Chapter Text
The leaves rustle softly, a gentle breeze grazing them.
Sohye sits on the veranda, gazing into the distance as a few strands of stray hair caress the sides of her face, caught in the wind. Her hands lay in her lap, absent-mindedly fingering the folds of her dark skirt. Behind her, she hears a pattering of feet, and turns to meet the new arrival.
"It is quite cool today," she comments, opening her arms to welcome her son as he seats himself in her lap, "and yet you are dressed rather thinly, Seokha."
"I'm not cold at all," the little boy protests, pouting at his mother. "I can withstand the cold really well!"
"Even so, you may catch a cold." Sohye reaches for the half-stitched-up skirt next to her, which she had put aside, and wraps it around Seokha tenderly. "It wouldn't do to have you sick again, would it, my little dandelion? You wouldn't want to have all that mucus running down your nose and suffer from headaches again, would you?"
Seokha immediately shakes his head. "I don't want the nasty headaches to return!"
"That's why you should dress warmly, however tolerant to the cold you may be."
"I'm still a strong boy though! Especially against the cold!"
Sohye taps the little boy's nose affectionately, and he giggles.
"I suppose you get it from your father," she comments without thinking, and instantly feels her heart throb the moment the words have left her mouth. Even years after his passing, Mooyeon still haunts Sohye and his last lingering gaze, right before the light left his eyes, remains etched firmly in her memory.
"What is father like?" Seokha asks. It isn't the first time he has posed the question to his mother, but she has always found some excuse to divert the topic, not ready to tell Seokha the full story.
Well, Seokha is seven years old. She doesn't think he is old enough to be explicitly told that his father is gone from this world, but he at least deserves to know what kind of a man Mooyeon was.
"Your father was strong and powerful, but he was also immensely gentle and brave," she says softly. Seokha listens closely, intrigued, and, today, she sees Mooyeon in his features more clearly than ever. "He had so much love to give, he was willing to leave his old life behind to start a new one together. When I was lonely, he brought comfort. When I was unloved, he gave me affection. He was my everything, my reason to live. He would have been a wonderful father."
Her words falter as she recalls his warm gaze and the soft smile he reserved only for her.
"We were - " she stumbles momentarily, conscious of tears threatening to leak out of her eyes " - we were separated, on the way." She chances a look at Seokha, whose eyes are dilated and brows slightly furrowed.
"Where is he? When is he coming back?" he asks tentatively, and she does not have the heart to say that no, Mooyeon will never - can never - come back to them.
"A long time ago, it once rained for a long time," she starts. "The whole land flooded and even the dandelions were about to drown. A small dandelion prayed to the sky to be spared - then, suddenly, the wind blew. The dandelion seeds took flight and landed on a sunny hill. A short while later, they sprouted and bloomed. If we ride the wind, we will be able to bloom somewhere else." She recalls their ventures in the hills, remembering how the dandelion seeds fluttered aloft the wind and around her as Mooyeon held her hands tenderly.
"...why do you cry, mother?"
Sohye blinks, snapping out of her reverie. Seokha watches her concernedly, and she realises that tears have slipped out of her eyes and are rolling down her cheeks.
"He will find us," she murmurs, more to herself now than to her son. "Whether he is born as a flower or a tree in his next life, he will become the wind and come to us. He is out there, somewhere, searching - but he will come home one day."
Seokha slips his small hand into her own, and she squeezes it reassuringly.
"The dandelion seeds are floating on the wind," he comments, and Sohye looks around; indeed, thousands of seeds ride the breeze now, and she watches them wistfully.
Seokha puffs his cheeks out, blowing at the dandelion seeds to propel them along their journey faster, and Sohye gazes at him fondly. For a fleeting moment, she fancies the wind dips around her - almost as if it were embracing her - and she wonders, not for the first time, how their life would have been had the three of them remained together these past few years.