Suddenly the phone rang!
Immediately afterward, Hearing it out of the blue newmoon spat out a mouthful of soap bubbles while coming out of the bathtub. Only he is crazy enough to dip his head under the soap water.
"?"
Before he could relax and catch his breath, he find himself grabbing the phone from the side of him. His eyes widened as looked down at the screen.
It was 'Jina noona.'
"…"
Little did he know he gave a ring first so it was obvious to get a callback. And to mention timing, Maybe he was unlucky after all.
For a few seconds, he remains still like in a coma state. Only after a certain moment had passed did he pick up the phone.
He clenched his lips and hardly uttered a word, "H-"
"D-Did she came back, Aiden?"
A desperate, sobbing voice shot his heart directly. It was the first ever time he heard her lose her coolness. One thing was clear. She must be losing her sense of despair. And the reasons for it? he knew!
"…"
A short silence fell over the phone. As though she felt some suspicious about the receiver's identity.
With a slight change in tone, Jina spoke, "..Newmoon, Is that you?"
It was way lower and softer than her original voice..somewhat convincing as though she wants him to be on a call for a little longer and made sure he won't cut off before she finishes her sentences.
"..I called you so many times earlier but your phone was out of reach..so I request Aiden to pass out the message for you. Where were you-?"
"My phone got broken!"
"How?"
By the end of the question, her tune somehow got overshadowed by the doubt as though she didn't buy the excuse.
With a pause, she asked in a small voice, " Newmoon are you angry with me?"
Newmoon shuddered down. His mind became blank like a sheet of paper.
It was already unusual for Jina to speak in such a way and now she was asking whether or not he was angry with her. The world must have been flipped upside down without his knowing. He was witnessing such a secret personality of hers today that he was never aware of in his entire life.
All of this made his doubt even stronger. He pursed his lips as if he wanted to ask and clarify right away. But again what would he do? Jina and her mother were like inseparable and irreplaceable people..she didn't even tell her mother with whom she shared a relationship of skin and bone, compared to that he didn't even come near to each closeness. In an instant, he felt a million miles distant from her.
"I Know you must be! And maybe you have every right to be "
"-Stop!"
He whispered. Slight veins popped up on the side of his wrists as he clenched his fist. Jina who used to be a carefree person was now using such sensitive words with a pitiful tone and even considering his opinions? No matter what it wasn't normal.
"Just like people said, I'm indeed stupid right?"
She added.
Hearing the 2nd sentence, the expression he was holding up till now all faltered at once and a drop of tear fell from his eyes straightly diving into the pool of water bubbles where it vanished in the next second.
"I've known this for a long time newmoon. Nobody knows me better than myself. I'm neither smart nor educated, neither I could take care of the insides of family matters nor the business of the outside world."
"..S-So.I'm sorry!"
Jina's voice cracked as if she was holding her tears too!
Knowing the truth newmoon flinched, "…"
However, he still couldn't bring himself to confront her. In the end, Jina swallowed her tears and let out her last request in a painful voice, "..I hope you'll forgive this stupid sister!"
That was the moment when newmoon lost it. There were no boundaries that would stop his tears from dripping away. He clenched his hands touching his chest in a way as if he was shielding his heart from ripping out.
While his internal voices went berserk.
"Why are apologizing in the first place..? Why? It never was your fault! If there was someone who deserves to be blamed then it would be the grandma instead! So..why are you apologizing? You just stayed low and were able to bewitch and hide from us all this time, made us feel happy while you were suffering from all god knows what you went through. So why?"
He wailed as he shut his mouth with his other wrist still holding the phone.
"Angry..? Right to be angry..? What right do I have to be angry with you? If there is anything then it would be my apology to you! And to speak of being stupid..it is me for not catching your pain behind those smiles and for…a..lot of other past reasons too!"
His vision got all blurred with those tears continuously filling his eyes with no sign of stopping. Amidst it, Something flashed in his eyes.
He clenched his chest too much to the point where his whole body was trembling in pain.
As though he had lost all the tracks of time and the belief between reality and illusion, he unconsciously muttered out.
"W-Why are you asking me to forgive you?"
A little moan escaped through her lips as though she was suppressing her sound of hiccups too! She instantly replied,
"It's because-"
"Stop..!"
Somehow the quick answers made his eyebrows twitch a bit. "Let me talk for a min."
He did know she hasn't hung up yet still who knew she would be holding the phone so dearly and nearly to a point where she immediately became active? Somewhere he was afraid that she even heard him cry.
He pulled himself off and cleared his throat while covering the phone with his wet hands before he continued, "Did they torture you so much to a level where you started to consider yourself Stupid and dumb?"
"Ah-"
"And why the fuck do you keep on cramming about me being angry?"
He shouted from the top of his lungs.
"…"
Newmoon had finally lost it. He crossed the fine line for the first ever in his life. Their relationship wasn't much deeper to start, but he neither had raised such a voice against her as how he did to her now. Instead of being the eldest one among siblings, she was the one who held power and roamed scolding him and john.
An awkward silence fell upon the environment.
Only when he spilled out words, did he realize what he just said?
This made him feel his heart even heavier and pushed him downwards with guilt even further than it already was.
In the end, he gave up.
In a helpless tone, he confronts as another series of tears split over his cheeks.
"Y-You are not stupid, you are not dumb! You are neither of them!"
His lips quivered as he added, "For us, you are like a second mother noona!"
Upon hearing this, it only sound in a split second but he was able to hear the tiny bit of the gasp that her sister let out from the opposite sides. Afterward, there was a complete pin-drop silence not even the movement of the phone as though she had muted the phone call right away.
Again this sort of behavior was the opposite of her. If she was feeling sad or something hurt her then she would cry instantly without thinking twice. Both of the siblings had seen her cry so many times before.., but this time it was surprisingly different. It wasn't the case that she was shy at this age and time. The reason didn't fit the puzzle at all. Which once again made newmoon worry and felt doubt about her.
"To be honest, I think I know why this phone call with me was urgent!"
He chuckled, "It must be..to stop me from spilling the truth to the mum right?
"…"
As he had assumed, it was true.
Newmoon grit his teeth while raising his tone high, "What happened to your courageous part? You always told us to raise our voices and take action against bullies, never look down upon ourselves, and fight for it! What happened to the slogan we have always lived up to?"
"Don't make mistakes in the first place,
But if you're accused of doing one, then don't hold back and fight for it!"
"It is the slogan and motto that you followed more than me and john. This isn't you! From when did you start to change?"
With a 'Hic' sound he broke down. His hands were busy wiping the tears from his eyes to clear the blurred eyes however the more he swept away the more it ended up coming.
His throat gave up and he cracked up in the last recalling the question she asked earlier, "..I-I am not angry. Why would I be angry?... I'm just hurt!"
The more he spoke, the more it was difficult for him to catch up his breath and speak clearly.
"Why didn't you share with me.., or us, or with mum at least? It is more painful to see you in pain."
He couldn't feel more worthless than this. Having lived happily with one of that people under the same roof, laughing while crippling his sister's tears and heart unknowingly.
After a while of silence, he declared, "You know what, I'll leave tomorrow!"
His voice was colder than ever yet determined too!
"It disgusts me to hell…, sharing the same floor with those fucking evil people. I'm outta here! It's already painful enough to breathe the same air as them!"
Sure enough, as expected, Jina gasped in shock at his sudden decision. She hurriedly interrupted, "Newmoon, do you even know what are you saying? Are you in the right mind?"
And this time it was newmoon who was silent as the ocean.
"Wait..first of all, relax and listen to me!"
She inhaled and exhaled a mouthful of breath and explained, "Things haven't escalated and gotten as worse as you think! Yes, indeed, they look down upon me, don't like me and I would be lying to myself if I say they didn't try to bully me!"
Newmoon wanted to protest saying 'See?' but as if jina knew he would cut it right away so she instantly completed her sentences,
"However- The main thing is they only 'tried'. Not more than that! I want you to be clarified on that matter. You probably know how I am and what I am made of! I'm not lying so rest assured and please do not ever speak a word about this to mum. Let this be between us, between siblings."
Newmoon didn't respond to it either.
Having received no words from him she had a little hunch that maybe he wasn't buying the truth. And once more it was jina whose persuasive and despairing voice sounded in the call.
"Though in the beginning part all of them tried to control me, especially my mother-in-law and sister-in-law. After several times of continuous failures to do so, their actions and behaviors flipped into bullying. But unfortunately, they failed to do that again in which they eventually turned me into their dislike lists. None of their plans worked so that's why I'm on their hater's list!"
Now that she confessed the truth and mention the main part of the problems, his memory suddenly shifted to the earlier part of the evening where all of this started, "Tell me what weren't we able to do? To teach her a lesson, I and my daughter gave an extremely hard time to her."
"However, who knew she would have one hell of a tolerance level."
"And to add more, you do know, right? How my little angle couldn't even continue her middle school studies..she is already sad and regretful about it and guesses what?..the audacity of that bitch to dig out and pointed the dirt from her weakness-"
All of the voices rang in his head like a bell. Only then did he wake up. Comparing those two conversations of them, Jina was indeed speaking the truth. It wasn't like Jina would be the type to lie but the fact she hide such huge things from everyone made him naturally doubt her words.
Realizing it, he let out a long sigh of relief secretly and his shoulders got lightened by half. Yet, he didn't agree to that point by nodding his head along with her. For now, he sat back and wait patiently to listen to what more would she say or spilled to make him believe her. If the timing was different or if he had never come to know the truth then maybe he would go on nodding his head with her, believing everything with a smile, and assuming she too was happy without having a hunch of anything that was going through behind the happy smile.
While Jina was taking her time, on the other side, newmoon was frustrated with himself why didn't he figure out such a simple meaning from grandma and saw their irritation towards Jina? He curled himself up like a squirrel and a line of agitation appeared on the eyebrows, above the red, swollen eyes.
How could he say that? He was ashamed of how he directly raised his voice to her and questioned her motto while still knowing how she was. Right at that moment, something hit his mind and he wondered pulling a straight tone, "What about our brother-in-law?"
Yeah! Enough with talk about grandma. Without much questioning, newmoon knew whether or not she was being bullied. But not about her husband. During a sneak peek, Newmoon only heard,
"Naïve my foot! She is way more stubborn. Only my one and only son can control such a wild bear bitch!"
That was it.
Although he won't have much hope for him too, still he hadn't heard the truth from either grandma or Jina noona! At last, his curiosity rose above all and he questions it.
"Tsk"
Newmoon, "?"
"Unexpectedly among all of the family members and relatives here in the united kingdom..he likes me!"
Newmoon, "…"
Now it was strange. Very strange to the point where newmoon was more shocked just like how he was when he heard the conversation between their grandma leaving him speechless.
A wave of smile displayed on her tune, "You must be very much surprised. Let me do you a favor. I'll rest your curiosity while in return you keep it secret from mum. What do you think?"
They sure were siblings. Knowing each other's strengths and weaknesses. Jina knew how much newmoon dies from curiosity when something caught his attention. He would rather die than be hanged on the cliff. This time it worked perfectly against him.
On the other side, Newmoon was already on the verge of dying. He anxiously bit his nails showing the sign of it. He had predicted less or more from all the interactions he had heard about him from. According to all the interaction and information about him from Jina, he more or less predicted maybe her husband was the one hell head of bullies.
"I heard from grandma too! Only he can control such a wild bitch- no my noona! So how come it twisted like this? No-No- if this continues I would die from overthinking and anxiety."
He knew if he somehow backed off and let this offer go, he would never rest in peace unless and until he heard the truth.
"Damn, I take it back. She isn't dumb."
His lips moved, as though he was feeling somewhat uneasy agreeing to her offer.
"O-Ok, but don't curse me when she learns it from another route."
"Rest assured, Rest assured!"
Quickly, she assured him in an enthusiastic, high-spirit tone. Newmoon could vividly recall the relieved expression she must be putting on her face.
Witnessing it, he couldn't help but sigh heavily. Her last tone made it looked like as if none of the bitter incidents happened at all. She must be tensed up like hell and so was newmoon too. However, still he couldn't shake off his feelings toward grandmas.
As it turned out, Jina was out with her friend that day when she was accidentally dragged by her same friend and coincidently made a scenario where she was introduced to her both future husband and mother-in-law at their own house. The fact she randomly roamed with her friend with a bare face, without knowing what was about to fall on her hand was the first and last thing that caught her mother-in-law's attention and the rest was history.
Long story short, In their first meeting, her mother-in-law liked Jina while her husband didn't!
And to talk about a plot twist?
But on the marriage day, Her husband took to liking her while her mother-in-law didn't!
Raising his eyebrows, newmoon asked in disbelief, "And just because of make-up and dressed up?"
Jina hummed in agreement, " Surprisingly yes!! and do you know what he said to me on a marriage ceremony day?"
"What?"
"He whispered that I looked pretty that day compared to the first meeting. And he has taken a liking to me. And he added life wouldn't be bad with me haha and encouraged me to dress up pretty like that."