- Chapter 13 -

Yeonseok called when Jisoo just got off from the bus after about three hours trip.

They hadn’t actually reached the destination, they had just arrived at this kind of transit place because the village they visited couldn’t be passed by the bus. The only kind of car that had access to the top—because it's supposedly still about five miles up the mountain—was small open trucks parked in the district farmers’ community base camp, and the cars would take them to their destination village.

“Everything’s good. The air is so fresh, the view is nice. I think you’ll like it here too, it’s so green in here.”

She wasn’t really comfortable to get a longer conversation when people started looking at her, so implying her desire to immediately end the call, she lowered her voice. She knew Yeonseok caught that in instant without too much difficulty, because he then winded up their chat.

“Alright, send me some pictures when you get there.” He said.

“Sure, I will. And…” For a second there was a debate in her head for something that she was thinking for the whole three hours on the trip, did she have to tell him about Sehun’s being here?

“Yes?”

“Um, Sehun is here too. Well, he’s not supposed to be here, but someone cancelled in last minute, and Jongin said—he’s the one who invited me to this trip, Jongin said he was the only one available. So...”

There was a pause for a second, but then she heard him replied a short ‘okay’. She was relieved that it’s not a problem for him, but it didn’t make anything less awkward in a sudden, though.

“It’s nothing actually, I just thought that you may want to know.”

“Yeah, sure.” He cleared his throat. “Thanks for letting me know. Have a fun weekend, you guys.”

“You too.”

Jisoo ended the conversation right there and joined the others. The bus returned to Seoul that morning and would come back to pick them up on Monday. They were prepared for another car trip by then, two small pickup trucks were ready to go to ride with them and and their stuff together.

This was the first time Jisoo rode in a pickup like this, if her dad was still around and knew she's doing this sort of thing, he would be thrilled. But it turned out the trip wasn’t too bad, although the terrain was more dominated by the uphill road, the scenery they passed was so incredible. It really worth the thrill in the sharp wobble and tight grip on the side of the wall of the car, as well as the cold wind that slapped their faces fiercely and the staggering fresh air. Squeals and shrieks of excitement met them in surprise. The village they visited was on the highest hill side, everywhere laid a vast agricultural area overgrown with vegetables. It’s really beautiful.

Jisoo took out her phone camera and took some pictures to send to Yeonseok later, then returned to enjoy the rest of the trip until they stopped in front of a white community building. The village chief welcomed them and invited them into the hall, where they would stay there during the activities here.

Some women and grandmothers also welcomed them and brought food for lunch. An elderly deaf grandmother caught Jisoo's attention when she saw her communicating with Soojung using her hands. The grandma looked very happy because someone could understand her language by communicating with her among them.

“Her name is Geunseok, she said.” Soojung explained to everyone, “And she cooked this dishes since four in the morning, she hoped you guys like it.”

They unfurled a long table in the center of the hall, then with the village chief and some of their residents having lunch with the cooking menu the women cooked for them.

Jisoo didn’t expect they would be warmly welcomed like this, it was her first time to see this form of hospitality where as if the whole village gathered to meet them and cooked this much for everyone. Maybe because she had been living in the capital since she was kid where people tended to be more individualistic, the scene around her was enough to make her emotional. It reminded her of her mom who used to be very friendly to everyone. She remembered how her mom could remember all the names of people who lived in their area, and how eoveryone seemed to know her too. Her mom would love to be here if she was alive.

She seated herself between Lisa and Hayi, and they reminded her of this saying that great minds think alike—these girls were full of wits and made a great team at lightening up the mood. Ah, they also had Baekhyun as their male version, they’re just a perfect trio. It could be said that lunch mood was great thanked to them, Baekhyun was really great with the elders, the grandmas loved him a lot while Lisa and Hayi were practically good with everyone, and they successfully broke the ice among the formality and made their first meeting with the villager much more fun with their jokes.

And the more Hayi got to know her, the girl couldn’t help herself to keep teasing her with the married-girl joke, and because Lisa and Baekhyun joined her, it became the talk of the lunch.

“You must have married a heck of rich man to get you this shinny bling-bling, Young Lady.” One of the aunties commented when they asked her to show them her wedding bands—she needed Baekhyun and Soojung to translate it for her since the ladies here were speaking in a very strong dialect.

“She’s the congressman’s daughter in law, Aunty. Her husband is the owner of one of the biggest hospitals in Seoul, super rich.” Said Baekhyun, again with the teasing.

“You’re so lucky. When I was your age even getting married with the chief village’s son was only just a dream. We couldn’t do much in this small place, everyone just married each other. We’re practically a big family tree here.”

Jisoo could only smiled responding the varies of comments from the elders. Indeed, if everything was measured with money and wealth, Jisoo probably would think that she was very lucky to marry Yeonseok. He, to all intents and purposes, had everything in his life, and she believed Yeonseok wouldn’t mind giving her anything she asked for. The only problem was her measure of happiness was not about those things mentioned. Jisoo didn’t even care about it.

Now that everyone knew about her marital status, the topic of their conversation suddenly turned into marriage counsel, the elder was, like, sharing their experience and view about their marriage and let them know what to expect from it when the time came for her friends. And in the depth of the discussion, Jisoo couldn’t resist to land her glance on the only passive figure at the end of the table. Sehun looked unconcerned with the chatter of the most of people, while looking busy chatting to one or two uncles across from him.

When her eyes met Jongin, who sat next to him, who also didn’t comment much from the beginning, Jisoo broke their gaze and stared at her rice bowl. She didn’t say anything more for the rest of the lunch.

They had free agenda until the evening after lunch. Their main event was actually in town. When Jisoo asked why they chose to spend the night in the mountains, in addition to saving money—because it was apparently free to use community hall building, Soojung got the fact that the village always celebrated the harvest party in late autumn every year. And she thought they could do some works there, even if it only helped the preparation of the celebration party in that small village. What was interesting was this village was very small and remote, that almost no young people lived there. Infants and toddlers even could be counted.

The youngest and the only young generation was grandma Geonseok's fourteen-year-old grandson. Jisoo met Junsu at the grandmother's entourage around the village, and took them home while visiting their home—which was far apart. There, the nearest neighbor could be up to hundreds of feet away.

Grandma Geonseok also lived with her another granddaughter, a young woman who was almost due with her pregnancy. Jinsu, the woman's name, was probably the first young woman, and probably the only one they'd found in the village all day. Jinsu's husband worked in the basecamp community where they had transited before, and always came home at night after his work was over.

Jisoo and Soojung escorted grandma Geonseok back to the house, which Jisoo herself was not sure was enough to live in. The house was just a small hut with solid ground and wooden walls. They got a traditional ondol, a manual heater was set under the high floor and worked only when the homeowner turned it on from the fireplace outside near the kitchen, or rather a small room with a clay stove and a small table filled with vegetable casks and spice bottles. Jisoo felt a little sad when she found the toilet, in which she thought was a storage room at the backyard, was not worth it at all. Without a