MELTM Chapter 1 Part 1

Classic

The year I-young turned seventeen, she got a third father.

Her newly acquired father lived with a phrase constantly on his lips: that from the moment one is born, the place one will live in is already decided. At that young age, I-young thought it was just another way of telling her to know her place. Only now—twelve years later—did she understand that the words could carry a different meaning.

I-young’s place had already been decided, and the one who decided it was not I-young herself.

“Is it very uncomfortable for you?”

The remark, disguised as concern, was aimed squarely at I-young’s fingernails. She stopped tapping her fingertips rhythmically against the table and lowered her hand.

“It’d be strange if a place like this were comfortable.”

She had plenty she could have said—that from the start, the only person who welcomed a setting like this was you—but I-young didn’t bother adding more. With her reply effectively cut in half, her mother reached for the cold water in front of her and took a drink.

Even after thirty minutes had passed since they arrived at the restaurant, the seat across from them remained empty. Despite the absence of the person meant to occupy it, neither mother nor daughter moved an inch. At the very least, they could have tried calling, but the two of them sat still, as if they had agreed not to.

The difference was that while I-young assumed the person would come when it was time, her mother seemed to regard this as some sort of first test—an ordeal to be endured.

“They say she’s capable. Capable people always make a point of showing it like this.”

I-young pretended not to hear her mother’s comment. All she thought was that capable people would feel wronged if they heard that.

“Why, it’s true, isn’t it? If you’re capable, you’re busy. And if you’re busy, you run a little late.”

Despite I-young’s silent forbearance, her mother deliberately pressed on, clearly intent on wringing a response out of her. In the end, I-young checked the watch on her right wrist.

“This is already past ‘a little late.’ I guess competence and manners are separate things. Being late to an appointment is just rude.”

“Son I-young! What if she hears you?”

“There’s no one here to hear me. She hasn’t arrived yet.”

I-young answered back with a calm face, as if she’d been waiting for the chance. Irritated, her mother took sharp, audible breaths. Just then, the outfit I-young was wearing—something her mother had disliked from the moment she first saw it—caught her eye. She seemed determined to make it clear that enduring unwanted remarks wasn’t something only you were doing.

“You really won’t be satisfied unless you win against your own mother, will you? On a day like today, couldn’t you think about your mother for once? And what is that outfit? You couldn’t have dressed with a little more care?”

“It’s perfectly fine. What’s wrong with it?”

“What do you mean, what’s wrong—everything’s wrong.”

“Should I have come wearing a hanbok or something?”

“Don’t get sarcastic. You’re always like this. You can’t rest unless you embarrass your mother.”

I wasn’t being sarcastic.

At her mother’s look of disgust, I-young glanced down at her clothes, but no matter how she looked at them, they were perfectly fine. She had chosen the most expensive and neat suit hanging in her closet. It simply didn’t meet her mother’s standards—but by any reasonable measure, it was respectable.

If she’d really wanted to embarrass her, she would’ve shown up in a swimsuit. She wouldn’t have bothered with a neat suit like this at all.

“You look like you could go straight to a funeral dressed like that. Do you have no idea how important first impressions are?”

“We’re not meeting for the first time.”

“Well said. Honestly, it would’ve been better if you were strangers. Same high school, same class—you should’ve spent more time together back then.”

“It’s been over ten years since we graduated.”

“So what, you forget everything after ten years?”

And yet, even as I-young said it had been over a decade, she herself remembered the past all too clearly—so it was only fair to assume that she still existed somewhere in the other person’s memory as well.

But memory was a private domain. It wouldn’t mirror I-young’s exactly.

How much did the other person remember, and what parts?

As I-young sank into thought, her mother continued chattering into her ear without pause.

“This is an opportunity. How often does something like this fall into just anyone’s lap? Si-hyeon is one thing, but you know your mother cherishes you more. You’re my aching finger—”

Her mother, who had been listing at length just how good an opportunity this was, finally fell silent. The reason was the presence that had rushed past, only to stop on the other side of the door.

Tap. Tap.

Two short knocks. At her mother’s brief response, the door opened.

The woman who opened the door herself and stepped inside wore a sleek, tailored outfit and low-heeled loafers.

“I’m Seo Jeong-in.”

Jeong-in bowed her head politely toward I-young’s mother, then sat down without a single word of apology for making them wait. For someone who’d arrived more than thirty minutes late to an appointment she herself had set, it was an audacious composure.

Her mother’s tightly pressed lips twitched once before she broke into a wide smile.

“It’s been a long time. Over ten years, hasn’t it? You already know her, but this is my daughter, Son I-young.”

“Yes.”

As if she hadn’t expected I-young to be there, Jeong-in’s gaze lingered on her without any attempt to hide it. When their eyes met, the slight lift of Jeong-in’s brow made her appraisal obvious.

I-young simply stared at the shadow cast over Jeong-in’s prominent brow bone and neatly shaped eyebrows. Staring so openly at someone’s face wasn’t exactly polite—but since the other woman returned the gaze without yielding, the discourtesy was mutual.

“You must be very busy these days. You haven’t been back in the country long, either. Jeong-in, you must be swamped, but it’s nice to see you like this. Though—”

I-young’s mother glanced at the closed door. At her silent question as to why Jeong-in had come alone, Jeong-in slowly withdrew her gaze from I-young and spoke.

“I didn’t think this was something to discuss over the phone, so I arranged this meeting.”

“Then Chairman Seo is…?”

“He doesn’t know about today’s appointment.”

“Oh my, really? I must have been mistaken.”

In contrast to her mother’s unbroken smile, Jeong-in did not smile even once. It wasn’t that she was expected to smile without reason—but even so, the severity was striking.

“Well then. I suppose I shouldn’t intrude when young people are meeting. I’ll excuse myself first.”

“No, Director Chae.”

“What do you mean, no? You two enjoy a good meal together. You’re about to become sisters-in-law—this is the perfect chance to catch up. I’ll take care of the bill—”

“Please hear what I have to say first.”

Perhaps the years she’d spent reading the room hadn’t been wasted. Sensing something amiss, her mother settled back into her chair after having half-lifted herself from it.

I-young had heard plenty of rumors about how skilled Seo Jeong-in was at business. And because of that, it wasn’t difficult for her to guess what it meant when Jeong-in didn’t even put on a professional smile.

“Let’s pretend this marriage never existed.”

…So even a business relationship was off the table.

As casually as if she were ordering lunch, Seo Jeong-in parted her lips, her expression indifferent.

The prediction hit dead on. The fatigue I-young had been pushing aside came crashing down all at once, and she pressed her palm against her eyelids. The silence that followed, folding in on the darkness behind her closed eyes, was brief.

As her mother’s voice—half scream, half shriek—demanding she repeat herself rang out, I-young regretted that she’d covered her eyes instead of her ears.

+++

Lumping the Seo family and the Son family together under the vague label of “well-off families” ignored a gap that was far too wide to overlook. The Seo family could be described in countless ways—an old, established lineage, a prestigious household, wealth passed down for generations. The Son family, by contrast, needed only two words.

Nouveaux riches.

How the Sons had amassed and grown their fortune was a tedious story. Once they had secured wealth comparable to others, they began to dream of social ascent. In a world where money could buy nearly anything, they wanted to go just a little higher. In that context, becoming in-laws with the Seo family must have looked like a single rope that could haul them straight into the upper class.

I-young understood their longing, to a degree. After all, their yearning stretched back far longer than the history of Chae I-young becoming Son I-young.

<That crazy, senile old bastard. Who does he think he’s marrying my daughter off to?>

The only person who opposed the marriage proposal that came to I-young was her mother, Mi-suk.

Even after demoting the illustrious Son patriarch to a “senile old bastard,” Mi-suk couldn’t calm down, thrashing in indignation. Her attitude changed only after Chairman Son tore up a notarized document renouncing his inheritance.

Ecstatic about officially becoming Chairman Son’s wife after twelve long years, Mi-suk decided she would meekly hand I-young over to the Seo family.

From there, everything moved with alarming speed. While I-young was still weighing gains and losses, stacks of documents traveled back and forth between the two families.

Today—about a month before the nominal formal meeting between the families—I-young was still measuring the profit and loss of this marriage. The benefits were obvious at a glance, but the opportunity cost was harder to calculate. Adding what she owed her stepfather onto the scale only made her head ache; she almost felt like giving in just to be done with it.

—If that son of a bitch pulls that crap, just smother him to death at night. With a pillow.

Shi-hyeon’s voice crackled through the phone, brimming with anger. She found I-young’s passive, dragged-along attitude frustrating, but instead of scolding I-young, she focused her energy on cursing someone else.

Chairman Son had given I-young many things, but among them all, her step-sibling Shi-hyeon was the one she cherished most.

—Bastard. Is he the only precious one? Our unni is precious too. Just kill him.

The call, which had begun as Shi-hyeon’s vehement opposition to the marriage, gradually devolved into an imaginative exercise—previewing married life with the prospective groom. Every time, the fantasy ended in tragedy, with the groom’s death.

“You know… what if that bastard asks me to suck him off at night?”

—Fuck, just bite it off and rip it clean off. Bastard. Bastard!

Since their mother had “graduated” from vulgar language after her third marriage, Shi-hyeon was now the only one in the household who freely swore, and she unleashed it without restraint on I-young’s future husband.

I-young liked that about Shi-hyeon. She deliberately chose words that would draw the foulest language from her, snickering quietly.

—Is this funny to you? You’re laughing?

“You know it’s a transaction. You can’t get emotional when you’re doing business.”

—What are you really going to do? Are you actually getting married?

“I’m thinking about it. Calculating.”

A sudden silence fell. I-young checked her phone screen. The call hadn’t dropped. She quickly realized Shi-hyeon was swallowing her anger and spoke in a soothing tone.

“It’s fine. It’s nothing serious.”

—Don’t say that. It drives the person listening crazy. How is marriage ‘nothing’? …I hate that family. Jeong-in unni is fine when I see her outside, but being tied together as family makes my skin crawl.

This time, it was I-young’s turn to freeze.

The name that slipped from Shi-hyeon’s mouth bounced like a kicked pebble at her feet, rolling noisily through her thoughts. Come to think of it, she had heard that Shi-hyeon and Jeong-in ran into each other from time to time.

—They say personality’s inherited, too. She’s nice to me, sure, but when Jeong-in unni goes off the rails sometimes, it’s scary.

“Really?”

—Why, she caused a huge incident once. Don’t you remember? At the pension. She didn’t hit anyone herself, but everyone who knows knows she was the one who ordered it. Even with her good reputation, she’s like that—so how much worse do you think her younger brother is? I hate it. I really do.

Shi-hyeon’s voice, brimming with disgust, trailed off just as the taxi came to a stop. I-young looked at the building across the street through the window.

“I have to get off. I’ll call you.”

She said she would call first, but it was always Shi-hyeon who did. They both knew it was just a formality.

The moment she stepped out of the taxi, the humidity hit her, reminding her of the heat she’d forgotten. The damp air of early summer, heavy with the coming monsoon, clung thickly to her breath.

As she entered the building, I-young thought of the person she was about to meet. It was a face that had already surfaced countless times since marriage talks began—even without Shi-hyeon’s prompting. Each time, I-young had deliberately excluded Seo Jeong-in, shutting off that corner of her memory like pulling down a shop shutter.

But now, becoming keenly aware of a forgotten memory resurfacing at an unexpected moment, I-young slowed her steps and thought of Jeong-in. More precisely, she thought of the time around what had later been called the accident.

A clear sky.

A pool filled with warm water.

There were many people, and I-young was arguing with one of them. She laughed at the other person’s face—red, then blue, furious beyond endurance—and the argument only escalated.

A pushing hand.

A staggered step.

Fragmented images.

And among them… Seo Jeong-in’s wet face. A face soaked through, as if something inside it were about to break.

I-young wondered what kind of fate it was that had made her think of that face just moments ago. She had never dreamed that she would see it again today, of all days.

“Let’s pretend this marriage never existed.”

At Jeong-in’s declaration that the marriage should be scrapped, her mother doubted her own ears and demanded repetition again and again. When the answer remained the same every time, she didn’t even pause—she hurled the cold water in front of her straight into the face of the Seo family’s eldest daughter.

“What’s wrong with my daughter?! Where does she fall short?!”

“As you know, the stock transaction has already been set in motion, and we will be considerate regarding the gallery investment.”

“Considerate? You call this consideration?”

Her mother’s eyes rolled wildly, as if she were moments away from dumping the entire water bottle over Jeong-in’s head instead of just the glass.

“More precisely, I am being considerate. The chairman doesn’t know yet. So let’s end this quietly, at my level.”

“End it? You want us to obediently take what you throw us and disappear?”

“You don’t need to feel insulted. I know your situation. And even if you are offended, it can’t be helped—we’re taking a fair loss with this offer as well.”

In the end, Jeong-in was splashed again. This time, even her top was soaked. Water streamed down from her drenched hair, collecting on her chin before dripping to the floor.

“…No matter what, eyes are watching. We can’t bring a cuckoo chick into our household. You understand, don’t you?”

Only after finishing everything she intended to say did Jeong-in brush the water dripping beneath her chin away with her hand.

Leaving behind I-young’s mother, slumped in her chair in a daze, I-young followed after Jeong-in. By then, Jeong-in was already striding across the corridor outside the restaurant, her steps neat and unwavering.

“Seo Jeong-in.”

Jeong-in stopping dead at just four syllables was unexpected. She turned around, having roughly wiped her face with her hand. She still looked like a drowned rat.

“Ah. Do you want to go to the restroom first?”

“…Is that any of your business?”

Jeong-in replied coldly to I-young’s sudden interference.

Fair enough. It really wasn’t her business. I-young nodded.

“Did you chase me down just to say that?”

Jeong-in resumed walking. I-young matched her stride, walking alongside her. The strange pairing formed without either a proposal or an acceptance.

“I was wondering what you meant earlier—about the cuckoo chick.”

“…You’re not asking because you don’t know.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Ms. Son I-young, you’re not Chairman Son’s biological child. When even a real daughter might be lacking, how could a stepdaughter possibly qualify? You really don’t know your place.”

Jeong-in spoke of I-young’s origins without batting an eye, right in front of her. I-young, having already anticipated the answer, accepted it with magnanimity.

“Then that’s exactly why things shouldn’t have gone this far. The formal family meeting is next month.”

“We’re simply cleaning up a match that was discussed last month. I admit there was a mistake on our side. I didn’t realize you’d be this shameless. That’s why I said I’d take your circumstances into account and be considerate.”

“I heard you’re in a hurry to marry. Guess you really were desperate enough to make a mistake.”

I-young’s prospective groom, Seo Jeong-ho, was Jeong-in’s only twin sibling and the grandson of the Donghwan Group’s chairman.

Chairman Seo had enjoyed a career path others envied, but he was said to have no luck with children. Rumors claimed he lost his first to inheritance, his second to kidnapping, and that the shock had driven him half-mad. The child he finally had at forty-five was born premature and frail, and the only achievement of his life was giving Chairman Seo twin grandsons.

The twins, fortunately, were healthy and grew up without major incident. But the grandson Seo Jeong-ho was known publicly as a constant source of trouble—countless scandals, several police investigations, and damage to the company’s image.

As a result, Chairman Seo intended to send him abroad, and before that, rumors spread that he was searching for a granddaughter-in-law. Around that time, I-young was summoned to her father’s study.

“Does it matter whether we’re in a hurry or not?”

“I was wondering if you’re really in a position to split hairs over whether I’m Chairman Son’s biological child.”

“This isn’t about position—it’s about dignity. Dragging this out will only worsen things once rumors spread. Let’s wrap it up here.”

“And if I don’t want to?”

Walking in step while looking at Jeong-in’s shoes, I-young felt a gaze and lifted her head. Their eyes met. Jeong-in looked away again, mercilessly.

“I know roughly what your family is hoping to gain from this marriage. Give it up. This isn’t an era where you can just buy a genealogy. Climbing the social ladder by lying about bloodlines isn’t appropriate, is it?”

“I never hid it. I never deceived anyone.”

“I wish Director Chae had done the same.”

“I can’t control my mother’s behavior.”

I-young’s mother was eloquent. She rejected the notion of her third marriage being an ordinary remarriage and instead reframed it as a dreamlike reunion with her first love. The goal was singular—and according to her, it was all for I-young’s sake.

Thus, I-young was packaged as the innocent product of a youthful first love—and as Chairman Son’s biological child. Some nearby social circles eyed it skeptically, but more people assumed it was an affair and looked on with disdain, so her mother’s scheme worked surprisingly well. But in this situation, did it really matter how many people had been fooled?

“And you knew, didn’t you, Seo Jeong-in?”

That I wasn’t Chairman Son’s child.

When they reached the elevator at the end of the corridor, their synchronized steps came to a stop. I-young pressed the elevator button for Jeong-in.

“What I want to ask is why, all of a sudden, now—”

“If I’d returned to Korea a little earlier, this would’ve been settled sooner.”

Jeong-in cut her off, frowning as if the conversation itself were unpleasant. The sigh woven into her voice was clearly intentional.

“Do you want this marriage that badly?”

“As you can see, my mother is deeply hurt.”

“You’re getting married just to comfort your mother?”

Despite the building’s height, the elevator arrived quickly. Jeong-in stepped inside, but I-young remained outside, facing her.

“For whatever reason, marriage is something I’ll do eventually.”

Which meant even her side’s thug of a younger brother would do.

Before finishing her cost-benefit analysis, I-young was letting herself be dragged along simply because it was easier. Just thinking about dealing with her mother, who acted like she was dying, and Chairman Son, to whom she owed a debt, was exhausting.

Until she found a compelling reason to push through all of this, she planned to continue being dragged. Even if that road led all the way to a wedding hall, it couldn’t be helped.

“Everyone gets married like that.”

It wasn’t some grand statement—just a plain fact. In their world, strategic marriages were common, and when everything was weighed objectively, it was an unbalanced deal to the point that it made no sense that the other side had pursued I-young first.

“If you have conditions, say them. I’m not talented at this kind of power struggle. And…”

I-young hesitated briefly. What she was about to say didn’t need to be said. But since she’d already begun—and swallowing the thought felt more awkward—it slipped out. Besides, it was the sort of thing you could say even to someone you’d just met.

“Next time, it might not be water. It could be the glass.”

When I-young tilted her head as if to say just look at yourself right now, Jeong-in laughed. It wasn’t amusement—if anything, it was a laugh born of sheer disbelief.

It was Jeong-in who stopped the elevator doors from closing. The smile vanished completely, leaving her face even more desolate than before.

“You haven’t changed, Son I-young.”

The sudden shift to banmal was like a punctuation mark—an ending and a beginning at once.

“Changed how?”

I-young answered as if she’d been waiting for it.

They’d spent three years together, even if it was back in their foolish teenage days. By anyone’s objective standards, they’d been quite close. Pretending to be strangers forever was ridiculous.

“You haven’t changed.”

Was that sarcasm? I-young blinked slowly, trying to gauge the meaning behind Jeong-in’s words. She couldn’t immediately pinpoint what the baseline for “haven’t changed” was.

“Go back. The marriage is off.”

Jeong-in’s voice that followed was as decisive as the halt in her orderly steps. Her face was harsher than when she’d been splashed with water, her contorted brows openly betraying her displeasure.

That was the end of the conversation.

When Jeong-in released the button she’d been holding, the doors closed without hesitation.