Sunrise

When Seo Jiyoon’s eyes fluttered open, she knew something had gone terribly wrong.

Looking up, she saw just a white ceiling. She slowly turned her head, looking to her right. The walls were white, too. There was one window in the room, from which the sun was streaming.

Sitting in the chair next to her was her older brother, Eunkwang, his head lowered. His arms were crossed. She knew he was asleep.

Lifting herself up, she noticed the needles in her arm. She winced, but leaned over and shook her brother by the arm, forcing him to wake up. Eunkwang shot up, blinking as he tried to rid himself of the sleep. When his eyes landed on Jiyoon, he practically leapt forward, sweeping her into his arms in a hug.

“You idiot,” he muttered, nuzzling his face into her hair. He took in her scent, the one that he could’ve lost only hours before. “You scared the out of me, Jiyoon.”

She frowned. “I’m sorry I worried you… but I’m not sorry I did what I did,” muttered the younger girl.

Eunkwang pulled away. “You scared all of us… me, Soojung, mom and dad…”

A scoff escaped her lips before she could stop it. “Mom and dad don’t give a damn about me. So stop pretending like they care. I’m sorry I worried you and Soojung… but I’m not sorry about anything else.” Eunkwang’s hands found hers, squeezing them tightly.

“Baby girl, you just tried to kill yourself…”

Jiyoon’s eyes flashed.

“You think I’m crazy,” she said, accusation and hurt seeping into her voice.

He quickly shook his head, squeezing her hand again. “No, sweetie, I don’t. But I do think you need to talk to someone. What happened that made you do this?”

Yanking her hands from his, she fell back against her pillow. The white ceiling did nothing to comfort her, the blankness of the paint only blurring her thoughts.

Her own brother was asking what had happened to make her do what she did.

“Everything. Life happened.”

That was her response.

It was an overdose of a combination of several different medications, both over the counter and prescription, that had placed her in the hospital. She’d downed so many pills that she’d lost count.

“They had to pump your stomach. It was horrible. Life made you want to do that to yourself?”

“Yes.”

She hadn’t just suddenly made the decision to die. She’d decided that it was time to leave the cold of the world behind almost a year prior. It was a premeditated action that came with the territory of depression.

“Why didn’t you just talk to me?”

“You think I could? When have I ever told you anything, Eunkwang?”

Depression was not fully depression like many people thought. Jiyoon had never gone around wearing dark makeup and dark clothing. She smiled and laughed like a normal person, talked with her best friend, Jung Soojung, and she even joined several clubs.

But there were signs. Signs that people just seemed to ignore.

She quit clubs almost as fast as she joined them, citing “boredom” as her reason to quit and change clubs. She could rarely be seen at lunch. She was always tired, but she could never sleep at night. She enjoyed being alone whenever she was upset and hid her feelings behind the mask that was her smile.

“You used to tell me everything, all the time, Jiyoon.”

“Used to. I used to.”

With no one noticing, no one to help save her from the darkness sent by her own mind to swallow her whole, she sank deeper and deeper until there was nothing left for her.

She couldn’t see anything worth living for.

“Sweetie, if you’re not going to talk to me, I have to get you a therapist. You can’t keep thinking it’s okay to kill yourself.”

“I don’t need a therapist. Stop treating me like I’m crazy.”

“I’m not, Jiyoon.”

“Then try and see that I don’t need a therapist.”

Eunkwang frowned, placing his hands on her shoulders and looking her straight in the eye. “You tried to overdose on medication. You could have died. We got lucky this time. I don’t know if we’ll get lucky again,” he told her, almost more serious than she’d seen him in a while.

She narrowed her eyes. “You lived through high school, Eunkwang. You tell me just what I went through.”

His face fell.

“I… I…”

Jiyoon scoffed, irritation burning in the deepest part of her heart. “It doesn’t get better. You lied.”

It will get better. I promise.

Looking down at his hands, Eunkwang frowned. He didn’t even notice that his sister was feeling like that. He didn’t realize that she was so ready to die like she was. She hadn’t shown any signs, none that he could remember.

There was only one time, when she’d cried herself to sleep after their parents had fought again. He’d laid in bed with her until she fell asleep, watching over her and protecting her. She’d refused to let go of his shirt, her face buried into his chest as he covered her ears to make sure she didn’t hear the yelling from the lower floor.

He knew that their home situation wasn’t the best, but she’d always made it seem like her school situation was okay.

“I didn’t know, Jiyoon. I told you that you could come to me for anything, right?”