Chapter 10 (1/2)

Now it was time to flip his mood over.

“And mother,” I looked at her.

“Yeah,” a soft smile crept onto her face.

“When I grow up, I want to be a chairman like grandfather,”

Their looks were reversed: the grandfather’s anger deflated and he grinned like a hahoe mask while the mother couldn’t hide her perplexed look.

“Hahaha, that’s my grandson!” the grandfather laughed broadly. And the mother saved her breath.

“Did you hear that, sweetie? Our Do-jun wants to be a chairman too, haha,”

The mother’s eyes widened, and she looked at the grandfather. He then stopped laughing as if he'd suddenly forgotten what was funny.

An awkward silence hung between them for a time.

The mother picked herself up from the sofa, then asked to the grandfather,

“Would you like more tea?”

“Sure, bring it up to Do-jun’s room,” he said.

He grabbed my hand and said, “Let's go upstairs,” and the mother entered the kitchen.

Sweetie? I thought to myself, climbing the stairs.

The grandfather bade goodbye to the two tutors. They nodded goodbye and left.

The grandfather looked around the room, then seated me on the edge of the bed.

“Do-jun,” he said.

“Yes, grandfather,”

“Do you remember what you told me the other day?”

“...?”

“The three friends,”

“Oh, yes, I do,”

Of course I remember. He must be talking about the presidential election campaign, I told myself.

“I gave each of the three gifts, to make them my friends, just as you told me,” he said.

“You did?”

Bribes, you mean.

“However…”

He seemed disoriented as the political situation was getting more and more chaotic.

“The second and the third are fighting shoulder to shoulder over the first,” he said.

“If the second and the third win over the first, they can be president and vice-president?”

“No, there is no vice-president in the country, kid,”

“But then why would the two team up when only one can be president?”

The second and the third are YS (Kim Young-sam) and DJ (Kim Dae-jung) respectively.

The two were longtime colleagues. They joined hands and went head to head with the military regime led by Chun Doo-hwan, running for president.

The two opposition parties, YS and DJ were poised to unite behind one candidate to prevent the ruling party, Roh Tae-woo from ruling the country.

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