"Pyeonosanim, your 6 o'clock is here," the petite, perfectly coiffed woman at the semi-circular desk spoke into the wireless headset she wore. She was silent for a beat while she waited for a reply from the other side. "He said to send you up," she told Jeong Hyeok, pointing towards a bank of elevators to her right. 22nd floor. Someone will meet you there."
"Thank you," Jeong Hyeok headed the way she had pointed. He got onto the elevator and pressed the button for Seung Joon's floor. When the doors slid open, he saw his friend waiting, a sympathetic smile on his face.
"Hey there!" Seung Joon greeted, reaching out a hand to shake and pulling Jeong Hyeok in for an acceptably manly bro-hug. "How are you holding up?"
Jeong Hyeok took a deep breath, shaking his head. "I don't even know," he admitted. "Everything is so..." he shrugged, at loss for words to describe what everything was.
"I hear you," Seung Joon commiserated. "I can't even imagine... Well, I mean, I think we've all technically imagined what it would be like to find out we've got an illegitimate child out there. Hell, it's Chi Su's entire goal in life..." he continued to babble. Jeong Hyeok glared at him with narrowed eyes, "What?"
"Eun Jung is not illegitimate," he growled.
"Well, actually--" Seung Joon began to argue but quickly realised it was best to keep his mouth shut. "Hong Pyeonosanim is waiting for us in the conference room," he switched tracts. He led Jeong Hyeok down to the hall to a small, well-decorated room. A long mahogany table was surrounded by eight leather-bound chairs. Cardboard boxes with Chinese writing were set out next to stacks of plastics plates, and little packets of duck sauce and spicy mustard.
A man stood up from one of the chairs to greet them. "I am Hong Jong Hyun, one of the partners here at Lee & Ko. You must be Ri Jeong Hyeok," he said, holding out his hand to shake.
"Nice to meet you," Jeong Hyeok returned the greeting, taking a seat at the table.
Seung Joon sat next to him, reaching for the Chinese containers and breaking them apart.
"Congratulations on the birth of your daughter," Hong started. "Seung Joon has given me a little background on your situation. I am sure it must be difficult for you, but still..."
"Thank you."
"Should we get right to business, or would you like to have something to eat first?"
"Hyung, stop being so damn polite," Seung Joon told his partner, dipping a pair of chopsticks right into a container of food. "Jeong Hyeok doesn't like being kowtowed to."
"I am a skilled multitasker," Jeong Hyeok added. "I can eat and have a conversation at the same time."
"Right," Hong agreed, relaxing slightly. "Business it is, then. I hear you live in London?"
"Not for long." Jeong Hyeok informed him. "I have every intention of being as close to my daughter as possible." Jeong Hyeok took the pepper steak from Seung Joon and emptied some onto a plate as he spoke. He missed Seoul Chinese Food. And he was hungry. He hadn't eaten much in the last few days.
"So you'll be relocating to Seoul?" Hong asked for verification.
"Yes."
"Do you have employment secured?"
"I hope to get a transfer and continue my current job, but if things don't work out, finances won't be a problem." Jeong Hyeok picked up a dumpling, dunking it in some soy sauce and taking a bite.
"Are you sure?"
Jeong Hyeok laughed. "Yes, I am sure."
"Do you have any financial statements to back that up?"
"I can get you a copy of my portfolio from my financial partner," Jeong Hyeok assured him, digging into his food. God, he was starving.
"That would be helpful. Do you know off-hand what it's worth?"
"Off-hand," Jeong Hyeok replied dismissively, swallowing a bite full of chicken and cashews. "I'd say my personal assets are just shy of $200 million."
Hong coughed, a spray of soda escaping his lips before he could get his hand up to cover his mouth.
"Need a napkin, Hyung?" Seung Joon asked, handing one to the man.
Hong looked at his partner, "Are you sure you don't want me kowtowing?"
Seung Joon smiled, "Jeong Hyeok is family," he replied, slapping Jeong Hyeok on the back. "He's not going anywhere."
"Right," Hong said, "Well, finances aren't everything of course, but it certainly helps."
"This isn't about money," Jeong Hyeok said, leaning back in his chair.
"It's never about money unless you don't have any," the lawyer replied.
"True. But I just want what's best for my daughter. I'll take care of her financially, no matter what. Se Ri will probably resist taking child support though."
"Is she wealthy too?" Hong asked, clearly wondering why else a woman would turn down money from a wealthy baby daddy.
"There's some family money, but she doesn't take that either. She prefers to earn her keep."
"And she does what now?"
"She's a freelance journalist, though she'd been struggling to find work last time I knew. She was planning to write a book as well."
"So her income is-- intermittent, at best?"
"It was nine months ago. I haven't had a chance to catch up on her career yet. I do know she's living at home with her parents."
"And home is where?"
"Seodaemun-gu."
"And do you have a residence set up here yet?"
Jeong Hyeok shook his head. "We have a few family houses, but nothing I'd call home."
"Well, for starters, I suggest you use Seoul as your primary residence. It will be generally easier for a joint custody setting."
"I guess I should be house hunting in Seoul soon then."
"Great," Hong replied, jotting some notes down on a legal pad. "Being able to provide a stable home for your daughter is essential. It seems you'll be able to do that. Is there anything else I should know about you that might call that into question? Mental health issues? Legal troubles?"
"Nothing on record," Seung Joon answered for Jeong Hyeok, leaning back in his chair with a laugh.
"Meaning?" Hong asked, eyebrows raised.
"Youthful indiscretions," Jeong Hyeok clarified. "A few misdemeanours... all expunged from my record. So did she."
"Wait... what did you guys do?"
Seung Joon laughed, "It should've been 'what you guys didn't do', right?"
"Oh, shut up! You and Seo Dan were there too," Jeong Hyeok chuckled. "We went for a joyride." he continued.
"Define 'joyride'" Hong prodded.
"Oh please, we were young. My lawyers got me off a technicality." Jeong Hyeok said.
"What about her?"
"She and Seo Dan had to do community service."
"So what you're saying is your daughter's mother is unemployed with a possible criminal record?"
"That's a stretch," Jeong Hyeok replied, tensing slightly, suddenly uncomfortable with where this was going.
"It's only a stretch if you want it to be."
"No," Seung Joon broke in, shaking his head vehemently.
"She's going to play dirty too," Hong said. "She kept him out of this so far, it's not unreasonable to think she'll continue to try."
"She wouldn't..."
Jeong Hyeok felt the room going fuzzy. his grip on the armrest of his chair tightening involuntarily. His teeth ground together uncomfortably. The Chinese food was churning in his stomach. his heart rate was rising and that uncomfortable tightness in his chest that had been waxing and waning constantly for the last two days grew stronger. He couldn't breathe.
What if this lawyer was right? For the past two days, everyone had been telling him it would be okay. Se Ri, Young Ae, Mrs Han, even Seo Dan. They'd told him over and over again that he would be a welcome presence in Eun Jung's life. They told him Se Ri wouldn't take Eun Jung away. That she wouldn't keep her from him. But she had tried to keep her from him. She hadn't wanted him in their lives. What was to stop her from changing her mind?
And here was Hong Pyeonosanim, telling him everything he feared, Telling him he wasn't crazy for worrying. He longed to see his daughter, to touch her. To know she was there. For all he knew, Se Ri could have gotten into the car at the hospital and started driving in the opposite direction. She could be halfway to Busan by now.
"Jeong Hyeok?" he heard Seung Joon's voice, but it felt distant, disembodied. His physical surroundings had all but disappeared. The only thing that felt real was this fear.
"Can you excuse us?" the far-away Seung Joon voice asked. A door opened and closed in the background. "Hey!" Jeong Hyeok vaguely heard. "Earth to Jeong Hyeok." He saw a pair of fingers snapping in front of his face but all he could do was stare straight ahead. He felt his chair being swivelled underneath him, and pressure on both his shoulders. Hands. Seung Joon's hazy face swam before him.
"Dude! Do not make me slap you." He was being shaken. Jeong Hyeok blinked a few times. The physical jolt must be helping. He took a shaky breath in, trying to focus on Seung Joon's face as the man stood, hovering above him.
"I-- I---" he tried to get the words out.
"What the hell just happened?"
"I-- I don't know," his heart seemed to be slowing but the crippling anxiety was still there. He grabbed his phone and held it up. "I need to--" With trembling fingers, he pulled up a text message.
How's Eun Jung?
A few seconds passed and Jeong Hyeok felt the wave of anxiety starting to take over again as he waited for a reply. Finally, he saw three dots appear on the bottom of the screen.
Sleeping.
The unease waned again.
Picture?
He waited again. 30 seconds seeming to take an eternity. Finally, a picture popped up. Eun Jung swaddled tightly in a pink blanket on it, laying in a crib. This seemed to relax him.
Seung Joon was looking over his shoulder. "She's got your nose, man."
Jeong Hyeok felt a smile pull at his lips. Everyone knew that nose was his.
"What's the hell is wrong with me?" Jeong Hyeok asked, collapsing back into the seat.
"Ummm... where do I begin?" Seung Joon jested, patting him reassuringly on the shoulder.
Jeong Hyeok buried his head in his hands.
"What if Hong Pyeonosanim is right? What if Se Ri tried to take her away? She knows things about me-- she could..."
"Se Ri wouldn't do that," Seung Joon defended, taking a seat again.
"Se Ri did do that," Jeong Hyeok reminded him.
"Yeah, because she's as stubborn and pigheaded as you are." Seung Joon explained matter-of-factly.
Jeong Hyeok's face scrunched up in confusion. "What?"
"I am not going to kowtow here, Jeong Hyeok," Seung Joon explained. "What Se Ri did was monumentally fucked up. But you didn't help matters."
Jeong Hyeok's eyes narrowed into slits. Seung Joon couldn't be serious right now. Se Ri lied to him for months and his own best friend was trying to make it his fault? "And how do you figure that?"
"You let her walk away," Seung Joon shrugged.
"I didn't let her anything. She's a big girl. She made her choice."
"Because you wouldn't." Seung Joon uncrossed his legs and leaned forward into the argument.
"She didn't want me to!" Jeong Hyeok cried exasperatedly.
"How do you know? Did you ever ask her?"
"She turned down my proposal--" Jeong Hyeok began.
"That was ten freaking years ago, you moron!" Seung Joon cut him off, his exasperation coming out full force. "For god's sake, man, get over it."
Jeong Hyeok didn't let Seung Joon's logic stop him. It wasn't that the rejection still felt as fresh as if it were yesterday. Even though it did. It was a wound that wouldn't close. For a long time, he had thought it was healed-- nothing more than a scar tissue-- a pale, fleshy reminder of a time before he knew what real loss was.
But then he saw her again in Hamburg and just like that the wound was open again. And every time she came to London and went away again, it was like the scab was pulled right off. That wasn't the only problem. No, the real problem was that Se Ri took every opportunity that they were together to remind him about how she still longed for those damn open doors. About how she loved the travel. About how she was so unencumbered she didn't even need a place of her own. About how few nights she ever actually spent in one place. For Se Ri, settling down was just a plain setting.
"When we got back together, she made it very clear that she didn't want a commitment," Jeong said, his voice stern. "When we were together we were together. When we weren't, we weren't. No strings."
"Oh please," Seung Joon scoffed. "No strings? You two are full of strings! You've got like seven pounds eight ounces of strings."
"Six pounds twelve ounces," Jeong Hyeok corrected, momentarily distracted by the thought of his daughter.
Seung Joon let out a frustrated breath, "Not the point."
"And what exactly is the point?"
"The point is that you were both idiots. Too scared to admit you want each other. Too frightened of losing the few moments of stolen happiness you had, to figure out how to make a life with each other. She was so scared of you rejecting her for Hye Jin, that she never asked you to choose. And you were so scared of her rejecting you for her unnatural need for independence that you convinced her and yourself that your life was set in stone. That the family destiny had finally caught up with you and there was nothing you could do about it. And you strung Hye Jin along while you did it."
"I wasn't stringing Hye Jin along. I loved her."
"Never as much as you loved Se Ri."
"It was different. I could count on Hye Jin. We wanted the same things. I could have a good life with her."
"The two of you would've been perfectly content," Seung Joon agreed. "But when have you, Ri Jeong Hyeok, ever been happy with being content?"
"Are you saying I want to be miserable?"
"No, I am saying you need a challenge. When things are too easy, you get bored. You did get bored-- and you cheated on her."
"Because it was Se Ri!" Jeong Hyeok tried to explain. He didn't cheat on Hye Jin because he was bored. He did it because he loved two different women.
"Exactly!"
Jeong Hyeok rubbed wearily at his eyes. "We're going circles here, Seung Joon," he mumbled exhaustedly. "I don't have the energy for this right now."
"Fine," Seung Joon relented. "All I am saying is that you both need to get your acts together. You don't need to forgive her, at least not right away, but you do need to stop letting your fear cloud your judgement. If you let this get ugly, you'll never forgive yourself. And neither will Eun Jung."
"I don't want it to get ugly," Jeong Hyeok reaffirmed.
"Then I think we tell Hong Pyeonosanim you want to start with mediation."
Jeong Hyeok nodded in agreement.
"Good," Seung Joon clapped Jeong Hyeok on the knee as he stood up from his chair again. "I'll go get him."
*****
You can always count on a true friend to tell you how fucked up you are XD
Now, the next big question-- how will things go in London?
I know you're mad at Jeong Hyeok, at Se Ri. And I promise you this situation will not last forever. They'll work hard for the sake of their daughter. There will be rainbows and sunshine in the future. But right now, they need to work on their issues, which sometimes includes some passive-aggressive comment.
As usual, comments and votes are deeply appreciated. See ya!