1 Month Later

Minjung’s lips are pursed in concentration as she ties Jinki’s bow tie for him. In her heels she is much taller than her husband who is easily able to gauge her brooding mood after spending 32 intimate years with her. Jinki spreads his legs and pulls her in between them by wrapping his arms around her red-clad waist. She takes a moment to adjust her balance and continues with her task habitually, her eyes looking a little unfocused.

“Babes?” Jinki prods her, only to receive a vague “hmm” in response. He tries again, “What are you thinking, love?”

“Nothing much,” Minjung answers absently. Her fingers patting down Jinki’s shirt collar.

Jinki attempts a guess, “You are worrying about tonight’s party.” When Minjung simply nods leaning into his embrace, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, he continues, “Share with me, love.”

Minjung lets out a deep sigh and relaxes in their embrace, “Sui has not spoken with me for nearly a month now, ever since the day we told him about our proposal that he should marry Amber.”

Her words make Jinki slump a little and frown, “You are not the only one. Our eldest is giving me the silent treatment. If Changmin does not like Junghee, why doesn’t he say so?”

“Exactly!” Minjung agrees vehemently, “We had simply proposed. We did not order them or anything like that. If they didn’t like our choice, both could have disagreed and we would have listened to them. Why are they silent instead? Even Dad and Papa Yun have no idea what is wrong. Both of them only care about playing with their great-grand kids.”

Jinki rubs her back and kisses her neck, “Babes, I don’t feel good about making the announcement tonight with the state of things as they are. We need to find out what is going around in their heads.” He fishes out his phone and calls his eldest child, “Your mother and I want to talk with you. Come to our room. Bring Sui with you.” He ends the call without giving Changmin an option to refuse. He then guides Minjung towards their sitting room and pulls her to sit on the loveseat with him, leaving the other loveseat and two single chairs free for their sons.

In less than a minute, their eldest sons heed Jinki’s call and enter the room in various state of dressing. Junsu makes a beeline for the vanity mirror to finish brushing his hair and puts down the hair brush before taking one of the single chairs and facing his parents, trying to gauge their mood from their faces. Changmin extends his necktie to his mother to tie for him. Minjung quickly does the needful in silence and after checking his appearance in the vanity, where Junsu had stood a minute ago, Changmin takes the other chair and crosses his legs. Just like his younger brother, he stares at his parents in silence.

Jinki and Minjung look at their sons sitting in similar cross-legged, crossed-arms manner displaying their closed and defensive states of mind. They let out a silent sigh and deliberately rearrange their bodies to show their sons that they are open to anything discussed.

Jinki looks his second- eldest straight in the eye and begins the difficult task of getting his usually chirpy child to talk. “Sui, is there any specific reason you are not talking with your mother these past few weeks?” He softly asks. Changmin glances at his brother, clearly expecting this moment.

Junsu takes a deep breath and fails in his effort not to fidget in front of their parents. He looks at his shining shoes, uncrosses his arms, thinks and links his fingers around his still crossed knees. “Hmmm, I am talking to her. I talked to her just this morning at breakfast,” he finally mumbles, unable to look at his parents lest they catch his lie.

“Asking her for another bowl of rice is not talking,” Jinki counters his son’s attempt to hide the truth. When Junsu does not appear to offer any other explanation, Jinki looks at Changmin and continues in the same soft tone, “Ming, what have I done to make you upset with me?”

Changmin simply shakes his head in negative without taking his gaze away from his brother.

Minjung covers her husband’s hand with her own, conveying her desire to speak. She does not beat around the bush. According to her, a month had been long enough time for their sons to approach them on their own. “If you do not wish to marry the girls we have chosen for you, why don’t you tell us? Has there ever been a time when we have not listened to what you had to say? We only suggested. You have the option to refuse.” Seeing that she has complete attention of both her sons, she smiles at them, “We do not want to force you into arranged marriages. If you want to marry someone else, remaining silent is not going to help matters.”

There is silence in the room for a few minutes.

“Junghee is narly three months pregnant,” Changmin finally whispers, not taking his eyes away from Junsu who begins to shakes his head frantically, trying to silently get his bother to stop talking. Junsu then looks fearfully at his parents, waiting for them to explode. He takes in the impossibly wide-eyed startled look of his parents and glares at Changmin.

Changmin waits in silence for his parents to regain their composure, then he drops another bomb, “The child is not mine.” Junsu is unable to sit still and begins pacing the room with his back to his parents. Having said all that he had to say, Changmin leans back in his chair and again waits for his parents to explode.

Jinki gulps a few times, opens and closes his mouth even more times and finally manages to choke out, “Then who is the father? Do her parents know?” He shakes his head answering himself, “Of course not, else we would know.”

Minjung takes her phone and tries to call Gwiboon, but Jinki puts his hand over hers and stops her. She turns to Junsu and asks him to sit down. When Junsu continues to pace, she looks at Changmin to find him looking at his younger brother again. She nudges Jinki and the couple study their sons again – the eldest sitting calmly while the youngest is pacing a hole in their carpet. She smiles as she watches Jinki finally understand the situation. Minjung grins and her eyes begin to twinkle naughtily, “Sui, when were you going to tell us that we are going to be grandparents?” She teases her younger one.

“What?” Junsu squeaks as he finally looks at them in shock. “Wh-wh-what di-did y-you s-say?”

Changmin finally uncrosses his body and relaxes, grinning at his brother’s shocked squeaks.

“We are so happy!” the older couple exclaims and gets up to squeeze their younger son between them.

Junsu stops his stuttering to look at them dumbly. After a few minutes of being squeezed tightly by his parents, he whines, “I can’t breathe! Let go!” When his parents hug him even tighter, he wails at his elder brother, “Hyung, get them off me. They are squeezing me to death. Why did you have to tell them?”

Changmin laughs, enjoying Junsu’s discomfort, “I have just told them one news, there’s more to go.”

The parents immediately release their younger one and round up on the eldest one. “There’s more? No wonder you were silent. What are you kids cooking up?” Jinki demands. Both husband and wife put a hand each on Changmin’s shoulders, gripping the young man tightly. Minjung goes as far as to glare at him.

“Well,” Changmin begins to squirm, “You see. It’s like this. You know. I don’t know why he told me. I mean, he should have come to you. But-”

“Stop talking nonsense, Ming, and come to the point. We’ll deal with why you and not us at a later time,” Minjung interrupts her by-now nervous son. “First, its Junsu and Junghee, right?”

Changmin nods. Junsu half shakes his head in denial, only to be glared at by his father and Junsu quickly nods his head in acceptance of his mother’s conclusion.

“Then you are going to marry Amber, Ming?” Minjung focuses on Changmin, ignoring Junsu for the moment. Changmin nods again, making his parents beam in happiness at him. “Good boy!” Minjung ruffles his hair, making him groan in annoyance. But she is not to be distracted from her task. She mentally kicks herself for not talking about this to Changmin earlier and saving herself and Jinki a lot of heartache.

“What else do we not know?” Jinki completes Changmin’s interrogation.

“Sehunnie has found his love in China,” Junsu pipes up the new kernel of information. As his mother picks up her phone to call his younger sibling, Junsu pours out the next bit, “Wait, don’t call him just yet. There’s more.” He then pleads silently with his elder brother.

“Idiot!” Changmin grins mischievously at Junsu. “I was anyway telling them, before you butted in. I should let you explain and then enjoy Sehunnie clobbering you to death.” He laughed loudly as Junsu’s eyes went comically round, remembering all the tortures their younger sibling could put him through.

The parents sit down in their loveseat and wait patiently for their sons to continue being a font of information. Changmin stops laughing and faces his parents to resume their conversation, “Don’t bring this up with Sehunnie as of now. Once he is sure, he will come to you on his own. They are not certain if long-distance relationship will work for them. Luhan does not want to leave China and Sehun does not want to leave Korea.”

“The twain shall never meet,” Junsu interrupts gleefully, happy that he is not the focus anymore. “Why the stubborn fool had to like someone outside Korea without any plans? And, here we were trying to set him up with the top model in Jinri’s agency. We should have known he is not interested in girls when he refused all the dates we put his way.”

“Look who is talking?” Changmin snickered, “The one who did not have the guts to tell our parents that he got his girlfriend pregnant.”

Junsu blushed red at the rebuke while their parents beamed happily.