gaon wore as she chatted brightly with Sang-kwon was genuinely lovely. He hadn't come to love her because she was like this, and yet the longer he watched her, the deeper he found himself falling.
Suho had felt it was too much to ask the visibly exhausted Gaon to cook dinner. He'd arranged this meal with his father precisely to spare her, worn out as she'd looked after her broadcast — and now he regretted it. He kept telling himself it was all for the best, that his father would only have been eating alone otherwise, but however many times he turned it over, his mood refused to brighten.
For a first meeting, the two of them had chemistry to spare. He didn't like how his father seemed to keep planting strange ideas in Gaon's ear, one after another. He hated how the man acted as if intent on shattering the plan he'd been so patiently building — to take his time and slowly, steadily win Gaon's heart.
Anyone watching would think Father and Gaon were already father and daughter.
Gaon chattered away at his father like a little girl with her dad, and Suho, thinking she looked for all the world like an innocent child, spoke to her as she spooned up the ice cream that had arrived for dessert.
"Noona. Since when have you been such a people person?"
It was the polar opposite of Gaon's usual self — the woman who dodged conversation with people and wouldn't even agree to face-to-face meetings for work. Perhaps because, without her even noticing, so many people had been showering her with attention and affectionate responses, she simply wasn't who she used to be.
"What? Isn't it a good thing that I get along with your father?"
She said it as though she truly had no idea what he was getting at, and with his head beginning to throb, Suho found himself at a loss for words. He had never anticipated the interest and affection his father would take to Gaon. The real culprit was that he'd forgotten her command of language — the exquisite prose that had once stolen his own heart.
If I'd seen this coming, I'd have just suggested the two of us eat out.
Suho knew Yeji's daily life well — forever crushed under her workload — and he could picture her state without even checking. Tomorrow was her day off, so by now she'd be dead to the world, sleeping deeply enough that someone could have carried her off without her noticing for hours. On nights like that, his father would sit here alone, quietly drinking the evening away.
"Father, has Suho always been this short on charm, even as a child?"
"Of course. Consider him much improved, these days."
Gaon glanced at Sang-kwon's empty glass, then lifted the teapot to refill it. Watching her, Suho felt his headache worsen — it was a lovely picture, and that was exactly the problem. He had never imagined that his father and a worn-out Gaon together would produce synergy beyond anything he'd expected, and in the end he gave up on the idea of separating them.
What on earth are the two of them even talking about?
There was a honeyed softness in Gaon's voice each time she called his father "Father." And it was also the first time in his life he'd ever heard his father's voice pour out affection like that — so unlike the desolate tone with which the man always called his son's name. He had no wish to spoil such a lovely picture.
Watching Noona call him "Father" makes me feel strange.
Suho — who had just caught himself wondering whether she might someday call the man Father-in-law — seized on a lull in the conversation to chide the two of them.
"I had no idea the two of you would get along this well."
He himself was still being treated like a child who knew nothing — nowhere near even becoming her lover — so for the life of him he couldn't understand why his own father looked so chummy with her.
"What, Suho? Are you jealous right now?"
"That's right. Does it make you jealous, seeing how close your father and I are?"
His father teased him, as he always did. And Gaon — who could once be swayed by the smallest push — was now soaring around like Lü Bu astride his legendary Red Hare. Baffled by the sudden reversal, Suho whipped his head around and stared straight into her eyes. The moment their gazes met, hers wavered.
Cute.
Her mind was surely shifting along with her body. He knew, because he'd been through it himself. This was, without question, the stretch of time when a person's heart wobbled most.
"Noona, I'll see you at home later."
"Wh-what?"
Only now, seeing the Suho she knew, did Gaon freeze mid-breath and stammer. His expression was anything but ordinary. He was wearing the very same devil's smile he'd had when he'd confronted her with that contract, and staring up at it, Gaon felt cold sweat trickling down her spine.
Sang-kwon's eyes flicked back and forth between their faces, and he spoke as though coming to Gaon's rescue.
"Miss Gaon, I'm entrusting our boy to your care. He may not look it, but he's been through a great deal. He carries a lot of scars. He's a child with a tender heart."
"Father, don't say things like that."
"Ah… yes. I'll do my best."
A tender heart? Him?
Gaon snorted inwardly, but she couldn't argue with Sang-kwon's interjection, which had cut Suho off as though to save her. Watching the man bow his head so deeply to her — courteous as a parent at a school open-house day — Gaon lowered her own head in return.
After a little more talk, Suho stole a glance at Gaon, her dessert now finished, and addressed his father.
"We'll be heading home now. What about you, Father?"
"I should be going home myself."
"Then I'll see you next time, Father."
"Yes. Head on home, now."
For all our talk of meeting "next time," we made our way down to the first floor together. After seeing off Suho's father — who departed first with the driver who'd brought the car around — I walked Suho home, and the moment we stepped through the door, I flung myself onto the sofa.
"Oof. I'm beat."
Sofas really are meant to be plush. That's the whole point of them.
The sofa at Suho's place seemed never to have known a person's touch, bearing nothing but the wear of the years. I'd lived alone and never bothered keeping one, and wanting, after so long, to feel that particular comfort only a sofa can give, I'd told Suho we should simply have the leather redone.
My eyes had drifted shut of their own accord at the softness, and I was doing nothing but groaning in contentment when Suho said, flatly:
"What's this? Weren't you flitting about so merrily earlier?"
I opened my eyes at that. The sour look on his face made me flinch, but I answered as though nothing were wrong.
"Nothing. It's just — meeting people after so long takes it out of me."
It was a lie. It wasn't meeting people that exhausted me. Meeting Yeji, or anyone else, had never fazed me. But today's time with that man had tired me more than I'd bargained for. Whether it was the title — chairman of the Mirae Group — or simply that he was Suho's father, I couldn't say. One thing was certain: I'd found him intimidating.
Either way, an exhausting man.
"Oh, really?"
The dinner had felt like one of those formal meet-the-parents scenes I'd watched in comics and dramas back in my writing days, hoarding reference material. And that remark about wishing I'd become his daughter-in-law was, for all practical purposes…
Does he think we're in a romantic relationship?
Yeji and Suho knew the truth, but everyone else seemed to take me for nothing more than his fiancée. At the very least, the word would have made the rounds at Suho's company, and there was no way Lee Sang-kwon — both the father and the group's chairman — could have missed it.
"Yeah. It wore me out."
The expression on Suho's face as he looked down at me, sprawled where I lay, began to ease. Whatever had displeased him seemed to dissolve; before I knew it, he was gazing down at me with his usual unhurried calm.
What's with him?
I didn't care for whatever he was scheming behind that look, but it beat being glared at.
"What?"
"Noona, go brush your teeth."
"Ugh. Too much effort."
My body felt so heavy. Just as exhaustion was winning and my eyes were sliding shut, a warm touch settled on both my cheeks. I jolted awake — and Suho's face filled my entire field of vision.
What the—
There was something unfamiliar in the mild expression he wore as he looked down at me. More than that, the posture he'd taken sent a stab of pure alarm through me.
He's cupping both my cheeks like a man about to kiss someone lying down—
No, what am I even thinking—
"You're the one who'd wake me even when I was about to fall asleep and make me brush my teeth, remember?"
"Wh-what…? What do you…"
I couldn't focus on a word Suho was saying. Every nerve in my body had migrated to my cheeks.
"Noona, why are your cheeks so red?"
"B-because I'm tired."
I brushed aside the thought that had just flashed through my mind. The harder I tried not to dwell on it, the more it filled my head, but I forced it down anyway. Yeji had only ever taught me about life as a woman. But Suho's father — the man I'd met today — had led our conversation as though he understood exactly what it felt like to suddenly become a woman and find yourself floundering.
"Suho."
"Yes?"
It wasn't that I'd suddenly become aware of his behavior. It was that this had become the moment I grew a little more conscious of the fact that I was a woman.
Am I not, at this very moment, the heroine on the verge of being kissed by the male lead?
I forced my fluttering eyes wide open and tensed every muscle. I had to get that warmth off my cheeks, and fast — before the heat of it branded itself into my memory.
"…How long are you planning to hold my cheeks?"
"I'll let go."
The warmth left my cheeks the instant he spoke. And then — to my own annoyance — I started to miss it, so I shook my head hard and sat up. Terrified that Suho might read something into my bizarre behavior, I scrambled to attach some words to the moment.
"I'm going to go wash up first, then?"
"Sure. Just don't fall asleep in there."
"I won't!"
I had no idea what exactly I was declaring wouldn't happen, but I shouted it at Suho and beat a hasty retreat.