21
Bermuda Triangle
Play, Listen & Read
Returning home today was the only thing glued and pasted to my thoughts for the past hours, through sixth and seventh period. Krystal discovered another brilliant way to humiliate me, once again, by pouring her lunch tray's contents over my school uniform which I now had to hand wash this evening. I have never done anything menacing to her, nor will I ever but how come I was receiving all of her wrath in strikes each day? Maybe it was a way of punishment for responding to her snarky remarks with my own, not my smartest move but I couldn't not defend myself.
I wasn't about to mutter anything about this with her sitting in the front seat, right next to Hyunwoo where I typically sat. Hyunwoo insisted for him to drive us to the house because he pointed out how he felt about me walking home alone; not that I really paid attention to how he felt because he discarded my feelings, not even taking them into consideration.
"Babe, did you pick out your suit yet?" Krystal trailed her fingers down Hyunwoo's thigh that was closest to her, giving no respect for my innocent eyes. She spoke a second time when he didn't respond. "Babe?"
"No." His recent answers that he gave to her seemed suddenly curt to me but he could've always been that way with her, just like how I was when she verbally attacked me. His eyes were on the cars darting through each lane, and not once did he turn to confront Krystal's needy gaze.
We arrived at her house in a minimal of ten minutes, for she lived rather close to Hyunwoo's neighborhood but I didn't question anything. The ride after their brief statements was a dead, painful silence that not even I bothered to disturb when I had a cough tickling my throat; mocking that I wasn't suppose to emit any noises to avoid any attention on me.
"We're here," he finally spoke.
"Let's talk for a bit."
Can I just go home? I had enough of waiting and being embarrassed because of her.
"I have to take-"
"Out. Now," she threatened him with a lethal stare which he complied to, but not out of fright but of annoyance. I didn't dare to observe their actions anymore in case she whipped around to glance in my direction, eavesdropping wasn't a thing I did that I was proud of or would like to be known doing; her words spread around school like wildfire.
They both exited the car from either doors and strode a few feet away, a far enough distance to share personal words if the windows weren't open; just a sliver gave me access to their entire conversation. She commenced with stating about whatever party or get-together she was mentioning earlier in the car, then went to go rub his arm which he hesitantly nudged away. A grin began to spread over my lips but I quickly wiped my face so that there were no traces of satisfaction.
"She's going if you like it or not, she lives in my household and if the maids get to go, she has every right to. It's her decision whether or not she wants to," that was the only sentence he had created in the past hours, not because he was conversing with Krystal but he was talking about me. He was defending me for once, someone was finally on my side and didn't agree with everything Krystal spat.
"She doesn't do anything for your family, what is she a charity case? Community service? And if you deny any of that, then it must mean that she is something valuable to you."
"She isn't a thing, she's a person."
Thank you, someone finally came to the conclusion that I was an actual human being with a beating heart that can shatter at any words.
"Then tell me," she shifted her position, hands on her hips and ever so often gesturing to the car. Hyunwoo interrupted, begging her to halt on whatever she was going to say.
"No, let me finish," she flattened her hair down and out of her face, she was beginning to feel her frustration that was boiling inside that little body.
"You think she's a charity, nothing more and you're going to invite her?"
He hesitated, if he agreed with her in the end I would die, pass out, become unconscious, and many other synonyms that were flooding my mind but I couldn't bob my head deep enough in these lethal waters for a more stronger word. He couldn't possibly feel this way about me, I wasn't that unpalatable of a person, I wasn't repulsive as some people would like to believe.
His breath came out shaky, even from here I could take note in the way his posture and the tone in his voice altered due to the mention of me. "Yes."
I wasn't breathing, all my feelings and emotions devoured my body then abandoned me with this numb sensation that I was now utterly submerged in. This is what it feels like to become nothing, to feel nothing. My body involuntarily began to shed tears, one after the other but I wasn't sobbing- at least not yet. My chest felt as if someone in a cartoon accidently released a rope that held a grand piano and it collapsed entirely on my heart, anchoring into my stomach. I held my breath in so he wouldn't hear how much I was trembling when he bid his goodbye and began to trail back to his side of the car.
I clenched my hands together to stabilize myself, to put an end on the intense shaking but it wasn't something I could simply control. My body curled into a ball, I couldn't display my face to him, he didn't require to witness how I looked when I was devastated and completely destroyed. That heart that I contained- the one I spoke of earlier, before this train wreck situation- was being smashed by iron hammers and the pounding of their action was my heart attempting to place itself together to continue beating; I don't think I could live like this, with my hopes and desires constantly being put down or thrown into a fire of unfairness. I could only wipe my tears and retain all of my limbs together so I wouldn't stray, I had to recollect myself for the both of us. Live through this like I have been doing for these past months.
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