TRIGGER WARNING: This chapter contains suicide and homophobia.

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FIVE YEARS AGO

Yeosang chews his lower lip while looking around the white room. Chairs have been placed around in a small circle, and he is the first one to arrive, giving him the opportunity to choose any seat he wants. Walking around the circle of chairs a couple of times, Yeosang tries not to overthink this otherwise simple decision. In the end his choice falls on a seat from where he can look out the window too.

The door opens and a young guy, probably around Yeosang's own age, enters. His brown hair is messed up from the windy weather and the way he walks tells he feels just as awkward and nervous as Yeosang does. The guy briefly looks up and his eyes meet Yeosang's, but only for a second. Neither of them speak a word while the other guy sits down, two chairs away from Yeosang.

The silence in the room is so heavy and Yeosang even starts to wonder if he is breathing too loudly or in a weird way. To his luck, the door opens again and soon the circle has been filled out.

"Welcome everyone," a middle-aged lady, with a warm smile and a gentle voice says, "to your first group session."

Yeosang swallows a lump in his throat while he uneasily shuffles around on his chair. To his comfort it seems that everyone else is anxious about being there as well, Yeosang definitely feels like he is burning up inside. As a quick introduction round starts, his heart starts beating faster the closer it gets to his turn.

He's had countless of therapy sessions up until now, but only with a psychiatrist and himself. But it had been decided it would be best for him to be placed in group therapy, to share his story and shadows with others who were experiencing similar things.

"H-hi..." his soft voice cracks at the first word and his cheeks instantly blush up in a pink-ish color, "I-I'm Kang Yeosang, and I'm sixteen. Nice to meet you all."

Since the others didn't share much else, Yeosang decides to keep it short as well. They'll surely get into everything else later on. The group is a total of six teenagers like himself, and then the therapist who does seem patient and kind, something that Yeosang deeply appreciates.

Everyone gets their own time to share the reason why they are there, but only as much as they are ready to share with strangers on the first day. Some are openly telling their story, while others hold back. When it's Yeosang's turn he has gone through everything in his mind over and over, wondering what he wants to say. In the end he just decides to make it short, he doesn't feel ready to share everything on the first day.

~

When Yeosang returns to his home, it's empty as always. His dad is once again working late, trying to make money for the two of them. His father is without a higher education, and getting a job with a good pay is hard for him. This results in him working an endless amount of hours for very little money. Yeosang feels like such a burden, he shouldn't have been born at all – just like she used to say.

The apartment is small, but it's just the two of them anyway so it's not like it matters. The one they lived in before was bigger though, and much nicer. But after what had happened there, they had to move. This was only one more thing Yeosang could add to his list over things that weighed on his bad conscience, but his father had insisted even though it had cost them a lot of money to relocate from their old small town home, to an apartment in Seoul. Although it was hard, his father wanted to do it, for Yeosang's sake.

It's getting dark outside, and the stars are starting to show on the dark canvas of the night's sky. Yeosang loves looking at the stars, it has always been that one thing that would calm him down. He would dream, wish, he could be a star as well. Something so beautiful, but so far away from everything, something that people would look at and admire – just like he does. And even the furthest star shines just a brightly as the others if you take the time to look closely.

A painful sigh leaves his lips when he stares out the window. Today has been mentally challenging for him. Not only to listen to such heavy, sad and horrible stories from the others in his new therapy group, but also having to share something personal about himself to strangers.

But at the same time, it did feel kind of good. Them being strangers somehow made it just a tad easier to open up. Whenever someone was done sharing whatever they wanted to, everyone else could give some kind of feedback – if they had experienced something similar, how they had handled it and things like that. It had actually turned out to be rather okay.

Yeosang walks over to sit on his bed, carrying a stack of books and papers he needs to read. He's been away from school for more than one year now, but he has agreed to start again soon. He needs to get out of the house, to at least try to get back into a normal life. At least he doesn't have to return to his old school where everyone knows him, and what happened. In a couple of months, he will start fresh in a new class in Seoul.

~

Yeosang's eyes flicker around the room when it's his turn to speak. It's his third time at the group session, and although his nerves aren't as bad as the two previous times, it still feels a bit awkward to be there. In the end he just looks at his own hands while talking.

The second time he went there, he had shared a little about the dark thoughts in his mind. How he doesn't feel like he deserves to be alive, or to be loved at least. How he thinks about ending everything, pretty much everyday, but he doesn't want his dad to feel more hurt than he already does. And even though it was hard for him to get through last time, he walked out feeling a lot better. The overwhelming feedback he had gotten the previous times had made him feel so touched, so deeply and truly understood for maybe the first time in his life.

"M-my mother... She killed herself last year," he quietly mumbles, staring at his fingers and how the skin of his fingertips change color when he presses them together, "she... She had had some problems for a long time. Sometimes she would freak out over the smallest things. Scream vicious words at me, throw things at me. But..."

And Yeosang can't seem to finish his sentence. Tears are welling up in his eyes, making his vision become blurry. While trying to shut out the memory in his mind of his mother's hurtful words, he hears the calming voice of the therapist trying to break through to him, telling him it's okay and he doesn't have to go on if he doesn't feel like it. And he really doesn't.

~

At home, Yeosang once again sits in front of the window gazing at the stars. He wonders if he'll ever feel ready to share that part of his life that hurts the most, the part that haunts him and makes him feel so worthless. He feels an itching in his nose run up to his eyes and the tears that want to break free again. Will he ever stop feeling like this? Will he ever be able to live with what happened that day, one year ago?

Right now it doesn't feel like he'll ever manage to move past it, but he clings onto the small hope that one day he will. One day, he won't be brought down by his own thoughts, of the memories of her. What she did and what she said to him.

"Look what you made me do! You devil child!" her voice runs through his mind, as clearly as the day it happened.

His mother had always had her own battles, but in the end she couldn't control it anymore. Yeosang can't even think of one happy memory with her, whenever he thinks about her everything just hurts inside. All the times she said she hated him, how she regretted everyday that he was born. But the thing that made her completely lose it, was one day she returned home from work earlier than usual.

Yeosang had invited a classmate over to work on a school project together. To be honest, he had had a crush on the other boy for quite a while. His first crush ever. The boy was so sweet, cute and always happy and Yeosang felt drawn to that, to those things he wished he could be himself. Yeosang had never thought that liking another boy was wrong, and he didn't think twice when they shared their first kiss – Yeosang's very first.

And that was when his mother came home and saw them. He will never forget her face, the glare of disappointment and anger that had been piercing into his eyes when she looked at him. She had screamed at the other boy, instantly scaring him away.

"What do you think you are doing?" she asked, yanking Yeosang roughly by the arm. "Boys don't kiss boys, Yeosang! It is wrong! But why am I not surprised? You are so pathetic and desperate to be loved that you'd take anyone, wouldn't you? Mark my words, no one will love you. Ever! People like you don't deserve love! You fucking disgust me!"

Yeosang knew he shouldn't talk back to her, it only made things worse, but that day he had had enough. Enough of her constantly degrading him, enough of crying himself to sleep every night. And then he did something he probably shouldn't. When she started screaming at him, he screamed back. Only seconds later he felt a hand hit him hard on his left cheek, the burning pain spread to all of his face as tears started to fall from his eyes. He ran to his room, dodging whatever she was throwing at him that day, locked the door and hid under the covers on his bed.

Hours later she had finally stopped yelling outside his door. But when his father came home, everything started all over again. Even through the closed door, Yeosang could hear everything. His mother was furious at him, calling him all kinds of nasty words.

"I didn't raise our son to be a fucking faggot! This one is on you!" she screamed at Yeosang's father, "You've always been too soft with him, and look what he has become!"

Yeosang had pressed the pillow around his ears, trying to drown out the vile shouting from the living room.

When Yeosang returned from school the next day, something felt off the second he walked through the door. After putting his backpack in his room, he went to the bathroom where he was met by the most horrid sight; his mother was sitting on the floor, looking at him with this hollow look in her eyes. Her hair was a mess and her makeup smeared all over her face.

But the worst part was the blood.

In one hand she was holding a razorblade, deep cuts were slit across both her wrists and the blood was running down her hands, onto her clothes and the floor.

"Look what you made me do, you devil child!" she growled at him, her face pale as a ghost's and her body swayed while she fought to stay sitting up, "Your corrupted soul made me do this! Remember that, Yeosang, for the rest of your life; this is all because of you! You were the one who killed me!"

Her words burnt themselves into his soul, just like the hateful look she sent him. Yeosang could feel his heart beating in his throat, but he was frozen in a shock like state. It wasn't before his mother collapsed on the floor that he finally could feel his own body again. With shaking hands, he found his phone to call for help, his fingers mistyping several times and his words were messed up when the operator picked up.

His mother died that day, but her vicious words never left his side. Instead they merged into a dark shadow that would be hovering over him every day, reminding him that he would never be good enough - that he would never be loved. By anyone.