Touch | k.t | Editing!!!!

Prologue

Time was passing like a hand waving from a train I wanted to be on. I hope you never have to think about anything as much as I think about you.

There was nothing quite as painful as being at your fourth high school party ever and seeing your boyfriend in the hallway with some chick who has nails that could puncture wounds in people's lungs and scratch at their skin. She had browner hair, a thinner frame, more experience making out against dirty white walls and a demeanor that screamed 'Seduction.' Son Yuna was everything I was not. And maybe it was for that reason that Taehyung's soft hands were in her hair, his rosy, puffy, lips on hers. His body pressed so close against her that she was basically morphing into the wall her shoulders laid back on. Kim Taehyung was devouring her and I was watching from a distance, a cup of vodka and rum in my hands. I don't know when the tears fell and when my legs picked up off the ground and headed for the door. I don't remember how I had managed to throw up in the bushes, or how I had gone home. I don't remember when my body collapsed on my bed, my dress covered in alcohol, and my mascara staining my cheeks.

There is no excuse I could've made that would've made me forgive Taehyung. I cried for days and weeks on end and some days the pain would be so unbearable, I couldn't even cry. I just laid there with my head resting on my pillow and a hole the size of Jupiter in my chest.

I wondered if he knew. He tried reaching me but I ignored his phone calls, his text messages, and even his fucking emails. I tried to avoid him at school but I couldn't shake the image away every time he came up to me, every time his hand enveloped my wrist, every time he kissed me on the cheek. For nearly eight weeks, Kim Taehyung was poison to me.

The touch that used to bring me so much comfort now brought me nothing but pain. The kiss that would make time stop now accelerated my heart enough for the room to start spinning. The voice that used to make me fall asleep was now the thing keeping me awake.

I was utterly, utterly, destroyed. And Taehyung never knew.

Until the ending of the year formal.

I didn't want to attend, but my best friend at the time convinced me I should.

"Just wear something sexy and then dump his ass on the dance floor or something," She said when she found me laying on my bedroom floor with my eyes on the ceiling and Sam Smith's "The Thrill of it All" album on repeat.

I did as she said. I put on a skin-tight black dress I had never worn before and put on a coat to cover myself up from the evening breeze. My feet were hugged by a simple black pair of heels that had a smaller heel than my younger sister's graduation shoes. My friend had helped me put on makeup and straighten my hair and then we were off.

I arrived at the party with Taehyung being the first to come up to me.

"You look great." He had beamed, juice in his hand.

I only gave him a small smile that nearly made me want to chew up my fingers, "Thank you."

The rest of the night consisted of me uncomfortably standing next to Taehyung who waved at his friends and made a couple of jokes here and there. He spiked his drink, smoked outside for a few minutes, and tried to get me to dance with him. I figured a slow dance would be the perfect timing to break up with him but couldn't bring myself to do it.

When we were making our way to the parking lots and he was going on and on about some basketball shot he had made the other day and I turned around and dropped the bomb.

"I'm breaking up with you." I all I said.

It even took me by surprise.

"What?" He asked, completely in disbelief.

I tried to overcome the massive lump in my throat but I couldn't breathe.

"I just don't think we're working out."

His furrows were furrowed enough to cause wrinkles on his face, "But, why? Is it something I did?"

I knew I should've been honest with him but I was ready to sob my eyes out over wine and crawl into my bedsheets forever. I felt like I was going to pass out.

"No." I lied, shaking my head and trying to gulp down the dryness in my throat. "It's me. I just don't want to be with you anymore."

I was walking towards the bus stop when Taehyung was asking more questions, questions I knew I should've answered.

"Ara. Please tell me why."

I could feel my eyes welling up with tears as I waited for the next bus to arrive. Other people were staring but I didn't pay attention to them. I didn't pay attention to anything but the blurry streetlights ahead of me.

"Ara," His voice was growing deeper, "If you tell me what I did, we can fix this."

How badly I wanted to spit in his face and tell him that's could never fix what he shattered. I wanted to slap him in the face for acting like he deserved another word from me. I wanted, most of all, to just tell him that he was a fucked up son of a bitch with an alcohol problem and a cigarette addiction.

But I didn't. I couldn't.

"Ara-"

The big green bus in our area had cut him off. I plucked out my metro card from my jacket and walked inside, my mascara now starting to coat my cheeks and my hands trembling as I brought the card up to the machine.

The doors closed and I watched as his face slid away. As much as I tried to keep myself from sobbing, I couldn't. The tears came before I could even look away from the windows. My hand flew toward my mouth and my eyes closed as my bones shook.

I arrived at my house 20 minutes later looking like I had just had the wildest night of my life, which was true. I let my coat fall to the floor and I was fast to take off my shoes. Numbly, I walked to my bedroom, closed the door, not even sparing a moment to turn on the lights, and cried until I felt nothing.

I thought Kim Taehyung was my reason to breathe, but he was the reason I was barely fucking alive.