＊jiyeon's diary

 july twenty third zero nine, 

I spent the whole day in my room, no one at home bothered me. They just left me alone. I sat in front of my computer trying to find ways to get rid of Hana. As I looked up information on death, I thought that I would back out of it, but the seriousness of my behaviour dawned on me. I took that to mean that I wasn't going to be half-hearted anymore. Of course I wasn't stupid enough to actually murder her by hand. I wouldn't want to be sent to jail over something ridiculous like that. How could I kill Hana without actually needing to get my hands dirty? What would be the perfect crime? 

If anything ordinary is imperfect. That meant the answer lied in something different.

The lucid memory of my childhood flashed in my mind. The moment when that bratty girl saw the bloody words in her notebook. Her rapid breathing. Her hyperventilation. 

Is it possible to kill with words?

---

 july twenty sixth zero nine, 

"Killing words" Not surprisingly it wasn't easy to find any information about it. Then I realized that what I needed was a curse. I was brought to a whole nother part of the internet. The information I found was strange and disturbing, but it matched what I was looking for. I found out that not only do the words matter, but things like writing quality, spacing, penmanship, thickness of lines - those were all important in creating a curse.

The curse itself was not specified, so I guess it was left to the imagination of the writer. The only thing in my mind was "breath". Therefore I strived to create a curse that made people aware of their breathing. Usually something like breathing is an unconscious reflex. Normal humans don't think "I need air now". Wouldn't it be interesting to see what life would be like if we had to be aware of our breathing? 

It was a bit hard at first. But I think I managed to get the hang of it. 

I decided to test it out.

Tomorrow, I will give the notebook to Hana.

---

 july twenty seventh zero nine, 

It was so easy to get her to read the notebook. I just told her that I had written a short story and wanted her opinion on it. Of course she immediately remarked on how "disgusting" it was. But then her words were cut short and her total focus was drawn to the book. Her eyes going over every single word. Noticing every single I had made on the page, she was completely in. The deliberate spacing between each character began to match the rhythm of her breaths. Slowly I noticed that her breathing became slower and slower. Hana noticed this too, and that's when she began to gasp for air, as if she were drowning. She fell from the couch and began to scratch at , leaving deep red marks as she clawed. Her breathing became irregular, and her eyes fell to the book, then back at me as if asking, "What did you do?", however the only thing that came out of were jagged chokes, heavy breathing and the occasional scream for help. 

Unfortunately, my mother rushed into the room at the sound of Hana's scream, and roughly pushing past me, she ran to her daughter's side and immediately called for an ambulance. 

Of course I didn't go along.

In fact, I was pretty disappointed that Hana hadn't died right then and there. 

---

 august twenty first zero nine, 

She died today.

But it took almost a whole month for her to finally stop breathing. 

How frustrating.

Actually, a few days later Hana's "accident", I gave the same notebook to my mother. At first she displayed the same reaction as Hana, but a few hours later, she was back to normal. Was my curse not strong enough to effect adults? How could I strengthen it?

Maybe it was because my writing is still too immature. 

I decided to enter the youth writing competition.

Strange. I only wanted to do this to kill Hana. But it seems like it's getting too interesting to stop. 

---

 october fourteen zero nine, 

The results were released today.

I won. 

This doesn't surprise me considering I'm a top student in class. Grasping academics is easy. Writing, although a bit tougher since it was based on creativity, was no different. However, with the results for the competition, it was clear that my writing improved. Maybe my curse will be stronger now. Actually, while waiting for the results, I decided to look into how to make curses stronger. It seems like one way would be dying. Hah. How ironic. After my death, this curse will only grow stronger. 

But...

am I now a "bad person"?

Hana deserved it. 

But that's it. 

I'll stop...for now. 

---

 may fourth twenty ten, 

I haven't written in such a long time. My fingers were actually aching to write. Interestingly enough, yesterday, a relatively popular classmate - Kim Myungsoo, I think, asked me to join the school's literature club. But, I had to refuse. 

I've had to hold back the urge to test out the strength of my curse.

But a classmate is making it so hard for me to endure, that person being Lee Jieun - the class representative. It sickens me that a girl like her was chosen by my peers to represent the class. Among everyone else, she was the bubbly, happy girl, willing to help anyone in need. But this was just a facade. It was clear to me that she was just like Hana. Upset that her grades were not as good as mine, she and her friends began to target me.

Her bullying was nothing too serious, just playground stuff, so I was willing to just endure it for a few hours a day. After all, maybe she and her friends would get bored. Things like ostracization, and seclusion were second nature to me. Sometimes she and her friends would actually get physical. Those were a bit tougher to ignore, but I managed to brush it off. Of course, my body would disagree with me - my cancer was only growing stronger, while I was getting weaker. Something simple like pushing me down a flight of stairs could turn out to be fatal one day. But I had to endure it. I was going to endure it.

However, today was the class discussion of our activity for the cultural festival.

Lee Jieun is so stupid...she made me in charge of writing the script for the class play.

So so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so STUPID.

How can I hold back now?

Today, Lee Jieun dug her own grave.