A few days have passed since the little breakfast between Hyemi and Changsun took place. In the meantime, the father got a chance to spend an afternoon with his daughter as he decided to skip out on his work and made her leave early from school just so they could spend time together before dropping her off at her mother’s.

They were having lunch at a quiet restaurant when the subject of Hyemi was brought up by the little girl, slowing Changsun’s gesture of having another bite of his food.

“Daddy? Are you ever going to get married again?”

“Huh? W-why do you ask sweetheart?”

“Mom got remarried to Doojoon so I was wondering if… it was ever going to happen to you too… You know, maybe to someone like Hyemi?”

He choked on his bite and reached out for his glass of water, taking a sip before finally being able to calm down. “H-Hyemi?”

“Mhmm. I know you like her.”

“Like her? Sweetie, I don’t even know the woman-”

“Daddy, I saw how you looked at her the other day! It was like hmm… love at first sight!”

The man let out a light chuckle, knowing where his daughter was going with this. “Hilda, sweetie, you know that the real world doesn’t involve fairytales, right?”

“It doesn’t mean that it can’t happen. They happened once, so it could too!”

“Happened once?”

“In the book! They are true stories daddy!”

Looking into her eyes, he noticed the glimpse of hope shimmering. He sighed, not having the courage to break her heart and simply let her believe that those fables were true. She was still an innocent kid after all. “If you say so~”

“So that’s a yes? You’ll marry Hyemi?”

“Who said anything about that?”

“Well you didn’t say no…”

“But I didn’t say yes.”

“Daddy~ Then what about that breakfast the other day? Hmm? That counts as a date, right?”

“Not really-”

“Then why don’t you ask her out on a date?”

Leaning closer to the table, his elbows resting on the covered surface, he stretched out his hand, playfully ruffling his daughter’s hair as a smirk displayed across his lips. “You really like her don’t you?”

Matilda only nodded her head, happily beaming at her father before taking another bite out of her food.

The man chuckled as he shook his head. “What am I going to do with you, hmm?”

After he dropped Matilda to her mother’s, Changsun drove back to his apartment, leaving his strange conversation to be replayed inside his head.

He had to admit to himself that Hyemi did make some impression on him the first time he saw her but that was only because he was shocked about seeing his daughter’s new ‘friend’ – or so he thought. The second time, spending that time with her left him more confused about that feeling that kept stirring inside his stomach; it’s been a long time since he felt like this and having it back felt kind of nostalgic but looking at Hyemi though, that stirring felt familiar, it was still new, enticing the little sparks that flew from one corner of his body to the other.

‘Maybe I should ask her out… It wouldn’t hurt, right?’

Recognizing on what street he was in, he decided to take a detour and drive to the library by his daughter’s school, hoping Hyemi was still working. Once he arrived, he quickly parked his car by the sidewalk just as she was making her way out. He quickly jumped out of his vehicle and ran up to her, calling out her name. She turned around and looked surprised by his abrupt presence. “Mr. Lee? I-Is everything okay? Is Matilda okay?”

“Please, call me Changsun, and yes Matilda is okay. I actually came to see you because I wanted to ask you something…”

“O-oh, okay.”

One deep breath and he quickly spilled out his question. “Would you like to go out on a date with me?”

Motionless in her spot, was barely hanging open in shock at his question. He was suddenly looking so shy, his hand rubbing the back of his neck, his heart pounding against his chest from the nervous feeling roaming inside of him. She blinked her eyes back to reality but was still left without her voice until she realized that her heart had suddenly picked up its pace. “A-a date? With me?”

“That was the plan.”

“Wow, hmm…” His words were starting to sink in and as they did, she couldn’t help but shyly glance at him, the corner of her bottom lip lightly stuck between her teeth. “… sure, I’d like that, very much.”

“Great! Hmm, how about tomorrow night?”

“Sounds good to me.”

“Perfect! I’ll pick you up at seven?”

“I’ll be waiting.”

He smiled at her as he started walking backwards before turning his back only to be quickly stopped as she called him out. “Changsun… There’s something you forgot.”

“Oh?”

“My phone number.”

‘I am so underdressed right now… Why didn’t he tell me that he was bringing me to a freaking five star restaurant?!’

Walking through the entrance of the place in question, Hyemi was left baffled at how expensive and elegant the place looked, her head eyeing every aspect that came into her sight. Changsun stood by her side as he went to call out for the reservation he had made, his hand gently holding his date on the small of her back.

As they were being led to their table, glances were shot towards her making her uncomfortable at the unwanted attention she was receiving from the customers around. “Ch-Changsun? Why didn’t you tell me you were bringing me to a place like this?”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“I-I’m not dressed… properly…” Looking at her, he saw how uncomfortable she was and glanced around him, realizing the first mistake of the night. “Do you want to leave?” Turning her head to look at him, she hesitated on her answer before shaking her head, telling him that it was fine. “I’m sorry about this, I didn’t realize-”

“It’s okay, don’t worry about it.”

“Hyemi, if you want to leave, we can go somewhere else-”

“It’s okay, I’m already getting hungry anyways~”

After reassuring him, he helped her take her seat at their table before sitting down in front of her. They were both handed a menu and took their time looking through it; Hyemi was displaying her confusion, her face scrunched up while Changsun had just closed the booklet. He glanced up at her and chuckled at her face, catching her attention. “Do you need help with that?”

“Please! I don’t even understand half of what is written in there.”

A light laughter escaped from both of them. Changsun leaned in closer towards the table as Hyemi handed him the menu so they could both be facing it. Every time she had a question about something, he would softly answer her, explaining to her what the meal would look like.

Once she finally decided what she wanted to eat, their waiter came by and wrote down their orders before leaving and coming back with a bottle of wine that Changsun had chosen as drinks for the night ahead.

From there, things were going smoothly as both have engaged in a lighthearted conversation about their lives. Changsun had learned from his date that she was taking night classes at a University so she could get her diploma that would allow her to aim for the position of EIC in a book publishing company – though she knew that it would take a while before she could reach the top – while maintaining her job at the library during the day. As for Hyemi, besides knowing about Matilda, she learned more about the divorce and his ex-wife, and about what he does for a living, making her understand the reason why his daughter called him a ‘workaholic’.

“How hard was it to have become CEO?”

“Quite hard actually. Even though it’s a family business and that my father could’ve easily given me the position, I told him that I wanted to work for it and climb up the latter like everyone else. I wanted the people to see that I was willing to work hard for the job.”

She was about to reply when they were interrupted by a buzzing coming from Changsun’s phone. He excused himself and picked out the phone from his pocket before ignoring the call and placed it back inside his pants pocket, putting his attention back on Hyemi as he apologized for the disruption.

“It’s okay, don’t worry about it.” She softly smiled at him and took a sip from her glass before going back to their conversation.

Just a few minutes afterwards, they were once again interrupted by the man’s phone, loudly vibrating in the middle of their conversation. A sigh came out from both of them, Changsun picking out the device once again while Hyemi was eyeing him feeling irritated. He stared at the ID screen for a few seconds, hesitating on whether to answer or just ignore the call once again. The glance on his phone caught her attention thinking that something might have gone wrong.

“Is everything okay? Is it Matilda?”

“N-no, its hmm, work calling…”

“O-oh. It looks like its important-”

“I’m not going to answer. I’ll deal with it later.”

She was glad to see that he wasn’t going to interrupt their date with work but seeing that he simply ignored the call instead of turning it off left her with that same irritation and upset feeling stirring inside of her.

‘And here I thought he was a complete gentleman…’

She smiled at him lightly, masking her true feelings about their night.

They tried to move passed this as Changsun attempted to pick up from where they have left off, leaving Hyemi to talk again about the internship at a book publishing company she was about to start, which was part of her school program to get her credits. Though he was looking at her, he tried to focus on what she was saying but his mind was starting to drift back to the phone calls he kept receiving; its not that she wasn’t interesting, in fact he was really liking how loving and quirky she seemed to be, something that made him feel more attracted to her.

As for the young lady, she knew he wasn’t listening and it was starting to seriously piss her off. Stopping mid sentence, she excused herself as she got up from her seat, catching his attention as he mimicked her gesture. “I’m going to go freshen up, I’ll be right back.”

She quickly walked away from the table, tightly clutching onto her purse as she made her way to the ladies’ restroom, leaving the man behind as he was still standing while watching her go. Once she was out of sight, his phone started to ring again; since she wasn’t there, he took this chance to answer the call thinking that it was going to be a quick one.

Back to the ladies’ room, Hyemi was standing in front of the mirror, her hands by the side of the sink as she leaned her palms against the marble counter, taking in a few deep breath before lifting her head up to look at herself in the glass. She tried to control her anger, feeling like she was about to explode at any second now.

‘Now I know what she meant by workaholic. Seriously, he can’t last without that stupid phone!’

A heavy sigh came out of . She stood back up on her feet, fixing her dress then her hair and gave herself one last look before walking out back to their table.

The closer she got, she grasped strongly onto her purse at the sight of her date talking on the phone. He was so caught up in whatever conversation he was holding, he didn’t see her coming until she sat down back on her seat. She tilted her head to the side to catch his attention but in vain, all she received in return was the ‘wait just one second’ gesture.

She huffed out in disbelief and roughly got up on her seat, throwing the cloth that was lying on her lap back at Changsun before hastily walking out. The man was left frozen, taking in on what just happened and realizing that Hyemi was walking out, he closed the call and rushed after her, ignoring the stares of the other customers.

She stepped outside to the cool breeze, gently hitting her body. She was looking for a cab to go back to her place when she felt a tug on her arm. She turned around and saw Changsun catching his breath as he had ran out quickly to catch up to her. She roughly pulled her arm back away from his grasp, letting her boiling anger take the best of her.

“Thank you for the lovely night Changsun. I had a great time.” The spite in her voice made him slightly cringe. He could clearly see the frustration in her eyes and it made him feel guilty over the way he acted through the night. “I’m sorry-”

“Save it. I don’t need your apology… I was having a good time with you; I was really enjoying our time to get to know each other, just like how it went with that breakfast the other day, but god damn it, that stupid phone! You didn’t even have the decency to turn it off so we wouldn’t be bothered! Do you know how disrespectful it felt? Who the hell do you think you are blowing me off like that?!”

“H-Hyemi, please-”

“I was actually starting to like you, really like you, but you ruined it. Goodnight, Mr. Lee.”

Not even giving him the time to answer, she turned her back on him and walked away to the closest cab that had just parked by the sidewalk. She climbed inside and the car quickly drove away leaving the man to sigh in defeat, his head falling backwards as he closed his eyes before going to back inside the restaurant and ending his night on a bitter note; paying for the meal and going back to his office to work.