You lay lazily in your bed, your eyes half open, as you whirled around in your half-asleep, dream-like state. Everything seemed perfect. You stretched and grinned - content and warm in your bed.

"Mmmhhmmph!" You groaned as you stretched, and then suddenly your eyes snapped open.

'Oh… I 'totally' forgot!'  You thought sarcastically, 'My life !'

3 days earlier:

"Mr. Lee," the principle's voice was monotone, not filled with the slightest hint of sorrow  or regret "We are afraid to tell you that your daughter is not well disciplined."

You saw your dad straighten up at this, as the medals on his uniform wobbled. That would hurt him deeply. He had been a captain in his younger days, before he married, and had trained many soldiers. To say that his daughter was undisciplined was a blow below the belt. For him anyway. You could deal with it. It wasn’t like you had anyone to discipline you when you were growing up anyway.

The principle seemed to not notice my dad shifting "So we've decided to expel her."

At this my dad exploded "EXPEL HER?! MY DAUGHTER?!"

You began to shrink in my seat. That was when your father, very calmly, told you to go home without him. He didn't return home until late. And he arrive drunk. You grimaced hearing the crashing and yelling downstairs, hugged your giant soft dolphin toy. 
 

*End of flashback*

What a wonderful way to started the week. Your eyes moved to a photo frame on your bedside table. Good morning mum.

It was one of those days where you knew something 'big' would happen. But you weren't sure if it could be breaking your arm for the fifth time, or that your father would decide to pack up and move. There were too many things that could go wrong in your already-broken life.

Grumpily you rolled out of bed and crawled to the fresh, but messy, pile of clothes you had arranged to wear today. You stumbled towards the bathroom for a shower. As your hand rested on the doorknob, you could hear your father moving around downstairs.

Damn, I wanted to wake-up early and avoid him.

It had been three days since you last saw him, he had avoided you as harshly as you did him. But now you guess he wanted to talk. And if he does, it’ll just end in disaster. We are always awkward with each other and to talk to him is like consulting with a doctor. It’s like he has his own language.

You locked the bathroom door and quickly undressed. Cold water blasted onto your skin and you leapt back in shock ‘I’m never going to be prepared for cold water when I always expect it to start hot… what’s the point of being prepared? Dammit, you’ve had a thousand showers but this always gets you, doesn’t it? Man up, woman!

You grinned to yourself at your last ironic thought.

As the water warmed up you began scrubbing yourself. You flinched as your finger brushed over your black eye.

*Flashback*

“Hey !” the voice of your daily tormentor, Kim Soo Jong, called down the school hallways. Inwardly, you laughed at all the girls who turned to answer his call. You kept your back towards him as you hurried to escape. You were not in a good mood that day, after staying up the whole night finishing an essay. You weren’t even sure you had kept on subject.

Someone grabbed your shoulder and roughly turned you around to face him, causing you to drop your books. You glared at him and began to bend down to pick them up.

“Hey, what’s this?” Soo Jong grabbed your wrist hard, while he leaned down and picked up your wallet, which you also dropped. He pulled out a photo and began laughing “Who’s this ugly ?”

You clenched your hands in anger as he showed the photo of your mother and 10 year-old you to the gathering crowd. He turned back to you, his ugly face twisted into a smirk “Was this your mother? I know where you’ve got your hideous features now. Like mother like daughter, right everyone?” he sniggered as others laughed.

“You better stop it, if you value your life” your growled.

He laughed at this “Oh yeah? You’ll kill me?” he eyed me teasingly “C’mon then… I dare you!”

That did it. You usually ignored him and his lame- comments, but this time he had gone too far and your fuse ended.

THWUMK!

Your fist met his nose and he flew to the floor. Furious you leapt upon him, showering him with blows and ripping at his hair, “TAKE IT BACK, YOU MORON!” He turned and socked you good, but you didn’t stop your violent rage until you were pulled apart by passing janitors. By then, the adrenaline was pulsing while both of you were bloody and bruised.

“WHAT’S GOING ON?” a voice boomed as the principle appeared.

“S-she attacked me… for no reason at all.” Soo Jong whimpered.

*End of Flashback*

What a coward. I had never gotten caught for bashing up my offender before, so I hadn’t been prepared when someone ripped us apart. I ended up hitting a teacher didn’t I? you grinned to yourself and scrubbed the conditioner out of your hair.

You glanced at your waterproof watch.

8:53 AM.

‘Let’s just get this over with.’ you muttered to yourself, as you turned off the shower.

---

You finished getting dressed and headed down to the kitchen, your damp hair draped across your shoulders. Your father was bent over the stove. Suddenly there was a burst of smoke and the frying pan was covered with flames. Your father shrieked out a string of curses as he threw the pan in the sink and blasted the would-be breakfast with tap water.

“You know, you could’ve just had cereal.” You swaggered into the kitchen, grabbing a bowl, a spoon and a packet of cornflakes. As you prepared your meal your father frowned at his wet, charcoal-crusted eggs. He sighed and grabbed an apple instead and took the seat across from you, “You should learn how to cook, yourself. You’re a female.”

‘Yep, he wants to talk.’ You grimaced and hurried back to the kitchen to get the milk (and to delay his lecture). As you opened the fridge and hungrily searched for the milk, you could feel your heart sink as you realized that there was none left.

You glanced back to your bowl filled with cereal and grabbed an orange instead. You joined your dad at the table. You both were silent for a moment, brewing over your spoilt breakfasts.

Then you heard you dad shift in his seat. ‘Here we go…’  you sighed.

“Jung- I… you… well to start off…” he mumbled. You rolled your eyes. While your father could bark out endless orders and scream insults at men the men he commanded (even now, as he worked in an office), he always seem to draw a blank when he tried to communicate with you.

Suddenly his eyes focused on you, “Daughter, I know that it’s been five hard years since your mother died…” at that, you flinched, but he continued, “a-and that I haven’t been around like a father should, but.. er- well I thought that you were a nice, hard-working student. But I guess you proved me wrong on Monday.” He chuckled half-heartedly.

Again, you rolled your eyes and began peeling your orange. He cleared his throat and spoke louder “I’ve come to the decision that you need to be disciplined and since… erm- well since I’m always at work I…” here he cleared his throat again “So I’ve decided to send you to military school.”

You choked on your orange as it hit you. ‘Military school?! He’s going to send me away?!”

“D-dad…” your voice croaked. You shook your head and then glared at him “No.”

He looked up at you “What did you say?”

You glared at him, half feeling guilty at your disrespect “I said ‘No’. I will not go.”

Before your dad could answer his phone rang. He answered it as you furiously ripped the peel off the orange, citrus spray flew into the air.  ‘I will not go! I will not go! He can’t make me! “ You sunk your teeth into the sweet fruit and flinched as the juice leaked onto your cut lip.

“Daughter.” You glanced at your father in mid-bite “I need to leave for work now. You are leaving early tomorrow morning.” He held up his hand, as if you had protested, but you only sat there in shock “We’ll talk later, when I arrive home again.”

He grabbed his bag and left. You continued to sit at the table, trying to comprehend what he had just said. Leave? Tomorrow? Military School? Did I miss something? What the Fu- wha… I… He can’t just…

Your eyes met the painted eyes of your mother, in a family portrait across the room, “What do I do, mother?” you muttered as a single tear fell down your cheek.

Suddenly annoyed, you wiped it away. ‘You’re stronger than this, Lee Jung! You just have to convince him that you can’t leave. That you mustn’t leave. No matter what you have to stay here and please mother.’

Cheesy? Yes. But hey, for eight years I had watched my mother slowly dwindle until the last two months where she was taken to hospital. They had asked her if she wanted to go to be more comfortable. Huh! Comfortable for what? Leaving behind her eight-year old child who barely knew her father? And then she asked me to look after him? Huh! His solemn face had only hardened when she didn’t wake-up that morning. There was no sadness or regret at the loss of a beautiful, loving wife and mother. 

Glancing around the room, carefully noting the mess and calculating the mess in the other rooms. ‘I’ll clean the whole house for him. I’ll prove to him that I can’t leave’ you nodded firmly to yourself, although a small part of you knew that it would be in vain. That it was hopeless to change your father’s mind.

‘No… I will change his mind. I have to…’