Forewarning: Abusive/neglectful language and behavior.

Light curses spilled from his mouth as he fiddled with the door lock. The spare key slipped out of his shaking fingers for the umpteen time in the few seconds he attempted to unlock the front door to his dreaded house. Jeongin never thought he'd return, never wanted to return, yet somehow here he was standing at the door like a criminal attempting to break into a house with nothing but the cover of the night. As he finally slotted the key into the lock, turning it and hearing a proper click on the knob he enveloped with his hands, his heart pounded in his chest. When he opened the door wide enough for him to slip inside, his heart felt as if it were about to collapse.

He prepared for the worst, and stepped inside.

There were noises in the kitchen, the sound of a cup being placed on that wooden table his parents placed in there for no reason other than to provide a place to spy on whoever left and entered this prison. It was followed by footsteps. Heels on the linoleum floors. Jeongin held his breath.

When the sink faucet switched on, he scurried past the kitchen, and up the stairs.

He tried to keep low, quiet, mimicking the rats that hid under city streets as he navigated a familiar yet unrecognizable hallway to his room. When the sink faucet turned off, he pressed his palms to the floor in attempt to keep his footsteps silent. To anyone else, it would've looked pathetic but to him, every bump in the house was enough to send the scenarios in his head racing. That confidence he had on his way, up to the point he entered the house, all drained away as he heard his mother's voice in the kitchen.

With unsure steps, he soundlessly made his way to his room and clicked the door open.

Without glancing too much anywhere else or even caring, Jeongin made his way to the other side of his room. He laid down on the floor in front of his dresser and stretched a hand underneath the furniture, his fingertips brushing against the leather pockets, before he successfully extracted Chan's jacket from under the dresser. With an unsteady arm, he sat against the dresser and laid the jacket out on his lap. It looked perfect. Unharmed, like it had never been disturbed since he had placed it there. For a few minutes, he ran his fingers across the fabric, afterwards clutching it tightly to his chest as he wiped tears from his eyes and tried to remember why.

Taking a few moments to calm himself, Jeongin scanned his room as he stood. Nothing inside had changed. It was all untouched, as pristine as the day he left it, his unfinished history homework still open on his desk. But, the room felt lonely. A frown found it's way to his lips as he brushed his knuckles on the end of his bedsheets.

This wasn't the time or the place to be sentimental and get caught up reminiscing about all the lost memories of his childhood. What he could've had. And now, the pieces he was left to put together.

None of it made sense.

But it's not my fault. It's theirs. It's my parents, and Chan's, Seungmin and Felix, even Mr. Park. Stop crying for them.

No one wants you.

His fists tightened their grip on the jacket. What kind of mind couldn't even make a decision on what to feel? One second it's trying to clutch onto a memoir of distant feelings for comfort, and the next it's blaming the memoir's owner with a wrath he didn't know he was capable of possessing.

He slipped on Chan's jacket and began to head downstairs.

Who cares what happens next?

As soon as the sole of his shoe connected with the bottom floor of the house, a call for his name came from the kitchen. A shrill voice, one of a warden he never wanted to hear again, one he just wanted to shut up. Yet, as he was called for, his legs carried him to the opening of the kitchen while he was trapped armored in a daze of jerky movements and a racing mind.

"Jeongin, sit with me," She called him one last time, and he obeyed without a word. Jeongin shuffled into the kitchen, sitting across from her at the small table as he clenched his fists tightly together in his lap. His jaw tightened. She watched him carefully, no doubt weighting her words for what would be the most effective before she inquired in a sickeningly genuine tone, "Do you... Have something in your hands?"

"No," His lips flatted into a thin line as he pressed his hands face down on the surface of the table. Unconsciously, he lowered his gaze to her painted fingernails. No matter how much he grew, or how much he thought changed, he still felt a panic in his spine whenever he was near her. Like a dog that was trained, he responded as she wanted. His teeth gritted together.

"Your hair is dyed," His mother observed as a depressive smile stretched on her lips. She lightly touched the end of his hair strands, as gentle as a mother would be with a son she loved, or they should be. It didn't feel right. Despite his mind telling him everything about this moment was strange, Jeongin let his heartbeat even out while he relaxed into the touch as well as the cheap chair. Despite every moment of below he wasn't enough that she instilled into him, he was able to convince himself that none of that mattered. It was nice to feel loved, even if it was for a few seconds.

The shadow his mother casted on the table grew as she stood from her seat. She released the strand of hair from her fingertips.

Even if it was fake.

His forehead was slammed onto the surface of the table.

Jeongin yelped, his hands flying to claw at his mother's wrists in an attempt for her to relieve the pressure she was forcing into his skull. He tried to wiggle free but all his struggling did was jerk the fistfuls of hair she gripped into a violent torrent of sharp nails and sensitive hair strands. The heart he thought he was able to settle started pounding again, thundering harder and harder till he thought it would climb out of his throat. His hands grew weaker with every tremor his nerves shot uncontrollably throughout his body and all he knew was he needed to get away. Somehow, he needed to run, he needed to break free from this.

But, he didn't know how. After all this time, he was still that scared kid who didn't know how to break free.

Her vexatious voice vehemently began chastising him, "Do you know the trouble you've caused!? Everyone is asking about where you've gone and we've had to make excuses for you. The police even came here to ask about you, you dare trouble these people for the likes of you? Do you not think you have created enough trouble for us simply by existing? Everything we've spent on you! Wouldn't it be better if you were dead!?"

Jeongin stopped struggling against her grip.

"Your brother will be getting his undergraduates degree this spring. Your teachers have been telling me you're slacking and skipping school. Do you understand the difference between you now? Why was I cursed with an unfortunate son like you?" She berated, nails digging into his scalp without mercy as she pressed his head further into the table. There was a chill in the room, in the house, that he was never able to feel before. An onerous feeling that hid in the family photos and in his mother's polished buisness heels. Why was he never able to notice it? Now, as the table began to leave marks on his forehead and his hands cramped from the comfortable position they froze at, there was nothing but that semblance.

After a while of her quiet, no more tussling or shouting from her lips, his mother let the tuffs of his hair go. She stood up straight, turned her nose up at him as if she were any better than he was, and straightened out her coat, "Apologize to us for making us waste our time on you."

Although she let him free, Jeongin pressed his forehead into the table as he parroted, "I'm sorry."

"That's not enough."

He tightened his jaw, hands coming to ball up into fists on his knees. Slowly, he lifted his head from the table but he didn't apologize. Not a word left his lips while a hefty silence carried out between them. If the mark on his forehead and the pain in the shape of crescent moons on his scalp were anything to go by, he had no reason to apologize. Even if she forced him, he needed to be stronger than this, he was different.

Jeongin looked her in the eye and glowered, "No."

"Jeongin, you're my son," His mother pressed in a tentative tone. Her hand stretched out to him.

"I'm not your son," He knocked his seat with the back of his knees, purposefully bumping it away to scream on the innocent tiles as he slapped her hand away from him. Jeongin turned his back to her.

In a last resort panic, is mother grabbed his arm, "I-"

Before she could say any, Jeongin whipped around, cocked his head back, and spat at her face. She pulled back from him with a sharp shriek.

"Fuck you!" Jeongin shouted as he backed away from her.

As he watched her try to clean her face, he never feeling happier that he listened to Jisung's random ravings. Riding off the adrenaline and emotional whiplash that about made his skull cave inward, Jeongin turned around and strode out of his house Not sprinted, not ran, he simply walked out the door with marching steps. For the first time he knew, she wouldn't be after him. She wouldn't chase him, she wouldn't call for him, for the first time he was able to break free from what he was conditioned to do. Response and reward, but the euphoria that came while he was marching down the sidewalk was stronger than anything he'd ever felt listening to his parents.

A few blocks away, Jeongin stopped dead in his tracks.

Although he was able to walk out of his house without any issues, that was the issue. He was just walking. One step at a time, forward, with no destination or journey in mind, getting high off of his brain dumping fight or flight chemicals into his veins.

Where... exactly should I go?

Back to the shop? Back to his house? In both places he had managed to stir up more trouble than it was worth, and what little pride he had left was stubborn enough to halt him from going to either. He could try to find his friends, but who was he kidding. Of course neither of them would let him in anymore, they don't care about him or what he wants, they never did. No one did. No one except... Strangers.

A simper corrupted his lips and his feet began to carry him to a new destination.

✘