Hoseok: 10 May Year 22

I was walking on a bridge when I snapped out of it. The sun was shining so brightly that it was difficult to open my eyes. Why had I come this far? I tried to think, but I got dizzy and my vision shook. My knees gave out and the honking of the passing cars attacked my ears. I saw the jet-black water of Yangji River in the corner of my eye. 

 

The orphanage auntie was the first person I could rely on after losing my mother. She was there when I woke up with a fever in the middle of the night and when my friend’s bed was empty after being adopted. She was there when I woke up in the hospital after having a narcoleptic episode. She was there from my first day of elementary school to my high school graduation. She was by my side through all of that. 

 

Then she got sick. One of the younger kids at the orphanage told me over the phone like it was totally normal. I can’t remember how I ended up going to Auntie’s house. The only thing I remember is her house and her face through the window. Auntie was talking with someone when she burst into laughter. Everything I was told about her being sick, that she needed surgery, and that there was no hope for her seemed like a lie. For a brief moment, she almost saw me. I barely hid in time. It felt like I would burst into tears if I faced her. It felt like words of resentment were going to start pouring out of my mouth. “Even you are throwing me away?” I started walking. I think someone was calling me, but I didn’t turn around. 

 

A bus blew air all around me as it passed. “Mom,” I mumbled while watching the bus get farther away. We rode a bus like that on the day that we were separated. Will Auntie leave me just like Mom? Will I lose someone important to me once again? The sunlight poured down on me as I raised my head. And then the world around me began to collapse. The sound of tires rubbing against asphalt, the wind blowing toward the river, and the memories of the times I spent with Auntie collapsed in the sunlight. I crashed into the ground.

 

@shootinghearts_

 

 

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