The Minor Complications of Love

Chapter Sixteen: The Devil in Her is Showing

Mark anxiously tapped on the arm of their living room couch as he clutched onto a cup of hot chocolate whilst waiting for his crazy little sister who for the nth time, was coming home late again for whatever reasons she could never really explain properly.

Mark groaned to himself, hating to have to become somewhat of a parent to his sister, but with moments like this, this role couldn't be helped.

As the door of their house swung open, Mark quickly placed his hot chocolate on the coffee table and stood up with crossed arms.

"Bella," he said quite sternly.

His sister rolled her eyes. "I knew you were going to be here so there was definitely no point in having to get in quietly."

Mark frowned at his sister's response. "Seriously? Seriously?"

"What?" Bella shrugged as she looked upon him with contempt.

"What do you mean by 'what'? You only have one responsibility every single day now that I'm here again and that's to be home before your damn curfew! Seriously Bella! Quit it with your rebellious teenage phase right now! Mom needs us and you're really not helping her! Imagine: she's working her ass off tonight. She's going on an overtime today because the company really needs her and you're just going to be this pain in the a-"

"Oh shut up Mark!" Bella shouted, interrupting her brother. "As if you would know anything about helping Eomma. All you've been doing was giving her a difficult time while you were in South Korea. I know you were barely studying there so don't act all honorable with me."

Mark stood there, frozen and stunned. How on Earth did his sister know? And since when did she know? Does their mom know about this too? So many questions rushed into Mark's brain but were then quickly dropped the moment that Bella started answering them as if she could read his mind.

"Don't worry, Eomma doesn't know anything about this. Only I do and don't you dare ask me how I did. I'm not in the mood to answer your stupid questions."

Bella turned her back to Mark and started making her way towards her room. Mark followed along behind her, finding the motivation to defend himself.

"So I made a mistake back in Korea, but I'm doing my damn best to make up for it, so you have no right to tell me that I'm acting all honorable in front of you. You have no idea what life there was like."

Bella turned to Mark one last time and before slamming the door of her room, she told him with piercing eyes, "Then the same works for me. You have no idea what life for me is like. You never even tried to know, so my advice to you is to just shut up and LET ME LIVE MY DAMN LIFE."

Mark sighed heavily as he found himself face to face with the locked door of his sister's room. He was filled with so much fury right now, but at the same time, with so much worry and even guilt. It's true that he barely tried to bond with his sister. And whenever he did try to bond with her, he always felt like he was acting as the father figure even if they were just a few years apart and that he was too young to even know what it was like to be a father figure. But what was he supposed to do? With their situation, he just... He just felt like he was doing the right thing.  But if that wasn't the right thing? Then what could be?

Mark found himself sinking into the negativity. He wished there was actually someone who could tell him that everything would be all right or a life where he didn't have to feel responsible for every single thing.