Eyes Full Of Stars || Park Sunghoon

43 ¦ Unconscious

A/N: Bet you guys thought this story would be over now... but guess what there are gonna be so many more plots heheh

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A few days have passed since Sunghoon and I got engaged. He is at work a lot, so I spend the afternoons painting in his mother's studio.

A soft knock on the door makes me pause. I turn slowly to the door. "Can I come in?" asks Teresa, poking her head into the room. "There's one thing I need to talk to you about." I nod.

Since it sounds serious, I set the brush down on the palette. "It's about your father," Teresa informs me. The heart in my chest skips a beat and I feel my knees go weak. "He's been released from the hospital. The police took him away and the trial starts next week."

"I can't face him yet," I inform Teresa in a panic, shaking my head and clutching my aching chest. "I know," the middle-aged woman sighs, taking a step toward me to give me a hug. "But you're not alone. You have your mother and me.... And Sunghoon."

Sunghoon.

With my thumb, I play around with the ring on my finger. So far, I've avoided wearing it around Teresa and my mother. Teresa knows that Sunghoon gave me the ring as a promise a few weeks ago, but she doesn't know that we are now officially engaged.

The right moment to tell her and my mother just hasn't happened yet. My mother's mind is always somewhere else and she is completely exhausted and Teresa tries to be there for her as best as she can.

From Teresa, I could imagine that she would be behind my decision. But I just don't know how my mother would react if I told her that I wanted to marry Sunghoon after everything that happened.

"Can I tell you something?", I inquire to the woman in front of me. We break away from our embrace and she looks at me with concern. "What's wrong?" she asks, slightly concerned. "It's nothing bad.... On the contrary," I say, holding up my left hand.

Her eyes widen as she spots the ring on my finger. "Is that-" she puts in, reaching for my hand to get a closer look at the ring. "When did this happen?" "A couple of days ago. It was the morning he made breakfast," I answer happily.

After Teresa looks at the opposite wall for a moment, pondering, it seems to sink in. "And I was wondering... After you and Sunghoon had a fight the night before, you were in a pretty good mood the next morning," she states. "I guess that was the reason."

My mind wanders back to that night when Sunghoon and I had a little argument. He apologized to me and told me that there were problems with people who were allegedly affiliated with the Korean mafia.

Sunghoon also said that he was afraid of losing me if he could not keep his promise. Also, I think of how I confessed my feelings to him and we kissed and eventually made love. Just thinking about it sparks a warm tingle in my stomach.

"There's one more thing I want to tell you," I confess to the woman I've always talked to about everything. "Sunghoon and I slept together." She seems a little surprised by my sudden confession. But just a few seconds later, her lips form into a smile.

I still remember the first boyfriend I had when I was 15 and he turned me down because I didn't want to sleep with him. Of course I was devastated and although I had my best friend Leela, Teresa has always been the person I went to first when something was bothering me.

At that time she told me that I should never let myself be pushed into something that I am not ready for. When I asked her how I would know that I was ready, she simply said that I would know when the moment came.

Of course, after what I have learned about my father and her, her words take on a whole new meaning for me, but today I know what Teresa meant when she told me.

"It was very unexpected, but it was really nice," I tell the woman. Teresa listens intently, smiling as she strokes my brown hair. "I'm happy for you," she replies, glancing again at my ring. "And you wouldn't believe how happy I am that our relationship with each other hasn't changed after all the strains."

By strains, Teresa means that she and my mother have kept from me all my life that Teresa is in fact my birth mother and the woman I thought was my mother all these years is no one. "You have disappointed me...", I reply, looking at Teresa seriously. "But you had your reasons. And I love you both, and I don't want to fight with you."

Teresa lowers her gaze and wipes away some tears running down her cheeks with the back of her hand. "You shouldn't tell your mother about the engagement just yet, by the way," she suggests. "With everything that's been going on with your father lately, too, she's not doing very well. You should wait for the trial."

I nod slightly. Teresa is right. Everything is very complicated right now, and I can only imagine how difficult the situation must be for my mother as well. Once my father is convicted and his company, built on lies and intrigue, is finally dissolved, everything will gradually return to normal.

"Shall we cook together?", I change the subject and look at Teresa with a smile. That's what we used to do back then when my parents weren't home and we had the house to ourselves.

"Nothing I'd rather do," she replies, winking at me. "I'm still cleaning up and I'll be right down," I inform her. Teresa leaves the studio and I hurry to clean all the brushes and put everything back in its original place.

I leave my painting, which has been completed in the meantime, for the time being so that it can dry, after which I join Teresa downstairs in the kitchen. It is unusually quiet, however.

"Teresa?", I call through the hall. Confused, I enter the kitchen and look around to find the woman lying unconscious on the floor with a laceration on her forehead.

"Oh my God," I say in shock and am about to run to her when an arm wraps around my neck and I am pulled against someone's chest. Startled, I gasp and want to kick around when that someone presses a gun to my temple.

I want to scream, but a large hand that comes down on my mouth and nose and squeezes hard stifles my scream. "Don't you dare scream, you bitch. Or you'll both die," a male voice with a stinging accent growls against my ear.

He removes his hand from my mouth and grabs me by the upper arm instead, while still pressing the barrel of his gun to my temple with his other hand. The man with the Asian accent, which I couldn't decipher, unlocks it and all the muscles in my body tense in fear.

"Please...", I whisper fearfully, feeling the tears running inexorably down my cheeks. "Shut your mouth or I'll shoot you!" The man drags me by the arm out of the house to a car parked outside.

For a split second, he lets go of me to open the car door. I don't know what got into me as I slap his hand away and run. But I regret it barely a second later, as the man catches up to me in a flash and delivers a powerful blow to my temple.

My vision blurs and my knees buckle under my weight, causing me to slump to the floor and lose consciousness.

A/N: Have a good night