15 days until Christmas

 Jessica checked around the mall for her daily morning inspection. Everything seemed to be opened, everyone was present, and the Santa stage was once again making headlines in the center of the mall.

 The only problem was that she was missing her Santa.

 Sica dugged in her pocket for her cell phone and dialed Khun's number. He's been late on and off, and it was really testing Jessica's patience.

 "Hey Jess," he greeted.

 Jessica snarled, "Don't 'hey' me. Where are you?"

 Nichkhun stuck his hands in his pockets, trying to deal with the snowy weather of Seoul. "I can't ride my bike in this weather and the next bus isn't suppose to come until 20 minutes later."

 "I'll go send you a car -"

 "No." he declined, a smirk growing upon his face. He might have been in a bit of a rut, but he wasn't going to get there by himself. "I want you to pick me up."

 Jessica scoffed, like he had the power to make her do whatever he said. Khun may have a few years of life experience ahead of her but intelligence wise he was at least half her intellect.

 "Nice try, but no."

 Khun tsked, he didn't like the sound of no coming from . "Remember what Lee Soo Man said Jess." he reminded her. "You don't want me to quit last minute then suddenly leave your precious little mall behind now?"

 She sighed, so she lost the battle. She looked back at her watch, with traffic she could probably get him back at the mall right before the doors officially open for another day.

 Jessica raised the phone back to and responded.

 "I'm on my way."

 After about 10 minutes Jessica arrived with her fancy Kia. She rolled down the window and called him over, startling the Santa Claus.

 "How'd you find this place so quickly?" He asked. His location was hidden in the suburbs, even though Jessica mentioned living somewhere around here he still didn't believe it.

 "Are you kidding me?" she retorted, while Khun was buckling his seat belt. "I lived just around that corner." She pointed towards an intersection with a stop sign perched at the corner. "In third grade I beat up Kim Jaejoong because he stole my barbies."

 "Miss Jung beating up boys?" Khun asked in disbelief, mocking a shocked expression as if he had any actual interest.

 "Shut up," she said, slapping his arm playfully.

 Khun rubbed his arm, her little slap actually did pack a punch. "Looks like you never lost your strength,"

 Jessica simply smiled as she turned towards the road. "I know."

 Work was over and Jessica gave Khun a ride home, at his request. He wasn't going to take the lame bus with perky high school kids that are so loud and he definitely wasn't going to walk home to the suburbs, and at least he had control over Jessica so it didn't matter.

 "Horvejkul's," Jessica said as she read the name of the restaurant aloud. There was something familiar about the place, but she couldn't remember if she actually been here.

 "That's my restaurant," Khun chirped.

 "I've been here,"

 "Seriously?" Nichkhun asked in shock. Had he really seen Miss Jung before their little fiasco two weeks ago?

 Jessica nodded. "My dad loved this place. I think he took me here once or twice when I was little."

 Khun adjusted himself in the passenger seat and turned towards Jessica. Maybe he had some sort of strong friendship with her dad at some point. "Are you sure? What's his name? I probably served him a billion times."

 "I really doubt that," she denied, shaking her head. "He left my family when I was five."

 Nichkhun froze, he never imagined that. He might have lost his mother, but that was just recently. He couldn't even imagine what would happen if his father left at that sort of age of development. He wanted to apologize just for asking but it seemed like someone was itching to interuppt their small conversation in her car. 

 "There you are!" Nichkhun's dad shouted as he opened the passenger door. He looked back at Jessica then towards his son. "Who's your friend?"

 "Jessica Jung, public relations at I'Park Mall." she introduced, offering to shake her hand with the creator of an imbecile.

 "Go on in Khun, you're late." he ordered. "Bring your friend too."

 "What?" Jessica asked in shock. She only came here to drop off her worker, not for a quick meal. She felt bad if she would deny an elder's request, but she really didn't want to eat at that moment.

 "You should just go," Khun whispered. "Dad doesn't take no for an answer."

 And with relunctance, Jessica got out of her car as well.

 "The key to a good curry is to use the proper spices." Mr. Horvejkul explained, demonstarting with a big pot in the back. "You don't want to overwhelm with spice, but you want it to be there." He added a pinch of paprika and churned the bowl. It held about 10 kg of curry and it was pretty hard to manuever. "You wanna try?"

 Jessica scoffed, moving a spoon big deal. "Totally. It's just curry, no big deal." She tried to turn the spatula but it didn't seem to budge.

 Nichkhun however came up behind her and adjusted her hands, taking his sweet time. "You want to hold the spat with your fists just centimeters away. That way the strength will be equal."

 Nichan, Yanin, and Sherleen were watching from the dining tables, interested in the new guest at their restaurant.

 "Isn't that the big boss lady Khun keeps complaining about?" Yanin asked as she continued to wipe down a table.

 Nichan examined the lady further and smirked. "I think his exact words were American name professional bit-"

 "Quiet!" Sherleen snapped, touching the stomach of her elder sister. "You don't want the baby to hear such horrible profanity."

 Back in the kitchen, Khun was still helping Jessica stir the curry. She seemed to get the hang of it and shook Nichkhun off her backside. "I think I got this curry thing now." She continued spinning it and suddenly the curry exploded in front of her face. Mr. Horvejkul rushed over to grab a towel as Khun turned off the stove, she seemed to have cause a bubble from the stirring and evidently popped it.

 "You okay?" he asked as he grabbed the towel from his father, dabbing the cloth around her face. Jessica snatched the towel away from Khun and rolled her eyes. She had spices among other liquid things all around her, she was definitely not okay.

 "Look, I'm sorry about what happened earlier." Khun apologized. After a few minutes the two got settled down and sat at the bar, Jessica all cleaned up. "Dad's really ... aggressive."

 Jessica chuckled. "It's fine, I think your father is very charming."

 "He probably thinks the same about you," he remarked. Jessica blushed and looked away, refusing to let her guard down around Khun in his own restaurant. She looked over at the corner to see medical books.

 "Are those yours?" she asked, pointing over to the stack of textbooks.

 "Yeah."

 "I didn't know you were studying to become a doctor," she confessed.

 "You don't really know that much about me Jess." Khun continued. "I juggle being Santa Claus, trying to be the family's first doctor, and run a restaurant all in one body."

 So maybe Khun wasn't that much of a slacker after all. He had to continue an education while working two jobs. "That must be difficult."

 Khun shrugged, it wasn't going to be in a few days at least. "The restaurant's supposed to close on Christmas Eve, so I guess I'll get that off my chest, by then I won't be Santa and all I'll have left is the doctor thing."

 "Wait," Jess backtracked, going back to the first thing that caught her attention. "Your restaurant's closing?"

 Nichkhun grabbed a nearby flyer and placed it in front of Jessica. On top it read 'Horvejkul's Final Day! December 24' in big font with other information about the goodbye party. "Some bigshot company is trying to buy this place to make some huge mega-mall."

 "That's crazy."

 Nichkhun scoffed, "I know. All the other restaurants and small shops already quit, we're the only ones fighting for it."

 Jessica nodded, it made sense. "And that's why you need the job."

 "With the job I got enough to pay up until Christmas Eve. I've been trying to get Horvejkul's stated as a national landmark so it would be untouchable and we don't get the final statement until Christmas Eve."

 "That's a y way to start off Christmas."

 "Well with my mom gone, I just don't want to leave the restaurant. It's the only thing that keeps me and our family so close together."

 Jessica nodded, she didn't really understand what he was trying to get at, but she pretended to. "At least you'll be with your family, my Christmas memories were mostly of me, my mom, and sister ordering Chinese food and drinking wine - my mom was doing the drinking though."

 "How about this year? Same thing?"

 Jessica shook her head and bit her lip. "My mom committed suicide and my sister moved back to America, so it's just me." Jessica looked at her watch and gasped, "Look, Khun, I appreciate the offer but I really can't overstay."

 "But why?" he asked, watching her stand up from her seat. "The curry's almost ready,"

 "It's fine, I don't eat curry, too many carbs."

 She walked away and bid her farewells. The moment the bell on top of the door rang Khun's father approached him.

 "So, when's the wedding?"

 Nichkhun turned around and laughed. "Who? Me and her?"

 "Of course,"

 "We're not together," he stated. "Besides, she has a boyfriend."

 Khun's father chuckled, his son was so naive at times. He held his son's shoulders and smiled. "You know when I first met your mom she had a boyfriend too."

 Nichkhun looked at his father in confusion. "What does that have to do with me?"

 His father simply slammed his medical books onto the table and grinned. "You'll find out sooner or later."