Chapter 3

My parents and my brother noticed I'd changed.

I'd turned cold and selfish.

No matter how they tried to stop me, I went back to repeat the year anyway.

I ignored the growing number of cuts and bruises on my father's body, ignored the way my mother could no longer straighten her back, ignored my brother screaming that he wanted a new phone.

My days ran on a routine.

Except for meals, every hour I had went into studying.

To my surprise, once no one was eating up my time, my very first mock exam came out surprisingly well. I even placed in the top five of my class.

Just as I thought.

They had all been dead weight.

I would be better off without them.

That day I came home from school to find my room had been ransacked.

Every inch had been turned over, even the mouse hole dug out.

I said nothing, and my parents called me to dinner as though nothing had happened.

My mother took a bite and frowned.

"Why does this food taste strange?"

My father chewed a few times and frowned too.

"Probably just old rice."

I let out one cold laugh after another.

"That's the taste of rat poison."

Their faces changed completely. One bolted for the bathroom, the other grabbed the trash can, and in no time came the sound of retching.

My brother went pale, his chopsticks shaking in his hand.

I patted his head.

"It's okay, sweetie. You never got in my way, so there's no poison in yours."

Just a little poison. Not enough to kill anyone, only enough to scare them.

Once my father had emptied his stomach, he rounded on me.

"What exactly do you think you're doing? No more chores, no more money? You're our son, you've got our blood in your veins, so you do as you're told. When your old man tells you to do something, you do it! Now hand over that money!"

He raised his fist and came at me. I wasn't afraid. All I had left was the courage of someone with nothing to lose.

I slapped the bank card down on the table.

"So what if I've got your blood in me? So you're all going to gang up and bleed me dry, is that it? Ha, fine. Take it if you dare. Just make sure you sleep with your eyes open tonight."

"Go on, take it!"

When he wouldn't, I forced the card into his hand.

My father recoiled from me in terror.

He shoved my mother forward instead.

My mother wasn't as sickening as my father, so I softened my face a little for her.

"Mom, you take it. It's the last meal, so you should at least eat something good."

Her hand trembled like she had Parkinson's.

She was afraid.

She was afraid that if she took it, it really would be the last meal.

"Aaah!"

My mother shrieked, shoved the card back at me, grabbed my brother, and fled into the bedroom, my father right behind her.

The house went quiet. Even my brother's crying was muffled.

I reported my results to the instructor.

The instructor was silent for a moment, then asked,

"You put rat poison in it?"

I shook my head. As if I'd ruin my own future over trash like them.

"Just scraped off a bit of wall plaster. Though yes, I did buy the rat poison."

I meant it.

If they had the nerve to ransack my room today, tomorrow they'd have the nerve to break my legs to keep me out of school.

I wanted them to be afraid, to weigh the consequences of crossing me.

In my eyes, they weren't my parents. They were the enemy.

It worked well.

I made my mother hand over her paycheck card, so that even that little bit of money wouldn't disappear into my father's bottomless pit.

She handed it over meekly.

I thought, I should have flipped the table long ago.

If I'd flipped it sooner, would I already be in college by now?

How did I let people this rotten drag me down for so many years...