Dara~~ Throw away the chains

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“How have you been?” YG asked me.

“Better,” was my brief reply. We are in his office and it’s the first time after seven months that I’ve set foot in his building. I’ve only been back in Seoul for two days.

He nodded and smiled. “Blonde hair suits you.”

In a moment of madness during my soul searching trip, I made an abrupt decision to have my hair bleached and dyed blonde. I cried after seeing my hair and regretted the decision because it came off looking like straw at first but thanks to my equally crazy companion, we found a more decent salon after a few days.

“Thank you” I answered. 

“Dara …” YG made a steeple of his fingers, resting his elbows on his desk and sighed. “You know …” he then looked at the envelope in front of him. “You know I’m a man of few words and I feel like I ought to apologize to you for what happened. You know that all of you are equally important to me, right? All of us are in one family and the thing that happened … was very unfortunate …”

I can sense his struggle and he sighed once again. “I am not going to pick any sides here because you are all my children but know that I was really displeased with the behavior of those two. I already talked to both of them and as much as I disapprove, I can’t control what they feel and …”

“It’s fine” I interrupted. “It’s alright, sajangnim. I just want to move on. So please, accept my resignation letter.”

“Do you think that leaving your job is considered as moving on? I don’t think so. You have a great potential and one of the best stylist this company has. Don’t throw away your career just like that. You’ve worked hard for it.”

“I just don’t think it’s a healthy environment for me … or for all of us to be in the same company.” I reasoned.

“Dara,” he said in his nasal voice. “I will not accept this. If you need more time, take another month of Sabbatical. The doors of YG will always be welcome for you.”

“But sajangnim …”

This time, he interrupted me. “No. You are also my daughter and I won’t let you leave until I know that you have fully moved on. You made us all worry when you suddenly disappeared. I think I’ve aged 10 years between the three of you so please,” he looked me in the eyes, “please stay. I’ll let you go once I’m sure that you can stand on your own two feet. Until then, I’ll give you assignments that won’t require you running into them.”

YG is a stubborn man. I feel like I can’t win against him. And honestly, I owe him a lot. He took me in fresh from high school and let me learn the ropes even with no prior experience. I sighed. 

I was about to declare that he won when the door to his office opened and in came YG’s top actor, Choi Seunghyun, which funnily enough, is also sometimes called TOP. 

“Sorry, I’m late” he said in his deep voice.

“Oh!” he exclaimed, noticing me then turned to YG. “I didn’t know you’re still in a meeting.”

“No, it’s fine.” YG motioned for him to sit on the other chair across mine. TOP gave me a brief nod as he sat down and I nodded back in acknowledgement.

“So, we just finalized the contract for the new movie.” YG said. “Congratulations!”

“Ah, neh. Komapsumnida” he bowed, then crossed his right leg over the left one and leaned back on his chair.

“You have a photo shoot next week, right?”

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