Alone [A Lisoo Story]

Chapter 1

After closing up the convenience store after a late night shift, she rides her bike back to her apartment. The sky was pitch black, there weren't any stars nor a moon. Just black, pure, dark blackness. 

Jisoo hopes her father isn't back home yet. If he was, she hoped he was asleep. Jisoo cautiously opens her apartment's door with her key. 

The whole apartment reeked the smell of booze, Jisoo lets out a sigh. She quietly locks the door after walking inside the apartment. 

She sees her father laying on the couch watching a football game while chugging cans after cans of beer. There was small puddles of beer on the ground. There was also a pile of finished and empty cans of beer. 

"You're finally back, huh?" Her father grunts before walking to Jisoo.

"S-sorry, I was working." She stuttered.

"Sorry?"

"Yes."

"You think you're sorry?" Her father yells, furiously. He pushes Jisoo on the ground. "I should've never raised you, you little piece of shit." 

Jisoo falls to the ground. By then, Jisoo had known what was coming. Her father grabs Jisoo by her wrist and squeezes it tightly. 

Tears escape Jisoo's eyes. Her father pushes Jisoo to the ground again before kicking Jisoo in the stomach. 

She wheezes and groans in pain. Each kick, it gets more painful, more uncomfortable, harder to bear. Until, it stops. Jisoo was barely even able to open her eyes, she sees her father, passed out on the ground, drooling. She stood back up, still trembling. 

Jisoo slowly walks to her room, clenching to her stomach tightly. She tends to her wounds. It has already been a torture for Jisoo to endure that much abuse, adding on she has to work after school to earn money. 

Her father has been unemployed for a month already. But, that is not the reason he drinks. He got addicted to alcohol and started becoming abusive after he divorced with her mother and decided to take Jisoo with him. 

She hasn't bothered to report her father for abusing her because he is Jisoo's only family member that she knows. She is also somewhat intimidated and scared of him. If Jisoo does report him, she is scared that he will hurt him even more, or worse, kill her.

After tending to her wounds, she takes a warm shower to clear her mind. She makes sure to not take too long because she still has to finish doing her homework, do the chores and make food. After she gets out of the bathroom, she checks the time. It is 11: 58 pm. 

She quickly cleans up the mess made by her father and does all her chores. She checks the time again, it is 1: 39 am. She hurriedly walks back to her room which made her flinch in pain.

Jisoo sits down on her desk and does her homework. She already did half of it at the school library to refrain it from taking too long at home. 

After another hour, she finishes her homework and walks to the living room to check on her father, he was still unconscious. So, Jisoo decides to go to bed as she was already exhausted from all the work and abuse. 

This was her schedule for literally almost all weekdays. It was tiring, but she couldn't do anything about it as she needs to put food on the table and take care of her father.

She slowly walks back to her room and closes the door. 

"Goodnight, umma." She said to a picture of her mother, hanging on the wall of her room. Her room was a simple room with grey walls, a bed, a table, a wardrobe and a chair. 

The only decoration was the picture. However, the picture brings warmth and joy to Jisoo. It brings her hope at the lowest points of her life.

She turns off the lights and then goes to bed, worn out from her job and studies. But mostly, worn out because of her father's terrible drinking habits, worn out because of how those habits hurt Jisoo and how it made her feel. It made her feel dreadful, it made her feel pathetic, it made her feel like she was alone.