sounds to words || yoongi • jihyo

3. Chemtrails Over the Country Club

Shoutings. Screamings. Cursings.

This home is hell. It has been more than ten years, and Jihyo is still never accustomed to the chaos. Oftentimes, she wished that everything was just a dream. A really bad dream. A nightmare.

Every night before she closed her eyes, she prayed that she would wake up to peace. That her mom will comfort her and his dad will laugh while messing with her hair. Like it used to be. However, everytime the sun’s coming up she realizes that everything is real and she indeed lives in hell.

CRASH!

Jihyo has lost count on how many glasswares have been shattered in this house. She hugs herself while looking up to her ceilings. At times like this, she loves to drown herself into the jubilant thoughts. Into her past –or theirs to be exact, if her parents even remember.

In the past, her mom always baked the best cake every weekend. In the past, her father would always ask Jihyo to go for a little adventure around their place. In the past, they would go for a simple picnic every month. In the past, Jihyo would witness how her parents danced together in the kitchen. Her mom laughed so prettily and her father would whisper love words.

Everything, and Jihyo means everything was perfect. She was too you back then, but she remembers how she wants a pretty and soft love like her parents had. Everything was beautiful, until it was not.

She is unsure how everything started, or maybe her brain just refused to remember anything at all. Everything was so blurry for her. What she remembered was, her home was no longer warm. Her mom was no longer full of fondness. Her father no longer radiates happiness. Everything becomes ugly, and Jihyo is alone.

She knows too damn well that these thoughts will not help her at all. If anything, it will ruin her even more. It will turn her into a pathetic sobbing mess as she craves for the impossible reality that she cannot grasp once more. Worse, these thoughts will tire her and get her into an ordeal dream, which does not get better when she wakes up –well, obviously.

Jihyo can feel her cheeks are wet now. As she raises her hands to wipe the tears, a breeze of afternoon wind moves her hair. Before she reacts, a familiar sound reaches her ears.

“Hey, are you okay?”

The only person in the world who cares about what she feels. Her home.

“Yoongi?” She tried to sound as okay as she could, even though her red eyes and wet cheeks said otherwise.

“You cried again.” And it was not a question, so Jihyo does not answer it. It was a statement and who does Jihyo think she is fooling?

As Yoongi’s rough fingers wipe her tears, she looks at the opened window, which was Yoongi’s entrance, as usual.

Her eyes shifted from the window to Yoongi’s concerned face. She forced a smile, “It’s okay, I‘m not crying.”

Yoongi looked at her with a straight gaze, “Yeah, and the Earth is flat.”

She cannot help but to stifle a tiny laugh. See? Who does she think she is bluffing? But then, her smile stopped, “Hey, is that a new bruise on your cheek?”

Yoongi brushes her question, “Let’s go, get your things ready.”

But Jihyo held his arms, “Yoongi, answer me! Did your uncle hit you again?”

“It does not matter. Come on, we are running out of time.”

Jihyo wants to launch a protest. Of course it is a matter for her. He matters to her. But Yoongi is right, they need to hurry up. The train is approaching. So, she grabs her bag and follows Yoongi who is already sitting on the window’s sash.

Yoongi carefully reached the tree’s branches sticking out to Jihyo’s room. As he prepared to climb down the tree, he said to Jihyo “Give me your bag.”

Obviously Jihyo shakes her head, “It’s heavy. I can bring it down myself.”

“Jihyo, for this once please stop being so stubborn.”

If this was their normal and usual banter, Jihyo would glared at him and hit his shoulder. However, as this is a precarious moment, she reluctantly gives Yoongi her bag.

Jihyo watches how Yoongi skillfully climbs down the tree. As both of his feet touch the ground, he looks up and nods to her as a signal. Jihyo nods back at him, yet before she reaches for the branches, she looks back at her room.

Suddenly, all the memories rush back. As much as Jihyo hate this hellish home, her room is still one of those places that oddly makes her feel secure. There is a weird comfort in it. But, staying at this house will surely turn her into a maniac like her parents.

She scans her room for the last time and closes her eyes while mentally saying good bye to her past life. The next second, she is already on the trees and climbs it down swiftly. Of course she is good at it, this is not her first time fleeing from her house.

What makes today different is the probability that she might not come back. Ever.

As Jihyo fixes her clothes when she reaches the ground, her eyes look at the sturdy tree in front of her. Back then, her father built a simple swing in this tree, because Jihyo always spent her time queuing for it on the playground.

Instantly, it becomes her favorite place in the house. Sadly, not long after the swing was made, her parents started the unending fight. And Jihyo would spend her time swinging under this tree to avoid the sound of her parents' fight. Until the swing broke and Jihyo did not have an ounce of bravery to ask his father to fix it up.

"Jihyo." Yoongi's voice breaks through her mind and pulls her out of the past —as usual.

As Jihyo looks at him, she recognizes his gaze. The same gaze that she also has on her own eyes. Mirroring each other's pain and misery. At least, they have each other to share their torments.
Yoongi offers his hand, which Jihyo accepts in certitude. She smiles at him and he replies hers with his own.

One step. Two steps. Three steps. And they run following the wind. Throwing the dice of life while hoping the universe will bless them, for once.

Run they are, as nobody's son and nobody's daughter.

fin

author's note:

a sudden and unexpected update since suddenly i finished this haha. i hope this is enjoyable. bye~