Meeting the parents
‘Next time, let’s stop by for real.’
Han Noah said that and climbed over the wall without looking back.
As always, even the back view was stylish.
“……He’s crazy.”
The words came out as if I was talking to myself.
Sohwa approached quietly and sat down carefully next to me.
“Are you okay, baby...?”
I quietly raised my head.
He spoke with force in his lips and in a clear voice.
“No, I feel like hitting you.”
Sohwa swallowed her breath and opened her eyes wide.
“Oh, baby! You have to be careful what you say and do!”
‘What if the Master’s servant hasn’t left the yard yet…’
Sohwa, who was muttering to herself, quickly looked towards the window.
He was about to close the door when he looked at me again.
I crossed my arms, leaned back, and slowly added one more word.
“Every time I hear that laughter, I want to throw the teacup I’m holding.”
“Baby…!”
Sohwa sat down in her seat, almost crying, instead of stopping me.
“Do you still hate me…?”
“It’s fortunate that it ends badly.”
The smiling face lingered in my mind.
Some things have changed and some things have not.
He was the kind of person who always made others angry without getting hurt himself.
With that privileged face and attitude.
I touched my forehead.
My head was pounding even though I didn't have a fever.
“Ah… my head.”
Sohwa quickly approached me and stared blankly at my face.
He placed his hand on his forehead and then removed it again.
“Baby, on days like this, you should just rest. Don’t think about the wedding or anything. Just thinking about it makes me sick.”
I laughed softly.
“You look more upset than me.”
“It’s frustrating. I’m so frustrated. He could have done whatever he wanted without getting married… but I know that the baby was left behind to wait.”
Sohwa sighed quietly and pushed the teacup aside. She cleaned up the table with a handkerchief and carefully stood up from her seat.
"Just be alone for a moment. I'll make sure there's no noise or people around. You need to have some time to gather your thoughts."
Sohwa, who had reached the door, looked back once more.
“I’ll come whenever you call.”
With those words, Sohwa quietly closed the door and left.
Silence fell again in the room.
The folding screen with a plum blossom painting stood silently in its place in the windless room.
The pink petals, which seemed to have been touched by the tip of a brush, felt particularly cold.
I picked up the teacup for no reason.
I put it down again before it even touched my lips.
The tea had already cooled, and the cold feel of the porcelain lingered on my fingertips.
Instead, I quietly pulled out the water bowl and soaked both hands.
The water silently enveloped my hand.
Instead of words, a warmth slowly flowed down the back of my hand, as if trying to console some emotion.
My fingers trembled very slowly in the water.
The controversy spread.
The dizzying words in my mind sank into the water one by one.
‘I don’t have a face you’d hate, do I?’
The words crossed my mind again.
I muttered to myself.
“……You’re so annoying that I want to kill you, but your face is so pretty that it makes me twice as angry.”
I just kept my hands submerged in the water
I was sitting still.
The water was still, so the noise in my mind was clearer.
A quiet moment, as if trying to swallow something.
In one corner of my heart, an emotion that had not yet ended was still alive and breathing very small.
I thought the cold would soothe my emotions—
The fingertips
I remembered a different sensation.
The surface of the paper.
The trembling of the tip of the brush.
and
The moment I drew that child's eyes.
I slowly turned my gaze to the side.
In the drawer under the desk.
I took out the hidden scroll.
Familiar eyes appeared on the carefully unfolded paper, wiped dry.
The picture was a little faded. The edges of the paper had a slight yellowish tint, and the ink lines were blurrier than before.
Yet the face was clear.
When I see your quietly smiling face
That day. That spring, in the backyard of Dohwaseo.
The moment when the child approached me while I was drawing that picture came back to me like a wave.
_______
The sunlight that day was spreading quietly.
I was sitting in a shady corner, avoiding people's eyes, under the light streaming in through the gaps in the bamboo trees behind the painting studio.
I spread out the paper and picked up the brush.
Even the sound of the wind made my shoulders flinch.
I lifted the brush as if catching my breath and slowly brought to mind a face I knew.
The corners of the eyes were slightly raised and the mouth was not sharp.
As I drew the child's unique expression, almost as if he was smiling, the tip of my brush kept shaking.
Why is it like this… Why does my heart keep pounding?
Until then, I didn't know that she would soon disappear, that what I was drawing now would become a memory trapped in time.
As I was thinking about it, I heard a rustling sound behind me.
“You were in a place like this?”
A low, playful voice.
I was startled and clenched my hands.
The ink spread across the paper, leaving a circular stain.
“……Brother, why are you here?”
Noah approached and lowered his gaze.
At the end of his gaze lay an open piece of drawing paper and a brush whose ink smell still lingered.
“Hmm. Is it a painting?”
I folded the paper without hesitation.
"no."
Noah looked at my face for a long time and then smiled lightly.
“He takes after his father, so he must be good at holding a brush.”
“…How could I dare to paint a painting? I’m just imitating it.”
I spoke firmly. My breath was still racing, though I wasn't caught.
Noah nodded quietly after hearing that.
“Really?” “Then I’ll pretend I didn’t see it.”
The child smiled brightly. After leaving those words behind, the child did not ask any more questions.
I hated that laugh.
no
I hated myself more for collapsing at that laughter.
Then he turned around.
Although the light footsteps moved backwards
His last words were heard from behind him.
“Be careful with the tip of the brush. If it shakes, it will leave marks.”
I swallowed. The ink stains on my fingertips felt like they wouldn't fade for a long time.
I just sat there holding the painting.
It spread quietly like ink spreading inside my chest.
⸻
Now, on my lap lay the same picture as before.
I looked at that face carefully.
The lines drawn with the tip of the brush did not blur over time.
The moment I looked at it, my father's words from when I was very young suddenly came to mind clearly.
My family was considered a prestigious family even in the court.
He was not just a simple painter, but he was also a court painter who had been in and out of the palace for generations.
A house that paints royal portraits and national paintings.
He held a brush to paint the king's face.
My father painted historical paintings of the court and was a hand that recorded history with a brush that captured the passage of time.
As the daughter of the magistrate of Hanseongbu, my mother brought the norms and etiquette of a high-ranking noble family into the household.
I grew up watching my father's brush strokes and honing my posture under my mother's gaze.
There was a sign like this hanging in front of the studio door.
‘In a picture The world Leave behind.’
We are people who leave memories with a brush.
These were the people who left their time behind, more than their names or faces.
Portraits could not be painted without the permission of the court.
The discipline of the Dohwaseo was always strict.
and
“Women can’t draw.”
I knew that from my father's time, even from a very young age.
So I drew it secretly. I drew it quietly so no one would know.
It would have been a big deal if I had been caught, but I still didn't throw the painting away because I was afraid of being forgotten.
I wanted to capture the face of that child who suddenly disappeared, even if it was just in a drawing. I thought I would never see it again.
“…But why did you appear again?”
_____
Less than three days after Han Gongja returned, the Left State Councillor's house notified them of the date of the meeting.
“Let’s get married within a month.”
That one word was together.
Father nodded silently, and from that day on, the inner quarters became quiet but quickly busy.
I looked at myself in the mirror.
A hat was placed on top of the neatly styled hair, and various layers of clothing were added over the underwear.
Although the outside was spotless and neat, the inside was still in disarray.
‘Is this wedding really going to happen…’
And finally he came in.
The door opened shortly after. He quietly entered, neatly dressed. The hem of his red-embroidered robe was neatly tied back, his hair neatly tied back.
His eyes were the same as when he looked at me from the paper.
The eyes that looked at me in the picture.
“Yeah.”
I bowed my head. It was a polite greeting.
““Confucius, I hope you had a comfortable journey.”
He laughed.
“Confucius. That’s what they’ve been calling me since yesterday.”
He tilted his head slightly and slowly raised the corners of his mouth.
After a brief pause, he continued speaking playfully.
“I’m worried. What should I call you? Your Majesty calls me Confucius, but if I just call you by your name, it would be rude, but if I call you ‘fiancée,’ I think you might dislike it.”
The tone of his speech was light, but it was sarcastic, as if he was trying to gauge his feelings.
Drawing a line under the guise of courtesy
He seemed to have noticed too.
Maybe that's why. He raised the corners of his mouth once more and added jokingly.
“Very well. If you call me Confucius, I will call you ‘the daughter of a nobleman’.”
(※ In the Joseon Dynasty, ‘Gyusu’ was a title used to honor a young girl from a noble family.For women in the middle class(This is not a commonly used word.)
And finally, he finished with a uselessly cheerful voice.
"You're so sweet. Your actions are just right. Miss Gyu-su. I'll be counting on you from now on."
The words sounded unusually clear, as if slowly and deliberately increasing the dose.
I didn't change my expression.
The kid glanced at me and smiled as if he was waiting for a reaction.
At that moment, a servant from the Left State Councillor's house stepped in behind Noah.
A man named Uncle followed him in.
They bowed politely, and the father nodded silently.
The meeting was held calmly and without any formalities.
"Your Majesty sent word of his regards. He said he felt sorry for leaving his daughter so far away, and that he was unable to visit her in her stead due to his limited mobility."
Noah's uncle said.
I bowed my head silently and accepted the greeting, following established etiquette.
Noah remained silent. Beneath his neatly tied hair, his eyes remained playful.
‘Is that really the face of someone who is about to get married?’
The topic of marriage came up again from my uncle's mouth.
"The wedding ceremony will be ready soon. His Majesty the Left State Councilor hopes to hold the ceremony before the end of this month."
At those words, my father closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them and quietly said one word.
“If it is the will of the Left State Councillor, I will obey it.”
At that moment, I felt a tightening sensation somewhere in my chest.
The certainty that there is no turning back.
Noah turned his head slightly and looked at me.
A silent smiling face.
I turned my head away without saying anything because I found that expression annoying.
As soon as the meeting was over, the Left State Councillor and his party withdrew.
Their footsteps as they left the yard were irritatingly neat, and among them, Han Noah, as always, was relaxed.
I didn't follow his back.
That kid who was just pretty when he was young and therefore annoying is no longer there.
Now only that prettier and more annoying person remains.
I thought only my body grew, but my face grew too. No, only my looks grew on their own.
I know now.
How easily a single face can sway the heart. And how cowardly it is.
The wedding will take place.
That was the established procedure.
But I won't give my heart.
No matter how beautifully you smile.
I won't be shaken by that smile.
Episode 2: Meeting the Families - End