I sat alone in the dark for a long time. It’s been a while since I’ve been here. I guess I’ve been faraway for too long. I forgot how my room looks like, I even forgot that tomorrow’s my mother’s birthday.

It’s been a while since I’ve come home.

How long has it been? 5 years since I’ve left home for stardom. I missed home a lot at first. I often got homesick, but eventually as time passed and I got busier I tended to forget where I came from.

In my room there is a twin bed I slept on for 12 years. Its covers are blue, my favorite color. The walls are a mix of white and yellow making it look lively when the sun shone in through the window above my desk. It’s the desk where I used to do homework every day after school.

When I first returned home, there wasn’t this mix of excitement at all. A lot of my neighbors and fans crowded around to welcome me back, but it all seemed normal. I’ve gotten too used to this kind of life. All the attention and all the love, that it no longer feels the same. I feel monotone.

Mom offered to make my favorite kimbap and I simply gave her a reply, “Yes.” There’s no love, no emotion in my voice.

I’ve grown weary of everything. Maybe even life itself. When walking through the city I see the playground I used to love going to as a child. It was also the place where I had my first kiss, but I can’t feel the excitement of the memory. It’s been too long ago.

When I start to head back home a crowd filters around me and asks for pictures and autographs. I give it to them with the smile I always use.

I’m empty. My home is empty. I’ve forgotten that my father works overseas leaving my mother home alone most of the time. In the depths of my room I discover a photo album of a very much younger me. The smiles on my face then were so realistically happy. Then I remember that I was very happy. I used to be very happy.

That was all before work tore me up and let me have no time for myself. I’ve changed, I see. My mother treats me the same, but I can’t return to myself and treat her affectionately as I used to. It’s no longer, “Mom, I’m hungry!” Now it’s, “I’ll buy something to eat.”

Where is this outgoing person now? The one that used to fill the house up with music and video games? The one who brought his friends over every other weekend? The one who grew excited at every little thing?

The Gundam models that I’ve fought with my mom for sit on the shelf above my head. I used to have so much love for them. It was an obsession I couldn’t get over, but now they’re just pieces of plastic molded together. I don’t see anything important in them.

I’m desolate and almost emotionless. Since when have I begun feeling like this? I’ve never noticed before. Where’s that boy I used to know?  

***Ok, I admit it's boring. I'm losing my touch of writing good drabbles.