Song Rin was the last person I expected to see walking with two feet while sporting a very round, protruding belly while in her second year of college. She was wearing a loose sun dress but it wasn’t enough to really hide how pregnant she was as she stuck posters for the upcoming school festival on the walls of the hallway.

Being a top student with stellar grades and a position she held in the student body council as the sophomore’s representative, this just ruined everything she had worked hard for. Her mother was strict and couldn’t care less if she caught a cold as long as Rin topped her grade, but I dreaded to find out how she took this in. I was pretty sure that her mother already thought Rin’s life was over.

The day I got back to Seoul after three years, she was the first person that I saw and I probably thought the same as her mother did when the sight of her slightly pregnant belly greeted me. To say I was surprised was an understatement. Rin, though I wasn’t that close to her, went to the same middle school as I.

She wasn’t the kind of kid that the old folks would frown upon and say ‘you see that kid? One day I wouldn’t be surprised if she gets pregnant at seventeen.’ No. She never wore skimpy clothes nor flaunted her at boys at a regular basis and hasn’t had one bad gene in her that would make you think you’d see her in this kind of position.

But then I guess, humans were unpredictable and most of the time our actions and decisions were inexplicable just like our existence. Sometimes we’d question our purpose the same way we question why someone ended up becoming something we truly didn’t expect but the judgement should stop there.

I realised as soon as her other half, Kim Joonmyeon, joined her that the sight of Rin’s pregnant belly shouldn’t define the entire her. One mistake couldn’t make her an instant . What if it wasn’t really a mistake to her? What if they really wanted what they have now? What if all along she knew this was her purpose and she didn’t regret it?

Trying my best to think with a voice of reason, I took my time in watching the two of them. Rin was still sticking posters on the wall while tiptoeing. Joonmyeon was beside her, helping her do the job like a man should. Who said chivalry was dead? I couldn’t help but smirk at the thought. At least, she wasn’t paired up with a jerk, that I knew.

I moved along after some time, not wanting for them to find out how I was secretly prying on their private lives like a creep and making silent comments to myself that if said out loud would probably get me in trouble.

The crowd wasn’t thinning any time soon even though it was already the end of the day for some, just like me. Some of them were packing things from their lockers on their way home. Some just huddled on the side as always—whether in groups or in pairs while doing god knew what. I didn’t want to even think about it.

On the other hand, there was me who chose to be alone on her journey home. It wasn’t like this for me three years ago, but I guess people change. I used to have a group of friends just like everybody, but after moving to Jeju for three years I decided I was better off alone. I had myself isolated and didn’t make any friendly associations except for the occasional group projects where I had to interact and do something fruitful for my grades. Sometimes people I came to know—albeit not in a personal level—greeted me in the hallways but that was it.

I guess, by now I just exuded the aura that said ‘scurry off back to your momma’ that people knew better not to befriend me because nothing good would come out. I wouldn’t open up or contribute in the conversation, making me boring as . And I considered it better than making ties that were uncertain and didn’t last for too long.

I hated thinking about it but thinking of relationships sickened me. They repelled me. I didn’t want to be in it if it meant showing someone else that you care. Because caring meant you were making yourself vulnerable to the other by showing one of your weaknesses. I was tired being weak. Nor did I want to be left alone again. I’d been left alone by enough a number to know what it was like.

It was hell.

Especially when your father just had to leave you by means of an unexpected death, your mother had to leave you by giving you away willingly and your siblings leaving you by practically forgetting about you for three years and your grandmother—your only motherly figure for three years—reluctantly leaving you due to old age.

I wasn’t alone but I never felt so alone my whole life even if my mother, older brother and younger sister took me back in. I was welcomed home. But I was welcomed by estranged family members. Add the fact that I heard mom talking to my sister about her being forced to take me back in because I wouldn’t be able to take care of myself after her mother-in-law died.

It just snapped another string, another part of me—a very small part—that had hoped in them. That they truly wanted me back and I would be able to trust myself again in letting them in. But look how wrong I was.

Mom only took me in out of obligation.

My sister politely spoke to me because she had to.

My older brother? I doubt he was any different.

Then I saw him. From the distance I saw my brother, Jaehyun, in the crowd together with his group of friends. One of which consisted purely of jocks. I wasn’t sure how they got associated with each other, but at least they weren’t as cliché as coming from only the soccer team. Instead, from what I heard from Jaehyun, they did different things. Soccer. Dance. Basketball. Music. Architecture. Whatever. I didn’t really pay attention to what he was telling me since I knew I wasn’t going to let myself get acquainted with his friends or him any time soon.

It wasn’t like I hated him or them. It was just that I preferred the isolation and getting attention from those boys wasn’t going to sit right with my intention of going through college quietly until graduation.

So, as stealthily as possible—if I was as invisible to others as I told myself I was—I mixed in with the people in the hallways and hid behind bodies as I moved with large but careful steps.

However, three steps away to passing them, someone just had to speak up and point out my unsurprising existence.

“Oh—isn’t that your younger sister, Jae?” I winced at the call out. It was so loud that others around the area might have already found themselves looking for Jaehyun’s sister.

No one should know, I told him. We didn’t argue since I came back but I firmly told him to ignore me at school and don’t associate with me if he didn’t want people finding out that he was related to a nobody. That would just ruin his reputation and eventually people would start digging dirt about me and before I knew it who knew whether when they’d start badmouthing about me after.

I knew that at this point my face was already red from anger, thoughts of his betrayal swirling in my head, and for sure my brother’s eyes were already on me, a look of guilt prominent on his features. I didn’t have to turn around to know. I had warned him and he knew how serious I was with my warning. After this, he was going to get a dose of his own medicine.

About to flee from the scene to do some damage control, I heaved out a shaky breath and took a step around some bodies only to collide with something hard, solid. It was too sudden the collisio