“Pick whichever model you like, one each.”

“O-oppa.”

“Can we really pick? Anything?”

“Dad, Mom, you take a matching pair too. Really… phones look so innocent and cute.”

Antiques that in 2020 would be buried at the back of a closet were showing themselves off in a glass case as the newest thing.

My eyes were rotting on the spot.

There was still about a year to go before the iPhun that Steven Matthew’s people built came out.

The invention of an age, which astonished the whole world in June 2007.

To me, who had lived with an iPhun and an Andreid smartphone in my hand, the old handsets looked like the stone axes of cave men.

“Ju-hui. This one’s pretty. It’s the new Amucall from Ojeong, isn’t it?”

“Wow! This one has a 1.3-megapixel camera! And 64-bit polyphony, so the sound quality is incredible. My friend was bragging about it — it really is good.”

Sixty-four-bit… polyphony… 1.3 megapixels.

Before I died, a twenty-megapixel dual camera was standard.

Sound quality was at the level of reproducing the original.

“You girls know how to look at these. This is the newest phone. The 2.6-inch QVGA screen is nice and clear, isn’t it? It’s got an English-Korean dictionary and an MP3 player built in, so it’s perfect for language study too.”

The saleswoman talked it up hard enough to spray the counter.

I wasn’t moved in the slightest.

I’d lived with nothing, but I’d used a smartphone with an AI assistant in it.

A smartphone in 2020 could do live interpretation, not just dictionaries.

“Ooh! It’s pretty!”

“Oppa, are you really buying it for us?”

My silly little sisters’ big dark eyes were shining.

They were cute.

Having come back against the current of time, there was none of the old awkwardness.

“Pick whichever one you like.”

“Oppa! Thank you!!!”

“Our oppa is the best!”

The twins hung off both my arms and made a fuss over me.

This is the whole point of being a big brother to pretty little sisters.

“Tae-san. Isn’t that too expensive for the girls? However much you got in royalties, how much can that come to…”

My father, worried, tried to stop me.

On the way I had told them my internet serial had been published and I’d been paid royalties.

I hadn’t named a figure, but my father was an educated man and he wasn’t going to be ignorant of what writers earn.

In his day it was a society where writing meant starving to death.

“Don’t worry. Mom, what are you doing? Get a matching phone with Dad. There isn’t another house in the world like ours, keeping this far away from the benefits of civilization. And Ju-a and Ju-hui are grown now — they need phones for safety if nothing else.”

I threw Mom a wink.

Mom had been standing right there when I pulled in twenty million won.

“That’s right. Thanks to my son I should get myself a cell phone too.”

“Dear…”

“Son. I like this one. They say the Simon from Elja is sturdy. Shall we get the same one, dear? A matching pair.”

Oh! Mom came on strong.

Dad was flustered by the sight of her committing on faith in her son.

He must have taken it for granted that she would talk me out of it.

“I’ll take this product, in this color.”

“Oh my, sir, your taste in color is aggressive. You really want the red one?”

“Yes.”

The phone I picked was a product called the Base, put out by Caritel, which back then was the choice of people who knew style.

Even to my eye, after living in the smartphone era, the design wasn’t dowdy.

It was thin, too, and easy to carry.

“Kyaa! Our oppa is the coolest!”

“Oppa? Are you really getting that color???”

My sisters bounced on the spot.

They were amazed that I, who normally lived like a shadow around the house, had picked a bold color.

“Our son has taste.”

Mom backed me absolutely.

My father still couldn’t guess what was going on and held to his silence.

His heart was probably in torment.

What I was spending would have covered this month’s interest to the Nonghyup.

“I’ll pay in a single payment.”

“If you sign a contract it can be cheaper. Since March there’s been a limited-time subsidy contract. Use it for three years and the fees are far cheaper, and there’s a considerable discount on the handset too.”

“No. I don’t need that. I’ll pay the handset price up front.”

I shook my head.

It was a fine-looking apricot with a rotten center.

I was done living a life shackled to a three-year contract.

There would be no installments in my life from here on.

“Please activate them on the standard plan. My sisters and I are minors, so they’ll go under our parents’ names.”

“Certainly. One moment, please.”

I held out the debit card for the account opened in Mom’s name.

Beep, beep, beep-beep.

“I’ve waived the sign-up fee. That’s two million one hundred and seventy thousand won for the handsets.”

“Hurk!”

“O-oppa…”

The twins, third-year middle schoolers with no idea how the world worked, made a choking sound.

My sisters’ monthly allowance, bus fare included, was seventy thousand won.

To them, over two million won was two years of pocket money.

“Nngh…”

My father couldn’t speak and made a strained sound.

It was money his son had earned and paid.

With my father’s nature he wouldn’t say it, but a fire would be blazing inside him.

Dad. When it’s hard, say it’s hard.

That’s what a real man is.

“Is there a particular number you’d like?”

“Yes. Our home number, 2732, as the last four digits. Because we’re… all family.”

When I graduated high school, my father bought me a phone even in the middle of hard times.

That was when he told me.

We’re family, so until the twins and I marry, the last four digits should all be the same.

“Oppa, are you buying lunch too?”

“Of course. Today your oppa has a full course prepared.”

“Oppa! The best! The best!”

Put food in front of my sisters and they cheered.

They had almost never eaten out.

Now and then, when my father or mother came back from town, they’d bring meat and we’d grill it — that was the whole of it.

They were at the age of growing fast, my sisters, with plenty they wanted to eat.

Over one phone each, they abandoned Dad and walked holding both my arms.

It was an unfamiliar experience.

It felt different from girlfriends in the past.

They were sisters who shared my blood, so it felt warmer.

It was the kind of happiness only family can give.

Walking along like that, I stopped.

“Oppa, what is it?”

“Tae-san, is something wrong?”

Ju-a and my mother looked at me with curiosity, stopped where I had.

“Let’s go in.”

“H-here?”

“Yes. This is the next stop.”

“Tae-san, this place is…”

My father, coming along behind, was flustered again.

I opened the door confidently and stepped inside.

My family followed me in carefully.

None of them had ever done this before.

In our family’s dictionary, buying a new car was a fantasy that existed in television dramas.

“Welcome. Welcome to Samyong Motors, trust and safety.”

As we came in, a dealer with a dignified look who had been watching approached and greeted us.

He made a decent impression.

Samyong Motors, who build their SUVs on a single frame.

The cars really were good, and there was a lot left to regret about them.

They were an icon of misfortune, going under and being sold off cheap to Chinese and Indian firms.

But unlike Yeondae and Gihan Motors, their frames were solid.

They were on a different plane from the wicked companies that advertised better fuel economy and stripped the safety equipment out of the car to get it.

If you were thinking of your family’s safety, Samyong was the one domestic maker you could halfway trust.

At the very least, in a crash there was no worry about the engine bay coming through into the cabin.

“Dad. How about this car?”

“…”

Robbed of his rights as head of the house today, my father just opened and closed his eyes.

A man whose whole life had held one used car stood in front of the Rockstone, Samyong’s flagship large SUV, and lost his words.

My father looked like his mind was in a tangle.

“Mom, how does it look to you?”

“Me? It’s b-big, and it looks sturdy.”

Mom was every bit as astonished.

She blinked her big eyes and watched Dad for a cue.

My father just stared blankly at the car.

My father was a man too.

The big, solid Rockstone had once been advertised as the car the top one percent of the country drove.

Samyong’s troubles had damaged its value a great deal, but it was still a luxury car.

“Your son knows how to look at a car. The second-generation Rockstone is full-time four-wheel drive, so it’s remarkably stable in rain or snow. And thanks to Samyong’s own single-piece frame, it’s extremely solid. It also carries almost the same audio and convenience equipment as the Cheriman, so you’ll be satisfied there too.”

The salesman, who had been reading the room, stepped in.

My mind was already made up.

For a family, nothing is more precious than safety.

“I think we need this car for Ju-a and Ju-hui getting to school, if nothing else. Right, girls?”

I pulled the twins in.

“Huh? W-well, that would be nice, but…”

“It’d be so good if Dad really drove us every day in this!”

While quick-witted Ju-a looked between Dad and me and wavered, Ju-hui bounced up and down in delight.

Twins can look alike and still be worlds apart in temperament.

“Tae-san. This car doesn’t suit our family’s circumstances. You may not know it, but your dad’s situation isn’t very good.”

My father brought the words out with difficulty.

But my father didn’t know.

That I had lived through our family’s finances in the future, in the harshest way there is.

“Dad. From today it’s going to be all right. Don’t worry.”

I looked into my father’s eyes.

I nodded at him.

Startled, my father said nothing.

He looked at me quietly.

From now on I was the head of this house.

The history of the Jang family, raised up again, would be written anew.

Father, put your faith in me!

In the past, after I came back from the army, I called him Father.

But I never held back on the word Dad.

It was a precious word you couldn’t use whenever you liked.

“You have stock cars, don’t you?”

“What?”

“You must have stock that can be delivered today. If not, this display model is fine too.”

I drove straight in and the salesman was flustered.

“Ah, well, that’s…”

“I won’t drag this out. Set it up so we can drive it home now. The standard discount is all I need.”

“…”

The salesman had no answer to my bold deal.

There was no need to haggle back and forth to save a few won.

The car my father drove now was a weapon on the road.

For the happiness of the Jang family, the family’s safety came first.

“You can dispose of the used car too, can’t you?”

“Yes! Of course! Leave it to us and we’ll handle it cleanly!”

The dealer raised his voice loud enough to carry across the showroom.

He didn’t dismiss what I said for being young.

He seemed to have caught the scent of money, the salesman’s cardinal virtue.

“…”

My whole family stared at me, stunned.

They were flustered by a boy in his second year of high school behaving like a seasoned professional.

Looking at them made me want to laugh.

Not one of them knew the high school kid was only the wrapping.

What’s so surprising? This is only the beginning.

The hungry shopping wasn’t finished yet.

Jang Tae-san, human being, returned!

Today I intended to show them the last word in dutiful sons and good older brothers.

(End of Chapter 10)