CHAPTER 8

Even after opening the book, there was silence for a while. Taejun ran his fingers through his hair, which had become tangled, and lightly stroked his neck. His fingertips touching the nape of his neck felt cold.

When he looked up, his eyes met Minhee’s, and she smiled and nodded, wordlessly urging him on. Taejun cleared his throat and began to read aloud the sentences he had read with his eyes several times.

[Lo…ve, I love you, our― our baby, I love you…]

He stuttered the sentences awkwardly between words, and after a moment of hesitation, his throat quivered, and he started reading again in a dry and monotonous voice.

The small sound of Rose’s slow breath, the rustling of the book, and Taejun’’s subdued voice filled the room.

Minhee watched Taejun’s pale face subtly contort in embarrassment, then harden and become expressionless, and felt a tingle in the pit of her stomach for no reason.

She couldn’t understand why a man like Taejun, who had everything, would look so sad.  He looked serene and lonely, like an island floating alone in the vast ocean.

Minhee was stunned by the absurd thought that she wanted to hug him and comfort him the way she had hugged Rose- but then-

“Mom…”

Rose’s drowsy voice calling for her mother made Taejun and Minhee’s eyes meet. Minhee’s nose twitched and tears pooled at the corners of her eyes.

Taejun’s deep and black eyes stared fixedly at Minhee’s face, where tears had gathered around her eyes and nose like dewdrops. Minhee’s eyelashes fluttered like butterfly wings, avoiding his gaze. Swallowing hard, Taejun lowered his gaze to the book.

[Yesterday, today, tomorrow. I’ll always love you].

Taejun closed the book. Minhee kissed Rose’s forehead.

[Good night, Rose. Sweet dreams.]

Minhee looked at Taejun with intensity and made a gesture towards Rose. He released the breath he’d been holding and rubbed the back of his neck, then hesitantly leaned over and kissed Rose’s forehead.

[Good night, Rose].

Leaving Rose to sleep, they turned off the light and left the room, their footsteps muffled.

[Mr. Baek, may I speak to you for a moment?]

Taejun, who was heading to his study, turned back and nodded briefly. Trying to keep up with his wide strides as he changed direction towards the living room, Minhee’s foot caught on a corner of the thick carpet.

With a lone scream, she threw her arms out in front of her, and just before she fell to the floor, Taejun grabbed the back of her blouse. In doing so, the weight shifted to the front of the blouse, causing two tightly pulled buttons to pop off with a ping sound.

In a sudden chaotic moment, Minhee raised her arms to cover her chest after a short scream. Taejun let out a surprised gasp and let go of the blouse, and Minhee fell forward, her arms outstretched again, gripping the floor.

Between the parted blouse, Taejun caught a glimpse of Minhee’s fair and smooth flesh, partly obscured by a white lace bra. 

Thanks to his photographic memory, which he didn’t know if it was a curse or a blessing, the image was seared into his mind like an imprint that he would never be able to erase.

Starting from Minhee’s face, down her neck and to the upper part of her chest, a warm sensation spread on her white skin like red paint spreading in milk, and Taejun, who had been observing this in real-time through the lens of his photographic memory, finally came to his senses and turned his head.

His breaths became subtly coarse. Minhee grabbed the hem of her blouse with trembling hands and quickly covered her br*asts like a curtain closing.

‘It’s already too late.’

Taejun shook his head as if shaking off vivid scenes that were replaying in his mind like an enlarged image.

‘I can’t believe I’m doing this to Rose’s teacher.’

Although he understood that she was an adult, he felt a vague sense of shame and guilt for doing something inappropriate to a woman who looked ten years younger than him.

It was hard to explain exactly what he felt sorry for, but an apology was needed.

[I’m sorry].

[Oh, no, I told you earlier that I have poor balance and often trip over!]

[I’ll wait, why don’t you go change your clothes].

The sight of Minhee squirming on the floor, clutching the hem of her blouse around her chest, and breathing heavily was sending a pretty strong signal to his nerves. 

Minhee nodded, got up, and ran out of the living room.

Taejun flopped down on the couch and crossed his legs. Scenes like the blouse falling to the ground and the white lace bra shifting upward were unprecedented for him, yet they were replaying in his mind as if on a loop.

[Damn it].

He furrowed his brow and tried to block it out, but it seemed to be on a different frequency than the information he normally took in.

His mind flashed back to quantum mechanics and Schrödinger’s wave equation. Trying to concentrate on complicated thoughts only made it more challenging. He thought about the algorithm of the quantum investment program he had developed. His breathing slowed, and a feeling akin to peace washed over him.

Closing his eyes and following the numbers and formulas, Taejun blinked his eyes open when a sweet scent wafted in.

The images he’d pushed away flooded back into his mind as he saw Minhee in a t-shirt.

Sitting across from him, her face, still flushed, with her orderly teeth biting her lower lip, confronted him. Taejun’s fingertips tingle with an unsettling sensation.

A desire to grasp and unravel anything surged within him.

[……Let’s get this over with].

[Oh, yeah. I’ll be quick. Can you spend at least two hours with Rose every evening, from 6 to 8?]

[I’ll try. Next.]

[If some of Rose’s belongings are still at the house where she lived with her parents, can we bring her things here? It would be a great help for Rose to adapt to this place.]

[……Sure. Let’s set a date, can you come with me, because I can’t tell what she needs by looking at it].

[I promised my roommate I’d be home on Sunday, so except for that day, it’s possible.]

‘Promised to go home on Sundays? Aren’t roommates usually more excited to have an empty house? Does she have a boyfriend she lives with?’

Well, it’s common for adults to become independent from their parents and live with their partners once they’ve reached that stage. According to what he unexpectedly witnessed a few minutes ago, despite her youthful appearance, Minhee was undeniably an adult woman.

‘I shouldn’t concern myself with whether she’s living with a boyfriend or not.’

With his chin slightly raised and his head tilted, Taejun continued to observe the experimental subject with a sharp gaze, as if trying to record and analyze.

From the dark hair cascading on her shoulders to the cherry-colored lips perched below a gently sloped nose, a slender collarbone peeking over a plunging neckline, revealing mature curves hidden beneath modest clothing, and the neatly painted pink pedicure on her well-kept toes—every detail was examined. It was absurd to think that he initially mistook her for a young student.

‘It’s normal for an adult man with a healthy s*x drive to see an adult woman and for his body to react but my body didn’t react at all to the weekend nanny when she was flirting with me, why now to Miss Minnie?’

Taejun’s brain, accustomed to storing, comprehending, and deducing optimal conclusions from many things, anxiously sifted through the data stored in his mind.

He had categorized the women who expressed interest in him despite his stony, unresponsive demeanor into two groups.

The first were career women who were aggressively assertive and confident, often playing up their strengths and promising successful business partnerships and intimate pleasure all at once.

The second was the overly flirtatious, physically seductive women who would run their lustful eyes over his body and suggest a casual relationship. The weekend nanny was in the same category.

‘Miss Minnie doesn’t fit into either category. What is different about her?’

Taejun observed Minhee, who sat before him with the eyes of a scholar facing a puzzle, a problem yet to be solved.

Miss Minnie seemed scared of him, yet had said everything she needed to say. She didn’t cling to him, no intrusive behavior. If anything, she was trying to distance herself from him, which subtly bothered him.

As she looked up at him with a smile that seemed both intentional and casual,  Miss Minniei’s voice flowed like a gentle spring breeze. Taejun couldn’t help but be captivated, feeling a tingling sensation in his ears and a subtle tightening in his throat.

When she spoke, it was as if sweet, sparkling gems poured out of her, like a girl in the fairy tales. She effortlessly returned the atmosphere to normal without raising her voice, just as she had done with Rose.

Once again, she proved to be the type of woman Taejun had never encountered before. Giving up on classification, he created a new category in his mental cabinet, naming it ‘Miss Minnie.’

In it, he lined up all the information he’d learned about her so far.

‘Alright, it’s nothing special. The physical reaction was just a temporary glitch in the system, like a bug. It’s simply the brain’s abnormal response to something it has never experienced before.’

As Taejun’s composed gaze returned to her face, her round pupils blinked in surprise. Despite the appearance of being frightened, her large eyes were surprisingly clear and transparent.

Miss Minnie’s eyes were pure as if they had been nurtured with love and care, never seen a rainstorm, never having faced a storm, and seemingly unaware of the world’s dirtiness. They resembled the eyes of a child like Rose. Eyes that a flawed person like Taejun could never covet… such eyes.

‘Yeah, maybe it’s because of those eyes that errors keep occurring.’

He let out a long sigh.

[The weekend nanny quit. Can you work on weekends just until we find a replacement? You’ll receive additional pay for working on weekends, and we’ll do our best to find a replacement as soon as possible.]