Lia frowned at the night air, the wind stirring her hair softly as her bike rolled down the road ahead of her. It had gotten dark so fast, she thought, that she’d barely had time to enjoy the warm evening before the cool night’s breeze set in. Hopping on her bike, she pedaled down the alley, as far away as she could get from her house.

Her afternoons were often spent outside and away from home – although home wasn’t the best word. Of course, she had a house, but there was no one with whom she could call home.

She shivered as a cold breeze crept up her spine, and with a sorrowful look she glanced back in the direction she came. It was getting quite dark, but she still didn’t want to go home. Not to all the yelling, crying, fighting. She was better off alone than in that hellish place.

However, she had nowhere else to go, and if she didn’t get back soon, her father might start shouting again. With a resolved sigh, she wheeled her bike around and made her way back down the road, towards her house.

As she neared her home, a thought struck her; was her mother all right? She’d left as soon as she’s returned from school, getting away before her father arrived from work. But what about her mother? Maybe she shouldn’t have stayed out so late after all.

She quickly dismissed the thought. Her mom was an adult who knew how to take care of herself. She didn’t need her daughter worrying about her. Besides, what could her father do – kill her? As if he’d do that. He may be a bit rough, but he’d never go that far.

Suddenly, the sound of screeching wheels snapped her back to attention, and she looked up straight into glaring headlights coming directly at her. She froze, her eyes wide in the path of the car. She tried to move, but her feet felt glued to the road.

She felt hand wrap around her shoulders, and before she knew it she was on the ground. The car sped past, its horn blaring as it hurried away.

With wide eyes, Lia glanced around wildly, her gaze catching a figure crouched beside her. A small gasp escaped her as her stare focused on the person that saved her.

The eyes of a boy looked at her with concern out from under a head of thick brown hair. He raked his hair back with spindly fingers, a loud sigh erupting from his lips. “Are you okay?” he asked. When she didn’t respond, his eyes trailed her worriedly. “You aren’t hurt, are you?”

She shook her head slightly, and he nodded, an expression of thankfulness crossing his face. “C’mon,” he mumbled, holding out a hand for her as he straightened himself, “Let’s get you up.”

Lia took his hand gingerly, standing up and dusting herself off. “Thank you,” she said, her voice hoarse. She cleared , looking away awkwardly.

“No thanks needed,” he dismissed, “But are you sure you’re okay?”

For the first time since he’d asked, she actually checked. Aside from a few scratches, she was fine. “Yeah, but what about you?”

“Me?” he echoed, gazing down at himself curiously. “Oh, I’m fine.”

She nodded and bowed slightly, beginning to turn away, until he made a quick noise.

“Ah,” he gasped, “I didn’t catch your name.”

She hesitated. “L-Lia.”

“Lia?” he repeated. “Are you a foreigner?”

Shaking her head, she gave way to a small smile. “No, my mom’s from America.”

“Really?” he beamed. “Than what about your father?”

The smile faded slightly from her face at the mention of her father, but she regained herself instantly. “No, he’s from Seoul.”

“Ah, that’s pretty cool. Can you speak English?”

She nodded proudly. “I can speak English and Korean.”

“Wow,” he gasped, giggling in amazement. “That’s so cool. Say something in English!”

She paused, thinking hard. “Um, thank you for saving me.”

His brow furrowed with concentration as he tried to discern what she said. “What’d you say?”

He laughed softly. “I said thank you. Really thank you, but I have to be going,” she said, picking up her bike and beginning to turn around.

“Wait!” he called, and she turned around. “Jongin. My name’s Jongin.”

“Well, thank you, Jongin, for saving me,” she said, and with that she hopped on her bike, wheeling down the alleyway.

 

---

 

Before she knew it, her house stood before her, the broken shutters and patchy roof welcoming her back with its slummy appearance. Climbing off the bike quickly, she wheeled it to her gate, locking it to the fence. Her feet led her to the door, where she paused for a moment. There wasn’t any yelling going on, so maybe her father hadn’t returned yet. Either that or he’d collapsed into a drunken coma.

She fiddled with the door knob for a moment before it finally gave way. As soon as she opened the door, she was greeted with a stony silence, one that was almost impossible in her house. Her hesitant steps trailed into the house and she shut the door soundlessly behind her.

“Mom?” she called, expecting a response, but was answered by the eerie silence that surrounded her. She made her way deeper into the house, passing by the kitchen and stopping in front of her mother’s bed room. Without hesitating, she threw the door open, facing a disaster.

It looked like a twister had blown through the room. Clothes and papers scattered the floor. Frames and vases lay smashed against the wall. Blankets were strewn across the room, far from their proper location on the bed. Lia’s worried gaze darted around the room, searching for a sign of her mother’s whereabouts, but finding worse.

In the corner, slumped against the wall, lay her mother. Blood stained her ragged, worn dress and bruises covered her body. A scream escaped Lia as she ran to her mother, crouching beside her. “Mom,” she whimpered, shaking her mother slightly. “Mom, wake up. Mom. Mom, please, wake up.”

Lia fumbled as she reached for her phone, dialing 1-9-9 quickly.

“1-9-9, what’s your emergency?” the woman on the other end of the line asked.

“My mom . . .” Lia trailed off, choking sobs consuming her.

“What happened to your mother?”

“She’s . . . she’d bleeding . . . she won’t wake up.”

“What’s your address?” asked the operator.

Lia sputtered her address, her eyes focused on her mother. “But my mom, she’s not breathing.”

“We’ve got an ambulance coming, just stay on the line,” the woman said. Lia blinked quickly, her eyes going blurry. Black tinged the outside of her vision, and her ears rang. She dropped the phone, holding her ears. After that, she out.

 

---

 

The beeping sound was what woke her up.

Lia's eyes flew open, blinking rapidly at the sudden increase in light. The smell of antiseptic filled her nostrils, racking her into a coughing fit. Her gaze cast around the room wildly. "Mom," she mumbled drowsily, struggling to free herself from the wires attached to her. "Where's my mom?"

As she struggled against the IVs, nurses rushed around her. "Where's my mom?" she spoke in English, unable to conjure up any thought other than her mother.

"Ma'am, please calm down," said one of the nurses, placing a careful hand on Lia's shoulder. "Ma'am, you need to lie down."

"I'm fine!" she shouted, jerking away from the nurses and slumping down against the bed. "Where's my mother!"

A look of sorrow passed across the faces of the nurses for a fraction of a second, but Lia noticed it. Her face hardened as she focused on the nurse in front of her. "Where is my mother?" she hissed, and the nurse fidgeted.

"I'm deeply, sorry, Ma'am," the nurse muttered, casting her eyes to the ground."

"For what?"

The nurse cleared . "Your mother was dead on scene. She never made it to the hospital."

And, in that moment, Lia felt her whole word crash around her.

 

---

 

The sound of the clock resonated throughout the deadened hospital room. With every tick, her eyes blinked. With every tock, swallowed. She was growing numb, being stuck in this room by herself. She had no one left; her mother was dead, her father was on the run. She had no friends to call her own and the only family she had left were halfway across the world.

One single thought, through all the oblivion, kept repeating through her consciousness:

You should have come home.

It was true. She should have been home. Maybe she could've stopped her father. If not, then at least she wouldn't have been left alone to live with the guilt.

The door to the room quietly clicked open, admitting through it a woman dressed in a grey suit. Her short brown hair swept around her round face as she stepped into the room, closing the door softly behind her.

"Hi Lia," she breathed, making her way across the room to sit in the chair beside her bed - the chair that had been empty during her whole stay. "My name is Detective Park. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?"

Lia couldn't bring herself to speak, so she just shook her head in response.

"Some of these questions you might not like, so tell me if you'd rather not say, but try and answer as much as you can, okay?" Park looked at Lia with an expectant smile, which faded when she received no reply. Clearing awkwardly, she looked down at her paper. "Where were you before you found your mother?"

Lia waited a moment before answering. "I was . . . riding my bike. I didn't want to go home," she muttered, staring at her hands in her lap.

"Why not?" asked Detective Park, giving her a curious look.

"I . . . my father . . . he's . . ."

Park sighed, setting down the paper and looking Lia straight in the eye. Lia's wide eyed gaze met hers, and she continued. "My dad wasn't a bad man. He wouldn't have done this. He loved me and my mother. He was just . . ."

"Just . . . ?" Park echoed, a sympathetic expression crossing her face.

"He was a bit rough, but that was just his personality. He loved us," Lia insisted, shifting away from the detective.

"Lia, I know it's hard, but did your father ever hurt you?"

Lia's mouth formed on o shape, and she looked at the wall. Her eyes began to mist as her mind whirled. He wouldn't have done this, she told herself. Dad loved me and Mom. He did. He did. She repeated this to herself as tears streaked down her face. "He didn't do it," she spoke in English, glaring at the wall. "He loved us."

"Lia," Detective Park said, with a tone that made her shiver, but Lia kept herself turned away towards the wall. "Lia, there's something I need to tell you."

Shaking her head, Lia put her head down. "I don’t want to know."

"Lia, the evidence is conclusive."

Her eyes squeezed shut, trying to shut out the words that she didn’t want to hear.

"Your father killed your mother."

 

---

 

There was a lot of noise going on outside Lia's room. Not at the same level that was usual in her house, but loud nonetheless. Apparently some people had come to talk about her situation. The fact that her only remaining family were halfway around the world was a bit of an odd case, so it was a situation that required some debating.

However, she didn’t care where she ended up at this point. No matter where she went, she would be with strangers. Never had she met her family in America, nor had she heard tell of them. All she knew was that they existed, and that was the extent of her knowledge.

The door to her room flew open, Detective Park treading through its entry. Closing the door, she gave way to a loud sigh, brushing back her hair behind her ears. "Well, Lia, I have some good news."

Lia looked up, her blank eyes focusing on the Detective.

"Instead of heading into the foster system, you're going to be going back to America to stay with your mother's parents," she told her, a broad smile crossing her face. "But until then, you're going to be staying with me."

Trying hard, Lia spoke quietly, "Why will it take so long?"

Park hesitated, rubbing the back of her neck thoughtfully. "Well, we need the foster system over there to verify your family's ability to take you, but they tend to be a bit . . . well . . . loose on their priorities, if I should say. It might be a while before they even begin to look into it."

Lia nodded simply, going back to staring at the wall. She could feel Detective Park giving her a sympathetic look, and refused to turn to her as she moved across the room to sit on the side of her bed.

"Lia," Park began in a whisper, "I know this is hard. But I'll do my best to make everything as easy and painless as it can be. Just trust me, okay?"

Clearing , Lia bobbed her head, looking down at her hands in her lap. She felt Park put an arm around her shoulders, rubbing her arm comfortingly.

She didn't know whether she should feel happy or sad. Of course, she liked Detective Park, who had been so kind to her these past few days, but she still didn't feel like she had the right to enjoy anything yet. For god's sake, they hadn't even had the funeral yet. It just felt . . . wrong. Wrong to even think about smiling.

It felt even more wrong to think about being happy ever again.