I'd Take A Bullet For You

Special Chapter: Ri Ji Hoon

Growing up, I used to think that my dad was a superhero.

My earliest childhood memory involved him carrying me in his arms down some darkened city street. My drowsy self barely registered the sight of his and my mom's shadows walking side-by-side and the sound of their hushed conversation and quiet laughter, but my overactive imagination made the shadows of the night form suspicious shapes and sizes. At that time, although I was too young to understand what they were talking about, I was old enough to know that I could not be safer with the two of them by my side. But still, I pressed my face against his neck for comfort, turning my eyes away from the scary shadows, and he soothed me with a warm hand rubbing my back, a gentle reminder that he was there with me. And I easily fall back to sleep because I knew that I have Ri Jeong Hyeok as my protector.

On the weekends, we went down to the park to feed the ducks. My parents would lay out a picnic blanket on the grass while I hurried over by the edge of the water, excited when I saw no other children stealing the ducks away from me. Then my dad would offer broken pieces of stale bread on the palm of his hand for me to pick and toss onto the water, and I watched in delight as the ducks quickly swam towards them. We spent most afternoons that way, only heading home when the skies began to darken, and I used to wonder how he managed to never run out of bread for me. Then one day, when the ducks became fat enough, he brought out a new remote-controlled boat to play on the water, and I quickly forgot all about the ducks and thought that the boat was the coolest thing in the world.

During the quiet mornings, he would prop me up to stand on a stool in the kitchen and guide my small hand in flipping pancakes for Mom who usually slept in on the weekends. Then, armed with the table filled with food for our breakfast on their huge bed, he would allow me to run ahead and surprise her. Without fail, she would wake up with the brightest smile that reached her eyes, acting as if it was always the first time, and smothered me with kisses that tickled.

Then, there was one incident in which I accidentally burned my finger on the edge of the pan while we were cooking, and my crying was loud enough to wake her up ahead of schedule. She admonished him while patching me up. And I could never erase his apologetic expression from my mind no matter how hard I try, hating that he had really beaten himself up for such a minor accident without me saying anything - something that I only come to realize when I grew older. He continued to make pancakes with me, taking extra care after what happened, but we never spoke of the incident again.

There was the time when we took a trip down to the beach and I saw the surgical scar on my mom's side for the first time. When I asked what caused it, a dark look crossed my dad's expression as she told me that she got it when she saved someone from a bad man who wanted to hurt other people. It was later on that I find out who that someone was and the uncensored version of the story. I, being the blissfully ignorant child that I was, excitedly exclaimed that I also wanted to save people from bad guys and earn scars like hers, and my dad took my attention off the topic by holding up a shovel and inviting me to dig up a hole in the sand. We do, a massive hole so deep that when he stepped inside only his head and the tops of his shoulders were seen, but not before I witnessed my mom giving him a kiss and asking him if he was okay.

Growing up, I was used to seeing a lot of love in our household. Dad was and still is not shy in expressing his feelings for his wife, from surprising her with bouquets of flowers on mundane days to leading her in silly dances in the living room. They made love look so easy that I didn't realize that it was not that simple for the rest of us. I found myself going to the police station where they worked one sunny afternoon after the girl I liked broke my heart by turning my proposal down. Both my parents clocked out way too early at the sight of me - much to Captain Pyo's chagrin but Aunt Hye-young was able to divert his attention with some "pressing matter" - and brought me down the street where our favorite ice cream store was located.