After opening the door to her apartment, Se-ri leads Jeong-hyeok into her tiny kitchen and ushers him into one of the tall, rickety wooden chairs by her kitchen island. She takes him in from head to toe.
"Now," she says. "Will you tell me why you're dressed like a Carribean tourist?"
Jeong-hyeok looks down at his flowered red shirt like he doesn't see the problem with it. "It's my disguise," he says, furrowing his eyebrows. "So the photographers wouldn't see me hanging around your apartment."
"Isn't the point of a disguise to make you look less conspicuous? You look like you escaped from a mental institution."
She leans over the counter and pulls off his fake goatee from his chin, dropping it onto the counter like it's a bug.
Jeong-hyeok rubs the place where the hair used to be and mutters, "My employees told me this was a normal, casual outfit."
"A normal outfit for what? A retiree cruise?"
"Can we-" Jeong-hyeok breaks in here. "Can we stop talking about my clothes? What about Roberto?"
Ah. Se-ri knew that she hadn't heard the last about that, given Jeong-hyeok's open hostility earlier. "Alberto? What about him?"
"With all the reporters crawling around you, and now that everyone knows we're dating," Jeong-hyeok sits back and crosses his arms, his lips turned into a pout, "should you really be meeting him in public?"
Se-ri blinks at him in surprise. "If not in public, would you rather I met him at my house?" she questions.
"What? No, of course not. That's not safe."
"But," Se-ri looks even more confused, "I'm meeting you at my house. Alone."
"I'm different." Jeong-hyeok is looking more and more flustered with the direction the conversation is taking. Se-ri finds herself smirking, and she leans towards him across the kitchen counter.
"Awww, is little Hyeoky jealous?" she asks him in a needling voice, her eyes lighting up.
Jeong-hyeok's eyes widen at her words, and he gulps.
"Don't - don't call me that," he says. "And no, I'm not jealous."
"I think you are."
"I'm not."
"Alberto and I dated years ago," says Se-ri, waving her hand in the air airily. "You have nothing to be jealous about."
"You dated him?!"
As he sits there with a stunned expression on his face, in his horrendous Hawaiian shirt and bucket hat, Jeong-hyeok paints such a picture that Se-ri can't handle it anymore. Her face dissolves into a huge smile, and she starts cracking up so hard that she doubles over and gasps for air. Her laughter only increases when she sees how confused he looks at her sudden mirth.
When she finally gets control of herself, she leans on the counter, breathing hard. There are tears of laughter in her eyes.
"Thanks," Se-ri says genuinely, wiping her eyes. "I really needed that. It's been a hard week."
At her words, Jeong-hyeok's face goes from gently amused to somber.
"Yoon Se-ri," he says, "About our conversation last time, I want to apologize --"
"No, no," Se-ri interrupts him, shaking her head. "I'm the one who's sorry. I shouldn't have gotten so upset at you over Seo Dan. What she told you about my family is public information. If you wanted to find out, I'm sure you could have found out even without her."
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Fanfiction"Jeong-Hyeok," his father says in a tired voice, "This is how it's going to be. The general shareholder meeting is in five weeks from now. If you are not firmly engaged by then - I am going to recommend that the board make someone else the Chairman...
