RILY - J.JK

Hit or Miss

Shit, not good. "I was in the library studying with Iseul." My gaze snapped to Donghyun, who formed an 'excuse me' with his mouth. My mom looked at me suspiciously "okay well, but why so long." my father didn't look too happy either. Did I catch a bad day or why are they both in such a bad mood today. "I wanted to make sure, that I understand everything now." Now it was my father who glared at me. "Fine because if you fall behind on your grades it's going to make our family look really bad and you don't want that, do you?" I could swear there was something very wrong today with the two of them. My eyes fell to the ground in embarrassment. "No father." "From now on, Y/N, I always want to know immediately where you are, with whom you are somewhere and what you are doing. Do we understand each other." My father's tone scared me. A small, barely visible tear fell from my eye.

Donghyun seemed to have noticed and chimed in, "Father, she understands, you're scaring her." None of us could believe what happened next. My father slapped me. It burned. It burned so bad. And I didn't know where it hurt more, on my cheek or in my heart. "Why did you do that?" said my brother, shocked by the scene he just witnessed. My mother gave an arrogant tone, "Don't question your father, Donghyun!" Is she for real? "Your sister has to learn to speak for herself and to become independent, we can't afford any mistakes in this family." Father repeated. Everything hurt, I wanted this all to be a bad nightmare, but it wasn't. "Did you just call your daughter a mistake? Are you crazy father, tell me what's gotten into you two? You just hit her... and mom you just watched like it was the most harmless thing in the world! And then right in front of Seo-ah! Lord, she hasn't done anything to harm you or our family!"

"It's okay Donghyun, I deserve it." I tried to calm the situation somehow, but I couldn't. "Your sister is right, she deserves it and that's how she learns, and if you keep going against an adult, you'll experience the exact same thing," father replied. I just wanted to go to bed and forget about it all. How can such a beautiful day become so terrible? Donghyun looked at me again but didn't say anything more, probably for the better. "Have we settled the matter now, you both?" my mother asked, looking at Donghyun and me boredly. We just nodded, "Well, I don't want to hear any more from you." After Mom had finished cooking the food, the five of us sat at the table. All of us were quiet, all you could hear was the sound of clinking cutlery. I was most worried about Seo-ah. She must have been very scared.

After dinner I went straight to Seo-ah's room, to talk to her. The wound still hurt and I'm sure I won't really get any sleep tonight. "Seo-ah can I talk to you?" She looked at me scared but then nodded and invited me onto her bed. I took a deep breath. "Does it hurt?" she asked. I pressed my lips together and shook my head "It's alright, the worst part was the shock." "Why did Mom and Dad do that?" they are so different since a few weeks, I don't understand it all myself, maybe their current work is stressful." "I don't want that to happen to you again Y/N. I'm scared." Me too. But I can't tell her that. "Everything will be fine, don't worry, it won't happen again. After all, they are our parents and they love us." At the moment I doubted it. Seo-ah looked up at me and hugged me tightly "I love you Y/N" "Me too" I smiled at her and hugged her back. "Now go to bed and sleep, you also have to go to school tomorrow." I covered her up and turned off the light and walked out of her room into mine.

After I changed my clothes and was about to go to bed, there was a knock on my door. "Can I go in for a moment?" I recognized the voice and knew it had to be Donghyun "Sure" When he came in, he quickly closed the door and hugged me. And this was the moment where i couldn't hold it in anymore, I started to cry. "I'm so sorry I didn't do more to help you." "It's okay, Dongi, it's not your fault. It's my fault." He broke the hug and held my shoulders tightly. "What? No! What are you talking about. You didn't do anything! I don't understand why the two of them did that!" He gently stroked the spot Father had hit. "Are you in pain, do you want me to get you something?" "It's okay, thanks." I tried to laugh but couldn't. "Mom and Dad have changed so much in the past few weeks." "I just said the same thing to Seo-ah." Donghyun continued to rub my back. „Did you talk to her about it?" „Yeah, but i only told her that it's going to be okay and that I'm fine, she looked so scared earlier I didn't want her to go to bed like that." "But what if it wasn't a one time thing. The two of them aren't really thinking straight anymore... at the moment."