I’m so tired of this house, I’m so tired of living here, he often said. However those words were only hollow echoes now, often echoing the haunts of the past, but never the everyday nightmares.

Some things became better since the change. The house had gone much quieter, peaceful, with no signs of the usual violence.

Some things stayed the same. The house was still small and depressing, crowded and piled up with unknown things. The bills had to get paid, but precious money was always spent on useless alcohols. The sons of the family never came home, only sometimes, except for one.

But some things also became worse. The only woman of the house, Maria, fell into illness.

She lay on her bed all day; not speaking, not cooking, not being the diligent mother she used to be. There was nobody to take care of her, because her drunkard husband, regardless of such serious conditions, never committed time for her, except her royal son. He would spend most of his day with her, taking care of her like she did to him not so long ago. So she often felt guilty for eating away her son’s precious times.

“You have so many things to learn, Kai” she whispered.

“Yes. We all do”

“And education…gives you the most precious opportunities…to fulfill your knowledge…see the world, open your mind…” she murmured in sigh, “Take the chance while you can.” Kai remained quiet, caressing her pale hands slowly. It bothered Maria so much that Kai hadn’t been educated since he was a young child, because of this, this family, this house, herself, everything. She always regretted her past mistakes for not listening to that advice and not taking that precious opportunity to learn, to explore, and to enlighten. She did not want Kai to go through the same thing and be in same situation as her.

“I don’t want you to be like me…” she choked. Then Kai, without any response, consolingly brushed her hair slowly with his bony fingers and left the room in odd silence. For several hours both Kai and Maria lingered in different rooms without any conversation, until Maria had a stroke of bodily pain.

They had no idea what she was diagnosed with, because they didn’t have the money to afford medical care and treatment. The only thing Kai could do was help as much as he could, and feel a bit helpless and hopeless for his poor mother. After the terrible event was over, Maria was at her exhausted state again.

“Mom” Kai whispered in a warm yet monotonous tone.   “I have to leave the house for a bit” Maria looked at him curiously, wondering where he would go at such late time. But having nothing else to do, she nodded helplessly and anticipated her son’s return until the next day.

Her night was terrible; feeling pain and nausea when she woke up; feeling pain and nausea in her nightmares. She was scared, and at some point she screamed, “help, help!” and called out Kai’s name several times until a soft echo of “mom” woke up from her nightmares.  

“You scare me” Kai greeted her with humor.

“You are back…”

“Look” he murmured as he took out different boxes and bottles of medicines. “Uhh…I think this one might work” and handed the medicines to Maria. It puzzled Maria how all of a sudden her son afforded all these medicines and treatments. However, feeling a little desperate to relieve her pain, she took some medicine and without doubt she was in a better condition afterwards.

Soon she felt better most of the time, but as her pain started to occupy less of her mind, she started to feel suspicious about the mysterious purchases of things that didn’t seem cheap. Is he stealing these? she became to wonder and worry. Where is he getting all this money? she questioned herself, but she brushed her worriment away quickly.

Only did it started to haunt her when she realized this started to happen right after the drastic change Kai went through. After all, when she first saw his changed self, she was terrifyingly worried that he might have gone insane. These thoughts started to return, with more fear because she has no idea what he’s up to now. What if he’s committing robbery? What if he’s committing murder??, she thought, but she never dared to ask Kai this question personally, nor did she show her urge to.

Kai’s intentions were unknown; however, Maria’s hidden concerns were not invisible to Kai.

So one day Kai approached her and told her, “I’m going to study abroad.”  

“Abroad? International?”

“Yes”

Maria was happy to see Kai motivated to get education, but he never explained why he was studying abroad or how he was going to afford to go to school.  Besides, he didn’t speak any foreign languages that she didn’t know of.

“English” he said.

“English? You don’t speak English”

“Well I will learn there then. Education is about learning new things after all” he replied, with that very same monotonous tone that started to bring slight chills down her bones lately.  

“Are…are you expecting yourself to go straight to college?”

“No,” he said, and that was his final answer for the rest of the day.

Even though Kai and his father hadn’t been close at all, he still felt it was appropriate to have his parents’ approval. On that very night, when his father returned home, he spread the news. However he never really explained it that deep, but after attempting to get his word across, Maria came to feel a bit better about her son’s intention; however, Kai’s father wasn’t convinced.

“Education? …Hah! You??” screamed out his dad, “garbage like you don’t deserve education,” laughing, heavily drunk.

“…”

“Adrian…there’s nothing to lose. Let him go” Maria urged.

“You are pathetic. You are trying so hard to be worth something but you are not,” he said as he stared at Kai with sleepy eyes.

“Yeah” Kai replied.

“So don’t even think about getting no educat-”

“Why not”

“Because you are nothing. You can do nothing better, nothing will make you from what you are and were before. It’s pathetic for idiots like to even try, thinking you can do better than anyone, so full of ego. Nothing that you will do will ever matter. Nothing-“ he choked as he was lifted few feet off the ground by his neck.

“Well then,” Kai whispered, “Whatever I do now will not matter either, will it?” and started to harden his grasp of Adrian’s neck. “Be careful of what you do or say. Anything could be turned against you like so.”

“*chokes*”

“I want to study. Get a job. Earn money. Mom needs it. You guys need it,” he whispered to him with his big staring eyes that seemed to almost shine in the dark, and he soon let go of Adrian to crash onto the ground.

“Sorry” Kai said, “You are drunk" as Adrian was gasping for air and coughing heavily. Maria was stunned and scared by what just happened, not simply because of the violence, but Kai’s way of threat. However nothing further happened and the day passed silently.  

Couple of long weeks later Kai left home with a goodbye and a promise that he will visit home, eventually. This left Maria a bit sad to see her precious son go, but she felt happy to see him move on to better things.

However whatever these things Kai had moved on to before still baffled Maria. Whatever things that brought these changes, she did not know if they are good or bad.

Perhaps dangerous.