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"I'm coming," I yelled back and walked to the living room, I found Saya sitting by the dining and waiting for me to serve his food.

"You know what, I'll go change into something comfier then come eat." He said and stood up but fell back down, grabbing his chest. "Ahh," he yelped.

"Saya! Saya, are you okay?" I asked worriedly as I dropped the plate I was holding and ran to him. "My chest!" He let out and groaned in pain before halting all his movements.

—

...and just like that, he was gone.

Forever.

The moment I broke the news to my mom that Saya was dead, she had high blood pressure which led to stroke and she ended up slipping into comatose state.

I got an autopsy done and the results came out as stress. He slumped and died because he was physically exhausted. Stress killed Saya and it was all my fault. If I had gotten two or more part time jobs, Saya wouldn't had to work at a company that treated their employees like slaves. And it would've been nice if they paid enough money.

I realized at that moment that Saya was just like Jake, Jake's six, maybe seven siblings were depending on him while my mom and I were depending on Saya. If he only had to work for himself then he probably would have quitted his job at the publishing company and looked for a better company that treats their employees like actual human beings.

I felt sorry for how I treated Jake and what I've said to him. I always him called pathetic for coming late and making excuses because he had to take care of his siblings. I thought Saya was fine taking care of mom and I so why couldn't Jake be fine too. Saya doesn't make excuses for his boss that he came late 'because his mentally ill mother was having an episode', so why would Jake come late and made the excuse of having to pick up his brother from day care.

I made a mental note to apologise to him as soon as I could.

Everything that happened to our family was my dad's fault. I wasn't even sure if I still wanted to call him 'dad'. It sounded wrong and disgusting. Even the sight of him disgusted me and that was why I still haven't gone to see him to let him know that 'your one and only son died doing what you were supposed to do and I hope you never have peace'.

He was the most selfish and despicable person I've ever seen in my entire life. He once was my hero, my role model but after what he did, I lost all my respect for him. My mom developed mental illness and my brother had to carry all the family weight on his shoulders. He couldn't afford to send me to college which led to me doing part time jobs instead.

I was fifteen and he was twenty one when the incident happened. Because of what he did, our family lost everything, we couldn't leave our house without getting pointed at. Parents were writing petitions for me to leave the school and I was getting bullied by my schoolmates. Those who I thought were my friends called me 'a criminal's daughter'.

It was traumatising and I could never forget it.

We had to move to another city which was the city my brother was going to college at. I went to a new school and we started a new life but my mom wasn't able to move on and accept what had happened.

Whilst thinking about it, she developed mental illness.

My ringing tone blasted off, starling me. I quickly answered not bothering to check the caller ID. I never give anyone my number anyway.

"Hello,"  I said. "Baby girl, where are you? The girls are here for practice," Gift informed and I immediately sprang up. I had lost track of time and forgotten that there was something called rehearsals.

"I'll be there in thirty minutes," I responded as left the HDU. "Be quick," She said before hanging up.

—

As I entered Gift's sumptuous apartment, I was greeted by two girls along with Gift, sitting and was probably waiting for me. One was in pink shorts while the second was in black leggings.

"Hi. I'm so sorry I'm late. I just lost track of time," I made excuses. It showed I really needed to apologise to Jake because I felt really guilty.

According to me few months ago, picking up one's younger sibling from daycare wasn't a reasonable excuse to be late neither was losing track of time, it sounded even pathetic.

If I were to scold myself, I would say this proved how irresponsible and unserious I took my job. If my mind wasn't on the job, it would best to quit and leave 'face of Oniria' to who really wanted it and would take it seriously.

Gosh, how insensitive was I?

Jake needed an apology—and SOON!

"Nah it's cool. You are the 'face of Oniria', you could be two hours late and we wouldn't be able to say anything. Without you, we won't be able to dance on stage," The one in pink shorts said with a warm smile on her face. It seemed like she liked me more than the one in black leggings who was secretly shooting me disgusting glares thinking I wouldn't notice but I did. My eyes always gets drawn to things like that.

"By the way, Tommy made us your backup dancers. I'm Fairy. This is Diamond," She introduced, the girl in black leggings aka Diamond, forced a smile but I could see through her and responded with an even faker smile. I didn't care if she liked me or not. What I cared about was to make money and pay my mom's hospital bills.

"Nice to meet you Fairy," I sincerely smiled at the pink shorts girl as she pulled me into a friendly hug.

"Hey, can I talk to you for a second?" Gift said and pointed to the back. I nodded and followed her but I couldn't help but heard Diamond talking trash about me to Fairy.

"She's so fake, you can tell she had everything done on her face," said Diamond. I halted in my tracks to respond to her oftensive remark.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Kids! Stress kills! Once you've started feeling pain in your sternum(chest area or at your back, below your neck) know that you're stressed and you NEED to relax. I've seen a lot of deaths caused by stress these days so don't force yourself to work or study when you know that your body can't take it.

Take a break. Nap for a few hours before continuing what you were doing.

There was a time stress gave me an heart ache. I had to be on serious medication to stop it from turning to something else. My entire family were worried, thinking I had some kind of heart disease but it was just stress.