Sleeping With The Enemy

Baby in chinos

The first time, Choe Min Hyeon set eyes on Koo Seo Ryeong, he wasn't even aware of it – at least, in retrospect. He should have known that something was off, but he was just a typical high school boy enjoying some downtime with friends. They had skived off school and took a walk to Jagalchi Market for a humungously expensive sit-down seafood lunch. Money wasn't a problem, not with his group of friends. Every single one of them were chaebol heirs. Min Hyeon didn't even bother to brag about the company he would inherit – KU Holdings was the largest chaebol-controlled group of companies in Corea.

As they walked through the fishmonger stalls, a pair of girls caught his eye. There was nothing special about the smaller girl. She had a round face with smudges on it but she looked happy. It was the older girl that caught his eye. She had the straightest nose he had seen on any Corean girl. It looked as though she had gotten it fixed. He shrugged off the thought – it was impossible for her to get the funds for nose surgery. Not when she lived right here in this hovel. He was about to walk right past the stall where the girls stood when one of his friends knocked a tray of oysters in front of their stall onto the floor.

"Are you crazy?" The older girl came right up to his friend, nose to nose. "You'll have to pay for the damages!"

"What damages?" said Shin Kyeong with disdain. "They're just oysters. They have a shell. They're not damaged."

"Eat this then," the girl picked up an oyster which lay flat on the floor of the market and smeared Shin Kyeong's face and lips with it. Shin Kyeong shied away but the girl was determined. Said oyster made it to his face. Min Hyeon braced for the burst of anger that was bound to explode. True to expectation, Shin Kyeong exploded with anger and grabbed the girl by her uniform collar. She continued rubbing the oyster all over Shin Kyeong's hand. Bystanders started to gather around them. Min Hyeon knew the situation had to be resolved quickly. The fishmongers here might be envious of each other's business, but they would most likely gang up against outsiders. Things were starting to look ugly. There was only one way Min Hyeon knew that would settle things fast. Cold hard cash.

The shop proprietor came out. It was a middle aged woman who was probably the mother of the girls. She had curly hair and wore an apron over her T-shirt and worn, loose jeans.

"It's alright," the woman said gently to Shin Kyeong. "You don't have to pay."

"Why not?" the little firebrand rounded on her mother. "He knocked the tray of oysters on purpose."

"It's alright," the woman said again to Min Hyeon and his friends. "There are plenty of oysters in the sea."

Choe Min Hyeon pulled Shin Kyeong away from the situation before it could get any uglier. Other fishmongers were muttering under their breaths at them. He pulled out his handkerchief from his pocket and offered it to Shin Kyeong to wipe his face and hand. Shin Kyeong wiped the moisture off his face and hand before throwing the handkerchief onto the floor. Behind them, Min Hyeon heard a loud, "Yah! Littering too? Come back here, you perverts!" The four boys broke off into a run, laughing as they went. It was what they always did. After five minutes, Choe Min Hyeon had totally forgotten the feisty girl.

Getting a scholarship into Seoul University was a lucky break. Koo Seo Ryeong hadn't known how she would fund her tertiary studies if she hadn't won the scholarship. She had worked her ass off for it, and it irked her badly how trust fund babies got their places in the university. Even at university, money and family made a huge difference in how you were treated. Lecturers fawned over the chaebol heirs, it annoyed her so badly. It was obvious that the university expected these heirs to remember to fund them when they came into their inheritance. Seo Ryeong mentally sniffed. If these heirs were stripped of their wealth, they had nothing to fall back on. Not even good looks.