Seoyul wakes up to the blaring sound of the police siren, a sound she’d never thought she’d hear again in this life time.

Ten long years has passed, but the sound triggers the memories of the night her parents had been taken away from her, and Seoyul finds herself panicking. Her hands immediately search for the warmth where Jongin’s body should be at the other side of the bed the first thing before opening her eyes, only to find it empty and cold.

“Jongin!” she screams, eyes finally opening and already desperately looking at signs of where Jongin might be, breaking into cold sweat.

“KIM JONGIN!”

Did they take him? Did they finally find out that her marriage is fake, and has arrived to execute them? Or worse, take Jongin—

“What’s wrong?” Jongin bursts through the door, his breathing harsh and choppy, hair a mess. The maids come trotting behind him seconds later in a frenzy, and Jongin waves them off with a flick of his hand when he’s confirmed with his own eyes that there’s nothing physically wrong with Seoyul.

“I heard you screaming, so I ran all the way here from the first floor, are you okay?” he reinstates, walking slowly towards where Seoyul is seated on her bed, his brows knitted in worry. Only when he touches Seoyul he realizes the severity of the situation, because suddenly she has a death-grip on his arm and she’s crying.

She’s crying so hard her whole body convulses, and Jongin has to hug her to keep her from shaking so violently.  

“I thought…I thought they t-took you a-away,” her words are choked and painful, and it pains Jongin to see Seoyul in such a state. He pulls Seoyul closer into his embrace, in hopes of making it clearer for Seoyul that his warmth is there and he is there—that no one is going to take Jongin away from her.

“Shhh,” Jongin murmurs softly, his hands carding slowly through Seoyul’s hair, “I’m here, it’s okay.”

“Haebit? Where’s Haebit?” Seoyul looks up through her tearful lashes, chin quivering even as she does, and Jongin’s heart clenches. He pulls her even closer to him as far as physics allow him to, gently caressing every part of Seoyul’s body to convince her that he’s here, he’s here and he’s warm and alive.

“She’s fine. We’re here. I’ll always be here,”

It goes on like that for an hour, Jongin convincing that he will never leave, until Seoyul finally falls into a dreamless slumber in Jongin’s tight embrace.

***

The sun is just starting to set when Seoyul comes to, the muted hue of the sky colors her bedsheets with streaks of warm orange and pink. It takes her a few seconds to make sense of her surrounding, and even though she’s alone this time, it’s silent and serene, so it doesn’t scare her anymore.

Seoyul checks the time on her phone and it’s a little past five, and she quickly jumps out of bed remembering that she’s very late on picking up Haebit from school. She dashes out of the room in a daze, only to find Jongin and Haebit sitting on the sofa watching TV downstairs and she breathes out a sigh of relief. She decides to go down the stairs to get herself a cup of water, or anything else to calm down her nerves.

“Mom’s up!” Haebit’s voice feels like a good charge to her body that has dying batteries, and Seoyul’s face immediately lights up with a smile when Haebit comes charging into her with a hug.

“Well someone’s in a good mood today,” Seoyul kisses Haebit’s forehead, “I’m sorry I didn’t pick you up. Mom overslept.”

“It’s fine! Dad told me you were sick, and he also took me to an ice cream place so it’s good!” Haebit replies happily, and Seoyul sends Jongin a knowing glance before joining her family in the sofa, sitting herself next to comfortably. Jongin rolls her eyes, but kisses her forehead anyway, before putting his arms around Seoyul’s shoulder to pull her closer to him.

“You looked so peaceful sleeping. I didn’t have the heart to wake you up,” he whispers, his breath warm against Seoyul’s ear. Seoyul feels her heartbeat flicker a little.

“It’s fine,” she snuggles herself closer into Jongin’s embrace, head resting on his broad shoulders. He smells like lilacs, and that only means that he’s been cuddling Haebit the whole day, because that’s Haebit’s favorite fragrance and Seoyul is the one who buys the child her favorite soaps. It makes Seoyul smile.

Jongin rests his head on top of Seoyul’s softly, and for a while, the two of them watches the TV in silence while Haebit chatters away every once in a while about the movie they’re watching.

“We need to talk,” Jongin says all of the sudden, but his grip on Seoyul’s shoulder restricts her movements and prevents her to escape from his embrace to look at his face and measure the importance of the matter.

“Later—just the two of us.”

Seoyul has to force herself to focus hard when watching the rest of the movie, because her mind keeps on thinking about the worst possible scenarios of the things Jongin might tell her later.

So when Haebit is finally asleep and it’s just the two of them left in the house with all the maids already clocked out, Seoyul immediately addresses Jongin about the matter.

“I wanted to talk about the sirens we heard last morning,” Jongin replies, voice relaxed and calm, but he takes Seoyul’s hand in his and she thinks she feels a lot worse than she did this morning.

“It’s not what you think… I… it’s not about us,” Jongin squeezes her hand reassuringly, and only then Seoyul finds herself able to breathe, and she quickly downs the cup of water she’s holding with her free hand in one go to calm her jittery nerves.

“Thank God, my God, I feel so much better now. What is it about, then?”

It’s Jongin’s turn to look uneasy.

“It’s the Parks that lives right across our street. They… they couldn’t afford financing their children anymore, and I guess they’ve been evading tax for a long while now and the Taxation Bureau finally got a sniff of it,” he explains, and with every word he says Seoyul’s heart sinks further down into her stomach.

“That’s horrible,” Seoyul struggles to find the proper words to express her feelings, “They’re going to be fine though, right? They can just declare bankruptcy and place their children somewhere while they try to get back up again, right?”

Jongin looks at Seoyul weirdly.

“You know it doesn’t work that way,” he frowns, looking at Seoyul as if she’s lost her mind, “They’ve been evading the taxes for years, Yul, it’s probably trillions. Do you not remember the new cars they’ve got coming in every month last year?”

“I—they—we can help the children though, right? What were their names again—Yixing and Luhan, no? They’re so little, Jongin, what are they going to do without their parents? Can we take them in or something, or at least—”

“I can’t save everybody, Seoyul,” Jongin berates, and the words feel like a jab to Seoyul’s gut, so she shuts up.

Jongin regrets his choice of words immediately after looking at Seoyul’s facial expression, and his hands reaches for Seoyul’s hurriedly. She takes a step backwards, and folds her hands under her chest slowly so Jongin can’t hold them, keeping her facial expression flat.

“Okay. I get it. What do you really want to say, Jongin?”

“What the Parks did, they brought it upon themselves. They were selfish and they had it coming, and even though I feel bad for Xing and Lulu, there’s not much we can do about it that’s thoroughly legal. Now, I heard from Junmyeon hyung it’s a possibility that the Parks might not even be facing jailtime, but a death sentence entirely so they can erase the taxes off Xing’s and Lu’s records, and,” Jongin has to take a deep breath before continuing his sentence. His keeps on blinking, the tip of his nose turning pink just the slightest bit, and Seoyul realizes that he’s close with the Parks too, and he’s not the only one affected by the event.

Chanyeol and Qiayi had been such great neighbors, and they’ve taken care of Haebit one too many times when Jongin and Seoyul has to leave for work for a couple of days on end. Seoyul feels her heart breaking. If only, if only her neighbors never met and never had fallen in love then choose to get married. This wouldn’t have happened.

If only.

“And I just don’t want Haebit to know, okay? She doesn’t have to know about these things just yet. I told her that there was a fire next door and the Parks had to move somewhere because the fire had ruined the insides of their homes completely. Can you tell her that too?”

Silence.

“Please, Yul?”

“Okay, I’ll tell her that. I don’t want her to grow up too soon either,” Seoyul replies in defeat, and Jongin sends her a look of gratefulness, but it doesn’t end there. It looks like Jongin has something else to say, and is contemplating whether or not he should tell her.

“What is it?” she asks, getting impatient. She knows Jongin like the back of her hand, and it’s probably pointless for Jongin to keep things from her because sooner or later she will find out or he will have to tell her one way or another.

“It’s—nothing,” Jongin tries to smile, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’m just proud that you’re taking this all so well. This is the best way for Yeol and Qiayi.”

Jongin pulls Seoyul into an embrace, and it feels like he’s hugging her to make himself feel better rather than the other way around.

“Are you sure you don’t want to tell me?” Seoyul asks.

“It’s really nothing,” Seoyul knows he’s lying, but figures that she’s just going to let this one go. Jongin probably has a lot on his mind too—and he’s right, he can’t just save everyone. If he could help everyone, Seoyul knew Jongin already would. But life isn’t fair and the world doesn’t work that way.

“Let’s just go to sleep, okay?”

Seoyul knows that she shouldn’t keep count, but it’s the third time Jongin tries to ignore a problem by telling her to sleep.

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