Why is her grandmother dead? Why did she die without telling Hannah or without anyone letting her know? How could she even die?

She is so furious at her family, crying out of anger and out of her headache, throwing her bottle of beer across the kitchen to the sink so hard that it breaks into pieces against the wall and falls down with shattered glass and beer falling down in the sink and around it. She wants to curse out her family so much, she wants to ask them why they hate her so much, if they think she wouldn’t care, if they think her life is really so worthless while she feel so blessed working with 5 Pieces. Is being happy a crime? Why does it have to be a bad thing in her family to feel at least a little good about yourself?

With the music banging loudly of Kelly Clarkson’s [Stronger] on repeat, you expect the doorbell to not be heard. Apparently, the music wasn’t as loud as Hannah thought and felt it was when the doorbell suddenly makes an echoing sound through the apartment, startling her so much that if she had been holding the bottle of beer in her hand she would have dropped it.

She is in a rush to turn the music off, dizzily running in the wall on her way to the hall afterwards and she gives out a whine when rubbing her shoulder. Hannah then stops her steps right around the corner and steps back, just to see on the monitor who is standing outside the front door.

“Oh…”

Her voice is horse from singing and screaming and crying for the past few hours, and Hannah has the ultimate unexpected face-expression in her drunken and tearful face when walking up to the door in the hall, opening it.

“Welcome,” she says and lets her head fall down in a tired bow. It hurts so much in her head when doing that and she grimaces when lifting her head up, mumbling out; “to the strong side of those who have not yet been killed.”

“Are you drunk?” Jonghyun looks shocked when stepping inside the apartment; his hand touches her face right away. Her skin is sticky from tears, but it is her eyes he tries to look at with his hand holding up her head; red and unfocused. Not in the same gone way she has earlier been, but in a haze, completely drunk. He has no idea of where she got the alcohol from.

“You know what,” Hannah answers, lifting a finger up at him and Jonghyun raises his eyebrows at that finger pointing straight up, “I totally hate beer. It is disgusting.”

“Yet you smell like it,” he tells her with a grimace, his shoes off and he throws his jacket on the side when hurrying with her inside, not wanting her out of sight.

Hannah head towards her office, but Jonghyun stops in the middle of the room outside, gaping when leaning towards the living-room to look inside.

“Did you jump in the sofas…?” he asks. His voice suddenly drowns in loud music, Kelly Clarkson singing the chorus in [Stronger]. “HANNAH!”

She comes bouncing out from the office where she had the music, using the loudspeakers on her desk like earlier. She looks happy though, like a heartbroken and drunken happiness, she grabs his hands and starts waving them when heading to the living-room, just dancing with Jonghyun staring at her. He was gone for a few hours and this happened?

Calmly saying her name, he is the one holding on to her from bouncing away from him, but she just starts singing to the music to him, calling out that she wished she could sing this song for her family.

It takes a minute for him to get annoyed. Jonghyun lets her bounce around in the living-room as he head to the office to turn off the music.

Half the room is covered in papers. Papers spread out on the floor, chair, bookcase and desk, making a huge mess while the other part of the room neatly belongs to Carolina. What has she been doing? He shoves the papers aside, making a path to the desk to turn off the music, and when the music is turned off he can hear a whine from the other room; Hannah complaining that the music is off. It is suddenly much quieter with the music off, and Jonghyun head back out to check on her.

She is pouting, ignoring to look at him when dragging her body to the kitchen. With a sigh he walks after her.

“Oh gosh. Hannah!” Jonghyun bursts out with a breath when seeing the kitchen.

“What?” she asks, annoyed, not turning around to look at him when taking a seat in front of the open fridge to take out a box of cold cut fruits, and she keeps the fridge open when with satisfaction opening the box to eat.

Jonghyun gives out a whine, hurrying up to grab her under the arms, pulling her away so he can close the fridge. She has ice-cream on the table, barely touched, melting, she has left drawers open as if she was just having fun opening them, there is beer on the kitchen sink, as well as a broken bottle – that makes him ask her questions, turning around to see her lying down on her stomach on the floor and picking out fruits to put in . The kitchen has an awful smell of beer because of the broken bottle that wasn’t even empty.

“Do you want?” Hannah cutely asks, rolling around on her back and holds out a piece of a pear towards Jonghyun.

“No, I’m good…” he mutters, not knowing what to do. “Hannah, how much have you been drinking?”

Hannah rolls back on her stomach, turning her focus to the box of fruits.

“Hannah,” Jonghyun repeats her name, sitting down on the floor with her, “Tell me what you have been drinking.”

“You know what I think,” Hannah tells him, eyes trying to focus on the box inches away from her face as if she has really bad eyesight, “that my family would probably say I deserved to not know about it. No word: that is what I deserve in their eyes. Maybe they didn’t even think about me – maybe they have forgotten all about my existence? No daughter, no sister, no twin – I have vanished from their family tree.”

“You’re drunk.”

“So what if I am? Better drunk than dead, right?”

She gives out a cry when he grabs her arm, tighter than he has ever done before, and he pulls her up to sit on the floor, glaring at her. “Don’t you ever say that, Hannah, you if anyone should not talk about it like that.”

“Why not?” Hannah asks back, moving her arms out of his grip, and though she doesn’t do much because he lets go of her she almost looses her balance, even when sitting down. “Why can’t I, Jonghyun? What does it matter what I do with my life when the people I should show affection and love to can not be told just how much I love them? She’s dead and she can never know how great it feels to hear from strangers that you make a difference. I want her to know that. I want to see her, Jonghyun.”

“It is still not an excuse to how you are behaving right now!” he says in a high tone at her, his whole face speaking his words angrily. “You think your grandmother would like to see this, the way you are treating yourself and this place? You thinks she would be proud to know that as soon as something bad happens in your life, you make yourself suffer, thinking you do not deserve anything? She was proud seeing how strong and beautiful you look on the stage, performing for a whole nation with passion and love. Your grandmother is proud to see you happy; she could see it when she was alive that you have grown into the most beautiful person in thousand of people’s eyes. You are loved and a part of so many people’s lives, she is proud over that!”

“But I want to see her,” Hannah cries, the tears just flowing down her cheeks.

“You can’t,” he strictly tells her, and it hurts him to see the broken face she gives him at those words. “I’m sorry, Hannah, but you can’t see her. You can pray to her, you can talk to the sky if you so want, but your grandmother is dead and you will have to cherish the time you had together.”

He can see the anger in her face at the truth in his words but he does not regret the harshness he had used to tell it to her. This behaviour is not good and he will not be soft to her just because of it. Her lips curl into a sad face before she looks away with closed eyes.

For seconds he considers moving closer to her, to wrap his arms around her. He wants her to drink some water and go to bed, to sober up. Before he can make up his mind, she gets up on her feet. He is fast to hold out his hand, but Hannah takes a step away from him, without a word letting him know she does not want to be touched, and she walks out of the kitchen. He stays seated, listening to make sure of where she goes.

The bathroom. It’s so quiet in the apartment now that he can hear the door close and lock, and he gets up to try cleaning up her mess, starting with the kitchen.

He has only put away the fruits and ice-cream when hearing something is wrong, and he runs to the bathroom, knocking on the door.

“Leave me alone!” Hannah cries at him.

“Hannah…”

“Get away!”

He frowns angrily at the door that he leans against when hearing her throw up, all that alcohol coming back up. She has the water running in there but he can still hear it. He holds his fist against the door, wanting to open it so badly that he tears up knowing he can’t come inside without breaking the door. She keeps throwing up when there is nothing left in her stomach, only beer has been coming up as she has not been eating anything else than a few bites of pizza the past two days. She has to cough from not being able to breathe when there is nothing left in her stomach but her body wants to throw up, she is crying.

He stays there, hearing how it calms down inside the bathroom after a while, but she doesn’t come out. He can hear movements and knows she is okay, and ends up leaving the door.

Hannah cries soundlessly in the bathroom, freezing and shaking, and crying rivers while her stomach gets emptier and emptier. Half an hour, more or less, she is in there, and she makes sure to wash her face and brush her teeth with one of the toothbrushes unused in a box there, taking mouthwash now and then for ten minutes before stepping outside, feeling pale and weak and as if she has cried floods.

The apartment is quiet. No movement, no sounds. She glances towards the hall, not able to look inside from where she is standing, wondering if he left. She walks to the kitchen to get some water, her head still pounding, and though she sees it on the way to the kitchen she still goes to get the biggest glass of water she finds before stepping inside the living-room, sadly looking at Jonghyun lying on the side in the sofa with an arm held out as a pillow for his head. He looks to be asleep.

Hannah walk upstairs, putting on a pair of sweatpants, too big for her as they are old ones, and she grabs her favourite blanket under a messy pile of clothes on the floor before she head back downstairs. The whole time she has the same sad face-expression, taking sips of the water she brings with her, her head hurts.

The living-room is the same: he looks the same.

As quiet as she can, she gulps down most of the water before putting the glass on the living-room table, and she bites her lip when looking at him. Slowly and hopefully quietly, she lies down next to him, putting the blanket over them both and she curls in to hug on to his chest, burying herself in him. She knows he is awake when one arm holds on to her, maybe making sure she won’t fall over the side of the sofa, but neither one says anything. She almost tears up when his arm is put over her, because he is always perfect. Whatever she says, it won’t make up to what has happened now; what he has seen, how she has behaved, what has been said. Somehow it seems to end like that often lately, but this time it is not about the two of them.

Even if trying, Hannah can’t sleep. She can hear the change in Jonghyun’s breathing when he fall asleep, wondering if he sleeps peacefully because she is there, but then again she did not give him a peaceful environment tonight.

What a mess she has done. She can’t really remember how the rooms look like, but in blurry pictures of her mind she seems to recall the messy bedroom she created with the drawer on the floor. She pouts, carefully picking up the cell phone she has on the living-room table, and she looks at the picture of her grandmother that she put up on the internet. Fans are responding to it, writing it is a cute picture, asking when it was taken, asking if 5 Pieces is in Sweden (the pictures the other members have updated, mostly Julia, hints that they are not in Seoul). On twitter it is like that too, but on twitter it is a mess on Hannah’s board of fans seeking her attention, asking questions and complimenting her or showing hate. It’s like it always is.

Putting the cell phone away she crawls back into Jonghyun’s sleeping arms, closing her own eyes.

An hour of pain in her body, Hannah can’t take her restlessness anymore. Her head hurts, she is still drunk, though she shouldn’t have any energy in her body after lack of sleep, food, crying for hours and from throwing up earlier, she can not lie down with the head just pounding worse and worse. Though she would love to stay lying there with Jonghyun, she gets up, refills her glass of water in the kitchen before she goes to get her laptop and head upstairs to not wake him up.

For a second she must be in other thoughts because she just walks inside her bedroom as if there is nothing wrong with it, puts the laptop down on the messy bed and decides to turn on music again, much lower this time though it is the same music. Kelly Clarkson with the best songs Hannah can think of these days.

Sitting on her bed, Hannah looks around in the room, slowly getting into her music.

Like a sudden change in her body, Hannah gets up. She doesn’t know what to do with her room, it all feels hopeless, but she should do something. Maybe throw it all out. She starts with putting back the drawer, kicking away the annoying things on the floor, creating enormous hills on the floor of things to create her path through the room. Singing in a low voice she is bouncing lightly once again, being ten times more quiet than earlier because of the boyfriend sleeping downstairs, and most of the time she is just bouncing and singing rather than cleaning up the mess she has made.

Somewhere during the cleaning up, most things end up going to her bed. All piles gathers there when she tries to clean up on the floor, but when she wants to sit down for a bit to change the song, she pushes all of it back down to cover the floor as if she is just doing this to waste time rather than cleaning up anything. The drawer is empty, her wardrobe has a few clothes hanging badly in it, underwear and whatnot are on the floor.

She head downstairs to get some more water, checking to make sure Jonghyun is sleeping, taking an adorable picture of him and then goes to the office to gather all pictures she can find before sneaking back upstairs.

Everything is laid down on her bed. Pictures of her with Jonghyun, of her with her members… Mostly a collection of pictures she has taken with Jonghyun, from Valentine’s last year and some other pictures. She sorts them all out; couple pictures lined up in one corner, pictures with her members in another and a mixed one. She looks at one picture at a time, making grimaces that show if she likes it or not.

With a sad pout she pushes all of the pictures away from her, changing the song on the laptop and gets up on her feet to kick away some sweaters over the room.

Why did she have to die? All the times Hannah wished she would die, never did she use to think of dying to meet another person. She never thought she would have anyone to miss, but then again she has never really lost someone close to her. Her family is alive in Sweden – until now. And she can’t tell them how much she loves them because it is so wrong for this family to say those things.

Picking up a pile of things from the floor, she throws it in annoyance over her room before going back to her laptop, sitting down by the bed and takes out Word, a blank page.

‘Ever since I was a child, I have been able to write things I have barely been able to think about. I have dreamt and used my imagination to create a world of my own fantasy, disappearing from the real world that I once used to hate so much. I write for everything; for my dreams, for my hopes, for my believes, for my future and for my past, for my emotions and my days, and now I write this, in hopes it will be my message for you…’

Before she knows it she has written over a page, crying while writing to her grandmother through the only way she find possible. Pages written within minutes it feels like, her tears flooding from minute to minute, she wipes them hopelessly as new ones arrive within a minute. But she needs to let it out, to write down everything she can come up with to tell her grandmother and use her imagination to think her grandmother actually reads it. Even in text it is awkward, Hannah has to smile through her tears when writing that it is awkward writing so much truth to a family member, but hoping her grandmother will appreciate to finally know all the things Hannah have wanted to tell her. ‘It’s a word we take for granted, but I love you, grandmother’. Reading it, she nods for herself, wiping her tears again.

Feeling like she can’t write anything more, she saves what she has written and takes up a picture of her grandmother to cover the screen. With a sigh she sits back, looking at it, crying some more.

“I still think I should say something,” Hannah whispers to the picture, “maybe you want me to explain myself, for things I didn’t write down.”

Being drunk, she has no idea of what she is doing or saying, so Hannah just sits there and talks to the picture of her grandmother on her laptop; fiddling on her nails with her fingers as it for some reason makes her nervous to talk to a picture.

“My childhood was great,” Hannah wants to tell her, to let someone in her family know about it. “I liked my friends, the way I was raised, I liked my tough mother and my family who was filled with hate. I didn’t know better, but I still liked it. I don’t know where I started to feel wrong. I jut felt that something huge was growing inside of me, a black hole just growing and growing each time I opened my eyes in the morning… It hurt me, to get out in the late evening to cry while thinking of ways to kill myself, knowing it would be embarrassing to cry at home. I can’t remember why it started, or how it started, I just remember doing it a lot. I never told anyone about it, about my thoughts. Then I met Julia. She was so similar to me. We never spoke much in school – we were all five hanging out there – but once we came home, we would chat online for hours, cry while telling each other how we are feeling and what we have thought. I connected with someone. School was never hard for me, I think, not in that age. I can say that the thing I am the most proud over in my life is my friends. The four friends who still are by my side; we have really gone through a lot together. But … you know that already. I wanted to boast to you, grandma… That was my purpose to visit Sweden. Finally, after years, (ha-ha), have I gotten the courage to boast about being in love. I hate it that you won’t meet him, or see me around him. Right now I am a wreck, but you should see him… I don’t know if you can, I don’t know how life after death is like. It would be sad thinking you are watching us; I want you to be in a better place, not just see how miserable the rest of us still are… But it would be nice if you for a second could see him.

Growing up, I think of the way you and mom were treated. How grandpa bosses you around, how my father treated my mother, how he treated other women… I don’t think my view of men has changed, but … do you think he could be different?” Hannah whispers the last words, her question, touching her nails while thinking. “I don’t know. He treats me too well; he doesn’t look at me that way. Each time my dad said he was in love in a woman, he didn’t have that look on his face when looking at her or talking about her. Jonghyun does. It is so different. All the things he does, just … it’s not the kind of men you knew, grandma. I wanted to tell you that, to let you know that for now, I have a good man by my side. If I don’t messes things up, because I am really going overboard lately… Ah…”

She sighs, touching a key on the laptop for the page to not disappear.

“I do wish I knew better though,” she whispers to her grandmother with a sad pout. “I don’t like myself because of how I treat people. Grandma, I am disappointed in myself. I understand why mother is disappointed too; she sees that side of me, only that side. But …” she lowers her voice even more; “I hope it doesn’t get worse. I want to do better, but each time I try it just gets worse. I hope he has the patience for me, grandma, and I hope I have it too. … …”

She opens to try saying something more when hearing something by the door, turning around with huge eyes.

“Who are you talking to?” Jonghyun smiles softly at her, standing by the door and looking relaxed, realising she did not hear her manager arrive downstairs; the female manager has come to take care of the pets, as it already is morning.

Hannah looks back at her screen, tearing up when wondering what to answer, just looking at the picture of her grandmother. When looking back at him, Jonghyun sits down behind her and puts his arms around her, his head next to hers.

“I hope,” Jonghyun whispers to her, while looking at the picture before them, “that you stop thinking of me as someone you need to prove your love for, and I hope you will never forget that my patience with you will never waver.”

She leans her back against him, liking his presence. “It’s bad to eavesdrop,” she tells him, her head falling back against his shoulder. Not for a second does she think of that she spoke in Korean instead of Swedish talking to her grandmother, the language coming out more naturally to her now.

“I know. But I think it’s bad to ruin your bedroom too – what happened in here? Another hurricane?”

She smiles softly, and Jonghyun smiles too seeing it. He gives her a peck on the cheek.

“You couldn’t sleep?” he asks her, knowing she had lied down in the sofa with him.

“I had a headache…”

“What about now?” Jonghyun whispers.

Hannah’s answer is to lie down in the bed, just lying down with him, and she turns around to look at him. “We can rest like this,” she tells, her eyes already closing with her head lying down. Jonghyun smiles as he takes her hand in his, telling her to get some sleep.

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“Are you going to be here all day?” Hannah whispers, again she doesn’t want him to leave, her fingertips playing along the skin at the back of his hand, her eyes following her fingers.

“All day has almost passed already,” Jonghyun answers in a low voice.

He can’t stop looking at her. They slept for an hour, then woke up and just talked for a bit before falling asleep again, he woke up to her sobbing and then they fell asleep again… She looks so sad the whole time, a frown stuck in her face and on the verge of crying each time he sees her eyes. He asked her what he can do to make her feel better but she just wants to stay at home, and he don’t mind doing that. He can focus on her and only her, watch her, make sure she is not alone, he can touch her and make her feel loved.

“The rest of the day then…” Hannah whispers. Her fingertips are following up his visible vein up his arm, just a bit, before tracing back to his hand.

“I’m right here,” Jonghyun tells her. “I will have to leave for a few hours tonight, but I will hurry back to you as soon as my radio ends, okay? You can listen to my voice on the radio at that time.”

“Mm…” Hannah looks distant. “I do wish I was at home.”

“Why do you say that?” Jonghyun wonders, thinking she was in such a hurry to come back to Seoul that it doesn’t make any sense that she wants to go back again.

“Um… Because it calms me,” Hannah whispers, then scoffs at herself and she rolls around to lie on her back, smiling at herself at how silly it sounds. “I want to go back to the place that hurts me the most because it is still the place I love. It’s so weird.”

“It’s not weird,” Jonghyun tells her and puts a hand by her neck to touch a few locks of her hair. “Not weird at all. You grew up there, and whatever has happened with your family now you still have the past together. Home is always home, no matter what has happened.”

Hannah rolls around on her stomach, resting her cheek on his arm that had been stretched out and she looks at him with those sad eyes that have been hurting him all day. How can he make her feel better?

“I both hate and love that place,” Hannah whispers to him, “and I hate to love it…”

With a sigh she knows he has no idea of what she talks about.

“I just wanted to see her, Jonghyun,” she whispers with a pout, the tears returning. “I was not expecting … what happened. I didn’t have a clue.”

He nods at her, wrapping his other arm around her to give her a hug, and he keeps it for minutes. She doesn’t start crying, she just gets a weird breathing as if she is having silent tears.

“I’m hungry,” Jonghyun mumbles.

She whines, as a part of her had hoped he wouldn’t bring up the talk about food. Jonghyun smiles at her reaction, hiding his noise in her hair and she really love the way he breathes in her scent.

“I’m really hungry,” he mumbles in her hair. “Let me cook something for you.”

Even without any strength in her body, he pulls her up on her feet, not waiting for her to answer and he supports her out of the messy room while mumbling that she really should re-think her decisions of letting out her anger and sorrow this way. She shows no reaction to his joke, and Jonghyun makes a face at it. He actually misses the ladies; they would know what to do, what to say. This is beyond him; he has been in Sweden once, she even gave his group a private tour around to see where 5 Pieces grew up and it was amazing but he has never met her family beside from her mother, he has only heard things about her childhood… Their view of family is so different that he can’t comfort her with words. He can’t handle her sorrow, and each hour that passes with Hannah just looking to be further away from him the more he fears that she will really make bad decisions.

Hannah gets to sit down by the kitchen table while Jonghyun starts looking around the kitchen, talking nonstop to her in a try to lighten the mood and to maybe get her in other thoughts. Hannah doesn’t say a thing, she tries to follow his silhouette moving back and forth but just spaces out the whole time, and not even when he starts with some basic cooking does she react.

It’s not anything fancy, but Jonghyun doesn’t care as long as they get food in their stomachs, so he makes some simple food and adds ramen to it before sitting down next to Hannah by the kitchen table with the food in front of them.

Hannah eats. Not much at all, and when she stops, she tells Jonghyun she can’t eat more if the food is going to stay in her stomach, and it feels like a threat; if he forces her to eat, she will throw up. So Jonghyun lets her be, continuing to eat himself while keeping an eye on her. Now she looks at him, from time to time her eyes look distant, but she looks at him eat and he keeps wondering on what to do with her. He likes to see her watch him, that she isn’t completely lost in sorrow.

“Your members come back the day after tomorrow,” Jonghyun mentions when he is slowly what is left from what he made for them. He puts his chopsticks by but she doesn’t want any, so he eats it himself. She shows no reaction to what he said. “On Tuesday you will have an event to attend; it’s three days away from now.”

He puts his hand by her cheek, caressing it for her eyes to move away from the distance and see him instead. She looks so sad.

“What do you want to do before they come back?” he asks her. “Anything, I will do anything for you.”

For seconds she looks at him, for seconds he wonders if she really is seeing him, but he notices that she is eyeing him; looking at his features with those sad eyes. “I want to see heaven,” she mentions. She looks so lost and serious saying those words, and Jonghyun thinks about nodding and just go along with it when she continues; “I like seeing the sky looking endless. I watched it when I was at home the other day; no tall buildings, you could see so long that the sky could look endless…”

“You want to see the sky?” Jonghyun smiles at it, but just as he pictures an endless sky in front of him he gets an idea. “If you want an endless sky, I will give you an endless sky.”

“I’m not kidding, Jonghyun.”

The smile grows in his face when leaning closer to her, their foreheads almost touching with those dark eyes piercing into her. “Neither am I, Nabi,” he tells her. She has no idea of what he means, but she can barely blink looking at him.

“I love you,” she whispers, and for the first time in a while he really feels it from top to toe when she puts her arms around his neck, her fingers touches the back of his head, his hair, joining her eyes really looking at him; seeing him. “I love you so much, Jonghyun.”

“I love you too,” Jonghyun answers.

The kiss is light on her lips and she pouts when he leans away too soon, blinking when focusing her eyes on him. Jonghyun smiles with a hand by her cheek, looking like he knows she wanted more from that kiss. He wants it too, but he isn’t sure now is the time for it when she looks so sad.

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In Sweden, Maria is not enjoying her days off the way she would have wanted. She has had a great time with her family; she has had such a great time that she is so relaxed and feeling free… It’s the best time to spend some days like this, just with her family, to see all her relatives and enjoy the loud laughter and chatting of her silly family. There is no doubt she has loved every second at home, but with what is going on with Hannah – her grandmother passed away without her knowing it – Maria is so furious.  For hours after Hannah went back to Korea, Maria couldn’t stop complaining to her family about Hannah’s. it’s awful how she is treated by her own flesh and blood.

Emelia told her not to, but Maria still does it. She needs to ask Hannah’s family what is going on, why no one told the girl her grandmother passed away last year, and compared to Emelia who could easily barge in the Martens family household and face the consequences, Maria has not met the family often enough to do such a thing. Instead, Maria approaches the only person in that family who she knows; the one she has gone to school with and met countless of times – Hannah’s twin sister, Jen.

Through her own sister, Maria found out that Jen works in children’s clothing store in the city, and goes to visit her one of the days in Sweden to have a little chat. Spending the day in the city, Maria drops by the store to let Jen know she is there and wants to talk and returns later when Jen has her lunch break.

“I didn’t know you were in Sweden,” Jen says when taking a seat in the staff-room, pointing for Maria to do the same.

The tall and skinny lady of 5 Pieces takes a seat; she can’t help but to look upset when seeing the other half of Hannah. Jen is tall, almost eight centimetres taller than Hannah, she is muscular and has the same blonde hair as Hannah, same blue-green eyes but bigger and something about their skin or their structure is similar too and she looks so kind that Maria remembers the time in school together, how Jen would always say hi and talk to them because she honestly likes Maria.

“I’ve been here for a few days, hanging out with my family,” Maria says, then saying it straight out; “Hannah’s grandmother is dead.”

Jen looks completely taken back by the words, by the coldness in Maria’s eyes and tone, and she gets no word out of here before Maria helplessly continues to tell her;

“Do you know how she found out about it, Jen? She went to your grandparents’ house, just to find a stranger who tells her that her grandmother is dead since months ago. She cried for hours in front of the grave on the graveyard! What kind of horrible person does not tell her own sister that their grandmother is dead?”

Maria tears up when asking the question, remembering how Hannah looked when they met the other day and she need to pause herself to wipe her tear and to take a long deep breath to not just attack Jen. Jen tears up too, looking down at her hands.

“I didn’t think she’d care…”

“Well she does!” Maria bursts out, her pitch high. “She loves all of you!”

“Okay, okay!” Jen lifts up her hands, knowing she is attacked by Maria’s frustration. “We’re sorry, okay? I wanted to tell her, but we haven’t really been on good terms lately. At the concert I thought of telling her too, but she got angry and I got angry and … it wasn’t a good time.”

“It was better to let her come here and find out by looking at the grave herself then?”

“Look, Maria, what do you want me to say? She was the one who left us-”

“She didn’t leave you,” Maria tells her with a frown. “Hannah went with us to look outside the box. It was your family who told her to not come back and pushed her out. Hannah has not once wanted to leave her family, but she knew that she had to think of her own and for that went with us to Korea. Yes, things could have gone so much better than this, but you must admit that you haven’t really made it easy for her either.”

Jen keeps looking at her hands, looking guilty, and it reminds Maria of Hannah when she can not meet your eye. They are alike even after spending so much time away from each other; Maria has never noticed it before.

“I came to ask for details,” Maria sighs. “I want to know what happened with your grandmother.”

“Is she here?” Jen asks. She sees Maria’s confused face-expression. “Hannah. Is she here?”

“Hannah went back to Korea as soon as she left the graveyard. She had to leave this poisonous place, you get that? She has nowhere else to go, Jen; only an empty apartment in Seoul, now waiting for the rest of us to go back. She thought she had her grandmother here in Sweden to go home to, but apparently not.”

“I’m sorry,” Jen mumbles.

Maria waits for a few seconds before asking again about their grandmother, and Jen sighs.

“She was told a year ago she had cancer, having the summer out to live…”

“Why didn’t anyone tell her?” Maria interrupts. “The whole summer? Not even her grandmother said a thing – Hannah was writing e-mails to her.”

“I know…”

“You know what?”

“Mom took over everything when grandma passed away…” Jen mumbles, looking further down on her hands. “She checked her e-mail too and … has read those from Hannah too…”

“You-” Maria scoffs, gaping at her. “You’re saying the whole family has known about Hannah’s worry but still decided to let her think her grandmother is alive? What the heck is wrong with you?!”

“It’s not like that! Do you have any idea of what Hannah wrote? She seemed happy! Mom noticed it too. Hannah kept writing about … your concert, how great it was and explaining things, about … so many things.”

“Yeah, because her grandmother used to like hearing those things while everyone else in her family just told her to drop it and come back here,” Maria rolls her eyes. “Your sister is desperate to surround herself in sorrow because while million of people are loving her there is always thousand of people hating her, and she struggles with the life we have chosen because she is constantly reminded that her family hates her and thinks she is disgracing the family while the rest of us admires her strength and mind. You have absolutely no idea of who your sister is.”

“I know more than you think.”

“Do you really?” Maria doubts it. “Do you know that your sister tears up just by the mention of family? Or that she broke up with the boyfriend who she loves because she think she does not deserve being in love? Or maybe that she has never looked as happy as she does when we are having a concert? She might be your sister, Jen, but she has so many people depending on her that she spends hours and days practicing in hope to live up to the name we have created. She is still that insecure girl as she was in the past, but she has grown far beyond your imagination. What you, your whole family, have done to her is something no person should have to go through. She wants a family, Jen, but she has learned from you that she does not deserve one.”

“I know my sister, Maria, I do not need to be lectured about her,” Jen sighs, rubbing her forehead, troubled hearing all these things. “I didn’t know she was coming home. She should have called or something.”

“Yeah… I think she gave up on that when your mother cursed her over the phone last year,” Maria mutters with small eyes.

“Look, Maria, I am sorry, okay? Last year was a mess. I can’t make up to that. You shouldn’t think that I don’t care – she is my sister – but it is hard to keep in contact with a sister who is across the globe from us. It’s impossible.”

“Don’t talk crap, if you just tried it would work just fine – you have four families’ examples living under the same roof as your sister,” Maria looks angry at her.

“It’s not that easy.”

“Life has never been easy.”

“Then what do you want from me?” Jen eventually asks, lifting up her hands to give up.

“I would want my best friend to be happy,” Maria answers, tearing up answering that question. “I want your sister to know that she is allowed to love and be loved, and that it is not her fault that her grandmother is dead. It is your fault for not telling her, and I want you to be the one explaining how her grandmother passed away.”

“She is happy. She is living her life in Korea, being in love and all-”

“Your sister is depressed!” Maria almost shouts at her, hitting the table. “You don’t get it, Jen! Hannah is in so much pain because the only person she was able to talk to is dead since months ago and she didn’t know it – can you even guess how hurt she is to find out about that? No matter how much we tell her or throw love at her, she does not feel loved because what really matters to her is to know her family does not hate her.”

“She knows I don’t hate her…”

“How can she know that when you don’t even tell her when her grandmother passed away?”

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Headline 26th: Fans Spot 5 Pieces’ Maria Back In Sweden Meeting Her Cousins

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X. devonalias - OMG am I not a bad person or what? Sorry for not updating in FOREVER, can come up with some bad excuses but truth is that I at updating though I write every single day. Would want to promise that I will do better but I never know about myself... And sorry for the depressing chapters but I had to get that out of my system ^^, And a great THANK YOU to SuperShannon asking for an update ;)