Chapter 16: Morning Interrogation
Min-ho woke to the solid warmth of Maria against his chest, her breath a steady rhythm on his skin. The room was brighter now, full morning light painting stripes across the tangled silk sheets. He carefully extracted his arm from beneath her, sliding out of bed. The tile floor was cool under his bare feet.
She stirred, half-opening one sleep-heavy eye. “Mm. Where’re you going?”
“Shhh,” he whispered, bending to brush a kiss over her messy hair. “Keep sleeping. I’ll make breakfast.”
She murmured something incoherent and burrowed deeper into the pillow, a small smile on her lips. He pulled on his discarded t-shirt and boxers from the floor and padded quietly out of the room.
The house was quiet but alive. He could hear the faint, rhythmic scratch of a pencil from behind Claudia’s studio door, the low hum of a refrigerator from somewhere deeper within. He followed the scent of coffee down the stairs and into the large, sun-washed kitchen.
It was a space of worn comfort. Terracotta tiles underfoot, walls lined with framed black-and-white photos of a younger Maria, of her parents, of landscapes he didn’t recognize. An old record player in the corner spun a vinyl disk, the upbeat rhythm of cumbia filling the air. A batch of alfajores, little sandwich cookies dusted with powdered sugar, cooled on a wire rack by the window.
And she was there.
Leaning against the counter near the stove, sipping from a small, silver-banded gourd, was a young woman. Min-ho recognized her instantly from the photos Maria had shown him on lazy video calls. Pilar. The youngest sister. Twenty-two. A model based in Milan, home for a visit. In the pictures, she was stunning. In person, under the stark morning light, she was almost unnervingly so. Tall, willowy, with Maria’s same golden skin but hair a natural, glossy black that fell like oiled silk. Her features were sharper, more carved, a high-fashion version of her sisters’ warmth.
She looked up as he entered. A slow, knowing smile spread across her perfectly shaped lips. “Buenos días, BET,” she said, her voice a smooth, low purr. She said his stage name like it was a private joke.
“Min-ho is fine,” he said, giving a short, polite nod. He moved to the stove, searching for a pan. “Good morning.”
“Sleep well?” The question was innocent. Her tone was not.
He ignored it, finding a cast-iron skillet. “Well enough.” He opened the refrigerator, surveying its contents. Eggs, cheese, some fresh herbs, a packet of bacon. He began pulling things out.
He heard the soft click of her setting the gourd down. Then she was beside him, holding out a second mate, the metal straw already in place. “Here. You’ll need this more than me today.”
He took it, murmured thanks, and took a sip. The liquid was bitter and earthy, but with a strange, cloying undernote. Artificial sweetener. He couldn’t hide the slight grimace.
Pilar chuckled. “Not a fan of the edulcorante? Maria takes it bitter. Like her heart.” She drifted back to lean against the counter opposite him, watching as he cracked eggs into a bowl. “I’m sorry.”
The abrupt shift made him pause. He looked up, whisk in hand. “Sorry for what?”
She gestured vaguely around the kitchen, at the family photos, at him standing there in his rumpled clothes. “You have a great career. You’re known all over the world. You’re an important person. And she trapped you. Now, here you are.”
The words hung in the air, dissonant against the cheerful cumbia music. Min-ho set the whisk down with a soft tap. He looked at her directly, keeping his voice level. “I’m here because I want to be here. She didn’t trap me. She’s carrying my child.”
Pilar’s smile didn’t waver. It was a model’s smile, beautiful and empty of genuine emotion. “Of course,” she said, as if humoring him. She pushed off the counter and took a step closer, well into his personal space. The scent of her perfume, something expensive and floral, clashed with the smell of sizzling butter he’d just put in the pan. “Well,” she said, her voice dropping to a confidential murmur. “If you ever need to talk. Or just… company. You can count on me.”
She held his gaze for a beat too long, her dark eyes unreadable. Then she let that little smile play on her lips again as she turned. She walked past him, her shoulder brushing deliberately against his arm. The contact was brief, feather-light, and loaded with intention. Then she was gone, her footsteps silent on the tiles, leaving only her cloying perfume behind.
Min-ho stood frozen, the spatula limp in his hand. The butter in the pan began to sputter and brown. His mind reeled, trying to process the sheer, audacious malice wrapped in a beautiful, sympathetic package. It wasn’t Claudia’s frontal assault. This was subtler. More poisonous. An offer disguised as consolation, designed to make him doubt everything.
A trap? The word echoed. He thought of Maria’s tear-streaked face wrenching the door open. Her furious kiss. The way she’d laughed into his shoulder after Estela left. The feeling of her, solid and real and his, asleep in his arms minutes ago.
Anger, cold and clear, cut through the shock. He moved mechanically, pouring the eggs into the pan, scrambling them with more force than necessary. He sliced cheese, tore herbs, his movements sharp and precise. He didn’t just feel violated; he felt protective. This was her family. Her sanctuary. And that kind of poison was sitting at the kitchen table.
He plated the eggs, found some bread, and assembled a tray with clumsy haste. He didn’t want to be down here another second. He needed to be back upstairs. With her.
He took the stairs two at a time, the tray balanced in his hands. He nudged the bedroom door open with his foot.
Maria was sitting up in bed, the sheets pooled around her waist, bathed in sunlight. She was scrolling sleepily through her phone, but she looked up and her face immediately lit up. “You made breakfast?”
“I made breakfast,” he said, his voice coming out tighter than he intended.
He set the tray on her lap and climbed back into bed beside her. He watched as she took a bite of the eggs, humming in approval. She was here. She was real. The scent of her—vanilla, sleep, him—wiped away the last trace of that other perfume.
“Everything okay?” she asked around a mouthful, nudging his knee with hers. “You seem… tense.”
He looked at her—at the genuine concern in her eyes, the simple joy of the food, the faint red mark on her neck from his stubble. He saw the future in her, in the barely-there curve beneath the sheets. He felt the weight of Pilar’s words, trying to cheapen all of it.
He couldn’t tell her. Not now. Not while she was smiling in the sunlight, eating eggs he’d made for her. It would shatter this peace, and she’d had so little of it. It would start a war in her home, and she needed this place to be safe.
So he pushed the cold knot of disgust down, forced a smile, and brushed a strand of pink-streaked hair from her cheek. “Just hungry,” he lied, his thumb stroking her skin. “And I missed you.”
He bent and kissed her cheek, his lips lingering against the warmth of her skin. She let out a small, surprised laugh, a few crumbs of toast clinging to her lower lip. Using her fork, she scooped up a bite of fluffy eggs and held it out to him.
He took the bite, chewing slowly. Then he rested his forehead against the curve of her shoulder, the soft cotton of her camisole against his skin. He sighed, a long, deep exhalation that seemed to release the lingering chill Pilar had left in his bones. “I feel like we’ve won,” he murmured into her shoulder. “Like we can actually have the life we want.”
Maria tilted her head, leaning her temple against the top of his head. Her voice was a playful whisper near his ear. “All you had to do was get me pregnant and threaten to go public.”
Min-ho laughed, the vibration shaking both of them. He lifted his head, his eyes clear now, sparkling with a giddy kind of relief. “And now we’ll make our relationship public. In a few weeks, the pregnancy. And we can start setting a date for the wedding.”
Maria laughed, delighted, pulling back to look at his earnest face. “You’re very optimistic. You have everything planned out.”
“I’ve been fantasizing about this for three years,” he said, his grin wide and unguarded. He brushed a thumb over the back of her hand holding the fork. “Let me have my moment.”
Maria burst out laughing, the sound rich and full, echoing off the sun-drenched walls. It was the sound of a weight lifted, of a shared secret too joyous to contain. She kissed him, a quick, sweet press of her lips flavored with salt and eggs and pure happiness.
From the hallway, the distinct, pointed sound of a throat being cleared sliced through their laughter. They broke apart to find Claudia standing in the doorway, arms crossed, a fresh canvas smock covering her clothes. She looked from the tray of food to their tangled legs under the sheets. Her expression was unreadable.
“Mamá is on the phone from Rosario,” she stated, her voice flat. “She wants to talk to you, Maria. And,” her eyes flicked to Min-ho, “to him. She’s heard rumors.”
The sunny warmth of the bedroom evaporated, replaced by a sudden, sharp chill. Maria’s smile vanished. The fork clattered softly against the ceramic plate. “What rumors?” she asked, her voice unnaturally calm.
“The kind that start when a globally famous K-pop idol is seen taking a private car to a specific yellow house in Palermo,” Claudia said dryly. “Or when his agency announces an indefinite, unexpected hiatus. People talk. Apparently, they talk all the way to Rosario.” She jerked her head toward the hallway. “She’s waiting. On the landline. She won’t be put off.”
Min-ho felt Maria’s body go rigid beside him. He placed a steadying hand on her lower back. The skin was warm through her camisole. “We’ll talk to her together,” he said.
“No,” Maria said, swinging her legs out of bed. She grabbed his discarded hoodie from the floor and pulled it on. It swallowed her frame, the sleeves covering her hands. “I’ll talk to her first. You… wait. Let me… prepare the terrain.”
She stood up, smoothed the hoodie over her hips, and walked out of the room without looking back. Her bare feet were silent on the floorboards. Claudia gave Min-ho a long, inscrutable look before following her sister.
The cozy nest of the bedroom now felt like a waiting room. Min-ho got up, pulled on his jeans, and wandered downstairs. The cumbia record had finished. The house was preternaturally quiet. He found the living room, a space of deep, comfortable sofas and more bookshelves. He sat.
He could hear her voice then, speaking rapid, low Spanish from the kitchen. The tone was strained but controlled. Then it escalated. A sharp word. A defensive cry. He stood and moved to the doorway.
Maria was pacing back and forth across the warm terracotta tiles, the cordless phone pressed to her ear. Her free hand chopped the air. “No, mamá, no es así—!”
The voice on the other end was a distorted, furious crackle. Min-ho didn’t need to understand every word. The meaning was carved into Maria’s face: a flinch of pure pain, a tightening of her jaw, eyes glazing with furious, unshed tears. He caught the hissed phrases, “puta” and “desprecio” and the brutal, unmistakable command, “abortar.”
His own breath froze in his chest.
Maria shouted back, her voice raw, “¡Es mi vida! ¡Es mi decisión!” She listened for a second, and her expression crumbled from defiance into something devastated. Her pacing stopped. She stared at the faded pattern on the floor. “Sí,” she whispered, the fight draining out of her. “Sí, ya sé. Una decepción.”
Min-ho was moving before he thought, crossing the kitchen toward her. He couldn’t let her stand there and absorb that poison alone. He reached for her, his hand aimed for the tense line of her shoulder.
Claudia stepped into his path. She placed a firm hand on his chest, stopping him cold. She shook her head, her dark eyes serious.
“This is between her and Mom,” she said quietly, her voice barely above a whisper. “The only way to handle Mamá is to stand up to her.”
Min-ho frowned, trying to look past her to where Maria now stood slumped against the counter. “But she’s saying horrible things to her.”
Claudia’s sigh was heavy with years of this same weathered battle. “That’s how Mamá is. The only perfect one is Pilar. The rest of us are disappointments.” A wry, tired smile touched her lips. “Maria for being a singer, and me for being a lawyer. She says my profession is for men.”
Maria’s voice, suddenly small and broken, carried across the room. “Sí, mamá. Lo siento.” She was apologizing. The surrender in her tone was a physical blow to Min-ho’s gut.
Then she slowly lowered the phone from her ear. Her thumb pressed the ‘end’ button with a final, soft beep. The silence she left in its wake was immense and suffocating. She didn’t move. She just stared at the dead device in her hand as if it were a poisonous insect.
Min-ho looked at Claudia. Her hand was still on his chest, a barrier. She met his gaze and, after a beat, gave one final, slight shake of her head. The message was clear: Not yet.
He swallowed hard, the metallic taste of helplessness coating his tongue. His fists clenched at his sides. Across the sun-drenched kitchen, Maria remained perfectly still, a statue of defeat, while the scent of the cooling alfajores grew suddenly, nauseatingly sweet.
Across the sun-drenched kitchen, Maria remained perfectly still, a statue of defeat, while the scent of the cooling alfajores grew suddenly, nauseatingly sweet.
Then she slowly turned her head. Her eyes found Min-ho’s. They were wide, glistening pools of sheer, unprocessed hurt. The look lasted only a second before her chin crumpled.
He moved. Claudia’s restraining hand was still there, but he sidestepped it with a dancer’s easy grace, his focus entirely on Maria. He closed the distance in three quick strides. He didn’t speak. He just opened his arms and pulled her into him, the cordless phone knocking softly against his back before she dropped it to the tiles with a plastic clatter.
She buried her face in his neck. Her shoulders hitched once, then again. A hot, damp patch spread on his t-shirt. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, the words muffled against his skin. “I wanted us to get used to the idea of being parents before telling my mom.”
Min-ho just held her tighter, his hand cradling the back of her head. Her next words came out in a wet, shaky rush. “She’s very religious. She cares a lot about what people will say. She hated that I dedicated myself to music. She always made those horrible comments, even when we were just eating because I earned enough from my music to buy food.”
Maria took a shuddering breath, her fingers clutching the fabric of his shirt. “I should be used to it by now. I’m the disappointment, Claudia is the butch lesbian, Mariano is the perfect son, and Pilar is the princess.”
From near the doorway, Claudia let out a dry, humorless snort. “And she forgets that Pilar has a modeling career thanks to all the strings you pulled for years.” She crossed her arms, leaning against the frame. “You called every editor you knew from that Vogue shoot. You paid for her first portfolio. Mamá’s princess was built by the disappointment’s dirty hands.”
The truth of it hung heavily in the fragrant air. Min-ho felt a new kind of anger, cold and precise, settle over the protective heat in his chest. He thought of Pilar’s perfect smile in this very kitchen, her poisonous offer. The hypocrisy was breathtaking.
“She told me to get rid of it,” Maria said into his shoulder, her voice so small it broke. “She said I was throwing filth on the family name. Again.”
Min-ho pulled back just enough to look at her. He used his thumbs to wipe the tears from her cheeks. His touch was firm, anchoring. “Listen to me,” he said, his voice low and clear. “You are not a disappointment. You are the most real person I have ever known. You built a life out of nothing but your voice and your nerve. You built this.” He glanced around the warm, chaotic kitchen, at the evidence of her family’s lives. “You feed people. With your music, with your money, with your heart. That is not filth. That is everything.”
Maria searched his eyes, looking for the lie, the polite comfort. She found only a steady, unshakable certainty.
“Your mother’s opinion is a relic,” he continued, not blinking. “It has no power here unless you give it to her. We are not asking for her permission. We are telling her our news. And if she cannot be happy for us, then she does not get to be part of it.”
Claudia pushed off the doorframe, a slow smirk spreading across her face. “Well, shit. I might actually like you.”
The tension in the room shifted, cracking like ice beginning to thaw. Maria let out a wet, half-laugh, half-sob and leaned her forehead against his collarbone again. “You make it sound so simple.”
“It is simple,” Min-ho said, resting his chin on her hair. “It’s just not easy.”
The creak of the back door interrupted them. Pilar stepped inside, shaking out her long, dark hair. She’d changed into a simple linen dress that looked anything but simple on her. She took in the scene: Maria wrapped in Min-ho’s arms, Claudia’s approving smirk, the dropped phone on the floor.
Her model’s mask was flawless, but her eyes flickered. “Did I miss the drama?” she asked, her voice light as she moved to the counter and picked up her mate gourd. “Was that Mamá on the phone? She called me earlier, you know. Full of gossip about a certain Korean idol being seen in the neighborhood.”
She took a slow sip, her eyes watching them over the rim of the gourd. “I told her it was probably just fan nonsense. That you’d never be so careless, Maria.”
The poison was back, dripping from every innocuous word. Claudia rolled her eyes openly. Min-ho felt Maria stiffen in his arms.
He didn’t look at Pilar. He kept his gaze on Maria, his voice deliberately calm, meant only for her. “We should call her back. Together. Right now.”
Maria pulled back, her tear-streaked face set with a new resolve. She nodded. “Okay.” She bent and picked up the phone from the floor. Her thumb hovered over the callback button.
Pilar set her gourd down with a sharp click. “Are you serious? You’re going to call her and tell her you’re pregnant by some foreign pop star you barely know? Do you have any idea what that will do to her?”
Min-ho finally turned his head. He looked directly at Pilar, his expression neutral, his eyes like stone. “She’s not pregnant by ‘some foreign pop star.’” He spoke slowly, each word a deliberate weight. “She’s having a child with me. Her partner. And you will not speak about her, or to her, like that again.”
The kitchen went utterly silent. The cumbia from the record player had long since ended. Pilar’s perfect composure slipped, revealing a flash of genuine surprise, then something hotter and uglier beneath. She’d underestimated him. She’d assumed the carefully polite idol would fold.
Maria’s finger pressed the button. She put the phone on speaker. The dial tone filled the quiet room.
It rang once.
Twice.
On the third ring, a voice answered, sharp and impatient. “¿Sí?”
Maria looked at Min-ho. He gave her a single, solid nod. She took a deep breath, lifting her chin.
“Mamá,” she said, her voice no longer shaking. It was clear, firm, the voice she used on stage. “We need to talk. Min-ho is here with me. We’re both on the line.”