There are three things my father will never live down.
The first is arriving late for my birth.
The second is forgetting, for approximately four seconds, that I existed.
And the third is allowing his entire family to witness the most embarrassing romantic performance in the history of Seoul National University Hospital.
He insists the third incident was private.
Unfortunately for him, somebody recorded it.
Unfortunately for me, my grandparents consider that recording a treasured piece of family history.
And as I sat on the living-room carpet at nine years old, watching the same video for the tenth time, I was beginning to wonder whether a loving family could also qualify as a form of punishment.
But first, I should explain how the recording came to exist.
Or rather, how we thought it came to exist.
NINE YEARS EARLIER — SEOUL NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL
"Doctor! Doctor, my wife!"
Murphy Cheng burst into the corridor as though the hospital had caught fire.
Dr. Wilson, who had barely reached the nurses' station, looked up from a patient's chart.
"Mr. Cheng? What happened?"
"Her neck. She's holding her neck. She said something hurts."
"Did she fall?"
"No."
"Is she having trouble breathing?"
"I don't think so."
"Did she tell you how severe the pain was?"
Murphy paused.
"She made a noise."
"A noise?"
"Yes. An unhappy one."
The doctor regarded him for a long moment.
Then, with the patience of a man who had spent the day delivering babies, he said, "Let's go and see your wife."
When they entered the recovery room, Alexa Cheng was sitting upright, perfectly comfortable, with her newborn daughter resting beside her.
"Darling!" Murphy hurried over. "The doctor is here."
Alexa's eyes widened. She had expected him to return eventually. She hadn't expected him to return with Dr. Wilson almost immediately.
"Oh," she said.
Dr. Wilson set down his chart. "I'm told you're experiencing neck pain."
"Just a little stiffness."
"May I examine you?"
"Of course."
He checked her carefully, asked a few questions, and watched her move her head from side to side. Nothing suggested a serious problem.
"Some muscle soreness is not unusual after a difficult delivery," he explained. "But I don't see anything concerning at present. If the pain increases, let us know."
Murphy released an enormous breath.
"And the baby?" he asked.
"Your daughter is doing well. We'll continue the usual observations. If both mother and child remain stable, they should be able to go home tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?" Murphy repeated.
Alexa smiled. "Didn't I tell you that already?"
"Yes, but now a doctor has told me."
She reached for a pillow.
Murphy stepped out of range.
"Thank you, Doctor," he said quickly.
Dr. Wilson smiled faintly and took his leave.
Outside the room, he paused to glance back at the door. Something about the newborn still troubled him, though he had no medical reason for concern.
From inside came Alexa's indignant voice.
"Murphy, did you just say you trust the doctor more than your own wife?"
"That's not what I said!"
The doctor walked on. Whatever his unease, this family clearly had enough to occupy them for one evening.
Murphy had almost reached the end of the corridor when an idea struck him.
Tomorrow.
His wife and daughter would be coming home tomorrow.
He pictured Alexa stepping through the front door, exhausted but smiling, carrying the baby they'd dreamed of meeting. The house ought to welcome them properly. Not with half-finished preparations and staff rushing around at the last minute.
He took out his phone.
Lin Hao answered on the second ring.
"H-h-hello, sir?"
"Lin Hao. I need you to contact the butler. Have the house ready for Mrs. Cheng and the baby tomorrow. Fresh sheets in the nursery, everything cleaned, and flowers in the sitting room."
"Y-yes, sir. Anything else?"
"Roses. And chocolates. I want them delivered to the hospital."
"Tomorrow, sir?"
"Now."
There was a brief silence.
"N-now?"
"Preferably within five minutes."
"Sir, I don't think a florist can—"
"Lin Hao."
"Y-yes?"
"Do your best."
The call ended.
At the office, Lin Hao lowered his phone and stared at the ceiling.
His employer had just requested flowers, chocolates, and a fully prepared household as though these things could be produced by pressing a button.
Lin Hao was twenty-six, of average height, and handsome enough that the receptionists occasionally invented reasons to pass his desk. He was also hardworking, quick-thinking, and blessed with the peculiar ability to solve Murphy Cheng's problems before Murphy finished creating them.
His stammer grew worse when he was startled. Unfortunately, his boss seemed determined to keep him startled forever.
"Five minutes," Lin Hao murmured.
Then he reached for two telephones at once.
He called the butler, arranged the nursery preparations, and persuaded a nearby florist to assemble the largest bouquet of red and pale-pink roses they could deliver immediately. For chocolates, he visited a confectionery shop on his way to the hospital.
It took longer than five minutes.
Murphy called twice to ask where he was.
By the time Lin Hao reached the entrance, he was carrying a bouquet that obscured half his face and a beautifully wrapped box of chocolates beneath one arm.
Murphy was waiting just inside the doors.
"At last!"
"S-sir, I—"
"Excellent work."
He took both gifts before Lin Hao could finish.
"Make sure the house is ready tomorrow."
"Y-yes, sir."
"And don't tell Mrs. Cheng."
Lin Hao stared after him as he hurried into the corridor, smiling like a schoolboy carrying a love letter.
This was the same man who could reduce an entire boardroom to silence with one raised eyebrow.
The same man who rarely smiled during working hours.
And here he was, nearly running through a hospital with roses pressed against his chest.
Lin Hao shook his head and grinned.
"So that's what l-love does to a man."
Murphy slipped into the recovery room, carefully holding the bouquet behind his back.
"Darling?"
No answer.
He looked toward the bed.
Empty.
The bathroom door was partly open. The cot stood beside the bed, and his daughter lay inside, sleeping with both hands curled near her face.
Murphy frowned.
"Alexa?"
"I'm here."
Her voice came from behind the privacy curtain.
He spun around.
"Where did you go?"
"Nowhere exciting. The nurse was helping me change. Why are you looking for me like you've lost your wallet?"
"I came back and you weren't there."
"And our daughter?"
He glanced at the cot.
A terrible pause followed.
"Oh. Right. Our daughter."
Alexa stepped around the curtain and folded her arms.
"Murphy."
"I knew she was there."
"Did you?"
"Of course."
"You searched the entire room for your wife without looking at the newborn sleeping beside the bed."
"I was concerned about you."
"That's an interesting defence."
He scratched the back of his head, caught between embarrassment and the need to keep the flowers hidden.
"Can we agree," he said, "that I was concerned about both of you?"
"No."
"Alexa—"
"No negotiations, Mr. CEO."
If my mother had known that this conversation would later be played in front of her in-laws, she might have been more merciful.
Then again, knowing my mother, probably not.
Murphy cleared his throat and moved toward the bed.
"My dear wife," he began grandly, "the only precious jewel no miner could ever discover—"
Alexa stared.
"Why are you talking like that?"
"Because today is a very special day."
"Murphy, what are you hiding?"
"Nothing."
She glanced at the arm held awkwardly behind him.
"Your right hand disagrees."
He shifted the bouquet farther from view.
"Today," he continued, "I have become the proud father of my first daughter, born to my first wife."
Silence.
Alexa's expression changed.
"Your first wife?"
Murphy closed his eyes.
He had done it again.
"That's not what I meant."
"Are you expecting a second one?"
"No!"
"Should I make arrangements to meet her?"
"Alexa!"
"Would she like the guest room?"
"There is no second wife!"
My mother considered him with impressive severity, given that she was struggling not to laugh.
"Good. Because I have no intention of sharing my husband."
"You are the only woman I want to marry," Murphy assured her. "In this lifetime and every lifetime after it, if such a thing is possible."
She softened at that.
"Now that was a better answer."
Murphy smiled in relief.
"Then, my love, will you close your eyes?"
"Why?"
"Trust me."
"Those are dangerous words coming from you."
"Please?"
Alexa sighed, but a smile escaped her.
"Fine."
She closed her eyes.
Murphy placed the bouquet on the bedside table, opened the chocolates, and unwrapped a small piece. He moved close enough that Alexa could feel his breath.
"Murphy?"
"Keep them closed."
He held the chocolate between his lips, drew her gently toward him, and kissed her. She startled, then laughed against the kiss as the chocolate melted between them.
"Open your eyes," he whispered.
Alexa did.
There, beside her, stood an enormous bouquet of roses: soft pink among rich red, wrapped in cream paper and tied with a ribbon.
Her favourite flowers.
"Oh, Murphy."
For once, she had no joke ready.
He picked up the bouquet and offered it to her.
"For the bravest woman I know."
Alexa accepted the roses, her eyes shining.
"And for giving me our little princess," he added.
She touched his cheek.
"You're still in trouble for missing her birth."
"I know."
"But..."
"But?"
"This helps."
He leaned in to kiss her again.
And that was the moment the recording ended.
NINE YEARS LATER — THE CHENG FAMILY HOME
"Disgusting!" I announced.
My grandfather laughed so loudly that he nearly dropped his teacup.
We were gathered in the family sitting room on a Sunday afternoon. Grandma sat on the sofa with a cushion against her back, Grandpa occupied the armchair beside her, and my mother had claimed the other end of the sofa. My younger brother sat cross-legged nearby, more interested in the bowl of snacks than the television.
My father, unfortunately, sat beside me.
He wore the expression of a man waiting for a judge to announce his sentence.
On the television, nine-years-younger Murphy was still leaning toward my mother, roses between them, with the sort of smile that made me want to cover my eyes.
"I don't understand why you people enjoy watching this," I complained. "They kiss every single time."
"Because it's romantic," Grandma replied.
"Because it's embarrassing," I corrected.
"Both can be true," Grandpa said.
Mother smiled into her tea.
Grandma shook her head at the screen. "My son! I raised him to be a respectable gentleman, and look at him. A completely spoiled romantic brat."
"Mother!" Dad protested.
"I used to boast to my friends that you were such a serious boy."
"I am serious."
"Not when somebody puts roses in your hand."
Grandpa began laughing again.
Dad leaned toward me and whispered, "Nyx, you wouldn't betray your own father, would you?"
I considered this.
"Depends."
"On what?"
"Whether you buy me ice cream."
My mother looked up. "Don't you dare bribe her."
Dad sat back, defeated.
This was the tenth time I'd watched the video. I knew every line, every expression, every ridiculous mistake my father made. I especially enjoyed the part where he forgot to look for me.
"Dad," I said, "how could you forget your own baby?"
"I didn't forget you."
"You said, 'Oh. Right. Our daughter.'"
"I was worried about your mother."
"That's what you said the other nine times."
"Because it's true!"
I gave him a long, disappointed look.
He spread his hands helplessly.
Mother laughed, and I turned back to the television. The final frame showed the roses in her arms. Even through the screen, I could practically smell them.
I wrinkled my nose.
Mother loved roses. I never had. Strong fragrances sometimes irritated my asthma, and I preferred flowers at a respectful distance.
"Next time," I said, "can we watch something with fewer flowers and less kissing?"
"No," Grandma and Grandpa answered together.
I groaned.
My younger brother pushed the snack bowl toward me in silent sympathy.
At least somebody in that house understood suffering.
There was something else about the video, though. Something nobody ever explained.
"Dad," I asked, as the screen went dark, "who recorded it?"
His smile faded a little.
"I don't know, princess."
"You always say that."
"Because I still don't know."
"Was it a nurse?"
"Not that we're aware of."
"Grandma?"
She shook her head. "We weren't even at the hospital that evening."
"Grandpa?"
He raised both hands. "Don't look at me."
I glanced at my mother.
She was studying the blank television screen.
The recording had arrived through the post years earlier, tucked inside an envelope addressed to my father. There had been no return address and no note. Just the video, showing moments from the hospital room that neither of my parents remembered anyone filming.
At first, they had assumed a relative or member of staff had made it as a surprise. They'd asked around. Nobody admitted to it.
Eventually, everyone stopped wondering.
Everyone except me.
"But the camera was inside the room," I said. "You can see the whole bed."
Dad nodded slowly.
"That's right."
"And nobody saw it?"
"Apparently not."
"Isn't that strange?"
Grandpa set down his cup. "It is."
For a moment, the room grew quiet.
Then Grandma clapped her hands. "Well, whoever made it, I'm grateful. Otherwise we wouldn't have proof of what a ridiculous romantic my son is."
The adults laughed, and the conversation moved on.
I laughed too, but less enthusiastically.
I had watched the video ten times.
And every time, I came back to the same question.
Who had been standing in that hospital room, watching my parents, without being seen?
Later that evening, I found my mother sorting photographs into an album.
"Mom?"
"Yes, darling?"
"Why did you name me Nyx?"
She looked up. "You don't like your name?"
"I do. It's short. Nobody can spell it wrong. Well, almost nobody."
Mother smiled.
"But why that name?" I asked. "It doesn't sound like anyone else's in my class."
She closed the album on her lap.
"Your father and I discussed so many names before you were born. Beautiful names, ordinary names, names your grandmother kept suggesting even after we'd said no."
"That sounds like Grandma."
"It does."
"But none of them felt right. Then, after you were born, I kept thinking of one name. Nyx."
"Just like that?"
"Just like that."
"Dad agreed?"
"Surprisingly quickly. He said it suited you."
I thought about that.
I'd looked up my name once in a book. Nyx was an ancient Greek name associated with night, and in the old myths it belonged to a goddess of darkness.
I liked the sound of it. Strong, sharp, easy to remember.
Still, I couldn't imagine my parents looking at a tiny sleeping baby and thinking, Yes, let's name her after the night.
"Do you think names mean something?" I asked.
Mother brushed a strand of hair from my forehead.
"I think people give names meaning by the lives they live."
"That's not a real answer."
"It's the one I have."
I leaned against her shoulder.
"Do you think I'll become someone great?"
She put an arm around me.
"You already mean a great deal to us."
"That isn't what I asked."
"I know." She kissed the top of my head. "But it's what I want you to remember."
I didn't argue. For once.
Beyond the window, evening settled over the garden, turning the trees into dark shapes against the fading sky.
My mother returned to her photographs. I stayed beside her, thinking about my name and the faceless person who had filmed my parents at the hospital.
At nine, I believed every mystery had a sensible explanation if you asked enough questions.
I hadn't yet learned that some questions could follow you for years.
And some answers were in no hurry to be found.