My Perfect Older Sister Was Broken
My perfect older sister had been broken.
One spring day, after a long time away, I’d come out to take some photos.
I adjusted the focus and pressed the shutter.
Cherry blossoms were scattering on the wind, and through that drifting pink haze came strands of red hair and a body still childlike in its smallness.
I knew that body well.
“Nabi noona?”
The Nabi noona I had known all the way through high school was so different now that I almost couldn’t believe my eyes.
The clothes that had once been so carefully chosen were now a wrinkled white shirt and a pair of jeans torn a little at the seams.
She looked like someone who had spent all her time locked away in a room, a wastrel who had dressed herself in whatever was easiest to throw on.
In one hand, she carried a convenience store bag.
I recognized Nabi noona and called out to her right away, but she ran.
Before I even had time to grab her, she was gone, and the photo I’d caught of her turned out unbelievably beautiful.
Her red hair and the pink petals flying through the air made for a lovely scene.
But whatever she was going through did not look good at all.
I had to find out what had happened to her.
So I shoved the camera into my bag and ran after her.
I couldn’t catch her.
The older sister I’d met again after so long had already been broken…
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