Daehyun’s POV

I walk into the kitchen to get some breakfast foods. I don’t want to bother the maids to make food since I can make food pretty well. When I was living in America, I always made my own breakfast and Sophie has tasted it before. I’m sure she would notice if it tastes slightly different to my way of cooking.

“Dad?” I ask as soon as I walk into the kitchen.

“Oh, Daehyun, hello,” my father brightly greets. If there’s one thing that hasn’t changed in these six years that I haven’t been here is the fact that my father is much more accepting than my mother. He’s kind and considerate and I can see why everyone loves him. He’s just like some big loveable person that totally seems approachable on the streets even though he’s royalty. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t attend your party yesterday, I had to go to an overseas meeting.”

“That’s okay,” I say.

I go over to the fridge and start pulling out ingredients that I’ll need to make some light breakfast for Sophie. “What are you doing?” my father asks.

“Making breakfast,” I reply without even looking up at him.

“You make breakfast now?” he asks a little shocked.

I nod my head. “Yeah,” I say as I turn the stove on. I was thinking that maybe I could make an omelet for Sophie. It may not necessarily be the lightest food out there, but it’s one of her favorites that I may. She wouldn’t mind if I take a little while.

“You must’ve learned a lot over in America. Speaking of, how was your time over there? I haven’t had a chance to properly talk with you.”

“It was good,” I say as I crack some eggs into the bowl. “I learned a lot of things, you know. Aunt was really good to me there. I made a lot of friends, too.”

“I’m glad that you were taken care of well. We could say that a lot of things have changed since you left.” My father and I laugh with each other at that statement.

“My mother got crazier?” I ask. “She’s the one that demanded me to come back."

“Oh, your hair,” my father says completely ignoring the statement about my mother. I briefly forgot that I actually dyed it blonde. “I like it; it’s like a nice change.”

“Thanks,” I shyly say as I touch my newly blonde hair. “There’s a reason for it.” I put the eggs into the pan and carefully watch over them as I look at my father sitting there staring at me. “There’s something that I need to talk to you about.”

“What is it?” he asks as he takes a sip of his orange juice. He seems slightly excited. It’s probably the fact that I’m back after so long and it’s the first time he’s seen me since then and also our first real father-son talk.

“Can you talk to Mom about me not attending today’s viewing as the prince?” I plead.

“You know that your mother isn’t the easiest person to talk to,” my father states.

“I know,” I say nodding as I continue making the omelet. “That’s why I was wondering if you would be able to do it. You see, the viewing today, it’s my friend’s parents.”

“Your friend’s parents?” my father asks practically spitting out his drink.

I nod my head. People seem to be having that sort of reaction. “She’s my best friend. She was the very first one that paid attention to me when I got there. Well, at least she was the first one that became my friend.” I smile to myself like a fool at the memories of meeting Sophie for the first time.

“She seems to be very important,” Dad observes.

“She is, she’s my first best friend,” I state with a smile. I put the finished omelet on the plate and quickly make another one. “Yeah, so can you ask Mom? Or better yet, Mom doesn’t know about my hair, if you just make up an excuse for me… Dad, I want to be there for Sophie as a best friend. That leads into the next thing.”

“She doesn’t know that you’re a prince, right,” my father blandly states without even looking up from the paper that he’s reading.

“What?” I ask looking at him with a shocked expression. “How did you,” I begin saying while pointing at him. How in the world does he know?

“The way that you’re talking to me about her, the way that you haven’t used the word prince a lot, and other things of the like,” my father explains to me. “But I’ll cover your mother for you.”

“Really?” I ask. “Thank you,” I immediately say going over and hugging him. “I have to go back out to Sophie, I don’t want her to think that I’ve abandoned her.”

Sophie’s POV

“Have you picked a movie?” Daehyun asks coming in with two plates.

“Toy Story 3?” I ask holding up the DVD.

“Perfect,” he says with a slight smile across his face. “I’ll take you to the place where we watch movies.”

I follow Daehyun through the house when we finally reach a room that is quite large and looks like a movie theater. “You really have one of these in your house?” I ask as I scan the room.

“We really do,” Daehyun says with a smile. “Well, more like Youngjae does.”

“Right,” I say nodding.

“Sit here,” he says leading me to a seat. He puts a tray in front of me and sets the two plates down. “One is for you and one is for me. I know how much you like eating my omelets.”

I smile at the thought. Once in a while, and especially during the summer, he would make them for me. I love the way that Daehyun cooks, there’s just something completely different about it that I’m not entirely sure on.

Daehyun leaves to put in the movie and comes back as it starts. We both sit there watching the movie in silence and eating the omelet as Daehyun says some funny comments that make me laugh. I don’t know if he’s purposely trying to make me laugh, but if he isn’t, then he’s just saying some funny stuff.

“Purple bear, die,” Daehyun whispered. I giggled. “What’s so funny?” he asks looking at me.

“Your comments,” I say smiling. “Purple bear, die. You’re funny, Daehyun. It seems like being home has brought a new personality out of you. Either that or dying your hair did,” I joke.

“Hey, don’t mess with my hair,” he says lightly hitting me. “I like it, it’s kind of growing on me.”

“I would hope so,” I say, “you’re the one that got it dyed that color.”

We continue to play around with each other, not even paying attention to the movie anymore. It’s really just playing in the background now. I try not to pay attention to the clock because I don’t want this time to end. I don’t even want to think about what’s going to happen in a couple o hours. I want to savor this moment right now and remember it forever. It’s the first time that Daehyun and I really got alone time since we arrived in Korea. I’ve been spending the days with his family more than him, I think. Or at least that’s how it feels for me.

“Does Youngjae really like electronics?” I ask Daehyun.

“Why do you ask?”

“Well, you said that he was going to electronics store,” I say. “If someone goes there, then they have to like it, right?”

“I guess he does,” Daehyun says shrugging his shoulders. “I’m not entirely sure since I wasn’t here for a while.”

We both stare at each other for a while as the movie comes to an end. I didn’t realize that time passed that quickly already. “The movie’s already over,” I say staring at the credits.

“Let’s go out,” Daehyun excitedly says.

“What are you talking about?” I ask immediately turning to him.

“Let’s go out. We can spend the rest of the morning out until we have to come back here,” he says in a quiet voice. It’s like he’s afraid to mention the viewing. I know that he’s probably looking out for me, but it doesn’t mean that he has to totally avoid the subject.

“It’s okay to mention it,” I say as Daehyun grabs my hand and takes me to the front door.

“Mention what?” he asks slightly confused, but I know that he probably knows what I’m talking about and is playing dumb.

“Mention the viewing,” I say in a soft whisper.

I look at Daehyun as he looks at me and slowly nods his head. “Okay, but let’s spend the day out. I want to show you some more things since Youngjae and noona aren’t here with us.”

Daehyun hands me his coat. “Don’t you need this?” I ask pointing at it.

“You need it more. Take it, I have other coats here. Plus, I could always borrow Youngjae’s.”

I nod as I take the coat and put it on. It’s really warm and it smells like Daehyun. It gives me comfort and reminders of home as I zip it up. I follow Daehyun out of the house. I have no idea where we’re going or what he has planned. “We’re taking a car?” I ask pointing at it.

“Yeah, they wouldn’t mind,” Daehyun says nonchalantly as he opens the side door for me. I step in and admire the interior of the car. Seriously, where does Youngjae’s family get all of this money from? It’s something quite surprising.

“So, what does Youngjae’s family do for a living?” I ask Daehyun as he begins driving.

“Just some stuff here or there. Nothing illegal and nothing you should worry about, though,” he quickly adds.

I simply nod as we continue driving. “Where are we going?”

“Surprise,” Daehyun says with a light chuckle. I decide not to question him anymore and just let him drive. It’s not like I’m even going to figure it out if I look out the window anyway. Sighing in defeat, I decide to look out the window at the nice winter scenery.

Daehyun’s POV

Is Sophie really alright? Does she want me to mention that the viewing is today? I mean, I don’t want to get her upset or anything. I guess avoiding the whole conversation would get her upset, too. Then she asks what Youngjae’s family does for a living. I can’t tell her the truth. There’s no way. I don’t know why, but a part of me just doesn’t want to let her know. I want her to keep treating me like a regular person. She was the first person to do that. Everyone else just judged me by title and that was how I made friends, but not anymore. With my new hair, I’m going to confuse everyone and let everyone see me for me and not as anything else.

I sigh and take a glance at the clock. Sophie and I have about three hours until the viewing, which means that we have about two hours of free time because I want to make sure that we both have enough time to change into proper clothing before the viewing.

“How about we park here,” I say pulling into a parking space. “And we can just spend a nice time walking.”

“Okay,” Sophie says nodding her head. I knew she would say okay since Sophie rarely ever objects to anything.

We both get out of the car and start walking on the cold path. “Look, it’s snowing,” I say pointing up at the sky.

“Wow, it really is,” she says with a bright smile. “My first snow in Korea. My parents always loved the first snow. Apparently they have many memories in the first snow of the year. They would always tell me them.” I look at Sophie as she starts talking about her parents and their memories in the first snow. It must have a lot of meaning to her.

As Sophie and I walk along the path together, people don’t recognize me at all. I’m grateful for it. I think they don’t recognize me because of my hair color for one thing and a second is that no one even knows that I’m back, including that I haven’t been back in six years. I went through a lot, including my face changing as I got older. People wouldn’t be able to recognize that.

Faster than I had hoped, it’s already lunch time and it’s getting closer to the viewing time. Sophie and I were wrapped up in talking about random things, basically whatever came to our minds about whatever we saw as we were walking. Sophie was basically talking about how pretty Seoul is and how she can’t wait to see it when it’s not winter. I was doing my best attempts to keep her suspicions away from Youngjae’s family and my family for that matter.

Looking over at Sophie, I see that she’s shivering a bit. No matter how warm my coat is for her, she’s still a little cold. “Are you getting hungry?” I ask her. Like a small child, she nods her head. “Let’s eat ramen.”

I grab her hand and take her to one of my favorite ramen places. We both sit down at a table and I order for her. “This place looks really nice,” she says looking around.

“Yeah, I remember coming here a lot when I was little with Youngjae,” I tell her.

“Did you guys always go everywhere together?”

“Of course,” I say with a big smile, “we’re cousins after all.”

“That makes sense,” she says with a smile.

After a short while, our ramen comes out. “Go ahead,” I say gesturing with my chopsticks. “Try some.”

Hesitantly, Sophie eats some noodles and I see her face light up. “Wow, this is really good,” she says while taking another bite.

“I know, right?” I ask her. “It still tastes the same as it did six years ago.”

“You really liked it here, didn’t you,” Sophie says as she looks at me while eating some more.

“I guess you could say that.”

“You always talk about it before you left. So why did you decide to go to America if you loved it here?”

“Complicated reasons,” I say while I eat some kimchi. “Here, try this.” I pick some up on my chopsticks and offer it to her. “You’ll love it, it’s like cabbage.”

Hesitantly, Sophie takes some. “Hmm, that’s good,” she says nodding her head. “But what complicated reasons? I know that you’re only trying to change the subject.” Geez, she really does know me too well.

“Reasons I’ll tell you later, I promise,” I say sticking out my pinky. The reasons are complicated and they revolve around my life as a prince. I don’t want Sophie to know that so I’m just going to keep it quiet for right now until I ever decide to tell her.

Lunch passes peacefully with neither one of us wanting to look at the time and ruin the perfect moment. Even I don’t want to and it’s not the viewing that I have to attend, but in the time that I lived in America, I’ve gotten extremely close to Sophie and her family and this will be as hard on me as it will be on her. I just hope my mother understands the reason why I’m not going to be there as the prince and I hope that my secret will stay safe.

“I guess it’s time to get going,” I quietly say looking at her.

“I guess it is,” Sophie says sighing in the process. Neither of us want this time to come, but it’s going to eventually.

Sophie’s POV

I look at myself in the mirror. The black dress that I have on right now dampens my mood even more than it already was by knowing that this time has come. Apparently this is a big event, even though I don’t know why. My parents were normal people, right? Why does Korea love them so much, why do so many people need to come say goodbye to my parents? They’re my parents and as far as I know, they didn’t do anything with these people. Maybe they are important, but is this some secret life that I don’t know about?

A knock is on my door and I go over to open it. It’s Daehyun standing there with Youngjae right beside him. They’re both wearing black suits and they said that they were going to stay next to me the entire time.

Following the both of them to go to the part of the Korean Palace where the ceremony is being held, I feel my feet getting heavier with every step. Comfortingly, Daehyun grabs my hand. I look at him and he flashes a smile. I attempt to give one back, but it doesn’t come. If I’m a mess even before I enter, I don’t know how I’ll be when I actually see the caskets there.

The three of us stop right before the door. “Are you ready?” Daehyun asks squeezing my hand.

“I guess,” I quietly say as I look down at the ground.

The two tall and wooden doors before us slowly open to reveal the crowd of people that have come to say their goodbyes before the semi-private funeral tomorrow. No other child has ever thought of having a funeral for their parents before. I know I surely haven’t. The sight before me moves me to tears, my parents’ caskets in the middle of the room with a lot of people crowding around the center.

For some reason, there is a stage off to the side of the room with chairs on it. Am I supposed to sit there and watch? I look at Daehyun for support as he pushes me to go forward. “Go,” he whispers, “you’re first. You’re their daughter.”

Slowly, I take steps towards their closed caskets. The steps are slow and heavy and with every step forward, I feel like dying. My heart hurts even more seeing the sight and remembering the moment that they told me. My head becomes confused with everything that is going on. Why are these people here? Do they all have something to do with the missions that my parents were supposedly involved in? Why are they having their funeral in Korea? Where are the rest of my family members?

I stop before the both of them with the flowers that Youngjae handed me before I made my way forward. Seeing me in front of them, the people in the room all go silent. I guess they’re waiting for me to say something.

Holding back my tears as best as I can, I look down at the ground. I don’t know who these people are but it makes me even more nervous and sad at the thought that I’ll probably never know who they are. I’ll never know if my parents were friends with these people. I’ll never hear any more happy stories or memories that they always told me whenever I asked the questions. After tomorrow, I’ll have nothing.

“Mom, Dad,” I quietly say looking at them. “I guess I don’t know what to say.” I manage to choke out a pathetic laugh to brighten my mood a little, but it only makes me sadder. Before I know it, tears start pouring out of my eyes as I manage to continue. “You are great parents, even if I’m not your biological daughter. You provided me with a loving family that I enjoyed every day. We always spent time together sharing stories and I could always talk to either of you. Even if you’re no longer by my side,” I say while I take a quick glance at Daehyun and Youngjae who are standing a bit away to give me room, “you’ll always be alive to me. I’m your daughter and I will fulfill the roll in every way possible. I’ll make you guys proud, okay?”

As I begin to back away from the center, my heart gets heavier. This is one of the last times that I’ll be in the same presence as my parents. My last memory of them is my mother joking around and saying that Daehyun is my boyfriend. That was the last morning that I saw them, that was the last moment that I would ever see them.

What happened to my parents? What are they hiding from me? Why can’t I know? What are all of these people doing here? Questions enter my mind once again as I turn to go back to where Youngjae and Daehyun are standing.

Shortly after I go back to their side, my head starts getting dizzy. I must be getting a headache. All of this is just too much for me. I feel my chest tighten up and I start having difficulty breathing. Everything I see suddenly goes black.

Daehyun’s POV

I take once glace over at Sophie while my parents step up to give their respects. In the one second glance that I took, I see Sophie grabbing her head. “Are you okay?” I whisper, but she never answers. One minute she’s standing up and the next she’s in my arms. “Youngjae!” I say slightly loud and hitting him.

“Crap,” he says as soon as he sees Sophie in my arms.

“Go over and tell someone that I’m going to take her back to her room. She fainted,” I say as I lightly touch her forehead. “Sophie! Sophie!” I say. By this point, people around me have noticed and are pointing at Sophie.

My parents look over this way. My mother looks angry as ever, I wonder what my father told her. With my mother staying glued to the ground, my father is the one to run over to me to see the situation; he is the king after all. “Daehyun,” he whispers. He must know the importance of me keeping my identity a secret. “Take her upstairs. Inform the palace doctor about this. He’ll know what to do.”

“I already told Youngjae,” I say as I pick her up. “Thank you,” I say bowing like a normal person would when they come in contact with the king.  Hurriedly, I get out of the room with Sophie.  

I bet everything’s just confusing her right now. With all of these people and wondering why it’s taking place in the palace and probably wondering what her parents kept from her all of these years. Everything probably got jumbled into her mind so much that she couldn’t think straight. Well, that stuff and the stress that this funeral put on her since they are her parents.

The whole room fell silent when Sophie was talking to her parents. They all know that she’s their daughter. They all know who her parents are even if she and I don’t. I have to do some investigating of my own. I have to figure this out for her. There’s nothing that I can’t do, I’m the prince.

I softly lie Sophie down onto her back, removing her pillow like I was taught when I was younger. I move her head to the side and go to the bathroom to get a wet towel to put on her head. As I place the towel on her head, the doctor comes into the room followed by Youngjae. I’m not entirely sure if he knows who Youngjae and I are, I guess I’ll just have to see.

“Um, she fainted…sir,” I hesitantly add at the end because I’m unsure of what to call him.

“Daehyun, I already know it’s you,” he says as he goes over and checks on Sophie’s condition immediately.

“What?” I ask looking at Youngjae who just shrugs his shoulders.

“You didn’t think that I wouldn’t know you or your cousin here? Your cousin has been living here, so a simple hair dying job isn’t going to do the trick.”

“It fooled everyone else,” Youngjae complains, but I shoot him a glare. There are more important things here.

“How do you think she is?” I ask as he does the examination.

“I’m pretty sure it’s stress-related. Those are her parents down there, right?” I nod. “She might be out for a little while, until the blood flow gets to her brain again. I need someone to watch her at all costs since I have to be down at the viewing just in case anything else happens. Those people are very important. Can you guys stay up here?”

“Of course,” I say. “But…why are her parents important?”

Either he’s heard me and is just ignoring me or he hasn’t. I’m not sure which one it is, but he just bows while exiting the room. I pull up a chair and sit down next to Sophie and hold her hand.

“Get well soon,” I whisper as Youngjae comes next to me. “I can’t stand to see you in pain, Sophie. It makes my heart hurt. Please share all of your worries with me from now on, okay? I’m your best friend, what is there to hide?”

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When will Sophie wake up? Why are her parents important people? Why does everyone who knows about Sophie's parents avoid the conversation? What will the funeral be like?

Here is Chapter 7. Hope you enjoyed :D