The morning of the holiday arrived with a silence that felt heavy, almost unnatural. Usually, my internal clock is a relentless taskmaster, jolting me awake at 6:00 a.m. with the phantom sound of a ticking exam timer. But today, the LED digits on my desk clock read 8:30 a.m., and the only sound was the distant, muffled rhythmic thump-thump-thump of Eomma in the kitchen, likely preparing enough food to feed a small battalion.
I lay in bed for a moment, staring at the ceiling. The LED strip I usually left on was off; I had actually slept deeply enough to remember turning it off. My mind, usually a chaotic grid of algorithms and "to-do" lists, felt strangely quiet. Or perhaps not quiet—just occupied by a different kind of data.
I looked at my hand, resting on the duvet. The bruising on my knuckles had faded to a faint, yellowish-green. A ghost of a smile—Danoh's smile—flickered through my mind. "I know," her eyes had said in the lab.
I sat up, shaking the thought away. Today was family time. In a Korean household, holidays aren't just days off; they are a grand performance of tradition, duty, and affection disguised as nagging.
When I walked downstairs, the house was a sensory overload. The air was thick with the savory, nutty scent of jeon (savory pancakes) sizzling in oil and the deep, earthy aroma of galbi-jjim (braised short ribs).
"He lives!" Hyuk-hyung shouted from the living room sofa, where he was sprawled out with a controller in his hand. "The SNU genius has emerged from his cave. I thought you might have turned into a line of code overnight."
"Good morning, Hyung," I said, my voice still raspy from sleep.
"Don't just stand there looking tall," Harin chirped, appearing from the kitchen with a plate of freshly fried zucchini. She shoved one toward my face. "Taste it. Is it too salty? Eomma is in a 'mood' because the pears for the kimchi weren't sweet enough."
I took a bite, the hot oil stinging my tongue. "It's fine, Harin."
"Just 'fine'?" She huffed, poking my arm. "You're so boring. Say it's delicious! Say your sister is a culinary mastermind!"
"It's acceptable," I corrected, a small tug at the corner of my mouth.
"Yah! You—"
"Leave your brother alone," Eomma's voice drifted from the kitchen, followed by the woman herself. She looked tired but vibrant, her hair pinned back, her apron dusted with flour. She walked over and cupped my face with her hands—hands that smelled of garlic and sesame oil. "You look like you've actually slept. And you're not pale today. Did something good happen at school?"
I felt a sudden, sharp heat behind my ears. "Just... the classes are interesting."
Eomma's eyes narrowed slightly—the "Mother's Intuition" sensor was clearly picking up a signal—but she just patted my cheek. "Good. Go help your father in the yard. He's trying to fix the gate again."
Appa was a man of few words, a trait I had inherited. We spent the next hour in a comfortable, industrious silence, tightening bolts and oiling the hinges of the front gate. There was no need for small talk. The rhythm of the tools and the shared effort was our conversation.
"The engineering department," Appa said suddenly, wiping his forehead with a rag. "Is it what you expected?"
"It's challenging," I replied. "Competitive."
Appa nodded, looking out at the street where a few neighborhood children were playing. "Competition is good for the mind, Hanbin. But don't let it turn your heart into stone. A machine without oil breaks. A man without... people... does the same."
I tightened a screw, the metal groaning under the pressure. I thought of the library steps. I thought of the girl from the English Department and how easily I had brushed her off. Then I thought of the weight of Danoh's bag on my shoulder and how it hadn't felt like a burden at all.
"I know, Appa," I said softly.
Lunch was a chaotic, loud affair. In our family, silence is a commodity that is rarely traded. Hyuk-hyung was busy recounting a story about his professor falling asleep during his own lecture, and Harin was complaining about her math tutor, all while Eomma kept piling food onto my bowl until I could barely see the rice.
"Eat more, Hanbin-ah. You're growing," Eomma insisted.
"I'm twenty, Eomma. I think I've stopped growing," I muttered, though I kept eating.
"You're still my baby," she countered, which prompted a round of gagging noises from Harin and a loud laugh from Hyuk.
But amidst the noise and the teasing, I felt a strange sense of grounding. For years, this table had been my battlefield—the place where I sat with my head down, thinking about my ranking, my future, my "perfection." But today, the pressure felt different. It was no longer a weight pressing me down; it was a foundation holding me up.
After lunch, I retreated to the living room. I pulled out my phone. I hadn't checked it all morning.
[KakaoTalk]
Danoh:Hanbin, happy holiday! I hope you're resting well and eating a lot of good food. My uncle made way too much Japchae... I'm currently drowning in noodles. (Attached: A blurry photo of a mountain of Japchae and her smiling awkwardly behind it).
I stared at the photo. Her hair was a bit messy, and she had a smudge of sauce on her cheek. She looked... real. Not like the polished, artificial perfection of the girls who usually approached me.
"Who are you smiling at?"
I jumped, nearly dropping the phone. Harin was leaning over the back of the sofa, her eyes wide with predatory curiosity.
"No one," I said, locking the screen.
"Liar! You had the 'stupid' look," Harin shrieked, jumping over the sofa to sit next to me. "Who is she? Is she pretty? Is she a genius? Does she like math?"
"Harin, go away."
"Eomma! Appa! Oppa! Hanbin Oppa is texting a girl!"
"I am not!"
But it was too late. The family gathering turned into an interrogation. Hyuk-hyung put me in a headlock, demanding to see the "mystery woman," while Eomma looked like she was about to cry with joy.
"Is she from SNU?" Appa asked, his voice calm but his eyes twinkling.
"She's... a classmate," I said, resigned to the fact that my privacy was a lost cause.
"Is she the reason you've been coming home with bruised knuckles?" Hyuk-hyung asked, his voice dropping to a whisper so Eomma wouldn't hear. He let go of my neck, his expression turning serious, protective.
I looked at my brother. He knew me. He knew I didn't fight without a reason.
"She's someone... worth the trouble," I admitted.
The house grew quiet for a rare second. Hyuk-hyung patted my back, a firm, manly gesture of approval. Eomma smiled and went back to the kitchen to pack a container of her best galbi for me to "take to uni."
As the holiday evening settled in, we all sat together watching a variety show on TV. Harin fell asleep with her head on my shoulder, and Hyuk-hyung was snoring lightly on the other side.
I pulled out my phone again, hidden under the shadow of the coffee table.
Me:Happy holiday, Danoh. The Japchae looks good. Don't drown. I'm bringing you something better than noodles tomorrow.
I hit send. My heart did a strange, recursive loop in my chest.
In my world of code, everything has a place. Every variable must be declared, and every function must have a purpose. But as I sat there in the warmth of my chaotic, loud, loving family, I realized that some variables aren't meant to be solved. They are meant to be kept.
And Park Danoh was the most important variable I had ever encountered.