Summer Vacation.
I was barely through tapping in the door code when Dad burst out.
"Baby~! You're home!?"
"Dad."
"Hm?"
"You doing anything tomorrow? Got time?"
"Huh? Nothing at all. Why?"
"Wanna go catch some sea bass and eat 'em?"
"Should we!?"
He watched me peel off my socks, then proceeded to head straight for the storage room to get ready.
When his daughter says she wants to do something, the man's follow-through is honestly...
By the time I'd showered and came out to flop on the sofa, Dad had finished prepping and was back.
Alpha and Beta are old now—they try to move only as much as strictly necessary—
but no matter how lazy they're feeling, they can't seem to stand not being next to me. They sprang right up onto the sofa.
The money I'd poured into keeping those two healthy could've easily bought a decent imported car.
And their hip dysplasia, that hereditary condition, was still under control.
I also had them screened for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and feline PKD almost every six weeks.
Beta in particular, being exceptionally big even for a Maine Coon, had me a little worried about her health,
but thankfully the vet's report said she was still in remarkably good shape.
"Alpha and Beta perked right up the moment they saw Si-yoon~"
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah. They slept all day long today."
Large-breed companion cats.
People say companion cats live fifteen to twenty years, roughly three times longer than strays,
but Maine Coons are a little different.
The average lifespan of a Maine Coon is nine to thirteen years, shorter than most other cats.
At sixteen, Alpha and Beta were so old now that it wouldn't be strange for them to go at any moment.
Their once-glossy coats had turned rough, like dried-out scallion roots.
Though they hadn't lost any of their elegance.
Dad looked at the two of them curled up in my arms, and his expression turned sad.
"When they die... what am I supposed to do...?"
It's a little absurd, having your father ask you—someone younger than him—about death,
but Dad had leaned on me heavily ever since I was little.
"Don't make that face. Alpha and Beta are smart, they read our expressions."
"...Okay."
"Haven't they both seemed happy this whole time?"
I touched Beta's nose.
She bit down gently on my finger.
Like she was telling me to pet her.
Beta burrowed into my arms and started purring, like my touch felt good.
"You should've been ready for this from the day you brought them home, saying you'd raise them."
"True..."
"If it gets too hard, just think back to all the happiness over those ten-plus years. The sadness is short compared to that."
"Yeah."
Even as I said it, I knew I might grieve harder than anyone.
Honestly, the more you dwell on the good memories, the harder it is to let go.
But if you ask me why I still say things like this, knowing that—
it's because while the sadness may double with every happy day you remember, in the end, you can still smile.
"Dad."
"Hm?"
He was forcing a smile for their sake, but that kind of face couldn't fool me... or Alpha and Beta.
"Just rub my feet."
"Alright."
He looked down at me wiggling my little toes and finally cracked a genuine smile.
Even past forty, my dad still needed looking after.
The next day.
Dad wanted to bring Alpha and Beta along on the fishing trip, but I told him to let them rest comfortably at home.
He slid naturally into the driver's seat. I stared at him.
"You wanna drive, Si-yoon?"
"Mm... it's your car, Dad. You drive."
"Okay, get in quick~ we're going fishing~"
He seemed downright giddy about our first just-the-two-of-us fishing trip in a long time.
I sat back and enjoyed the peaceful Korean countryside.
"Si-yoon, you're not gonna do any variety shows?"
"Teacher Baek Jun-won?"
"Yeah."
A major player who had the Korean restaurant industry in an iron grip—thirty brands, two thousand locations.
Net worth I'd heard estimated at a minimum of three hundred billion won.
"Dad, did he get something on you? Why the sudden obsession with TV?"
"It's less that he's got something on me and more... you know he personally taught me most of the dishes I make?"
Dad smiled and kept talking.
"This episode's the Vietnamese pho special. He asked if I could stop by and do a tasting."
"What about filming? Oh, right—Aunt Ji-su's been asking me to guest on that show about her married life too."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah, I was thinking about maybe dropping by, actually."
So we'd both gotten appearance requests from close acquaintances.
Dad's variety fees had dipped a bit, sure, but they were still an eye-watering sum you couldn't just hand out lightly.
Which made it all the more notable that my rate was at least three times higher.
Even a brief glimpse of our faces on social media or Neotube pulled in overwhelming view counts.
And the moment we stepped overseas, we commanded multiples of what we got paid in Korea—so yeah, I could still feel my star power.
As a result, our TV appearances had started running on loyalty now, not money.
Ultimately, I decided to appear on both "Corner Restaurant" and the variety program "Same Action, Different Thoughts."
Dad called Uncle Jang Seong-man.
"Bro!"
—"Hey, Ji-ho~"
Unlike Dad, Uncle Jang Seong-man's voice was starting to sound his age now.
"Hello~"
—"Si-yoon!? Come visit the headquarters sometime~ Uncle'll buy you something tasty."
"You know I'm not at an age where I can be bought off with food, right?"
—"Hahahahahaha."
Maybe because Dad had been hanging out with Lee Jin-seok so much lately, their laughs were starting to sound the same.
—"So, what's the call about?"
"Si-yoon and I are going on as guests on Corner Restaurant. And Same Action, Different Thoughts too."
—"Ji-su?"
"Yeah, yeah."
—"Su-a and Ji-su are gonna be thrilled. And Si-yoon, good call. They say the boat'll glide along even if you don't row, sure, but give it a stroke now and then and it really moves."
"Publicity isn't something I worry about, you know?"
—"If it's good, it's good~"
We ended the call, arrived at the west coast, and unpacked at our lodging.
"The waves are pretty rough..."
"Then we just fish from the breakwater."
"It's dangerous."
"From falling in the water? Dangerous? Me? Or Dad?"
"....."
I slathered sunscreen all over my body, rubbed it in, then pulled a white tee over a thin black rash guard that clung to my frame.
My bottoms were leggings under loose pants—a look that radiated a fierce determination not to let a single ray of sunlight touch my skin.
As a finishing touch, I put on sunglasses and a wide-brimmed hat. Perfect.
"You all ready?"
"Yeah."
We drove Dad's car over. A few other people seemed to have had their eye on the breakwater too.
Including us, there were five groups, and everyone's faces were bright—looked like the sea bass were biting well.
There are plenty of casting techniques, they say,
but it looked like a school of fish had gathered nearby, so I quickly finished rigging up, took hold of the baited hook, and drew the line back in one smooth pull.
The rod had such good performance that at short range, I didn't even need to make a hard cast.
I loaded up the rod until it looked like it was straining, then released the hook. The rod's recoil alone sent it flying about twenty-five meters, no arm strength needed.
"Whoa~ just like always, Si-yoon, that looked seriously skilled."
"Not just looked skilled. Was skilled."
"Yeah..."
I worked the lure and gazed out at the cool, open sea. Today felt good.
Spla—ash.
"Whoa, little lady's got one hell of a hookset~"
Little lady? My face was covered, and no matter how young Dad looks,
his hair color alone should've made it hard to mistake a guy in his forties for my husband...
I was kind of thrown, honestly.
"She's my daughter."
"Ah? Shoot, my mistake there. The father's awful young-looking, sir."
His speech pattern sounded like someone in his fifties or sixties, but he looked barely late twenties.
"Uh... I've seen you somewhere a lot before, I think. Si-yoon...?"
"Hello?"
"Oh my god!!! Then th-then that's Ji... Ji-ho!?"
Dad, who was up on the breakwater, turned around at the commotion.
The guy walked right past me and headed straight for Dad...
"...I'm Kim Si-yoon, though."
Usually, wherever I go, people are desperate to soak in even one extra second of looking at me, but this guy was apparently the exception.
He practically skipped over to Dad, shook his hand, took a photo, then thanked him with three full deep bows and drifted away.
As he headed back to his spot, the guy glanced over at me.
He stood there mulling something over, then sighed and walked back toward me.
"Want me to take a photo?"
"...?"
For a second, I froze, trying to figure out what was even happening.
Why was he the one saying that line?
I was just flabbergasted that this guy had flipped the script and put me in the position of having to ask.
"Huh? No."
"Ah... okay. Have a good one."
I watched the guy's retreating back.
"What the hell, is this a hidden camera prank?"
I was making a sour face, just feeling weirdly gross about it, when Dad came sprinting right over.
"Baby? What's wrong? What'd that guy say to you?"
"He asked if I wanted him to take my picture."
"Huh?"
Dad took a moment to process that, then suddenly started laughing at me.
"Ahahaha. So that's why you're sulking? 'Cause Daddy's more popular?"
"You think that's funny...?"
"...Sorry."
The day had been feeling so promising.
Thanks to that guy, and with him, we didn't get a single bite.
"Want to switch spots?"
"Nah. It's not like we came here dead-set on catching something."
I kept working the lure for a while, staring blankly out at the ocean, until Dad settled in beside me and started fishing.
The two of us ate cup ramyeon we'd brought from the car, enjoyed the fishing, and then started packing up our gear.
"Total bust today, huh~"
"Right? Still fun, though. Getting the sea breeze and all."
"Yeah. And I got to spend time with my daughter for the first time in a while, so I liked it too?"
"I'm on break starting next week, you know. Did you pick where you want to go on vacation?"
"Yeah. Dad's never been to Peru."
"I kind of want to go to Iceland."
"That place is great too~"
Our hands were empty of fish as we headed back to the lodging, but our pockets were full of cash, so we drove straight to a sashimi restaurant and feasted on sea bass anyway.
We ordered sea bass sashimi and hanchi mulhoe, and ate prawns—a must-have with grilled sea bass.
Dad rubbed his belly, stuffed.
We went back to the lodging and drank.
This body, where one sip from a tiny can of beer brings on the hiccups and half a can summons the Sandman... honestly, whenever I think about it, the cost-performance ratio is goddamn incredible.
I got up from Dad's embrace and looked around.
Everywhere was evidence of the night before—me and Dad, drunk off our asses and having the time of our lives.
There was even the perfect evidence of a seotda session played with fifty-thousand-won bills and cashier's checks.
The spot where Dad had presumably been sitting was piled high with bills that were probably mine,
but gambling that happens when you're wasted ought to be null and void, so I pocketed only the cash that'd actually been in my wallet and stuffed the rest into Dad's.
The whole place was a disaster.
Looking at the spread—everything from grilled Spam on down—it looked like we'd eaten like absolute kings last night.
I glanced over at Dad, still asleep.
The left side of his face was massively swollen.
".....?!"
I tried to drag up last night's memories to figure out why Dad's left cheek was so swollen, but absolutely nothing came to mind.
"I'm fucked."
"What the hell? Why? What the fuck did this crazy bitch actually do..."
I was on the verge of tearing my hair out trying to remember anything from yesterday, but astonishingly, there was nothing. At all.
Right then, Dad shifted in his sleep and woke up.
"Nnnggghh.... Huaaah!?"
He touched his left cheek and flinched, realizing it hurt...
To leave a bruise that bad, there were really only two possibilities.
Either I'd used on him the kick that's basically a one-way express ticket to the afterlife...
or I'd used the anesthetic punch with my right hand.
If it was the right hand, even Park Ji-hoon bitches and moans from that. For someone as fragile as an average civilian, it would be nothing short of a catastrophe.
On top of that...
I'd apparently swung not to knock him out, but for the express purpose of inflicting pain. Like a total fucking moron.
I did my best to play dumb and went over to him.
"Dad!? What happened to your face!?"
"It hurts..."
I grabbed some leftover beef from the fridge and laid it on his cheek.
"I don't remember a thing... baby, do you know anything?"
"I passed out right away, remember?"
"How... did this happen?"
Dad pieced the situation together, reached the conclusion that I was the only person here capable of hitting him, and stared at me while clutching his cheek.
"".....""
I quietly kept playing dumb and swore to myself, right in front of him, that I was never touching alcohol again.
We finished cleaning up and headed home.
Back at the house, Dad gave me a pointed look as he pressed an ice pack to his face.
Naturally, I responded by silently cooking a whole meal for him and presenting it like an offering.
He sat down at the table with a smile.
"Ah~ it's hard to chew~"
I'd been chewing a spoonful of rice topped with the braised short ribs I made. I stopped and stared at him.
Dad was absolutely, one hundred percent certain I was the one who'd done that to him.
No—even if he didn't know the details, he definitely knew I was connected to it.
He opened his mouth wide at me.
"Ahh~"
I stuck my spoon in my own mouth, scooped out the contents I'd been chewing, and Dad recoiled in horror.
"You want some?"
"What the hell are you doing, that's disgusting!"
"What? Didn't you say you couldn't chew it?"
"I meant feed it to me!"
"What, is your finger broken? Why would I feed you?"
I put the food back in my own mouth, ate it, then used his spoon to scoop up more rice and feed it to him.
All the while renewing my vow to never drink again...