“It feels weird to cook again. How long has it been since the last I chopped these carrots anyway? Thanks to Mrs. Jung, the kitchen is now has been put into some good use.” Chen muttered to himself, chopping some carrot into small dices before throwing them in the frying pan.

He was just about to have dinner, and ever since ByulHee left, he’d usually have a very light dinner and most of the time he didn’t even cook. He’d just grab whatever he could find, and that would be his dinner. However, his concerned neighbor, Mr. and Mrs. Jung, noticed his eating habits and claimed that he hadn’t been eating healthy lately.

Feeling as if she couldn’t stand it anymore, Mrs. Jung spent the whole evening harassing Chen about the importance of having the right food at the right time, and it went on for about an hour. She even mentioned how ByulHee would be worried looking at her dad in that condition, who looked almost like a walking skeleton.

Before she left, she’d made sure that Chen would take into account of what she said, and indeed, he did. He’d taken out the vegetables and some meat, and decided to prepare himself some fried rice. What Mrs. Jung said was true though, that he needed to stay healthy so that ByulHee wouldn’t worry about him.

It was a miracle that she didn’t notice how much weight that Chen had lost when she was around a few weeks back, and it probably because she was too excited to see him again. In any case, he wondered whether ByulHee was doing well, too.

He was most concerned with what she ate, and hoped that she had proper meals than him.

“Ouch!” Chen exclaimed, and groaned at the sight of blood oozing out from his finger as he’d cut them by accident. His thoughts drifted too far away towards his daughter that he couldn’t focus on what he was doing.

“Darn it.” Chen grumbled as he headed towards the sink and tried to wash the blood away. Once the blood had stopped flowing, Chen took off his apron and walked towards the living room, not wanting to cook anymore as he’d lost his appetite.

He applied some medicine and a plaster, before resting his head on the cushion and sighed. The cut was not so excruciating, but something else was disturbing his mind terribly. He just couldn’t shake the thought off.

Right when the knife sliced his finger, an image suddenly popped into his head, and it got clearer when he tried to clean the wound at the sink. It frightened him so much, and he prayed that nothing bad would ever happen.

Because the image that appeared on his mind when he cut himself was ByulHee, and he felt restless for some reasons that he cannot fathom.

“No, she’s fine.”

Meanwhile, ByulHee was locked inside her room all day, and no, she wasn’t grounded. After the previous episode that happened, she interacted lesser with her family members, and so did they. Each parties found it hard to face one another after the incident that took place, and the atmosphere was filled with awkwardness and silence most of the time, especially during the meals.

MinSeok was away more often, and MinYoung seemed to be uncomfortable around her now. ByulHee noticed the guilt in her eyes, and she often felt like there was something that MinYoung wanted to tell her, but the woman could never spill it.

ByulHee thought that it was pointless to fill her head thinking about such things; hence she decided to ignore them and started doing things to occupy and entertain herself. She was just kind of tired with how everybody was acting lately. HeeJun looked at her with more hatred, and she didn’t even want to know why. MinYoung was avoiding her, and MinSeok was making it even more obvious.

And this day, was nothing unusual. ByulHee was always in her room, if not the library, and currently she was doing some finishing touches to the birthday card she was making. She’d spent hours on it, and gave her all into making the best birthday card she’d ever made.

Every year, ByulHee never failed to give Chen his birthday card, made by herself. Sometimes there would be a present with it, but most years it would only be the birthday card. Not that Chen minded, he was more than thrilled that ByulHee had put so much effort into it, and he treasured each of them dearly.

But this year, just because they were living far away from each other didn’t mean she’d stop making a birthday card for Chen. She was still thinking about giving him a present this time, and thought of asking JongIn for help since everyone in the house was on pins and needles around her.

Once she was done, ByulHee inspected her work and though not wanting to pat herself on the back, she was satisfied with the outcome. Over the years, she’d learned how to improve her decorating skills and she’d looked up for some ideas in books at Chen’s library.

When she was younger, the cards she used to make were childish and full with glitter here and there but as she grew, she taught herself on how to make a more mature looking card. Aside from her daddy, she often made cards for Mr. and Mrs. Jung, and sometimes for SuBin on her birthday.

She wrote her name lastly, and then went out of the room to grab something to drink. She’d been working on it for hours without her realizing, and it was only then that she gathered how thirsty she was.

While she was on her way to the kitchen, HeeJun happened to pass by her room and dully glanced inside, as the door was left open. He saw the mess on her bed, which was filled with coloring papers, scissors, and other stuff that ByulHee used.

He was just about to walk away uninterested when the card caught his attention. Amidst all the mess on ByulHee’s bed, the card stood out the most and HeeJun was curious about to whom it was. He casually entered her room and picked up the card, opening it and reading the content, as he pleased.

He smirked at ByulHee’s work and shook his head. “A dummy making a dummy card.”

He noticed the name ‘daddy’ on top of the card, and he immediately knew that it was for Chen, ByulHee’s so called daddy who lived far away from the city.

And without knowing why, this suddenly made him angry. The thought of ByulHee who still could make cards for someone who wasn’t related to her by blood made HeeJun angry. Despite everything that was happening in the house, she still had the audacity to think of the person whom she should forget, who had nothing to do with her.

“Put it down now, HeeJun.” A voice cut his train of thoughts, and HeeJun slowly turned with a bored expression. He held up the card and asked with a sneer, “You mean this rubbish?”

“Just put it down now!” ByulHee exclaimed, ignoring whatever HeeJun had said about the card and insisted that the card was put back on the bed, where it was. But ByulHee should’ve known better that HeeJun would never listen to her, and his expression hardened as he looked at her right in the eyes.

“Are you stupid or what? How can you still make a card for someone who’s living far away from you but you’ve never made one to your own dad? After the troubles you’ve caused, you’ve still got the guts to think about your adopted family than your real one!” HeeJun snapped, and ByulHee scoffed.

“You don’t know anything. You’re still a child. That man is my daddy, and no matter what happens he and my late mother will always be my parents.” ByulHee replied, suddenly feeling the need to let HeeJun understand this. She didn’t intend to have a childish fight with him, but HeeJun was talking about nonsense, and she couldn’t keep this up anymore.

HeeJun stared at her as if she was an idiot, and indeed an idiot was what came out from his mouth. “I can’t believe just how stupid you are.” He said. “And how selfish. The whole family is going through a hard time right now because of you, and here you are making some stupid card for some man who isn’t even your real dad! And everything that’s happened in this house is because of you! Appa is no longer around because of you and omma is on edge more often now! Why did you even have to come