“Excuse me, I’m sorry for coming late.”

Yonghwa bowed his head deeply as he entered the meeting room. He felt sorry for embarrassing his parents by coming late. However, when he lifted up his head, the view he saw surprised him quite much.

There was a young woman he knew, who was sitting comfortably between her parents.

She was Seo Joohyun, known as Seohyun, the best staff of finance division at his office. But also his main enemy when composing a financial proposal.

“Seohyun-ssi?” he finally voiced out his shock.

“Have you known each other?” Mrs.Jung asked him enthusiastically.

“Ah, de. She is one of the finance staff in my office,” he stated the fact.

“Yonghwa-yah, as much as you are so happy to see her, you better not forget to greet her parents first, Mr. and Mrs. Seo,” Mr.Jung teased.

“Oh right, I’m so sorry. Annyeonghaseyo, Jung Yonghwa-imnida. Nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Seo,” as he slightly bowed to them.

“Annyeonghaseyo, Yonghwa-ssi. It’s nice to meet you, too. Please have a sit,” Mr.Seo responded to his greeting.

“Aww, he is very handsome like Mrs.Jung said, isn’t he, Seohyun-ah?” Mrs.Seo nudged her daughter while the latter just simply nodded.

“Ah, kamsahamnida, Mrs.Seo,” Yonghwa responded politely.

“Right, this is my handsome boy – Yonghwa,” Mrs.Jung patted Yonghwa’s back a little and shifted to ask Seohyun, “So, Seohyun, have you known my son in the office?”

“Yes, Mrs.Jung. He is the leader of the avionics team. I have worked with him for several times. If I’m not mistaken, two or three times, wasn’t it, Yonghwa-ssi?” Seohyun passed the conversation between them.

“Yes, it was a pleasure to work with you,” he answered with a forceful smile.

‘No need to remind me of those exhausting battles,’ he added in his mind.

“I think we should start the dinner before the food get cold,” Mr.Jung proposed.

“Sure.”

Then, they all began to enjoy the food while exchanging stories about their family, the mothers’ old times, the fathers’ works, and of course about Yonghwa and Seohyun.

It supposed to be a good thing that his prospective wife was not a total stranger, wasn’t it? Yonghwa was not so sure, because his prior knowledge about her in the office didn’t make him at ease.

He could not imagine to be ruled by someone like her for the rest of his life, if they got married for real. But it seemed like his parents had loved her already, especially his mother.

“Seohyun-ssi, I heard that you are a great cook, is that right?” his mother kept the interview session on, even after the dinner time.

“Ah, aniyo, Mrs.Jung,” Seohyun shook his head shyly, “My mother just exaggerated about it. I just learned to cook simple dishes.”

“I was not exaggerating anything. She is absolutely a great cook. You should join us for dinner at our house sometime. You too, Yonghwa-ssi,” said Mrs.Seo.

“Ah, ne. Thank you so much for the invitation, Mrs.Seo,” he said.

“I always hope Yonghwa will marry someone who cooks well, because he could not even cook a ramyeon if I went out of the town. And two months later, he will go to study in Germany. I am really worried about his food,” Mrs.Jung shared her worries.

“Please don’t worry, Omma. There are so many places to eat around the campus and my apartment there. It won’t be a problem,” Yonghwa explained.

“But it’s not healthy to eat out everyday,” Seohyun suddenly commented.

‘Great, now she dares to lecture me about food nutrition, too,’ he muttered silently.

“Alright, I’ll learn to cook a few simple dishes from Omma before I go,” he said to his mother, only to be immediately passed by her to Seohyun.

“Or you can learn it from Seohyun. Is that okay, Seohyun-ssi?”

“Or maybe Seohyun could cook it for you there,” Mrs.Seo giggly added and ignited the laughter from the others.

“Eh?” Yonghwa could not believe the tricks they pulled in this family meeting.

To make it worse, Seohyun never said anything to oppose it. She just sat there and smiled politely to everyone.

‘Does she really agree to this marriage?’ he thought inwardly.

“Isn’t that lovely, Yonghwa?” Mrs.Jung’s question woke him up from his reverie.

“Pardon me, what were you talking about? I’m sorry for spacing out,” he asked again.

“Seohyun said that she ready to leave her work and follow his husband wherever he goes, if she is asked to. There are only a few young women who think like that these days. I’m glad that Seohyun is one of them,” Mrs.Jung told him.

“Oo..oh. Good for her future-husband,” he stuttered a bit.

Before the situation became out of control, Yonghwa decided to talked privately with Seohyun, “If you don’t mind, may I talk to Seohyun for a second?”

“Right, both of you must have many things to discuss. Just go to the back side of this place. They have a small garden there,” Mrs.Jung felt so happy to see Yonghwa took an initiative to chat with Seohyun.

“Seohyun-ssi?” Yonghwa called her.

“Sure,” Seohyun nodded and followed him.

***

After a few moments admiring the beauty of the garden, Yonghwa and Seohyun took a seat on one of its benches.

He cleared his throat before he began the conversation, “I guess I haven’t asked you how have you been these days, Seohyun-ssi? It’s been awhile since our last project, right?”

“De. I’m good, thank you.”

“It’s awkward, isn’t it?”

“No, if you don’t want to,” she suggested.

“Okay, let’s get straight to the point. We both know very well that they arrange this meeting to set us up. So, what do you think about it?” he asked her opinion.

“I think it’s fine.”

“You don’t mind if they force you to marry me?”

She laughed a little, “Seriously? I’m sure they won’t force me to do anything, Yonghwa-ssi. They only tried to help us in their own way.”

“Then, do you agree to marry me, Seohyun-ssi?” he looked at her curiously.

“Are you proposing me right now?” she asked him back.

“Oh no, I’m not proposing you. I’m asking because you looked so cooperative throughout this meeting. I don’t know, maybe you’ve already interested to marry me, or maybe you are the one who was suggesting this arragement on the first place. I’m just wondering.”

She scoffed at him, “Don’t get a head of youself, Yonghwa-ssi. I was just being polite.”

“But you do understand that those actions of yours only led them to think that you’re agree to marry me, don’t you?”

“I haven’t decided it yet whether I want to marry you or not,” she said as a matter of fact.

“Oh, are you really considering it? Because as long as we’ve known each other, you don’t have any interest in me, neither do I. So, I don’t think we could get married to each other.”

Seohyun just listened silently.

“I’m sorry if it sounded a bit harsh to you. I didn’t mean it like that. I just want to make it clear. And I think we shouldn’t give them a false hope by pretending to have interest to marry each other. Do you understand me, Seohyun-ssi?”

“Okay, Yonghwa-ssi, I get your point,” she responded, before muttered to herself, ”No need to be overdramatic.”

“Who did you say overdramatic? Me? You must be kidding me. I’m just helping you to understand our situation right now,” he felt so annoyed with her response.

“I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t mean to offend you. I think we should get back inside and tell our parents right now, before they think you are proposing me out here,” she gave him a mocking smile and stood up from her seat.

‘Geez, I can’t even talk with her more than 30 minutes without a fight.’

***

Yonghwa entered the dining room after Seohyun when he saw their parents smiled at them way too bright for his liking. He sensed something was not right.

“What happened? Is there any good news when we were out?” he wondered.

“Yes, Son, it’s indeed a very good news for all of us,” Mr.Jung replied happily.

“What is it, Father? Just tell me,” Yonghwa asked.

“What about your date with Seohyun just now? Have both of you confessed your feeling to each other?” Mrs.Jung interrupted.

“Oh, it wasn’t a date, Mrs.Jung. We just talked about something else,” Seohyun helped him to deny it clearly.

“Please don’t be shy, Hyunnie. Omma will not scold you, instead I’ll help you with it. We have discussed it with Yonghwa’s parents, too,” said Mrs.Seo.

“Eh? What do you mean?” Seohyun looked at the parents confusedly, so as Yonghwa.

“Yonghwa, Seohyun, we have decided to marry you two by the end of this month,”  Mr.Seo explained in excitement while the others just nodded their head in agreement.

“WHAT?!” screamed both Yonghwa and Seohyun in unison.

Author's note:

Being young and smart do not always make you move faster than your parents, right?

Thank you so much for your supports: comments, subscribers (I can’t believe it that many of you have subscribed to this story), and readers. It really gives me so much motivations to update this story as soon as I can.

Enjoy the story and please continue to inspire me by sharing your thoughts :)

- minikittybdg -