"We are so not going where I think we're going," Mark said behind me as I sped walk forward. This scene seemed way too familiar considering it was just us walking down the street to my house, but even though the scenery was the same, everything was different.
"Are you sure you're ready to go in there again?" he asked, finally catching up to me. I stopped in front of my house and looked up at the lifeless building with yellow police tape surrounding it and the windows all black.

Hard to believe that only a few weeks ago, I was in there helping my mom make dumplings on the kitchen counter.
But now, thanks to my father, I won't be helping her with anything else anymore.

I took a deep breath and let the air exhale out of my lungs, watching it materialize in the form of a white cloud. The air around us was already chilly, and despite all the pretty Christmas lights hanging on the houses around us and my huge, puffy winter jacket, I still felt cold.

"No," I fought the tears threatening to spill out as I slowly made my way to the front door, ducking underneath the yellow tape and stepping over fallen tree branches, "I don't think I'll ever be ready to go back in there."
"Then maybe we sho-"
"But it's something I have to do," I turned around to look at Mark with a small smile on my lips and my hand on the door knob. "Being scared of this place and avoiding it isn't going to bring my mom back. And it sure as hell isn't going to help us solve this whole thing."

I felt my hand push down and turn the knob, but it didn't register in my head that I had opened the door until I was looking into the front hallway. The once warm, inviting hallway was now dark and cold. The floor was now littered with dead leaves here and there from the police tracking them in when they were investigating and searching the house. I'm guessing they didn't find anything considering how I didn't get a call so that box was definitely still here.

"It's upstairs in my mom's room," I pointed to the staircase, one foot already on the first step. Mark nodded, quickly climbing the stairs before me and stopping in front of my mom's door. I followed him up, feeling the air around me get colder with every step I climbed. My mom's room basically looked the same as it did on the day I found her: clothes thrown everywhere, the sheets and comforter that were suppose to be on the bed laid abandoned on the floor, and the picture frames from her nightstand were scattered around the room. I closed my eyes and tried to push away the bad memories flooding my head along with the tears starting to form again. 

Focus ______________.
You're here for the box and that's it.
Get it and get out.

"________________," Mark called from across the room by my mom's vanity, motioning me over, "is it one of these?"
"I think so," I stopped beside him, looking down at the long line of different jewelry boxes sitting beside the wall. My eyes scanned the ones that were there, feeling my breath get shorter with every box I passed over. "The one we need isn't here though."
"What're you talking about?"
"The one that the key opens isn't here," I replied, feeling my head spin and my stomach tighten. 

"So you do have the key," a voice said from behind us. Mark whipped his head around almost instantaneously but I couldn't do it. My head wouldn't turn. My whole body wouldn't move.
Just like how it wouldn't move everytime he was around when I was a kid, always letting the fear completely paralyze me.
That voice was too familiar. I knew exactly who was behind us right now. I didn't have to turn around to know.

"C'mon _______________. Be a good girl and hand it over," he said, his voice getting closer as his footsteps echoed off the empty walls. I felt Mark move to stand in front of me. There was no way he could protect me from him, but there was no way in hell I was gonna let Mark share the same fate as my mom.
"Over my dead body," I finally turned around and said, looking at his face for the first time in years. It looked like whatever hair he used to have on the top of his head had migrated to the bottom. His beard was unruly and nasty looking and he had really let himself go. I didn't think it was possible for a person to change this much but then again, it has been a few years.

But how he physically changed didn't matter.
He was still the same abusive pile of he alway was.
Only worse this time...since he was the one who killed my mother.

"You and I both know that that can be arranged," he took another step closer, one hand holding the box while the other held up a knife.
Probably the same one he used on my mom.
The sight of it made me want to hurl.

"How could you?" I narrowed my eyes at him, feeling the tears well up. But this time, I didn't try to fight them. I let them spill out onto my cheeks as I slowly shuffled my way away from the vanity. "What the hell made it okay for you to kill my mother!? Why are you even back?"
"Why? Well let's see...you and your mother have something that I want, so since I couldn't find you that day at your school, I went straight to her instead. I didn't want to kill her, but she didn't really give me much of a choice. If you had just stayed put that day, she probably would be still alive today."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"I didn't plan on killing her. I was gonna use you as bait and get her to give me the information I want, but since you ran away that day, I went to plan B."

"You're a sick person," I almost spat at him, lashing out a bit of my bottled up rage, "You're the one who should be dead!"
"You're not the first person who's said that to me," his eyes shifted a little to the side, in the direction of the closet. "But whatever. Just gimme the key and you'll never have to see me again."

"Like hell she will," Mark spoke up, taking a step towards my dad. The anger in his eyes could probably burn a hole through the wall. "That box doesn't belong to you either so I think you should be the one to hand something over."
"Little boy, I don't think you know who you're dealing with."
"And I think you're delusional," Mark retorted. "Who do you think was the one _____________ came to after every time you beat and yelled at her? Who do you think was the one who helped her through your abuse? Now get the hell out and leave the box, you sorry excuse for a human being."

The look on my father's face was the same one from years ago. It was the same one he used every time he lost his temper and started hitting me or my mom.
He was going to hit Mark. 
Only worse since now it wasn't just his fist.

"MARK, DUCK!" I moved to my dad's side and all my body weight onto him, knocking him over. As he fell, the box flew across the room and hit the wall by the door. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mark pull himself up and grab the box before sprinting down the stairs.
I stood up and kicked the knife under the bed, a place where I knew my dad couldn't possibly go. 
"You really think this is gonna stop me from getting what I want?" he yelled, that same look of rage and malice on his face. "You can't hide from me forever!"

I looked down at him...at the man who killed my mom and almost killed my boyfriend.
Then with the force of years of bottled up anger, I slapped him.
Hard.
I'm pretty sure the neighbors could've heard the impact that it made.

I held up my phone and dialed 9-1-1 before turning back to look at his pitiful looking form still on the ground.
"I can try to."

Author's Note
chapter title: Empty-WINNER [x]
for the readers who don't live in america/don't know/are confused, 9-1-1 is our emergency number xD