Catch The Light

004 | four

        "Who?" He paused, and then hesitantly continued, "Dad?"

        She hummed, pulling at the mmm while she swayed to her left as if to lay down again. "I don't know what he wanted, but he seemed mad. Yelled at me, said a bunch of useless fucking shit and then went to your room. I could hear the stomping from down here. You know, thin walls, thin floors, this place might just fall apart any moment now, don't you think, Seungminnie? I always told him he should have discussed buying it with me. But he never listens, he always does stuff like this. Even after the accident, he never changed. He never listens to me, he never does anything to h—"

        Seungmin couldn't really hear her anymore. He was already rushing his way up the stairs, and a moment later he stood at the door of his bedroom, which, as he expected, was left dangling open, revealing the inside.

        Calling it a mess would have been a huge understatement.

        Everything was on the floor. Clothes, papers, books, notebooks, and amidst everything, broken pieces of glass were piled in, which he can only guess were once the old mug he used to use as a pen and pencil holder. The doors of his closet were wide open, the same with the desk drawers, everywhere had been emptied, and everything was left to cover the entire flooring.

        Seungmin's heart was racing in his chest, legs suddenly weak and trembling.

        He ran into the room, not bothering to even mind the glass, or anything or even thinking about anything else. Nothing, except that. He couldn't have found it, right?

        Seungmin hadn't really even hidden it anywhere that secretive, but he never would have thought that his father would ever go into his room to search for it himself. He didn't even know his father had any idea about him keeping that box. He didn't even think he would have ever found out that he'd been keeping a good share of his earnings to himself. But he must have figured it out somehow, or at least maybe he was just desperate enough to think of it as a possibility and wanted to check, because why else would he have done this? Why else would he have turned the room upside down if it wasn't for money?

        The box wasn't anywhere to be found. How much money had Seungmin even managed to save up and store in that box? How much money had his father found and taken away? He'd been saving up for months, and he was sure that the amount of money he had managed to save up was not little.

        His entire future depended on those savings. Without them how would he get into college? How would he continue to live? He couldn't stay in this house, not with how bad its condition had been getting. He could not stay when both his parents were slowly just ruining everything for him, at least college would be a good enough excuse to leave.

        But without the money, where would he go? Everything would be over. Everything would be ruined. It all would end up—

        Seungmin paused, finally breaking out of his thoughts and coming back to his senses as he heard noises from downstairs. Thin walls, thin floors, this place might just fall apart any moment now, Seungmin echoed his mother's words as the sound came again.

        The doors were being opened and closed, and then footsteps at the stairs. Had his father returned earlier? If he had had the time to go through his room like that, then he probably had.

        Seungmin felt his heart drop as he heard the footsteps growing louder. He left the mess on the floor as he stood up, making his way to the entrance of his room, just a few steps away from the top of the staircase, where he saw his father.

        Mr Kim's hair was a whole mess. He had dark circles under his eyes, and he somehow wore a tired and yet wide-awake expression. Seungmin noticed how his father's grip on the stairs' thin railing tightened as he stopped in his tracks, his eyes meeting his son's.