Chapter 6

〈 Chapter 6 〉 Emergency Family Meeting

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Something felt a bit off.

Usually, I don’t leave my room much.

Apart from the occasional need to move around, the main reason is that there’s no real need for me to go outside.

My meals are brought to my room by my mother or the housekeeper, and there’s a bathroom in my room that has been specially modified for my wheelchair.

Most importantly, my lifestyle, which mainly involves playing games from night until dawn, is quite different from that of the rest of my family, so I naturally didn’t often run into them, except for my mother.

This is why I hadn’t felt out of place until now.

Everything was as usual.

But, considering what had happened to me, things shouldn’t have been as usual.

‘I thought Mom would have told them…’

Of course, I couldn’t blame her.

I understood how she felt for not having told the family about my situation yet.

‘If I’m honest, it’s my fault.’

I had been playing games at a time like this, leaving everything to my mother.

Although it’s a bit sudden, I realize how little sense of crisis I have.

It was already 2 AM.

Considering that tomorrow is a weekday and my father and brother have to go to work and school, respectively, this is too early to drop such a huge bomb.

“Can’t we do it tomorrow? It’s still early….”

“No, we have to do it now.”

Mom was firm.

“Do you… not need the wheelchair anymore?”

“No, I can walk.”

As I answered, a small tear silently rolled down the corner of Mom’s eye.

“Yeah, that’s right. Let’s go.”

Knock knock

“Wake up.”

All the lights in the house turned on, and Mom woke up my father and brother.

“What? What’s going on?”

“Get up. I have something to say.”

Sensing something odd in Mom’s voice, my father got up without a word,

“Get up.”

“Ugh… What time is it?”

“2 AM.”

“2, 2 AM? Why didn’t you wake me up!”

“It’s 2 AM in the morning.”

“…Huh?”

“I have something to say. Get up.”

My brother grumbled for a while before finally getting up.

“Everyone, sit down.”

“…Mom, why? You woke us up all of a sudden. I have a class tomorrow morning.”

“What’s going on?”

For the first time in a long while, the whole family gathered around the dining table.

“I have something important to say.”

Then, Mom subtly nodded, and my father and brother’s gazes naturally turned to me, who was in the corner.

“Oh, um… Who is this? If there’s a guest, you should have said so.”

“Uh… Hi. Ahaha.”

My father and brother were momentarily stunned upon seeing me.

I understand how they feel.

Even now, every time the monitor screen turns black, I’m still startled by the reflection of myself.

“It’s me, Yujin.”

“…Huh?”

“What do you mean?”

Mom’s sudden bombshell left my father and brother with a stunned expression.

“This is Yujin.”

Mom’s declaration made my father and brother look at me one after another.

“Yujin? What do you mean?”

“Why is my brother’s name coming up?”

“Sigh….”

Mom took a deep breath under the family’s questioning.

“I’ll explain everything from the beginning.”

Then, she slowly opened her lips.

“Yujin had a seizure.”

“…What? Where is Yujin now? Is he in the hospital? Why are you telling us this now!”

“Is my brother okay?”

“Yujin is fine. …I think.”

“What do you mean, ‘I think’? What─”

Mom cut off my father’s words.

Then, she turned her gaze to me.

“Are you okay?”

The focus shifts to me?

“Um, yeah, I’m fine.”

The bizarre scene left my father and brother equally flustered, unable to hide their discomfort.

“What’s the connection between this person and Yujin… Oh, are you his nurse?”

“Nurse? She looks younger than me? Is she a foreigner?”

Mom said.

“This is Yujin.”

“…What are you talking about? Speak clearly.”

There was a hint of anger in my father’s voice.

It seemed he found the whole situation very unpleasant.

After all, being woken up in the middle of the night without any warning and hearing such strange things was bound to make anyone upset.

“I’m speaking clearly. I know it’s hard to believe, but this is Yujin.”

“So, what do you mean by that─”

“Honey.”

Mom spoke in a trembling voice.

“It’s really Yujin.”

“Um, so this woman is my son Yujin? Huh.”

“Yeah.”

“Huh.”

My father scanned me, clearly not understanding.

“Why? What makes you think that?”

Mom took another deep breath and began to recount the events of a few hours earlier.

“When I got home, this child was lying in Yujin’s room. Yujin wasn’t there.”

“…So?”

“I woke up the child, and he said he was Yujin.”

“…You believed that?”

“I didn’t believe it at first either. But… it’s really Yujin.”

My father, though bewildered, tried his best to listen to Mom.

“Did you look for Yujin?”

“He wasn’t at home. He can’t go anywhere on his own….”

“What about the front door security camera? Did you check? Someone could have taken him out.”

“No one has come in or out. The windows were all locked from the inside.”

“…That’s strange.”

At that moment, my brother, unable to bear it any longer, interjected.

“Hey, what are you doing? Just ask the person. Excuse me, pretty lady. What’s your relationship with my brother?”

What relationship? She’s me.

Of course, I couldn’t say that directly, so I hesitated for a moment.

‘What should I say?’

Introducing myself to someone is a difficult task.

I’ve never even had a job interview, and now I have to give a briefing to prove that I’m Yujin.

But it won’t be that hard.

After all, I have a strong ally by my side.

“Yuri.”

Mom softly called my brother’s name and placed a piece of paper on the table.

It was a powerful weapon to end this tedious back-and-forth.

[DNA Test Result Report]

The moment Mom handed this to my father and brother, the house was turned upside down.

“Um, what’s this?”

“A paternity test between Yujin and me. I just got it.”

“You can’t be serious. You’re saying this lady is my brother?”

“Yeah.”

“What?!”

A loud exclamation burst from my father, who had been watching.

The power of the single piece of paper Mom handed over was truly destructive.

“Really… this lady, no, this sister is my brother?”

“Yeah. I had it done in several places, and they all confirmed it’s a match.”

…That was news to me.

She was indeed thorough, more so than I expected.

“Um, so, are you my brother?”

“It’s me.”

My short answer seemed to satisfy my brother, whose face turned to shock.

“Haha… That was quite entertaining. What kind of surprise is this?”

“Yuri.”

“Mom, no matter how I think about it, this doesn’t make sense. We shouldn’t be doing this. We should be looking for my brother. Have you reported it to the police? No, he’s probably hiding in his room. I’ll go look for him.”

Despite the clear DNA evidence, convincing them wasn’t easy.

“Yuri.”

When I called my brother’s name, he flinched after checking that no one was in my room.

“Yes? Why…?”

“Remember when you said you were going to Gaepyeong with some girls? There were boys too, right?”

“Um, how do you… No, how could you know that? Even my brother didn’t know!”

“I just pretended not to know.”

“…”

My brother turned his gaze away.

“Mom, I don’t think this is my brother. My brother wasn’t like that, with a different inside and outside.”

“Yuri….”

Mom looked at my brother with a sad smile.

“Let’s talk about the Gaepyeong trip tomorrow?”

“…I’m done for, I’m done for.”

After a brief struggle, my father, who had been watching, stepped in.

“Ahem. So, you had a seizure, and when you opened your eyes, you were like this?”

“Yes. I clearly remember that it was different from my usual seizures.”

“And you found this woman… no, Yujin, lying there and woke him up?”

“Yeah.”

“Hmm.”

My father nodded.

“There’s circumstantial evidence and direct evidence… Well, then there’s no problem.”

“Dad!”

“You, be quiet. You went to Gaepyeong with some boys?”

“Well, there were girls too. Actually, there were more girls─”

“Quiet!”

“Ouch….”

My father’s gaze turned to Mom.

“And I’ll also do a paternity test with you. No objections, right?”

“Huh? Why?”

My father said playfully.

“What if this child is a daughter you’ve hidden? If we’re doing it, let’s do it right.”

“What?”

Mom’s voice turned sharp.

Realizing something was off, my father tried to smooth things over, but it was too late.

“It was just a joke. Why are you so sensitive?”

“Is now the time for jokes? And you have to do that test. No exceptions. Got it?”

My father is generally good, but he always has to add one more word.

‘This is a three-year, no, a five-year type.’

That’s what they mean by someone who asks for a beating.

“Honey? I was wrong. It was a mistake. You know I’m good at jokes.”

Anyway, the emergency family meeting ended like that.

Of course, my father and brother still didn’t seem to fully believe it, but I believe time will resolve everything.

The past few hours have felt like a rollercoaster between heaven and hell.

Finally, I’ve truly come home.

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