I Will Return
Kim Seong-ho stood with his father, Kim Pan-seok, gazing out over the broad stretch of rice paddies that filled the plain running from Buin-ri all the way to Deokpyeong-ri.
“You always said the soil here was good, that the rice grew well.”
“That’s right. I did.”
“This land is yours now, Father.”
Kim Pan-seok turned from the wide fields to look at his son.
“Can I really accept this? Twenty thousand pyeong?”
He had never owned so much as a single pyeong of land in his entire life. Even the new house they had built not long ago had been paid for with his son’s money. He had lived every day as a poor tenant farmer. Now his in-laws were offering him a gift of a full hundred majigi of fields, and the gratitude he felt was drowned out by a strange, heavier fear.
“You didn’t do something wrong, did you?”
Seong-ho only smiled and shook his head.
“Who in the world gives away land because someone did something wrong?”
“Well, that’s true, but…”
Kim Pan-seok hesitated, then glanced back at Lee Gyeong-eun, who stood arm-in-arm with Jang Myeong-ja chatting behind them. He lowered his voice.
“I heard rich families sometimes hand over money and tell a man to leave their daughter or son. This isn’t… that kind of deal, is it? Take the land and walk away from our little daughter-in-law?”
His face was full of worry. Seong-ho took his father’s hand.
“If they wanted me to leave her, they would have done it a long time ago. It’s nothing like that. Don’t worry.”
“Really…?”
Even after the denial, his father still looked unconvinced. Seong-ho reassured him again and pointed toward the fields.
“I brought the family a huge profit. Father-in-law said I’d done well and gave me this as a gift.”
“You… you can do things like that?”
“I told you last time I came, didn’t I? The in-laws don’t look down on me. They treat me like precious jade.”
After his regression, Seong-ho had returned to Nonsan, to the house where his parents still lived. Seeing the father he had missed so much and the mother for whom he still carried a deep regret, he had wept for a long while. Kim Pan-seok and Jang Myeong-ja, watching their son’s tears, had assumed he was suffering unspoken hardships as the live-in son-in-law of the Ilhyeon family. A boy from an ordinary country home who had married into such a great house would naturally have to watch his every step and endure constant scolding. After the tears stopped, Seong-ho had made them a promise: the people of the Ilhyeon family would come to treat him like jade. His parents had listened with one ear and let the words go out the other, thinking only how hard things must have been for him to say such a thing. And now he was telling them he had kept that promise.
“So you’re saying the in-laws gave you this land as a gift because you did well?”
“Why else would they hand over a plot this big? Even at twenty thousand won a pyeong it’s four hundred million.”
Kim Pan-seok still could not quite believe it and asked the same questions again and again. Seong-ho never grew impatient; he only smiled and gave the same answers.
“I’m only going to become more indispensable to them. So take it without worry. I earned this fairly.”
Only then did Kim Pan-seok finally relax. He looked out across the broad paddies. A lifetime of farming other people’s land flashed past him like a lantern show. The thought that from now on he would be one of the richest farmers in the whole district, able to walk with his head high, filled him with joy he could no longer hide.
While the two of them stood gazing at the fields, a tiller came rattling toward them. The man driving it called out the moment he recognized them.
“Well, well! Look who it is! Seong-ho’s here!”
“Village head. Have you been well?”
The village head turned to Kim Pan-seok.
“Hyung-nim, why didn’t you tell me Seong-ho was coming?”
“He just stopped by for a short visit.”
“Come on. Even a short visit is still a visit.”
He looked at Seong-ho again.
“Your wife come with you?”
“Yes. She’s over there.”
Seong-ho pointed to where Gyeong-eun stood with Jang Myeong-ja. The village head nodded as if everything had worked out perfectly and spoke to Kim Pan-seok.
“The whole family’s together for the first time in ages. Let’s eat together.”
“Aigoo, why go to all that trouble?”
“What trouble? It’s been forever since I’ve seen Seong-ho and his wife. I’ll tell the neighbors. We’ll gather at the village hall this evening and grill some meat. All right?”
Without waiting for an answer he started the tiller again, told Seong-ho he’d see him later, and rumbled off in a cloud of noise and exhaust.
Kim Pan-seok gave his son a look that asked whether this was all right. Seong-ho only smiled and told him not to worry, then walked over to Gyeong-eun and his mother. When she heard the news, Jang Myeong-ja wore the same awkward expression as her husband, but Gyeong-eun’s face lit up with unexpected delight; she looked as if she could hardly wait for evening. She had already been thinking of coming down to live here someday, and the chance to get to know the neighbors only made her happier.
The four of them finished walking the land Lee Tak-hyeon had given them and set off toward the village hall where the evening meal would be held.
Jo Byeong-jin looked up with open pleasure when Seong-ho walked into the office after the long holiday.
“Have a good break? Back early on the first day of the new year.”
He handed over the documents he had brought for a report and followed Seong-ho into the office.
“Trip home go all right?”
“It did.”
“Parents happy?”
“How could they not be? You should get married soon yourself. Your parents must be waiting.”
“They are waiting, sure. But marriage isn’t something I can do alone… and there’s no one suitable.”
Byeong-jin’s face showed real regret; he clearly wanted to marry. Seong-ho smiled and floated a suggestion.
“Want me to ask Gyeong-eun to set something up?”
“Aigoo, don’t you dare.”
Byeong-jin waved both hands frantically.
“Any young lady around Gyeong-eun would be way out of my league… I couldn’t handle it.”
He lowered his hands and looked at Seong-ho with something like wonder.
“You’re the only one who can manage that kind of life. I don’t have the confidence. I just want to live easy.”
Seong-ho was still smiling when Section Chief Jeong Byeong-ju stepped into the office.
“Heard you were in. Get a good rest?”
Seong-ho pointed to the empty chair beside Byeong-jin.
“I was just about to call for you. Perfect timing. Have a seat.”
“What? You looking for me?”
Jeong Byeong-ju sat down, glancing between the two men. Seong-ho looked from one to the other and began to recount everything that had been settled with the Ilhyeon family.
“Over the New Year in Pyeongchang-dong, the Chairman gathered the whole family.”
Both men tensed slightly at the mention of a full family gathering. Seong-ho told them everything that had been said. When he finished they stared at him in open confusion.
“So you’re… quitting the company?”
“Yeah. That’s how it turned out.”
Seong-ho answered as if it were nothing. Byeong-jin’s face twisted.
“So that family’s finally starting their crazy games. You start doing well and they kick you out?”
Even after the explanation, hostility still burned in Byeong-jin’s eyes. Seong-ho only laughed.
“Where did you hear that? I’m the one who chose to leave.”
“Which means they forced you into a corner so you had no choice. That insane family…”
Jeong Byeong-ju laid a calming hand on Byeong-jin’s arm.
“That’s not how it sounded to me. Calm down and listen carefully to Director Kim.”
Byeong-jin let out a long breath and nodded. Seong-ho knew every bit of that anger was on his behalf; he looked at his friend with quiet warmth.
“I’m only stepping back for a while. So the two of you—Section Chief, help Gyeong-eun take good care of things.”
“‘Stepping back for a while’ means you might come back?”
Jeong Byeong-ju had been turning the words over carefully and now asked the question straight out. Seong-ho nodded.
“Yes. I’ll come back.”
“If you come back… when? How?”
Byeong-jin picked up the thread at once. Seong-ho turned his head toward the calendar hanging on the wall. It showed the brand-new year. He looked at the numbers printed across the top and smiled lightly.
“This year is going to be full of special events. It won’t take long. And when I return…”
He turned back to the two men.
“I’ll come back when the company itself comes looking for me and begs me to return. Until then, just stay by Gyeong-eun’s side and keep Ilhyeon Hotel running steadily.”
Neither man fully understood what it would mean for the company to come begging, but they knew Seong-ho well enough to believe that if he foresaw it, it would happen.
“Then what happens to our Restructuring Team in Strategic Planning?”
Jeong Byeong-ju pointed a finger at Byeong-jin, at himself, and at Seong-ho in turn.
“We were only a small, nothing team of three inside Strategic Planning, but we still turned Ilhyeon Watch and Ilhyeon Hotel around pretty well.”
“I was going to talk about that next.”
Seong-ho clasped his hands and continued.
“First, I asked the Office Chief to promote both of you. Section Chief to Deputy Manager, and Jo Assistant Manager to Section Chief.”
“Really? I’m making Section Chief? I don’t even have the years yet. Is that all right?”
Seong-ho turned to the startled Byeong-jin.
“You’re short on the standard years, yes, but I asked them to put you on the special promotion list. The Ilhyeon Hotel job more than justifies it.”
Byeong-jin nodded. No one in the company could deny the scale of the results they had delivered.
“Unless something unusual happens, both of you will be promoted. As for the Restructuring Team itself… unfortunately, it looks like we’ll have to dissolve it for a while.”
“I figured as much.”
Jeong Byeong-ju’s voice was heavy with regret. Working beside Seong-ho had given him a real taste for restructuring. Taking a company that was collapsing, putting it back on its feet, and watching it rise again had been more satisfying than anything else he had ever done. He had wanted to keep doing that kind of work. He had even begun to suspect he might have a genuine talent for it; he had thrown himself into every project. The moment he heard Seong-ho was leaving, he had known the team was finished. It had existed only because of Seong-ho; without him it lost all meaning.
“You asked us to support the new president well, so I expected this… still, it’s a shame.”
Seeing the regret on Jeong Byeong-ju’s face, Seong-ho leaned forward over his clasped hands and looked both men in the eye.
“That, too, is only temporary.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Byeong-jin sensed layers of meaning packed into the single word. Seong-ho gave them a deep smile.
“When I come back, the Restructuring Team is going to be bigger than it is now.”
“Bigger? Not just the three of us—bigger?”
“Right. When I return it won’t be a team. It’ll be a headquarters.”
“Headquarters…?”
Even Strategic Planning was only an office. The Restructuring Team had been just one of several teams under that office. To hear that Seong-ho would return at the level of a full headquarters—larger than Strategic Planning itself—shocked them more than the news that he was leaving. They had watched every prediction he made come true. If he said he would come back as head of a headquarters, it was not empty talk. In a situation where they could not even imagine when or how he would return, the idea of a headquarters-level comeback strained their imaginations to the breaking point.
Seong-ho leaned back in his chair, still smiling, and turned his eyes once more to the calendar on the wall. The year that would be carved deep into the history of the Republic of Korea had just begun, and it looked back at him from the page.