17 October 2015

Toiletries, checked.

Passport, checked.

Chinese Yuan, checked.

Movie script, checked.

Phone charger, ch- wait..

Jessica spent at least fifteen minutes going around the house looking for her phone charger. She gave up when she knocked her toes to the foot of her bed for the second time in that last fifteen minutes.

Knock knock.

“Soojung-ah, can I borrow your charger?” Jessica shouted through the door. It took quite some time accompanied by bumping and shuffling noises before Krystal opened the door.

“Do you have an extra? I’m leaving soon and I couldn’t find mine.” The older sister stepped into the younger one’s room, inspecting. “What were you doing when I knocked the door?” She arched her left eyebrow at her sister.

“Nothing.” Krystal said, throwing the charger to Jessica’s lap, who was now sitting on her bed.

“Oh.. my.. God..” Jessica said in an exaggerated dramatic tone. “Were you watching something naughty?”

“That’s my old phone charger so you can have it.” Krystal just recently changed her phone to the new iPhone 6S, meaning she had a new charger somewhere inside the box in the room. The problem was that she didn’t know where she put that box at, but she would deal with that later. “And to answer your question, no, I’m not.. watching or something.”

“Oh.. my.. God.. then, were you doing something naughty?” The dramatic tone still continues, but with a playful smirk this time.

“UNNIEEE!!” A pillow landed right on Jessica’s laughing face. Krystal was almost 21 years old so was nothing extraordinary for her. Although, that was usually something she discussed with her friends, not her sister. Because there was nothing more awkward than to talk about , or self-pleasuring with someone who had been with you since the day you were born. “I was just Skype-ing with Jinri. Now, if you’re done here, get out of my room!”

“Ya! Is that the way to talk to your sister?” Jessica fake-scolding her sister. She thanked her for the charger and left Krystal’s room to continue packing.

“Unnie!” Krystal called when Jessica was about to reach her bedroom. “When will you be back?”

“Next week.” Jessica answered, head peeking from the door frame.

“Next week when?”

“Probably after the week end? Why?”

“After the weekend means next next week.” Krystal stated grumpily, emphasizing on the double nexts and shut her bedroom door close leaving Jessica dumbfounded.

Realizing something wasn't right, Jessica made her way back to Krystal’s room. She gave the door two knocks before inviting herself into the room. Krystal was sitting on the floor beside her bed, sulking.

“What’s wrong?” The older sister asked softly, to which the younger sister just shook her head.

“I didn’t forget your birthday if that’s what you’re sulking about.” Jessica smiled, sitting herself down beside the almost 21 year-old woman.

“I’m not.” Krystal claimed, while not intending to even pretend that she was actually not sulking.

“I’m new there. I don’t want to be branded as a spoiled brat asking them to work their filming schedules to suit mine.” She explained, only to have Krystal muttered something under her breath as a reply. Jessica was going to China to film a Chinese romantic-comedy film, her first film ever as an actress in a foreign land. She was sure not going to act like a diva asking for the production to shift things to her liking.

Jessica sighed. “Jung Soojung. We’ll celebrate it after, okay? Where would you want to go?”

The younger Jung stayed silent.

“What should we eat? Hmm.. Italian? French? Your favourite prime quality super expensive beef?” Jessica suggested excitedly, trying to change her sister’s mood.

“No, thanks! If I wanna eat those things I can buy it myself.” Krystal said coldly.

“Ouch, that hurts, Soojung. Now that you’re a big superstar yourself it’s hard to bribe you, huh?” Another failed attempt as Krystal only rolled her eyes at her.

“You know what?” The older Jung snapped her fingers. “Let’s go to Kobe and have a feast! Just the two of us. Or Tokyo? Anywhere you want. Which dates are you free two weeks from now?” Jessica went on and on following her big ‘Aha!’ moment.

“You kidding right?” Krystal looked at her judgingly, disappointingly.

“What?” Jessica asked, clearly confused. “Oh, shoot! I didn’t forget about your comeback! In fact, I’m really looking forward to it. It just slipped my mind for a sec there.” She quickly covered her mistake, biting her lips nervously.

Krystal sighed and faced her sister. “I don’t need those things. I just need you to.. be here. You weren’t here last year and it was my coming-of-age birthday.”

Well, that successfully shut Jessica up.

“Last year you promised that this year we’ll celebrate together on the exact date. You said we’re going to make more time for each other, remember?”

-

The girls were sitting on a hotel room bed. They were filming for the last episode of ‘Jessica & Krystal’. Jessica had her eyes swollen because of the surprise Krystal prepared for her. A wall of memories; hundreds of photos the filming staff and they themselves took during the show, accompanied by Krystal’s sweet hand-written messages to her sister.

“A lot of thoughts passed through my head. How did you come up with all of this?” Jessica asked.

“I like writing letters. Writing helps you express some things you find hard to say.” Krystal explained. “I don’t know.. It’s just that I had lot on my mind these days.”

Jessica knew. It was a rough week for Krystal with all the troubles her group were going through during their unexpectedly short comeback meanwhile Jessica herself was busy touring in Japan with her own group.

“Sorry I couldn’t be there for you.” Jessica said sadly.

“I really needed to talk to you.” Krystal confessed between the sobs she suddenly could no longer control. “Seriously, no one.. no one would listen to me.”

“I’m sorry.” Jessica looked down apologetically. “I think it’s like.. saying that I’m busy is just an excuse. That’s how you neglect the ones closest to you. You should always do your best to those that are closest to you. That’s why I’m so sorry. I knew your texts meant that you wanted to talk. But, in reality we don’t have much time to talk face to face.”

“But that should stop. We’ll make time for each other and we’ll be more relaxed.” The older sister promised. She grabbed her sister’s head and laid it down on her lap, tapping on her back several times before resting her own head to her sister’s back. Feeling her sister’s warmth in her arms made her sob again. She sniffled repeatedly while apologizing again and again.

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry.”

-

Of course Jessica remembered. She had been trying her best since then; always making time to go for movie or dinner with Krystal, spent hours cooking and baking for her, brought their whole family to trips to New York and Maui, setting up Blanc & Eclare’s office in Seoul so she didn’t have to go to Hong Kong as often as before and even to the point of inviting