Stars and Summer Skies (ZB1 Ricky X Female OC) [COMPLETED]

Ch. 20: Fear, Which I Had Forgotten

"I...

"I forgot..."

It was truly unfortunate. No matter all the times and all the nice feelings Ricky finally got to feel for the first time, he would soon come to realize by the end of each day that he was still trapped, in the cage that his father had set up for him.

He felt like a bird, trapped in a cage and only allowed to stay there and go nowhere else. If he were to "sing" he would be berated and hit, and if he were to try and flee, he would most likely be killed, either by the one that had caged him or by the things outside his cage that he had never really known about.

Unfortunately, not even Yeoreum, who had repeatedly given him chances to feel a sense of freedom and peace, could give him true freedom. Because by the end of the day, even she would have to bring him back to his cage.

He understood it, though. There was really nothing much she could do, either. He was a bird, but she was also a little girl, both of them under the strict eyes of their supervisors.

She was just freer.

Slap!

"Where the hell have you been going?!" The boy's father yelled as he stood over him, the look in his eyes dark and staring right into the boy's shaking pupils. "I only checked to see where you were just after your lunch break, and suddenly I see you in some random street I've never even heard of? Who gave you permission to go there?! WHO?!"

Here he was again. Right when Ricky thought he had been able to sneak all the things he had been doing in school. After all that effort, and all that planning, just one little mistake where he just simply forgot, and it was all...

"ANSWER ME!"

... ruined.

The man's hand landed on the boy's face once again with a huge sound, sending Ricky to the ground only seconds before his father would grab him by his collar, almost choking him.

"Do you realize that what you have been doing is so, so wrong for you," he spoke with a low, menacing voice as he forced his son to look back at him. "Lying to your father! To me! HOW DARE YOU?!"

This time, a fist, and when Ricky fell to the floor, his father no longer made any effort to pull him back up as he raised his foot over the boy.

"You ungrateful. Deceitful. Disobedient. Son of a b*tch! Why are you always so disappointing?!" With every stomp the man dropped onto his son, every insult came out of his mouth, stabbing the boy just as well as the sole of his father's shoe. "You might as well just DIE!"

"Ugh!" Ricky grunted when the man's shoe suddenly hits his stomach. A sharp pain shoots through his whole body as if, for a second, he had lost all oxygen inside him before the next thing he knows, he sees his father's hand grab him by his arm and pull him up.

He had fallen into a dazed state due to the last hit he received, but when he almost came to, he was hut again, but this time, by the floor of his room as his father threw him inside with an enraged force.

"Don't ever come out and show your face to me from now on, you brat!" The man shouted, before slamming the door of the room. The whole place shook, and almost everything in it. Some things fell from their places as a result, and one of them... was a piece of paper from a nearby desk.

Ricky flinched as the loud sound reached his ears, and yet even after his father had left, he remained there, lying on the cold floor, curled up and breathing heavily. He was almost wheezing as he tried to fix his breathing, but even so, silent tears fell from his eyes, as he remained just looking ahead. His tears blurred his vision, making it harder for him to find a reason to calm down.

And then a piece of paper landed conveniently near his hand... Of course, he knew what it was. He knew well enough, after all the times he had read it over and over again. He had memorized the paper used, the writing style, the stickers, and he would have read it again... If only he didn't have to move even just a little bit to get it.

"Please... I'm tired... I can't..." Even his thoughts were constantly interrupted, as if his heavy breathing affected them, too. But his thoughts really weren't clear at all.

As much as he wanted to move, it hurt too much. And he was shaking, and numb. It's almost as if he was scared to move. Almost as if maybe, if he did, his father would barge into the room and finish the job.

But the man never came in. And Ricky fell asleep in his tears and on the cold floor.

It was in his sleep, however, that his hand finally moved and reached for the paper containing Yeoreum's poem, crumpling it in his desperation for solace...

If only hands could read.