Chapter 04 – Hello I'm Bae Suzy

“Myungsoo!” Sungyeol, one of my friends, calls out. I pretend not to hear him.

It’s 9 am in the morning and I can barely open my eyes. Yesterday night was especially restless, dealing with the trauma of losing my guitar.

“You what?!” my mother screams

“Do you have ears?! I said I lost my guitar” I huff as I throw my empty guitar case on the ground and give it a kick. If there is one thing I hate, it’s repeating myself.

My mother’s eyes have a feral blaze. “Do you have any responsibility?! Is this how I raised you?!”

“Honey. Calm down. I’ll just buy him a new one tomorrow” my father gives us a cursory glance from novel he is currently reading on the new couch he just bought himself.

“NO!” my mother screams again. A maid nearby holding a tea kettle practically jumps up in shock. “This isn’t about money. This is about being responsible. Yap yap yap yap”

I watch with tedium as my mother yaps on about being mature, growing up, and taking care of my own things. I’ve heard it all before.

“It was only last week we replaced your old guitar!” my mother goes on. I stifle a laugh remembering how that one ended. Sungyeol and I were curious if guitars would be good skateboards. Turns out not…. But anyways, I didn’t like that particular guitar, it smelled like old ladies. Of course, my mother didn’t understand the situation.

“Hey. You heard dad. He’ll buy me another one” I shrug still wondering why I didn’t just tell my mother what really happened. Making my way to the stairs, I begin to head upstairs.

“Don’t you dare leave!” my mother shouts after me

“What did you say? I can’t hear you anymore” I roll my eyes as I put my headphones on and turn the volume up, up, up.

Oof. I slam into someone halfway up the stairs. I look up somberly ready to shout until I realize it’s my older brother, Sunggyu. He looks at me with a downcast glaze of disappointment and I quickly look away. This is the first time I’ve seen my hung in three whole months. He has been studying abroad for a year in a college across the world and he rarely gets chances to come home. Last week, I overheard from my parents that his flight would arrive at 1 in the afternoon today, so I purposely left an hour earlier.

“Myungsoo” he begins but I already know what he’s going to say –myungsoo, I see your still the same. So I run up before he can continue.

“Why are you ignoring me?” Sungyeol complains “Is it because I ate the cake that Jiyeon made for you?!”

“No. It’s because you smell bad. ” I reply pretending to look repelled.

“Do I?!” Sungyeol panics as he hastily smells himself until he realizes I’m joking. We both burst out laughing soon after. It was an inside joke that had grown up with us for many years.

“Hey what you are doing?” Sungyeol