FOURTEEN

Jessica was stirring around the pot absentmindedly; Tiffany had remained lighthearted throughout the meal and I tried my best to carry that energy, but Jessica was notably quieter than usual; both were avoiding their usual suggestive jokes. Normally, I would have no qualms with this, but the conversation felt so void and … overly polite? Weren’t Tiffany and Jessica friends in the past? Had I not listened to their back-and-forth prior to the meal, I would’ve never guessed that they were friends in the past, or even that they knew each other.

Now that the meal was mostly done, Tiffany started shifting around in her seat in anticipation while Jessica diverted her gaze, clearly trying to avoid the now pressing matter at hand.

“Sica, are you fishing in there?”

My attempt at humor seemed to have diffused the atmosphere to the point that Jessica was willing to concede her attempt to draw out the meal.

“Sorry,” she said, withdrawing her chopsticks from the pot and setting it down.

I turned to a Tiffany still fiddling in her seat, coming to attention as I directed my gaze at her. “Jessi, I—actually, Taeyeon, can I tell her?” Tiffany said, looking at me.

“It’s ok Fany, I’ll tell her,” I told her, patting her knee, “Um, so when you got drunk last night, you just told me that you worked for Fany’s dad, but I stopped you before you said much else.”

I knew the way I worded that was misleading, but that was intentional; I felt bad for lying to Jessica like this, but I knew she would start blaming herself if I told her the truth. Tiffany, who probably noticed my intentional exclusion, didn’t choose to comment on it and instead waited for Jessica’s reaction.

“Oh, really?” she said, as if unsure of what she just heard, “Well, I guess it’s fortunate that I only said that much, huh?”

“Yeah, do you want to know what else you said?” I inquired, continuing before giving her a chance to respond, “You were also giving random people in the bar an attractiveness rating, but you were rating everyone seven or—”

“Ookaay I don’t think I need to hear more,” Jessica said, leaning over the table quickly to cover my mouth. I smiled; although what I had said was true, the only reason I chose to reveal it was to ease Jessica into talking. Fortunately, it seemed as though my attempt succeeded; Jessica’s facial features became much less closed off and cautious.

“Jessi, can I be frank?” Tiffany said very sternly. This level of seriousness was something I had never experienced with her before, and it scared me. I wasn’t cautious of the sudden change in mood the conversation took, but I chose not to comment on it, hoping that Jessi was feeling more cooperative now. “Don’t trust that man that you’re working for. He’s the reason I left the States.”

I didn’t know what to make of this. It simply confused me. There must be context behind this, right? But what kind of reason would be good enough to force one’s own daughter to leave the country?

While my mind swirled with a million questions, I glanced up at Jessica, who simply looked taken aback.

“Not only that, but he told my relatives bad things about me and I had to live by myself. I cried the entire airplane ride; I missed you so much, Jessi.”

The longing in Tiffany’s voice hurt. It felt like a hole in my chest appeared, or that someone was trying to extract my heart with a vacuum cleaner. In that one sentence, I could feel the loneliness, the anguish, the suffering that Tiffany must have gone through. I instinctively grabbed a hold of Tiffany’s hand and squeezed it.

Jessica was just staring at Tiffany, not making a single sound. Usually, I had an easy time reading Jessica’s emotions as she was a very expressive person, but right now she was being stone-faced. “So you did end up saying that, huh.”

“What?”

It took a second to register that it was, in fact, me who made that exclamation. Jessica continued on, “I was warned about this. Since you already know, I guess there’s no point in hiding the fact that I’m working for Tiffany’s dad. When I met him, he warned me that you would try to twist the story that way.”

“Jessi—”

“Tiff, didn’t you always say that you hated lying? Why are you lying right now?”

I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. It was a terrible thing to think, that I shouldn’t be here and that I should leave. But I needed to be here for both of them: if things escalated, then I would have to be the one to deescalate the situation.

“Jessi, I don’t know what that man told you, but he’s lying to you. He always put up a nice front to you, but I know him better than you,” Tiffany replied. She didn’t even look angry that Jessica just accused her of lying, one of the things that Tiffany seemed to hate the most: she looked more sad and fatigued. Another thing I found curious was the way Tiffany was addressing her father; I understood that their relationship was strained, but it seemed like Tiffany was outright denying their familial tie by calling her father ‘that man’.

Jessica, on the other hand, did start to get angry. There were very few times I’ve seen her get angry, but they were always directed towards men at bars or rude strangers. Jessica’s angry state was so terrifying that I would probably rather watch a horror movie than experience her anger being directed at me. “How could you say that when there exist records of your conversations with him? How could you say that when, after that news article came out, you talked to him about moving to Korea for fear of being bullied in school because of the news?” Jessica was standing at this point, dismissive of the fact that people from other tables were starting to look at her, “Do you know lonely I was? How scared I was? How confused I was?” At this point, Jessica had switched to English. I could see a waitress approaching her out of the corner of my eye; I wanted to do something as well but was honestly too scared to move. Why was I such a coward? “Did you know that I blamed myself for the whole situation, and that I never could get into another relationship because of how insecure I became?”

“Miss, could you be quieter? You’re disturbing our customers,” the Korean waitress said to the fuming brunette.

“I’m leaving anyway,” she replied, switching back to Korean, storming off.

“Jessi—”

My muscles froze in the motion of getting up, having felt a squeeze from Tiffany’s hand. “D-Don’t get too jealous when I say this ok? I used to love Jessi so much, but it’s s-such a shame that man entered her life.”

Those words tore a hole in my chest.

I usually was a stoic person who was just barely unable to count the number of times I cried in my life on one hand, but at that moment, another count was almost added to that exclusive list. The way she stuttered, the very fact that such a positive person was essentially crying, the broken tone to her voice—something about that combination triggered a protective instinct. I sat back down, turned around and hugged her; it was an automatic reaction, something which my body just did on its own, without any thought or pretense of intention. It very much felt like I was a mother soothing her daughter through her first break-up.

“When he was in my life he ruined it, what if he does the same to Jessica?”

I could do nothing but pat Tiffany’s back, her head dropping onto my shoulder. “I’ll help her,” I told Tiffany, “I believe you. I’ll make sure she comes through.”

Tiffany chuckled. “For you, I would hope so. She is—” she cut herself off, as if abruptly remembering something.

“She is what?” I said, leaning my head back to look at her.

“It’s not for me to say, I think,” she concluded, releasing our embrace, “I’ll pay for this.”

“What?” I refuted Tiffany as she waved to get the waitress’s attention.

“Just let me do it. You’re in college, right? I have more money than you, I’ll pay,” she insisted, “Plus, it was my fault that we’re here anyway.”

“May I help you?” a waitress said, approaching our table. I couldn’t help but notice it was the same one that asked Jessica to calm down.

“I’m sorry for the commotion we caused earlier, but may I have the check please?” Tiffany asked, smiling politely.

“It’s fine, of course,” she replied, “May I take the dishes?”

“Oh, yeah!”

With that, the waitress whisked the dishes away to the kitchen.

“I’ll pay, ok? Even though Sooyoung was half-joking when she said it, you would be surprised at how much money this bartender has,” she said.

I frowned. It felt wrong to let her pay, especially given what just transpired, but it seemed like I had no choice in the matter. Plus, she could probably overpower me—not that overpowering me was a particularly difficult task.

“Well, Jessica is a business major, so she’s usually really logical about things,” I mused, “So the ‘evidence’ that was presented to her must have been really convincing.”

“That man is a rich one. He fabricated it to get on Jessica’s good side. I don’t blame Jessi at all; it’s his fault and no one else’s,” Tiffany replied. Anger seethed inside her words; silently but surely. “That man is incapable of empathy. He is a purely self-driven man who only turned more inward after my mother’s death.”

I gasped. So that’s why Tiffany never made mention of her … how horrible it must be. Just the thought of my mom being gone was unbearable. But Tiffany … not only was she living away from home, but with a negligent father and an absent mother? I couldn’t last two days without missing my parents.

“I’m so sorry, that’s horrible,” I said.

“Thank you; it happened a long time ago, but it was then that he started becoming even more selfish. I think my mom was the person who reminded him that other people existed and to have empathy,” she said; her disdain regarding the man she was talking to was clearly seen on both her face in her voice.

I could never imagine a father being the way that Tiffany described him. Not that I didn’t believe her, but it just seemed unfathomable that someone’s parent would be so cruel to his own daughter. I knew it was a function of my positive relationship with my own parents, but even with this consideration … how could a parent do that to a person he helped create?