Chapter as2: After Story: Happily Ever After (2)
He took the kids to Bom’s house. The house was fairly big, and had three rooms.
When he saw Bom again after bringing the kids back, her hair was no longer black, and looked as if it was slowly turning to a bluish-green colour. The roots of her hair were bluish-green while the rest was slightly darker.
“Welcome everyone.”
She had ordered all sorts of dishes, from spicy chicken feet to jokbal, fried chicken, two pizzas, Chinese cuisines including sweet and sour pork and stir-fried vegetables, several types of burgers, ice creams, noodles and street food like tteokbokki, fried dumplings and oden.
“Uwah. That smells crazy!”
For some reason, they all looked quite familiar.
“Hukk! Don’t tell me this is sweet onion bomb chicken? It smells exactly the same!”
“Nn. And the one next to that is chilli mayo sauce. They sell it separately but I tried buying it. What do you think?”
“You are amazing, unni! Are you like Mrs. Eat-it-all…?”
The next one to comment in surprise was Yeorum.
“Hoh? Is this what I think it is?”
“Nn. Spicy chicken feet. It’s your favourite, right?”
“How spicy?”
“Inferno 7 apparently. I asked the owner to make it a bit more spicy.”
“Wow. I missed this quite a lot. Feels great to have this again.”
Yeorum and Kaeul said with sparkling eyes.
But that wasn’t the end.
Placed in front of Yu Jitae was a very familiar burger.
“This. It’s from back then.”
“Do you remember it?”
“Of course I do.”
“I made that myself.”
Yu Jitae smiled seeing how thorough Bom was.
The burger she made looked exactly the same as the one he got from his benefactor back when he was young. She appeared to have used the burger they made during Gyeoul’s school election in the past as a reference.
“Bom.”
“Yes?”
“Thank you. This makes me very happy.”
Bom nodded with a smile.
Sitting at the table full of food that might even cause the legs of the table to bend, the four of them waited.
They weren’t praying or anything.
Usually, Yeorum would have picked up some food to mark the start of the meal while throwing out some words like, ‘Thanks for the food’, but today, none of the kids were keen on eating anything.
It was the same for Yu Jitae.
Even though he had his hands on the burger, he couldn’t eat it.
“…”
Sunlight was casting shadows inside the house. Delicious food was in front of them, and they were with their precious ones.
Having a nice meal together, they would share the trivial things that happened to them that day.
It was such a normal moment. It was nothing but one of the countless insignificant moments that were so common that it didn’t even leave any significant impression on them in the past.
“…”
However, it was now different.
How many things have they gone through just to reobtain this experience? What kind of life did they have to go through just to feel this small happiness again?
Remembering all the things that happened to them, Kaeul could not readily bring the drumstick in her hand towards her mouth.
“…Wh, what’s wrong with everyone? Hehe.”
But something like this was not what Kaeul wanted. She awkwardly swung the drumstick like a cheering stick.
“Unni? Hello? Let’s hurry up and eat. Uuun…?”
She shook it once to Bom, and once to Yeorum.
“Same with you ahjussi. What is wrong with everyone? The food’s going cold!”
Then, Kaeul shook the chicken in front of Yu Jitae.
“Like, seriously…! Unnis. You didn’t forget ‘that’ did you? Wake up, all of you!”
If we meet him again:
Then let’s push aside all the sorrow, have a relaxed conversation like we always used to and share what happened until now. Let’s open up to him everything that happened to us, without making him feel burdened.
That was what they had agreed on, but it seemed that the kids couldn’t control themselves anymore.
“…”
Bringing her hands that were grasping on the spoon to her forehead, Bom deeply lowered her head and began silently sobbing to herself.
All the blood and tears she had shed; her suffering and times of despair reappeared inside her head.
“…”
Before long, Yeorum covered her face with her hands and started crying as well. Her fully capable memories had been endlessly drawing her most precious relationship in the world in her head regardless of the time.