ENTHRALL° s.th

001

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THE ARENA
AFTERNOON
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✧──────✦ "park jaehwa representating korea in the blue guard!"

"and mu xinying representing china in the red guard!" the announcer yelled as the two teens entered behind their country's flag.

"welcome to the junior taekwondo championships!" the mc spoke into the microphone.

the girls walked onto the mat holding their headgear. they kicked at each other's gear once or twice, and the referee had them bow to each other. the match began with a yell from the referee, and the two of them threw all types of kicks in hopes of being the victor.

it was only two minutes of fighting until the minute break. then another two minutes with another minute break.

round 1- 3:2

round 2 - 7:4

the girls were close in points. they just needed to keep this up for two more minutes. jaehwa looked for an opening on her torso to try and knock xinying out of the designated fighting area.

what she didn't see, was the agitated look on the representative from the china representative's face. xinying pretended to stumble and fell directly onto jaehwa's knee. she felt a rip as she hit the ground, but she wasn't a quitter.

that stunt had earned xinying a few penalty points, but now jaehwa couldn't think straight. all she thought of was finishing this round and embarrassing her. she landed one more extremely strong hit that knocked her out of the boundaries before the buzzer sounded and signaled the end of the final round.

"AND THE WINNER IS-"

all she could hear was blurred yells around her and the fast beat of her own heart. everything seemed in slow motion as she took deep breaths, not even noticing the pain yet.

she saw her opponent come over and give her a handshake that involved sharp nails and a smug smile. xinying knew what she did. and jaehwa was pissed, but turned over to her coach who was yelling with a wide smile.

she stumbled over with weak legs, and nearly collapsed by the woman. her coach pulled her headgear off to reveal a sweaty face and matted hair. the middle aged woman grabbed her face and slightly slapped it a little bit after a kiss on the forehead.

"did i win?" jaehwa asked quietly.

"you won! you giant brat, you won!" her coach's muffled voice rang in her ears.

she won.

at that, jaehwa collapsed onto the ground still panting. her hearing was finally coming back, and the paramedics came to help her up and walk out of the arena. as the adrenaline ran out, she cried out after putting pressure on her left knee. they quickly brought out a stretcher for her and fastened the belt to her.

as they rolled out, she looked around for any familiar faces. her parents. where were they? they said they would come to this match. she really put her everything into it.

with a deep breath, she closed her eyes. just for a moment.

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THE HOSPITAL
EVENING
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jaehwa woke up to a not so quiet beeping in her ear. as she began to gain consciousness again, she felt a dull burn in her knee. she wiped the sleep from her eyes and moved her vision to the painful area. one thing she did remember was the pain in her knee. "probably just a sprain" she thought.

what she didn't expect to see, were bloody bandages wrapped around it. jaehwa moved her slightly shaking hands to it and slightly pulled the bandage away from the leg. she caught sight of the wound and her heartbeat quickened as her eyes widened. the monitor on her side started to beep louder and quicker to let the nurses know something was wrong.

nurses and doctors of all ages ran in to find a panicking patient. she tried to pull her arms away from the ones who tried to restrain her. jaehwa felt a prick in her neck and felt the sudden need to fall asleep. it was just a nightmare, she'd wake up from it eventually.

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she woke up for the second time, still in a hospital bed. the girl took in her surroundings and looked around with half open eyes, still feeling the calming effects of whatever the doctors gave her.

jaehwa tried to pull her arm up to move her hair out of her face, but it stuck to the bed. they really restrained her. the small clinking from her struggle caused her coach to get up from her chair in the waiting room and walk into the room.

the nurse came in and undid the constraints and helped jaehwa sit up. "i'm so sorry." her coach said.

"what happened to my knee?" jaehwa asked, biting down on her tongue.

"you tore your acl. you needed surgery for it." she said bluntly.

"oh." jaehwan was surprised that she wasn't angry. in fact, she didn't really feel anything. just kind of, numb. why couldn't she feel anything? but another question came to her mind, "hey coach kim, did my parents come by?"

the woman looked at the ground and shook her head. "they came by to fill out paperwork and then went back."

she nodded slightly and asked, "so when can i go back to practice?" her coach looked to the left, that didn't mean good news.

"they aren't sure." jaehwa snapped her head up.

"excuse me?"

"the doctor said you shouldn't think of coming back."

what?

"well obviously i'm going to get better. i just need a few months, right?"

"the doctor said no, he didn't advise coming back."

that's all she could think of. everything she had worked for, was gone within a span of a ten minute match. jaehwa bit the inside of her cheek as she thought a little bit about her future. she wasn't a good student, she paid more attention in class to the next move she planned on perfecting rather than studying. jaehwa had planned on focusing on taekwondo for the rest of her entire life. not to mention that she had never even heard of an athlete bouncing back from an injury like this.

taekwondo was the only thing she had. the girl gripped the sheets hard and her knuckles turned white. jaehwa finally found her voice, "can you leave? i just want to be alone right now. thank you for coming though." her coach nodded and gave her a kiss on the head before leaving the room.

jaehwa wanted to scream and cry. she wanted to tear this stupid room apart. why did a room this big in size feel so suffocating? was white and blue always such an annoying color? don't even get her started on the smell. but she stopped herself and closed her eyes to steady her breath.

she knew it wasn't allowed, but she moved her legs off of the uncomfortably firm hospital bed. and tried to be as quiet as possible as she moved to grab her phone that was across the room. the girl grabbed it and nearly fell when she put pressure on her knee.

jaehwa unlocked it and searched her name. within half a second, were articles upon articles about her.

"Korean Prodigy Knocked Out For Good?!"

"Park Jaehwa, Taekwondo Prodigy from Seoul, Encounters Career Ending Injury!"

of course she found ones that wished for her fast recovery, and others that had called her nasty words and a dirty player. how was she a dirty player if she was the one in the hospital? she ignored the negative ones, and opened an interview with the chinese representative. it was obvious that they had gotten backlash from the injury, and was now crying apologies and bowing, trying not to get banned.

jaehwa chuckled at the audacity of the girl while she waited until the doctor came to check on her. the man told her about what was going to happen now, and that she had to stay in bed for a week or so before she could get discharged. everything else went in one ear and out the other, and all of a sudden, the world outside of the window became interesting.