Dec 30

Seoul

Jeong-Hyeok,

I had an exceptionally bad day today. If there's one thing I'm glad about being separated from you, it is that you'd never get to meet my family, if that is what I could even call it.

You must be wondering why I'm saying so since I never shared my story with you. I will tell you about it all today. For there is no one else I can talk my heart out to but you. Here it goes-

My mother is not my biological mother. I guess you could call me an illegitimate child of my father's. I never even knew my real mother. Ever since I was a month old, I was raised by my father and his wife, whom I still call Eomma. I have never known any family apart from them.

My two elder brothers are aware of this truth and since childhood resented me for barging into their family. We'd always been made to compete for the best, and as we grew older, the competition turned fiercer and the sibling bond became flimsier. Soon, we wanted to bring each other down. When it came to the question of choosing an heir for my father's business, my elder brothers and my mother never thought of me as a contender. I chose to move away, out of home, and began a company from scratch. It was my dream and if my family was not going to help me do it, I decided to do it myself. For thirteen years, I toiled day and night and made Se-ri's Choice the world reckoned brand that it is today.

Even that was not enough, for my brothers still detested me. So unofficially, I cut-off ties with my family and rarely met them. I'd even blocked my elder brother's number. You could say the only thing that tied us together was our surname, Yoon.

However, it was just the night before my paragliding mishap, no it wasn't a mishap (how could it be when I descended right into your arms), my father called us all to dinner and declared that he wanted me to lead his company, Queen's group. I was elated. My mother was disapproving and my brothers and their wives furious. Yet I was on the top of the world. Sure that nothing could snatch away from me what I deserved. But as you know, destiny had other plans.

When I disappeared, my second elder brother, Se-hyung, was chosen to lead the company. I think my family members were celebrating when I vanished and was declared dead. My mother and sisters-in-law paraded through my apartment, picking up stuff they liked. I could read disappointment on all their faces when I came back hale and hearty.

But this is not what hurts me. It is the fact that Se-hyung was in touch with Gu Seung-joon and had found out that I was alive and in North Korea. He and his wife kept it a secret from the rest of the family. I'd expected him to get me out of there safely. Now that I think about it, I realize I was so stupid. Why would he have cared? I was a competitor to him, not a sister. Yet the worst I could have thought of him was that he'd ignore my request and not relay information about my whereabouts to my father- the only person who'd been concerned about my disappearance.

But what he did was beyond redemption. Do you know, it was he who colluded with Cho Cheol-gang and instructed Gu Seung and his aides to prevent me from returning home. It seems he was eager to do anything to make me stay there permanently. While in other circumstances, staying permanently with you seems a wish that I was desperate for to come true, the level of Se-hyung's machinations shocked me. I'm sure the brain behind this all was his wife, Sang-ah. And this is not the end. That day, en-route to the airport, the trucks that were sent to kill me, the goons who shot at you, were in a way, all sent by my brother. I'll not say I could forgive him for threatening my life, but what makes me so furious, so distraught is that he tried to harm you, tried to kill you. And that, Jeong-Hyeok, is something I cannot forgive. I swear to you that I will avenge it. I will make him pay for it.

Till now having grown up in such a dysfunctional family, I'd begun to believe that the bonds between family members were fake, that they were just pretenses in front of the world. But when I met you and your family, it all changed. I could see the love and concern for you sparkle in your mother's eyes, how her face lit up when she saw you were alive. Even General Ri, tough on the outside, loves you a lot- so much that he chose to side with his son for me, me who could have gotten him and his entire family executed in the wink of an eye.

When you spoke of how much you and brother adored each other, how he joined the army so that you could follow your passion to play the piano, how you broke all bond with music ever since the day he died, I was stumped. It was then I understood what it means to love and care for each other, to stand together through the thick and thin of life. I realized this is what families are meant to do- their love doesn't change even when someone dies, even when someone does a mistake, even when they fight or get angry, they still care. And that never changes. That should never change.

You have a wonderful family Jeong-Hyeok. And equally wonderful are your friends. And a kind man like you deserves all that love. I wish I could have been a part of your family, a part of you. I know this is an impossible dream, a dream which would never come true. Though my heart aches as I write this, I'm sure Dan loves you to bits and would take good care of you and your parents.

I would pray to God every day for you to be surrounded by such loving people all your life.

Jeong-Hyeok, I know your daughter would never feel the way I did. She would be the luckiest woman alive after her mother and grandmother. For they all would have you.

As for me, I'll live by clutching this beautiful dream at heart, the dream where you are mine.

Dreaming an impossible dream,

Se-ri