Because Min-jun had asked me to eat…and I was trying — really trying — to let them in.
Chapter Twelve
HWAN
The letter arrived on a Tuesday morning.
Tae-min burst through the dorm door like he'd been shot from a cannon, his face flushed with excitement, his ocean-and-mint scent practically vibrating with barely contained joy. In his hand, he clutched a single envelope — slightly crumpled from his grip, withSIRENwritten across the front in handwriting I didn't recognize but somehow knew immediately.
"She wrote back," Tae-min announced, holding up the envelope like a trophy, his dark eyes shining with triumph. "She actually wrote back."
I was off the couch before I'd made a conscious decision to move, my body drawn toward that envelope like a moth to flame. The golden amber bond in my chest flared with desperate hope, and I had to stop myself from snatching the letter right out of Tae-min's hand.
"What does it say?" The question came from Jin-ho, who had materialized from his studio like a ghost, his notebook still clutched in one hand and ink stains on his fingers. His violetbond must have pulsed at the same moment mine did — we'd all learned to recognize the sensation by now, the way our connections to her seemed to echo each other.
"I didn't read it," Tae-min said, and I could hear the effort it took him to admit that, the way his voice strained with the desire to know. "It's addressed to all of us. I thought we should read it together."
"Where are Min-jun and Jae-won?" I asked, looking around the empty living room, my heart pounding against my ribs so hard I could feel it in my throat.
"Kitchen," Jin-ho said, already moving in that direction, his bare feet silent on the hardwood floor. "Min-jun's stress-cooking again. Jae-won's pretending to help but really just eating everything."
We found them exactly where Jin-ho had predicted — Min-jun at the stove, stirring something that smelled incredible, while Jae-won leaned against the counter with a pair of chopsticks in his hand, stealing bites from a plate of side dishes that were clearly meant for Keira's next delivery.
"She wrote back," Tae-min announced again, holding up the envelope, and I watched both of them freeze mid-motion. Min-jun set down his spoon carefully, his forest-and-cedar scent shifting from focused calm to sharp anticipation. Jae-won straightened from his slouch against the counter, his thunderstorm scent crackling with something that might have been hope or might have been fear — with Jae-won, it was sometimes hard to tell the difference.
"Read it," Jae-won said, his voice low and commanding, the pack alpha tone that usually made all of us snap to attention. But there was a tremor beneath the authority, a crack in the facade that betrayed how desperately he wanted to know what she'd said.
Tae-min opened the envelope with trembling fingers, pulling out a single sheet of paper covered in neat handwriting. He cleared his throat, and we all leaned in like children waiting for a bedtime story.
"Hwan, Jin-ho, Tae-min, Min-jun, Jae-won," Tae-min read aloud, his voice slightly unsteady. "I read your letters. All of them. I don't have words for what I'm feeling right now — everything is tangled up together in ways I can't separate. Gratitude. Guilt. Fear that's starting to feel less like a wall and more like a door I might be able to open."
My breath caught in my chest. A door. She'd said her fear was starting to feel like a door instead of a wall. Doors could be opened. Doors meant possibility.
"I want to try something Tae-min suggested," he continued, and I saw his cheeks flush slightly at hearing his own name. "Being honest even when it's messy."
"I'm still scared. Reading your words didn't magically fix twelve years of fear, and I don't think anything will. But I'm starting to believe that maybe you're not what I was afraid of. That maybe my mother's story doesn't have to be my story. That maybe breaking and completing really are opposite things."
Jin-ho made a soft sound beside me — something between a gasp and a sigh. I glanced over and saw his eyes glistening, his hand pressed against his chest where his violet bond pulsed.
"I'm not ready yet," Tae-min read, his voice dropping slightly. "I don't know when I will be. But I'm trying. Really trying this time, not just hiding and calling it something else."
"The food was incredible. Min-jun, thank you. I ate until I couldn't move, which is more than I've eaten in days. The rice balls were perfect."
Min-jun's face crumpled slightly, his composure cracking at the edges. He turned back to the stove, but not before I saw himswipe at his eyes with the back of his hand, his broad shoulders shaking with silent emotion.
"I don't know what comes next," Tae-min finished, his voice thick. "But thank you for being patient with me. Thank you for listening. Thank you for giving me exactly what I asked for instead of pushing for more. — Keira."
Silence settled over the kitchen like a blanket, heavy and warm and somehow sacred.
She was trying.
She'd said it herself — not just hiding and calling it something else, but really trying. She was starting to believe we weren't what she feared. She was starting to see that her mother's story didn't have to be hers.
"She ate the rice balls," Min-jun said quietly, still facing the stove, his voice rough with emotion. "She said they were perfect. She remembered that I remembered."
"She's trying," Jin-ho murmured, something like wonder in his voice, his ink-stained fingers pressed against his lips. "She's actually trying."
"We need to keep doing what we're doing," Jae-won said, and his pack alpha voice was steadier now, more certain. He pushed off from the counter, his dark eyes scanning each of us in turn. "Letters. Food. No pressure. We don't change anything. We don't push for more. We let her come to us at her own pace."
