Chapter Text
Everything always hurt, always.
It wasn’t anything special, something that stuck down suddenly upon his life like a cruel curse for all his sins. It was just- there.
An ache that would turn into a blazing, painful hellfire that blazed silently to the rest of the world yet in its angriest moments could leave him collapsed on the floor in agony… until it would slowly fade again.
It lay silent within him, pain waiting to strike.
It wouldn’t let him run as fast as the other kids without feeling like his knees were being stabbed with burning hot knives and his muscles were pulled like taffy. He couldn’t climb trees or jump rope with the few friends he had without an invisible cannon ball struck his back at a million miles per hour and shattered into a thousand razor-sharp shards of pain on impact.
It hurt just to get up in the morning, to kneel over and try and put on that damn shoes that were always too small, to walk down the stairs and get yelled at relentlessly by his mother for being a dramatic, whinny little brat.
It hurt to walk to school, to hike up the endless hills that felt like mountains. Every step slower and harder than the last. It hurt when he’d get to school late every single morning, shame burning in his cheeks as he’d be forced to stand in front of the laughing classroom. Arms raised high above his head, shaking to fight against gravity for what felt like hours while his classmates snickered under their breath and his teacher would hit every tremor in his hands with a ruler.
The pain would never stop, it would never go away. no matter how much he prayed and begged and cried, it was still there with every breath he took.
So he learned to to be silent.
He learned to walk along the soft grass instead of the harsh stone stairs every morning so the steps would feel less heavy. He learned to bite his tongue when his knees would shake as he stood and pushed harder to stand up straight and walk anyway. Learned to get up before the sun so he could rub and stretch the worst of the pain out of his joints through the gentler light of the moon so his mother might just yell at him a bit less.
His pain was silent, yet it always burned… so he learned to be quiet too.
But unholy hell was this a new kind of evil.
He couldn’t get up, no matter how much he tried he couldn’t get his damn body to move he was in so much fucking pain.
Why…why today of all days did the universe have to do this?! He had a test first period, one he couldn't miss even if he wasn't already failing miserably. Missing this test would probably be the thing that would set him back a year adding to all his late entrances.
And if his mother found him like this…
he lay there through his first alarm, and his second, and his third. Barley able to reach over and shut off the ear-splitting bells without gasping for air from the knives that shot through his side just from moving his arm.
Get. Up.
Why was it so hard, so heavy? It felt as if an elephant had slept on his small frame all night long before waking and choosing to use his back as a trampoline. Breaking his bones and stabbing the shards anywhere it could.
You have to get up, you have to get up and stretch and pray so you can walk and put your uniform on and make your bed and look over the notes and make sue she takes the pills before breakfast come on you have to get up.
But he couldn’t, couldn’t do anything more than scream at himself in his mind and watch as the sun burned higher and higher in the sky like a death sentence. Gods he’s never felt it get this bad before. Never had it radiate from every minuscule part of his very being, all at once, leaving him holding back tears and groans with every breath and just begging to whatever Gods or whatever was there who could maybe give a shit to have mercy a-and make it stop so he could just get up.
But no one answered, nothing came. He could do nothing but lay there miserable while his body screamed and he heard the seconds tick by on his clock like a bomb sealing his fate and the wicked sun streaming through his torn blinds. feeling his heart pound louder against it and drop down to his feet when at last he heard those footsteps creek across the old wooden boards closer and closer and closer to his door.
Shit shit shit shit shit no.
“Ju-an”
His eomoni’s. voice dripped with venomous anger, her glare blazing bright against her sleep-less, sickly pale skin. “What in the name of the Gods are you still doing in that dirty bed you little brat?!”
She ripped the sheet off of him, throwing them straight to the ground as he managed to somewhat sit up purely from fear. Biting his tongue to force himself to breathe in spite of the aching pound in his chest.
“Eomeoni I-”
“Haggyo starts in five minutes and you’re still rotting in bed ah- you think that the class you are failing. will just sit there and wait for when you feel like getting up?!”
His arms screamed in protest when he pushed himself up against the hard headboard, legs still dragging limply and useless yet hurting with the fury of a thousand pissed-off suns and it was all he could do to look down at his lap like a dog and pray his eomoni wouldn’t see the tears pricking the corners of his eyes.
“Ugh- what are you still doing lazing around huh?! Get up before I drag you out of that damned bed myself you little-”
“I can’t-” His voice cracked with tears and desperation. that made his heart stop cold in its track.
No no no no no, he couldn't cry- not in front of her.
“Nae dali- they hurt Eomoni-” He didn’t even have to look up to feel her glare sink deeper with such disgust and shame with every small word that left his breath, making the tears freeze on his cheeks with fear.
Fuck.
“They hurt? They hurt?! Ay- how many times Ju-an are you going to do this?!” her anger blazed bright like a violent fire, burning deep into his soul as he sat there frozen and useless. his tears only seeming to fan the flame rather than snuffing it out.
“It’s all in you head lah! All in your stupid, attention seeking head!”She was throwing her hands in the air as she cursed, pacing around the room and throwing his things to the ground. Too disgusted to even look at him.
“What did you do to hurt?! Huh?! What made-up sickness rests in your weak bones other than foolishness! Nothing! You are not sick! You do not hurt! You are just a lazy and selfish waste of a child!”
He almost flinched, almost let himself cry harder. Almost let himself scream back at her about the knives that pierced his legs with every step, the stones of burden that would crush his back every night and day, almost screamed about how that pain was nothing compared to her poisoned glares.
He almost crawled out of bed, crawled to his knees, begged for forgiveness and love and relief.
Almost begged for his eomma.
…But he didn’t. That, at least was one thing he did know better than to ever ask for.
He just stayed silent, stared down, let his stupid tears dry and crust like patterns of pain on his cheeks. Silent, like always.
“You do not know what sickness feels like… what it is to live your life off pills that replace your body, to be cut up like a pig and have had the broken parts ripped out.”
Her voice spat shaper than daggers at each word, scowl ugly and done as she brushed off lint from her robe. “Hansimhan nom- I should drag you off to the old horse stalls so thy can beat that back of yours raw with a whip. Then you’ll have something to cry about jag-eun jwi.”
He said nothing still, only watched out of the corner of his sullen eyes as she marched out of his bedroom with the same thunderous stride, cursing under her breath as she locked the door behind her.
…he wasn’t leaving this room today, was he…
The tears came back with a roaring fury, pouring down like a dam had broken inside him as he very shakily laid back down. Not bothering with bankets and not letting a single sound leave his lips as he cried. Her footsteps echoing angerly from below squeezing his aching heart with fear and shame. Breaths short, pain bright, tears silent.
Cold, hellish flames danced in his mind. Burning the words in his mind over and over and over again.
Waste
Liar
Foolish
Stupid
Lazy
Your hurt is nothing compared to hers you brat, you only make it worse each time with your wining. You will never care, never love, she will never care for a faking, foolish waste like you.
But I can give you someone who does…