Chapter 10 

❝I wish to go back in time.❞

[3 days later; Krystal's Room]

Krystal

"Who does she thinks she is, waltzing into this house for the past 3 days, making dinner for us and as if she owns this place?!"

Punch. Punch. Punch.

"I mean first, I have to clear my Thanksgiving Break for her sorry fashion show."

Punch. Punch. Punch.

"Now she's wanting to spend Christmas with us at home?!"

Punch. Punch. Punch.

"I'm supposed to go to Hawaii for Christmas Break... HA-FREAKING-WAII."

Punch. Punch. Punch. Punch

"AARGH SHE IS RUINING MY LIFE!"

Punch. Punch. Punch. Punch. Twirl, kick. Kick.

I took deep breaths as I stood there, hands on my waist. I stared at the now torn and crumpled, taped picture of Lydia's face on my punching bag.

"If I may put in my opinion--" Luhan stated from the couch in my living room area, while watching TV.

"No, you may NOT put in an opinion." I punched the punching bag a few more times. "Your face will be next after I'm done with my punching bag..." I gave my red sack a few more punches with a few kicks, fuming out my anger. For the past 3 days, Luhan's insisted to crash in MY house, in MY room, sleeping on MY couch, which he magically turned into a bed; stationing MY living room as his own personal bedroom. I mean, he could make all his clothes, shoes, and cars appear out of nowhere with his magic. So, why didn't he create himself a luxury condo or something AWAY FROM ME. His reasoning?

Just in case I sleep talk and make a wish from my dreams.

On top of having to deal with Luhan living in my quarters, a certain lady has been trying to herself into my life as well. For the past few days since the dinner with her, she's been coming over to play 'mommy' with us. She'd be there in the morning, preparing breakfast for Jay and I and handing us our lunches 'made with love'. She'd be there when we came home from school, preparing dinner with the staff and asking us how school was. Then on top of that, she didn't leave until she saw us both off to sleep, checking on us promptly at midnight to make sure we were in bed with the lights off. She would even use that childish saying of "good night, sleep tight! Don't let the bed bugs bite."

"I don't see what's wrong with Lydia" Jay input his own thoughts as he fed Mickey a doggie treat before resuming to watch TV again. "I mean, she's definitely making more of an effort than all the other women that Appa brought home. He's been dating her longer. She's actually trying to get to know us like a mother--"

I turned to Jay, giving him a glare before I gave my hardest punch to the sack, ripping Lydia's face into useless pieces of paper. Jay's eyes widened as he immediately shut his mouth and said no more. Luhan merely looked between the two of us, and for once, he didn't use his smart- mouth to say anything. I took off my boxing gloves in a harsh way throwing them on the floor. Without another word, I turned around, heading towards my closet to close myself in from the tension that I had created out there.

With my back against the door, I slid down, wiping my sweat off with the towel around my shoulders. Jay HAD to mention the 'm' word huh? I stood up and walked towards the back corner of my closet, opening the lowest drawer there. Upon opening it, I took out my elementary decorated shoebox; sitting down, I lifted the lid and laid my eyes on the thing I was looking for.

A picture of Umma, Appa, and I.

"Omma..." I said as my fingers lingered over her in the picture. "You can never be replaced alright? I'll make sure of it..."

"Krystal, darling, are you wearing Omma's pearls??"

"Yes Omma! I want to be just like you when I'm older: pretty, rich and popular!" My 8 year old self said, smiling at her with my two missing front teeth.

Omma shook her head and chuckled. "My dear, when you're older you'll come to find that you don't need money or beauty or a status to be happy, alright?" She held my chubby face in her hands, puckering her lips to place a kiss on my forehead. "Trust me dear."

"So, if you don't have those things, you can still be happy?"

Omma nodded.

I closed my eyes and leaned my head back, holding the tears in the wells of my eyes. The last words she ever said to me were lies. In this life, beauty on the inside doesn't give you perks. In this life, you can't survive only on a few dollar bills. In this life, you couldn't get anywhere without people knowing your name.

"The new girl is SO weird."

"Look at what she's wearing."

"That is so last year..."

“She doesn’t even belong with us.”

“Look at her sitting all alone.”

My fingers grazed across the face of Omma in the picture. "I know you said that beauty, money and popularity won't gain you happiness, but that's all a lie." I placed the picture in the box, still staring at her face. "Look at me now Omma... Look at me now..." A teardrop fell onto the face of my 8 year old self. "I'm sorry Omma, but it’s too late to go back and change now." I placed the lid on top of the box, putting it back in its place. "I'll make up for my mistakes all right? I'll make sure that no one takes your place."

Luhan

Jay and I sat there in an awkward silence as the click of the closet door signaled she was out of the room. A deep exhale came out from the both of us. The tension between Krystal and her brother was high; if I could, I would have pulled out some scissors and cut the tension like a string.

"Sorry about that, Hyung..." Jay patted me on the back, giving me an awkward smile."Noona gets a little touchy when it comes to the 'm' word."

I shook my head and shrugged. "Oh, it's alright. As a genie, you kind of get used to these situations between humans. You know, with being invisible and all."

Jay nodded his head as he bent down to try and pet Mickey who was on the floor, still enjoying his treat. "I bet that power would come in handy when you're in awkward situations like this, when you say something wrong and just want to disappear right then and there." Jay chuckled, pointing at a certain closed door. "Example A."

I looked over at the closed door where my master was, then I looked back at Jay who was nodding. "Then again you can't hide forever from your problems you know?" It was my turn to pat him on the back. "The best thing to do is actually to face the problem head on or else it will always be there."

Jay sighed, shaking his head, understanding what I was saying. "Yeah, but with Noona its different though... especially when it comes to the mo--eh hem- I mean 'm' word situation."

"Oh, is that so?" I asked, a plan starting to formulate in my head; maybe I could use this against Krystal to make her wish for something then. "If you don't mind me asking... what is the deal with your sister and the 'm' word?"

"Well, it's kind of a long, complicated story to be honest..." Jay said as he tried to pick up Mickey to put on his lap. The dog barked sharply at Krystal's brother, running straight towards the door Krystal had closed herself in. We watched as the door slightly opened letting the animal in.

"I'm all ears" I announced while laying back further on the couch, pressing Jay to go on.

"Well, the first thing you should know is that Krystal and I are actually half siblings." Jay grabbed a pillow off the couch, hugging it tightly to his chest. "Appa cheated on Krystal's Omma with mine, but he didn't find out about my existence until years later when Krystal's mom had died and Appa found out that my Omma had left me with my grandparents." Jay sat back, looking up at the ceiling as if he was replaying things in his mind.

"When Appa found out about me, I was 6 while Krystal was 8 years old. Around that time, Appa wanted a fresh start so all of us moved to America. When we got here, we lived with a family friend of his and he only had 2 spare bedrooms; meaning I would have to share with Krystal. The thing was: she hated my guts and ignored me all the time. I didn't understand why at the time, and regardless, I kept treating her like family because I had always wanted a big sister." He chuckled slightly, shaking his head at the memory. "This was kept up for a few months or so, until Thanksgiving."

"What happened at Thanksgiving?" I asked the obvious, signaling to him that I was still listening. I wasn't expecting so much to come out of the history of the Park siblings. Thinking about it now, this information was gold in comparison to what I had planned in my mind.

"Well, I was sent to get Krystal from upstairs in our bedroom since the guests had arrived and dinner was to be served. As usual, I knocked on the door, announcing what I had been told to do. She didn't reply as usual, and as I was about to walk away, I heard crying on the other side of the door." Looking away from the ceiling, Jay made eye contact with me. "At first I thought I was hearing things, because Noona never cries. But, when I pressed my ear against the door... sure enough, it was her crying. I let myself in and found her crouched up at the end of the bed with her face in her knees. When she looked up, she didn't even tell me to go away like usual... she actually came up to me and gave me a hug without even telling me why." Jay clapped his hands together to signal the end of his story. "And since then, she has been treating me like the brother you see today."

I scrunched my face in confusion, "Wait... did you ever wonder why she never told you why she did all that? Why she suddenly switched roles on you?"

Jay shook his head no, "I mean, at the time, I was just happy that I was finally being recognized by her, so it didn't bother me as much. As we got older though, I actually did start to think about why she did such a thing." Jay started to play with the string on the ends of the pillow in his lap. "Yet, every time I asked her, she dodges the question and would leave me hanging." Jay sat there for a few seconds in silence, before leaning in, turning his voice into a whisper, "When I started my Freshman year of High School though, I asked her the question again and for the first time... She actually answered me."

"What did she say?" I whispered back, leaning in towards Jay, intent on what he had to say.

"Her explanation was that--"

BANG.

Jay and I jumped up in fright, following where the sound had came from. Krystal was standing in front of the closet door with such an intense gaze in her eyes that it could scorch a hole through our heads.

"Jay, what did I say about talking about our past, huh??" Krystal growled through clenched teeth, looking straight at her brother. I have seen many facial expressions on humans before, but this particular expression was an anger I, myself, was growing intimidated by.

"Noona I--" Jay started to try and explain himself but Krystal was now pointing at the door of her room.

"Out. Now."

I looked from Jay, then Krystal, then back to Jay. The tension from before had now risen, causing little beads of sweat to form around my forehead...

And genies weren't supposed to sweat.

"Come on, don't be like this--" Jay stood up, slowly admitting defeat as his feet dragged him across the room, to the door.

"It's late Jay. You have tryouts tomorrow and you need sleep. Now go..." Krystal put Mickey down on the ground and the dog ran over to Jay, pushing its head on Jay's feet to move out. Jay looked at me, giving me a mental sorry with his eyes, then looked back down, shuffling his feet out of Krystal's room with the dog pushing his feet from behind.

"So do you want to tell me what that's all about?" I boldly asked Krystal, putting on my own look of intimidation. Krystal's eyes fell upon me and I noticed that her facial expression was now replaced by...

Sadness.

"I don't want to talk about it with you, alright?" Krystal said as she began untying her Nike's shoelaces. I turned my head a bit, noticing her odd actions; she didn't pull any smart- lines on me. She didn't roll her eyes at me or any of the facial expressions that she did when I was annoying her. I was seeing that side of her I recalled from dinner last Friday night when she was left out of the conversation.

"Oh, is that so?" I asked, levitating myself up from the couch and floating my way to where she was now standing. I planted my feet on the ground, in front of her.

"Get out of my way." Krystal moved to the left and I moved to the right. She moved to the right and I moved left. This game was kept up longer then I thought until I spoke again, "You know I'm not leaving until you explain to me--"

"PLEASE. LUHAN. JUST... please...." I stopped my movement and trained my eyes on Krystal. She took this chance to walk past me without interference to her restroom where another loud bang came, leaving me alone in the room. Instead of wondering about her actions and words, I had no guilty feeling whatsoever. I stood there in a sort of triumphant stance. She said "please" to me. Never had I ever heard her say please to anyone in such a serious, commanding tone. Not even to her family or friends or when I had been eavesdropping on her invisibly. I smiled, realizing that the plan in my head was slowly working and churning out more ideas and tactics. My plan of weakening her facade was slowly coming into play... She would soon be one of those humans in distress and desperation. 

And those humans were always the ones who knew what to wish for in times of need. 

Officially Posted on 
August 22, 2015