Old Ties

The Burning Hatred

My hand reached to the empty side of the bed for the seventh time tonight. Cold emptiness was all that met me. I missed my wife, my real wife. Huijin, the woman I married, had changed, I thought. She had grown cold and numb. But there was only one person to blame for why my perfect wife stopped loving me... Isa Ramos.

Isa was my wife's personal assistant and greatest admirer. I never thought a twenty-three-year-old university student could cause so much trouble in my life. Three years. Three years it had been since Huijin started to drift away from me. Three years since Isa began working for her. I've grown to hate the girl and everything she's stolen from me. I could never put the blame on my beloved Huijin though; she had saved me, I thought. She took me in, knowing of my rocky past, and gave me so much love nonetheless. My past was another story... A far darker one, at that.

When I was young, back when I lived in Japan, my father used to get mixed up with loan sharks and dangerous people. He used to borrow money from the local mob; we lived in poverty back then. We shared one futon amongst the four of us; my father, my mother, my sister, and I. My father had a gambling problem, money came to him, but never back to us. He was brash, abusive even... His "friends" would hang around. They were drunkards at best, really. At best. The others, are murderers, loan sharks, corrupt law enforcement, gamblers... I grew up in a home without safety, where my eight-year-old self would have to protect my twelve-year-old sister... Where my, later, sixteen-year-old self would join the Japanese Yakuza mafia.

It was trying times, I told myself to ease the crushing weight of the blood on my hands. It was for my family, I told myself as I held the gun. It was for the best, I told myself when the CIA made an offer to me. Ah, yes...The offer... How could I almost forget such a thing? At eighteen, my family was found by the CIA, in big trouble for our associations with the Yakuza and loan sharks. All seemed hopeless until a dangerous-ridiculous road was offered.

"We've been wanting an inside person, Kage." The agent told me.

"You'd fit the deal... A young man in need of a decent life for his family... His own family already in ruins..." He paused. "We're making you an offer- work with us to take down the district three branch of the Yakuza, and we'll put your mother, sister, and yourself in witness protection in the U.S.... Give them a new start, you know?" He smirked. "Your pasts would be left behind, you'd be under military protection, and you'll live with a clean conscious... What do you say, young man?" He asked.

Of course, I took the offer, who wouldn't?... But I never knew I would lose my family in the process.

That aside, I rolled over on the bed; my back now facing the side once occupied by my wife. I huffed, saddened at the thought of our current situation. I knew she didn't love me anymore, but baking everything on Isa felt easier. Restless, I climbed out of bed and stumbled to the kitchen nook.

Pouring myself a cup of coffee, I glanced at the digital clock. Green symbols displayed the numbers three-zero-zero. Three in the morning, I sighed. This had been happening a lot, restless nights surrounded by loneliness and crisp air. Walking over to the glass balcony I held my cup of coffee, it's warmth keeping me warm in the chill night air. Stepping outside, a voice greeted me.

"Good morning, Mr. Park." A small voice with a thick Latina accent rang through my skull.

"Ramos- What has you up so early?" I ask.

I had forgotten Isa was living with us now, another thing that relentlessly bothered me. Huijin had said it would be more convenient for both of us as Isa often did housework as well.

"Never went to sleep, Mr. Park. Why are you up?" Her faint voice echoed back.

"Insomnia." I replied bluntly before taking a sip of coffee.