Jihoon used to know how to use both of his legs.

From the first time he started to crawling with both of his arms and legs, and started to know how to stand up later, and walk, and run fast with it. His parents used to say that both of his legs are beautiful, even if it was pale, just like rest of skin on his body, and even if his legs won’t make him any taller than children around his age.

But everything changed. On November 2002, in the middle of autumn rain on his sixth birthday.

It was a beautiful day. Sun shone the brightest that day, despite the cold weather, that soon would changed into winter. Some kids playing around the park just in front of his house, running here and there, playing swings, creating sandcastle, hands and cheeks covered with dirts, accompanied by leaves that flying around them before it felt to the ground. A group of parents were talking and laughing as they told stories with each other on the park bench while they were watching out their kids, bags of lunchboxes secured on their hands.

“Jihoon-ah”

The little kid, Jihoon, spun around at the voice of his mother, tearing his gaze away from the other kids, lips grinning widely, showing a small, white teeth with both of his front tooth missing, “Mommy!”

And she smiled at the endearing sight in front of her, not the nice weather on autumn days, not at the beautiful and fluttering feelings radiated from children’s laughs, but her one and only son, bounced, hopped on his feet, excitement reflected on his now reddened chubby cheeks.

She knelt to the ground, fixed a coat on her only son’s small body, muttered a ‘You’ll catch a cold’ on her breath, then placed both of her warm hands on the little boy’s shoulder to keep the boy in place, “Is my handsome pirate ready for a birthday party?”, and Jihoon eagerly nodded, heads bobbed up and down, “And for birthday presents and cakes?”

Once again, Jihoon nodded as he cupped his mother’s face, “Yes, Mommy! Jihoon is so ready! Let’s go, let’s go!”, and he giggled, pecked his mother on her cheeks eagerly, “This will be the best birthday ever! Did you bought me a Power Rangers robots?”

Just as he was about to describe every single birthday presents he was expecting to, his father got out of their house, car key on his right hand. And he too, smiled, mirroring his wife’s beautiful smile, “My little pirate looks so happy, isn’t he?”, and then placed both of his hands under Jihoon’s armpit, raised him from the ground, hold him steadily on his strong arms, “Which ship should we hijack today?”

And Jihoon, an adorable boy he is, screamed on top of his lungs as he wrapped his arms around his father’s neck, “Aye-Aye, the ship on ‘Pirate by the Bay’, Captain!”, earned a laugh from his father as her mother’s pinched his cheeks.

“Now let’s go, it looks like it’ll be rain soon. You don’t want to get into a storm in the middle of ocean, don’t you, Pirate-nim?”, her mother asked. The little boy once again nodded, and his father bring him down back to the ground, opened the back door and let him get into the car.

“Ah, it’s raining earlier than I thought”, his father stated as he drove, hands on the steering wheel, “And harder than expected”, and he pressed the button of the car’s windshield wiper, swept the water away to help himself see clearly in the rain.

Jihoon innocently asked, face full of anxiety, afraid that they won’t make it to go to the restaurant on time, “Dad, can we still go to the pirate ship?”

His father stealed a glance from the mirror, “Of course, Jihoon-ah. I’ve told you we’ll hijacking a ship today!”, he stated sing-songed, his eyes turned into crescents as he laughed before his eyes trained back to the front, focusing himself to the street in front of them, “But maybe we’ll be a little late, is that okay?”

Jihoon nodded, smile once again took his worry away from his face, “Okay, Dad!”, and he grabbed his car toys, playing with it, and blew his breath to the side window, write his name at the printed air on the window glass, the only thing he remember from his class back at school.

“Mom, look!”, he called his mother, pointed at his handwriting with his index finger on the window proudly, and the young woman turned his head towards him, “I write my name!”

“Aw, my smart little boy”, and she chuckled, “But it isn’t correct yet, Jihoon-ah”, she stated, smiled reassurely, “You read that as ‘Jisoon’, this is how you write ‘Jihoon’, baby”, she added as she illustrated the way to write his name.

Just as his mother wrote his name half-way, everything goes black and the last thing he heard was his mother’s voice screaming in the air.

“Mom, Dad”, he blinked, adjusting his vision to the light, called out for his parents.

There’s no one answered. He blinked once again, looked at his mother. Eyes closed tight, bloods flowed from the tip of her head, dried on her right cheek, “Mom”, he called once again, “Mom?”, and he looked at his father. His body tangled in an uncomfortable position, left cheek scratched, fresh blood still flowed from his right arm. He cleared his throat, somehow his mouth felt dry, “Dad, wake up, why are you sleeping? Are you tired?”

His father didn’t answered, lips sealed and eyes closed tightly. Jihoon grabbed his car toy, now broken, played with it, “It’s okay, Dad. You can sleep right now, we can go to the pirate ship later”, he stated, smiled softly at his father, looked back to his mother, “And Mommy can sleep too. It’s okay, I’ll wait for you to wake up, sleep tight”

And then there’s a noise, he faintly remember it as ambulance sirens. A guy opened his father’s door and dragged him outside carefully. Another guy opened the door on her mother’s side, also, dragged her outside, carefully. He blinked when another guy opened the door on his right side, “Sir, why do you take my parents? They are sleeping, don’t wake them up!”

The guy looked back at him, 911 printed on his clothes, a pitiful expression on his face, “They can’t sleeping here, kid. Now, we need to get you out of here”, he said, “Can you move?”, the guy asked.

Jihoon nodded and tried to move his legs, tried to get out of the car by himself. Only to found out that his legs were numb, won’t move him anywhere. He tried once again, twice, thrice, but his legs stayed in place. His mind goes blank, looked up at the 911 guy, scared, “I can’t, Sir. I can’t move. My legs, it won’t moving. What can I do?”

And the guy opened the door wider, got inside the car, carefully pulled him out, carry him as they got outside, and put him down on the gurney. He grabbed the guy’s shirt, “What happen to me, Sir? What’s wrong with my legs? Why can’t I walk?”, he asked. But then he saw his father’s now broken, wrecked car. And from afar, he saw another guy placed both of his parents into body bags.

“Sir, why are they−”, and those guys put his parents into an ambulance, “Why are they taking my parents into that ambulance? Why they separate me with my parents?”, then they closed the ambulance’s door, “Wait, sir, why−”, he tried to stand up, tried to lift his body with his elbow, only to failed once he tried to use his legs, “Sir, please bring me there. Bring me to my parents!”, he shouted, “Sir!”

And the guy beside him only hold him down on the gurney, closed