Jaebum dreams that night.

He’s standing what he knows to be his kitchen- the tap’s on, for some reason, pouring thundering sheets of water into the metal sink, like rain on a rusted attap roof. There’s an anxious bubble lodged in his chest, rising up through his throat and burning his airways like bile.

“Don’t go there,” he still manages to choke out.

Gyeommie’s standing just a few steps away, the top of his head just level with the bluish flames spurting from the stove, and Jaebum’s irrationally worried- Yugyeom’s never been stupid enough to play with fire, so why should this time be any different?

“Gyeommie, don’t stand over there, the soup’s hot, it’s dangerous,” Jaebum’s eyes flick towards the pot that’s always been on the stove, bubbling and over boiling, frothing madly under the lid. He gestures towards himself, training his eyes on Yugyeom, trying to smile. “Come to Daddy- come on.”

Yugyeom slowly turns his gaze to the boiling pot, eyes hooded with a sort of resigned curiosity, and the bubble of stress seems to rise to the back of Jaebum’s neck, leaving tracks of chronic pain wherever it floats.

“Hyung caught the pot.”

Jaebum’s hands freeze like ice where they’re outstretched, fear prickling at the back of his neck.

“Hyung caught the pot, so-…"

"Hyung's gone now, Gyeommie," Jaebum's raising his voice, something boiling low at the pit of his stomach that feels a lot like guilt, regret, and anger in one horrible stew. The steam rising from the pot is filling the room, clogging his airways, and beads of sweat run little tracks down the side of his face. "You have to get away from the pot."

"He wants to do good things," his words sound both familiar and so, so strange at the same time, like he’s listening to something he’s heard before for the first time. "He won't hurt you, Daddy."

"Yugyeom," Jaebum says sharply, gesturing towards himself in one forceful move. "Come here now."

"Bam was crying," Gyeommie's voice changes now, quavering but sure at the same time. "There was a big cut on his chin near his neck, he was crying a lot and there was blood coming out."

"There was no blood, Gyeom, Bam was fine!" Jaebum's eyes flick to the pot again- the metal's trembling against the stove, lid clanking threateningly, prepared to fall. "Im Yugyeom! Listen to me!"

"Would you change it?" Yugyeom asks, and Jaebum blinks the sweat out of his eyes.

That's not my son's voice.

"Gyeommie-..."

"Would you change it if you could?" Gyeommie continues to talk in Yugyeom's voice, dark eyes expressive and wild with a repressed ache he's never seen before. "So it never happened?"

"Yugyeom get over here, now!" Jaebum shouts across the kitchen, eyes on the pot, soup now frothing over the edges, making the fire spurt and hiss angrily, the sound cutting through the tiny space.

"Dad!" Yugyeom's raising his voice now, too, and there's something Jaebum can't place about him, something urgent and frightening and different. "Would you change it? Tell me, would you change everything if you could?"

And Jaebum's no longer looking at a tiny six year old in Bart pajamas with scruffy hair, now, but a grown teenager, messenger bag over his shoulder, with chocolate brown hair and single piercings through each ear, an unassuming black book in his hands, full to the bursting with pictures.

"I-..." Jaebum stutters. "I don't know. No, no, I'm happy now. I wouldn't. I can’t."

"Dad," Yugyeom says, clear as day, knuckles white around his book. "Would you change it?"

Jaebum's throat is dry with countless negative responses he's sure he's given, enough to fill several lifetimes, but then again he can't remember when he'd given them, or if he'd even given them at all, but there's an answer in him bursting to get out, whether he's physically able to vocalise it or not.

Something surrenders within him, quietens, waves its mournful white flag to accept its defeat and death, and Jaebum gives the tiniest of nods.

"Yes," he barely whispers out. "Yes, I would."

The tight, tense silence doesn't defuse, but something underneath that does, something deep and underlaying whatever the two of them are feeling now, and Yugyeom seems to let out a breath he's been holding in since forever, body creasing and folding in like a wilting flower.

"Okay."

Jaebum watches helplessly as he opens his book to one of the front few pages, the one with only two distinct rectangle-shaped pieces of film pasted to the paper, and touches the surface, fingers dipping into the picture, which ripples and morphs like a puddle, before his hand disappears in it, his wrist, his arm-...

Until Gyeommie's standing there again, book clutched tight to the front of his pajamas.

"Okay," he repeats, both relieved and afraid, and Jaebum's stomach twists in fear as he takes a step towards the pot.

"Gyeom, no," he forces it out, feet rooted to the ground, exceptionally heavy. "Gyeommie, we can do something else. We can fix it together."

"No, Daddy," Yugyeom holds the book tighter, the tips of his hair almost touching the stove. "No, you can't."

"Yes, come on, we can do it, you, me and Papa, that's the way it's always been, remember?" Jaebum's heart twinges painfully at the sound of that, but he can't remember why, though it's somewhere at the back of his mind.

Tears pool in Gyeommie's eyes, then, and Jaebum inhales sharply- Gyeommie never cries.

"Yugyeom caught the pot," Gyeommie says again, little fingers pulling at a part of the book in his hands. "Yugyeom caught the pot, so," he takes a deep breath, looking at the boiling soup with a calm sort of resignation. "So Papa didn't get burned."

And as he reaches out, the pot finally tips, sending boiling water gushing down onto Yugyeom's slight frame, burning him a horrifying, blistered sort of white-...

...-and Jaebum wakes up with the sound of his son's screams echoing in his ears.

The blanket’s off him, and a second wild glance around informs him that the window’s cracked open- he’s running a cold sweat, but goosebumps are prickling on his skin from the frigid wind. He automatically starts feeling blindly on Jinyoung’s side of the bed for comfort, only to find him gone. He’s probably sleeping in Yugyeom’s bed again- the boy does come over on some nights if he’s had a nightmare to ask them to go over, and Jinyoung doesn’t usually want to bother Jaebum on nights before work. 

Shaking, Jaebum fights his way out of the covers in bed, stomach twisting in apprehension as he opens the door to the dark living room. The details of the dream are already slipping out of reach, and good riddance, for all Jaebum cares, but the fear remains, thick in his chest like tar. His hands turn to ice when he gets a hold of the doorknob to Yugyeom's room and turns slowly, heartbeat speeding up for no reason at all.

A sigh of relief leaves him at the sight of Jinyoung curled up loosely around Gyeommie, both under the covers, so the only parts of them visible are the messes of dark hair and Jinyoung's eyes, closed peacefully in the darkness.

It's alright. Everything is okay if they are.

Quietly closing the door behind him, Jaebum curses mentally at the way his arms and legs are aching when he plods over to the bathroom, sneezing again in the darkness, before flicking on the light to start getting ready for work. Though he can tell immediately from the telltale scratching sensation at the back of his throat and the cold sweat prickling on his forehead, he stubbornly refuses to admit he’s sick, grabbing his work clothes and heading to the bathroom to wash up.

The sensation continues all the way until he’s down in the elevator lobby, fiddling with his top button and watch, hoping he hasn’t missed the bus, before he halts in his tracks, seeing the familiar outline of someone in the misty dawn light, sitting with his back to him on the wooden bench outside the lobby.

And Jaebum realises he isn’t quite sure what to do.

“Yugyeom?” he questions loud enough to stamp out the quake in his voice, ignoring the way his nose is running as he heads over. “Why are you up at this hour?”

There’s a moment of quiet between them, as Jaebum tries to clear the storm raging in his head, both from the nightmare and the events of the previous night, and think properly over the white noise of questions and emotions. This is his last day repeats over and over again at the back of Jaebum’s head- your last chance to find out why.

Right now, though, the teenager’s sitting, cross-legged, on that same bench under the streetlight Jaebum had found him on, staring at an indiscriminate spot across the road, and all of a sudden Jaebum feels oddly intrusive, even though he’s outside his own apartment block, just standing on the soft grass. 

“I’m going home today,” Yugyeom says, though he sounds oddly detached from the notion, and Jaebum nods.

“Right, today’s the fourth day,” he says again, but his eyes still widen slightly in realisation of what this means. “How are things back home?”

“They’ll be okay,” Yugyeom says, and it’s strange, how completely neutral he sounds about that. Jaebum hesitates as he takes a seat beside him, watching Yugyeom carefully out of the corner of his eye.

“Listen, kid,” Jaebum turns to face him, and , he can feel the beginnings of a migraine at the back of his head. Whatever sickness has gotten a hold of him is starting to get annoying. “If things aren’t safe back home, you can always come and crash here, or at least until your boyfriend comes back, you know?”

Yugyeom nods once, still not looking at him, dark eyes weighted with something Jaebum can’t even begin to decipher.

In the brisk heaviness of the morning air, though, highlighted in tired rays of dawn light, Yugyeom seems emptier, spirit translucent and weary, a stark contrast to the general contentment Jaebum’s been seeing this past few days. He wonders if he’s missed something, before realising that he’s probably missed a lot, considering the questions he’s held back, all because he’s never felt it his place to ask.

Jaebum wonders, now, if it’d been worth keeping quiet.

The sight of him like that stirs something quiet and shameful within Jaebum’s mind, a little boy with black hair and nice clothes, red streaks across his face and palms, huddled and crying in the corner of the mental bars he’s built to cage that boy in, and now he fumbles with the key he has in both hands, not quite sure what to do with it.

“You know,” he swallows, throat suddenly dry. He doesn’t know why he’s even starting on this- probably because he feels like he has to, if he’s expecting Yugyeom to be ready to say anything at all. It’s the last day, he tells himself. You might never get the chance to talk to Yugyeom again. “You know, I used to have problems with my dad when I was a kid, too.”

There it is. There, I said it.

Yugyeom’s eyes widen slightly, and he turns to look, as though for confirmation, at Jaebum, who deliberately avoids his gaze. It’s odd, why all this is suddenly coming out now- like the need for answers has built up over the few days Yugyeom’s been here into this cumulative burden Jaebum can’t get rid of.

“I know how it feels, it’s-…it’s difficult, dealing with someone like that, when they’re supposed to be there for you, to support you,” Jaebum has never talked about it like this to anyone before- it usually comes out in little slips, usually revealed when people like Mark, people like Jinyoung, peel him back, bit by bit. But for Yugyeom he feels obliged, somehow, to package it neatly and spell it out. “There’s loads of ty things that come up from growing up with someone like that, sure, but it feels like the worst part is the confusion, you get me?” Yugyeom nods, listening as though spellbound. “Because sometimes it’s like-…like for every good thing they’ve ever done for you, playing games with you as a kid, or buying you a new phone, there’s something bad, like hitting you, taking money from your mother or yourself.”

Yugyeom doesn’t say anything, but he nods, eyes clouding over, probably remembering his own father, and Jaebum braves on.

“So what I got from it all,” he says, taking a deep breath. “It’s important to remember they’re still people, you know? There aren’t any bad or good people in this world, Yugyeom-ah, just bad and good things and the people they happen through. But that being said,” his hands tighten into fists, here, before uncrumpling, like he’s letting out a sigh. “At the end of it, the most important thing is to do what’s best for the people you care about, and yourself. If that includes making a tough decision, like handing things over to social services or the police, even, you need to be able to do that.”

“You think so?” Yugyeom says, sounding more tired than Jaebum ever thinks he’s heard him, and the man exhales quietly.

“Yeah,” Jaebum says, unwavering.

“Would you change it?”

Jaebum blinks once, twice, turning to look over at Yugyeom.

“If you could,” Yugyeom’s gripping the edge of the bench, now, looking dead ahead. “Would you change it? So it never happened?”

Something stirs at the back of Jaebum’s head, like the remnants of a bad dream.

“So what never happened?” He tries to steady the trembling of his voice, a horrible feeling of déjà vu crawling up his spine, cold and unwelcome.

“So your father never did any of those things to you,” Yugyeom hesitates. “So he continued to love you. Would you change it- even if you know, well, you can’t really?”

In any other situation, Jaebum’s answer would’ve been no- I don’t want to dwell on that possibility, because I’d rather make the best of my circumstances than wish for better ones, and I’m happy with things as they are right now, but something’s telling him to say otherwise.

Jaebum remains silent, letting the pause in the conversation drag on so long that Yugyeom glances up at him, dark eyes weighted with a hauntingly familiar mix of resignation and curiosity. So Jaebum takes a deep breath and says it.

“Yeah.”

Those same eyes widen in shock at once.

“Yeah,” Jaebum says finally, letting it out like a breath, mumbling an explanation. “I mean- obviously there’s no way we can actually do that, but if-…if we had the chance, who wouldn’t?” He turns to look at Yugyeom here. “We’ve been conditioned to accept settling for second best because the best is unachievable, to miss opportunities and be happy as life is for the fear we’ll lose what we already have, but if what we wanted, the only thing we ever needed, was in reach-…” he hesitates here. “It wouldn’t-…wouldn’t be wrong not to pass it up.”

Yugyeom’s watching him like he’s hanging onto Jaebum’s every word, slightly stunned, like he would never have expected him to say this. Like he’s never heard this before, the sentence comes to Jaebum’s mind, which is ridiculous, because when would Yugyeom have ever heard it? It’s not like they’ve had this conversation before, and Jaebum had said something different, right?

“It would be wrong to want to change it if we couldn’t,” the older man finishes awkwardly, averting the boy’s eyes. “But if we could-…I,” Jaebum thinks of Jinyoung, of Gyeommie, and sighs. “I might.”

“You,” Yugyeom clears his throat. “Really? You…you mean it?”

“That being said,” Jaebum backtracks a little. “I meant what I said- that I’m happy with Jinyoung and Gyeommie now. Think about it, your boyfriend, your friends- they make you happy, don’t they?”

Yugyeom’s looking away now, staring once again at that spot in the distance Jaebum can’t quite make out, and his voice is quieter, lower, when he speaks next.

“Do you believe some people are destined to lead a bad life?”

That, at least, Jaebum knows how to answer.

“No,” he says firmly. “Listen, Yugyeom- I don’t know how things are exactly at home, but the one thing I’ll always know is that if you think that way, things will only get worse. As long as you’re part of the equation, and you will be if you want to, you can make something change,” he gestures to himself for lack of a better solution. “Look, I-…I got help. Things took a turn for the better, and now I don’t have to go to sleep worrying about my mom or myself. I went to college, met Jinyoung, adopted Gyeommie, and I haven’t regretted anything yet,” he looks Yugyeom firmly in the eye here. “As long as you’re there, Yugyeom, you can do something.”

A tiny crease forms at the edges of Yugyeom’s eyes, then, reminding Jaebum strangely of the way Jinyoung’s eyes crinkle when he smiles, but while Yugyeom doesn’t look happy, Jaebum can’t say he looks sad either. The expression on his face seems to be caught in a limbo somewhere between the two, but there’s something set and calm behind his half-smile. Like he’s made a decision, and that nothing will change his mind. 

“Thank you.”

“I think you’ve done more for us than we’ve done for you,” Jaebum smiles, trying not to be unsettled by the strange expression Yugyeom’s wearing, setting a hand on the teen’s shoulder. “Really. I think your family should be proud to have you.”

That seems to lighten the burden clouding Yugyeom’s eyes, then, and he looks up with a small smile. “Really?”

“Yeah, I can’t imagine why any parent would regret having brought up someone like you,” Jaebum says, slightly assured by the hesitant gratification in the teen’s eyes. “I have to head to work now, so I might not catch you before I get back tonight, but our place is always open, okay? Come back and have a meal with us sometimes, Jinyoung might throw a fit if you don’t,” he chuckles, before waving. “Take care.”

“You too,” Yugyeom says respectfully, bowing slightly, and Jaebum turns, heading for the bus stop, checking his watch and sneezing in the chilly morning air as he does so.

He catches a last glimpse of the boy, sitting alone on the bench under the streetlight, watching him go, increasingly tiny figure bathed in amber rays, before the bus turns around the corner, and Jaebum wonders, for a moment, what he’s just done.

*

Jaebum spends the later half of the day in a daze, running up a pile of used tissues on his desk, shivering under the air-conditioning to the point Younghyun notices and turns the temperature up, forgetting the afternoon meeting until Nayeon brings it up during lunch, and by five he’s slumped in his chair, sniffing miserably.

“, man, just go home already,” Younghyun says, peering over the top of his booth in mild amusement and noticeable concern. “You look like you’re going to die, or something.”

“Yeah, you’d better just go back, oppa,” Jungyeon pipes up in disinterest from the neighbouring booth. “Or Jinyoungie’s going to skin us alive the next time we meet up for not kicking your sorry behind back home.”

“Oh yeah,” Jaehyung says in horror, probably recalling that time he jokingly gave Gyeommie beer during that one office barbecue Jaebum had brought Jinyoung and his son to, and ended up in the condominium koi pond for his grave mistake. “Listen, need me to drop you off? Maybe Jinyoung’ll stop returning my Christmas presents, then.”

“I doubt it, but thanks,” Jaebum grumbles into the cup of (not-Jinyoung-made) honey lemon tea. “I really appreciate it.”

*

Jaebum’s sneezing his way into the house that night, secretly grateful for the way Jinyoung fusses over him immediately, going on about how he should’ve just stayed at home if he was sick, before pushing him into the bathroom for a warm shower, with promises of a hot meal once he gets out.

Neither Yugyeom is in sight when he emerges tiredly, and while he’s surprised, he doesn’t question it, too exhausted to even do anything but eat what Jinyoung’s made for him and let himself be dragged to bed.

“I still can’t believe you still went to work this morning when you should’ve known you were falling sick,” Jinyoung’s chastising him, pulling the blanket up around him, and Jaebum mumbles out an apology, feeling embarrassingly tame as Jinyoung tucks him in gently. “You’re not getting up to try to do anything until you feel better, and don’t even think about going to work tomorrow, because we’re going to see the doctor if it gets worse.”

“Mmph,” Jaebum protests weakly, half into the pillow, but the look in Jinyoung’s eyes says that his decision is final. It’s then, thinking about going to the doctor, that he remembers-…

“, the car,” he croaks out, rubbing a hand into his eyes. “Was s’posed to go pick it up from Junho-hyung’s garage tonight.”

“I’ll do that,” Jinyoung says firmly. “There are some things I need to pick up outside, anyway. Yugyeom’s in his room, he was a little out of it today, too- why all of you need to fall sick at the same time, I’ll never understand. Now sleep, okay? I’ll take care of everything.”

Jinyoung stands, turning off the light, and through lidded eyes Jaebum can see the faint outline of the smile on his lips from the light pouring in through the doorway as he turns back once more.

He wants to say I love you, or thank you, but the command fizzles out from exhaustion halfway from his brain to his mouth, and the door closes between them, submerging Jaebum in cold darkness, and he drifts off, vaguely reminding himself to say it when Jinyoung gets back.

a/n: so here we are! at the cusp of enlightenment! jkjk but yay finally an update!! i went to a macs yesterday, bought a coffee and literally wrote for four hours straight. never have i seen a greater look of loathing from a mcdonalds staff before ay. so by now i think the cat's really almost out of the bag for most of us XDD the next chapter will be out sometime next week, then the final 2 chapters yay!

thank you so much for your support so far- a big part of the reason why i was able to write literally almost the whole ending yesterday was because i was looking through what you all had to say, and they really gave me strength ^.^ as uaual, comments will be extremely appreciated and loved, and i hope y'all will like the chapters to come! :) 

- angel :)