𝐅𝐨𝐫 𝐘𝐨𝐮 & 𝐌𝐞 || 𝐒𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐈𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬

Hallucinate (2/2) || 16

"mrs song?"

"yes, that's me," she stands up, fixing her hair and gives a small smile to the assistant lady who nods briefly, telling her that she can go inside and the doctor will see her now. mrs song heads inside the modern looking office of the doctor. he smiles at her, standing up with his hand extended out, "i'm song yana, i—"

"yes, dr. heesung told me," he nods, "please have a seat, mrs song. heesung is an old friend of mine. he told me about your daughter and the family situation," he says as mrs song sits down, nodding slowly, "first of all, ma'am, i want you to be comfortable and tell me everything from the beginning, from your husband's death and when your daughter started taking drugs,"

mrs song nods, taking a deep breath and speaks, "my husband, soowon, had a stroke last year. he was aera's step dad. i married him when she was thirteen,"

the doctor nods, noting down something before he asks, "what about your first husband?"

"he was abusive," mrs song says, "he used to get drunk, hurt me and aera too. he never loved us. now you might ask why i even married him... it was because our families had arranged our marriage. he loved another woman but he was forced to marry me by his parents, and i was forced to marry him by my parents. he was rich, had a job of  charter accountant in a big firm. he looked like a nice package to my family,

"after getting married his family started persuading us to give them a grandchild because they were getting old and they wanted to see their son's children before they died. he was drunk one night and forced me into having sex so that i would get pregnant and his parents would shut up. that's how i had aera, my daughter," she says, glancing at the dr. kang who's just as indulge in listening to her as she's telling.

"he never really behaved like a decent husband or a father. he would yell at me in front of aera, hit me sometimes, and hit aera as well if she cried too much or if she didn't leave me. it took me a lot of time to gain enough courage to step up and finally leave him... most of aera's childhood was already ruined by then. she was already ten, grown very introverted, barely ever spoke to anyone other than me. i had a hard time taking care of her after the divorce because then i had to work and leave her alone,

"i worked as a librarian for a few months, where i got a lot of time to study and i started applying for better jobs which paid enough for me and my daughter to survive. i got accepted in a company as an assistant. they paid a decent amount and i managed aera's school fee from that. for two years i was only focused on bringing home some money and bread on the table. aera never had any extra interests like other kids, she never asked me to buy her anything, never asked why i didn't cook her favourite food... never. she would take whatever i had for her without any complains.

"she was thirteen, and i was still working in the same place when i met soowon for the first time. he had moved in the same apartment complex as us. we started talking and he eventually came to know about my past. he never withdrew himself from my life like most people did... he met aera and i still remember, the first thing he told her was that she had pretty eyes just like her mom," mrs song, rubs her eyes, taking a deep breath and looks down at her lap, "aera opened up to him eventually. he had some sort of magic in our life. i saw aera smiling and laughing like other kids after years, all thanks to him. he loved her like his own daughter,"

"aera became so attached to him that when he got sick she cried the most. more than me. she wouldn't let go of him and sat by him the whole night. soowon laughed at her the next day, saying that it was only a fever. but it wasn't. that was the first sign we ignored of his tumor... within a year his health was getting worse and worse. aera used to ask me if he's going to die, and i told her that he won't. i never had the courage to tell her about the cancer even after we came to know...