Chapter Seven Sunny
Chapter Seven
Sunny
Captain Seo, Minju, and I land in Korea just before sunset. I’m proud of myself for eating and sleeping my way through a thirteen-hour flight without once thinking about anything more complicated than chicken or beef.
And the captain let me. In fact, she doesn’t poke and prod me, neither literally nor figuratively, even after we get off the plane. Maybe she gave up on trying to figure out what happened to me. I shrink in on myself. Or maybe she thinks I’m beyond help. I shrink even smaller.
I don’t give a fuck.
Besides, this situation has a calm-before-the-storm vibe. The captain doesn’t give up on anything. A slow, dull ache spreads in my chest. Even if I give up on myself, she won’t give up on me.
Stop it, Sunny. Hope is stupid.
Once we step out of the hectic bustle of the airport, the three of us move faster and talk less. Without the protection of the airplane, we’re fair game for anyone who wants to track us.
I wave down a taxi. When a middle-aged woman cuts in front of me as though she has every right to my taxi, I shoulder her away. After a brief tussle, the ajumma scoffs at me in affront and immediately cuts in front of a sucker who doesn’t know any better.
While I indulge in a smug grin, Captain Seo gets into the front seat of the taxi I hailed before I can call shotgun. Who’s the sucker now? Grumbling under my breath, I shuffle in after Minju into the back seat.
“Eurwangni Beach, please,” the historian promptly tells the driver.
I don’t ask how she knows the closest beach to Incheon International.
Whatever. I shouldn’t be surprised by her vast knowledge of .
. . well, everything. But why Eurwangni Beach?
I shrug and go along for the ride. As long as the two seonnyeos do nothing to interfere with my one and only objective of keeping them alive, then I officially do not care.
Moreover, I heard Eurwangni Beach has a killer seafood restaurant right by the water. They grill fresh clams and scallops over lump charcoal until the shells open to reveal the tender meat inside, bubbling in their juices. Saliva pools in my mouth just imagining the sweet, briny goodness.
Captain Seo pays for our fare with the black card, and we get off the taxi at the beach. The sun hovers just above the horizon, casting a shimmering stretch of golden light across the water. We don’t speak for a long moment, entranced by the beautiful sunset.
“Today is Hangawi,” Minju murmurs, breaking the melancholy silence.
“Really?” My eyes widen, and butterflies flutter in my stomach. “We should eat some songpyeon for good health.”
First of all, I love the sweet, half moon–shaped rice cakes. Second, I haven’t celebrated Mid-Autumn Festival in over a hundred years, and a small, often unheeded part of me misses the holiday that celebrates family and abundance.
“Okay.” Minju smiles distractedly. “We have quite a bit of time until the road turns silver.”
“Until the what turns what?” I ask, exchanging a bewildered glance with the captain.
But the historian doesn’t answer and crosses the street toward a row of single-story structures facing the beach. My gaze snags on a small hut that stands sandwiched between two modern buildings, looking woefully out of place.
When Minju heads straight for it, the captain and I jog across the street to catch up with her. The hut appears to be a restaurant, and from the delicious smells wafting through the windows, a very good one.
“Huh.” A smile quirks Captain Seo’s lips. “The restaurant is your namesake.”
The sign outside the hut says, Minju Ne, which means “Minju’s Place” in Korean.
“All the stores are probably closed for Hangawi . . .” I trail off when Minju pushes open the restaurant’s door and walks right in. “Okey dokey then.”
“After you,” the captain says with a sweep of her arm.
I step past her with a mocking bow but come to an abrupt stop. “Whoa.”
Minju stands in the middle of the restaurant, embraced by two strangers—a tall, broad man and a diminutive woman, both middle aged and exceptionally attractive. And the three of them are weeping elegantly—tears falling silently down their cheeks with no snot in sight.
“You’re blocking the way.” Captain Seo nudges me to the side and walks inside the restaurant. “Whoa.”
I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t—
“What the hell is happening?” I croak. Damn it. I care. But only to the extent of keeping my friends alive. “Minju, do you know these people?”
“I do.” The historian steps back from the strangers, sniffing delicately. “They’re my parents.”
“Guh.” My brain vibrates with curiosity, but I shut that nonsense down. All I have to know is whether her parents will kill us or not. Anything else will get me too close to giving a fuck.
I focus my magic gi goggles on them. Minju’s mother glows with the vibrant red gi of Underworld—a dokkaebi. As for her father, I don’t need to see his silver gi, the life force of Sky, to know he’s a seonnam. His exquisite bone structure is a dead giveaway.
Her mother takes out a handkerchief from the apron tied around her waist and dabs away the tears on Minju’s face, while her father watches the scene with a heartbreakingly tender expression. I blink away an inexplicable tear, clearing my throat.
Okay. They probably won’t kill us.
“Nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Ha.” Captain Seo, with her fully functioning brain, bows respectfully from her waist. It seems like a good idea so I mimic her. Just because I care about nothing doesn’t mean I have to be disrespectful to Minju’s parents.
“Are you friends of our darling daughter?” Mrs. Ha doesn’t give us a chance to respond and pulls us into a hug, one in each arm. She is surprisingly strong for someone so small—not that I’m much taller.
Before I can force myself to squirm out of her embrace, she drops her arms and steps back from us. “Oh my. What am I thinking? You girls must be hungry.”
Again, we don’t get a chance to object as she bustles away and disappears into what I assume is the kitchen. In the brief lull, I study the small restaurant with round eyes—to scope out a potential escape route, of course. I don’t actually care about any of it.
The walls are covered with rustic hanji, and a menu, handwritten on a wood plank, hangs on one side.
The simple wooden tables and chairs crowding the front hall add a perfectly haphazard and cozy feel to the quintessential mom-and-pop restaurant.
It’s so human. I can’t believe two shinbiins run this place.
“Come sit down. Please.” Minju’s father beckons us to a table close to the kitchen. He grabs three paper cups from a neat stack at the corner of the table and pours cold roasted-barley tea into them. “You, too, daughter. Rest your feet while I go help your mother.”
“It seems like they were expecting us.” Captain Seo sits down with her gaze trailing after Mr. Ha’s retreating back. “How did they know?”
“They were expecting me.” Minju tugs me down next to her and faces the captain. “I visit my parents every year on Hangawi.”
“Wow, what a coincidence.” I bite my lip, because it can’t be a happy one.
Minju must be exhausted from tracking me down. Not to mention everything that happened before I ran away to Las Vegas. And now, we’re on the run from the Jaenanpa because of me.
“I’m sorry I ruined your visit,” I whisper.
“You did nothing of the sort. If it weren’t for you, I would still be in the Realm of Four Kingdoms.” She squeezes my hand over my lap. “Besides, I’m glad my parents finally get to meet some of my friends.”
“It’s an honor to meet them.” Captain Seo tilts her head to the side. “Did your parents come to the Mortal Realm so they could be together?”
Her loaded question is characteristically efficient.
With one sentence, she conveys that she recognized Mr. Ha as a seonnam and Mrs. Ha as a dokkaebi and she understands their union is forbidden under the Code of the Realm—beings of two different life sources cannot marry.
And with her lack of censure, she reassures Minju that she’s not passing judgment in any way.
That’s impressive, even for the captain.
“My mother was a suhoshin stationed in the Kingdom of Sky when she met my father. They fell in love and married in secret.” Minju stares down at her hands.
“They kept their secret safe for over two centuries . . . then I came along. They couldn’t risk anyone finding out that I’m of both Sky and Underworld, because they wanted me to have a normal life in the Realm of Four Kingdoms.” She sighs heavily.
“My parents came to the Mortal Realm to protect me.”
“They just left you behind? All by yourself?” I accuse. Being together matters so much more than normal. It could never be worth the cost of being alone. “Why couldn’t they bring you with them?”
“Living in the Realm of Four Kingdoms is her birthright.” Mrs. Ha steps out of the kitchen with a tray laden with a feast, but her expression is grim. “We couldn’t take that away from her.”
“What’s so great about the Realm of Four Kingdoms?” I persist. “What’s more important than family?”
“Life,” Mr. Ha says, coming to stand next to his wife. “If shinbiins leave the Realm of Four Kingdoms, they become mortal.”