First Love

Chapter 59

Chuseok day was a whirlwind for Jae.

After Yoongi left, Jae joined the females in Han's residence to prepare the food for the celebration. Grandma Han delegated them to groups to prepare the dishes and the sweets. Jae was assigned to make songpyeon, the traditional rice cake with sweet fillings.

There was a small and good natured competition between the single women in the family on who would make the nicest and prettiest songpyeon. It is believed that whomever makes the prettiest and most perfect rice cake would find true love. Jae didn't believe it but joined in the fun nevertheless. She felt like she became a dessert chef by the time she was done. She hadn't been celebrating Chuseok for so long and being able to do it that year meant a lot to her.

The next day, early in the morning, she donned on her hanbok before joining in for the offering ritual at Han's residence. She then went to visit her family's grave site to pay respect. Her foster family went too and the place was filled with other people who wanted to pay respect to their deceased family members. Chin Hwa's tree grew well. The cemetery management have been taking care of it and Jae could almost see how big it would be in the future.

They returned to the family house for the big family lunch. After that, Yoongi came and visited her family. Jae then said goodbye to her family as she was supposed to take the train to Seoul that night. She had to catch the plane back to Tokyo the next day. She could stay until Sunday but there were no available ticket for that day. She settled for a Saturday flight. Yoongi made her change the plan yet again by telling her he would be driving her back to Seoul as his vacation time was also nearing to the end. Traffic on Sunday would be a torture anyway as people would be heading back to their respective home when work starts on Monday.

"What do you have there?" asked Yoongi as Jae untied the cloth securing the food container in the car.

"Some sweets and food Grandma asked me to bring to your family," said Jae. The plan was to bring Jae to visit Yoongi's family before returning to Seoul. His family usually celebrates at his uncle's house, so that was where they would be heading. She took the small container on top before tying the cloth back. "This is for you," she handed it to him.

Yoongi took it and in there was a mix of songpyeon and some other confections arranged nicely in it.

"I made the songpyeon. As you can see, it went through an evolution," supplied Jae humorously. "It went from a blob of something with a very pitiful looking leaf on top to something more acceptable," she said, pointing to the rice cake. Yoongi looked and at the end was a nicely decorated half-moon shaped songpyeon with a flower on it. "Grandma looked at my first try and told me not to let you see it. But hey, it's funny and it's still edible," said Jae.

Yoongi took it and ate it in one bite, "Yup, it tastes great too."

"They didn't let me near a yakgwa last night. They didn't want it to finish before everyone had a taste," explained Jae, laughing. "I'm a yakgwa addict. I think I gained 5 kg with all the food I ate today."

"Save some more space. There's a lot of food at my uncle's too," advised Yoongi as he drove.

Yoongi's uncle's house was just as loud as Han's. Jae went through the first meeting with them by answering their questions and going through the good natured bantering. Yoongi and Jae left the house with food that Jae could bring on her flight.

"Gosh, I'm so full," commented Jae in the car.

"Me too. I'm feeling sleepy already," said Yoongi.

"I can drive if you get drowsy," Jae offered.

Yoongi looked at her in surprise. "I didn't know you could."

"Just because I've never driven in front of you doesn't mean that I can't. Not to brag, but I'm the only one dad trusts to drive his '67 Shelby Super Snake," said Jae.