For Love's Sake || Jeno

12: Unravel

Here's to all the ladies whose fathers broke their hearts before any boy could.

"How do you know them?" Mr. Kang asked. He was talking about Jeno and Johnny, Naeun assumed.

She felt faint. Her tongue felt too heavy to lift and she felt acid at the back of her throat. She had played the scenario of getting caught by Seulgi or her mother countless times but never in a million years did she imagine it would be her father.

What was he doing at a club in the afternoon anyway? Shouldn't he have been at work?

"Naeun?" Seulgi asked gently. "What is dad talking about? Is it true?"

"Of course it is," the man countered harshly. "And she has also befriended a bartender. Yeah, I was watching the whole thing. I was thinking about confronting you there but I didn't. What was the use anyway? You've already gotten mixed up with the wrong kind of people, and you've developed a drinking problem at this age, I wonder who you you're learning from." When he glanced in her mother's direction at the last rebuke, Naeun's fear turned to anger. She was angry with her mother for the same reason too but what right did her father have to criticize her?

"I wasn't drinking alcohol!" She yelled.

"Keep your voice down, you mannerless brat," his index finger shook in front of Naeun's face. "Look at how she's turned out," that was directed at her mother. "You haven't taught her how to respect her elders because you were too busy drinking. Or maybe you didn't care about her upbringing because she isn't your daughter." What?

Naeun's first thought was that he was making this all up. But one look at Seulgi and her mother's shocked, panicked faces, she knew there was more truth to it. "What do you mean she's not my mother?" Her voice trembled when she asked.

"It doesn't mean anything," Seulgi reassured.

"Tell me," Naeun demanded, her voice eerily quiet.

Her mother glared at Mr. Kang. She hesitated before saying, "your father had you with another woman. Then that woman left you at our doorstep when you were a year old. We were happily married at that time, might I add." Naeun could not process any of that. She would not believe it in the first place.

Ignoring her mother, Mr. Kang spoke up, "tell me what you were doing there?" He continued interrogating Naeun. "Did they take money from you? You don't know these kinds of people - how they scam innocent girls to make money."

Seulgi stepped forward, "that's enough dad, you've-"

"Oh, I know," Naeun cut her off. "Are you talking about your kind, father? The way you got money from Seulgi? The money we were supposed to pay as rent? Did you blow all that money in a club like the one you were in today?" Naeun had heard her sister and mother talking about how her father needed the money. She had been furious when she found out that Seulgi's hard earned money was being pocketed by that scum, but she had kept it to herself.

"Naeun!" Seulgi gasped.

"You can't talk to your father like that," her mother chastised.

"Father?" Naeun snarled. "He's only a sperm donor."

Her father, face red with anger, raised his hand to strike her.

The blow landed on her cheek. It stung but the pain doubled when she realized the slap came from her mother's hand.

Mr. Kang opened his mouth to say something but the girls' mother beat him to it. "Get out! I shouldn't have let you in in the first place. Get out and never come here again!"

Mr. Kang started to argue but Naeun never waited to hear it. She bolted out of the room, hastily shoved her shoes on her feet, and ran out, shoelaces be damned. She barely heard Seulgi calling after her. She only stopped when she reached the playground.

A couple of kids were still on the swings but she paid them no mind. She sat on a bench with her back towards them.

She was tired. Oh, so tired, both physically and mentally. She had resented her mother for always favoring Seulgi. How could someone discriminate between their daughters? Now she knew, her mother only had one daughter and it wasn't Naeun.

Mr. Kang was even worse. He slept with someone else while he was married and didn't even have the decency to take his daughter with him when abandoning his wife and her daughter. How dare he show up now and act like a member of the family!

What unsettled her more was mother keeping Naeun - the living proof of her husband's infidelity. Did she love Mr. Kang so much that she accepted Naeun as a bitter price for being with him? That didn't go as she planned either, for he was only faithful to his fickle nature.

Naeun's phone rang, startling her. She did not want to speak to anyone, especially her family. But when she saw the caller ID she was confused as to why Jeno was calling. She answered the call, despite herself and held it to her ear without saying a word.

"Hello? Naeun?" She could hear traffic in the background.

"Yeah?"

"I was waiting for your message. Did you get home okay?"

Jeno's worry was what broke her resolve to not cry. "I got home," she said, but her voice was cracked.

"Are you crying?" He asked, and when Naeun did not reply he continued, "Naeun? Where are you right now?"

"I..."

"I'm coming to your place right this second."

Naeun did not want him to show up at her home especially when her father was there. "I'm at a park," she told him. "It's in my neighborhood."

"Wait for me."

xxx

So it's been almost 9 months since I started writing this book. Thank you to everyone who has been tagging along ever since. We're more than halfway done with the book so hopefully, it will not take another 9 months to complete it.

I'm going to write the next chap in Jeno's POV. Would you guys like that or should I continue the usual way?