Bathroom Floor, Tears Spreading Like Pink Paint
"Mom, I really want to die."
Eight-year-old Soo-eun’s voice fluttered down like a dead leaf onto the black bathroom tiles. In the first 0.1 second after I heard it, something sizzled in the back of my skull. ‘You can’t die—if you die, I’ll…’
Wait.
What flashed across my mind wasn’t my daughter’s death. It was my chance at salvation.
A pink princess Band-Aid clung to the scar on my wrist, bitten by sharp teeth. A toy knife, smiling sweetly, stared quietly back at me. ‘That’s not me, that’s…’
It was the knife I had given my daughter. I wondered who had first dragged its edge across skin. My fingertips tingled.
Lavender Suit, and My First Orgasm
The door opened and Min-ji walked in, the social worker in a lavender suit.
"I’m here for the child’s safety."
When she smiled, something inside me snapped open like a ripe pod. At last, someone was about to pronounce me a bad mother.
Under the banner of protecting my child, I wanted to drag her into the shelter of the savior. Min-ji touched Soo-eun’s wrist and asked, "Who told you to do this?"
I inhaled sharply. The question felt like scalding water rinsing me clean. I had a role now: mother of the victim, the one good parent inside a bad marriage.
A single tear rolled from Soo-eun’s eye and slid down the back of my neck. It was electrifying.
The Shelter, the Fourth Wall Beyond the Glass
Forty-eight hours later my daughter lay on a cot in temporary care. Under the surveillance camera, I watched her from a regulated one-meter distance.
"Mom, I still want to die, even here."
Her words stirred the black liquid deeper inside me. ‘Good—then you’ll crawl back into my arms.’
Min-ji opened her laptop. "How many hours a day was she left alone?"
Jong-hyuk answered, "We both had work…"
The pen scratched: possible neglect. The letters writhed on the page like living things.
I watched my own tears fall onto Soo-eun’s cheek.
‘If I lose my daughter, my daughter regains me.’ A twisted equation.
Soo-eun stared at the toy knife placed in the center of the room. It gleamed. I laughed softly, involuntarily.
Second Room, Tentacles in the Dark
Soo-eun’s new home had no windows. Numbers were taped to every door: 4, 7, 9.
I hovered my hand over hers on the other side of the visiting-room glass.
"Mom, can I touch you?"
I shook my head. Against regulations.
A warm throb flared low in my body.
‘Perfect—I can’t touch you, so you’ll keep needing me.’
The social worker asked, "Does a kiss from Mom make you feel better?"
Soo-eun nodded. A lie. We both knew it. Yet I cherished that lie.
My daughter’s falsehood keeps me alive.
The Shape of Desire: A Savior’s Prerogative
In the counselor’s office the father said,
"We called because we were terrified our child might die—and the moment we called, we lost her."
He wept, but I didn’t blink. His tears fed my excitement.
‘You failed, but I can still be saved.’
I pressed my forehead to the cold wall.
I realized what I couldn’t grasp wasn’t my daughter, but the lie she whispers to me.
Each time she murmured, “I’m scared,” I felt swaddled in warm, wet cloth.
It wasn’t love. It was covert ownership. I craved her pain; without it, I am unnecessary.
The Neighbor-Mother’s Whisper
The woman next door asked cautiously,
"My kid has scars on her wrist… should I call… someone?"
I saw the smoldering ember of desire in her eyes.
‘You know it too. Make the call and you become the savior.’
I told her,
"Once you phone, you can turn yourself into a victim too."
She flinched. She had already heard the story of the wife who called CPS and fought her husband for two years.
She was hiding the same hunger.
The Unheard Cry, and My Ecstasy
Soo-eun still undergoes a monthly “psychological evaluation.”
The social worker always asks,
"Do you feel anxious when you’re with Mom and Dad?"
My daughter nods.
That nod is the key that lets us meet again.
Each time she lies, my heart pounds.
‘When you say you’re anxious, I become Mom once more.’
Last Question, and My Answer
If tonight your child whispered, “I want to die,” could you still dial 911? I already know my answer.
"In trying to save you, I lost you. Will I press that button again?"
The footsteps of the CPS worker echo outside the door once more.
Now I feel electricity skating across my skin whenever I hear that sound.