My own guardian angel
_ย
I believe that there is a god who protects us all. Most people would probably laugh at that and say, "What are you talking about?" But at least I believe in the existence of a "guardian god."
My belief in guardian spirits dates back several years. As a child, my parents would whisper to me, as I lay in bed, curiously staring at a moving mobile, that everyone had a guardian spirit. Of course, being a child, I firmly believed this wasn't just nonsense, but a sincere message. Time passed, and I enrolled in an ordinary high school. And on my first day there, my mother said to me:
"You already know that there is always a guardian angel by our side, right?"
"Make sure you find someone like that this time, my daughter."
He gave me a tip. Several months have passed since those words began, and I've been trying to continuously find out about the existence of the guardian deity.
My mother clearly told me that there must be a guardian angel, somewhere close to us. But as if to defy her words, I couldn't think of a single person around me who could truly do that. I tend to see my friends for a long time and form deep bonds, so I don't have many friends around me. The few I do have are people who only want to tease me, and I truly didn't want to watch them.
One day, while I was enjoying my peaceful school life, I made an irreversible mistake. Or maybe it wasn't a mistake at all.
It was a long-awaited outdoor physical education class, and all the children were excitedly heading out to the playground. Without the teacher's supervision, the children were free to play dodgeball. As the game began, the ball was passed to a large boy, and the ball flew towards only one child. Several children, along with the larger boy, were attacking this one boy. The classmates, who had been watching intently, fell silent.
As time passed, the child, who had been unstoppably taking the balls flying at him, began to tremble slightly, and his eyes gradually lost focus. Then, as if by a miracle, the ball flying toward him stopped in front of my shoe. I caught it and stared at him, who covered his face with both arms.
"Hey there, throw me the ball you're holding."
At that moment, I looked at the trembling child across from me, then threw the ball I was holding at a larger boy with all my might. The ball escaped my grasp and struck him squarely in the eye. Yes, that was probably the beginning. The target of bullying in class shifted from him to me.
Adults don't know that this kind of thing happened in schools and that bullying continues to this day. No, they don't even try to find out.
When even the school I trusted so easily betrayed me, I thought there was no reason for me to stay at this school anymore.
At 12:02, I went to the bathroom as usual and got doused with water. And with the water I used to wash the mop with. Well, things like this didn't bother me anymore. I just sat on the toilet in the same position as when I got doused, waited for the kids who had been laughing at me getting doused to disappear, and then rinsed my hair, and it was over.
I rinsed my hair roughly, changed into the spare clothes I'd prepared, and ran to the infirmary. I was only supposed to lie down until my hair was completely dry. Then I closed my eyes, hoping that when I opened them again, the world would end.
- Whoa.
With only a few minutes left until morning roll call, my head turns to the right and I drop limply. The bag of bread I was holding falls with a clatter.
"That bastard doesn't listen to what people say. He's being a jerk."
The assault was caused by a simple act of buying different kinds of bread for the children using the bread shuttle. They didn't even pay me for the bread shuttle service I was supposed to run. While muttering these words to myself, I repeatedly slapped them. My head kept turning, my lips split, and my right cheek was bruised black and red, but I couldn't dare tell them to stop. How could I possibly do that?
- Thump.
As I was tightly shutting my eyes and holding back tears, at some point, I couldn't feel the hand of the person hitting me at all. What I meant was, I couldn't feel the pain anymore.
" what are you doing? "
"What the heck, this kid."
"I asked you first. What are you doing?"
"Haha, you're hitting the nail on the head."
"The teacher will be here soon. I wonder how he will react if he sees you guys acting like this."
" ....... "
"Come here, Jiyu."
A boy whose face I had never seen before reached out his hand to me. I didn't want to feel shame in this corner anymore, get slapped in the face, or hear curses. I grabbed the hand of the boy I had never seen before who reached out to me as I lay face down, and soon I was able to escape that horrible place.
I walked for a long time with that nameless boy who dragged me out of the classroom. I walked and walked until the tears that kept coming to me as I walked stopped flowing.
" are you okay? "
" ....... "
" Sorry. "
"What is it?"
" just. "
" ...... "
"My name is Jung Ho-seok. I transferred here today."
"Why did you help me?"
"All the kids in my class are busy just watching."
"I thought that was weird."
" what? "
"Just watching."
My heart felt strange. For a moment, the thought crossed my mind: what if I could express my feelings, even just a little, to that girl I saw for the first time today?
After that kid transferred to this school, the bullies who had been bullying me started to go overboard. For example, they would vent their anger on me in places without CCTV, or they would waterboard me without giving me a chance to breathe. There was a reason why those kids treated me so harshly. Of course, I couldn't get what they wanted. The reason they kept bullying me was because that kid, Jung Ho-seok, was right next to me. One day, I quietly asked him a question.
"Why do you always help me?"
"You suddenly came to me one day and saved me, and you were always by my side when I was in danger."
"I'm the person you've been looking for."
"Isn't it time you realized it by now?"
"แข No way you."
"I came to protect you. As a guardian who came to protect Han Ji-yu."
I couldn't say anything to her. I simply held her in his arms, the one who had protected me all this time, and burst into tears, filled with sorrow. From the moment I first met her, she had always been by my side, protecting me whenever I was in danger, and even in the distant past, she had always quietly, unobtrusively, played the role of my guardian angel.
"Why, why, you're here now."
"Come a little earlier, a little later."
"I'm sorry, it was my fault."
"Huhh ...
I cried for a long time as that child patted my head and back, and in the summer of my 17th year, I found the guardian angel I had been looking for so desperately.
From that day on, all the people who had been tormenting me to death were sentenced in court and taken to a juvenile detention center. My parents hugged me and cried several times that day when I left the court. That was the first time I saw them cry.
A few months later, I finally got back the comfortable school life I longed for, and my own guardian angel was always by my side. So, what's the ending? I'm happy.