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“Eomma, why don’t I have an appa?”

Taehyung remembered his mother looking down at him with a sad smile on her face. “Because he couldn’t take care of you, baby.”

Taehyung hadn’t asked again until he was sixteen.

“I’m old enough now.  Tell me why I don’t have an appa.  Please?”

He remembered the tears that filled her eyes.  She’d told him the whole story.  How they’d dated secretly for a while, and how when he’d found out she was pregnant, he’d broken up with her.  Left her to raise a baby all by herself.  But she’d been determined to do it.  For that, Taehyung was grateful.

Now, as he stared up at the man who he’d only met once in his life, he scowled.

“Why are you here, Mr. Myeong?  I thought we agreed I’d never see you again after you signed the company over to me.”

“I wanted to see how the company is doing; that’s all.  I have to say, you’ve done a fairly good job with it considering you walked in here with no experience.”

Taehyung let out a long sigh and pointed towards the door. “You see that?  That’s the way out.  Please see yourself out.”

“Can I not have a chance to reconcile my relationship with my son?”

“I’m not your son,” Taehyung spat out angrily. “I stopped being your son the moment you walked out on my mother.  Do you know how hard it was for her?  She could barely feed me and clothe me, but she never gave up on me.  And what did you do?  Nothing.  You only bothered to look for me when you had no one else to hand your beloved company to.  You’re lucky I didn’t destroy this company from the top down.”

Taehyung was fuming, but his father seemed unnervingly calm.

“Why did you leave her?  Tell me.  Because you had no excuse.  You’re the reason I’m sitting in this chair right now; you’re the one who got her pregnant.  You had no right to leave her to raise a child alone.”

Mr. Myeong smiled. “Your mother raised you well, I see.  She taught you to respect her.”

“You know why I respect her?  Because she loved me.  She could’ve died having me.  But she took the risk and had me anyway.  Where were you?  On a yacht drinking with your friends?  You didn’t even offer her child support.  You don’t deserve my respect, so don’t come in here acting like you do.”

Mr. Myeong nodded. “I understand.  You’re right, I don’t deserve your respect.  I hope your wedding goes well.  That’s a pretty girl you got.” With those words, he turned and walked out of the office.

Taehyung’s face had gone pale.  How had his father known he was getting married?  He pulled out his phone.  That’s when a notification popped up.  He clicked on it, and it took him right to Nia’s social media.

“Dress shopping: round two!  I never realized shopping for dresses for little girls would be such a hard job!”

The caption was accompanied by a picture of her and Minseo.  Taehyung sighed.  Of course, his father had probably found Nia’s social media.  It wasn’t that much of a surprise, really.  She was frequently posting pictures of dinners she was having and other random things.  As he scrolled through her feed, he found many pictures of himself.  In most of them, he wasn’t looking at the camera.  He clicked on one.

“Best birthday ever!  Tae took me to Fish Out of Water for dinner!  He’s so sweet.”

Taehyung sighed and locked his phone, burying his face in his hands.  He didn’t know anything about his dad.  He didn’t even know his first name.  And now here the guy was prancing into his office like he owned the place.  Taehyung really didn’t want to see him again.  Thinking about the possibility made him sick to his stomach.  He stood up from his desk.

“Jimin, I’m headed home for the day.  Can you handle everything else?”

“Sure!”

It was only four, but Taehyung knew he couldn’t do anymore work today.  He needed to go home.  Hopefully, Nia would be home soon too.