"Lee Jinkyung, wake up." 

"WAKE UP!"

My eyes bolt open in surprise, and with a bit of suspicion. He usually builds his voice until he screams into my face. But today, he just went straight for the yell. 

Or was I just really sleepy and not catch all the other times he called me? 

The new day starts with another round of nagging. 

Wearing his motherly apron, my brother begins to pick up the clothes from my floor and begins to hang them. 

"Aish Jinkyung, how many times do I have to tell you to pick up your clothes and keep your room clean? Just every single day you ..."

His words drift into one ear and slides out of the other. I've also told him I'm not the type of person to just continuously keep my room clean. I need it to be so dirty to a point, and wait for a wake up call that will really motivate me to actually clean. I do clean, I'm not a messy person. But as usual, my morning starts off being annoyed at my brother cleaning my room for me. 

"Lee Jooheon, I said I will clean it, you don't need --"

"What did you just call your older brother?" he snaps back

"....Oppa. I can clean on my own." 

But by the time our morning routine of nagging at each other has ended, my room was sparkling clean once again and he leaves my room by saying the same words,

"Hurry up and get dressed, breakfast is ready." 

Now, I know typical older brothers don't wake their younger sisters up. Even if they do, they surely do not make breakfast for their family every single morning. I guess the toll is a little smaller on Jooheon, since we are each other's only family. My parents passed away five years ago when I was just in my 5th year of elementary school, which would make my brother in his first year of middle school. They were visiting my grandma in America, and just when they happen to come back home, they both took the last straw and their bodies were found floating on the middle of the ocean just a radius away from where the plane crash happened. We were notified to move in with another member of our family or go to a kid's foster care center. My brother and I decided to go with the first option, but living with my dad's sister's family for one year was hell, and living with them was no different from the horrors that happened in a child's foster care. 

I'm thankful for my brother, because he was a fighter. He always had a passion to do what he really cares about, and protect the ones he loves. He made a deal with my aunt and uncle, that they would give us a separate place to live in if we promised to pay back more than our own rent. But of course, by "we" Jooheon really meant by himself. I don't know what he's been up to or what job he actually took, but ever since I started my second year in middle school, our morning routine of nagging at each other had officially began. 

And here we are today.  

Walking into the kitchen dressed and ready for school I come acorss my brother's eyes glued onto the TV. Another unusal sight that does not happen every morning. 

"Student from Pledis High School found dead from committing suicide by jumping off the rooftop ... "

My eyes widen and drift to the patch attached onto my brother's and my uniform

PLEDIS HIGH SCHOOL

"Oppa, that guy went to our school?" 

My brother jumps at my voice, he must have not even noticed me walking in. Immediately he turns off the TV and heads towards the table that has a various amount of food flooding it. Things like this: our TV, and our phones makes me truly wonder what my brother is exactly doing to get all of this for the two of us on his own. It worries me, but also at the same time leads me to think our aunt and uncle wouldn't be that evil to make us pay for our own living expenses.

I shrug off this thought once again. 

As we begin to eat, our morning routine continues to happen as two obnoxious boys decide to barge into our door as usual. 

"Hi hyung! Hi Jinkyung!" 

"Hello hyung, hey jinkyung," 

Kihyun with his normal bright smile, Minhyuk with his quiet but kind personality. They take a seat next to us and begin to eat. 

"Hey! What did I tell you guys about eating here?" 

"Oh, sorry," they both whisper under their breaths. They speak before even swallowing what they already stuffed in their mouths, "Thank you for this meal." 

"That's right," Jooheon goes on, "You don't know how hard I work for my three younger siblings to have a morning meal every single day." 

He doesn't really have three younger siblings, just me. But Kihyun and Minhyuk come over so often and spend so much time with us they are technically family to us. Both of their parents work in the morning, so they just slide on over to our apartment for breakfast. 

"But hyung, I do know how much you work. I have the same job as you," Kihyun dares to challenge Jooheon. He raises his arm and stops it before actually hitting Kihyun,"Just be grateful and eat your food." 

The meal continues on, just like any other morning. There was silence, there was talking, and there was laughing. 

"Hyung, today's a big day. Aren't you nervous?" Minhyuk asks.

Jooheon tilts his head, "Huh? What are you talking about?" 

"The results of your test! The day you get accepted into a college, the beginning of a new chapter in your life!"

Oh yea, I totally forgot about that. 

My brothers speaks my exact thoughts. 

"Eh, I don't really care."

The three young ones jolt our eyes onto him.

"What do you mean? You don't feel ANY emotions about your results?" 

"Yea, I mean -- I'm happy with where I am right now." 

Everyone does the thing where we nod it off, but we all know we don't understand his attitude. He spent long, hard years managing his time even if it meant staying up to finish his homework and to study. He worked his off living without any guardian or adult, how can he not want to go to college? 

The last bell of the day rings indicating that school is finally over; and the three of us make sure to dash over to my brother's third-year classroom to see his results. 

"So? What did you get into?" 

He shrugs it off, "Doesn't matter, I'm not going to college." 

The three of us shrink into silence thinking he didn't make it into a good, well-known college, or maybe he didn't get into any college at all. But I know, and I believe that's not the case. I know my brother is super hard working, super smart, and can get anything when he gives it a chance. So I snatch the piece of paper in his hands. 

"Jinkyung, give it back!" 

I refuse, and make sure to dash 500 ft. away from him so he can't stop me. Nervous, I slowly open the folded piece of paper as if it were my own results. 

SEOUL UNIVERSITY

My eyes widen. Seoul University? Like, THE Seoul University? Like, the number one university in Korea? I can't take my eyes off the paper. I blink several of times to make sure I wasn't seeing anything weird. But it was real -- my smart, hard-working brother got into the number one prestigeous university in South Korea.  

"Lee Jinkyung." 

My eyes drift to my brother, "Why aren't you going to college?" 

He can't maintain eye contact with me and stares off into a corner of nothing, "I said I don't want to," he mumbles. 

Lies. Pure lies. 

"You can learn so much, become so much more successful, earn so much more money--" 

"I don't want to go to college!" He shouts. It startled me because the only time he raises his voice at me is when I don't come home by eight at night; he yells at me when I don't clean the dishes; he yelled at the guy who stalked me; he yelled at me saying I deserve so much more in life;

he yells at me in the morning to wake me up and nag at me.

He never yells at me for something unnecessary like this. 

"Oppa, --" 

"Lee Jinkyung," he clams down as he takes a breath, lowering his voice, "I'm not going to go to college, you go." 

It hits me. 

you go.

"College tuition is a thing and we'll only have money to send one of us to college, so I should go?" 

My brother can't answer me. 

"Oppa, do you want to go to college?" 

"No" he answers in a quiet voice.

"Lee Jooheon! Do you really want to go to college or not? Because I'd MUCH rather have YOU go instead of me!" 

"I'm your older brother, I've been making the money, so I'm making the decisions. You're going to college, and I'm just going to continue making money. If I go to college, how are we going to survive? How are YOU going to survive? I'm going to be living in the dorms, and I can't leave my little sister by herself. Are you going to start making money? Because I can guarentee you that you damn cannot make a CENT by yourself." 

It hits me. A gust of guilt, of anger, of sadness -- all at once just hits me as tears stream down my face. Yes, I am emotional and sensitive --mostly because I've been taken care of and nutured all my life without having to worry about what to eat for the next meal. I want the best for my brother, and I really believe I can make it on my own. But the spoiled little younger sister in me doesn't want my brother gone either, and it makes me mad. I want my brother to live his life, to experience a whole new world, to create his own universe, but I know deep down inside I will die myself if I let my brother go.

He walks up to embrace me. This makes me mad, too. Why did I end up with such a smart, hard-working, and caring brother? Why can't he just be selfish for once and leave me? 

"I'm sorry, Jinkyung. I know you just want the best for me. But in all honesty, I'm really happy where I am right now. I don't want to loose the job just because of a stupid school I got accepted into. I know you're more than capable of living on your own, but you're my only family. I just want to stay with you for a little longer... before you go off to college."

"You have a nasty sister-complex," I muffle into his shoulder. 

He laughs and hugs me tighter, "I love you, Lee Jinkyung." 

AUTHOR'S NOTE: 

WOW! Feels so weird writing again... it also feels weird putting Minhyuk as one of the younger ones, AND it feels so weird how serious this story is because I know how meme Monsta X is....  But BTW, the beginning chapters are gonna kinda go by quick since these are just a bit of preludes before it actually starts getting juicy, muahahaha. Well hope you guys liked that, feel free to comment anything, whether you hated it or loved it, I'm open to any comments! And have a wonderful day, see you at the next chapter :-)

MUCHO gracias to LittleSnowFlake for being the FIRST upvote! I am soso blessed <3 SARANGHAEYO