Jongin simply stared at her. Rousing all the guilt Dami still felt. When Jongin left he didn’t call home for half a year. The house was an empty shell without her other sibling. Continuously locking herself in her room when her father brought his woman home to introduce her. There was no one to vent to, no one to understand the situation. Who else would understand how outed and alone you felt but family?

But she’d had no one. Her brother had left, abandoning all that was.

Jongin had simply given up and ran away. He didn’t even respond to her emails. A year into college, Dami finally understood what he had felt when she fell in love for the first time. Always feeling sorry that he never had a chance at his first love.

And he was still carrying the pain from the wreckage. 

“I know what you’re thinking, but it’s not the same anymore,” Dami realistically pointed out. “You have a girlfriend, don’t you?”

“I don’t need you to tell me.” Jongin’s eyes hovered away.

She wouldn’t hold it against him. He could hold everything against her and she wouldn’t blame him. Aware he probably still held the memory grudgingly in his heart; that night when she held him back from going after Namjoo and her mother. Or maybe he realized by now that it had been she who had snitched on him and Namjoo. If she hadn’t said anything her father wouldn’t have known.

Would it have been any different? Would Namjoo and her mother have left regardless?

“Namjoo,” Dami observed his still too full tray then to him aware she could be cutting him, “said she doesn’t want to see you.”

Her brother’s sharp jaw sharpened as he bit down on his teeth. For a moment life burst around them in hues of tans and deep bronze. The hospital light glowed a distance away. Then life picked up and filled with color again when Jongin stuffed himself more hungrily.

“I suppose she should feel that way.” Jongin emotionlessly agreed. “I left out of the blue. I left dad. I left you. I didn’t even visit mom once. I dropped everything and just flew away.”

And Jongin was angry, too, about the way dad had minimalized him powerlessly. Maybe still wanted to. The old man still wanted him at home.

“Nothing’s the same, Jongin.”

“Of course. We weren’t that great of a family.” Jongin spitefully blasted.

Dami stared at him injured. He still hadn’t really forgotten everything. Returning home was like reopening all his wounds. The things he’d boxed away. Far from home he could forget, move and enjoy life with ease. But here…Jongin had to face his early adult years again. His late teens.

The time when dad remarried and brought Namjoo into their lives.

She the denominator in Jongin’s life.

Changing the course of conversation, Dami asked, “When is Sohee coming?”

⸛⸛⸛⸛⸛

“Lunch?” Namjoo had repeated into the phone that morning as she slipped into her heels by the front door.

“That’s what I said,” Jonghun repeated. “I got someone to cover for me, so I can extend my half hour. Can you manage, too?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Namjoo replied shuffling her handbag from one arm to the other in order to get a hold of her keys.

“You have to. No matter what.” Jonghun pleaded. She caught excitement in his tone.

“What’s going on?” Namjoo asked humored, wondering if he was planning some kind of silly surprise for her.

“Fine,” Jonghun gave up. “So, last night Jongin stayed with me.”

Grasping onto the doorknob to open the door Namjoo, instead, paused as if her brain somehow stopped functioning.

“He did?” she managed after a few seconds of quiet.

“He agreed to meet up for lunch.”

The keys dropped from her hand. Namjoo bent down to pick them up.

“He’s bringing a woman, so we’re having a double date. Isn’t it finally time this happens?!” Jonghun’s voice went hyenic on the other side. The man so overjoyed his friend was home and was about to be introduced to a woman his friend was linked to.

The handbag landed next to her keys still needing to be picked up.

“Do you think this is why he probably didn’t want to come home after he graduated?” Jonghun curiously asked. “I should’ve known it all came down to a woman.” He cracked up happily, “Jongin is so obvious.”

Crouching down Namjoo’s gaze disappeared into the brown, black, and red swirls in her carpet. So…it was all about a woman.

“Honey?” Jonghun called out snapping her to attention.

Combing a hand up into her hair, Namjoo caught herself. “Yes?”

“Lunch. Remember. I’ll come pick you up. Remember to get someone to fill in for you.” Jonghun kissed her goodbye before hanging up, leaving her with a long hanging silence.

Maybe that was all it was about. She and Jongin growing up separately. Finding the ones of their lives. Making do and settling down. Like this and like that.

Their lives interwoven one moment and unweaving the next. A long string of their connection never meant to be tied. Like their families meeting was just a mistake.

That was all it was. She had to stop dwelling. She was no longer a teenager. She was no longer a helpless girl. She had come this far, making something out of herself, for herself. To prove she could be bigger, she was worthier.

Namjoo was going to get engaged and she was going to live a long good life with a man who loved her and cherished her like she should be cherished. Life was going to be fruitful with him.

Jonghun would make it so.

She would make it so.

Namjoo eyed the