.02

ROSÉ POV

Not long after, the sounds of police sirens and ambulances filled the whole place. I was rushed to the hospital after the incident in the airport earlier. The medicals staff had treated several wounds that were found on my body, including the burn that I got just now. However, all these pain is nothing when compared to the throbbing feeling in my heart. The doctor even has to prescribe me with some dose of tranquillizer to help me calm down from my mental breakdown. I felt really weak at that time, maybe because I had been running for my life and crying non-stop afterwards. It feels like I had fallen into a very deep black hole, where I tried to climb and shout for help, but nobody can ever come to save me and pull me away from all this mess. I feel like nobody will ever understand how traumatizing it was to see your own father lay in a pool of blood right in front of your eyes, while you were just there not being able to do anything than crying. It definitely left a mark, probably an open wound in my heart that is still bleeding badly and will never be healed anytime soon. When I slowly became stable, the doctor, accompanied by a woman and a man came into my wardroom to see if I was well enough to be asked a few questions.

“Miss Roseanne, right?”

Apparently, the woman and the man are FBI agents who are in charge of investigating the shooting incident. I did not say anything, but instead just slightly nodded as an answer.

“I am so sorry for what happened to you, but I hope that you can give us cooperation in solving the case. The more information we get, the faster we can know the truth. Before that, may we ask if you have any relationship with any of the victims that lost their lives in this tragedy?”

“Y-Yes. Alzon Park. He is my father and we were both from South Korea.”

I tried my best to finish up my sentences before the feelings started to eat me up again. Although it hurts but this might be the last time I will ever hear this name being mentioned again.

“Once again, we were very sorry to hear that. Is it okay for you to continue?”

Once again, I just nodded.

“So Miss Roseanne, tell us whatever you know.” The man spoke up.

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, trying to recall everything that happened. It still ached me when I think about it. It might have will get used to it.

“Today was supposed to be a happy day for me and my dad. He came all the way from South Korea to New York to meet me. I woke up at around 8 in the morning and hailed a taxi to the airport. It was still early when I arrived there, so I went to buy a cup of Americano for my dad because he must have been tired after the long flights. We hugged when we met and it was all good, I was about to give him the coffee when,”

I stopped for a while before continuing, “suddenly we heard loud sounds and people started to scream. Everything was happening so fast and I did not even notice that the coffee cup was being shot. The bodyguard then came to father’s way and was shot a few times. My dad pulled my hand and we ran as fast as we could. The shooter kept on shooting in our way and we had successfully dodged most of it. We were about to make it to the exit when the glass door was shot. My father covered me from the shattered glass, and that was when I saw the bullets came and-and,”

“It is okay if you do not want to continue, Miss Roseanne.” The woman concerned.

“No, I wanted to. And the bullets hit my dad which made him fell down. I didn’t even know what to do on that time except for calling him. He said something to me, touched my face, and not long after that his eyes were closed. I still can remember the look on his face now.” I said while covering my face with my hands, with the tears fell down uncontrollably. “I am sorry, but please give me a few moment.”

There was almost silence across the wardroom, only filled with my sobbing sounds and I can hear that the officers breathing had become heavier.

“Sorry.” I murmured.

“It must have been really hard for you. But, do you perhaps know if your father has any dispute with anyone in the United States or South Korea?”

“What? My father is a really good man and is a really well-respected man in South Korea! We do not know that much of people in the States, but I doubt that there is someone here will go as far as trying to kill him!”

“Well, we cannot really neglect the possibility of whether this case is just a gun assault or planned homicide. That is why we need the most cooperation we can get. We checked the CCTV footage from the airport earlier and found out that there are a few suspicious people all over that place. During the encounter of you and your father, we saw that someone was pointing the gun to the direction that seems to be yours, and it matched with your description earlier about how the shots were always on your way.”

“But-but, who would ever want to did that to my father? How could they?”

“That is for us to investigate and we will let you know immediately if we found something new. I think that will be enough for today. Thank you and condolences to you and your family, Miss Roseanne. If you happened to have some more pieces of information, feel free to contact us, we will try to reach to you as soon as we can.”

There is no way that this was all planned to take my father away. He may not be a saint, but he is far away from someone people will consider getting rid of. Now that I think of it, it somehow starting to make sense. As soon as my father has collapsed, the shooting stopped. It is like the shooter has accomplished his mission which was to kill him. My thoughts are killing me; it is hard to believe that my father, the person that I love will become a target of a homicide like what the officers said. Is there something that I do not know about him? What if he is not actually like the father that I actually know?

“I don’t know anymore, I don’t know I don’t know I don’t know…”

I lied down on my bed, feeling light-headed and eventually fainted there. All of these must have exhausted me plus I did not really get enough rest. When I woke up again, the agents were already gone.

The doctor discharged me from the hospital so that I can fly back to South Korea to attend my father’s funeral, but I still need to be reviewed in the hospital there to make sure that I was fine, both physically and mentally. Upon reaching my home country, my real mother was the first one to come to me and hugged me tightly while crying. I did not say anything, only patted her back and did not even cry a bit. It was sickening to cry in front of people and after all those tears way back in New York it had probably dried out. I figured that crying is really useless and won’t help in making things better. I still did not cry, maybe just shredded a few tears when I saw my father’s coffin was buried in the ground. My father probably will not like to see me cry either. On that night, all of my family members gathered in the mansion my father and I used to live with to hear about his will. A family gathering was supposed to be happy, but this one had minus my father and the happy part as well.

“I, Alzon Park has assigned this mansion and another one by the bay to my ex-wife, Lynn Kim but other family members shall feel free to stay in any of them. I also decided to file a divorce with my current wife, Maya Lee, and provide her with alimony so that she is free to go on with her life. Meanwhile, my daughter, Roseanne Park will take over my company after she has finished her study in the United States. Both her and my son, Micah Park will inherit my assets equally and a trust fund for each of them is published. The trust funds will be rightfully under Lynn Kim’s name before they turned 21 years old in which they will become the rightful owner. Another of my request is to have Micah Park to stay in the Park household until he reached his age of consent.”

The puzzle started to be in places when father’s will was read to us by his attorney. It felt like he knew that someday he will lose his life and therefore making this will. After that, the attorney told me and my mother to go to my father’s study room.

“First of all, Miss Roseanne and Miss Lynn, I am very sorry for your loss. The reason I called you in is to tell you something really important, especially to you, Miss Roseanne.”

I was confused when I heard about this but when I looked at my mother, her face told me that she knew what was going on and let out a small smile while reaching her hand over to hold mine.

“As you know, your father is a really successful businessman who runs a well-established company, but that is not all about him,”

“What is that supposed to mean?” This is it, the moment of truth. The truth that I am dying to know. I actually thought to ask my mother after all of this is done but it comes sooner.

He paused for a while and looked at my mother before continue talking,

“Your father is not only actively involved in the business world that we can see, it is way more beyond that. He is actually a member of a really important organisation called The Alliance."

“The- The Alliance?”

“Yes, and it is a really big alliance that is related to many chains in the country as well as overseas. It is not a gangster mob that run some shady business, it is more of an alignment between a few big companies, at least that is what it was before it was all twisted.”

“How come did I never know any of this?”

“In fact, not many of people know about this either. Your father is a really careful person and is one of the main people behind the alliance. In recent years, your father found out that there is something wrong going on with it. An evil force is starting to grow stronger and it becomes more uncontrollable. That is why he decided to send you to study in the United States to keep you away as far as possible. And,”

“And what?”

“We believe that his murder recently was related to the gang. To finish him up so that they can manipulate the whole gang without your father’s intervention.Some people are actually working really hard to cover the case so that no one will ever feel suspicious.”

My eyes widen in disbelief. Is this really is, like what the FBI agents said, that my father’s case is not just a simple assault? I look at mother once again, and she still has the same expression as before.

“Your father might never tell you the real reason why we divorced in the first place, but that is how he wanted me to not get involved in any of these.”

My mother told me. The puzzle is now started to complete by itself, pieces by pieces.

“Now that your father is gone, the company is in need for someone to take over and representing us in the alliance. And that person will be you, miss Roseanne.”

“Me? But I do not even know how to run a company, let alone controlling a twisted alliance!”

I am shocked and stand up from my seat when the attorney announced that I am going to replace my father.

“At first, I have completely opposed it as well. I even got into an argument with your dad. But he told me that there must be someone to keep the balance of the gang. I was too old for this, your father doesn't want your stepmother to have anything with this and Micah is way too young. You are the only people whom your father can trust enough. It was hard for him to make such decision too, Roseanne.” Mother has also stood up and put her hands on my shoulder, trying to calm me down over all these emotions that are too much for me, or even anyone to handle at once.

“If there are no suitable people why can’t our company just leave the alliance?” I tried to reason.

“This doesn’t look as easy as it is, Miss Roseanne. If there is something going wrong with the alliance, it can seriously affect the whole country. Just like in the movie, it will be chaos if the alliance broke and the power fell into the wrong hand..”

I did not know what to say anymore.

“Will you please do this, for all of us and for Mr Alzon, Miss Roseanne?”

“BUT, WHY ME? WHY ME?”

I ran out of the study to my room. All of this just happened way too fast for me to accept. I was supposed to be enjoying my father’s accompany in the United States now but instead, I am here in South Korea listening from my father’s attorney and my mother about my so-called big responsibility for the family and heck, the whole country. I always thought I was just a normal girl who lives in a normal family with a normal father, but I was way far from that. If I run harder, will I ever be able to run away from these bad things in my life, from this reality?

“Give her some time to accept all of this Miss Lynn, it was all too much for a young innocent girl like her to accept.”

“WHY MUST IT BE ME? WHERE ARE YOU WHEN I NEED YOU THE MOST, FATHER?”

“WHY ME?”

I sit up to see that I am sitting on a lounge chair. I am in a session with Mr Song, my psychiatrist.

“I am sorry Mr Song, I think I need a break now.”

I say as I hold my aching head.

“I think it is enough for today Miss Roseanne, thank you for coming.”

“Mr Song, will I ever get out of this memory?”

“It is really hard to say because everyone behaves differently. Some might can get over the past while some are still struggling with them. It really depends on yourself to see whether your heart is ready to put all of them behind. If not, it might stay with you and will haunt you forever.”

Mr Song’s words are actually crystal clear, it means that I am still bothered by the incident because there is still something that I want to know. Before I know the real culprit and the real reason for my father’s murder, it will continue haunting me and make my heart aches.

For two years, I went back to the United States to continue my study and try to avoid my family as much as possible. I said that I need to concentrate on my final few years in university as an excuse to get away from the everything. I had minimized my social interactions, went to school and went back home straight every day and deactivated all of my social media. I also developed insomnia and slight depression. I once relied on sleeping pills heavily until my mom found out and forbidden me to take any of those again. During those days, I felt like I was only a human with a body that could move as my soul was empty. It was one day when I realised that there was no way out of this mess.

My mother missed call me for almost a hundred times before I finally gathered enough courage to pick up her call. In the phone call, she told me how our beachside house was burned to the ground and our company’s security system was down, trapping almost all of the employees inside for almost three days. The police said that this was all just a series of accidents, but my mother and I truly know that this was all the work of the twisted people from the alliance. It was a threat sent by them to us, or to me specifically. I realised how a selfish person I was and my father would never want me to act this way. The next day, I bought a ticket and flew back to South Korea to get it over with.

This is my fate and I have to accept it.

I am fated to play in this game, and I will definitely lose if I did not even involve myself in it. If I were to play this game, I am going to play it really hard. It is either go big or go home.

I am never going down without a m*th*rf*ck*ng fight.

That's it! The first two introductory chapters about Rosé's background in this story.

The chapters onwards will be the present time. 

Is anyone excited for BLACKPINK TV as well?