Sunoo's bright and cheerful persona was a testament to the fact that humans are capable of hiding the darkest, murkiest secrets behind a simple smile. Sunoo had learned how to smile when he was a kid. It was fairly easy. All you had to do was scrunch your eyes and curve your lips upwards. It might look unnatural and fake when you're a beginner, but as you gain more experience, it becomes far less obvious.

He sighed.

Home. He dreaded that word to the core.
Home never existed for Sunoo. He didn't have one.
Home is a place where you feel safe, where you unload the weight of the day. Home is warmth in a rainy day. Home is comfort.

Sunoo lived in a house, not a home. Those are two very different things.

He had been out of his house for roughly twelve hours now. It was pretty late. Now there were no friends to hangout with, no blind dates to go to.
He stood outside his flat and reluctantly entered the passcode. He was greeted by his father, smiling at him weakly.

'Sunoo ya,' he said. 'You're back.' ' Yes appa,' Sunoo returned the smile.

His appa suddenly winced.

'Appa,' Sunoo's eyes widened slightly as he touched his father's face. He had a deep cut on his bottom lip. It looked like it had been sliced into two.
'Appa we need to go the hospital. This looks serious!,' he almost screeched.

Sunoo heard a sudden clanking of utensils.
He shivered.
Eomma.
She's mad right now, isn't she?

He clutched his father's arm and dragged him behind, standing in front of him. She came out holding a knife in her hand, pronging it up and down as she walked in his direction.
'Hospital?,' she sneered. 'Who'll pay?', she threw daggers at Sunoo with her eyes.
He looked down at his feet and gulped.
'Appa looked hurt,' he faltered. Eomma looked at him with the irritation. The kind of expression you make when you look at an unwanted pest and are searching for ways to get rid of it. Sunoo had seen it before countless times. It petrified him.
'Yah Kim Sunoo,' she held the knife under his chin. 'It's been long since we had the talk, right?,' she smirked.

The talk.

'I'm sorry eomma,' he whispered, digging his nails in his palms to stop tears from escaping his eyes.
'Boyeon ah,' his appa pleaded. Sunoo's body started shaking like a leaf. 'Boyeon ah,' he kneeled down, folding his hands together. 'You can take your anger out on me. Just don't hurt my boy again,' his eyes started brimming with tears.
She scoffed.
'I'll think about it after he stops talking back to me,' she snapped. She dragged Sunoo by his arm and pushed him inside the attic. She locked the door from inside.
'Pull your sleeve up,' she said curtly.
'Eomma,' he said in a shaky voice as a tear slid down his left cheek.

'I don't have all day you idiot!,' she thundered.
He hastily pulled up one of the sleeves of his sweater and t-shirt. He didn't want to anger her any more than this. There were faint purple marks against his pale skin. Winters and cold weather just worked fine, but during summers concealers became a precious commodity.

Boyeon grabbed his arm and pierced the knife deep into his skin, twisting it.

'Aah!,' he shouted in agony.

'Keep it down you brat!,' she pulled his hair. He
whimpered. She pulled the knife out and dug it in again, this time a bit higher. With his other hand, Sunoo clasped his mouth to muffle his cries. His lips quivered as tears streamed down his cheeks.
He had been through this before but somehow it never seemed to hurt any less.

Boyeon pulled the knife out of his arm and wiped the blood off her clothes. 'Kim Sunoo,' she said, holding his tear stained face with her hand, penetrating her nails into his cheeks. 'I hope you've learnt your lesson. Lecturing you takes a lot of my time,' she pushed him. Sunoo lost his balance and collided against an old book rack, sending some of its contents flying backwards.

Boyeon facepalmed. She looked at him with her cold black eyes. 'Fix that mess,' she slammed the door shut and left.

Sunoo stood up and fetched the first aid kit he had hidden behind a broken chest of drawers. He sterilised the wound and started applying the ointments. He didn't know what his real mom had been like. But there were some days.
Days like these when he missed the mother he never knew and wished she was alive.
He finished dressing his wound and pulled his sleeve back up. He picked up the old, tattered books which had fallen out of the book rack minutes ago and stuffed them back in. To someone watching their family right now, it might seem like he, particularly looked like he had forced himself to stay in such a situation. But his "mother" was the sole breadwinner of the family so calling Child Protecting Services a few years ago would have either landed him alone in his mom's custody or in a foster home. He desired neither. Right now, buried under countless student loans, affording a separate flat to live away from Boyeon was only a dream he dreamt. He was stuck. Debuting as a singer through one of the biggest entertainment agencies in Korea was his way to drag him and his dad out of this hell.
Music was the only thing that had kept him sane all these years. He loved writing songs and composing music as much as his old, battered laptop allowed him to.

His laptop.

He smiled. This smile was real, not the plastic one the agency people and his classmates fawned over. It made his pretty hazel eyes glisten. He touched his old laptop. It was lying broken in the attic. His dad had gifted it to him on his thirteenth birthday. He had stolen money from his stepmother, god knows why. This came with a price, of course. When she found out about the cause of disappearance of her money, his dad ended up losing a finger and Sunoo's laptop ended broken. She hated music, and most importantly, she hated watching Sunoo happy.
That was her motivation behind destroying the laptop, even though it had been purchased through her own money.

She was vile, cruel and pathetic. Sunoo detested her with all his heart. She would definitely pay for it someday. Someday, he believed, karma would get back at her.
He swallowed back his tears.

Author's note
Not gonna lie, this chapter was extremely hard for me to write for a wide variety of reasons. Nevertheless, I hope it turned out okay. Tell me if it feels extremely bland at some places. Thanks for reading❤️
Appa - father

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