Chapter 29

I haven't seen him all week. He hasn't even texted me, but it doesn't take me long to figure out that his phone has been taken away. He would never just ignore me like this by choice. Sometimes I try to talk through the wall, but only once did he reply. It was soon cut short as his mother interrupted. It seems he's not allowed to even close his door now. What kind of hell is that? To feel like a prisoner in your own home. I miss him more than I thought I would. In my past relationship, I never cared much about how long it had been since I saw my boyfriend. I could go weeks and feel fine. But now, all of a sudden, I feel like I'm always on edge. My legs constantly shake when I'm sitting and my fingers won't stop fidgeting with whatever they can grasp. The energy bouncing within me almost makes me get up and knock on his door at one point, but my logic forces me to stop and try to meditate, as my father would suggest at this point. It didn't work much though. On this evening, I'm taking a break from studying and am watching a show. Despite being a comedy, it doesn't do much to improve my damper mood. I've even been wearing the jacket Jaewook forgot, hoping his lingering scent will reassure me that he's okay. When my door slowly opens, my eyes have to blink a few times in order to be sure of the image in front of me. "Baby." "I don't have much time," he says. "My mom has an appointment." He quickly climbs onto the bed and moves my laptop away from me. His hands hold onto my jaw and he kisses me deeply. "Jaewook," I pull away, "why? Why was she so mad?" He looks at my eyes, left and right, as he contemplates what to say. "I don't like talking about it, but you should know." He settles beside me on my small but familiar bed. "My father is abusive, as you've guessed by now, but it isn't just that. He's only like that when drunk. Sometimes he'll go a month without hitting us, then other times he'll come home drunk four days in a row. It's unpredictable. But the worst thing is my mother. She uses me as a shield, that's why she's so possessive of me." So his mother has built a tight wall around her son in hopes to keep him by her side for what seems to be forever. No wonder Jaewook often feels suffocated by her. Despite her not being the abuser, a mother shouldn't prioritize their own self over their son if they truly love him. I can hear his words struggle to leave his mouth now as his eyes water. "My father didn't used to be like this, it started maybe when I was 13. When it first happened I defended my mother and fought him for her. Ever since then she expects me to take his hits for her. She gets anxious when I'm not home at night, worried he'll come home drunk and hit her without me being there to save her sorry ass. She only sees me as a shield now. It never used to be like this, never, I don't know what happened. She doesn't act like my mom anymore, she just uses me as an asset and hopes buying me things with my dad's money will make up for it." He's sobbing in my arms now as he says this. I rub circles on his back and stroke his hair. "I hate them both, so much. I just want to get away. I want to graduate so bad so I can leave. Destiny," he looks at me with red eyes. "Destiny please leave with me. Come with me. Please." His vulnerability cuts through me as I grow speechless. I can't just promise to run away with him, but his desperate pleading breaks my heart. "Okay baby, don't worry right now. I'm here now." He takes a deep breath to steady his sobs and wipes his tears. He quickly composes himself as a whirlwind of emotions evidently washes over his face. "Enough—enough tears," he grumbles. "Noona, I just want to kiss you. I want to touch you, I've been missing your touch this week so bad. It almost hurts how much I ache for you." My body freezes at his words, which aren't said in a way that implies he's trying to turn me on or tease me—not at all. He's saying it as fact, as truth. He physically aches for me. "Okay," I simply say as I hold onto his face. That's all he needs to hear before he places his soft lips back over mine. His uncharacteristically delicate movements make me yearn for him as well, as I realize that I too missed him so much that it hurts. He holds onto my face as he angles his kiss. Then his tongue pushes through my lips and tangles with my own. My body slowly falls back onto my bed as he hovers above me. The kiss lasts for so long that my chest heaves and gasps for more air. So he lets me go and moves down my neck instead. It's not like before. It's not playful as his tongue runs along my nape, it's not teasing when his hands roam under my shirt. None of this is a game anymore as I let him take our shirts off. It's serious, almost dire, our need for each other is so intense that no words even need to be said, as if our form of communication has resorted to touching. It doesn't take long for all of our clothes to become a collage of colour on the floor. And it takes even less time for me to fall completely under his spell as his mouth causes me to whimper. And all the while all I can think about is how much I feel for him—how everything attached to me inside and out feels connected to him, intertwined with his own entity. I can't imagine not having him now. I can't imagine him being alone, without me. I can't imagine ever feeling this way with anyone else ever. I love him. I know this and have known it for quite some time. I've never fallen in love quite so quickly, but I think that's because this feeling of love is very different from the love I felt before. It's much heavier, much more menacing as it blinds me until I can only see him, only smell him, only feel him. So as I sit on his lap—his lips fluttering over my neck and my fingers roaming through his hair, our bare skin sticking to one another in a way that makes it seem as though we are one being—I say the words aloud. And he doesn't even falter, doesn't even blink as he looks into my eyes and says the same words. "I love you too."