The room was dark and silent, still and lifeless. Large drops of rain pelted against the windows causing a soft rattle to go through the house. Kibum sat on the living room couch with his blanket wrapped around his shoulders comfortingly. He was just staring out into space blankly without a single thought flowing through his mind. It had been almost a week since he’d gotten home from the hospital, home to an empty house, only to realize that his parents had left him. But since then, Kibum had been waiting for them day by day, hoping that they had just gone on a vacation for awhile to escape reality. He was waiting for the moment he heard the car pull up in the driveway and the door to open, and then he’d hear his parent’s voices calling out for him and telling him that they were home and loved him so much.

But he could only hope, because in reality he knew that wasn’t going to happen. They were gone and they weren’t going to come back. And one by one, the neighbors packed up and left as well so that he was the only left in the entire neighborhood. Kibum felt completely alone and isolated from the rest of the world, and he hadn’t even chanced leaving the house yet. He was scared, to say the least. He didn’t know what was waiting out there for him. Would it be like before, when everyone would give him looks and whisper behind his back? When strangers would come up to him and start telling him how he deserved to rot in hell for killing his sister? When no one knew the truth but blamed him anyway? It wasn’t fair and it was absolutely cruel. But then again, he’d tried to escape it by slitting his wrists. He hated whoever found him and brought him to the hospital. Everyone wanted him dead, so why did someone save him?

Kibum closed his eyes and whimpered to himself, just letting himself drown in self-pity because there didn’t seem to be anything else to do. School was out of the question, his head was still pounding from crazy from finally being off that damn anti-depressant medicine they’d forced him to take at the hospital and he doubted anyone would care if he just stopped going to school altogether. He just didn’t care anymore, about anything. His parents were gone, his sister was gone, his life was a mess and nothing was going to get any better. I should just try again, just take the knife to my wrists again. No one would be here to save me this time, he thought numbly. It seemed like a really good idea. He didn’t know what he’d been thinking before, doing in in the school bathroom where anyone could have found him. But now he was home alone and there would be no one; it would work this time.

He stood up and held onto his blankets, making sure they didn’t fall off his shoulders as he walked into the kitchen. If there was anything good about his parents leaving, it was that they’d left everything as it was. Kibum walked over to the cutlery drawer and pulled it open, glancing at all the sharp knives that were in it. He reached down and pulled out a small one and then leaned against the counter and stared at it. This was it, the end was finally here; no more pain, no more suffering. Kibum felt tears well up in his eyes as relief washed over him and an adrenaline rush ran through his body, sparking his nerves and making him excited. This was it, this was the end. His heart beat sporadically, pounding painfully in his chest as he slowly lowered the knife to his wrist. He applied a little bit of pressure, enough to only draw a little bit of blood; he didn’t even feel the pain it should have brought.

Just as he was about to press down and let the ruby red blood run down his arm, something stopped him. Kibum dropped the knife out of his hand and it clattered to the floor, causing a loud noise to break through the ultimate silence. He didn’t move a muscle and looked out the window; there was a car there, a familiar black car. Kibum watched as a man got out of the driver’s side and walked up to the house; a few seconds later he heard the front door open. He stood there frozen as his father’s best friend, Lee Yanhwa, entered the house. The man was like an uncle to Kibum and was Dayeun’s godfather, him being there made hope spark up for Kibum, making him think that perhaps he was there to come save him and bring him to his parents. However, he was a bit surprised when Yanhwa headed down the hallway, but figured that he was just looking for him, so instinctly he followed the older man.

Quietly shuffling down the hall, Kibum heard noise