Sterling

PROLOGUE

PTSD was something Taehyung grew up with for as long as he could remember. His parents were always fighting and if they weren't fighting, he was getting beaten by them to the point he wished he would just die. He was verbally, emotionally, and physically abused by the people he has to call his parents, and nobody knows about what happens behind closed doors.

His best friends hardly know what goes on when Taehyung goes home after school, but they assume what's happening when the brunette shows up to school with bruises and marks all over his body. He would show up to school with a busted lip and an occasional black eye, sometimes a bruised cheek and jaw, cuts scattered and littering his beautiful porcelain features to the point they've left scars he wished he could cover up.

Home life wasn't the only thing going on in his life that made him suicidal and depressed. School wasn't any different. He was bullied and picked on, and of course, every time his friends would find out, they would scare them off until the next day where the process started all over. His life was a living hell and he's grown so used to it, he was convinced this was how everyones life was.

He never had a happy childhood. Everything consist of bad mouthing, hate speech, violent kicks and blows to his body in all areas, hurtful words that pierced through his heart, lies that he believed were true about him, and so much more. He grew cold to those around him and sometimes he would express it towards his friends as well, when all they do is try and help him.

He doesn't hate his friends, and he grateful for all of their help, but it didn't feel like anything was working. He went to school with so much anxiety, so many nerves dancing within his body because he didn't know what to expect—even though that's mostly a lie. He did know what to expect and he expected the usual daily thing: bullied by the group fo jocks and others that completely despised him, hated him with a burning passion.

And when his day at school was over, he would go home to the abuse his parents would give him, as if the beatings he got from school weren't enough. He swore the world had it out for him, and he was convinced it was trying its absolute hardest to try and get rid of him permanently, to which it almost happened on several occasions—so many he almost bled out because of a vertical line right down his wrist.

So many times because of so many pills he had stuffed in his mouth, swallowing them until he would black out and wake up in a hospital bed. So many times because of the amount of alcohol he would drink in hopes to get alcohol poisoning—drinking himself to death. So many times because he would stand on the ledge of a bridge or something so high up from the ground, just gathering enough courage to make one effortless leap, until someone would stop him by asking what the hell he was doing and if he were okay.

He's tried so many things but none of them were successful. It was like the world wanted him gone, but at the same time, it wanted to watch him slowly suffer and watch him endure all the physical and emotional pain that it threw at him, expecting him to just deal with it and be okay and move on. But he couldn't do that. He wasn't like everyone else.

He actually had a heart and he actually had feelings unlike everyone he's met so far—besides his best friends. He wore his feelings on his sleeves for the longest time until he finally shut down his emotions and became a cruel and heartless prick that everyone came to know. That was the new Kim Taehyung, and that's the man everyone referred him to.

Cold.

Heartless.

Ruthless.

Rude.

Cruel.

Freak.

Weird.

Worthless.