The next few days passed by in a blink of an eye, and surprisingly, ByulHee hadn’t seen the sight of MinJi and her friends throughout the week. She was being more cautious now at school, just in case they appeared out of nowhere and started kidnapping her again, but they didn’t show up not even once.

ByulHee wasn’t sure whether to feel relieved or worried, and JongIn often assured her not to dwell so much on the latter. Also, according to JongIn, he heard some of the teachers talked about MinJi and her friends being suspended from school, when he was sneaking in the staff room the other day, which explained the group’s disappearance.

And there was a high possibility that they will be shifted to another school as their parents just discovered each of their crimes, and decided that their current institute was not the right place for their children. Most of the teachers were happy about this, as the lot brought nothing but trouble in and out of the school. And it was a good riddance, as for the students.

They can now move about freely and those who were once bullied by MinJi and the gang can come to school at ease now that they were no longer there.

And as planned, ByulHee stick by JongIn and his friends, as agreed at JongIn’s house the other day. All of them started to get closer to one another, and ByulHee really enjoyed their company, as they were loud, chaotic and noisy.

She’d never thought that her first few friends would be boys, but since they were good boys, ByulHee didn’t really mind. And they were sincere and happy enough to include her in their circle, too.

Weekend came in a heartbeat without ByulHee realizing, as she spent so much time with the boys that she didn’t realize how fast the time had gone.

And so, that Saturday, after getting up, washed and dressed, ByulHee found herself at the dining table while having breakfast with her mother and HeeJun. Director Kim was nowhere to be seen, and ByulHee had to admit that she hadn’t seen her much lately, but couldn’t care less about her.

It was probably better that they didn’t cross each other’s paths, though they were living under the same roof.

Looking around while munching her toast, ByulHee noticed that someone else was missing at the table, too. And she had to admit that that person as well had been avoiding her throughout the week.

Turning at MinYoung who was spreading some butter on her own toast, ByulHee asked, “Where’s ... father? Why isn’t he having breakfast with us?”

MinYoung looked at her apologetically and gave her a small smile, “Oh, he had to go to the office today. He said there are some paper works that need to be taken care of.”

 ByulHee only nodded her head at MinYoung’s answer, and continued eating her breakfast. She knew that that was just an excuse. No matter how busy MinSeok was, he always had time to eat breakfast with the family. Besides, it was a Saturday, and MinSeok rarely went to the office to take care of some paper work on weekends.

Clearly, he was still avoiding her.

It wasn’t just that morning that they had breakfast without MinSeok. Lately, it seemed that MinSeok left for work much earlier than usual and it didn’t go unnoticed by the others. Not only he left early for work, he came back late too so ByulHee hadn’t seen much of him as well.

And someone else wasn’t too pleased about it.

“Thanks to you, father is no longer around to spend time with us. He’s always at work and by the time he comes home, all of us are already asleep. He’s never done that before. No matter how busy he is, he always has time to at least have a meal with us. Now, we rarely see him and that’s because of you who keep making lots of trouble.” HeeJun snapped, sending ByulHee a hateful glare since he was sitting in front of her.

MinYoung sighed and shook her head. “No, HeeJun. That is not true. None of this is ByulHee’s fault and no, she doesn’t make any troubles. Your father is just a little bit busy lately, that’s all. He’s always busy during this time of the year, right?”

“But at least he used to have some time for me! Now, we hardly see him now and it’s all because of this girl! Don’t ever think I have no idea what’s going on because I do! Father keeps himself busy at the office so that he doesn’t have to be home and deal with whatever trouble this village has caused!” With that, he stood up, pushing his chair aside and stormed upstairs, leaving his unfinished breakfast on the table.

“Kim HeeJun!” MinYoung called, but of course, the boy wouldn’t be bothered to turn. He kept going upstairs and locked himself in the room, and MinYoung sighed again while rubbing her forehead. She had no idea on what to do with her son anymore. And the only thing she could at the moment was to apologize on HeeJun’s behalf.

“Don’t mind him, ByulHee. Ignore what he said, none of it was true. Your father is always busy at this time every year so the reason of him being hectic lately is certainly not because of you.” MinYoung tried to assure her, and ByulHee only kept quiet.

She very much wanted to tell MinYoung that every single word HeeJun said was true, but decided not to rub more salt onto the wound. It was evident on her mother’s face that she already had a lot on her plate, so ByulHee didn’t want to add any more trouble.

The two of them finished their breakfast in silence, and just as ByulHee drank her last glass of milk, MinYoung turned to her again and said with a rather small smile, “Oh, I almost forgot. I have something to tell you.”

ByulHee put down her glass and faced her mother, waiting for her to continue. This had better not be another company dinner that she had to attend or another company’s anniversary that invited her family to come. She already made up her mind that she wasn’t going.

With a deep breath, MinYoung tried to form the largest smile she ever had and laid down the news to her daughter, and surprisingly, it had nothing to do with dinners or anniversary celebrations.