daybreak || minsung

Chapter 1

Prelude

I'd never given much thought to how I would die. Maybe I should have, considering the company I'd been keeping.

Death was the farthest thing from my mind. Life was captivating me more than it ever had. Finally my story had a moral, finally my existence seemed full — overflowing with possibilities and hope...

In hindsight, it was misguided. This was never going to end well.

I couldn't make myself feel regret for it. I could never regret my time with him, however fleeting it was destined to be.

My limbs were frozen as I fell back. Fear was only on the periphery of my senses, just out of focus. All I could hear was my family's roars echoing off the trees, and all I could see was the blood-red eyes of the predator as he leapt forward to kill me.

Chapter 1

I watched the flat surface of Phoenix fly past me from the passenger seat of my mom's car. The windows were rolled down, and the dry air blew into my face as I dived headfirst into my bleak thoughts.

In the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington State, a small town named Forks existed under the cover of near-constant rain and clouds. My dad still lived there, but my mom had survived it — she ran screaming from its limits with baby-me tucked under her arm. I'd had to go there for summers until I was fourteen — and then immediately put a stop to it.

Now I had banished myself to this damp, insignificant array of buildings and streets, and — oh, my god — it was only hitting me now: I was going to have to live there. Goddamnit.

I only brought one duffel bag of clothes and books and whatever else, and my carry-on was a rain coat. My mom walked along next to me, organizing my documents in a way that I'd definitely have to reorganize later. 

Then it was time to say goodbye, which made my heart sink deeper into my chest than it already was. My mom held her hands to my cheeks and turned my face to her. She was crying; it bothered me. Not that I wouldn't be crying myself to sleep tonight — and the night after that, and so on and so forth — but I didn't need to see it, just like she didn't need to see me.

"Email me when you get there, Minho," my mom said, petting my hair.

I smiled pathetically. "I will."

"I feel like I'm abandoning you," she said. "You can come back anytime. I'll be there for you."

"Yeah," I replied, looking down. "I just want you to be happy."

Now she smiled, and her brown eyes lost some of the gloss. "You're too good to me."

I shrugged.

"Say hi to Charlie for me."

"Yeah. Bye, Mom."

"Bye, sweetie." She wrapped her arms around me and hugged the air out of my lungs. I could go a few seconds without breathing. I hugged her back, sighing glumly into her shoulder. I loved my mom. I loved her like I loved nothing else. 

The airport was boring, until I was late for my flight and had to run to catch it. I almost missed it, but I called for the staffer to 'wait, stop, oh, my god, please' just as they were sliding the door to the tube shut. Panting and disheveled, I was ushered onto the plane like a chicken that hadn't made it into the coop before sundown. 

I was then seated between a person with a large folding map and an already-drunk CEO-type in a suit. I closed my eyes and thought about how the plane could malfunction and crash and we could all die. You know, to cheer myself up.