The Red Bow [Chaelisa]

21. Prom

January 9, 2015. – First year of college.

I was sitting on the sofa in the living room watching Alice play with the pink bicycle she had won for Santa Claus’ Christmas. It was no longer snowing anymore, so the cool clothes were finally replaced by shorts and T-shirts; I felt free away from all that extra weight, but still saddened by the farewell to the snowflakes. My parents had been acting weird all day since I got home from college and I didn’t quite understand why. As soon as I arrived, I noticed that the house was not arranged for visitors and my mother had done nothing for dinner. Strange. Would they order the food? Or would we all go out to dinner as a gift? Well, the question hung around my head the whole time I watched them talk to the murmurs in the corners of the house. At the end of the day, my mother sat smiling all over me on the sofa and handed me a yellow package. It was an Ipad. Of course, I hugged her and said I didn’t need to, I knew we couldn’t afford to spend on brands like Apple, but of course I was totally happy with the gift, and I really was.

A few hours later, the doorbell rang and my mother went to answer it. I didn’t have to get up to know it was Jennie, Jisoo and Somi with all the fuss they did with birthday whistles and hats at children’s parties. What had I done to deserve the three best friends in the world? I would definitely take a picture and send it to Lisa, she would like to have a good laugh with the friends we had.

When the girls went to the kitchen with my mom, Dad approached me with that same look of pride that made me feel special.

“How do you feel at nineteen?" He asked as he put his arm over my shoulder, snuggling me closer to him on the couch.

“I should feel special when I turned eighteen, now I just feel like I’m walking straight into old age.” I joked and he laughed amused.

“Most girls your age would be in a club, you know."

“I’m glad I’m not like them, then."

And he hugged me tighter as if to say he was proud of me for being different.

"Here, I wanted to give you this.” He took something out of his pocket, it was wrapped in a thin purple silk cloth. When he tried to hand me over, somehow, the object fell into his lap and I noticed that he had lost his coordination at that time. I was tense feeling my heart beat in my chest, this could not be happening. But as if nothing had happened, he picked it up again and handed it to me, forcing a smile. "It was your great-grandmother’s."

I ignored the bad feeling of seeing what, little by little, was happening to my father, and unrolled the cloth until I found a varnished wooden necklace in the shape of a plaque; there was an inscription on it that I had already read in a book that I did not remember at the time.

"I’m very proud of you, Chaeyoung. When I left music, I knew it would be for a much bigger reason than me. You will always be worth it.” he explained passing finger by the necklace. "It is a tradition to pass this necklace on to the eldest child, and I think you are mature enough to receive it."

“Father! This is amazing, thank you …“ My eyes really filled with tears with that gift. This was proof that we don’t need expensive or exaggerated gifts to be happy. "It says Maktube. What does that mean?"

“That’s the magic of the necklace, my love.” he said in a calm way, and in a way, those words calmed me down. "You find out at the right time."

Dad and I walked to each other in the kitchen where Jennie, Jisoo and Somi were gathered around the table discussing something that seemed important to my mother while Alice ate pasta on Jennie’s lap. When we arrived, Dad cleared his throat so they would shut up and I was angry that I couldn’t hear the conversation, that whole mystery was getting on my nerves. Maybe they were organizing a surprise party, soon several colleagues from Juilliard would come into the house celebrating my birthday …