"I'm coming home

To breathe again, to start again"

We stop, and we get out of the too small car. I can see them trying to avoid them. I can see that they're trying to hide it. But I don't blame them. I would avoid me, if I could. If only I wasn't me.

The house is nothing special. Clean, yellow, at least, not the ugly brown I remember. I wonder if they can reach me here, in this deserted house on the shore. And then I shake my head, feeling stupid. Then I wonder if there is a place on Earth that they can't reach me. I decide there isn't. Except death. Death, maybe. But is death on Earth? My mother, when I was little, used to say whenever I was sad about my grandmother dying, that she was in heaven, in the stars. And the stars aren't technically on Earth. They're in space. So if I were to die, I might not be on Earth. Although, I might go to hell. And isn't hell inside Earth? So I would still be in the Earth. And there, I would meet them. Because as sure as I am right now that everything will fall down one day soon, that all the fragile, clear-glass walls will crack and crumble around me to let the demons in, I'm even surer that they aren't going to heaven. So they would find me. I couldn't escape them. I can't. I will never. I will never escape them.

They are all afraid to touch me after what had happened with Joon. I couldn't help it; for four months, human touch was bad; it was the start of a torture session. So what was I supposed to do? So instead, Seungho tells me to come on, gently, in a quiet voice I had to strain to hear. So I follow them into the house, leaving the car behind, and in to our new home. 

"So," Byunghee says, setting down his bag. "This is our new home."

"This is your new home, Mir." A rough, low voice hisses in my ear, and I start awake at once, my head throbbing painfully.

"I think you'll like it here." He takes a knife and presses it to my quivering throat. At the same time I feel his hot breath on my ear, and I could smell the onions on his breath as he leans closer. I shiver as a tongue brushes over my ear, then the edge of my ear, wet and disgusting, and sending chills rocketing through my still strong body. I clench my teeth, but he withdraws his tongue so he could speak again. 

"I think you'll love it here."

I couldn't help it; I curl up, pressing my hands to my ears, and yet still feeling the hot breath, the smell of onions that always lingered on his breath, the wet tongue on my ear. I loosen my jaw, intending to let out a scream, but I can only manage a whimper, faint but so loud in the silence of them and me. The floor is cold, and I hate it. I hate the cold, but I can't move. I can't breathe. I can't breathe.

Over me, I can hear them. They're panicking, running, but I can only focus on my lungs, forcing them to breathe, to move, to do something. At first they just sit there, doing nothing, protesting. Protesting me living, protesting me thinking, protesting me. But I force them, I make them move, and I can breathe again. Slow, small, painful little gasps, but at least I can. I can breathe, I can live another minute. Although if even my body is turning against me, I don't know how to continue. 

Cheondung kneels beside me, and I realize I'm still crouched on the ground. I don't want to move, though. The cold has become warm, and although the tile is still hard and ungiving, it is a comfort to me, even if I don't know why. I wish I could stay here forever. I wish they didn't try to help me. It's no use, can't they see that? Can't they see I'm too gone? That I'm too lost to be saved? I wish they would stop looking at me. I wish they would go, although I know somewhere I would cling to them if they really did leave. 

But I know them. I remember that they would never give up on me, always taking care of me, no matter how much I annoyed them. I wonder, exhuasted, how I had had once so much energy, so much smiles and laughs and enthusiasm to be like that. I wonder where it went.

They took it, probably. They take everything. MBLAQ, A+'s, happiness, my mind. They've taken my mind, and with it my sanity, and locked it in a chest. They took it with them, when the thunder was grumbling and water poured down in millions apon millions of tears, and light split the sky and left invisible scars in the black left behind. They took it with them as they dumped me on the grass, hasty and careless, not that they had ever been careful with me before. They took it, and I fear I will never find it again. I know I will never find it again.

But I want to make them happy. I want to make them think they are doing something. So I get up, the warmth and hardness and comfort of the floor missing immediately, but I stand anyway, and look everywhere but any of them. I avoid Cheondung, who is still kneeled on the floor. I avoid Byunghee, who is standing there, bags still weighing him down, eyes fixed on me. I avoid Seungho, who is sweeping his eyes around, pretending he wasn't looking at me. I avoid Joon, who looks so lost I want to comfort him, but I have no words. I have nothing to say, and even if I did, I couldn't say it. They took my words away too. They took everything. 

So I just take a single bag, the one I know they packed for me, bow my head, and leave. I was going to go to my room, but after I realized I didn't know what that was, I left the bag abandoned on the side of the stairs. I took off my shoes, and propelled by a strange urge, I walked down to the beach. Sitting cross-legged on the beach, I notice the sound for the first time. It wasn't the roar of trains, the whistles, the sound of cars beeping and voices screaming and a slap of skin and bones against skin and a cheekbone. It was the lap of the waves, the voice of the ocean. And, somehow, it calmed me. I didn't look over my shoulder, as I now had a habit of doing, just to check they weren't there, at least physically. I didn't hear voices, I didn't feel anything but grains in between my toes and the late afternoon sun shining from behind a thin cloud. I closed my eyes, took a tentative breath, and thought, just for a second, that I could beat this. I could beat them. 

And then I am snapped back to reality. I don't know how, I don't know why, but suddenly, a knife was in my hand, and I was there. I was there again.

"This is a knife, my sweet, innocent Mir. Today, I will teach you how to use it." 

I closed my eyes, willing for when I opened them, to be anywhere but here. But it didn't work. It never worked. 

"No."

"Oh, yes. And you will be a good student, yes? Because if you aren't obedient, and follow my instructions correctly, you will be punished. Am I understood?"

I set my jaw, and didn't answer, although I felt fear build in my stomach. 

The man, this time a different one, snarled and bent down, to take a lock of my hair to tug on it brutally, twisting it and racking his huge, gnarly fingers in it, scratching my scalp and making me groan in pain. 

"Am. I. Understood?"

"Yes."

"Good," the man purred. "Now, take this knife. Very good. Now, raise it to your cheek, like so."

Trembling and knowing what was coming next, I did what the man asked. 

"Now, press. Press the knife into your skin until you can feel a sting. Good. Drag the knife across your cheek to your jaw. Good."

I squeezed his eyes shut, feeling the burn of pain in my cheek, felt my hand trembling on the knife, but still I obeyed.

When I had cut a deep enough wound in his cheek, the man leaned down, running his finger across the open and bleeding cut. I winced in pain, but managed to swallow any sound I would make.

"Good Mir. Good job today. Maybe you will get a reward from me." And the man walked out, leaving me in silence. 

When I snapped out of it, I found I was on the beach, sitting in the sand. I found a knife in my hand. 

"Take this knife. Very good."

The knife in my hand was shiner than the other. Newer. 

"Now, raise it to your cheek."

I can't. I can't refuse. I raise it to my cheek.

"Press the knife into your skin until you feel a sting."

I can't refuse. 

"Drag the knife across your cheek to your jaw."

I can't. I can't. My body is no longer mine.

I'm not in control.