Episode 1. The Eldest Daughter is Suspicious (3)
After roughly organizing the baby supplies, Kang Dae-oh drove his car back to the post-natal care center.
He exchanged greetings separately with the director of the post-natal care center, whose face he had seen so often that he was now familiar with her.
Kang Dae-oh headed to Room 501, located at the end of the hallway.
Right next to the door, Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon’s names were clearly written.
Knock knock.
As he knocked, the door opened immediately.
“Honey. I’m he–…”
“Shhh!”
Min Seung-yeon brought her index finger to her lips, making a gesture for her husband to be quiet.
At first, Kang Dae-oh couldn’t understand why his wife was acting this way.
But as soon as he entered the room, he immediately realized the reason.
It was because of the couple’s child, Chukbok-i, who was quietly sleeping in the baby crib.
“She’s sleeping?”
“Yeah. I brought Chukbok-i here 10 minutes ago because I wanted to see her. She just kept sleeping, probably tired.”
“They say newborns just eat, sleep, and poop. It’s a repetition of that.”
“But the director told me that once we leave the post-natal care center and go home, that’s when the real parenting hell begins. So she told us to rest as much as possible while we’re here.”
“Oh, really?”
They had heard a lot from their married senior friends about how difficult parenting was.
However, the two of them couldn’t accurately gauge just how difficult parenting would be.
And that was because.
This was their first time having a child.
Naturally, they were also beginners at parenting.
“Still, they say our baby is very quiet. Some babies cry a lot and make a fuss when their mothers take them out of the nursery. But our baby is quiet in the nursery, and quiet here too. The caregivers said they’d never seen a baby like this before.”
“Certainly… she is unique.”
It was beyond unique; it felt suspicious.
Chukbok-i already gave off a strong vibe of being on her second life.
But there was no way to confirm such a thing.
And actually, if he thought about it, as his friends said, the idea of a “second life” was nonsense.
So Kang Dae-oh decided to just brush it off as a joke.
He thought, ‘I must have just been sensitive.’
After spending their last day at the post-natal care center.
The director handed a small gift to the departing couple.
“These are diapers and baby bottles.”
“Oh my! Thank you, Director. I’ll use them well.”
“Especially for diapers, you’ll need a lot, so I recommend stocking up in advance.”
“How many do they usually use in a day?”
Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon had thought they would use at most 2 or 3.
However, their thinking was pure naivety.
“Babies who use a lot might go through over 10, you know?”
“What? Is that, really true?”
One should not underestimate a newborn’s appetite and bowel movements.
And that’s not all.
“Newborns also spit up frequently, so make sure to keep handkerchiefs handy. Babies’ digestive systems are still very underdeveloped.”
There wasn’t just one or two things they had to take care of.
Still, Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon decided to diligently care for Chukbok-i under the responsibility of being parents.
“Oh, right. Have you decided on Chukbok-i’s name?”
“Yes.”
Kang Dae-oh informed her of Chukbok-i’s new name on behalf of his wife.
“We’re thinking of naming her Kang Yera.”
“Kang Yera. Oh my, that’s a pretty name.”
“Isn’t it?”
There was a particular reason why Kang Dae-oh was so proud of the name.
Min Seung-yeon knew this reason very well.
“Her daddy agonized over it for days before finally deciding. Didn’t he say he visited at least five naming centers?”
“I thought I was going to die. It felt like I visited every famous naming center in Seoul.”
Still, Kang Dae-oh was quite proud because the name seemed to turn out well.
Originally, they had thought of heading straight home.
However, since they had to visit a hospital again for check-ups and vaccinations anyway, the two carried the baby, who was lying in a basket, straight to a nearby pediatrician’s office.
Despite arriving relatively early, there were over 40 people waiting.
A look of anxiety spread across Min Seung-yeon’s face.
“It looks like it’ll take over an hour. What if Yera wakes up and cries?”
The couple hadn’t even properly practiced how to soothe a crying baby yet.
Worries already came flooding in like a tide.
Just then, something happened that would accelerate this worry.
“H-honey!”
Min Seung-yeon urgently called out to Kang Dae-oh, repeatedly patting his left arm.
“What’s wrong?”
“Y-Yera woke up! What do we do…!”
They had hoped she would stay asleep quietly until she got her shot.
But contrary to their wish, Kang Yera’s eyes were wide open.
“Can’t we get her back to sleep? Didn’t the director tell us a method?”
“Th-the director…”
Just the sight of the baby opening her eyes was enough to fluster the novice parents.
To make matters worse, a child who had just received a shot started crying at the top of their lungs.
The sound of crying spreading through the hospital scared other babies as well.
Some children even started crying along, as if infected by a crying virus.
This phenomenon approached the couple like a domino effect, gradually tightening around their necks.
At that moment.
Wink.
“…Honey?”
“What?”
“Our Yera. She just… winked at me.”
“Huh? Wink?”
At her husband’s claim, Min Seung-yeon scolded Kang Dae-oh, asking what he was talking about.
However, Kang Dae-oh, to express his injustice, pointed at their daughter again and said.
“It’s true! Look.”
Min Seung-yeon had thought Kang Dae-oh was seeing things.
But soon, she realized his words were true.
Instead, she smiled faintly and gave them a look as if to say, ‘I won’t cry, so stop talking and give me milk.’
Min Seung-yeon let out a laugh full of bewilderment.
“Our child is much more mature than her mom and dad.”
“…”
Every time Kang Dae-oh saw Kang Yera’s actions, which surpassed adult expectations, he couldn’t help but feel suspicious.
‘No way. It’s not really like that, is it?’
As a parent, how should he think about this?
Kang Dae-oh fell into an unexpected time of contemplation.
Ten days passed since Kang Yera came home.
Upon hearing the news that their granddaughter had arrived, Kang Dae-oh’s family visited their home.
Min Seung-yeon greeted her in-laws while holding the baby in her arms.
“Welcome, Mother-in-law, Father-in-law! Daeyeon, long time no see.”
“Unnie! You’ve worked hard!”
Kang Dae-oh’s younger sister, Kang Daeyeon’s gaze, turned towards Kang Yera, who was held in Min Seung-yeon’s arms.
“Oh my, how pretty!”
“Aww, our granddaughter! My goodness, her eyes are pretty, her nose is pretty. Her features are already so clear. She must take after her mother.”
In front of her mother-in-law’s showering praises, Min Seung-yeon blushed shyly.
Meanwhile. Upon hearing that his family had arrived, Kang Dae-oh, who had been in the kitchen, appeared in the living room wearing an apron.
“Dinner preparations are almost done, so in the meantime, please watch Yera with my daughter-in-law.”
“Why bother cooking? Just order food. You two must be tired and losing sleep because of childcare already.”
Kang Dae-oh’s mother knew very well how difficult parenting was.
If a newborn baby is at home, you can’t get proper sleep at night.
You have to breastfeed every 2 hours, and the baby doesn’t even sleep.
If you spend ages soothing a crying baby, sleeping even 2 hours a day becomes a lot.
That’s how it should be, normally.
However, considering the hardship, Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon’s faces looked remarkably relaxed.
Not even a common dark circle was visible.
Min Seung-yeon let out an awkward smile and revealed the secret.
“Because Yera is so quiet and well-behaved, we’re incredibly comfortable.”
“Quiet?”
Her father-in-law asked in surprise.
Min Seung-yeon nodded in response.
“Yes. She breastfeeds well, lies quietly by herself, and sometimes spits up because of indigestion, but other than that, she doesn’t cry and stays quiet. She hasn’t cried even once since coming home, I think?”
“That’s impossible…”
Kang Dae-oh’s parents, also experienced in parenting, knew very well how absurd Min Seung-yeon’s words were.
Especially the part about ‘never crying’ felt like a lie no matter how much they thought about it.
However, surprisingly, it was true.
Kang Dae-oh confirmed that Min Seung-yeon’s words were true while setting out the food.
“It’s just as Seung-yeon said, Mom.”
“No, how can a baby not cry even once? Is there something wrong with her body?”
“I also took the baby to the hospital with Seung-yeon several times because of that. They said there’s nothing wrong. No jaundice either. They even said she’s too healthy, if anything?”
Kang Dae-oh’s family showed reactions as if they were dreaming.
At this moment.
The baby suddenly started tossing and turning.
“Honey. It looks like Yera wants to see ‘that thing’.”
“Alright. Just a moment.”
At the mention of “show me,” Kang Daeyeon stated her guess.
“Are you talking about the focus book, unnie?”
Babies can’t distinguish colors well yet, so they should be shown focus books drawn in black and white.
However, what was in Kang Dae-oh’s hand was not a focus book.
“Oppa! Is that… isn’t that a CD case?”
“Oh, right.”
Kang Daeyeon and Kang Dae-oh’s parents were simply dumbfounded.
Because the item their son brought was the album case for singer Choi Seon-a’s 3rd mini-album.
When he stood the case upright next to the baby so it was clearly visible, only then did Kang Yera quiet down.
At the baby’s strange behavior, Kang Dae-oh gave a wry smile.
“She didn’t like the focus book. But when I showed her this, she became quiet.”
A baby becoming quiet by looking at the album package of a deceased idol singer.
It was an unheard-of case.
Min Seung-yeon provided additional information.
“She also dislikes children’s songs. She only likes idol songs.”
“How peculiar, our Yera.”
Kang Daeyeon asked with a hopeful thought.
“Maybe Yera is saying she wants to be an idol later, unnie?”
For Kang Dae-oh, an idol wasn’t the issue.
‘Why does this feel so strange?’
His eldest daughter is extremely suspicious.
