I remembered one morning when I woke up to the frantic whispers from my older brother’s room which was just right next to mine. I took a small peep into the door which was left mostly closed.

“Yoon Jae”, I saw my mother sitting by my brother’s bed with my brother sitting right up and listening to my mother earnestly. I could feel the still air in the room. They sounded serious. What was going on?

My mother grabbed my brother’s hand. I remembered that was what she said.

“I know you are capable of taking care of yourself. But your sister, she still needs you to take care of her and protect her”, my mother told my brother, I could almost sense that she was on the verge of crying in her words.

“When the both of them moves in, don’t get into a direct conflict with them, you still need your father to go through your education years. You don’t have to feel bad for me, Omma is selfish but over a decade of torturing is enough for me” she continued.

 My bother nodded. Being 5 years older than me, I always admired my brother’s matureness. He gave my mother a hug as she left for the door.

My mother opened the door and she saw me. She gave me a hug and a kiss on my forehead and she went down the stairs with this humongous luggage.

I was confused. Nobody told me anything. Where is my Mom going?

A sudden screech caused from the sudden halt of a car caught my attention as I made my way down the stairs.

I walked through the living room with an ominous feeling inside me. I pushed the door opened with insecurity and I saw my mother lying lifeless on the ground as blood trickled from the back of her head. I saw my father standing just right in front the door, holding to my mother’s very precious bracelet that my grandmother had given to her right before my grandmother passed away.

My mother, she tried to escape that horrible house. And she failed.

3 weeks later after my mother’s funeral, my father’s new wife and her daughter moved into our house.

That 13 year old Shin Se Kyung, she became someone that I was destined to fight with for the rest of my life.

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