PITYING THE PRISONER | p.jm

t h i r t e e n - c o r a

I'm home.

No, not home at The Company, not any home in particular. Something in me just knows that this place is my home.

I'm sitting on a bed, presumably my own bed, in a room that is presumably my room. The walls are white and the floors are a dark hardwood. The furniture is all teal, my favorite color. I stand up on shaky legs, surveying the room that is probably mine.

In one corner, there is a small vanity with a mirror. Upon seeing myself, I find that I look much more rested, much happier than I used to be. My brown hair is down, falling to about my shoulderblades. I never got to wear my hair down before, I didn't realize it's actually this long.

The mirror on the vanity isn't what attracts my attention to it, though. No, there are photos scattered along the tabletop and against the mirror as well. I examine each one of them. There are seven of them in total, and each is more shocking than the next.

The first photo is of me and my family, something that I know shouldn't be possible. The three of us are standing at what appears to be a carnival, with bright lights flashing behind us under the moonlit sky. Both of my parents look young, and I only looked to be about ten years old. The photo is candid and happy, but something is very wrong with it. My father died before I was even born, so how can I be in a picture with him? There is technically a possibility that this man is not my father, but something in me just knows that it is. I sigh, confused, and examine the second photo.

This one is a picture of both of my parents on their wedding day. Sure enough, the man in this photo is the same one in the picture at the carnival. It still doesn't clear anything up, though.

The third and fourth photos are of me and Subin. One of them is from when we were young, maybe five or six years old. The other appears to be more recent, as though it was just taken a month or two ago. In both pictures, we're making the same poses. Subin is leaning on me, her rather long black hair sticking up all over the place, while I just stand next to her, laughing. We had mimicked the photo from when we were young, which is quite a touching gesture.

The fifth photo is similar to the first one. It's me with my family again, and we're at a beach. I look to be fifteen or sixteen in this picture, and it seems like we might be in Busan, judging from the scenery. The thing that's different about this photo, though, is that my mother is most definitely pregnant. The obvious baby bump shows that I have a sibling on the way, one who most likely exists here and now, as proven by the next picture.

Photo six is of me and my brother, who appears to be a toddler. He looks more like my father than I do, with black hair and darker eyes than my own. I look the same as I do now, so I can only assume that it's a very recent  picture. On the back of this photo, the words "Myungjun's Second Birthday" are written.

After all of this, though, it's the last picture that gets me.

I'm wearing a light pink dress and white flats, clothes I normally wouldn't be caught dead in. My hair is braided to the side and I'm wearing real makeup, too. I've got a huge, dorky smile on my face, as something behind the camera probably amused me. I'm standing in front of a tree with a bunch of white fairy lights on it. I've never looked happier in my life, and for good reason. Park Jimin is standing next to me, his arm around me as he too smiles for the camera. He's wearing a suit and his hair is styled neatly, but the smile on his face says it all. He's never been happier either.

I put the photos down, still not understanding what they all mean. I need to figure this out, so I exit my room and come downstairs.

As I enter the kitchen, I'm stopped by a little toddler in a sheriff's costume.