Pigeons & Planes

Epilogue

TWENTY-ONE YEARS LATER

Nash Soh sat designing a new line of jackets for his exclusive clothing line Soh Dynasty. For almost twenty years the hip-hop inspired streetwear had been a top selling commodity, from L.A. to New York, to Europe, all the way to Seoul, Korea and even Mexico. Nash had traveled the world and incorporated a blend of international style, mixing the culture of Korea with American flair, as well as Latin American chic. Soh Dynasty was a huge hit. In his younger days Nash had even been able to appear in a few rap videos alongside emcees clad in his clothing.

Nash built an empire for himself at twenty years old and it was steadily remaining at the top in the urban fashion world, and had even crossed over into the mainstream markets as well, becoming an instant success.

         On his lap as he sat out in the café area at Hye's, a coffee shop on the north side of Rowland, California, his one-year-old daughter Hye was trying to get his attention as he continued to sketch. In her tiny hand she held up a snack cookie for her father to partake of. At the sight of this, Nash smiled and leaned down as he pretended to nibble on the baby's cookie.

         The moment was soon interrupted when his sixteen-year-old daughter Elena came over from running the front counter and sat before him at the table.

         At sixteen, Elena looked very much like her mother, except she had her father's eyes and interest in design. She was a straight-A student at Santana high school, and she never did anything to upset her parents or cause grief, yet, as she sat in front of her father she chewed nervously on her lip at what she was about to ask him.

         Nash looked at his daughter, sensing something was up with the waves of anxiety teeming from her direction. "What's up?" he asked coolly.

         Elena looked down at her lap shyly as she tucked a thick strand of her dark hair behind her ear. "I...uh, Mom told me to ask you if it'd be okay if Brady Gomez took me for a ride in his car Saturday?"

         Elena had barely been able to hold eye contact with her father as she rambled out the request. There was a rule in the Soh household for Elena and her older brother, Ortiz, that they weren't to date or think about it until they were each seventeen. While most of their friends' parents were laxed on the issue from the start of high school, Nash and Nina Soh had insisted that their children focus on their academics and extracurricular activities first. Elena volunteered as a tutor after school, while her brother bounced around from club to club trying to find his niche. Outside of school, both Soh children were learning Korean and Spanish from both their parents, grandmothers, uncle and their father's cousin. They'd been to Guadalajara three times and Busan, South Korea once. Nash and Nina both agreed it was important to instill their heritage within their children, something neither child disagreed with. Both parents also wanted their children to be attentive with their futures and didn't want the drama of high school dating getting in the way until they thought their children were ready.

         It wasn't that Elena wanted to break this rule, although Brady Gomez was muy atractivo as she would so often write in her diary; it was just that he was a nice boy who seemed interested in her. The Latino hunk was captain of the soccer team and just as studious as Elena, and all the girls thought he was dreamy, but it was Elena he had sparked conversation with one afternoon. Elena was aware that she was pretty, but unlike her terrible flirt of a brother, she was a bit shy and unsure of herself at times. Having Brady Gomez's attention was a big deal. When he'd asked her if she wanted to go for a ride in his new car she was sure she'd died and gone to heaven at the inquisition.

         There was just one road block: her parents.

         Nash settled back into his seat with Hye, ruminating over the idea of allowing his daughter to do such a thing. Unlike his son, Elena wasn't a rule breaker and never saw trouble. He trusted her. "What's the deal with this Gomez kid?"