Kang Ji-yeon/With someone

## Someone

She was sitting in the empty fireball stands hoping that no one notices her there and flicks through a comic book about Star Wars, headphones shoved into her ears.

She was near Charlie, glaring at her younger brother who was locking his Fireball gloves onto his wrist. "You and I both know you don't have to do this," she said angrily. He looked at her with indifference.

"Well I'm doing it, so chill, Ji," he remarked, turning on his heel to walk away.

"Kang Seung don't you dare walk away from me!" she yelled, crossing her arms. She didn't care about whoever's attention she had attracted but Seung persisted his retreat. "Seung!"

The yell drifted through her headphones and she looked up, pulling them out and forcing herself not to glare at the pair. "He's not about to set the whole place on fire, is he?" She asked tentatively.

She huffed and crossed her arms, not taking a look at who asked her the question, just answered it. "No, it's just family stuff but he's being unreasonably stubborn."

"You find people are most stubborn to family than anyone else really," she said, flicking a corner of a page.

"Thanks for the statistic but it isn't really helping right now." She shoved her hands into the pockets of her jeans and watched him leave before turning to look at Charlie. "Who are you?"

"A student," she responded with a friendly wink, "and I'm assuming you are too?"

"Why else would I be here? There's no Fireball game and I'm obviously not a teacher. Non-students and staff aren't allowed in here anyway. And I was asking for a name."

*Hence why I was assuming.* "Charlie," she responded with a shrug, "yours?"

Knowing she didn't have the tolerance to listen to someone try to pronounce her actual name, she simply said, "Melanie."

"Pretty name," she responded, "so I'm assuming that guy was your...younger brother?"

"Thanks..." she murmured, looking uncertain. "...How'd you tell?"

"Doesn't really look older. I was thinking maybe your twin, maybe. But I took the risk."

"I get told more often we look like twins than anything else," she said with a shrug. "He's about a year and a half younger than me so..."

"Just a bit younger," she responded before shrugging, "is...that your only sibling?"

She narrowed her eyes, half wanting to say, *Why are you asking?* She shrugged, "Your guess."

"I don't know," she said, "you both look familiar so I thought...maybe, I don't know."

"I can't tell if that's a 'because you're related' or a 'because you're Asian'," she said.

"I've lived in Asia, so like maybe not the latter," she said before it clicked, "you look like that kid from the library. Hyungseok, I think? It was a while ago."

"You mean Seok. No one calls him 'Hyungseok'," she corrected her. "Yes, he's my younger brother."

"Oh, right, sorry about that," she said, before shrugging. "Sorry about the questions, I've been told I'm a...curious person."

"I'd say it's fine, but right now I'm highly annoyed and I'm a very blunt person."

"Yeah, don't worry, I'm use to it," she responded, "do you wanna talk about it?"

"Talk about what?"

"Whatever you're highly annoyed about."

"You want me to talk to you, a complete stranger, about how insensitive my brother is being towards his wellbeing?"

She grinned at this, leaning back into her seat, "they say a third opinion offers the best advice. Something along the lines of being seperate from the situation. Something like that," she said with a shrug, "don't have to, though. Just trying to be nice."

"Uh huh...." she pressed her lips together, debating what to do. "Thanks for being 'nice' I guess?"

"Don't tell people," she said, "I have a bitchy reputation to uphold." She winked, pulling out a nail filer.

"You're not very good at it then," she snorted. Jiyeon truly didn't know what to make of Charlie, just stood there, pressing her lips togther and thinking.