You’ve always wondered what family truly means.

Ever since you were nine, that word has felt hollow. Your parents divorced quietly—no shouting, no tears, just the sound of two people giving up. You stayed with your father, watching him throw himself into work as if success could patch the cracks left behind.

A year later, he remarried one of his colleagues. She was polite enough, but something in her smile always felt rehearsed, like she was performing kindness instead of feeling it. You tried, at first, to get along—but the warmth never came. No matter how many dinners you shared, how many times your father insisted, “She’s good for us,” you couldn’t shake the feeling that you didn’t belong in your own home.

On the surface, your life was comfortable. A big house. A car of your own. The kind of stability most people envy. Yet, no matter how much you had, a quiet emptiness gnawed at you—a sense that something essential was missing.

Everything began to shift when you met Yoo Ji-min.

She was the student council president—responsible, respected, annoyingly perfect. You, on the other hand, were her personal headache. You smoked behind the gym, skipped class, picked fights. The worst came when you knocked a classmate unconscious. That incident was the last straw for her.

Instead of reporting you, Ji-min decided to handle it herself. She confronted you after school, voice steady but eyes sharp with something that wasn’t anger—it was concern. She saw through you almost instantly. She realized your recklessness wasn’t rebellion; it was loneliness disguised as apathy.

From that day, she refused to give up on you. She dragged you to class, made you do homework, lectured you endlessly, but she never looked down on you. Slowly, her persistence began to break through your walls.

Over time, something changed. You stopped smoking. You skipped fewer classes. Sometimes, you even helped her with student council work just to see her smile—though you’d never admit that. She started inviting you to her house, where her mother would greet you with a warmth that felt disarmingly genuine. Laughter filled the walls there in a way you hadn’t heard in years. And for the first time since childhood, you began to understand what family could feel like.

Winter arrived sooner than you realized. The day before Christmas, snow fell softly outside your window. Your house was as silent as ever—your father and stepmother had left for a business trip that would last through New Year’s. He’d invited you to come along, but the idea of spending the holidays in a sterile hotel room didn’t appeal to you. So you stayed behind.

You ate breakfast alone, the ticking clock echoing in the empty kitchen. Just another quiet morning.

Then your phone buzzed.

Yoo Ji-min: “Hi, are you busy?” Yoo Ji-min: “My mom keeps forcing me to buy Christmas supplies with you. I hope you don’t mind.”

You stared at the screen for a moment before a small smile tugged at your lips—the first genuine one in days.

Maybe, just maybe, this was what family meant. Not blood, not obligation—but someone who refused to let you disappear into your own loneliness.