The Brothers Kim

"You mean to say that each of the Kims has their own houses?" she asked in awe.

Madam Zhou wearily replied, "Yes, that is correct."

"Wow! This family"s loaded. Move over Queen Elizabeth, Buckingham Palace ain"t got nothing over the Kim household!"

Madam Zhou arched her brow at Gyuri, choosing it wise to ignore her ramblings. After two hours of shadowing, Madam Zhou had grown accustomed to Gyuri"s peculiar references, most of which she believed must have been the consequence of Gyuri being without food for so long. That poor girl, she tutted to herself internally. She has been starved for so long that now, half of what she says is gibberish.

Madam Zhou led Gyuri to the maids" quarters after the end of their quick orientation. "Master Namjoon has instructed me to let you rest for today. Tomorrow, you will start work for real."

Gyuri blinked. "Wait, so what am I supposed to do now?"

Madam Zhou sighed. "You will rest in your quarters." She gestured for Gyuri to return to her quarters and obediently, Gyuri did.

Well, I"m not gonna pa.s.s on a day of chilling, she thought to herself. She stretched her arms as she approached the hallway which led to the bedrooms. When she reached the door she faintly recognised, she tentatively pushed it open.

Inside, were three other girls roughly her age. Gyuri blinked and as she stared at them, she thought she recognised one of the girls. Hm. Wasn"t that girl"s name Mia or something? Or maybe it was Maya...

Gyuri scrunched her face in thought as she racked her brain for the girl"s name. While she did this, the other three girls gave her peculiar looks. To them, she looked like she had smelled something funky to which they responded by sniffing the air around them.

After a while, one of the girls finally spoke. "Hi!" she greeted cheerily and Gyuri noticed how her voice was quite ardent like she was waiting for Gyuri to arrive. "My name is Pho. You"re Gyuri, right?"

Gyuri backed away slightly as the short and excited girl bounced up to her and slowly closed the distance between them. "Er, yeah. Yeah, I"m Gyuri."

"Oh!" she squealed excitedly. "It"s so good to finally talk to you, I"ve been dying to speak to you ever since I watched you chase the Young Master. I thought you were so cool and intriguing! I mean no one else would do such a thing and-"

"Okay, Pho" the-girl-who-cannot-be-named interrupted. "I think you"re overwhelming Gyuri a bit."

Pho, realising that she was invading Gyuri"s s.p.a.ce, decided to back away a little. "Sorry about that. I get excited really easily."

Gyuri smiled awkwardly as she eyed Pho. She couldn"t help picturing her as an excited puppy since her large brown eyes were sparkling like they were keen to get her approval. "No problem," Gyuri managed to respond as Pho took a few steps backwards, letting Gyuri observe her in her entirety.

Pho was a relatively short, thin girl with long black wavy hair that was braided at the back and tied with a plain, dark ribbon- much like all the other maids in the household. Her garments were the same as Gyuri"s: a plain light-coloured traditional robe paired with a long, traditional dark skirt. When Gyuri looked around she noticed that everyone was wearing identical clothing- much like a uniform.

"So Gyuri, which one are you?" Pho asked keenly.

She looked at her quizzically. "What do you mean?"

"Were you selected or were you recommended?"

"What?"

"She"s asking how you got your job" a different girl replied.

Gyuri turned to face who had answered and saw that it was someone she had never seen before. She was a little taller than her and had sharp features. Gyuri would have considered the girl as attractive if only she wasn"t glowering at her. Her thin eyebrows were creased into a frown and her lips were puckered into a haughty expression, giving off an annoyed vibe. It didn"t take much for Gyuri to realise that the girl who answered did not welcome Gyuri"s presence at all.

"I-I"m not sure..." Gyuri responded to Pho"s question. "I don"t think I was either of the two."

The tall girl scoffed, "You"re not sure?"

Gyuri couldn"t help feeling slightly agitated by her tone.

"Well, let"s put it this way" Pho interjected, sensing the tension in the room. "Mayu," she said pointing to the girl next to her, "was recommended by a patron while Kalyani was selected for service. Almost all the maids in the household got in through either of these two ways." She pointed to herself, "I was also selected from the guild."

The tall girl, named Kalyani, turned to Pho. "Why do you even want to know?"

"Because I wanna know who her master is" Pho replied.

"Master?"

The three maids turned to face her, evidently confused as to why Gyuri had sounded so shocked.

"Hold up a sec," Gyuri began. "Don"t all of you serve the Kims?"

"Yes," a soft voice escaped the lips of the girl named Mayu. Gyuri was surprised at finally hearing her speak. "But each of us is in charge of ultimately serving one of the Kim brothers. Did Madam Zhou not explain this to you?"

Kalyani rolled her eyes. "Clearly she hadn"t or else the new girl would know already."

Mayu ignored her remark. "The Kim brothers each have a personal maid to attend to their needs. Often, they choose who serves them either by asking for a recommendation or by selecting someone from the guild of servants-"

"That"s the place where trained maids can advertise themselves," Pho helpfully added.

"Right, and that person becomes their master" Mayu concluded.

"Well, I didn"t get here through either of those methods" Gyuri explained. She thought for a while as she tried to find the best words to describe her weird predicament.

It"s not like I can tell them the truth, she thought. They won"t believe me if I say I suddenly woke up in someone else"s body and ended up in a different time period too. But then again, how I ended up in the Kim household isn"t really out of the ordinary...

Gyuri thought about all the movies she"s watched and how being rescued seemed to be a common occurrence. She cast her memory back to how Namjoon rescued her and the cheeky brat and how he offered to take her in as a servant of the household. If she rationalised it, she ended up with a very simple explanation.

"I was adopted," Gyuri said.

The trio exchanged strange looks with each other, disbelief clearly written on their foreheads.

"What do you mean by that?" Pho enquired curiously.

"Well, Master Namjoon took me in after I helped Master Taehyung" Gyuri responded, copying how the other maids addressed the Kims.

The trio raised their brows in surprise.

"You mean you were rewarded?" Pho"s voice was high-pitched to signal her shock. "That"s incredible!"

"It is?"

Kalyani chipped in, "Being rewarded is a rare occurrence. The Kims are well-known for their generosity when it comes to rewards. So far, only men have been rewarded for their valiant behaviour." She eyed Gyuri with envy. "You must have done something merit worthy for them to reward you with such an opportunity as this."

"That"s true!" Pho nodded enthusiastically. "It"s very difficult to get a prestigious job like this. I still consider myself as very lucky to have caught Master Junmyeon"s eye."

Gyuri"s ears p.r.i.c.ked up at the sound of that name. She remembered Taehyung addressing the scary brother with the same name. "You"re the scary brother"s maid?" Gyuri pried.

Pho giggled at Gyuri"s description of her master. "Yes. But I wouldn"t call him that out loud if I were you." She looked around warily as she pressed her finger against her lips. "The walls have ears so you must be careful of what you say."

Gyuri chuckled nervously. It was the same warning she had received from Madam Zhou. "I"ll do that next time." She glanced at the other two, "And what about you? Who are your masters?"

Mayu was the first to reply. "I serve Master Namjoon."

"Master Namjoon, eh?" Gyuri repeated. This girl"s lucky, she thought. He seems to be the most decent out of the Kims so far... but then she remembered how he had admitted to "examining" her body while she was unconscious and she immediately discarded her good impression of him.

Gyuri turned her attention to Kalyani. She replied proudly, "I serve the Young Master: Master Taehyung."

Gyuri immediately pulled a face at the mention of the brat"s name. How unlucky, she tutted to herself.

"Hang on a sec," Pho declared. "Since it was Master Namjoon who rewarded you, does this mean you will serve under him?"

The four exchanged looks with each other. Gyuri couldn"t help noticing the mildly alarmed expression that Mayu exhibited. The news seemed to be disagreeable to her. Mayu immediately interrogated Gyuri, "Was it truly Master Namjoon who rewarded you?"

"Er, yeah."

The crease on Mayu"s smooth forehead deepened. But then her expression changed. "Wait, since you were rewarded, did he also grant you a new ident.i.ty?"

Gyuri considered this. "No, it was Master Taehyung who did."

Mayu"s expression relaxed but in turn, Kalyani became more vocal. "What? It was the Young Master who named you?"

Gyuri nodded, baffled as to why Kalyani was against her this time.

Pho"s large eyes shifted from looking at Kalyani to Mayu. "It seems as though Gyuri may serve either Mast Namjoon or the Young Master."

Pho"s words hung in the air as the trio turned to look at her.

"What? Is it something bad?"

"Not for you" Kalyani snapped. "But it will be for Mayu and I."

Mayu"s face was scrunched up in worry. "If you serve under either Master Namjoon or the Young Master it means that one of us is being replaced. There can only be one personal maid. It is possible to have two but-"

"Two is too many," Kalyani abruptly interrupted. "One will be like a third slipper: pointless."

"Look," Gyuri stated, trying to defuse the tension in the room. "We don"t know for sure yet. No one has told me about anyone being replaced-"

"But it won"t be long until they do," Mayu responded anxiously.

"And when they do," Kalyani said fiercely, "I will make sure that your life here will be a living h.e.l.l." Kalyani gave Gyuri a threatening glare before pushing past her shoulder to leave. Mayu eyed her worriedly before swiftly following Kalyani"s lead, leaving Pho and Gyuri alone in the room.

Pho rubbed her neck. "I"m sorry about Kalyani. She"s a good person in general but this job means everything to her."

"No, it"s okay. I understand where she"s coming from but it"s not like I asked to be rewarded by the Kims."

Pho was sympathetic. "Don"t worry about it for now." But even she looked uncertain with what will happen in the future. "But if you get a chance to choose, which of the Kims will you choose to be your master?"

Gyuri arched her brow. "Can I even choose?"

"Probably not. But say if you do, who will you choose?"

Gyuri was quiet. To her, it was a no-brainer which of the two she preferred more.

"Definitely Master Namjoon."