Everyone tried to reason with me that they understood how I felt. That they share the same pain as me, but all sympathy and pity aside they don’t…to watch your parents collapse in front of you dead, their eyes that were once filled with life agape at you soulless. Your mother’s bloody hand stretched out and was squeezing your tiny hand in hers trying to give you comfort until the warmth disappeared, your small whimpers left unheard as the house became deserted, leaving you there behind.

Worst of all I was only six…

Long story short

2 causalities and 1 traumatized

Throughout these years that I’ve grown and watched time whizz by so slowly, my body became tired as if it had been dragged as time went on. Silent and lifeless as I stayed in the corner in the dark, observing how others lived, how they went on with their everyday routines from being childish to maturing. People changed, looks changed…time changed. 

Leaving me…

Park Bom, 21 years old and a university student.

I was basically a wallflower, and I pretty much accept and appreciated that, I didn’t need the limelight because I knew I couldn’t handle it. My past was my past but it still haunted me, I was the few unlucky to have terrible people raid my house in search of nothing but wealth as they trashed and searched through our home but now that I was a fully grown woman I could still say I was basically the same as I was.

Not childish, but in the way that I still lived in the past, dreams of that horrific night would play my head again and again like it was on replay that it was normal for me to wake up in tears, tossing, turning and even screaming as I then felt my grandmother hold me down, her weak wrinkly hands gripping my shoulders as she struggled to take care of me. I would always open my eyes to see her white hair…my head nuzzled into the crook of her neck as she patted my hair lovingly, she was my only family.

My grandparents only had one child…my father, when then my dad met my mother then created me, their so-called bundle of joy. My mother had her side, but her parents had passed long ago where her and her two siblings had drifted apart and acted like strangers, as if their they didn’t have the same blood pulsing in their veins. Now with my grandmother the only one taking care of me I would be lying if I said that I didn’t feel guilty, with such old age she was the one whom deserved to be taken care of not vice versa.

Grandfather passed away a few months after my parent’s shocking deaths, leaving me in the hands of my grandmother. I loved her so much that I ended up crying every night with the thought of fright of losing her, scared to death if I wake up one day and find her lifeless.

“God knows the best for everyone darling,” my mother had once cooed, “the day when you lose someone to God, know that he isn’t punishing them or their loved ones, but know that he has a path set for everyone.”

“The day will come when God will claim that person and bring them to him to heaven…because he loves them…”

I admired my mother for what she said to me that helped me grow up to be a well raised and religious person as I was. Attending mass every Sunday with my grandmother, when then she would bashfully compliment me to her fellow friends, saying that I was refreshing and beautiful like flower in spring. Like they say with age sometimes they grow childish, but I still love her very much.

Of course all traumatizing events come with a consequence, and to think my nightmares and the deaths of so many of my beloved family wasn’t enough there was something else that rocked my life and left a huge impact on me after that fateful night…

I’ve become mute…

I could hear just fine, but after that incident the doctor explained that my body has chosen me to become mute, I could speak fine and there was nothing wrong with my body but my body chose what it chose. Every time I opened my mouth my grandmother would become hopeful, wanting to hear her grandchild’s voice just one more time before her time would come, of course I felt nothing but guilt when I would disappoint her like usual, no words rolling of my tongue as I would hold my tears back mouthing sorry to her.

I was so thankful that she had such great patience, flashing me a small smile as she nodded her head understandingly, hugging me tightly as I would go on with everyday life. Like I said I was basically a wallflower, always stuck in the back in everything, if it be school, I was way far from popular; I bet you if you ask one random student about me they would only look back at you with confusion or if it be friends? 

I was a loner and I won’t lie about that…

But what did I hate the most? Ungrateful university students whom I would occasionally cross by where they would then gather all the information needed for assignments for their convenience. Some days I was lucky and they would just ask me nicely, other days I wasn’t so. Yes I was basically a wallflower, but I wasn’t invisible enough to be unnoticed for some of my grades. I know what it feels like to be slapped, to have some of my fellow classmates complain about how I would look back at them dumbly and even to the extent of calling me out for not answering them…

I’m mute…why couldn’t they figure that out?

It was torture, those rare days would be my most terrible ones when my thrashing and screaming in my dreams would be the worst that it would even cause my grandmother to cry in defeat, having her arms wrapped around me with the lights on as she rocked me back to sleep.

*ring ring*

Awaken by the shocking sound of the alarm clock beside my head, with my eyes tightly scrunched closed I searched for the device blindly. My head limply resting on my fluffy pillow while I patted the space on the table, luckily hitting jackpot as I hit the clock with a thud, causing silence to reign in my room once again. Though dreading to get up, I knew it was no use to head on back to dreamland, as I flipped to the other side of the bed my eyes half open only to be met with the empty space with no trace of my grandmother. Assuming she had migrated back to her room after I had fallen asleep after my usual late night interruption with my screams, I raised my sleeping body up as I stared around my plain room in silence.

Light rays seeped through the curtain, managing to avoid the blackout curtain as it shone through the few spaces near my window. Looking around my room was just as usual, how it looked like a few years ago when I had moved in no changes made as my clothes were already picked beforehand. Having to get ready for a day at school, I dragged myself up making my bed quickly before rushing into the bathroom for a quick shower.

I wasn’t late, but I cherished having breakfast with my grandmother, listening to her endless stories of various topics and I wanted to take advantage of each and every breakfast I had with her.

Anyways, 20 minutes later all fresh and clean I skipped towards the staircase, only to find her elevating device still left on the upper floor rather than the ground floor. It indicated my grandmother was on the same floor as me, or else she would have climbed down the stairs herself which I find unbelievable since she only managed to walk and keep up with me barely.

Deciding not to linger on that unusual detail, I skipped down the stairs with a pleasant mood, already readying myself to be hit with the scent of the food that she would prepare, or the sounds of the radio which she would use as her companion during her cooking sessions. I was taught how to cook and I did help her with cooking as much as I could, only leaving her the responsibility with breakfast while I would cook lunch for her the night before, not wanting her to have too much trouble.

With my bag in tow I entered the kitchen ignorantly, finding the kitchen empty and silent as if no soul had disturbed the room ever since last night when I had cooked dinner. Pots, plates and even the sink head was still in the same place as I had left it…

Foolish

Stupid

Dumb

Useless

All these words and even more synonyms hit my head, as I dropped my bag with shock, wanting to scream and scold myself for the being so unaware with all those signs that already warned me of what was to come. The unmoved elevating system…no scent of food…not even the usual rustic sound of the radio…they were all absent and I was too oblivious to realize.

Tears flooded my eyes, as I turned back full speed, the word ‘please’ being replayed in my head over and over again in a loop. My bare feet burned against the carpeted floor, my breathing heightened as I stormed upstairs as I only prayed and hoped that I would find my grandmother asleep in bed, hopefully only oversleeping as a result of the tiring nights all due to me.

I whimpered again, shaking my head with fright as I ran down the hallway, my fingers stiffly wrapping around the door knob of her room beside mine. Tears continued to spill down my face, my whole body shaking as I closed my eyes and turned the knob to discover my grandmother lying there in her bed.

Her face peaceful, solemn just as how she would normally look, but one thing that wasn’t normal, how I noticed that her chest was heaving up and down. It was like my world came crashing down on me, feeling sadness and pain overcome me as I rushed to her side, the waterworks now flowing continuously as I shook her body.

Scream!!

Just scream Park Bom!

Those words were planted in my head but nothing…not even the slightest yell as I cried and sobbed as I knelt down beside her, my hands holding her left hand as I felt her cold and lifeless hands.

No…not again

It was like God wanted me to be alone, a loner.

I believed in God, but why? 

My grandmother was the last thing holding me together, she was the stone base in my life, she was the last person whom I trusted and loved that still lived and breathed the same air as I did, but no. God had to take everyone I loved, my parents my grandparents…my family.

I was completely alone now and that was the reality that was hard for me to believe…

The time had come for my grandmother to be taken away from me; I wanted to hit myself so badly for not taking good care enough of her…most of all my lone wish I always hoped for.

I wished to thank her and tell her how much I loved her…but now I can’t.

How great would it have been if I was able to greet her one day and mutter those words to her, imagining how happy and proud she would have been of me? I would expect her to rain me with endless compliments, saying that she was proud of me long before that. Truly I would have felt accomplished, to know I was really moving on with my life on a new chapter, to be able to communicate and tell her anything I wanted.

I was too late, no excuse but it was my entire fault, and I was too late. 

“Now now Bom…when the day comes and you’re by yourself and I’m not here anymore,” she had once told me.

‘Grandma, don’t say that!’ I wrote on notebook I kept with me.

She smiled back at me, squeezing my cheek affectionately, “don’t worry I’ll always be by your side…but if that does happen I want you to stay strong okay.”

“I want you to be the great and inspiring woman you are and go on with your life to share your stories and help people to move on like yourself,” she explained.

“One day…one day you’re going to be able to talk again and I’ll always be watching you,” my grandmother smiled though tears were swelling in her eyes, “find your other half and create your own family.”

‘But you’re my only family…’ I scribbled down, my handwriting messy as I just wanted to express my opinion as fast as I could.

“Yes, I am your family but I also want you to have your own family and have kids,” she continued.

‘Stop trying to make me lose my innocence grandma…’ I replied back, flashing a smile.

“I’m not thinking in that way, Bom…” my grandmother said, “just remember that as days go on by one day you’ll find your way...”

‘God has a path for everyone,’ I wrote, showing her of all the knowledge I was taught by my mother.

“Exactly…”

Reality…I was still unprepared to be left alone just like that. 

Unexpected to find her gone the next day after I had just spent a wonderful evening with her yesterday; I crouched down into a ball on the floor. Feeling my endless tears stain my shirt as I cried for the loss of another of my loved ones, to not be fully over the past of my parents and now having to deal with another loss of