Until I Become an Orchid

How long can a good person stay good? My mother’s hope, my aunt’s dream. Women whose bridges of life are broken, using the lives of others as crutches. I don’t want to say it coldly, but looking back on my life, I was just someone’s crutch. Because I loved, because I was good, because we were family. Days when beautiful words didn’t feel beautiful at all. And in the winter before entering my senior year of high school, my only neighborhood friend, Kang Eui-joo, also left my side. On the day of that child’s funeral, “Here to pay your respects?” I met his older brother. A voice, ground out, low and sinister, echoed in the unlit space. “You’re Yang Ji-eon.” It was shocking that the man k...