I can’t exactly remember when I met him. My parent’s said that our engagement had been planned since before we were born. I can’t even begin to count how many memories they caused us to suppress just by being near each other. Though there is one memory that is engraved into my mind. Mom and dad had arranged another sleepover for Kyuhyun and me. By now, we were nine, and they should have figured that anything involved with the two of us turn disastrous. Because at this age, we have learned about violence and torture. Our parents were downstairs drinking coffee and tea and talking about their co business while upstairs I was sitting on Kyuhyun’s back as he lay on the floor, face down.

“You say that again, I’m going to kill you!” I said pulling his hair.

“You're ugly!" he screamed and shoved me off him. I jumped onto his back and pulled his hair. 

“Take it back you wimp!” I screamed, kicking him in the side. He slammed me into a wall and stuck out his tongue at me. By now we were bruised, cut, burned, and pissed off at each other. As usual it started with a game of I dare you and as usual it led to fighting and broken toys. I stood back up from the floor and was about to grab the broken vase from my drawer when my parents barged in. 

“How’s the bride and groo - dear lord! What happened in here?” my mother said shock and furious. 

“Again,” my father added, earning a nudge from my mother. 

“Mommy, look what Yoona did?” Kyuhyun whimpered with a puppy-dog look on his face pointing at me.  

I pressed into one of my open wounds and induced to pain leading to tears. “Daddy” I cried. Kyuhyun glared at me and I stuck my tongue out at him. 

“Kyu, you shouldn’t be treating your fiancé like this.” his mother said. 

“But she started-” Kyuhyun whined. 

“Fiancé?” I asked, since Kyuhyun obviously didn’t pay as much attention. 

Our mothers rolled their eyes. “Yes fiancé. How many times are we supposed to remind you?” my mother said. 

“No, you never told us anything!” stammered Kyuhyun, with a face on like he was thinking.

“Yes, actually, we’ve been telling you this for your whole entire life.” Kyuhyun’s father answered. 

“Y-you’re serious?” I asked stuttering. I kicked Kyuhyun in the ankle and a pained expression crossed his face before he glared at me. 

His father sighed. “For the last time, your grandpas arranged a marriage between their children so our family businesses can unite. But of course it turned out both, as in us, being male, and due to that the marriage was postponed to the next generation being you two.” 

“But WHY!” Kyuhyun screamed. He kicked the broken toys that lay on the floor and stomped his foot. “NO!” he screamed and kept stomping on my toys. Well now it’s impossible to fix. 

“CHO KYUHYUN! YOU STOP THAT RIGHT NOW!” Kyuhyun’s father demand. I flinched when hearing Mr. Cho yelled at Kyuhyun, who just stared hatefully at the ground. I can only remember certain blurs, but does remember the good news was that the sleep over ended early. So that was it. This is an example of those types of memories that even if you try to expunge it, you can’t, and so it haunts your life, every single day. Mr. Cho’s eye twitched. “Come here,” he latched onto Kyuhyun’s arm and pulled him into the hallway. Mrs. Cho rushed out of the room as we heard glass breaking from the hallway. My parents looked at me and I could feel a lecture coming on. The rest of the day was complete chaos. Kyuhyun wouldn’t stop crying and I needed stitches.

 

On the last day of grade 8, Cho Siwon, Kyuhyun’s father, had to move their family to the US leaving with the promise that they’ll be back. That’s when my parents began stacking on the rules. I try to break as much of them as possible, of course.

 

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