I close the door of my house behind me gently, and a soft tick resonates after. I guide my eyes around the suspiciously quiet house and ask myself why my Mom’s voice is no where to be found. She’s not exactly a boisterous person but she tends to make her own set of noises whenever she’s home alone to suppress the overbearing silence. To come home and feel nothing but the essence of a quiet place makes me grow nervous. Is she not home? That’s not right. She finishes her shift at the hospital early and usually always goes home before me. Rolling my eyes here and there, I search for any sign of life in the otherwise calm house. 

I call out to her while taking the straps of my backpack off of my shoulders, still looking around with enlarged pupils. “Mom, are you home?”

As if the silence awaits another noise to be broken; I hear giggles come from upstairs. The giggling echo is soft and subdued, and I furrow my eyebrows in confusion. Is my mom giggling? That’s for sure. The volume seems to be hers. But what is she giggling about? I have no idea. I trudge further inside my house and call out again.

“Mom, I can hear you, you know.”

I hear more giggling, this time the sound is more masculine than my mom’s voice, and I freeze almost right away. My eyes widen and they shoot towards the stairs leading to the second floor as if the bearer of that voice will teleport downstairs right away, showing himself. It’s definitely a male that’s with my mom, and I feel a drizzling rain grow within me, threatening to fall down with just the littlest of nudges. I swallow my growing nerves thickly, blinking my eyes to moisturize them and to really prepare them for when the man appears, because right now all odds seem to be against me. I may be an introvert who doesn’t know a whole lot about what she dislikes and likes in clear, specific language; but I’m certain that coming home to find a guy’s voice is definitely not something I like to be exposed to. 

“Mom,” I swallow again, slowly walking towards the stairs and meeting my toes with the beginning of the structure, my anxiety rocketing. “Are you with somebody?”

Fast steps stomping on the stairs greet me and I take large steps backward in surprise, blinking when my mom and another guy I know nothing about emerge from the heightened staircase of my house. It feels almost as if they teleported out from the rooms upstairs and are suddenly standing in front of me. My eyes flicker towards the man instantaneously, like they’re reacting to seeing a different species that hasn’t been welcomed in our house for a long time and finding out that they weren’t showered with a good view at all. The man’s insanely rugged. He looks to be in his latest thirties which means he’s at least five years older than my mom. He’s wearing jeans and an oversized sweater and he’s bearing a large yet awkward grin upon his thin mouth. I can tell right away that he’s nervous of me, of my reaction to him. Mom must have told him of my dislike to men in her life, and he’s filled in to all of the nasty way I’ve treated most of them. I stare at him from head to toe and even though I try to force myself not to scowl so openly; mg lips naturally pull into the most unwelcoming zip they can ever curl into. The man’s got a nice pair of warm honey eyes, which look to be glinting in gold as he stares at ms with softness I clearly can see but ignore. None of my mom’s men owe me anything, and neither do I owe them anything in return.

I snap my eyes towards my giddy mom. “Mom. Who.. who is this?”

She’s grinning so hard that seems to freeze in that act. Her eyes are twinkling a fair brown but it’s dark in comparison to the honey flare in the man’s eyes. Her hair’s brushed out gently in a nice hairdo and I notice, for the first time, that she’s wearing a delicate looking dress that’s fit for summer hangouts. She’s looking incredibly beautiful in her soft makeup and I admit that she looks radiating; happy, in the presence of that man. But her nervousness doesn’t escape me. Her nervousness that I will show anger and disgruntlement at the fact there’s a man in my house that’s a total stranger to me. Whether he’s a stranger to mom is a totally different story. 

“Baby,” Mom begins softly, tenderly calling for me, and I yank my eyes off of her to look at the man again, clear disgust in my pupils. I don’t miss his atrocious gulp. “I want you to meet someone. Someone important.”

I’m rather taken aback by how wide the man’s smile is. I don’t want to be the person that admits of his genuine happiness but there is real joy behind those honey orbs of his and I want it to be unreal. I almost go on my knees to pray for God that his genuineness is not real. But it is. Mom’s words in which she pointed him as someone important seemed to make him happier, too. He glances at her with twinkling eyes.

“Him?” I question quietly. I don’t want my voice to appear whimsical and weak, but the underlaid vulnerability doesn’t escape my ears. I gulp forcefully, looking back to mom again, my eyes showing the clear panic in which they’re enwrapped in. 

“Yeah,” mom says gently; caressingly, and I understand that she’s in a mental state of calmness so that I don’t break down. She’s treating me like delicate glass and I hate it. “He’s Jae, he’s uh, well,”

“Your boyfriend?” I guess, snark in my voice, and I once again turn my head to stare him down. 

“I’m still not officially her boyfriend,” the man, Jae, interrupts, looking ridiculously happy, almost nonsensical. “We haven’t yet reached this point. We’re trying things out. This is the least I can give to your mother. Time.”

“Isn’t he like the sweetest?” My mom gushes, staring at him with heart eyes. I can see from their back that they’re hiding their held hands. I force myself not to grimace openly. “He agreed to wait until I’m ready to ask me out. But for now, we consider ourselves exclusive.”

“Mom, can I...” I fiddle with my fingers, snapping my eyes from her and him over and over again. “Can I talk to you in private?”

Mom’s eyes soften in understanding. “Of course, sweetheart.”

I turn around and walk towards the open kitchen where I hope Jae won’t be able to hear us. Mom walks behind me ambivalently, and I can feel her contrasting thoughts go haywire inside her head without even looking backwards. 

Upon the kitchen, I turn around to face her. Mom pauses at the entryway and looks at me with those pair of molded, compressed eyes. I hate that she looks at me like a breakable glass, like i’ll falter and fade into smoke once she strengthens her look. I hate that even when I tell myself over and over again that I’m not affected; I still am. 

“Listen, Mom—“ I’m interrupted by mom coming over and taking my hands in hers. 

“Before you say anything,” Mom says with a smile she’s constantly trying to stifle. “Just know that I’ve been giving him more than six months to woo me and it took nearly a year for me to understand that he’s actually really safe. No man can wait all that long, and you know that.”

“Does he... does he make you happy?” I stutter, afraid of the answer to that question. 

“He does.” My mom squeals like a teenage girl finding out that the boy she’s been crushing on all summer is finally returning her undeniable love. I don’t want to be the girl that ruins her mom’s dreams by waking her up from her sleep, but I feel like I at least owe her a few reality checks when she’s too driven by fantasy to see them. 

“Does he know about your past and what happened?” I ask her, swallowing. The word ‘past’ brings a lot of unfathomable memories that I want to dig up only to burn in a hole of ash. But there are times when you’re forced to make good amends with the horrible happenings of your life, the events that you hate so much. I guess in a point of time, I wished I’d never be able to open this sealed jar, but I’m coming to a dreadful halt when now my mom’s forcing me to break it open again. 

I don’t want to rethink about this ‘past’ of ours that connects to Mom more than it connects to me. But memories of violence and negligence flash in my head anyway, and the images that are brought forward make me stumble. I catch to my own insecurities and force myself to remain strong: for my Mom.

“Yes, he does,” Mom’s wide, shining smile dims to a softer version, and she releases my hands so she can timidly brush some fallen strands of her hair. “He promised me that nothing will befalls me again, especially not from him. He cried the first time I told him about that man and he punched a wall and fractured his knuckles the second time. He’s been treating me with nothing but respect and he’s really a great man, the greatest I’ve seen so far.”

I’m taken back to a lot of horrible memories when I hear Mom mentions That Man. I’m not even hearing his actual name but I’m already falling inside a pit of fractured memories that make my skin bleed with black blood. Depictions of what happened years ago attack me like balls of fire creating acres of indentations upon my body; ugly and scarred, fragile. I gulp down the grown saliva from the fear that’s overwhelming me and I pray, with ever power that I’m having in my remaining capacity, that my Mom wouldn’t notice. To her, she seems like she had already moved on from the spectrum of what made That Man the violent boogyman that’s terrifying me personally, and I’m envious of her, envious that she seems so over the whole matter when I’m still over my knees with mud. 

“I’m.. it’s too sudden for me to swallow but,” I swallow thickly for probably the hundredth of time this day, and I notice my Mom’s hopeful eyes. I alter my words. “But, if you’re sure about this and you say he’s never going to end up like That Man, then.. I trust you.”

Mom comes over towards me and hugs me tightly. My arms stay besides me as she does so, and my eyes peer forward at the living room where the man is waiting. Mom’s happy to be in a new road of redemption, and I wonder if I ever will be. 

I whisper in her ears. “If I see a fracture of a mistake or a single yell I’m going to have to kick him out. You know that, right?”

“I love you so much,” Mom whispers back, squeezing me in her embrace. “I promise you, this time you won’t need to protect me.”

-

I exit the house in hopes of clearing some of my unease and reclaim some of my previous ambiance, the same glittering sphere in which, I realize, I only ever receive when I’m with Park Chanyeol.

It’s crazy how things, bad or not, remind you of the emotions you feel regarding a place, or someone, that you haven’t placed a label on yet, but while you’re in your own cosmic abundance of negativities, you understand some of the most complicated things that you’ve acquired in your mundane life, exactly like Park Chanyeol.

I feel like everything that had happened with my Mom has shaken me up greatly. The image of the stranger man that’s soon going to be a part of our lives attacking me like spikes destroying an airplane. My whole soul is unwinded, shaken, and the only thing that I’ve truly felt inclined towards is to find some glint of positivity. In that sense, I’m usually empty of all kinds that give me that, especially considering the none too cordial life that I have gained for myself. My whole atmosphere is tricky, tense, and filled with nonchalance and emotional anxieties, but now, now I’m different. Now I have Park Chanyeol. It’s weird. Because who is Park Chanyeol to me anyway? But whatever it is, I keep thinking of him, longing for him and his contagious laughter. 

He’s that bright color that splashes sheens of spluttering pastels to the monochromatic reality of my existence.

I walk aimlessly around the grimacing neighborhood of my home and look around with transparency. My whole reality has shifted and I genuinely don’t feel anything — as if now — regarding it. I’ve let all of my bigger emotions home, with my Mom, and I took nothing with me but my sheer unluckiness. I don’t realize myself as I take my phone out of my pocket and ring Chanyeol’s number. He doesn’t answer the first call, and I remain holding the phone hearing the sound of the dial. This doesn’t discourage me, and I ring him again. 

Thankfully, my desperation is saturated, and Chanyeol picks up the phone after a while.

“Yo.” I hear his joyful voice, and almost right away, my lips curl slightly.

“Chanyeol. Where are you?” 

“Ooh, Babygirl,” I hear his stupid, ambient, low-pitched and tender voice echo from the other side, and I wholeheartedly feel myself melt, shifting into nothingness but a pile of liquid cheese. “This is the first time you call me asking about my whereabouts. I’m so glad I might cry.”

I roll my eyes because that’s really all I can do when it comes to Park Chanyeol, whether the intense emotion behind such gesture is real or not. “You’re so full of , my Gahd. I’m simply asking where you are so that I’ll come meet you,” I clear my throat, wishing I don’t sound desperate as I am, and then add hurriedly. “I’m bored.”

“You’re bored? You’re bored?” Chanyeol repeats this as if he’s unsure if he’s hearing this right, and I don’t