Chapter Text
Ah-yi was walking back from the mailbox. She had left another letter for Lee Eul.
Every time she checked the mailbox, it was empty. Someone was taking her letters. She hoped it was Lee Eul. She hadn’t heard anything from him in a few years, despite hoping beyond hope that he would somehow reappear.
Maybe magic wasn’t real. The world could be a cruel place. Maybe something happened to him.
Then who is taking my letters?
She made her way through the snow. She took the long way home to walk past Bella’s grave. She missed that parrot. At least she wasn’t alone these days. She had her sister to remind her to eat dinner. She didn’t feel like eating much these days.
Nearing the gravesite, she thought something looked off. There was red of some sort on the grave. She ran toward it, thinking it might be a hurt animal.
It was a rose: a single red rose.
She inspected the rose, but there was no note below the flower. She sighed and made her way home. She inhaled the spicy aroma of her sister cooking bulgogi for them. She tried to eat the entire dish, but she could only stomach a few mouthfuls.
“I need to study.” She pushed away her bowl.
Her sister put down her chopsticks and gave her a stern stare. “You’ve been studying so much lately.”
“I guess I’ve become a boring adult.” She got up from the table and made her way to her bedroom.
She grabbed a textbook and switched on her desk lamp. In the middle of her desk lay a white card that was hand cut in the shape of a butterfly. There, illuminated in the lamplight, was the one word she had been hoping beyond hope to read for the past three years.