Author's Note: I'm pretty new to the fandom and so apologies if this storyline has been done before. Also, I'm going to use the Korean language sparingly as I know next to nothing about it and I'm too lazy to educate myself. So if things don't seem as authentically courteous (as is the Korean way, it would appear) then you know why. :] Anyway, enjoy!
...
Little Sister, Don't You
...
For the longest time, quite literally from the day she was born, Ga Eul learned to stay away from her older brother's friends. Despite only being a couple of years older than her, Jun Pyo had always made it clear that his friends were his and his alone. As a little boy, he lamented up and down the vast hallways of their home that she was just too little (she distinctly remembers him repeatedly using the word 'baby' in a most condescending tone) to play with him and his friends. After having been guilty of being too young, Ga Eul was then deemed too much of a girl to play with boys. Fast forward a few years later and braces-wearing Ga Eul was accused of cramping her brother's style.
Not that she minded much. She had her own group of friends, after all, and she had no need for a bunch of foul-mouthed, noisy and smelly boys. It didn't really occur to her until later, when she entered Shinhwa High School, that other people (mostly girls) would literally die at a chance to be around her brother and his friends. She didn't get it, of course. Her brother was the same boy she knew all her life. Stubborn, loud and with penchant for grammatically incorrect and ridiculously inane commentary. But she assumed that her being in the same school as her brother meant that the rule still held. And perhaps, it would have, but what happened next was something neither sibling saw coming.
Guys liked her. Like... like like. Much to the chagrin of her older brother, of course.
"You should wear a hat."
Apparently, her brother thought that that none too astute suggestion was appropriate breakfast conversation and really, it's always too early to talk ridiculous with her brother.
"A hat," Ga Eul repeated, and quite patiently too if she did say so herself.
"Yes. One that maybe covers... I don't know... your face?"
Ga Eul tried desperately not to strangle her obtuse older brother. Certainly that was illegal. And impossible, seeing as how he was about twice, possibly thrice, her size.
"Is there something wrong with my face?"
Her brother's response was a mixture of angry gesturing, frustrated sputtering with a defeated sigh at the tailend. She could tell that he was trying very hard to keep from running his fingers through his oddly coiffed hair. Only she knew that he woke up each day at an insane hour in the morning just to keep up with his version of perfection and mussing it in any way was just not an option.
She had to bite down on her lower lip to keep from giggling and instead, busied herself with buttering her toast.
"The problem, Ga Eul," Jun Pyo began again, this time not at all bothering to keep the edge off his tone, "Is that there is absolutely nothing wrong with your face. Do you know how many red cards I've had to deliver last week alone? Too many."
This made her sit straighter. This was all news to her. She knew that, although it was terribly childish and just plain terrible, receiving a red card was no joke and she felt immense guilt that she was the cause. Her brother paid no attention to her change and demeanor and continued on with his whinefest.
"A card each for all the guys who looked at you wrong, and for all the guys who looked at you twice, and the ones who just even looked at you... It's like they don't even know who you are! You're my sister!" His fist came down hard on the dining table, effectively startling Ga Eul out of her guilt-ridden stuppor. "I've had to give almost every single guy a red card. The guys who usually do my dirty work? I had to give them cards, too. Me. I had to hand them out personally. I almost broke a nail, trying to get into someone's locker! And now, because almost everyone has one, my red cards have become useless!"
She almost sighed in relief but caught herself at the last second. Her brother's temper was not something one wanted to encourage. The opposite always yielded more positive results.
"Don't worry, oppa," she assured him, keeping her tone light. "I don't like any of the boys in school."
"I'm not worried about that," was his dismissive reply. "It's everyone else I'm worried about."
Some of Ga Eul's exasperation wore off once the gravity of her brother's concern slid home. Some. Although it did warm her heart to know that her brother was looking out with her with only the best of intentions, it was still incredibly annoying.
Gu Jun Pyo? Annoying?
Ga Eul stifled another snicker.
...
So Yi Jeong wasn't even going to pretend to be interested in his friend's blathering on about his little sister. He'd just finished two-month long stint in Venice, Italy studying glassblowing which ate into the first few weeks of his last year at Shinhwa High. A part of him was secretly hoping for some grand homecoming. Venice had left him rather dry, seeing as how his teacher monopolized almost all the hours Yi Jeong was awake and it would have been nice of his friends to have shown him a little relief in the way of some feminine attention.
But no. Apparently, that was too much to ask. What he got, though, was a nice little headache since the walls of their lounge fairly reverberated from Gu Jun Pyo whine about his little sister. And the rest of the male student population at Shinhwa. And how said male student population should die die die!
"No, Jun Pyo, I don't think that Ga Eul would consider being home schooled." Ji Hoo's reasonable statement pierced through Yi Jeong's thoughts.
"But it's the perfect solution!"
Woo Bin sighed, finally looking up from his phone. "The perfect solution would be to go out tonight and forget about this whole thing with your sister. The guys in this school will get over it soon enough. It's just that she's fresh meat—"
Yi Jeong did a mental fist pump at Woo Bin's suggestion. Yes, please! A night out is exactly what he needed.
"She's not meat!"
"But the shine will wear off eventually," Woo Bin continued while completely ignoring Jun Pyo's vehement interjection. "And everything will go back to the way things are now."
Yi Jeong watches as his troubled friend takes several deep calming breaths, something that he's learned to do per his therapist's suggestion to help curb his warmongering tendencies. After a few minutes, Jun Pyo, looking somewhat calmer, turned to him.
Great.
"What do you think, Yi Jeong?"
What did he think?
To be perfectly honest, all this talk about Ga Eul and all the unwarranted attention was feeling a little surreal. In his mind's eye, brace-face little Ga Eul had never been a head turner or even held the promise of being one. Unless of course, she had undergone some sort of ugly duckling transformer while he wasn't looking. But that seemed unlikely, although all accounts did point toward the very opposite. Suffice to say, all this talk about Ga Eul's popularity with the boys was making him a little curious about his friend's little sister.
"I think," he started slowly, if a little uncertainly.
Jun Pyo leaned forward in his seat. "Yes?" he prompted.
"That Woo Bin is right. The guys are probably just curious, is all. She's new and she's also your sister—"
The frustrated brother threw his hands in the air. "That's what I don't understand! She's my sister! She's off limits! OFF LIMITS!"
Yi Jeong exchanged perplexed looks with his two other friends. While it was perfectly normal for Jun Pyo to lose his cool as is the case on a daily basis, this over-protective brother thing he had going was something they'd never before witnessed. It was... kind of funny, actually. The throbbing vein on their self-proclaimed leader wasn't too attractive, however.
Half an hour later and only Yi Jeong and Woo Bin were left in the lounge. Jun Pyo had stormed out, several red cards in his hands with Ji Hoo taking upon himself the task of keeping their hot-headed friend in line. Yi Jeong was slightly relieved but still a little disappointed at not having received the welcome home he was expecting. He wasn't shallow enough to take it against his friends. It was obvious that both Woo Bin and Ji Hoo had their hands full with having to look after Jun Pyo and Jun Pyo had his hands full because the chemicals from his hair treatments have penetrated his thick skull and seeped through his brain. It was only a matter of time, really.
"So," he began, "Is it as bad as Jun Pyo thinks it is? Or is he just blowing this out of proportion the way he always does?"
"A little bit of both?" Woo Bin shrugged, twirling his phone between his fingers. "Ga Eul's a good kid. She's kind, graceful, a bit soft-spoken... Pretty much the complete opposite of her brother. She's more of a puzzle, I think, to guys than anything else. Everyone's probably just wondering how anyone could survive living with a neanderthal."
That sounded about as a correct an assessment as he was going to get. "I can't believe that little Ga Eul is now a heart throb," he admitted to his best friend who raised an eyebrow at him. "What?"
"C'mon, Yi Jeong... You cannot honestly be thinking what I think you're thinking..."
"What?" Yi Jeong repeated, confused with what his best friend was trying to tell him.
Woo Bin studied him for a minute, a small smile playing along his lips, before he shook his head and pocketed his phone. "Never mind me. Let's go out tonight?"
Finally.
"Most definitely, bro."
...
Author's Note:
So there you go! Hope it was an interesting enough read to warrant succeeding chapters. :] Leave me some love!
Title is from the Elvis Presley song "Little Sister"
