Heartstrings

Chapter Ten: The First Cut is the Deepest

Charity. 

Charity. 

He is just a charity work.

Baekhyun clutched onto the railing with all his might, trying hard to control the threatening tears from falling but perhaps he wasn't doing it properly as he felt them making its way down his cold cheeks. The words, they wouldn't let him have a control over his bruised heart. They kept repeating themselves like a broken record, hurting his head like a bitch. He still tried to not break down, to not make a sound but when the scene he had witnessed, the conversation he had overheard, crossed his mind, all Baekhyun could do was fall to his knees, weak and broken.

"You are a charity."

The words pierced his heart into infinite pieces giving him a burning pain. Everything started to feel meaningless. Those words, those fake promises, the laughs, their friendship, everything started to feel like a joke.

A big fat lie.

Why did he think that the Parks would not be like the others? Why did he think that there was no business involved when they took him in? Who in their right minds will care for a dead employee's son unless they wanted the spotlight? Why did he think that they were actually helping him? Just because they protected him from getting raped and sent the culprit to jail? How did the thought that they loved him ever crossed his mind? How did he even thought that he was not being used just as a pawn?

Because they promised him a happily ever after with the love of his life?

By being fooled and lied to for all these years, Baekhyun must have set new levels of blindness and plain idiocy. He was being deceived every day for the past 8 years without a hint or a clue to see it. His legal guardians must've won Oscars for their breath-taking super real acting. Even Chanyeol should be awarded an Academy award because wow, he played the role of a perfect best friend and boyfriend so damn good!

But why? Why him?

Why did they play with him? Why did his life got destroyed in such a way that he couldn't even think to rebuilt it? Was this some sort of revenge on his dead parents? Did his late family do something wrong? No, as far as he remembers, his parents were so simple, too kind to even lie to someone. They could never betray their employer. It was against their morals.

So why?

Did Baekhyun do something along the way that had hurt the Parks? He agrees he was never the smartest person out there but he always tried to obey them. He did what he was told to, lived how they expected him to. Stayed away from any type of scandal that could ruin his guardians' name, tried to make a name for himself so that he could make the Parks proud and show them that they didn't do a mistake taking him under their wing. Then what went so horribly wrong that led to this? Was it his own fault somewhere that made the Parks play with his life and toy with his feelings?

Or was it for fun from the start? Is it how it was? Was Baekhyun so lost in the love showered upon him that he didn't bother reading between the lines?

"...hyun? Baekhyun? Are you feeling okay?"

Baekhyun wiped his tears off and quickly stood up slowly when he saw Mrs. Park looking worriedly at him. Or so he assumed.

"What happened, son? Why are you crying?" She asked in a sickly-sweet voice that fell like a hot iron on his ears. He wanted to tell her to drop the facade, to stop acting as if she or any of them really cared. He wanted to tell her that he knows-knows the motive behind their care. That he finally knows the truth behind their lies. But he didn't, he couldn't. Call him a coward but he just couldn't bring himself to lash out at the lady who had treated him like a son. Maybe she was faking it, but still, she was always there when Baekhyun needed a motherly figure. Even if her love wasn't real, he knew he loved her genuinely.