Chapter 62
In order to go on a wild shopping spree with the gift card, we went into a department store in downtown Paris.
Starting from the first floor, the jewelry section with necklaces and rings was decked out lavishly, but maybe because we were kids, it didn’t really appeal to us.
Instead, what caught our eye was a children's clothing brand.
Pitter-patter-.
Arin and I were walking when we both stopped at the same time.
“Wow...”
Insanely cute dresses, insanely cute pajamas, insanely cute outerwear, insanely cute T-shirts, insanely cute skirts.
French children's clothing brands were displaying only the cutest clothes.
Clothes combined in warm, cozy colors like pastel pink, mint, lavender, and cream.
Arin and I stared blankly at the display for a while.
“Sis, the clothes here are super cute...”
Arin said quietly.
“Yeah...”
I replied quietly too.
Mom smiled beside us and said,
“Ayeon, Arin, then shall we buy the clothes you like with the money you earned?”
“Can we?”
“Of course. You two worked hard to earn it, so it should be spent on you two.”
“Yay-!”
Tadadada-!
The two of us answered at the same time and dashed off together.
Mom sat in a chair and watched us.
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The first thing Arin picked up was a bear pajama set.
Arin loved bears. Her beloved plush toy Ppo-po was a bear too.
“Sis, look at this!”
Arin shook the pajamas back and forth.
“Cute.”
“I’m gonna buy this!”
“You should try it on first. They said you can change clothes over there.”
I pointed toward the fitting rooms with my finger.
“Hurry and try it on!”
Arin slipped into the fitting room.
While she did that, I picked out a cute rabbit pajama set.
I liked rabbits. My beloved plush toy Topi was a rabbit too.
When I ran my hand over it, the fur was soft and pleasant to the touch.
Rustle-. Rustle-.
I went into the fitting room next to Arin’s, took off the clothes I was wearing, and pulled on the rabbit pajamas.
Then I looked in the mirror.
A super-cute girl with rabbit ears was standing there!
“Heheh-.”
As expected of a country famous for fashion brands.
They really did make girls’ clothes in an adorable, charming way.
I turned my body this way and that.
A little rabbit tail was sticking out behind me.
I heard Arin’s voice from the next fitting room.
“Sis.”
“Yeah?”
“I changed into my pajamas, but now I want to sleep here. These pajamas are so warm-.”
Yeah. That made perfect sense.
If this had been a hotel instead of a department store, I would've dived straight onto the bed and crashed out on the spot.
“Let’s change back and come out. We still need to look at other clothes.”
We changed back into the clothes we had been wearing and came out of the fitting rooms.
After that, we kept browsing other cute clothes to our hearts’ content.
Arin found a colorful children’s umbrella and picked it up.
“I’m gonna buy this too.”
“An umbrella?”
“Yeah. It’s cute.”
“You only use that when it rains.”
“You said it rains a lot in Paris.”
“We’re going back to Korea now.”
“It rains in Korea too.”
It was an argument I couldn't refute.
“Um... Arin, though, there’s one important problem.”
“Whaaat?”
“We don’t have room in the suitcase for that umbrella.”
“Ahh-.”
Arin had come to an important realization.
Just because we had gotten a gift card loaded with money didn’t mean we could go on a shopping spree however we wanted.
If we were taking things back to Korea, they had to be things that would fit in our suitcases.
“Ehh...”
Arin pouted and put the umbrella back.
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We stood in front of the register with the clothes we had each chosen.
Beep-. Beep-.
After the clerk finished scanning all the barcodes, Arin took out the gift card and held it out.
The clerk looked down at Arin and smiled.
“C'est toi qui paies?”
It meant, “You’re paying?”
Arin didn’t understand the meaning, but she figured it out from context.
Then she grinned brightly and shouted,
“Oui!”
The clerk received the card with a pleased smile.
Then it was my turn, and I held out my card too.
The clerk finished the payment, put the clothes into shopping bags, and handed them over.
Arin lifted the shopping bags with both hands and said,
“Ugh... i-it’s heavy.”
“I ended up shopping way too much without even realizing it...”
Even so, Arin grinned and shook the shopping bags.
“Merci!”
“Mersing-.”
The clerk smiled and waved back.
“Merci à vous! Bonne journée!”
We left the clothing section.
Mom, who had been watching from afar, came over and took our shopping bags.
“You did great for your first shopping trip. I’ll give you three praise stickers when we get home.”
Pat-pat-pat-.
Mom kept ruffling our hair over and over.
“Heheh.”
“Heheh.”
✒️✒️✒️
It was time to head back to Korea.
I’d been trying hard to spend the money on the gift card during the remaining days.
But there was still a lot left.
There was nothing to be done.
Even if I tried to comfort myself by eating something expensive and delicious, I’d be full after eating only a third of what Mom ate,
and if I bought a bunch of cute clothes, they wouldn’t all fit in the suitcase.
And I couldn’t exactly buy jewelry and other expensive things I wasn’t even interested in, could I?
“Mom, what do we do with the money left on this?”
“The next time we come to France, you can use it then.”
“Huh? We’re coming to France again?”
“Who knows? I’m not sure, but maybe we’ll come again someday.”
Honestly, the remaining balance on the gift card was a minor issue.
The bigger problem was that we had way too much luggage to bring back to Korea.
Cute clothes we bought at the department store, souvenirs for friends and acquaintances, the Millennium plaque, chess tournament medals, and so on.
We tried to cram all of it into our suitcases.
“Hngh-! Mom, Arin, help me!”
“Ha-yah!”
“Hup!”
With all three of us—mother and daughters—pushing with all our might, we just barely managed to close the zipper on my suitcase.
The suitcase bulged out with a round belly.
It was like a convex set in which the internal division point of any two points always lies inside it.
Phew, that was a close one.
If we’d bought anything else here, the suitcase would’ve blown apart for real.
Likewise, with all three of us working together, we packed Arin’s suitcase to the brim too, and Mom’s suitcase as well.
“Phew. One thing down!”
Smack-.
We wiped away the beads of sweat forming on our foreheads and slapped our palms together.
Then we checked out of the hotel and went to the airport.
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The plane ride back to Korea.
My ears hurt a lot during takeoff, but Mom handled it well and I was able to calm down.
Still, the droning noise and the slight motion sickness didn’t disappear...
It couldn’t be helped.
To cover the 8,966 km straight-line distance from Paris to Seoul in just 13 hours, you had to put up with a little discomfort.
I’d have to soothe this stress with the first-class in-flight meal...
“Huaaah... so tasty.”
Munch-munch-chomp-chomp-.
We polished off the course-style in-flight meal with gusto.
Looking out the window, the fluffy clouds spread out across the ground like a soft blanket, and it was beautiful.
✒️✒️✒️
After ten-odd hours had passed.
We were able to set foot on Korean soil again.
Ughh-.
We loosened up our stiff bodies with some stretching.
When we came out of the arrivals hall, Dad was there to pick us up.
“Dad!”
Tadadada-!
Arin ran to Dad.
Dad grabbed Arin around the waist and lifted her up.
“How were my daughters? You weren’t bored while Dad was away, right?”
“It was so much fun! And, and, Dad!”
Arin looped her arms around Dad’s neck and started chattering away.
She kept talking even as we walked to the parking lot.
She kept talking even as she got into the car.
She kept talking until she was sitting in the child car seat and her seat belt clicked into place.
“We went to the chess tournament and got first and second place! I got first place and Sis got second! The two of us got medals and a gift card too! And we got tons of applause, and the camera went click-click, and confetti went pop!”
Dad smiled at Arin through the rearview mirror.
“Really? First place?”
“Yep! I beat Sis too-!”
“You beat your sister?”
“Yep!”
“Wow, our Arin is really amazing.”
Vroom-.
Dad set off.
The sound of the car was far quieter than the roar of the plane taking off.
It was a familiar, comfortable sound.
Mom, worn out, was already fast asleep in the passenger seat.
Arin must have been tired from the long flight too, but she kept happily pouring out stories to Dad.
That experience of being applauded so much must have been an incredibly special moment for Arin.
The medal was heavy.
The sound of applause was nice.
The camera flashes were dazzling.
She bought a ton of cute clothes.
The food at the Michelin-starred restaurant was delicious.
Leaning back in the car seat, I listened quietly to her.
“Aaah...”
My eyelids grew heavier and heavier.
A 13-hour flight. A 7-hour time difference.
Arin’s voice grew farther and farther away.
“Mmnya mmnya...”
I drifted off into sleep.