Finding Se-gye

Dohyeok stepped into the large house, the automated doors glided to a close, he ambled up the stairs to his Dad's home office.

"Dad, are you in here?"

He peered his face in, opening the door just a little bit. Mr. Chae stood next to the palladian windows on the left side of his office, overlooking the whole villa.

"Come in, Son".

He walked in. Mr. Chae raised the tumbler of pure black coffee to his lips and sipped. Although caffeine intake this high is not recommended for someone his age, he's never been the one to care about his health anyway. He worked himself almost to death, neglecting his dead wife and family, now in his golden years he plans to just relax and travel the world.

"What is it Dad? You know you can just text me or call or send whatever it is to my secretary, why'd you have to call me back home, I have a meeting in forty-five minutes".

Dohyeok looked around, his Dad had made up some excuse to drag him back to this house again. Back to the place where he had no freedom, where his youth had been stripped away from him. He had no animosity or whatsoever towards his father, nonetheless walking back into this house jogged up memories he was doing just fine with not remembering.

"Sit down, son".

Dohyeok scowled, he wasn't trying to be disobedient but not now. He's been trying to get this project with the french investors settled, if everything goes well, they'll finally sign the contract today.

Mr. Chae sighed, turning around to face his son. He dropped the teacup on a nearby saucer.

"Dohyeok, I'm not getting any younger. I'll be seventy-five soon, you know very well that I had you in my old age, I want to at least hold my grandchildren before I die".

"What about Doyun? He's got a little girl already, and Tian Mei is already engaged, you'll be surrounded by kids soon enough".

A frown flickered across his forehead, really? This is why his Dad called him, his eyes followed the wall clock behind the desk chair. Forty minutes left.

"You know I'm not on good terms with your elder brother and Tian Mei is reluctant to return home".

He glanced at his youngest son, the last child he had with Willa before she passed. He appeared very disinterested in what he was saying, he'd already expected that.

"I'm too busy for dating, not right now that the company is expanding even more, you of all people know that. And you also know why you have no right to interfere in my love life, you've taken too much from me already I don't want my future wife to have to answer to you".

Dohyeok noticed the creases in his suit, he'll change into a freshly dry-cleaned one before entering the conference room later.

"I know, I lost all rights to tell you what to do once I put a stop to your dreams but at least try, you haven't dated anyone since middle school. I'm sure there are a lot of ladies who'd want to date the CEO, pick the one you like and bring her to meet me. I don't want to make the same mistake I did when your brother was still in this house".

Dohyeok scrutinized him. He wasn't using his walking stick, maybe the exercises were paying off. He wants him to date now? He's not supposed to interfere in his life, ever. Neither does he have any right to tell him what to do, especially after taking most of his youth from him. He sighed, tearing his gaze away from his smiling old man.

"Fine, I'll try. But I'm not promising you anything Dad. If you'll excuse me, I have a meeting in half an hour".

Dohyeok bowed and took his leave.

***

Se-gye updated the new prices for the umpteenth time that week.

"Hina, what is wrong with this site? it keeps removing one zero from our prices".

Hina tapped her from behind. She stood up from the swivel chair and let the tech genius do her magic.

"There, all done".

"Like you're a lifesaver, how do you manage to pull that off every time".

Se-gye thanked her with a bright smile. Hina shrugged popping her headset back on, she wasn't really into talking. She liked it quiet. Talking felt stressful to her.

"Okay, so the orders will be here by noon, I need you and Yo Shan to make sure you cross-check every detail of the dresses before signing off the last page. It's our first time selling these kinds of outfits, we need to be as transparent as possible so we can maintain our five-star reviews".

Yo Shan nodded from behind the mannequins. She was pinning up one of Se-gye's newest designs.

Se-gye moved to her working space, she needed something to snack with. Missing breakfast this often, always drops her blood sugar before eleven thirty. They'd been working nonstop on the pre-ordered packages that would have to be delivered before they close up for the day.

She rinded off the aluminium foil-like wrapper off her favorite double chocolate chip cookie sandwich. Her shoulders danced in delight once the saccharine came in contact with her taste buds.

She bounced into the recliner chair by her little rack of romance novels, she usually used those to pass time on days when business was slow. Running an online shop wasn't easy, luckily she was quite the celebrity. Winning Cityscape's got talent after two earlier failed attempts.

"Se-gye, Miss Tamlin is here, she came along with the police this time around".

Yo Shan sputtered, her right hand adjusting her glasses to the light intensity of the new environment she'd ventured into.

"What! I'll be right there".

***

Scott glanced at his boss through the rare view mirror again. He'd hardly ever seen him lost in thought after a successful contract closure. He'd mostly smile and give him the day off. So why not today? He had already asked out Veronica already if he doesn't show up this time, she might really dump him for good.

"U-um Sir, I heard that you successfully closed the deal with the french investors".

"Yeah, I did".

Scott glanced at him again. Dohyeok was still staring blankly out the bulletproof windows.

"Well, you don't seem so happy about it. Boss, did they do something to annoy you before their flight took off?"

Dohyeok shifted his gaze to the nosey driver, one of the longest employees he'd kept with him at the head office.

"Is it because you're supposed to have a day off? Don't worry I'll let you go by noon. There's somewhere I want you to drop me off first, Mario is already driving my SUV over there, so you don't have to worry about how I'll get home".

Scott couldn't deny that Dohyeok had gotten the reason perfectly but if that was the only reason, he'd seem more of a selfish person and he didn't really want that. His Boss was very hardworking in his eyes, he often admired him from afar. But sometimes he just overworks himself and that might come back to bite him in the butt later, health-wise if he's not careful.

"But Sir, you're usually lively after something like this. Is there something else bothering you?"

Dohyeok picked up his phone to check the text message again, he wanted to be sure that the directions were legit on the map.

"Shouldn't you focus on driving, you've always been nosey".

Scott opened his mouth to protest, but then several flashes of him doing the same thing hovered in this memory. He sighed, so much for being caring.

Dohyeok followed his eyes from the rare view mirror, it looked like he'd given up on asking already. Scott had lost his job when he'd found him, a very good friend he'd kept back in high school. He decided to make him his secretary and sometimes his driver, he was one of the very few people he trusted.

"Do you remember that brown-haired girl that had a crush on me back in high school".

"You have to be more specific, literally the whole year knew who you were back then".

That made Dohyeok happy for some reason. If that was the case, maybe she'd still remember him. Maybe she might still be single. Although, he'd imagined her already married with kids. She was a beautiful girl the way he remembered her, someone would have surely noticed and decided to take good care of her. Maybe he just wanted an excuse to see her, so he sent that private investigator to track down her whereabouts.

He didn't know he'd smile so much when Patrick replied to him within two hours. With the address of a warehouse and some info on what she'd been up to in the last four years. He'd watched her perform on Cityscape's number one talent show four years ago. He wondered how she'd been if she would blush like she always did whenever he remembered her name.

Scott felt creeped out by the sudden twitch on his boss's face. He had smiled quickly again.

"I mean the one who didn't follow me around, we just seemed to run into each other often or get paired up by coincidence. She was teased endlessly because of that, she once accidentally confessed that she'd liked me for a long time".

Once he'd mentioned those two words 'long time'. Scott finally knew who he was talking about, the half-Canadian half-Chinese girl. Um... what was her name again. She was pranked one day. A bully had gone too far by playing a recording of herself practicing how she'd confess to Dohyeok on the school's PA system, during a lock-in sleepover activity.

"Seolhwa or something".

"It's Se-gye. I'm going to meet her today".