Chances

Chapter 15: It's Getting Cold

Only a month left before December, the winter winds starting to come in, making the inhabitants of Seoul shiver as it greeted them. Reyna Lee could feel it especially as she got off the train platform to deliver her father his lunch that he had forgot to bring with him on his way to work.

Coming back to her alma mater, she walked through the halls of the unfamiliar science and technology building looking for her dad's lecture hall. Turning right an being met with a bunch of students who had just left his classroom, she came in and called onto her dad as he wiped the whiteboard clean. Some of his students whispering and speculating about his age and his daughter's, thinking he was too young, to have a twelve year-old kid would be possible but someone who looked to be in her twenties? They didn't think so.

And he was. He was young when Reyna's mouther gave birth to her, they were both only 16. He got her pregnant on the night of their school prom and had did not regret a single choice they made since. They had Reyna in the Philippines where he stayed until he moved back to Korea to go to university. It was hard to leave the one-year old girl especially when she had first said "아빠 (dad)" which was much easier to say than 'dad' but Reyna's mom didn't want to hold him back, that him leaving would be for the best in the future.

It surely paid off. He had studied at the same university where he now taught, getting his first job straight of university and coming back to the Philippines to claim his child and the love of his life. Only the latter had been sick, "Leukemia, cancer of the blood, in it's very late stages. Best to day good bye." The doctors had told him. 

How long has it been? Almost two years, it progressed really fast. Why didn't she tell him? Because she wanted him to finish. What will he do without her? 'Live" she said. And in her dying moments did she claim that they were one of her favorite times since they had been complete again. Reyna now five and her father an official teacher, life had been great, and Reyna's mom had been happy to end it there.

After the funeral he did as promised. He brought Reyna to Korea and offered her the best life he could manage. He had supported all her endeavors, had bought her paint and canvases to fuel her passion for her art, bought her her first camera when she sent her off to boarding school, bought her first photograph as a professional photographer when she graduated from university. He had been there for everything, letting her go back and forth from the Philippines to Korea so she could visit her mother's relatives too and phoned every so often to catch up and talk about their days, always creating moments so she'd never feel like she lacked love just because she had lost her mother so young. He was just enough, even more than, and Reyna was thankful.

Now standing in front of him, the spitting image of his mother. Her dark eyebrows and her big round brown eyes, her cute button nose that she said was too flat but he had told her it was just perfect for her small oval shaped face, her lips, the bottom being plumper than the top tinged the same pink shade as her cheeks. He always founf his little angel so beautiful and was so happy to have her when he lost her mom. 

Hugging her as a greeting and thanking her for the lunch, they sat in the classroom before his next class began again. She had showed him new pictures she took on campus, amused that she brought her camera everywhere with her, watched her expressions as he tried saying comments like professional critics would making her laugh and say how silly her appa was. He also didn't forget to nag at her, telling her to eat more as she's gone so skinny, and to hang out with friends instead of taking pictures of random people, he even encouraged her to go clubbing instead of hanging out with him in school or with her soon to be stepmom at home.

At the mention of mom they had grown silent, a moment of remembrance for the beautiful woman they both knew. Expressing how much she missed him and wished she was still here, her voice cracking as she did so. Her dad brought her in hugging her tight and stroking the back of her hair, willing himself to not cry either. It's been almost ten years but his heart yearned for her still, and he believed it would never stop doing so.