Chapter 5. Brother Unknown

Night and day Desi had been holed up in her room, rubbing her bruised nose.

“I’m NEVER going outside again,” She wailed, hiding her face under her covers as if hiding would erase the memory of everyone’s laughing or horrified faces

At that time Taemin had looked unfazed; Desi couldn’t tell what was going on in his mind. To make matters worse, Aunt EunAh had found out that she had left. And how did she do this? Well the townsfolk were, apparently, talking about the odd-looking redheaded girl who made an appearance at the art festival.

As she sobbed she wondered to herself if there really was a family for her out there.

Little did the sensitive Desi know that only a few miles south from that very church was her mother and father.

 “Jinwoon, it’s time for dinner!” A boy’s mother’s voice had broken through his headphone’s blaring sounds. Jumping to life, the 16-year-old had taken off his headphones already.

“Be right there!” He called and set his precious headphones down on his desk next to his laptop. His stomach was calling out in hunger and in his hurry he had turned around too fast, only to hit the doorway.

“Aish,” Jinwoon rubbed his head lightly. The vibrations from his head hitting the doorway had traveled through the wall, knocking down a lot of things off his shelves. One thing, among many, had caught his eye as it fell; a box that he didn’t even remember having in the first place.

He made his way over to the scattered papers and things that were sprawled on the ground disorderly, and put them back in their places. Everything except that box.

Jinwoon glanced down at it and moved to open the lid when his little sister—well not so little; more like 14—had burst through his door.

“Hey, didn’t you hear Umma, or were you listening to your precious headphones again?” She mocked scathingly.

“EunMi, get out!” He roared, pointing at the door. She stuck her tongue out at him and left. Again Jinwoon had turned to the box, wanting more than ever to open it. So he did.

Its contents were not what Jinwoon was expecting. He expected old family pictures, little ribbons from primary school. Not pictures of an ugly baby and a birth certificate.

At first he didn’t think the baby was human; someone could have easily photo-shopped that crazy birthmark and weird eyes onto it. But what he really didn’t understand was why his mother was on the bed holding the baby in the blanket.

His mother looked so young in the picture, younger than the pictures from his birth. Could he possibly have another sibling? That’s impossible, they’d be living with them, wouldn’t they?

“Jinwoon, dinner’s getting cold!” His mother’s voice startled him so much that he stumbled backwards and hit his head on his bed.

“Aish,” He cursed again, rubbing the back of his head this time.

“Get down here, you idiot; I’m hungry!” EunMi called, followed by a loud scolding by his mother telling her to be nice to her brother because he’s the only one she has. But that made Jinwoon think…is she lying?

“A-ah… coming!” He called and put everything back in the box and stuffed the box under his bed before running down the stairs to eat.

“Took you long enough,” EunMi glared, and Jinwoon rolled his eyes. His parents prayed, saying thanks and blessing the meal. They finished saying thanks and began eating, murmuring about the meal occasionally.

“So, Umma, Appa… I found a box in my room,” Jinwoon said, swallowing his last bite of food. His mother and father stopped eating and looked at each other. His mother looked almost sympathetic—sad in a way, while his father looked absolutely horrified.

“Well, I’m sure it has nothing of importance in it,” His father said, dismissing the topic.

“But, that’s just the thing. It has-,”

“IT IS NOT IMPORTANT AND THAT IS FINAL,” His father breathed heavily and bit his lip, “I…it’s…nothing,”

“A-appa?” EunMi gaped at the man, who was known never to raise his voice at all.

“I…please, excuse me,” he put his napkin on the table and walked out of the room.

“Um, I’ll be right back too,” Their mother said, her voice quivering slightly as she got up and left the  room.

“you see what you do; you made them cry!” EunMi hit Jinwoon with her napkin and stormed back up the stairs.

With a heavy sigh, Jinwoon grabbed the plates and put them in the sink. He was about to go upstairs but, before he could reach the steps he heard his mother’s quiet consolation.

“….it’s okay. I know you meant well that night….you didn’t do it…shh,” She comforted his father and Jinwoon couldn’t help but wander in the room and stand in the doorway.

“You have another sister…” His dad whispered so quiet Jinwoon’s ears nearly strained just trying to hear him. But he heard him loud and clear.

“I…what?” He asked, not believing his ears.

“You have another sister….that box…is all that we as a family have of her. We…we thought that getting rid of her memory….would…would,” His dad was now crying and his mother patted his back.

“Don’t listen to your father, Jinwoon; he’s having a break down. Go on upstairs and prepare for bed,”

Jinwoon nodded hazily and turned to go back upstairs.

I already have a sister….i don’t need another one….but I still can’t help but think of what she’s like. Does she like music like me, or is she into fashion and boys like EunMi?

With thoughts racing around like race horses, Jinwoon couldn’t quite fall asleep just yet. He got up and grabbed the box from under his bed. He tore off the lid and grabbed the birth certificate.

Park Seong Jin

Born on August 18^th1993

She was born a month and 2 years before me…September 18^th1995 so if she’s still around she must be 18 by now…

He looked down to the hospital and nodded slightly.

Same hospital as my sister and I…she may still be in the area….

A rapping at his window made Jinwoon get up and look out. Upon seeing his friends he smiled and opened the window leading to a tall tree that was amazing for climbing. He quickly stuffed the picture he was looking at in his pocket as he shimmied down the tree and met his friends at the bottom.

“Hey, what’s that about, I was going to go to bed” He teased and one of the guys hit him.

“Yah, don’t give me that! I know you stay up later than this every night dongsaeng,”

“Oh be quiet Key-hyung, anyway, what’s new with you five?” Jinwoon plopped himself down on the sandy grass outside his house, listening to the waves from the beach only a few block down.

“We were at the art festival yesterday, as we normally are every year, and this time we actually met the girl in the window,”

“Oh you mean that girl that you guys keep telling me about? What’s she like? Is she pretty?”

“Aw, hell no, man! She’s got this giant birthmark that she tried to cover with makeup giving it a pink-ish tint,” Jonghyun said, slightly repulsed. Something about that sentence made Jinwoon’s eyes open wide.

“Oh and her eyes are two different colors, like one’s hazel and the other is a brown,” Key said, leaning in for effect.

Jinwoon placed his hand in his pocket and rubbed the picture of the baby that he had stuffed in there at last minute. Could the girl they met, possibly be his ‘sister’?

“Oh and get this,” Jonghyun leaned in too, “Her hair is bright red, like it’s um…you know that one cartoon movie about the ugly guy in France?” He asked and Jinwoon nodded.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame

“Well her hair is about the same color!” Jonghyun laughed, and Jinwoon’s stomach nearly hit the floor. Everything they had described was just like the baby in the picture.

“You all are being so cruel,” Minho piped up, “She was a sweet girl, very kind.”

Jinwoon nodded; well at least his possible sister is a nice one.

Taemin nodded in agreement, “The poor girl, you all are talking about her like she’s not even human! She has feelings too you know.”

Key rolled his eyes and turned back to Jinwoon, “Oh and it gets better; while we were at the art festival, the annual dance had started and we all danced with her,” Key started snorting with laughter so hard that Jonghyun had to take over telling the story.

“Yeah, so she was tired and sat down. Key and I decided that we should cool her off so we got a bucket of ice water that we kept our water bottles in and poured it all over her!” Jonghyun howled with laughter and slapped his knee. By this time Minho had started laughing along too.

Jinwoon gave a pretty convincing laugh but was feeling sort of defensive. The poor girl did not deserve to be treated like that. Sister or not; nobody deserved to have ice water poured on them for someone else’s enjoyment.

“Oh yeah, it gets better,” Minho smirked, holding back a laugh, “and when she was trying to get away because her makeup washed off or something, she tripped and fell!”

“Oh I forgot about that part!” Key held his sides as he rocked back and forth.

“Minho, I thought you were on my side!” Taemin pouted, “It’s not fair to her; her nose was bleeding! It was terrible; she was limping back to her house!”

Onew, the eldest of the group got up and hit Key and Jonghyun in their heads and folded his arms across his chest.

“That was you two? Why if I had known in the first place I would have had you pick up all those pieces of ice with your bare hands and help that poor girl home! You two should be ashamed of yourselves,” He fumed.

Right on, hyung!

“Poor girl,” Onew looked saddened,  “She looked so alone and awkward at the art festival. If you first looked at her, you would’ve thought she had never been outside before!” He sighed as he leant against the tree.

Key snorted again, “I could see why someone wouldn’t let her out of the house looking like that.”

Jonghyun let out another round of belly laughter before Jinwoon stood up, completely angered by this situation.

“Hey, what’s wrong dongsaeng?” Taemin looked up at Jinwoon.

“Oh nothing, I’m just tired…do you think you guys can come back tomorrow? We can go into town and look at the shops,” He offered, calming himself down.

“Yeah, see you tomorrow,” Onew said, brushing himself down of sand.

As Jinwoon shimmied back up the tree his thoughts kept running back to the girl; she must have felt terrible because of them!  He pinched the bridge of his nose and lay on his bed, quickly falling into a dreamless sleep.