17 DAYS TO GO | KWON SOONYOUNG

32

Hana

The turned off lights and the thundering weather outside only made me remember the night I had wished I could wholly forget. The night where my life turned upside down. It changed and not for the better.

I recall welcoming an empty house after my extra classes that was led during the exam season. The cold then was eerie and cold, a weird smell lingering as soon as I had opened the door.

It wasn't new that my parents weren't home that evening but a part of me urged that they indeed were home. "Mom? Dad?" The middle school girl hoped she could've turned back that day, maybe I could've been exempted to a horrifying sight.

"M-M-MOM!" I had sprinted right across the room to my mother who was laying on the cold floor, droplets of blood scattered on her temple. "R-run" The words she had spurted out as soon as I fell into her embrace.

"What's going on?" The tears in my eyes were accumulating faster than the downpour outside, "Hana-yah" Mom had managed to slip out. "You n-need to get out of h-here"

Taking my hand in her's, she had gotten up and rushed towards the door with me being dragged behind. "Before your father gets here" the little girl couldn't understand why they had to hide away from her father, the man she loved dearly and who loved her very much. Little did she know.

"W-why?" I had witnessed my mother stumbling and staggering, fumbling with her fingers to get hold of her car keys. My eyes had wandered across the house, a gag erupting from my mouth when I noticed the trail of blood from the bedroom.

"Where's Dad?" I had managed to ask yet was ignored, "Mom" I shook her by the shoulders. "Shh"  She hushed me down, still busy trying to find her car keys. "W-where is h-he?" The moment she had  whipped her face towards my direction, I noticed the tears falling down her cheeks.

My mother was an extremely strong person, a woman who rarely cried just because she didn't want to appear weak. I guess I get that trait from her. The current me would rather bend than break.

"It your father finds us....he will kill us too" My mind wasn't that matured but it ran to different directions as soon as she had conveyed those words. "Kill us?" I hadn't realised that I was sobbing or whimpering, "We don't have time for explainations, Hana-yah!"

But I needed them. I needed them so much that I couldn't breathe then, knees shaking and my world crumbling. "But-" Her hand immediately flew to my mouth, silencing my further words. "Shh"

Without another thought, Mom had pushed me behind her as soon as she heard clattering of steps against the cold floor. Her hands were trembling but she used them to encircle me, protecting me from whatever harm that was nearing us.

"WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING?" The loud, booming voice caused a ripple of shiver to run down my spine. It sounded fierce and emotionless, anger seething through its pitch. "Our little Hana is here. I see"

I wished that I didn't peek from my behind my mother's towering form, i wished that I didn't come home early that day, I wished that he wasn't my FUCKING FATHER.

The man held another man by his collar, he was wounded and bruised. Blood dripped down his face and his features were contorted. It was goresome sight and I had to cover my mouth in order to not throw up right there and then.

"Why d-did you do t-this?" My mother questioned, her voice just above a whisper. "Wasn't he getting too close to you?" Dragging the unconscious man behind himself, my father had settled on the couch, just like he was sitting now.

"Why did you kill him?" The question that rattled my mind every night and day. I had finally asked him.