Yunho has always had a special spot in his heart for taking long showers, making the most of his time and made sure he would scrub all parts of his body from the top to the bottom squeaky clean by the time he had finished his half an hour long shower. Moreover, another habit he enjoys while he is inside the most private place of the home is singing along to a few tunes here and there, certainly something his sisters have accustomed to hearing every time.

 Sizzling droplets of water splattered vigorously on the ground and hot steam breezed warmly from the bathroom doors all the way to the bedrooms found on the upper floor. The cold gust from outside seeped through the window sills as the man inside the shower raised the temperature of the water he used for his shower for him to be able to resist the cold weather.

Melodies and hums of “Deck the Halls” were vaguely heard over the splashing sound of shower water and the scent of lathering bubbles with a clean and flowery scent. “Deck the halls with boughs of holly, Fa la la la la, la la la la. Tis the season to be jolly,-”

A young girl with slightly unruly, curly brown hair walked over towards the bathroom with a neutral expression, yet groaned in frustration as she realized the shower was still occupied by her brother. “Jessica-unnie, can you please tell Yunho-oppa that we need to take a shower too?” Krystal whined at her older sister while she was tapping her foot impatiently with a set of neatly folded towels and toiletries in her arms with an intention to take a shower a quickly as possible.

A young woman with strawberry blond hair who seemed older than the previous girl walked out of the room upset as a result that she was woken out of her peaceful slumber a bit earlier than usual and sighed quietly “Why am do I always have to do it? Oppa, you’ve spent nearly 30 minutes in there – Dad wouldn’t like to see you late for work again!” She violently banged on to the wooden door and shouted loud enough for him to hear, obviously speaking in an unpleasant tone.

He was thoroughly scraping his fingers against his scalp with his eyes closed before he was startled by his sister’s sudden complaining. “Hey Jessica no -I’m almost finished - Wait!” He panicked unexpectedly as he turned the shower faucet off and peeked onto the porcelain clock hung in the navy blue painted wall that chimed at “10:03 am” and quickly ran out of the shower and covered it with its laced curtains.

He quickly got dressed with a formal, long sleeved plain white shirt, a regimental striped crimson dyed necktie, and a pair of jet black trousers. Yunho swung open the door in a rush towards his room, rubbing his cotton towel over his soaking wet hair and with beads of liquid water dripping down from his forehead and down to his neck.

Jessica enters his room with a calm expression, clinging carefully on the wooden door. “Would you like some pancakes or some kimchi with various side dishes for breakfast? Mom is asking what you want to eat so she could make more for you.” She curiously questions him, entering the room with her arms crossed.

Yunho turns around and cheekily replies as he put on his coat and slicked up his hair with greasy and sticky hair gel that was hardening up and was starting to stay in place. “I’m having some pancakes today, thank you very much.” He grinned at his younger sister with a confident expression.

Sooyeon looks up with an unpleasant frown. “You don’t even have your tie on properly!” She complained impatiently, obviously not surprised as she walked over towards his to untie his tie from his shirt and knotted it back around his neck.

He stares at her for a few seconds before rolling his eyes in annoyance.” Well sorry I didn’t have time to put it on correctly because someone was trying to get me out of the bathroom earlier than usual.”  He tried to reason out with matching exaggerated hand gestures, but with no avail.

Her features tighten up in impatience and animosity as she shoots a deadly glare at him. “I don’t think you’d want dad to suffocate you with that tie of yours once he sees it knotted so lazily!” Jessica reasoned out as she tightened her grip on the tie and looped it for the second time.

Yunho was stunned to silence as his sister untied the poorly tied necktie and knotted it just loose enough for him to not be strangled.

He thanks her sincerely as an earnest grin appears on his face after “Thanks sis, I don’t know what I’ll be doing now without you.” He gleefully smiled at his sister, corners tightening as he tapped her shoulders lightly.

“Anytime, just get down in time for breakfast or it’ll get cold, like the weather outside.” Jessica responded with a timid grin, before walking off to the door and reminding him to come down to breakfast.

“I’ll be bringing my coat too, don’t worry.” He shooed her towards out of his room before he grabbed his thick, weighty black suitcase and carried it with his left arm, supporting it from the handle and kept a tight grip on it.

He twisted the doorknob of his door and swung open the door as he walked carefully down the stairs, shifting step by step towards the dining room.

His mother, whose attention was currently skimming through a 100-page fashion magazine attentively, looks up composedly at her son and immediately sets it aside by the time she is able to greet her only son.

            “Good morning, Yunho-ah. Did you have a good sleep last night?” Mrs. Jung interrogated him with an eased and relaxed expression.

            “It was horrible last night, mom. It was freezing cold, my heater broke in the middle of the night and snow had started to block my window, which made me think it was still early in the morning.”

            “You should have told us earlier, so we could have fixed it earlier for you. I’d probably scrape the snow off the road later on.” She looked at him disapprovingly with a sour frown on her face.

            “He also went overtime with the shower this morning, mom.” Krystal, the youngest of the three, commented hostilely, rolling her eyes as her hair was still dripping wet and a peach dyed cotton material towel against each strand of her hair.

            “I even have to take a shower after this meal.” Jessica, the middle child, stood up and wiped a plain canary yellow handkerchief against before standing up and walking to the bathroom.

Startled, Mrs. Jung turned around and paused for a second before speaking to her daughter. “Aren’t you going to have more pancakes dear?” Her mom grabbed her arm gently to ask her a question, with a confused expression.

            “I’ll be having some when I get home, mom.” She replied as her voice eventually drifted away as she went upstairs.

Their mother sighed as she watched her daughter leave the dining table so hastily. “How about the two of you, have you packed both of your lunches already?” She shifted her attention to her remaining children still beside her.

            “I have wrapped up everything, mom.” Krystal confirmed as she was munching diligently on her maple syrup drenched pancakes.

            “Dad’s treating me and my co-workers.” Yunho happily replied as he took another bite of his blueberry flavored pancakes.

            “It’s my co-workers and I, oppa.” His younger sister corrected her brother in an in-fact tone as she pointed a finger at him.

Yunho shrugged his shoulders casually as he set aside his spoon and fork by his side, ignoring what his sister had said. “Fine, my co-workers and I – Hey it’s rude to point!” After realizing she was pointing at him, he mentioned another insult against his sister.

            “The two of you, stop acting like little children! The two of you are grown up enough as you the eldest is already working at your father’s law firm while the youngest is already graduating high school; the two of you just continue to prove me wrong do you?” Their mother angrily slammed the table as she shouted at her two children and they were stunned to silence, before laughing out loud.

          “We were just kidding, wow mom – You still fall for that and we’ve been doing that for more than a decade.” Krystal uttered as she stood up to bring her plates and utensils on the sink.

The two siblings shrug their shoulders casually. “Friendly rivalry sometimes- There goes the time, I have to go to work now. Bye mom, bye Krys and please say bye to Jess for me thanks.” Yunho lets out a hearty laugh just as he glances at his black colored watch and his eyes go wide as he realizes that he has to go to work before the traffic jam starts or he will end up at work late.

            “You don’t even need to ask, son. Take care!” Mrs. Jung smiled sincerely at her son as she waved at him by the time he had exited the door.

Yunho walks carefully on the snow covered pavement, as snow had started to reach his knees and he could feel the chill, wintry feeling creeps up his legs.

“, I should have worn an extra layer of clothing or worn something else other than this today.” He cursed to himself as he looked down towards the flecks of frozen ice and snow that was soaking his newly polished black shoes.

He limped towards his car, which was currently unable to move due to the snow that was thick enough to block his winter tires from being able to drive. Yunho came in his car, put in his keys and started its engine as he kicked the gas pedal over and over again, which failed to even move them more than an inch.

Covering his face in frustration and resentment, he got out of his car and slammed his door with a dissatisfied expression, locking it before he walked back to his house to bring some money and possibly borrow some extra tickets one of his sisters have purchased so that he may be able to take the subway to work.

Yunho opened unlocked his house door with his keys and opened up to see only his sister Jessica to look up, as she was previously browsing through her brown khaki purse and was wrapped up warmly from a gray fur-trimmed coat and a green wool scarf twirled tightly around her neck.

“You’re home from work already?” She with a mischievous grin as she stood up and flung her purse over her neck and slid her white colored gloves over her slender fingers.

He shook his head worriedly with a scowl plastered on his face, taking off his shoes by the mattress to wipe off the frosted snow and slabs of ice of it. “I just needed to borrow some tickets for the subway or for the bus if any of you had some, in case any of you did so that I wouldn’t need to go all the way to Hongdae or walk by foot to work.”

“Don’t worry I have some extra ones. I’ll just see if I have a few more here in my bag or I’ll run upstairs to borrow some from Soojung-ie.” She insisted persistenly.

Jessica opened the flap of her bag and perused through her well-organized bag and he could swear he saw a spark in her eyes once she spotted a pair of tickets in her purse and took it out with a triumphant expression.

“Here are two tickets, one for on your way there and another for your way home. You don’t need to pay me or replace them, since you wouldn’t commute unless you’ve had to. “Jessica pulled out two unfold able tickets, one lime green and another orange, and placed them gently on her brother’s palms, which were nearly twice the size of hers.

He took the two tickets and inserted them into his wallet, before he slid them in his pockets and held on to his suitcase before thanking his sister and walking away to the next bus stop.

“Don’t put your wallet on your pocket in the bus or the subway- You wouldn’t want to know what usually happens when you do.” She warned him seriously as she marched steadily towards the door to take a different bus that went towards a different route than his bus.

“I wouldn’t risk a chance of any snatchers taking my wallet for sure!”  Yunho turned around as he shook his head and tucked them into his suitcase instead.

….

He stood by the bus station along with nearly a dozen other people, who were shivering and running on the spot in order to warm themselves up from the cold breeze and dropping weather that they were cursed with today.

Looking around to see if there was any place for him to sit, beside him was a middle-aged man with a cigarette tightly gripped in between his fingers, who obnoxiously smoking right next to Yunho as the scent lingered around him and secretly felt uneasy and weary that he would start smelling like he’d been smoking cigarettes and doing other illegal things his father would not approve him doing it again.

He remembered that as a teenager he had gone through a period of life where he wasn’t exactly sure what he wanted to do and preferred to go with the trends and kept up with the peer pressure he was put up with too- something he will forever regret and still cringes every time he thinks about it.

At 15, he was a well-known athlete at his high school, known to be skillful and proficient at multiple sports ranging from soccer or track events and even in Taekwondo , he excelled at all of them. Yunho was also quite the charmer among the ladies, who swarmed and squealed being at least within 15 m radius near him and was popular among the entire school population in general.

Yunho eventually drifted apart from his usual clique who included Yoochun, Junsu, Jaejoong, Changmin and even his own sisters Jessica and Krystal as he was most seen hanging out with the jocks and fellow athletes in the school who spent most of their time outside sports events partying and going on dates as they completely ignored their academic aspects in school.

He first thought he had been enjoying the time of his life and had never felt so alive once he had started to live a lifestyle that was completely different than his own, but he realized that he had passed by the limits and had crossed the line once Jessica had decided to shun her brother from their family and cut off all ties from him in public.

It took him more than 2 years to even attempt to fix the broken relationship they had with one another due to his foolish desires and fulfilled temptations that went to nothing. He decided to go back to live the previous peaceful lifestyle he had enjoyed with his childhood friends and quitted all the malicious events and habits he had picked up with the new sorority he joined.

Even until this very day, any sight of heavy liquor, cigarettes, drugs or anything associated to those items are things he tried to keep away from, as he feared he would return to the dark past he had been through and that his relations with his friends and family would crumble apart again.

“Are you still going on board, young man?” An impatient voice snapped him back to reality and he nodded timidly as he stepped on into the bus and quietly gave his ticket to the driver in front of him.

He walked towards the middle section of the bus, as the front and the back sections where seats were located were currently all occupied and full, which gave him no choice but to stand and cling on the plastic handles above him as he was surrounded by a dozen more people squishing him to death.

Most of the people who he stood beside with were people at least within the same age range as him, from college students to young part-time workers who made a living by their early 20s. Right beside him however, was a tall yet curvaceous young woman who looked a few years younger than him, slightly tan and her eyes were hid with a pair of large horn-rimmed glasses and held on a thick khaki coloured purse.

Yunho did admit to himself that from his angle, the girl did look quite attractive, but who was he to judge to check out some random person he stood by next at that one time he actually took the bus. “She probably could be some spy or some murderer assassin who’s plotting your death or whatever- be careful Jung Yunho.” He shook his head slightly.

An object that was cautiously too close him however was a medium-sized cup of take-out coffee that seemed from a familiar café that was located near where he lived. “Didn’t she get that cup of coffee from Jaejoong’s coffee shop? Didn’t they open till 9:45 and – wait Jessica’s probably late again is she.” Yunho smiled to himself as he glimpsed at the plastic cup of coffee but frowned tiredly as he remembered his sister did have a habit of being occasionally late.

The bus took an abrupt turn, wheels shrieking loudly as it dragged harshly against layers of thickening ice and passengers violently turning over to the left with screams of horror and surprise; Yunho fell over and grabbed onto a nearby plastic chair and blotches of vanilla flavoured and sugar dosed coffee splattered all over his work shirt.

“I’m so sorry sir- Please forgive me, I did not mean that!” He recognized that the woman who spilled coffee all over his body was the same young woman who he was carefully observing and attentive to as she took out a lilac colored silk cloth from her purse and wiped it vigorously on top of his coffee stained shirt.

“It’s fine really, It wasn’t really your fault and the bus really just turned sharply and all. I can just change my shirt later.” He shrugged it off with a genuine smile as he stretched out his linen material shirt and rubbed it lightly for the caffeine scent to wear off and for the brown tinted stains to dry off.

“No, no please take this as an object of apology – “ She insisted staunchly as she held out the coffee besmirched cloth into his hands, which he hesitatingly took and scraped the remaining splatters of brown marks on his shirt.

He looked up as he wanted to thank the stranger who had immediately apologized for having spilled coffee all over his shirt (His father wouldn’t really be pleased seeing his son go to work with coffee drenched all over him anyway, even before work started) but the moment he looked up, the mysterious stranger was gone as he assumed that she already got off for her stop.

….