Then, he looked at us and he told us he had to go back to Korea the day after.

I thought I heard wrongly when he repeated himself again. “I will be going back to Korea tomorrow,” Didn’t he just reconcile with his son? But he was only here for the weekend. He told me way before this. But…… No but. He certainly had other schedules back in Korea tomorrow and in the future. I couldn’t possibly expect him to stay here with us forever. Jesper was looking at me with his eyes opened wide, waiting for the translation.

“Jesper, papa is going back to, uhm, Korea. Tomorrow.” I said while I put on a fake smile to hide the disappointment. I… I didn’t know where the disappointment came from but it was there. Even though I tried to hide it, it was still rather exposed to anyone, judging from the way I spoke. I set my eyes on Jesper as I couldn’t bring myself to make any stable eye contact with Baekhyun at the moment.

Jesper was really calm about the news, though. He was pretty much quiet the whole time. He didn’t utter a word anymore but he didn’t even look like he was alright comparing to the way he was jumping and cheering just a few minutes ago. I couldn’t decipher what he was thinking in exact but I knew he was definitely bitter about it. He just didn’t know what he could do. The atmosphere that just got slightly better tensed up, again.

“But, would you and Jesper like to come to Korea with me?” Baekhyun finished off his uncomplete sentence from just now.

I finally made a proper eye contact with Baekhyun after hearing what he just said. I was taken aback by his words. But, would you and Jesper like to come to Korea with me? His words ringed in my head again and again. My mind went empty. We were staring at each other and I was totally stunned, I didn’t know how to react. After what seemed like forever, he finally raised his eyebrow and picked up a curve at the corners of his mouth, “Hmm?” he prompted for a reply. If that didn’t snap me back to senses, something else obviously did. Jesper was gently pulling my sleeve. More than once. Jesper’s waiting for his translation.

“Uhm, he asked… He asked if we, we would want to go to Korea with him….” I translated it to my mom and Jesper. My mom’s eyes was big af and I could literally see a sly smirk behind her poker face.

“Mommy, where’s Korea?” Jesper asked.

“Where your daddy came from, honey. It’s about 6 hours from our country by aeroplane.” I explained.

“Are we going to take a plane?????” Jesper was excited already. He had never taken a plane before. My mom and I didn’t really have the time and money to bring him out of the country. All we went were merely some neighbour states or just the neighbour country that could be reached by taking buses. Watching planes in the sky had always excited Jesper. Given a chance placed right in front of him like that, how could he be not excited?

Of course your boy wants to go. Going to Korea was even YOUR dream. My inner self snarled at me. True that. But, how could I just agree to it like that? Going to an oversea trip with someone who just got me hospitalized hours ago? “But… But how long are we going? I still have work amd Jesper still has classes… And, it’s too rush for us! We don’t even have a place to stay or whatever… We don’t have that much of money too,” I was certain I heard my mom’s sarcastic laugh when I said we didn’t have that money. Mom, I know that we do now but can’t you just cooperate a little  with your daughter? I hissed and glared at my mom and continued, “it would also be causing too much trouble for you if we were there...”

“How about just for a week? I will get my assistant to settle the leave application for both of you and I will take care of all the expenditure. I will arrange for you two to stay in the hotel near my place,” Baekhyun hurriedly replied in low voice before I could go on any further. “I can afford them.” he said and paused for two seconds. “Let me have a chance, to make it up to Jesper and…….” he looked genuinely sincere and that was what made my heart quivered. I looked away and Jesper was shaking my hand. “Mommy? What did papa say? Mommy??”

I cupped Jesper’s face with my palm but I didn’t answer him and instead, I asked him a question, “Baby, do you really wanna go to Korea with daddy?” Jesper nodded his head with force. I sighed and looked at my mom who was mouthing ‘just go’ to me. I finally gave in and nodded okay to Baekhyun.

Baekhyun’s face lit up as he quickly took his phone out from his pocket and called his assistant. “Confirm the tickets with the airline today. Proceed with the hotel booking and the arrangement of leave. I’ll contact you later. See you.” he kept his voice rather low as he didn’t want to attract too much attention. Technically, his voice was rather distinguished and unique and it wouldn’t be hard for any of his fans to recognize his voice just by listening to him speak.

“Mommy!! Are we going? Are w