Mom Has Changed (1/2)
Han Pan set down his carrier and the bag slung over his shoulder, then spread his arms wide toward the woman approaching him, the gesture as natural as breathing.
She melted straight into his embrace, clinging tightly against him.
“My son!!! How long has it been?”
Wrapped in his arms, Park Miho felt wonderful.
No—it felt as if she possessed the entire world.
It was a mother-and-son reunion after far too long.
They held each other like that for a while, unable to speak, simply savoring the long-missed sensation of each other’s bodies. Her perfume reached Han Pan’s nose and stirred a faint flutter in his chest; the two large, soft masses pressing against him felt somewhat alien, yet by no means unpleasant. Rather, he found himself wondering if this was what ecstasy felt like.
After holding him for a long time, his mother finally loosened her arms and looked up at him.
“Let me take a good look at my son…”
Park Miho stepped back a little and carefully studied his face. The deeply tanned skin and the roughness that had settled into it pained her heart, yet those very things only made him look more manly. His bulked-up frame looked solid and powerful, like a carefully sculpted statue.
“My son… your body has gotten so solid… Wow… look at this… Wow… my boy’s been working out hard…”
She ran her hand over the biceps exposed beneath the rolled-up sleeves of his military uniform. The firm, dense feel of the muscle reminded her of a man’s presence after so long, driving home that her son—now quite masculine—was no longer a child.
Feeling her touch, Han Pan flexed. His biceps swelled, veins standing out clearly, and Park Miho delighted in it like a child.
“Oh my! Son!”
Pleased, he tensed his abs and said,
“Mom, touch my stomach too.”
“Let’s see.”
Park Miho swept her hands down over his chest and abs. As the solid hardness of his body slowly registered through her palms, an unfamiliar sensation suddenly flooded her entire frame. It was a man she was feeling after a truly long time. A sharp, thrilling current raced through her, but she gave no sign of it and simply stepped back a little.
“Mmm… Son, you really do have a great body…”
Han Pan looked at her and grinned.
“I’m even cooler with my clothes off, hehe… I’m thinking of entering a bodybuilding competition like this.”
“Oh, really?”
“You have no idea how many guys in the unit were jealous of this body, hahaha.”
Mi-ho was thoroughly pleased that her son had returned as such a fine man. She smiled, quickly brushing away the emotion she had just felt, and gestured toward the seating.
“Let’s sit first…”
“Yeah, yeah… okay.”
“Want something to drink?”
“Uh… coffee?”
“Iced?”
“Okay.”
Park Miho returned to her desk, called someone, and ordered two iced coffees. Then she came and sat right beside Han Pan on the sofa.
“Scoot over a bit. After all this time I want to sit next to my son!”
She said it and snuggled right up against him. For a woman who had thrown herself so completely into work that she barely had time to think, the fact that her son had returned was deeply encouraging and reassuring; it filled an empty corner of her heart.
They chatted lightly about this and that. A moment later a knock sounded and the woman who had guided Han Pan earlier entered. She gave a short bow, set two iced coffees in front of them, bowed again, and disappeared.
Sipping the iced coffee, Han Pan said,
“Actually… I ran into Dad just a little while ago…”
Park Miho’s eyes flew wide. It felt as if her mind had snapped fully awake.
“R…eally…?”
“Yeah… And I met that auntie too…”
Her expression darkened.
“Oh… I see…”
“Yeah.”
“So…?”
Han Pan hesitated a moment over how to put it, then said,
“Well… they seem to be doing fine… Their faces look good and all…”
Park Miho considered her words, then let out a heavy sigh.
“You’re an adult now, so the judgment is yours… I think your dad did his best in his own way.”
Han Pan instinctively felt that his mother still carried lingering longing for his father. She began asking various quiet questions about them, and he wondered whether she might be feeling jealousy. Her questions grew rather persistent, so he decided to change the subject.
“Mom, but you seem different somehow…”
Mi-ho, who had been talking about one thing after another, paused at his question, then quickly understood and answered.
“Oh, really? Do I look different?”
Han Pan nodded.
“Yeah.”
At once the irritated expression she had worn while grilling him about her ex-husband vanished completely. A bright smile lit her face. She straightened her upper body with confident pride and asked,
“Do I look okay?”
“What?”
“Me.”
Han Pan stared at her intently for a moment. Aside from having lost a little weight so that her facial contours were sharper, and having cut her once very long hair into a styled length, he couldn’t spot anything particularly different. He was reluctant to mention her chest.
Seeing him simply stare blankly, she decided he wasn’t catching the change. She rose from her seat. When she spread her legs a little wider than her shoulders, the tight wrap dress that fell to her knees stretched left and right. At the same time the silhouette of her figure became clearer, and Han Pan could tell exactly why her breasts stood out so much.
“Uh… uh…”
He could clearly see that her breasts had grown larger than before. After a brief moment of confusion he realized what it meant, eyes widening.
“Mom, don’t tell me…”
She made a face as if her son had finally caught on, then broke into a broad smile.
“Mm… yes… hohoho.”
A moment later, as if suddenly shy, she emphasized her upper body once more, then drew her shoulders in and lightly covered herself with both arms—a clear invitation for him to look at her chest.
“Mom… really… did you… do… your breasts…?”
“Hohoho.”
She nodded firmly.
“Why?”
She considered for a second, then answered,
“Mom also wanted to try dating a new boyfriend and living a whole new life, so I decided to give it a shot!”
She declared it almost like an announcement.
Han Pan turned his head slightly.
“That’s your choice, Mom, but… you didn’t have to go as far as your breasts…”
“Don’t men like big, full breasts? When you wear clothes the volume really comes alive too… hohoho.”
While he had been away in the military, Mi-ho had combined intense dieting with professional counseling, pouring money into her appearance with the resolve to start a new life and meticulously caring for her body. The results were remarkable; she now looked far younger than her actual age. At the same time she had undergone breast correction and procedures at a plastic surgery clinic, upgrading her already large breasts even further until they possessed the contour of a woman in her twenties. She was thoroughly satisfied with the outcome. The life that had shrunk after the divorce was being offset, little by little, by the attention of men.
It had all begun when her second daughter So-jo entered a beauty pageant; that was when Mi-ho started taking care of herself, and from then on she had been overcoming the pain of divorce rather well. At So-jo’s urging she often went to clubs, and every time she received advances from men much younger than herself. She was secretly very proud of that, though she could never show it—meeting men half her age still felt extremely awkward. In particular she felt a considerable, unnameable sense of rivalry with the woman who had remarried her ex-husband, and that rivalry was a powerful stimulus. But as a result of all her efforts, receiving so much male attention felt genuinely good.
Mi-ho smiled and added,
“Your sister did it too!”
“!!!”
In the meantime Mi-ho picked up the clutch bag hanging behind the desk and stood beside it.
“Shall we go?”
“Yes.”
The two left the office and walked toward the elevator. A few employees who recognized her bowed their heads in greeting. She returned the greetings with a light nod, and soon they rode the elevator down to the underground parking garage.
The wrap dress clung tightly, accentuating her slender waist, her breasts, and the full curve of her hips—the word “Coke bottle” stamped itself into Han Pan’s mind. It was a body that could devour most women in their twenties. For a moment he thought of Seo Eunju’s figure, the last woman he had slept with. But then the thought suddenly struck him: if Mom took her clothes off, wouldn’t her body be even more amazing?
He shook his head hard, wondering what on earth he was thinking.
Mi-ho, walking a step ahead, glanced back at him.
“What’s wrong?”