"No Longer Alone": Part 9

Brynn's POV

When school ends, I decide to head to the school’s front curb. That way, I can depart on my bike right when it hits 2:35 to get home at 2:40. I was looking forward to the time alone when I stopped myself short. Shoot. Jaehyun. What’s he still doing here? Maybe if I turn around now he wouldn’t even know I was here. But, as I turn on my heel, I take a good long look at him. Perhaps befriending him isn’t the betrayal I believed it was. So, instead of safely turning around, I bravely walk up to him and say, “Wow, you talk to birds and squirrels now? You keep getting weirder by the second.”

“Brynn!?”

“Hello, companion.”

He does a double take. “Did you just call me your companion?”

“Sorry. I'm still getting used to this whole friend thing.”

“So we’re friends?”

Good, I think. The whole “companion” thing worked. By far the most embarrassing sentence I’ve ever said in my life, but it's worth it if I want the title of "friend.” Were things with Abby this hard?

“That’s what you keep saying,” I say in response.

“I knew it!” He exclaims suddenly. “I knew we were friends!”

“Yeah, well, don’t let it go to your head.”

“Fine,” Jaehyun says with a laugh. “Why are you here by the way? Don’t you bike home?”

“Oh! Yeah,” I say, getting flustered. “But I um…”

“That’s okay. You don’t have to tell me. Let me guess, did a boy distract you?”

“What!? No!”

“I’m just gonna keep guessing until you tell me…”

“Ugh, fine. My mom wants me home at exactly 2:40 today.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.”

Just at that moment, a gray SUV pulled up.

“That’s Robert.”

“Your dad?” I ask Jaehyun.

“Technically.”

“Well, I better go too,” I say frantically. “I’ll see you tomorrow. And don’t open that letter!” I yell as I ride away. 

When I get home, my mom reprimands me and sends me to my room. I was only one minute late, but I gladly take the punishment so I don’t have to hear about my mother’s boring knitting club. I manage to complete my homework in three hours, leaving fifty minutes to myself before dinner. I decide to practice my guitar when I hear a gurgling noise. Unfortunately, my stomach refuses to align with my mother’s strict eating schedule. The only way to get a snack is to sneak into the kitchen unnoticed. So, that’s what I do. Or try to do. I stop at the top of the stairs when I hear my parents’ voices.

“Is it really him?”

Really who?

“It can’t be. It’s impossible. But what if…?”

“No. No, no. I won’t believe it,” My mother says as she starts to leave the kitchen.

I’m about to abort the mission when I hear something that catches my attention. “...Jaehyun.”

Jaehyun? What’s he got to do with this? I keep listening to learn more, but it’s hard to hear the muffled voices through the walls.

“...brother…Brynn…can’t know…Jaehyun…”

What!? That can’t be. I probably heard it wrong. But just to be sure, I run to my room and rummage through my backpack to find my rumpled envelope. I don’t waste any time ripping it open and almost drop it, my jaw nearly hitting the floor. My hands shake as I read and reread the three words that change my life forever: “Brother - Jaehyun Kang.”