It hurts. An indescribable sense of pain takes over my arm. It’s dark. I can’t see anything. But I can feel the pain piercing through my every fiber and slowly creeping through my skins and muscles.

I’m afraid. I can’t tell where this pain comes from. I feel my arm numbing out, refusing to move at all. In the midst of that, the pain intensifies, before beginning to pulsate. I wish I could rip it off. So I can escape from all this pain.

I run and run, but there seems to be no end. Through the pit of the seamless darkness, the pungent smell of iron sweeps so temptingly. In a glimpse, the eternal nothingness fades into a nauseating red that drowns me in a suffocating sea of irony.

As I open my eyes, I find myself in a familiar room, strangely freed from the mysterious pain. Amidst that was a silhouette, slowly inducing the growing feeling of déjà vu and the restless longing – a strange nostalgia.

Instinctively, I take a few steps, hesitance weighing on each.

“Father,” I called out. Yet, as words hurriedly escaped from my lips, an undefinable wave of melancholy rushes in. With each and every step, I can feel my breath thinning out; my legs slowly giving up.

“If…”

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No. There’s no point. You know what’s going to be the answer. Don’t say it. There’s no need to it. I knew that, but for some reason, a part of me still clings to the idea that hope might still exist. To the even slightest glimpse of hope that everything is still redeemable. That in the very end of all this, I will find reassurance. That everything is just a huge misunderstanding; that this kind of relationship is still fixable. For the tiniest chance, I decide to take a further step, set to finally step out of my shell.

“If… I was a demon, would you… still be ()?”

By the time I lift my head up, our eyes meet with each other. I can see his gaze, visibly put off by my nonsensical words. Long, cold pause. That disgust in his look. Ah, what a stupid question. Why did I even bother asking? Why can’t I think of the answer by myself?

It’s the normal reaction. Of course. So why do I feel so terrible? No. You knew. You’ve expected this to happen. So why are you holding back your tears like a dumbass now? What was I expecting, really? Why does it feel so suffocating?

Tears are rushing in. Time as though frozen, still in denial. Why? You expected this. This shouldn’t have been such a surprising outcome. You’ve thought of it. This is the only rational thing to happen. Why are you being all melancholic out of the sudden? You know from the very start that there is no affection at all. So why are you so desperate for it? You know it’s always fruitless. You mean nothing to the house. Totally unneeded. In fact, why are you still here?

Haha.

It is embarrassing. Why did I say that? I wish I can run away from all this. I want to escape. From all this. What was I thinking?

A totally unwarranted existence. A shame to the family’s name. I wish I was dead. I wish I wasn’t born at the first place. I want to die.

When I open my eyes, I come to realize my tearful eyes.