• Hurt •

"Care comes first -- "

-Park Ji ah

Kyungsoo walks down the hallway of the corridors of the school struggling with his wheelchair, frown his eyebrows, trying to get intact with the wheelchair. His hands were uncoordinated with the wheels of the equipment, scars appear on his hands. He already plastered two plasters on two fingers of his this morning because he accidentally scratched his hands on the wheels. And once again, he was late for class; he didn’t receive any help for anybody even though it was obvious that he needed help with his wheelchair. He, on the other hand, didn’t ask for help from the students passing by because he knew that those people wouldn’t want to help him. People who passed by acted like he was invisible, without any heart, leaving him, struggling on his own.

He sighed, thinking about his disability while trying to coordinate the wheels with his hands. He was on the verge of tears, trying to hold back. He knows he’s a man, a man wouldn’t cry. He had this disability a year back, after getting into an accident involving his parent’s car and a lorry. During that incident, he flew out from the car, hit the lorry and he went under the lorry, and his leg was almost crushed because it was stepped over the lorry’s wheel. Luckily his bones were strong enough so it didn’t crushed, but there were deep cracks all over his leg bones. He couldn’t walk anymore, the doctor was concerned that his bones will eventually crush and treatment wouldn’t even help. So from that day, he used wheelchair and wouldn’t move.

The doctor made an appointment for him to get treatment for his leg once a month, to fix the deep cracks in his bones. The doctor said it will take up a long time for his leg to be fully recovered. When he heard that, he didn’t cry in front of the doctor or his parents but he cried in his room or the bathroom. He didn’t want people to hear him cry. That lasted for a week at most; he knew that he needs to get a new life to start over. And when he said a new life, he really meant it. His ‘loyal’ friends are now his former friends and they started to bully him about his disability. His former friends think that having a disability friend is no use.

And now he became distant towards people, no friends, alone all the time, gets bullied, his face doesn’t show any spark of happiness at all. He wasn’t lively as always. He changed.

--=--

A girl was transferred into his class two months ago. She was originally from class 3-3 but she improved and joined class 3-1, his class. He was in the senior year, and so was the girl. Kyungsoo didn’t mind the new girl; he knew that she was going to treat him the same way as everybody. The girl, Park Jiah, noticed him who was always alone. For those two months, she was actually interested in him. She started to realise that Kyungsoo was always bullied by his former friends and was always alone. Struggling alone. She didn’t take any action, she doesn’t know why. She kind of hesitates to approach this Kyungsoo guy.

One day, Jiah passed by the school’s canteen entrance when she saw Kyungsoo with his wheelchair near a tree. She immediately hid behide a wall, peeked to look at him. She widened her eyes when she saw him getting bullied by his ‘friends’. His hair got pulled several times, he was smacked on his head a few times, but it was normal. She continued to watch him getting bullied. She gasped when they pushed him and he flew out from his wheelchair. The bullies laughed at him before leaving him on the ground. Jiah, quickly run to Kyungsoo.

“Kyungsoo sshi, are you okay?” she asked with a tremble in her voice. She knew that he couldn’t move his feet.

Kyungsoo groaned as he felt a small pain on his leg. He just went for a treatment three days ago to give him painkillers. And today, the pain came back. Jiah helped to pick him up on his wheelchair, she was strong enough, and helped him to rub off the dust and grass on his uniform with a frown on her face. Her eyes were wet from her tears as she kept helping him the fall. She stood behind him and rubbed off her tears before kneeling in front of him, giving attention to him.

“Are you hurt? Does your leg hurt? Should we go to the infirmary?” she bombarded him with questions.

Kyungsoo groaned a bit before staring back at her. She kept asking him questions about his leg while he kept staring at her. He didn’t know what to feel actually. Touched? He didn’t know.

“Kyungsoo sshi?” she spoke as she looked at him.

“Leave me alone.” Kyungsoo said in a monotone before walking past her.

Jiah stared back at him, looking at him walking past by her, until she didn’t him anymore. Leave me alone… Leave him alone? She was disappointed that he didn’t even appreciate her help. She sighed and bit her lip.

--=--

Kyungsoo asked his chauffeur to send him to school 30 minutes earlier the next day so that he wouldn’t be late for his first class, geology, which is an important subject. He would have enough time to get used with his wheelchair. Luckily, his school has an elevator that stops to every level. He was thankful for that. He didn’t need people to help him.

Kyungsoo went into the lift, pressing the button ‘Level 3’ and settled himself in the lift.  The door of the elevator opens when it reached level 3. He went out and slowly focused on walking forward.

“Kyungsoo sshi!” a girl’s voice was heard calling him from behind. Kyungsoo turned his head to look behind and was surprised to see Jiah running while waving her hands towards him with a smile on her face. He stared at her again.

Jiah huffed and breathed in when she was in front of Kyungsoo.

“Mwoya?” Kyungsoo turned his head towards the front and started to leave her behind.

“Wait!”

Kyungsoo ignored her and continue walking. Jiah managed to run and walked beside him. Kyungsoo continued to ignore her.

“Let’s walk to class together.” She said.

Kyungsoo stopped and tilted his head a bit to her side. He sighed and rolled his eyes.

“Fine.” Kyungsoo said. Jiah smiled a bit, she was happy that he didn’t reject her.