Taemin: Age 6, Eunsook: Age 9, Taesun: Age 10

“I’m so sorry, Taeminnie! Does it hurt very bad?” Eunsook says as she and Taesun help him into her house. “When my Appa taught me how to ride a bike, I fell down a lot too.” Eunsook runs to the bathroom to find some bandages and something to clean him up with.

Taemin continues to sob, tears streaming down his face as Taesun helps him sit down on the floor. Once they’re seated, Taesun assesses the damage. Thankfully, besides Taemin’s knees, the other wounds on his hands and arms only appear to be minor scratches.

Taesun and Eunsook had been convinced that they could teach Taemin how to ride a bike. After all, they were veteran bike riders at the ripe old age of 9 and 10. How hard could it be…?

They had been SO very wrong.

It had started out alright, Taesun and Eunsook pumped up on bravado, then it got awkward when they realized they didn’t know where to even start, there was some disorganized yelling in the middle, and it had ended with a out-of-control careening bike and Taemin being launched onto the ground.

Eunsook returns from the bathroom, she hands a wet paper towel to Taesun to wipe down Taemin’s knees of dirt and blood, while she holds another one up so Taemin can blow his nose, she wipe the tears from his face. Once they get most of the dirt off, Eunsook starts opening bandages. Her chubby fingers have a hard time opening the band-aids.

“Oppa, help.” she pushes some bandages into Taesun’s hands.

Eunsook and Taesun both focus intensely, their faces full of concentration as they open the bandages. They start applying them to Taemin’s hurt knees, Taemin lets out smalls gasps and winces as their fingers press the bandages down.

Eunsook’s father opens the sliding door, coming in from the garden and finds them all on the floor of the living room, bandage wrappers everywhere.

He stands gently behind them and clears his throat.

“That’s probably a few too many bandages, sweetie.”

All of the children look up, startled. They had been so focused, they hadn’t heard the door open.

How could it be too many bandages?! Taeminnie is hurt!! Eunsook thinks.

Taesun shrugs, putting his hands up.

Sookie wanted them...

She looks back down and sees that they’ve covered the entire surface of Taemin’s knees with bandages.

She is satisfied.

Taemin looks at Eunsook curiously. After the initial shock, he had been distracted from his pain by all of Eunsook’s attention. He doesn’t realize what he’s doing, but he tries to fall more in the future when he’s with her, so she will bandage him up.

After they clean up all the bandage wrappers and Eunsook’s father re-bandages Taemin’s knees, using actual antibacterial, Eunsook’s father takes a picture of them with his new camera. Eunsook’s hands are wrapped around her father’s neck, her little cheek pressing into his. Taemin sits in his lap with a popsicle, a bribe, so he would stop crying from the sting of the antibacterial, his bandaged knees prominent in the photo. Taesun sits next to Eunsook’s father on the ground, her father’s arm wrapped around him, pulling him in close.

“Taemin learns to ride a bike!”*

* It will be a couple months before Taemin actually learns to ride a bike, under proper adult guidance and supervision, Taesun & Eunsook cheering him safely from the sidelines, but scrapbooks, eh?