집 (Home) - Tablo Ft. Lee Sora

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22/6/14

    In the morning, when she woke up and noticed that the hands around her waist were freshly scarred and slightly bloody, that was when Taeyeon realised that there were more problems than those she already knew about. Placing her fingers on the scratches, Taeyeon ran her fingers over them gently and felt Jessica jerk her body slightly behind her.

“Have you cleaned them?” Taeyeon asked quietly.
At this, Jessica snatched her hands back apprehensively, “I know how to treat my own wounds.”
Taeyeon turned around and saw that Jessica’s eyes were red and her limbs were withdrawn, clenched against her body. The look in her eyes made Taeyeon feel her heart sink. She wondered how it was possible for a person to harbour so much self-loathing when she loved her so much.

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    Jessica is five. She is reading a book with a spoon in . Her brother hits the back of her head and she chokes on the spoon, and tries to get it out. Her brother laughs. Her mother calls her stupid for putting the spoon in in the first place. At age five she learns that it’s always her fault.

    Jessica is seven. She limps back into the house after falling off her bicycle and grazing her knee. The blood doesn’t stop. She tells her mother, in hope of getting some medical attention and is only offered a hum of acknowledgement. At age seven she learns that being dependent on other people is a liability.

    Jessica is ten. After being scolded and slapped for not doing her homework, her father tells her to stop crying. So she tries, but the tears still fall and she tries not to make any noise but she can’t stop sniffing and hiccuping. He asks her what reason she has to cry. He tells her to shut up. At age ten she learns that the only way she is allowed to cry is silently.

+trigger warning+ please skip the highlighted parts if you are sensitive about things such as self harm, depression, domestic violence, mentions of blood, etc.

    Jessica is eleven. After her father shouts at her for reasons she can’t remember anymore, she spends a while crying at her table, unable to concentrate on the maths in front of her, instead picking at her nails and making her fingers bleed. A few days before she had found a small, very basic Swiss army knife. It was minutely rusty, and the blade was somewhat blunt, but it was able to shave wood, so she decided it was good enough. She rolls up her sleeve and finds a place that she knows no one sees. She presses the blade to her arm, just below her shoulder. When it doesn’t bleed, she presses harder, increasing pressure and she starts to saw at her skin. But all she manages to accomplish is small beads of blood leaking out slowly from a red indent in her arm. There isn’t as much blood as she expected. She hides the knife again and thinks of other things that would be sharper. She eyes the nail clipper. It’s always sharp, isn’t it? At dinner her father asks why there is a red hole in her arm. She wonders whether to tell him that out of anger she gouged out a small amount of her arm just to see it bleed. She tells him that she hit the corner of a table. At age eleven she learns that nothing can hurt more than the pain you don’t ask for.

    Jessica is twelve. She runs up to her father, eager to show him something that she found. The force of his blow cause her to fall backwards, and her head hits the tiles with a thud. Tears begin to pour out of her eyes without her consent and she struggles to get up. He shouts at her and her mother does nothing. At age twelve, she learns that no one really cares.

    Jessica is thirteen. Returning home from the hospital after contracting pneumonia, her mother scowls at her. She asks Jessica why she had to have pneumonia, as if it was her choice, and chides her for wasting money. At age thirteen she learns that to her parents she is a wasted investment. 

    Jessica is fourteen. She cries silently, something she has mastered in the recent years, as her parents shout and scream at her and refuse to listen to any of her reasoning. Her father shouts at her. He says that if she wants to destroy herself, she can go ahead. At age fourteen she learns that love is a fickle word that is quick to turn into hate when it loses its way, and that she’ll never be important enough for anyone to want to listen to her.

    Jessica is fifteen. She wakes up at three in the morning, feeling out of breath and tears have slipped out of her eyes as she holds her neck in sweaty hands. She knows she’ll never forget the feeling of hands around her neck. She stares at the wall in darkness and hopes for the day she is able to leave. The hands never really leave. At age fifteen, in the darkness of the early morning, she learns that no one can control how her deepest feelings affect who she is, but there will always be people who want to do that and at this point in time, submission is the only way she can survive.

    Jessica is sixteen. Her mother reminds her, in angry bouts, that she doesn’t need Jessica, she doesn't need her, she doesn’t need her, she doesn’t need her, she doesn’t need her, she doesn’t need her. At age sixteen Jessica learns that she isn’t needed.

+end trigger+

    Jessica is seventeen. She finds a job at a local cafe, so she doesn’t have to rely on her parents as much for money. As long as she doesn’t have to study for exams, she works overtime, so that she can put off going home for as long as possible. She has slowly stopped talking to her parents. The only one of her siblings she still talks to is Krystal. Taekwoon is twenty, and he left home long ago. She wants to leave.

    Jessica is nineteen. She has managed to get a scholarship at a reputable university in Seoul, and she stays at the dorms there, with Yuri. Instead of pursuing medicine, like she told anyone who asked, she majored in music. Her parents don’t visit, and she is glad. She is finally able to sleep without fear of being woken up by shouting and arguing. At age nineteen she learns that silence is best when it isn’t shared.

    Jessica is twenty. She hasn’t seen her family for a year, and she is fine with that fact. Her scars (both physical and mental) are healing slowly, but healing nonetheless, despite the hurt she feels sometimes. She and Yuri buy over a run down bar from its (ironically) drunken owner and turn into a rock bar. At age twenty she learns that in addition to the two usual options (the “good, proven-to-succeed” path and the “ty, you-could-have-done-better” path), there is a third option. She can make her own path and go in whichever direction she wants. The path she chooses to take is hers to make.

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    “Jessica,” Taeyeon whispered desperately, moving closer to Jessica and holding her from behind, wedging her arm between Jessica’s stomach and the mattress.
“I’m sorry, Taeyeon.”
Taeyeon reached around to hold the scratches on the back of Jessica’s hand. She shivered at the touch of Taeyeon’s cold fingers and closed her eyes.
“There’s nothing I can do to make those scratches and wounds heal, but I can help them heal faster and lessen the pain,” Taeyeon said softly, “only if you want me to and only if you let me.”
Jessica wrapped her held Taeyeon’s hands in her own and clutched them to her chest, eyes still closed.
“It hurts less when you’re here.”
Taeyeon buried her face in Jessica’s hair and smiled. Jessica pulled Taeyeon’s arms closer and gripped her hands.
“One day I’ll tell you everything. But for now I’m asking you to wait. I’m sorry. I’m sorry you have to keep waiting for me.”
“That’s okay. I think…we’re both waiting for you. And I’ll make sure to be with you for the whole time we’re going to wait.

    The night passed, calm and quiet, and Jessica was lulled to sleep by the scent of Taeyeon, her warmth and her heartbeat. Her dreams were still. Peace found her weary soul and coaxed it into a long desired reverie.

    Still silence.

    Shared silence. 

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aw man it's been ages

i'm sorry

it hurt to write this chapter

i mean is that trigger warning really necessary i dont know

but just in case