“Why did you have to invite him?” complained my husband cradling the younger one in his arms. My younger one was annoyed at her father’s frown, which prevented her from poking his dimpled smile. Seeing that her father was not interested in entertaining her, she decided to slap his lips to shush him up with her tiny hands.

“Not you too Eunji,” he whined, “Your father is too annoyed to smile.”

But he smiled nonetheless; he always did. And Eunji poked his dimples, giggling at those pits in her father’s cheek which she never found in her plump ones.

“Eunji ah!” came my brother-in-law’s crisp, deep voice, “Your father is an insecure man!” Eunji loved Kai’s, my brother-in-law’s voice. Her father’s dimples did not interest her anymore, not when she had heard Kai’s voice. Turning her head left and right, she tried to look for him, failing which she rested her head on her father’s shoulder, a father who was furious at his wife’s first love and his daughter’s imaginary one.

“Here,Here,” Kai whispered and kissed Eunji’s forehead as she raised her head excitedly to have found her prince charming.

“Tough luck!” he teased my husband, handing over the plates and other crockery.

“Kai,” I finally interrupted, “Enough teasing, he is a delicate soul after all!”

“The two of you are conspirators!” yelled my husband. Eunji struggled in her father’s arms as if wanting to join our group of conspirators. “And you Miss,” he hollered, carrying her away from us, “are not going to join the two of them!”

Watching father and daughter squabble with each other I laughed and then mockingly scolded Kai, “You should stop your teasing; you know how he detests you.”

Wrapping a hand around my waist, Kai leaned in and whispered, “I know but I love rubbing it on his face that I am the one responsible for his wife’s metamorphosis. Oh! By the way, I am sure he has his eyes on us so let’s act all lovey dovey.”

“You are not the only one,” I argued as I snuggled closer to him, playing along, and “Life gets the most credit. But I’ll allow you, only for today, to bask in its glory.”

“Jieun take your philandering husband away!” shouted Yixing, my husband, as he gave Eunji to Sehun and stomped towards Kai and I. The two of us chuckled mischievously before Yixing separated us, with a hand on my waist and the other on Kai’s face.

“Unnie! Can’t you just take this Casanova? I am tired of him!” Jieun complained but landed a sound whack on Kai’s head for his misdemeanor. Seeing Kai lifting his wife gingerly, and taking her to the lounge while she resorted to verbal abuses to get out of his clasp, I reminisced about the beautifully perfect past. 

Perfection was Jieun’s insecurity and repeated refusals of Kai’s love. I had seen Jieun grow up into a beautiful and strong woman with a hollow in her heart. I had seen Kai spending his blood and sweat to fill the void in her heart. Numerous times, she had insulted him, numerous times, she had rejected him but he stuck on, not because he was a pest but because he knew Jieun was lying.

Perfection was Jieun’s grand walk away from her marriage altar when it was revealed that the marriage was a part of the contract. Looking resplendent in a beautiful white gown, studded with several crystals, her hair done elaborately, she stood staring at the suited Kai with a lilac pinned to his pocket, her eyes tinged with tears of betrayal. With an unimaginable force, she had hit Kai with the bouquet, which she had been tenderly caressing only a little while ago, and walked off her marriage.

Perfection was my laugh after what had happened. Perfection was the harmony of Kai’s laugh with mine. “I guess I’ll have to start all over again,” he had said and I had nodded vigorously.

Perfection was Kai’s gradual acceptance of the fact that he could not become a father. Hands covering her tear stained face, Jieun had sobbed incessantly at the maternity hospital while Kai had tried to control his own tears, clutching the medical report. “I am just a defective piece!” she had yelled out. I remember seeing those restrained tears of Kai flow effortlessly when he saw his wife demean herself to being just an object, a childbearing object, a defective childbearing object.

“My wife is a beautiful woman,” he had said, kneeling down and bringing his face close to hers, “My wife is a beautiful, intelligent and strong woman. So what if she is not a mother! She is a great wife, a greater friend and the greatest woman ever! I am a weak man so it will take time for me to accept it but you cannot break. If you break then who is going to support me?!”

I had run away from the hospital when I saw those two. It felt as if I had been intruding on something intensely personal, intensely special.

Nuzzling my neck, Yixing spoke, interrupting my reverie, “Please don’t tell me you were thinking about Kai?”

“And what if I was?” I teased, craning my neck to the side giving him better access to his favourite spot.

I never got my answer because his words were muffled by the butterfly kisses, which he trailed down my neck.

“Just look at those exhibitionists!” mocked a deep voice from the corner who was cradling Eunji carefully. I tried to extricate myself from his passionate embrace but Yixing just tightened his hold around me.

“Get lost Sehun!” he grumbled.

Perfection was mine and Sehun’s disturbed relationship. We had entered into the relationship with no expectations except for a re-establishment our lost friendship. But Sehun had been contorted beyond imagination. He remained as possessive as before using me as an emotional crutch and later, as a drug. He was emotionally handicapped. He was so messed up and disturbed that it had started affecting me as well. Both of us were regressing in time, he wanted to get back the ‘me’ who only had eyes for him, and I wanted to get back the Sehun who was unreachable, unattainable: Perfect.

Perfection was Sehun’s slow recuperation with the help of Kai, Jieun, Yixing, Miyoung, and I. it was one of the most depressing phases of our life. We saw Sehun going into one existential crisis after the other, saw him writhing in agony as his questions remained unanswered, saw him banging against the mirror yelling that the person in the reflection was not him, that he was, in realty, scarred and handicapped.

“You are no less of a voyeur,” commented a chirpy female who slid her arm into the crook of Sehun’s folded arms and rested her head against his muscular arm. Sehun snorted snootily but ruffled Miyoung’s hair, allowing his fingers to be entangled in the silky mane.

Perfection was Miyoung’s incomparable efforts in helping Sehun stand on his two feet. The shy girl in the café who had a dominating alter ego was just what Sehun needed. She pushed him when needed, pulled him when needed, stretched him and molded him into what he was today. She knew what were sleepless nights, what were tormenting sights, what it was to fight. Sehun was still discovering himself but thankfully, he had someone to guide him.

“Umma!” yelled my older son, running up to me, “Umma, Uncle Kai says you didn’t know father’s name till you entered college!”

Sehun and Miyoung started laughing uncontrollably. I could see Kai being nudged by Jieun for revealing this embarrassing secret to my son but smiling nonetheless, while Yixing and I, averted our eyes from each other, blushing madly.

Perfection was Yixing, whose name I did not know until I entered college. To me, he was just my Financial Advisor until he stopped being one and I was left at a loss. After four years of knowing him, I had asked him his name and was rewarded with a lecture on conversational skills and social protocols by him.

Perfection was the memory of his cold hand caressing my head when I had fainted in the café. The angelic boy had always been by my side as a friend, privy to little details of my life. When had that friendship turned into love, I could not remember.

I looked at the six of us gathered in the kitchen counter, laughing at each other, laughing with each other. We had spent almost our entire life together, growing up together. Today, Kai was a celebrity dancer, Jieun, a Women's Rights Activist, Miyoung, a child psychologist, Sehun, a professor, I, the owner of my father’s company and Yixing, my chartered accountant, but when the six of us came together, we were all teenagers still raising questions and trying to find answers, still squabbling amongst each other.

Eunji decided she had enough of both Sehun and Kai and desperately needed her father, so she cried out to grab our attention. Yixing’s ears perked up and without wasting time, went to play with his daughter. My older one looked at me with immense suspicion, as he did still not have his answer.

“I’ll wait,” he said, “I’ll wait till you decide to answer.” He was a spitting image of his father, both in face and personality.

Perfection was the blue paint shedding off our rusty main gate, perfection was the tilted photo frame within which was captured a memory of the six of us fighting with each other like siblings, perfection was my stretch marks, a remnant of the two bundles of joy I had given birth to. Perfection was Yixing’s and Jieun’s joint hatred towards the fact that they saw their respective lovers exchange their first kiss in their presence, perfection was Yixing’s few grey strands, perfection was the six of us. Perfect was our life.

“Oh dear Wise woman,” sang Kai, as he tried to get Eunji’s attention away from her father, “What is it you think of so deeply?”

Five pair of experienced eyes looked at me expectantly and two pairs of young eyes, looked at me confusedly.

“Just wondering,” I replied, a small smile dancing at my lips, “ about how perfect we are.”