I walked along the quiet beach alone, looking out into the crashing waves. It was sunset, so the water far out looked almost purple and the sky was a deep orange. It was peaceful out here alone on the beach by my father's house. My father lived in Jeju Island where there were beaches almost everywhere you turn. He moved out here after he and my mom split. He said he needed to get away from where my mom and I were staying and claimed it was where he had always wanted to stay to get his creative juices flowing for his writing. I came to the Jeju this summer before my senior year because he wanted to spend time with me before I graduated and headed off for college. I had never really spent extended amounts of time with my dad since I was fifteen. Three years ago.

I sighed, thinking about the breakup.

It was so sudden, but it was almost as if I saw it coming. My parents had been fighting a lot, but towards the end, it seemed to have calmed down. Then, one night when I finally thought everything would be all right, they sat me down and told me they were going to be together no longer. It felt like my world stopped, but I wasn't upset. Not until my dad told me he had decided to move to the Jeju. It was so far away from me and my mother and it felt like he didn't want me any more. He was moving far away because he didn't want to see me anymore because I reminded him if my mother. At least that's what was going through my mind when he told me he was moving.

Afterwards my mother told me he wasn't moving because he loved me any less, he was angry at her and needed space. I was still upset, though.

It had been three years later and I finally got the courage to spend a whole summer with him. I wasn't upset with him for too long after he told me about the move, and we had talked on the phone and Skyped plenty of times after he had moved. My mother hadn't talked to him since he walked out the door for the last time.

I sighed once more, scanning the ocean again, before turning and hiking up the sand to my dad's beach house. His house had only one floor and it was flat and long. It had three bedrooms, one bathroom, a kitchen/dining room set, a living room and an office where my father worked on his writing. As you entered through the back, you were met with the living room. It was cozy and filled with leather couches and a plush beige carpet. After the living room, you were met with a long hallway that was the home of the three bedrooms, the office, and the bathroom. The hallway was quite wide so the rooms weren't too close together. After the hallway was the kitchen/dining room. That was my favorite room in the whole house because it was just as big as the living room, but more spacious and much cleaner. It had sparkling, white tiled floors and smooth, white marble counter tops. The refrigerator was a pitch black and the cabinets were white as well. There was a dining room off to the right as you enter in through the hallway entrance and a tall kitchen island to the right, in the midst of the sink and fridge. It was calm and bright and being in there made me happier, which was weird.

I found my dad in the kitchen sitting at the dining room table near one of the bigger windows that was in that area of the kitchen. He had his reading glasses on and important looking papers in his hands.

"Hey, dad," I said softly.

He looked up and smiled at me, setting his papers down on the table. "Hello, Chaeyoung. Come sit." He sat straight in his chair and pulled out a seat next to him. He looked tired when he smiled down at his hands as I walked over to the seat he pulled out for me.

I had been at his house for four weeks, this being my last week, and his eyes had lost the shine they first had when I arrived. His hair seemed to be thinning out as well. I was worried, but not very, and I secretly hoped it wasn't me that was making him so stressed looking.

I sat in the seat next to him and, ignoring his stressed out appearance, I nodded to the papers on the table. "What are those about?"

He glanced down at them and hurriedly scooped them up. "Oh, they're nothing. Work stuff." He straightened them up then tossed them onto the floor next to his chair. I gave him a curious look and he seemed to notice this, but ignored it. "So, you're leaving tomorrow. Ready for your senior year? I know I wasn't." He leaned back in his seat, looking off into space as if thinking back. "I was scared to death because I had my parents down my throat, telling me I had to do well this year or else I'd be gong nowhere in life. My mother had said that her first husband had gone nowhere in life and she didn't want that for me. I had a..." He trailed off when he noticed my look. It wasn't one of annoyance nor interest. Just a blank look. I was used to this by now, though. My father starting a topic, then trailing off into a story about something he'd seen or done. He chuckled. "So does that mean you're ready?"

I smiled politely and nodded once. "I think I'm ready for senior year. How hard could it be? It's just another year of high school, I've been through three years of it so far, I think I can handle one more."

H