With each minute that passed with no sign of Father coming in, my breathing grew shallow, and my heart rate climbed. Every second felt like it was scraping away at my life.
All I could do was sit in the dark, accompanied by my own swirling thoughts in the silent living room.
What's going to happen to me?
What am I supposed to tell Father?
How am I supposed to face Mom?
What do I do about Uncle?
Will Father be mad at me and tell me it's my fault?
Will Mom never talk to me again?
Will I have to deal with Uncle again after all this is over?
Should I just… let him do as he pleases next time?
Those thoughts circled over and over again.
I wasn't sure of how I felt about anything most of the time—but in this very moment, one thing was certain.
I was scared.
Fear closed its cold grip around my chest until sitting still was impossible, and my fingers wouldn't stop rubbing at my sweaty palms.
I came close to losing myself in that fear time and time again, in the short while I'd been in the house. Yet, whenever I was on the brink, a faint warmth would bloom in my cheek.
That warmth held me together for just a little longer each time.
Eventually, the front door swung open.
My body went frigid as my head snapped up. Three shadowy figures were entering the living room. The one in the middle—my Father—shoved Mom forward, urging her to take a seat. She lowered herself onto the couch opposite from mine.
Uncle followed behind her, about to take a seat as well—only to be caught by the back of his shirt and hauled up in front of Father's face.
"Tell me," Father said, his voice low enough to send shivers through my body. "What is the meaning of this, brother?"
With a petrified yelp, Uncle flinched and instinctively tried to pull back, but Father held him firmly in place, leaving no room for retreat.
"Do you remember what I told you a while back?" Father asked, seemingly out of nowhere.
Uncle frantically shook his head. "N-no… What did you say?"
Something snapped behind Father's gaze then—the glint in his eyes seizing into full craze.
"I said you could do what you wanted… as long as you didn't cause trouble for me. And what did you do?"
Before Uncle could even respond, Father kicked his legs out from under him and threw him onto the hardwood floor.
"You did just that—caused me trouble. So from this day forward–"
Father crouched down, lifted Uncle's head, and slammed it into the floor with a loud *BANG*. When he raised it again, Uncle was clutching his bleeding nose with tears in his eyes. His mouth opened and closed, but with Father above him, not a single sound made it out.
Father pulled him closer, foreheads pressing against each other.
"You are prohibited from doing anything but working, sleeping, and eating. Do you understand?"
Uncle gave him a meek nod.
A part of me felt somewhat relieved. This way, Uncle wouldn't be able to do anything to me again. But at the same time, if he was willing to be this rough with his own brother…
What's going to happen to Mom and me?
The mere thought of it left me pinned to my seat, a cold pit hollowing out my stomach.
But I didn't have time to dwell on those imaginations for too long. The answer came a second later.
Father tossed Uncle's limp head aside, leaving him crumpled on the ground, and approached Mom.
He slowly raised a hand toward her. On instinct, Mom jolted hard—the couch scraping back an inch—and squeezed her eyes shut.
Father's hand inched closer and closer—until it gently settled against her cheek and gave her a soft caress.
I watched, utterly speechless.
He touched her with such care that it looked almost… loving.
Mom held her breath, bracing for the pain that would always come next. But the pain never came.
Father let out a soft exhale, the crazed glint in his eyes receding into something like half-affection.
"Honey, you don't have to worry. I'm not going to hit you. Not for this."
In all the years I'd known him, Father… had never spoken or acted like this before—especially toward Mom. If I didn't know any better, I'd have sworn that it was another man entirely. But I did know better—and so did Mom.
With trembling hands, she cautiously placed them against his and eased them away from her face.
"S-s-sorry… B-but I-I don't—understand what you're trying to say… dear."
Getting those words off her chest seemed to shave years of her life as she began choking on her own breath, struggling to suppress her sobs.
Father only shook his head and took a step back. "It's okay, dear. What I mean is—you did nothing wrong. You saw your Daughter was in danger, so you fought. And most importantly—you won."
Mom's shoulders went still as she stared at him with wide, disbelieving eyes. As if to further prove his point, Father turned around and stepped away from her.
"I told you," he said, making his way toward me. "You won. That's all I care about. You are truly fit to be my Wife. Good job."
By the time he finished, Father was standing right over me. His figure stood tall in the dark, looking down at me with his bright red eyes.
The earlier affection he'd shown Mom was gone, replaced by something colder, calculating, yet crazed at the same time.
"And then there's you, Mei."
His voice wasn't soft. It wasn't deep, either. It was just him speaking. That was all.
It should have been a blessing. At least now I knew I wasn't going to get treated as roughly as Uncle had. But not knowing what was behind it all made it all the worse, keeping me right on the edge of my seat.
"I'm not all too pleased about the fact that you ran away. Much less that you didn't even close the door on the way out…"
My heart stopped as I waited for whatever came next.
Father crouched down to my level, laid a hand on my shoulder, and looked me dead in the eye. "But… the fact you got my signal and lied to the cops without me having to say anything to you... that makes me proud."
Hearing him say that, the breath left me all at once—one I hadn't even realized I'd been holding.
Thank God–
"But do not get the wrong idea."
Suddenly, Father's voice dropped, his grip on my shoulder tightening until his finger dug toward the bone.
My shoulder throbbed with a dull pain, but I maintained my cheery smile as I waited for him to continue.
"I'll allow it just this once… but next time—do not run. You stay, and you fight. If you succeed, good. If you fail, you take what's coming to you. Do you understand?"
At that moment, everything came to a stop, and a wave of nausea surged up from my stomach as a trace of a realization formed in my head.
Why… is he saying this?
Now that I thought about it, it was strange. It made sense that I knew what happened—I lived through it. But how did Father know?
There was only one possible solution.
...He's known the whole time.
The gears turned, and everything clicked into place.
He's known… but hasn't done anything.
He knows what Uncle—his brother—tried to do. What he has done.
He knows, but he never stepped in.
The nausea welled up in my throat, burning my esophagus and tainting my breath with an acidic stench.
Why?
Why didn't he stop his own brother?
Why did he leave me to defend myself?!
Why…
Why?
whyWhyWHY?!
And the answer came just as fast. When it did, the nausea froze over and sank back down into the pits of my stomach, as if it'd never been there at all.
…What a stupid question.
The answer's simple.
If I didn't want it to happen, I just needed to fight.
And if I lost, that just meant I wasn't good enough.
That's all there was to it.
Father, Mom, Uncle—they have nothing to do with it.
I just wasn't good enough.
Father shook me once, bringing me back to our conversation. He didn't need to do that, because I'd already finished thinking, anyway.
With a smile, I raised my hand and gently held his—the one digging into my shoulder.
Nothing should have changed; it should've still hurt. But just for now, for these few seconds, I didn't feel it.
"Yes, Father," I said, my voice perfect. "Next time, I won't run. You don't have to worry about anything."
Father gave me a satisfied nod. "Good. I'm glad you understand."
With that, he stood up and returned to the center of the living room. "Now then, I have somewhere to go. You all should head to bed. Good night."
Without wasting another moment, Father turned around and left the house as if he had never been there in the first place, leaving only Mom, Uncle, and me.
With him gone, there was no point in staying here any longer, so I got up and began heading toward the stairs.
My pace didn't falter in the slightest, even as I passed by Uncle.
I climbed the stairs, stepped into my room, and collapsed onto my bed.
It had been a long day, and I was exhausted. So surely, sleep would claim me just as quickly…