Holiday Getaway

Toxic

Minho

When I heard the door open, I knew who it was without even looking and as relieved as I was to see him, I was also equally upset. Here he gets to see me a complete mess with red and puffy eyes, but looking at him now hurts my heart.

I know he didn't really mean it all, is it wrong that I just want to wrap him up in my arms and tell him everything will be, okay?

Felix looks worried and scared and most of all guilt and shame were written all over his face.

 "Felix." I motioned for him to sit down.

Felix closed the door behind him and slowly came over to the bed and sat down next to me keeping his distance.

I guess this is where I tell my story.

It was the night before Valentine's Day during my Sophomore year of college, and I was waiting in my dorm room for hours watching the clock. Hours had gone by, and he still hadn't come home, finally around 3am he showed up bursting in the room laughing to himself. "Baby, you have no idea how crazy this night wasssss!"

His breath smelled of alcohol "I wish you would have been back sooner." Needless to say, I was very disappointed. I had mentioned to him that I thought we would have spent the night together celebrating and as I waited for him to answer me, he grabbed the closest thing to him which was a heavy book and threw it at my head.

"You always do this!"  He slurred. "I can never have a good time with you, you ruined my night like you always do!"

I tried to apologize and take the blame, but I pushed him further.

I had mentioned he had hung out with the guys the night before and thought that this night would just be for us. I pleaded with him as I watched him put his shoes back on. He then walked over to the desk and grabbed the box that I kept next on the bookshelf next to the desk.

It was full of various things including love notes that I wrote to him and shirts among other personal items of his.

He opened the door and started to walk out and as I followed him out into the hallway, he stopped dead in his tracks making me run into him. The next thing I knew I felt a sharp pain go through my back as I was shoved into the doorway hitting the side of the wall.

"You're such an idiot. I can never have a good time." "I'm sorry!" I pleaded. "No wonder why you can't keep any friends around or dated before me, you're such a mess."

Nights like that happened often and the arguments always differed from night to night, day to day but the premise was always name calling and belittling me. So many mind games were played, and they made up a majority of the emotional abuse I endured my freshman year.

Most times he was drunk but even some sober times he'd call me an idiot or blame me for ruining everything. He made me believe that I was the one causing all the problems in the relationship. He would always threaten to leave me and call me in the middle of the night screaming at me telling me how ugly or dumb I was.

If I showed any tears, he would always let me know how weak I was.

I didn't have many friends, so I never had anyone to go to, Hyunjin was the only I had at the time. I was never too close with the rest of the group. In high school I was just kind of there and tried to fit in, Hyunjin was the only one I could tolerate. The rest of the guys were great and fun and outgoing don't get me wrong, sometimes I wonder how me and Hyunjin ended up so close.

Not everything was bad though.

Our relationship started off great, he was sweet and romantic. Hyunjin was never really sure about him and always told me to be careful. Once we got more comfortable around each other there were times when he would get upset for no reason, then the name calling got bad with each fight. You would have thought those would have been red flags, but I think the fact that he wasn't always hurtful made leaving him harder for me.

I kept telling myself I just have to be more careful with my actions and obey him, show him how much I loved him and catered to him. I was attached and thought that there was a person in him capable of being a wonderful boyfriend.

Hyunjin started to notice how detached I had become and tried to reason with me, knowing that my boyfriend was the cause of my downfall. At some point I tried hiding how miserable I was and put up a good front, but I know I wasn't fooling Hyunjin.

Hyunjin was a good friend and I know he mentioned my situation to Chan at least but I didn't think nothing of it. My self-worth was so low that I'd rather endure the abuse than be alone.

Multiple times we would break up or threaten to leave but he always came back, and I always let him. Short periods of time he would act like how he was in the beginning when we first started dating. It never lasted long though and everything went back to the way it was.

Later down the line it wasn't just emotional or verbal abuse anymore, but it became physical.

That's when I knew or tried to get myself to figure out that this was a toxic relationship.