The Red of the Rose | Taeyong

01 | A New Beginning

It has been two years since Miah graduated from high school. She never told her family about her last year of high school; about how difficult her life was in that final year. But they knew something was wrong. Mark, her younger brother, was the first to notice the change in her. Her parents had asked her multiple times but she refused to speak. They asked Mark to try and talk to her but Miah blamed her long silences on the stress of the final year. She could not worry Mark.

The day before her graduation, she sat them down and told the three of them that she no longer wished to be in this country. Her father had hugged her and her mother had cried silently. Mark had protested vehemently against it but he could not make her stay. She had decided she wanted to leave, and Mark knew his older sister's resolve. They sent her to a college abroad.

She never came back home in these two years.

With time, her sunken cheeks and swollen eyes healed. With time, so did her heart. That feeling of alienation, those mean comments, the feeling of being wronged when nobody believed her, she pushed them down enough so that she could keep them locked away forever.

Last month, Miah called home and told her parents that she wants to come back. She missed them, she missed them so terribly. Mark was overjoyed and she was too. She wanted to come back home and wanted to be with people she loved.

~*~

Mark was standing near the exit at the airport terminal. He was dressed in a plain beige hoodie and a pair of blue jeans. He was there an hour earlier than he was supposed to be. Glancing at the time in his phone repeatedly, he was fidgeting with the drawstring of his hoodie.

Mark had just become a high school junior when Miah left for college. With both their parents working since they were little; Mark and Miah had always been together. Even though Miah was only two years older than Mark, she had taken the role of caring for him ever since he could remember. Two years ago, it wrenched Mark when Miah expressed her wish to study abroad. It was not that he was against the idea of her staying away from home, but he had sort of pieced together that something was wrong. He didn't go to the same school as Miah did and Miah never told him nor anyone else what happened. He just wished she can move on from whatever it was that was bothering her and go back to her old self. His old cheerful sister, full of life.

He was leaning against a pillar now, arms crossed over his chest with his phone still in his hand. He felt a light tap on his left shoulder and looked over it. He turned around to follow the arm and saw Miah standing in front of him. Shorter, he thought but no it was him who had grown taller.

'Noona,' Mark exclaimed and smiled from ear to ear.

'Hi.' Miah met his smile. 'You have grown taller.' Her eyes were brimming with emotions. Her little brother was not so little anymore. She ruffled his hair like a mother. 'You need a hair–'

Mark hugged her and sobbed into her shoulder. She patted his back lightly and said, 'And please burn this ugly hoodie already,' making both of them laugh.

Miah pulled back from the hug to wipe off the streaming tears off of Mark's face and when he looked at her with his innocent eyes, she said finally, 'I missed you too.'

'Come, let's go home.' Mark pulled the luggage trolley from behind Miah.

'Wait, you are driving?' Miah stood confused. 'You can't drive.'

'I can and let's go. I have been standing here for ages you know. You were so late,' Mark rolled his eyes.

'I can't control the flight timings and it was exactly on time, by the way.' Miah ran after Mark when he started pushing the trolley a little too fast.