North - South

Witnessing

Swiss, one month later circa

"I'm glad you're back. And I'm glad you managed to come back from your business trip right in time for my release."

I could have been home earlier, if not for your sons. "Yes, appa. A fortunate coincidence, I must say." 

As a reply, it couldn't be said it was holding much conviction. Although there had been a time when her dad's release had been everything Se-ri had longed for, things were different now, and she wasn't able to feel like that anymore.

Something had snapped inside her, and what had mattered in the past had long ceased to be relevant. The consideration and the love for that man, that man who had been the apple of her eyes when she was a girl, was long gone, replaced by an indifference which bordered the boredom.

"And Se-ri? I'd like for you to come to London next week."

"Naturally, appa." She hoped for the request to be for something worthy because the flight ticket had a cost. And seeing all of them too.

London

Ramrod straight in front of the lawyer's door, Se-ri waited for her dad to greet the old friend - hands shaking, shoulders patting, empty snickers, the entire men's repertoire -. To her surprise, in the end, she too was the beneficiary of a fond shoulders' grab.

It was unknown, to the young woman, the fact that that man was the deus ex machina behind that summoning.

Only keeper of all the family secrets - including Se-ri's mom's identity -, and only keeper of all the family bills, when Yoon Jeung-Pyeong had been released, the family lawyer had left the courthouse robe to wear the good friend's one, suggesting what his own sense of justice was suggesting him to do.

Registering the house and the farm under Se-ri's name wouldn't have meant robbing the other two sons, nor playing favorites, but returning what she herself had invested.

Besides, among all the three, Se-ri was the only one who possessed integrity and a sense of responsibility. The only one. Registering the mansion under her name would have meant granting a future to the farm instead of witnessing it chopped up and sold piece by piece to satisfy the vices of those two wimps. 

Jeung-Pyeong had really been unlucky with his male sons. And he had to know it, because it had taken a very short time to convince him.

"Don't park there," her dad instructed when they arrived home, "the grain warehouse is under renovation."

Since when? It wasn't possible, she would have known it. What, they had started paying works by themselves? Oh, please.

"APPA!" Se-hyeong, the younger, slammed the napkin on the table while Se-jun dramatically pretended to get up from the chair. Mirroring their stances, the two girlfriends tried to calm them respectively with an icy gesture of the hand which longed to look classy but only smelled cheap, and with a sort of flashy, coarse hug. "How can you give everything to her! HER!"

"There's no use complaining," the not-that-old patriarch stated with a flat yet firm tone, "I signed this morning. It's done."

"How could you..." and now it was his wife's time to cast him a bewildered, furious look. "Without saying a word. Without even consulting us."