Speeding Into Trouble || Taekook

29

The morning sunlight poured into the Kim family dining room like liquid gold, but there was nothing warm about it.

Taehyung sat at the far end of the long mahogany table, his breakfast untouched, his soul somewhere else entirely.

Across from him, his father was already halfway through his third monologue of the morning. His voice was smooth, calculated—every word precise like a scalpel cutting through any hint of resistance.

"I told the board that if the Zurich merger doesn't go through by the 27th, we'll simply buy the holding company ourselves. No room for hesitation. That's the difference between boys and men, Taehyung."

Taehyung stared blankly at the marmalade on his toast, nodding like a man hypnotized.

He wasn't listening. Not really. He was trying not to scream. Or laugh. Or cry. Or maybe all three.

He didn't need to hear the rest to know what was coming—he could recite it himself by now.

Words like legacy, duty, numbers, discipline, disappointment, were strung together like pearls on a noose around his neck. His father had a special talent for saying things that sounded like compliments but felt like prison bars.

"Teaching," his father suddenly added, almost spitting the word like it was an infection, "was a phase. Like playing dress-up. You are not meant to be an average man, Taehyung. You are a Kim."

There it was. Again.

That cursed surname, wielded like a weapon.

Taehyung's jaw tightened. He took a slow sip of his espresso—burning hot, bitter, expensive. Like everything else in this house.

He didn't respond. Because what could he say that wouldn't turn into a fight? That he missed chalk dust and the sound of kids laughing? That he missed waking up excited instead of exhausted? That he missed being himself?

The phone in his pocket buzzed.

A small mercy. A reminder he hadn't been swallowed whole just yet.

He glanced down discreetly.

Jeongguk.

His heart betrayed him instantly, skipping like a scratched vinyl record. One call. Then another. He didn't dare answer them—not here, not in front of him.

But just the name alone was a life raft.

Taehyung pressed his hand over his pocket, anchoring himself.

"Put that thing away," his father snapped, not even looking up from his tablet. "We're discussing your future."

No, Taehyung wanted to say. You're discussing my cage.

He smiled instead. "Sorry."

"Next week," his father continued, unaware—or uncaring—of the storm behind Taehyung's eyes, "you'll start shadowing Min-joon. We'll begin grooming you for the CFO role. You'll fly with me to Singapore after. You'll sit in on the capital restructure meeting. It's time you saw how the real world works."

Taehyung set his coffee down, a soft clink against the porcelain.

"I already know how the real world works," he said coolly. "It's just that mine included students. Laughter. People who liked me for something other than my last name."

The silence that followed was deafening.

His father looked up slowly, his eyes sharp and unreadable.

"That world was small, Taehyung. And you're too big for it. You can't afford to be sentimental. Weakness will cost you everything."