The first thing that came into your mind when your eyes snapped open was;

“Jongdae?”

You wait for his answer.

“Yes, agasshi,” It came, muffled from outside the door.

You don’t know what to feel, since he was so vague yesterday but either way, you smile, somehow glad that you’re going to see him again today. 

Immediately after getting dressed, you open the door of your bedroom and swiftly close it.  “Jongdae?”

“Here,” You feel his oh-so familiar hand take yours, guiding it as you hooked yourself onto the crook of his arm.

“Where.  Have.  You.  Been,” You say, gritting your teeth and slightly pinching him as you emphasize every word.

“Ow,” He simply says, stopping you from going further.  “Sorry, agasshi,” Chen laughs, guiding you into the car and taking the driver seat, driving off towards school.

“It’s fine.  But next time, when you decide to ‘disappear’, tell me clearly,” You smile at him.  “You worried me.  And I kind of miss you,”

The two of you laugh and Chen says yes to your sentence, the topic dismissed just like that.

Just like yesterday, nothing, absolutely nothing happened at school.  The usual lessons, the friends, the partners, the interactions, the lunch time, etcetera.  Nothing out of place happened. 

“Jongdae, are you tired?” You ask him on the way to work.  You’ve been hearing him sigh repeatedly since the beginning of the day.

“Of course not, agasshi,” He answers.  You hear him chug down his drinking bottle, setting it back to its place stuck at the door after he was done. 

“Okay, I guess?” You mutter to yourself, frowning at his strange response.  He seems, detached.  Somehow.  And Chen doesn’t lie to you.  It’s a promise the two of you made since you knew each other. 

Work was just how it was supposed to be.  Greetings, small talk, snacks, stuff like that.  In the office, Eun had told you that there were several paperworks to get done with, and Chen got to work with it, while you made something up for the magazine’s approaching photoshoot.  Neither of you initiated any conversation, which is once again strange, because Chen always talks to you at times like these.

“Jongdae,” You start, finally.

“Agasshi, has Eun-ssi told you about which ones should be signed?”

“O-Oh, the papers? Yes, I think,” You nod.  “The one for the design section and the one for the photographers.  Oh, and the one for the models,”

“Design, photographers and models,” Chen repeats.  You feel a stack of paper beneath your fingers and Chen takes your hand, slipping a pen into it. 

He guides you through the signing like he always does and goes out to take the papers to Eun, for her to hand over to Choi-sajangnim.

Just when he came back, the alarm rang. 

“Time to go,” He says, taking your bag for you and helping you out the building.  “Do you want to visit your sister?”

“What?”

“It’s been a few days since you’ve seen her, why not?”

You feel the car lurch forward.  Any attempt for you to ask Chen about anything is quickly cut off, or answered very shortly so that the conversation isn’t even worth continuing.

“Oh, hi!” You hear Baekhyun say as you arrive at the doorstep of your sister’s apartment.  “What brings you here?”

“Just a visit, Baekhyun-ssi,” Chen answers instead, passing your hand for Baekhyun to hold.  “Please excuse me, agasshi,”

“Jongda—“ You begin, but was immediately cut off as the door closed itself in front of your face.  You stomp your feet in frustration and feel the door for its handle, but you feel someone else’s hand on top of yours.

“Don’t,”

“Rin-unnie,” You recognize. 

“Last night, it was raining right?”

Now that you remember, yes.  It was raining quite a lot.  You didn’t really pay attention to the weather yesterday because you were distracted enough.

“What does that have to do with this?”

No one came to answer you. 

“Well?” You push.  “Unnie, Baekhyun,” Your hand brush off Baekhyun’s.  “You’re hiding something from me, aren’t you?”

“What if they are?”

Kris makes his way into the room.  “What if we are?”

“Wha—“ You step back.  “What if you are? Isn’t that just mean?”

“Don’t ask us back,”

“Well, isn’t it?”

“Hey!” Rin raises her voice.  “You’re being mad at us for keeping secrets? Then what have you been doing?”

“What are you sayi—“

“Aren’t you the one keeping secrets here?” Your sister grabs your shoulders. 

“Rin,”

 “No, Kris,” She firmly brushes him aside, keeping her grip on you.  “Sure, yeah, you can do the things you love to, but heck, keeping it a secret? That’s funny, little sis.  I guess the only person I can trust is myself, after all,”

“Noona!” You hear Baekhyun yell and Kris loudly grunts in disapproval.

They know.

They found out.

You don’t care how, you don’t care who told them, they know.

You, even though you can’t see their faces, you just lower your head.  You keep it lowered, not wanting to face them even though you can’t literally see them.  The atmosphere is heavy.  Too heavy.  

“Well?” Now it’s Rin’s turn to push you.  What they’re hiding from you doesn’t matter anymore.  What matters is now they found out.  That you’ve been lying to them.

“I—“

“Rin-ssi, please,”

Jongdae.

“Chen,” You hear Rin address him. 

“No, Rin-ssi.  Agasshi has her reasons.  Please, just understand,” He wheezes.

Wait, wheeze?

You turn towards the direction of his voice and blindly felt about for him.  “Jong—“

“I’m sorry, agasshi,” You feel him take both of your hands in his, gripping it tightly.  “I told them.  I’m sorr—“

In a second, you feel Jongdae’s grip on you loosen as he steps away from you, a loud, muffled thump following his step.

“Kris, go,” You hear Rin say.

Your attempt to chase after Chen is completely in vain as you can’t see where you’re going.  Yeah, because you’re blind. 

“Unnie,” You felt around, and when you find your sister’s hands, you weakly take it and thank God as she did not pull away from you in disgust.  “Unnie, please, I’m sorry, I’m sorry I lied to you,” You beg.  “Baekhyun too, both of you.  I’m sorry.  I’m sorry.  I, I thought, if I had told you, or mother, or father, you would stop me, you would make me focus on my life as the Park family’s daughter.  I swear, I had planned to tell every one of you, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.  What if, I had told you, and you had strongly opposed to my work and forced me away from it? And even if you supported me in it, I didn’t want to be known as the Park family’s daughter.  I wanted to be normal, I wanted to know how hard it is to start from a scratch,” You shake your head.  Even now, your reasons seemed, well, unreasonable.  It doesn’t make any sense, now that you think about it.  It doesn’t cope up for your reason of lying to them.  You just lied.  To your family.  That’s all you can think of now.  “Doesn’t make any sense!” You tightly shut your eyes.  “I’m just sorry.  I’m just so, so, sorry, unnie,” You finish off, unable to say anything more.  You understand well, that the world you and your sister lives in is a world of lies.  Of facade, of roleplay.  A plotted dialogue, an event with plans prepared.  The two of you, knowing that you only have as much as each other, had unconsciously swore to each other that neither of you would lie to either.  So far, neither of you had truly broken that oath, but both of you had held back from the truth.  Which only differs by a hair’s breadth from lying. 

You hear Rin sigh, and you brace yourself for her words.

“Hey,” She unexpectedly says, gently and softly.  “Hey.  You know why I’m angry at you?”

“B-because I lied?” You quietly say.

“Well that, but it isn’t the only reason,”

You stay silent, waiting for her continuation.

“Because I was sad for not having your trust,” She clearly states.  “You could’ve at least given me a hint, and even if you did tell me, did you really think I would stop you or bribe the company to take you in and raise you up to the position you’re in now? Come on, lil’ sis,” Rin sighs.  “And, it’s also because I don’t want you, to be like me,”

Like her? “But unnie, you’re exactly what mother and father wants you to be.  You’re their precious diamond, why wouldn’t you want me to be like you?”

“That’s exactly why.  Because I’m what they want me to be, not what I want to be.  The thing I love, it was to be a cook.  A job in a dirty kitchen, following recipes and making ones of my own.  I didn’t tell mother and father about it, I kept it to myself, I did it for a couple of years until they found out, and I was forcefully pulled away.  I was forcefully separated from what I loved, because to them, it was a ’waste of time’.  What if something alike happens to you? Even though your job is ‘cleaner’ than mine was, but still, it’s a job.  A daughter of a prestigious family is not fit for a ‘job’ because we have what we need, that’s what we are taught.  To be of a higher class than people are.  Haughty, yes.  That’s why you paid no heed to it, right? Just like what I did.  Our life is haughty.  Our life is that of a princess’.  And you, no, we, hate it.  We hate being treated like this, we hate being displayed in front of others to see, to marvel, to criticize, to do whatever they want to.  We wish to be normal.  I failed, but I don’t want you to,”

By the end of her sentence, your tears were already flowing down your cheeks with nothing to halt them.  Rin, your sister.  She’s just like you.  The perfect woman standing in front of you right now, the woman you always looked up to, the woman you envied, she’s exactly what you are.  She was exactly what you are.  And now, she’s not just a woman.  She’s your sister.  

“I’m sorry,” You breathed out.  “I’m so, sorry,” You sob, letting her take you into her arms, soothingly carressing your head.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,”

For a long time, the two of you stayed like that, the unspoken feelings the two of you have coursing through the contact you’re experiencing.  Rin hadn’t told you the truth about Baekhyun, and you hadn’t told her about your job.  Sisters are sisters.  Even in bad things. 

But, backtracking through the memories of the past few days, you remember Chen’s absence yesterday.  You, too, remember his words just now, where he had confessed that he had told them.  He had apologized to you, and yet you’re supposed to thank him.  For breaking that wall of fear for the truth.  What happened to Chen?

“Unnie, Baekhyun,” You start again.  “What happened to Jongdae?”

“He,” Baekhyun clears his throat.  “Rin, help?”

“He, he’s in the hospital,”