A Good Brother Was Already Impossible

When Ethan turned toward the terrace, he saw Yeon at the far end of the corridor, waving.

"Ethan!"

She was bouncing on her toes, afraid the people passing between them would hide her, and at the sight of her the harsh set of his face melted clean away.

"Tiny little thing. Nearly scared the life out of me."

He hurried toward her.

Sure enough. She had started toward him at a steady pace, but her steps slowed in a way no one could miss. The moment he caught that uneasy shuffle and the eyelids sliding shut, Ethan broke into a run, panic tearing through him. Afraid he would never reach her in time, he shouted, hoping the men nearest her would hear.

"Catch her!"

The two men in conversation turned, puzzled.

"The girl in front of you is about to fall—catch her, now!"

Han Seo-jun heard the desperate voice and looked. Yeon was already swaying, a breath away from going down. There was no time to wonder what was happening. He moved the arm still fitted with an IV needle and pulled her into his arms.

The one truly startled by the woman collapsing so suddenly was Han Min-jun, standing at Seo-jun's side. Anyone in the entertainment industry would have coveted a face like hers. Seo-jun, suddenly holding a stranger and entirely at a loss, was glancing around when the man who had shouted arrived.

A moment ago Ethan had been begging someone to catch her. Now he wore open hostility as he took Yeon back, as if reclaiming her, and dipped his head at a crooked angle.

"Thank you."

"She isn't well, is she?"

Min-jun, whose work had trained him to be instantly personable, smiled brightly. Unless her health was truly dire, he meant to slip her a business card.

"No. It isn't that."

"Ethan!"

Yeon's eyes flew open, and she lit up at the sight of him.

"You scared me. What were you thinking, walking out without a word? If Seol-woo finds out, you're a dead woman."

He set her on her feet with a threat that wasn't quite a threat, and Yeon's face crumpled. If Seol-woo learned about this, the scolding would run well past thirty minutes.

"Are you going to tell him? One of the nurses said the terrace here is gorgeous, so I was only going to look for a second and come right back."

"Depends how you behave. Say thank you. They helped you."

"Oh—really? Thank you."

She thanked Seo-jun and Min-jun in turn, then brushed the creases from her patient gown with a few brisk pats. She had fallen asleep in the middle of all that. Once again she was forced to see how serious her condition was—something she had never understood while she was locked in the psychiatric hospital.

"Um……"

"Yes?"

"You don't know him?"

Min-jun held a palm up beside Seo-jun's face and asked, genuinely shocked. It was more astonishing than the collapsed woman waking in under five minutes. Unless a person was past sixty and no longer counted among the general public, he had been certain every last one of them would know this man. Not only the tall one—even the girl, who looked exactly the age to be crazy for a handsome actor, seemed to have no idea who Seo-jun was.

"How would I know someone I'm seeing for the first time?"

"The drama The Day We Met Again—five years ago, a national hit with ratings over forty percent. The film Restricted Zone—Best Actor at Cannes, two years back. And last year he took the Grand Prize for acting in the medical drama Neurosurgery. The actor Han Seo-jun. You really don't know him?"

"I don't, not really."

Yeon, fresh from gazing at the Han River—the view that threw her chest wide open—only smiled, soft and vacant. Seo-jun looked down at her from well above. The stares of people who recognized him had driven him into a slump, and meeting someone who didn't know him at all left him with a strange feeling.

"Guess you're still not that famous."

Min-jun snickered and needled him.

"Do you know him, Ethan?"

"Hmm. Feel like I might've seen him somewhere."

"Put it on in my room. I want to watch it."

"All right. Let's get you inside first."

Ethan wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Before they headed back, Yeon bowed, and Min-jun—who had been studying her without so much as a blink—finally drew out a business card and offered it.

"What's this."

Ethan snatched the card that had appeared out of nowhere and glared, savage.

"Han Min-jun, CEO of Jun Entertainment. Actors, singers, models—we raise them all. If you're interested, please get in touch."

"She can't do that. Doesn't need to, either. We'll be going."

He handed the card back and gave Yeon a light push.

"I'm Han Seo-jun. That's my name."

"Oh. I'm Sun Woo-yeon."

The name, settled on her tongue by now, came out easily. Yeon wasn't thinking of anything in particular, but the two men who kept talking to her were getting under Ethan's skin.

"Watch my drama, and let's meet again. I want to know what someone who didn't know me at all thinks after seeing my work. I'm in A8."

So that lanky pale bastard is in the next room. Ethan's brow creased another degree.

"I'm in A7. I'll make sure to watch it and tell you what I think."

As she had all day, Yeon wore a smile from start to finish. Ethan was not the only one undone by a smile like warm spring. For a long while, the two strangers could not shake those mysterious eyes.

Seol-woo came down the hardwood corridor, lit along its length by lavish floral arrangements, and checked the time while he waited for the sliding door to open. Seven-thirty. If he was up by eight-thirty, that would do. He was already half an hour later than he had promised, but all he could think about was getting back to the hospital.

The door slid open with a soft hush, and his lowered gaze rose with it.

"You're here?"

"You came?"

Both women, seated across from each other, turned toward him. At a turn he had not expected, Seol-woo let out an empty laugh. His mother, Hwa-jin, and Han Joo-hee were a combination that did not belong in the same room. He chose neither seat. He stayed planted in the doorway and looked from one to the other.

"Sit by your mother. I heard it's been a long time since the two of you shared a meal."

Joo-hee smiled prettily and indicated the place beside Hwa-jin.

"Why are you here?"

He hung his suit on the stand and, in the end, took the seat beside Hwa-jin, then lifted a water glass of pure white porcelain. Is Yeon all right at the hospital? Lately, anything white made him think of her.

"Why else? I came to eat."

"You must have time to spare."

"Look who's talking."

Hwa-jin smiled faintly and poked at her salad. Pufferfish salad, wasn't it? The thick cuts in their batter were tempting enough. It was Wednesday, the middle of the week with the weekend still ahead, and even Hwa-jin felt the fatigue. She had just finished preparing for an early departure—rare for her—when Joo-hee's call came. Irritation had been creeping up at the woman who kept clinging to the conversation, until a single suggestion, that they eat with Seol-woo, settled her.

"I was the one who called. That's all right, isn't it?"

Joo-hee slipped into the exchange between mother and son and lifted a small bottle of sake, and Seol-woo let out a scoff. Did she imagine she had Hwa-jin tucked away as an ally? Joo-hee turned the bottle slowly, lifting the gold leaf settled at the bottom, closed a fair distance, and filled Hwa-jin's cup.

"And you?"

"I don't drink."

"Then the future daughter-in-law and I will have to drink by ourselves."

When Hwa-jin took the bottle, Joo-hee hastily raised her cup and observed the courtesy. She bloomed into a wide smile at future daughter-in-law, but Hwa-jin had chosen the words only to tease her son.

"Don't be like that—just one glass, Seol-woo. Grandfather arranged this. We ought to keep up appearances."

Of course. That man would never spare time like this for no reason. Hwa-jin, who had been nodding slowly, took in the irritation piled high on her son's face and smothered a laugh. The soy-marinated crab, roe and meat neatly parted, went down smooth. Whatever the occasion, a meal with her son felt like being handed an ordinary day.

She had lived nothing like an easy life beneath the title of eldest daughter of Hyunjin Group. Money had never been lacking. Everything except money had. She had never once possessed a family's warmth, a love that ran deep, or even a pretty friendship, and because she had lived that barren life, the same barren life had passed on to Seol-woo. As the years stacked up, so did the regret—guilt that she had failed to give him an ordinary life, and sorrow for all the days they had not shared, bound as they were to money and reputation.

"Just one glass. Please?"

How could anyone be so oblivious? A pianist, was she? Perhaps that was why she was so hopelessly sentimental.

"Are the peak-season events at Paradise coming along? This is when you'd be busiest."

Having mocked Joo-hee for doing nothing but the things Seol-woo hated, Hwa-jin turned the subject. Openly ignored, Joo-hee faltered and set the sake bottle down.

"About the same as last year."

"Good. CH only keeps that seat if Paradise pulls in the revenue. If it weren't for Paradise, we would have taken you down long ago."

"Before long, Hyunjin will be number one."

"Oh my. Are you complimenting me?"

"How is that a compliment? It's a fact."

Hwa-jin laid a slice of deep-red tuna belly on Seol-woo's plate and went on.

"I'll give that old man his stubbornness. The age when the heir had to be the eldest son ended ages ago. He seats someone who isn't up to it, and the company's value keeps falling."

"If they drop to second in the industry, he'll change his mind."

"Awfully relaxed, aren't you?"

"Because in the end, it'll be mine."

Yes. The ambition, at least, took after me.

"I'm sorry to interrupt, but I'll just step out to the restroom."

"No need to announce something like that. Go on."

She had heard the two of them didn't get along. That was why she had arranged this on purpose. She had meant to play mediator between a mother and son starved of affection and make herself indispensable—but set aside a chill that seemed born in them, there appeared to be no trouble between them at all. Reduced to baggage no one had asked to bring, in a gathering she herself had led, Joo-hee shut the door on a bleak face and left the room.

"Tsk. Exactly your grandfather's type. Docile, obedient, and not very bright."

"I thought you liked her."

"Who, me? Her? Not a chance. She's precisely the sort I can't stand. A hothouse flower."

"Then why did you come?"

"To eat with you."

The answer came out as if it were obvious, and Seol-woo laughed under his breath. It was not an answer that suited Hwa-jin.

"Did you have something to say?"

"I can invent something. Wasting time like this, so unlike you—is it because of a lover?"

"If I want one thing from Grandfather, I have to give him one."

"Then play quietly. Why are you walking around my hotel with a woman in your arms? What happens if someone recognizes you and the rumor grows? There's nothing good in it if your fiancée hears."

"I'm not playing around. And she isn't a lover."

He set his chopsticks down without having eaten much of anything and ended the meal. The answer came out a shade sharper, and out of habit he flicked his wrist to check the time. To reach the hour he had first set, he would have to sit another twenty minutes.

"What are you enduring it for? Just go."

"I don't feel like arguing with Grandfather."

"I'm here today. I'll keep his mouth shut for you."

He looked at her with suspicion—she was being far too kind—and Hwa-jin shrugged. Seol-woo considered it a moment, then picked up his suit jacket.

"I'll go."

"All right. Call if you need anything."

He nodded to her bright smile and left the room at once.

Actors of striking looks filled the screen. They were nearing the final episode of the drama Min-jun had named, The Day We Met Again—the scene in which the man who had lost his memory recognized the woman who had stayed at his side. Yeon, tears welling because she had sunk too far into it, turned her head at the presence she felt to her right.

"Why are you on the sofa?"

"I wanted to watch the drama. It's really good. Won-woo just remembered Ha-jeong. It's so sad."

"And what's that?"

"Ethan. He said he was bored. I think he fell asleep."

"Move over. I'll watch with you."

Seol-woo shot one glare at Ethan, asleep in possession of the hospital bed, and sat down beside her.

"Have you seen this? It's episode fifteen. Oppa, this man loved the woman, but he got in an accident and lost his memory. Then three years later they run into each other and fall in love ag—"

She told herself she was imagining it. But the gaze kept reaching her, and midway through the plot she turned her head. Her golden eyes blinked, following Seol-woo, who was staring straight at her.

"Do I look that much like her?"

"What?"

"Like the real Sun Woo-yeon."

"Yeah. You look exactly the same."

"You must miss her terribly."

Had they loved each other, the way the leads in today's drama did? Sitting under that heated gaze, she found herself suddenly curious. She envied, truly, the fact of having remained someone precious to another person.

"I did miss her. I wanted to find her quickly."

A gaze straight and cold, and yet full of affection, fixed on Yeon. She didn't look away. She met his eyes, and slowly her cheeks flushed. It felt so much as if he were speaking to her that the question slipped out on its own.

"Why?"

"Because I couldn't look after her in the moment she was most unhappy, and most afraid. So I wanted to find her, and once I found her, I wanted to be a good brother in Jun's place, but……"

The fascinating story broke off without warning, and Yeon's head tipped to one side.

Looks like I've turned into a son of a bitch no one should go near.

He could excuse the jealousy that rose when he went looking for Ethan and Chen instead of for her. The lust that showed itself now and then, he had no excuse for at all. Eyes that held light. A small, pretty nose. Red lips. On the day they had met by chance, in the moment he saw that pale skin and wanted to touch it, being a good brother had already been impossible.