2nd Track: Poisoned Letters

As Dara pulled out her books from underneath her table, a series of coloured letters fell out. Dara bent down to pick it up, but Chaelin, her best friend was faster. She picked up the letters and waved in the air before announcing, “Excuse me, can I trouble all students to stop helping those idiots send these love letters to our Dara, alright? Especially, this type of idiots who can mistake ‘Dream’ for ‘Destiny’.

This kind of ordinary, simple life was turned upside down by that very letter.

I reached underneath my desk to pull out my Korean Textbook, but imagine the surprise I felt when my hand brushed against a paper-like envelope, instead of the smooth covers of my files and textbooks.

(To: Lee Yumi)

I giggled quietly to myself before hurriedly tearing open the envelope and unfolded the letter but to my dismay;

(This is a chain letter from South America, Missionary De Crowne. Now that the good luck has been bestowed upon you, send out 5 copies to your friends and the good luck shall be yours, otherwise, horrible consequences will await you. In 1979, Mr Bo from China did not take this letter seriously and threw it up and died from a car accident the very next day. In 1990, Mrs Hathaway from France burnt this letter and her spouse suffered from an incurable disease.

… bankrupt… broken family…death…you have 3 days left, good luck!)

The person I want to send this chain letter the most would be my brother, Lee Jimin.

“Your brother advanced 3 places in this exams,” My mother boasted as we ate our dinner.

“He scored the lowest score in the entire school the previous time. Besides, he spent 8 years on a 3 years programme.” I retorted.

“How dare you talk back?! If only you could score half as good as our neighbour, Dara next door, how great that would be! You scored 30 out of 100, you even tried to alter it! With a different colour nonetheless! Your teacher used red, and you used pink?!” My father scolded.

“How stupid!” My mother nagged.

“My red pen ran out of ink…” I responded.

“Then, couldn’t you borrow one from your teacher?” My mother exclaimed.

“That’s right,” My brother agreed smugly as he accepted the two chicken drumsticks that my mother placed onto his rice bowl as my parents praised him for his actions.

Many of us probably had the same thought – “Am I really my parents’ child?

But, if this chain letter thing really worked, my brother’s family would be ruined and eventually will only drag me down. Therefore, I dismissed that idea.

`

And therefore, the first letter was sent to him.

‘Class 305’

“Lee Yumi,” My math teacher greeted.

“Question 09, If the marbles are placed in the order, red, blue and green, what would be the colour of ball 101? It’s fine if you don’t know the answer,” he sighed miserably.

“But, why did you draw these on the answer sheet?!” He shouted, as he flashed the answer sheet that I coloured in various shades of red, blue and green as my working for this question.

“Don’t you dare dodge!” He scolded as he brought the wooden ruler upon my opened palm.

In every school, there must be a psycho teacher like him, ‘Woo Pa Bon’. He is our mathematics teacher, as well as our biology teacher. We all called him ‘Woo Pabo (Stupid Woo)’

As I slipped the letter into his plastic folder, Minzy would distract him.

Before, he could bring the ruler down onto her palm, she flinched, yelled and turned away.

“I haven’t even hit you, why are you screaming? Come back here! How dare you