The rain was falling in thick heavy drops and a slight mist was hanging in the air, as my mum's boyfriend Young Hwan pulled his Volkswagen off the highway and into the net of streets leading into the outskirts of Seoul.

"It's not far now," he said in a cheery voice.

I turned my head away from the window for a short moment to give him what I hoped qualified as a smile, but Young Hwan wasn't paying any attention to me. He and my mum were holding hands over the brake.

"Never mind then," I thought. "I'm just your invisible stowaway over here."

My mum worked as car-saleswoman and that's where she had met Young Hwan, when he had bought the sales spot she worked at. Both divorced single-parents they had soon become infatuated with one another. I had never voiced it, but secretly I couldn't help thinking that some of my mum's motivation for the relationship - which was speedily heading towards marriage - was the fact that with Young Hwan as her partner, the days of our financial worries were over. And I also couldn't help thinking that my mum's youthful looks - although she had just turned 40 - had worked their charm on Young Hwan, who seemed like the type for a trophy wife. Yet they were both making sure their relationship seemed loving and genuine. Their strategy -  at the end of the day - came down to a lot of PDA.

Put in other words - I couldn't wait to move out.

But first Young Hwan and my mum had to actually get married... And then he still had to agree to pay half of my university living expenses, which the scholarship programme didn't cover. Until then I was stuck with living in the same house as the two and would have to put up with Young Hwan's son, too. I hadn't met Park Chanyeol yet, but from his instagram I had no trouble deducing that we had absolutely nothing in common.

"Welcome to Hannan-dong," Young Hwan exclaimed and my mum let out a girly cheer that I hoped to never hear from her again.

"This is our part of town now," my mum said, turning around to speak to me. "Look at those houses, Jieun!"

"Nice," I said with little excitement, as we passed rows upon rows of tall white impersonal buildings, which reminded me of little fortresses rather than homes.

The Volkswagen soon came to a hold in the drive of one of the modern concrete carbuncles.

"Welcome to my humble home - or should I say our home," said Young Hwan, while we waited for the garage to open.

Humble was an odd word of choice to describe the inside of the Park residence: At first I wasn't sure whether it was furnished for human inhabitants at all, because all that greeted us in the entrance hall was a large ugly statue, that resembled a vaguely horse like figure. The entire hallway that connected entrance hall and living room had neither windows, carpets nor any sort of wall decoration.

As Young Hwan went to get our luggage from the car, even my mum voiced some dissatisfaction.

"Something needs to go on those walls," she said, as we slowly walked down the corridor with an eerily high ceiling, "I can't come home every day to looking at a dark hallway. Maybe we can put some of your drawings on the wall, what do you think? Or those paper cuts you've been making?"

"I don't think that matches any of the other decoration," I said as we entered the living room.

It was slightly more comfortable than the entrance of the house - it had a fire place, a large sofa, a huge TV screen and a carpet. The walls however were scarcely decorated, except for a huge expensive-looking abstract artwork, on which canvas red and black blots were seemingly fighting for dominance.

"My plants will need space though," said my mum, "Surely Young Hwan will tolerate a bit of green in here."

"For you, I sure will my darling," said Young Hwan, who had come down the hallway carrying our luggage.

He handed me my backpack and suitcase and gave my mum a kiss on the cheek, upon which the two jointly carried her luggage up the tall staircase that led to a 2nd floor, completely forgetting I was present.

Luckily I remembered my mum telling me something about my room being above the garage, so I took the first door to the right by myself, which I assumed led in the right direction.

The door opened a crack, then it hit something solid and someone exclaimed in pain and let out a curse.

I dropped my backpack and suitcase in panic and hurried through the door hoping desperately that I hadn't injured anyone seriously.

"Are you alright?" I asked the tall young man - presumably Park Chanyeol - who was standing in the small hallway behind the door holding his nose.

"It hurts," he answered through his mouth, "But I don't think it's broken."

"I'm so sorry," I said, bowing repeatedly, unsure if he even noticed since he had closed his eyes, "If you'll let me have a look, I can tell if there'll be bruising. And if... if you show me where the kitchen is I'll get you some ice or something."

Chanyeol slowly let go of his nose, while I stared, still slightly shocked by my involuntary physical attack on my new step-brother.

Chanyeol's nose was red with an almost blue patch, where presumably the door had hit it.

"How does it look?" he asked.

"Really really bad," I answered after some hesitation. "I'm so so sorry! I'm... I'm Kim Jieun. Ehm, Kim Gayun's daughter. Do you... want me to go get something or someone?"

I was getting really nervous. There was a mirror in the small hallway and Chanyeol was eyeing it, as though unsure whether he should take a look. Finally - without answering me - he moved towards it to inspect himself.

Once he came within sight of his own reflection he let out a shout and then another curse.

"I look like !" he exclaimed.

"I'm sorry," I apologized again, "I didn't realize there was someone behind the door. I didn't even push it open forcefully or anything. I don't know how..."

I had gone silent. Chanyeol's reflection was staring at me with such fury I felt a tremor going through my legs.

"I have an interview for university next week," Chanyeol said with a calm, but minacious voice.

"My god, I'm so so sorry!"

I was starting to sound like a broken record and now felt slightly scared. Would Young Hwan be angry? Would my mum? It had been an accident. Nonetheless I owed Chanyeol something more than an empty apology.

"Is there anything that I can do for you?" I asked.

Chanyeol hesitated, still with the back to me and facing his own reflection in the mirror. He didn't speak for several seconds, while unbelievably fixing his dyed red hair.

"There's something that could make us even," he said with a deep sigh, as though he was about to ask something momentous of me, one hand still sorting the red strands of his hair, "You could give me your room."

"My room?" I repeated perplexed.

"Yes! Technically it's my room. I live over the garage, but my dad decided you would have the room and I would move to the smaller one upstairs. Only I really like my room. In fact I'd like to keep it."

I stood there staring for a few second, before I caught myself. What was a room to me? In a few months I would hopefully be out of here anyway. And if that fixed the whole... bruised nose issue... why not?

"Okay, I guess."

"Excellent!" said Chanyeol, who now gleamed as though he had struck the bargain of a lifetime, "I'll say I injured my nose during basketball and you are entirely off the hook. I'll show you to your quarters then."

As it turned out the 'smaller' room upstairs was little more than cupboard size: There was a small bed and a big desk, which almost touched, crammed between the claustrophobically close walls.

"This was our dog's room," Chanyeol said.

"Oh, I'm sorry," I said.

"Why?"

"I thought... you meant.. it died."

"Nah, we got rid of it, when it got too big. Dad bought a smaller dog instead. We keep it in his office, so this room's been free for ages. Have fun settling in."

And he and his red hair disappeared leaving me slightly suspicious. He hadn't complained once about his nose after I had agreed to the bargain or went to get ice or anything like that... in fact now I wasn't sure, if that bruise had looked entirely real...

Accepting things as they were - as I usually did - I tried not to think about my unlucky first encounter with my step-brother too much and instead started unpacking.

The walls in my room were high, white and empty just like all the others in the Park residence and the lack of decoration almost gave it an asylum like atmosphere.

"First thing I'm gonna do is put some color on those walls," I told myself.

Even if I'd be only here for a few months, I could not stand looking at nothing every time I retired to my room.

Soon however I discovered that I had neither pins nor tape to put anything on the walls. I sat on my bed staring at the stuff I had taken with me from my old life and wondering whether I should go ask Chanyeol, if they had any adhesive tape or such around the house. Only I didn't feel like talking to anyone.

The one tall window in my room revealed that the rain outside had thinned, but continued to drizzle.

With a sigh I got up from the bed and grabbed my purse.

I didn't know my way around Hannan-dong yet, but I didn't care. Getting lost in an unknown city trying to buy some tape sounded like the best thing that could happen to me right now.

I left my phone at home on purpose, but on the way out took an umbrella that had the name 'Park Chanyeol' engraved into it in silver letters.

"Who the hell is vain enough to have their name engraved into their frigging umbrella?" I thought, as I opened the front door, stepped outside and opened the umbrella.

At first it felt very liberating to move further and further away from the large white brick that I was now supposed to call home, then it started to get cold.

It was early autumn and temperatures were unusually low. The coat I was wearing was insufficiently thick and I soon found myself walking faster to get warm. Unwilling to turn back I simply kept walking, until I was almost running down the pedestrian walk past the boring fancy residences.

I slowed down when I finally got to a larger street and could see houses of a different shape on the other side. I spotted a shopping centre and decided to head inside, since my legs were getting cold.

Warm air, the smell of coffee and a comfortable babble of voices greeted me, as I entered the coffee shop, that was part of the shopping complex. Being amongst strangers didn't feel so bad. Somehow being amongst unknown coffee-drinkers was less suffocating to me, than being in a large house with three other people. I was unsure what to do next, when the smell finally convinced me to stay and order my first Seoul cappuccino. So, I went into the line of people waiting to order.

Back in my hometown I wouldn't have had the patience to wait 15 minutes or more for a mere chain store cappuccino, but since I was in Seoul and finally somewhere where I knew not a soul, I felt it was worth the wait. I even found myself nodding my head along to an Indie song that was playing in the coffee shop.

After some time it was finally my turn to order.

"One caramel cappuccino, please," I said.

The barista looked irritated.

"Didn't you order our special lunch menu five minutes ago?" he said, pointing on a steamy tray on the counter.

"I'm pretty sure I would remember that," I replied, now equally irritated.

"Well, it's finished and warm and someone's paying for it. And I'm quite sure you ordered it," the barista insisted.

I wasn't sure whether this was some odd sales tactic, but the barista seemed quite convinced of what he was saying.

"I most certainly did not order anything five minutes ago. I was waiting in line five minutes ago!" I replied.

The barista was eyeing me with increasing suspicion, but noticing the impatient customers behind me quickly turned to his colleague, who took a look at me and shook her head.

"I don't remember what the girl looked like, but she wore a pink coat, not a blue one. Maybe you're mixing up customers," said the other barista and the one serving me turned his head back to me.

Unfortunately the words of his colleague had not convinced him - now he was really angry.

"Is this some kind of prank that you are pulling? Did you just change in the bathroom and now don't want to pay for what you ordered?"

I felt myself growing hot with anger. I had most certainly not ordered the stupid lunch menu - hell I was allergic to tomato soup. Was he pulling a prank on me?

Now taking a closer look at the barista I noticed that he was quite handsome, despite the distasteful expression he was giving me. He wasn't doing this to get my attention, was he?

My mum had always insisted that I had inherited her good looks, but I had never seen it that way. All through high school I had bitterly fought skin problems that had only started clearing up half a year ago - but had made sure that I had never had a suitor.

"I'm kidding myself," I thought, while I found myself staring at the barista's nametag that read 'Oh Sehun'.

"I don't care whether this is your prank or something you plotted with your sister or twin or whatever - just pay for the lunch menu and don't make other people wait," Oh Sehun said impatiently.

I turned around to get some support from the people behind me who should be able to testify that I had been waiting in line for the past 10 minutes, but the people who had been standing directly behind me had already moved past me into other lines and were gone.

"5000 won, now please," said Oh Sehun, leaning over the counter and gleaming at me angrily.

It was the second time I had found myself being shouted at and coerced by a handsome young man today for something that most probably wasn't my fault. I silently cursed myself for it, but I gave in and quietly paid for the lunch I didn't order.

"Hey, aren't you gonna eat that?" Oh Sehun called after me as I left.

"Never mind! You can have it," I called without looking back.

My cheeks were burning fiercely from having been in the center of such an embarrassing scene. I wanted to leave quickly, but found my way blocked by the masses of people that had flooded into the coffee shop to escape the weather outside, that had turned into something of a storm. I instead found myself being pushed into the direction of the restrooms and finally gave up and let myself be swept into the ladies' room.

To my surprise it was almost entirely empty: The exception was a young woman washing her hands in one of the sinks next to the stalls. For a moment I simply stared and admired how perfectly the pink of her coat matched the soft pink of the stalls. Then the woman raised her head to look at herself in the bathroom mirror and her reflection caught my eye.

I almost let out a scream.

The young woman looked exactly like me! She had my straight natural black hair, my slightly child-like face with the large brown eyes, my small - yet thick-lipped mouth... she even had the tiny mole that I had on my right cheek! Yet she also looked different: Her hair was longer than mine, reaching almost until her elbows. And she wore heavy, yet elegant make-up - unlike anything I had ever managed to put on my face. And the way she looked at herself was entirely different than from the reflection that I was used to having stare back at me: She looked at herself with satisfaction, with content ... with... confidence!?

It was the oddest thing to stare at someone who looked just like me and at the same time didn't. I was unable to move backwards or forwards. I felt that should I move the figure in front of me would turn to dust or... or turn out to be a different person entirely. So I remained where I stood, until the eyes in the face in the mirror spotted me.