Fireflies
Owl City
Written by Soohyun Hwangbo
Illustrated by Heesun Sim
Warm summer breeze swept past my forehead, my nose, and my cheeks. I gazed into the hazy night
dotted by fluorescent, glowing lights, leisurely taking an aerial stroll at nighttime. Fireflies. Compared to how
this place had been when we came a few years ago, they were scant in number and feeble in brightness. They
must have degenerated. Just like our family.
Dreams. Wistful nostalgia. A scent of something familiar.
Amorphous lumps of unsorted thoughts seemed to do flip-flops in my brain. The emergence of dusty,
fragmentary memories seemed to arouse numb, throbbing pricks at one corner of my heart dully. I cringed my
nose.
Fireflies. Mom. Dad?
The situation in front of me was far from such delightful indulgences. Face the reality, I mumbled to
myself. A few steps away from me, Marie and Andre was playfully tagging behind one firefly after another,
waving their little hands to catch one. The shrieks and giggles somehow numbed the pain. I gave a blank stare
at them. They would be immersed in firefly catching for at least five minutes. My younger siblings were too
young to be bothered by foggy memories. Heaving out a strained breath, I plopped down onto the soft grass.
Familiar fragrance of slightly wet grass, moist soil, and a hundred other things flooded over me. Another turn
of overwhelming nostalgia drowned me. No matter how hard I tried to resist, I was soon sucked into whirlpools of secluded past.
Mom. Where are you? We are doing really great here. I tore away all remnants of you so that the
twins won’t ever have to face you, even in pictures. Dad struggles to keep things together, and fails. And I am
left to face his raw pain and soothe it. Things are going wonderful in the goddamn family that you cursed and
abandoned.
Where are you?
I stifled a sob down the throat. I should have made a tantrum to avoid coming here, mused I. Just then
something fluttered past my face. Even with my tightly shut eyes I could feel the brightness sweeping away.
Startled, I quickly opened my eyes. And let out a gasp.
“Hailey, look! Millions of fireflies!” Marie and Andre screamed in unison as they ran toward me.
Fireflies had revived, filling the night sky. Like embroidered golden threads, their glow seemed to
shimmer.
Like the fragments of blissful past deep down.
I must be dreaming, I thought. But I refuse to be jolted out of it