The cold, night air cooled the sweaty, hot skin down after a long and tiring shift at work. Jung Chan-woo walked along the quiet street, one of the only times he could fine peace in between his busy schedule of work and studies. He knew that the moment he walked in the front door to his horrible home life that he wouldn't be able to find peace any longer.

It was just Chan-woo, his father and his mother at home. He hated living there and that was why he spent most of his time either studying or at his full-time job. He lived in hell, literal hell, with his mother always drunk and his father always finding a reason to pick on him. He couldn't wait until he the day he could finally escape from them and live on his own, free from their abuse.  

With a sigh, he decided to pull out his phone from his pocket since he hadn't had a chance to catch up on his notifications in a while. He scrolled through his phone and navigated to his emails. Amongst a bunch of junk emails, his eyes caught sight of an unexpected subject line: 'Submission Accepted and Interview Time'. His heart skipped a beat as he opened the email with shaky hands.

 Dear Jung Chan-woo,

You're submission to BigHit Entertainment has been accepted. We would like to propose an over-the-phone interview with CEO Bang Si-Hyuk at 10am tomorrow. If unavailable, please contact the number below to reschedule. A big congratulations and welcome to BigHit Entertainment!

Kind Regards,
Lee Suhyun- Receptionist.

A giant smile settled upon his face as he reread the email over and over again in a state of shock. Chan-woo could not believe his eyes. He had done it! He had been accepted into his dream company. It suddenly seemed to hit him that he would finally be leaving his personal hell as he rounded the corner of his block. As he stared down the dark street with his heart racing wildly in his chest, he wondered to himself how soon he would be able to leave to Seoul.

With a small pep in his step, Chan-woo continued to walk the rest of the way home. He reached his front door and hesitantly pulled out his keys, not particularly wanting to go inside and ruin his rare ecstatic mood. Inside, he suddenly heard a shrill voice yelling. Chan-woo shuddered as he knew exactly what lay inside waiting for him to enter. The second he opened the door, his nostrils were instantly hit with the strong scent of alcohol. 

"Great," he whispered to himself as he stepped over the threshold of the front door. 

The moment he shut the door, his mother stumbled into the hallway, her dark brown eyes glued on him with a sadistic smile spread across her plastered face. She wobbled down the hallway as if the world was rocking side-to-side. His mother came to stand before him with one hand held out towards him and the sadistic smile turned into an expectant look as he didn't move.

"Did you earn well for me this week son?" she asked with a twinkle in her slightly glazed over eyes. 

"Yes mother," he sighed as he pulled out the cash he had earnt from work in the last week. 

With great hesitancy, Chan-woo placed all of the cash into his mother's outstretched hand. He watched with blank eyes as she counted his precious earnings, but behind his emotionless eyes he was cursing her out. Of course he would never utter a single word that ran through his mind in fear of her retaliation. But it always felt good to do silently whenever she counted his money in front of him.

This was by far always the hardest part of his week, when he had to hand over his money he got from working at his full-time job. His money. Not theirs by any legal means. It was his money that he had earnt from all of his hard work, and it was gone in an instant to fuel his parents addictions. He didn't dare sigh in irritation as he turned around to lock the front door. 

"What's that in your back pocket, son?" a gruff, deep voice said from further down the hall which caused Chan-woo to freeze.

"N-Nothing father," he replied quietly, head downcast.

"Doesn't seem like nothing to me, son," slow footsteps approached the two at the front door. "Hand it over to your mother. Now!"

Chan-woo jumped at the sudden raise in tone, heart racing as he knew what was about to come. He turned around and pulled out the small stack of hidden cash from his back pocket. He handed it over to his mother before he snuck a look at his father. His father's face was shadowed with anger, nostrils flared and iris' narrowed.

Before he knew it, a fist landed square on his left ribs which made him gasp out in pain. He fell to the floor on his knees and tried to hold in his tears. A foot kicked him in the middle of his chest. He was pushed hard into the closed door behind him, his head hit the wood with force. As another kick landed on the same ribs he had just been punched on, the air was knocked out of his lungs. He tried to gasp out, but couldn't from the sheer amount of pain he was in.

"Get out of our sight, you pathetic waste of space," his father spat in a low, angry tone. 

Without hesitation, he crawled onto his hands and knees and pushed himself up off of the floor before he sprinted to his room in the far back of the house. The second his bedroom door closed, he allowed the tears to fall, his face frozen in a silent scream as he tried to breathe through the pain. His entire left side stung from both the physical assault and the jolty movements as he made his way to his room.  

His heart cried out in pain from the constant abuse. It hurt him to think why any of this was necessary. He just wished he hadn't been born. He just wished he had different parents. He just wished he could escape this hell; alive or dead. Chan-woo pushed away the intrusive thoughts as he carefully took off his backpack and placed it on his desk chair. 

After he walked over to his body length mirror, he slowly lifted his shirt to reveal the new, dark bruise forming over his painstakingly visible left ribs. His light, brown eyes drifted up to his tear soaked face, a sight he had seen too often on himself. He instantly hated the sight that stared back at him as those invasive thoughts returned once more. He looked so broken, so defeated, so lost. Chan-woo wished he could save the boy that stood in front of him.

He peeled off his now dirty clothes from the eventful day and stared at his semi-naked body. Scars of all shapes and sizes littered his body. All of them in different stages of healing; some old, some new. As he stared at each one, he could recall how it had occurred, whether it had been himself or his parents. And amongst all of the scars were bruises, lots of bruises. His body easily collected them thanks to the daily abuse at the hands of both of his parents.

Pitiful eyes turned away from the mirror while Chan-woo walked over to his small closet. He grabbed out a fresh pair of silky pyjamas. Very slowly and carefully he got dressed into them, the cool material felt great against his hot and sensitive skin. Small gasps of pain echoed throughout the quiet room at the task however, but he pushed through it as the bed in the corner was calling his name.

After he had turned off the bedroom light, Chan-woo finally crawled under the covers. He wiped away his tears in the now dark room and tried to settle into the warm bed. Sounds from the noisy duo out in the lounge room flooded his ears. He couldn't help but flinch each time he heard a loud noise. A rather annoying habit he had picked up after a long eighteen years of living under this roof.

He tried to keep his mind focused on the happy news he had received earlier that night, and eventually, his found his eyes closed on their own, feeling heavy. Chan-woo drew in a deep breath as he imagined what it would be like moving out to become a trainee for BigHit Entertainment. To be away from this hell, to be free of the abuse, to potentially even be happy for the first time in his life. Chan-woo eventually fell asleep with a slight smile on his face. For the first time, in what felt like quite some time, he had hope.