Regret

oneshot

Kris POV

Driving around the country now, I still see things that will remind me of the orphanage. I might pass by the corner of a field, or see a familiar house as I come down the side of a valley, or see a particular arrangement of trees up on a hillside. “That’s it! It’s the orphanage!” I might say, but then I’ll realize that it’s impossible to be so and carry on driving.

I remember a certain afternoon, we were standing on our toes, crowding around the high windows of our room. That gave us a clear view of the cars that came over, the people who seeked adoption. There was bright sunshine, but it must have been raining earlier that day because I can remember how the sun was glinting on the surface of the green grass.

Yixing said we shouldn’t be so obvious about watching, but we hardly moved back at all. Then Lu Han said : “They don’t suspect a thing. Look at them. They don’t suspect a thing. So why bother?”

When he said this, I looked at him and searched for signs of disapproval about what the boys were going to do to Yixing. But the next second, Lu Han gave a little laugh and pointed outisde the window where a boy in our class was being taken away by a young couple. That lucky bastard. Behind us, I could hear Yixing kicking the bedside table and muttering ‘it isn’t fair’s. I don’t blame him, it really isn’t fair at all.

We’d all seen plenty of Yixing’s tantrums by then,