Rain.
Beautiful, cleansing rain. Washing away dirt and sin in equal measure. Soaking through cloth and right down to the skin. Until flesh broke out in a thousand tiny pin pricks, shivers running down the length of his spine. Beating against old brick in a drum beat rhythm, a perfect melody that played over and over with his mind.
It was late. So late and he should have been home long ago. Because the streets, no matter how brightly lit, were no place for someone like him.
Someone innocent.
Someone pure.
Someone pretty.
Those warnings had been given thousands of times, but still he refused to listen. Refused to believe. Decided to play with fire and walk entirely too close to the flame. Didn't understand the rules by which the game was played.
Then again, he didn't actually care.
Later, he would look back on the exact moment it happened and wonder if maybe he had been the one to seek it out. If he had finally grown so tired of his normal, ordinary life that he had subconsciously sought the danger out. That he had forced himself to bear witness.
All of his life there had been horror stories. Of being captured and sold. Of being snatched right off the street, in broad daylight. Of families with loved ones who had been lost. Never seen or heard from again.
And now his family was one of them.
...
It had been raining that night. Later, when he would attempt to look back at it, everything would seem as though it had been placed beneath some sort of filter. Made to appear hazy and cold when he could clearly recall it being neither.
His family had never actually bothered to look for him. But he would learn that later. That there had been no missing persons report filed. Nothing mentioned to anyone about the sudden disappearance of their son. No, in their minds, it had been something like a blessing. It didn't actually matter how it came about; weather it had been something he chose or a happy accident, they were finally free.
They spun a story. About how their disappointment of a son had finally decided to stop being the family embarrassment.
And that was the first time he ever considered actually asking for anything.
...
Asking Jimin to find information on his parents had been something he'd kept quiet. A secret he held within his own heart until the moment it found it's way back. Until things came full circle and he realized that he had never meant anything at all.
How could they care so little to not even wonder what had happened to him? How could they truly view him as such a disappointment that they would find relief in his suffering? He could be anywhere. Could be in any state. Could not even exist within this world any longer.
And they wouldn't care. And despite how far he had come, how long he had worked at accepting his own nature, something inside of him broke. Despite how loved he was for who and what he was, despite how adored, how cherished, something inside of him snapped.
Because he had loved them once. With all of his entire heart. And gave and gave and gave and had gotten nothing but distain in return. Nothing but hatred. Had stood by willingly as they tried to turn him into something he could never be.
As they ruined him.
Destroyed him.
But he wasn't the true disappointment.
