“Underline” – Speaking English

 

“Normal” – speaking Korean

 

Part IX

 

“Can I really get this?” Saki asked for the hundredth time, she was gently holding onto a box which contained a very odd looking doll, which was named Draculaura and appeared to be a vampire decked out in pink, in Jae’s eyes but Sang had immediately said that he would buy it for the girl and there were no arguments to be had. Saki seemed pleased but a little on the unsure side, “It’s really expensive.”

 

Jae gently patted the girl on the head, “Saki, we wouldn’t offer it to buy it for you if we couldn’t afford it. Stop worrying so much and you can tell your Daddy when we get back that he is not paying us back for anything either.”

 

A bright beaming smile crossed the girl’s face and she smiled down at the doll before toddling off to rejoin Sang and the others ‘youngsters’ who had managed to wander into the toy shop. Jokingly the maknea-line up to about Jae had agreed to take Saki out for a short while around the shopping mall seeing as Kyung and Jin had been lumbered with the food shopping chores and had blatantly stated that they did not want all of the others traipsing around after them and causing a mess or whining the whole time. So they had bundled Saki up into their arms and headed off into the main mall to shop around and generally spend a load of money.

 

On a normal shopping trip they could spend a small fortune, this time seeing that they had Saki with them they were probably going to spend much more than that. Though strangely, or more accurately unsurprisingly, Saki wasn’t the usual type of brat who pointed at things and went ‘want’ and expected to have. She certainly knew what she liked and what she didn’t but she was sensible in her choices. Plus she was very much aware of how much her Oppa’s were spending on her and was trying to curtail them a little bit. She was definitely her Father’s daughter and the thought made Jae smile.

 

Sang battered him with a large teddy bear, “Oi, Earth to Jace! Wake up.”

 

“Stop battering me with a teddy first,” Jae said, catching the poor thing before it could be abused any further, “What did you want?”

 

“We’re heading to the tills, you seemed to be off in lala land,” Sang said cheekily, grinning a little and looking more like a dork than ever because he was wearing his glasses rather than putting his contacts in, “C’mon, you don’t want to get left behind do you?”

 

Jae rolled his eyes, tugging the cap down a little more on his head, “No I don’t cause that means I’ll get stuck with the bill. Where’s Saki gone?”

 

“Kiyeol’s got her, geeze will you stop being so grown up, it totally doesn’t suit you,” the geek stuck his tongue out but smartly moved before he could be grabbed by the other who just sighed and followed along after him. Whilst they weren’t as big a group as say EXO, BrightSide knew that sometimes it was a good idea to keep a relatively low profile, especially seeing that they had an ex-members daughter with them. All it would take would be one eagle eyed fan and everything could turn very sour in a matter of minutes.

 

Thankfully the checkouts weren’t that expensive, out of a whole toy shop Saki had only wanted a total of three things, being the aforementioned Monster High Doll, a little pretend dressing table set and a Transformer which had been a bit of a strange one but the girl had insisted that she would play with it so the guys had given in. Plus it meant they got to look around the boy’s toys section and whilst they were supposed to be grown ups, they were still kids at heart. Even Kiyeol had trouble behaving himself around that area but it felt so good to be around.

 

Though Jae already knew that he at the very least would be back later on for some extra things, whilst Saki was not a little brat who wanted every last thing, they had all seen how her eyes had shined at all the toys. As well as when they had briefly gone around the clothes shop too, as Sunwoo had claimed that Kiyeol and Sang both needed replacement clothes since the ‘painting’ incident the other week, but Saki had been reserved and only let them buy her a pack of t-shirts as her way to appease them. Plus they still had to get stuff for Bradley too, but it was probably best to get them later on.

 

Heading out of the shop, Jae grinned at finding Kiyeol with Saki watching the crazy little kid’s show that was being performed in the square below. He knew that it was just a bunch of guys wearing overly huge and amusing costumes but it was entertaining to the kids and perfectly harmless in its own right. He grinned at the pair, leaning against the railing to watch with them and playfully tugged on Kiyeol’s ear, “You’re such a child you know that, Mouse?”

 

Kiyeol shifted his head slightly but barely reacted otherwise, “I’m allowed to be.”

 

“True but I would have never thought of you watching one of these things,” Jae said, leaning his chin on his hand.

 

For a few seconds Kiyeol didn’t respond, mainly due to the fact that he was shifting Saki so the girl could see a little better, but he grinned half singing, “Well if my Oppa’s hadn’t gotten into an argument over who was paying for what.”

 

Jae clipped the boy around the head, “I see you managed to get out of that one easily enough.”

 

“Already gave my money to Sang to pay,” Kiyeol stuck his tongue out cutely at Jae and giggled a little like a girl. It suddenly struck the elder that it felt like it had been ages since the other had been this cheeky and playful, there again the entire maknae-line suddenly seemed more lively and were in the process of winding each other up something rotten.

 

Even the usually very serious and grown up Sunwoo was playing up. It was strangely rather fun.

 

Lightly he chuckled at something going on the stage before feeling pressure on his back as someone leaned playfully against him, pushing him into the railing in front, “Oww! Quit it!” he shoved back only to be half hauled backwards which naturally caused him to loose his balance and flail around much to the amusement of the other.

 

“Teehee, don’t worry, silly,” Jin said, grinning happily, “I got you.”

 

“Let me go, babo,” Jae said without thinking only to receive an “Okay” from Jin and suddenly found himself falling more towards the floor. He literally let out a squeak of fear, an actual squeak not a yelp or anything that could be considered to be manly in the slightest, but didn’t actually hit the floor. Instead he felt Jin’s knee just on his back and realised that the other had merely shifted his arms from his stomach to his arms.

 

The other was already laughing at his expense, “Ha, that’ll teach you to say silly things won’t it.” His eyes crinkled in that special way that made it virtually impossible to get mad at him for any real length of time.

 

“Sod off, Jin,” Jae managed, embarrassingly pulling himself up out of the others hold and trying to straighten himself out, “I’m so going to get you back for that.”

 

“Yeah right,” Kiyeol rolled his eyes, grinning at the other two, “Like that’s ever going to happen.”

 

Jae was about to start arguing but saw an all too familiar glint in the pairs eyes and wisely decided to drop it, “Babos, the pair of you,” he huffed but was grinning regardless.

 

Saki slipped around Kiyeol’s legs to look at the others, “Food shopping all done, Oppa Jin?”

 

Jin nodded, ruffling the girl’s hair, “Yup, all done and dusted, sweetie.”

 

“Did you get some cookies for Daddy?” the girl tried to grab at Jin’s fingers to stop him musing up her hair despite it already being fairly mussed up already since it was being worn long and with a simple hair band rather than being tugged into it’s accustomed pigtails – seeing as Sunwoo, Jin and Sang had all tried and completely failed – but the girl didn’t mind in the slightest. She also adored the little jeans and t-shirt set that Kyung had gotten her the night before, the bright yellow with the pink and purple butterflies really suited her down to the ground and she loved it all the more.

 

Jin frowned, “Cookies?”

 

“Yes. Cookies for Daddy.”

 

“Bradley doesn’t usually like sweet things though,” Jae frowned, leaning back against the railing once again as the others headed over to them.

 

Saki gave them her best incredulous look, “You don’t know about Daddy and cookies?”

 

There came a sea of blank faces from the others and the girl sighed, “Daddy loves cookies. They cheer him up regardless of what mood he’s in. How can Oppa’s know not when even Saki knows?”

 

Sunwoo sighed, “He kept that quiet.”

 

“Or we didn’t pay attention,” Kyung said, hopping back and forth on his feet as he usually did, “That’s more than probable.”

 

Sang chuckled, “Right, we go and get Mama Bear a whole bunch of cookies and then lets get out of here cause I’m about to melt.”

 

“Where we going to next?” Saki asked, sounding really excited and she latched her small fingers onto Sunwoo and Sang for the time being.

 

“There’s a park with a playground in it,” Kyung said with a grin, before sighing at the series of strange looks he got, “I was brought up in Seoul, I know it pretty well. Plus it’s not far either and there’s plenty of parking.”

 

“It is Saturday though,” Sunwoo said, his seriousness taking back over for a few seconds.

 

Kyung nodded, “But it’s only ten thirty and the storm will keep most people indoors for the time being. As long as it doesn’t start raining again we’ll be fine.”

 

“Is there a pond with ducks?” Saki cut in before anyone else could argue, her eyes bright and shiny with the prospect.

 

The eldest of the small group smiled probably the warmest out of the lot of them at that second, “There is definitively a pond there, I don’t know about the ducks as the weather may have kept them indoors but I’m sure we can do something about that.”

 

It wasn’t long before the group were heading towards the two cars, both Kyung and Jae had been utilised since there were so many of them trying to get to one place – plus they had to bring the shopping home with them as well so it made sense to use both cars. As they moved through the parking lot, Jae managed to successfully tug out his phone and sent a quick text message to Jongki as he had promised to do earlier in the day.

 

~~~

 

Looking up as his phone beeped cheerily at him, Jongki clicked it on and blinked at the message from Jae, “If we have any at home, give Brad a cookie from all of us.” For a second the Leader frowned before grinning, realising that Saki may have mentioned something to them in regards to it. It was one of Bradley’s few vices in life and he generally kept it quiet as it was also a good way to bribe him into doing something for you. He replied back to the message and put the phone down and refocused his attention on his laptop for the time being.

 

The dorm didn’t feel quite as big as it normally did when he was alone in the place, but there again right now he wasn’t really alone. Since Bradley was still snoozing, Jongki had taken the opportunity to indulge a little in the fandom that they had and also keep a check on any of the boy’s antics whilst they were out. They all had the very public facebook accounts and blogs that got bombarded by the fans and management but they did have their own private and security protected accounts on Cyworld that weren’t as well patrolled. However Bradley’s account had not been updated in the entire time that he had been away from the boys though they had tried multiple times to contact him through it. It had been one of the many things that gave the impression of something not entirely being right with the situation but now he knew something of what was going on in the others life, Jongki guessed that the internet was one of the few luxuries in life that had been dropped by the other.

 

He smiled at seeing some of the photo uploads from around the toy shop that featured little Saki and his boys. They probably didn’t realise that they were doing some of the best aeygo that they had ever done but he would download it all later on.

 

“Where’s the others taken my daughter?” the sleepy voice of Bradley cut into his thoughts about two hours later and Jongki glanced up from the screen with a gentle smile.

 

“To the toy shop in the mall,” he replied, quickly setting about closing a few things, “I think Kyung and Jin must have chased them away from doing the food shopping.”

 

Bradley smiled a little, “They better not be spoiling her.”

 

“Bradley, they are allowed to spoil her rotten and you are not going to pay us back for this,” he chuckled, knowing that already that phrase had been said toward the eldest more than enough times, “We’re your friends for gods sake, we’re here to help you out of horrible situations like this. None of us expect anything back from you.”

 

“But-” Bradley started.

 

Jongki glared at him, “Eun Bradley if you so much as try to start complaining at me I will seriously get annoyed at you.”

 

Slowly the other sighed, “It’s not that I don’t appreciate this, in fact I couldn’t be happier right now but...if anyone finds out that I’m here there’s going to be hell to pay and I don’t want you guys getting into anymore trouble with the company.”

 

“How do you know about that?” Jongki said, passing the other a cup of steaming tea.

 

“You didn’t think that I wouldn’t keep up with you guys when I could?” Bradley shook his head, “All I had to do was ask the landlord’s daughter about you guys and she could give me a full update in a matter of minutes. You lot really did cause some bother.”

 

Jongki shrugged, “Well we didn’t have Mama Bear to keep us in line did we?”

 

“That’s your job Jongki, not mine,” Bradley sighed, shaking his head and staring dumbly at his tea, “I was never any good at that sort of stuff.”

 

“No you weren’t,” Jongki said, “But you were always there for us. Fussing on and making everything somehow just a bit more tolerable when things went wrong,” quietly he paused, taking a slurp of his tea, “Bradley...why are things so bad for you right now? What happened after you were fired?”

 

There was a pause for a few long seconds, clearly the elder thinking his response through. Just as the Leader was about to lose his patience, Bradley clicked his tongue against the back of his teeth, “I got stung by the company...loss of earnings. Something I hadn’t taken the time to notice in the contract and it’s not a pretty sum either. Then I had Saki’s medical bills to take care of-”

 

“Saki’s medical bills?”

 

“She’s got a heart condition,” Bradley blinked, “its how they found out that she wasn’t actually related to her stated father on the birth certificate.”

 

Jongki blinked curiously as a way of asking and Bradley sighed, “Virtually all of my family has suffered from a heart condition at some point in time. It’s a trait that we apparently got from our grandmother. Saki suffers from Ebstein anomaly, it’s a problem with the valves in her heart. All of us had something similar when we were little, excluding Greg bless him but we didn’t think he was going to make it through the night so he deserves a break in that respect. When they went to operate, they said that it would be best that she had a family match for a blood donor just to be extra safe...Mali wasn’t a match and neither was her partner so there was only one option left.”

 

“But how could she know it was you?” it was something that had been bothering Jongki for a little while, “without a DNA test of course.”

 

Bradley took a long gulp of his tea, not minding the fact that it tasted a little bit off, “I was the only other guy she was with at the time. I was a rebound for two weeks when they had a falling out.”

 

“Ouch,” Jongki sighed, “So that’s when she turned up right?”

 

Bradley nodded, “Yeah. Virtually dumped Saki on me and said that she wanted nothing more to do with me or Saki.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because I’m bi.”

 

“Seriously?”

 

“Yeah, it’s why she finished me actually...well other than her git of a partner crawling back into her life,” Bradley shook her head, “But back on track. So I had the medical bills to cover and the loss of earnings fine and the legal fees to officially adopt Sakura and change her name-”

 

Jongki blinked, “You changed her name?”

 

Bradley nodded, “Saki asked if it would be possible to.”

 

“Why?”

 

“She didn’t like it.”

 

Jongki paused, “What was it originally?”

 

“Uk Jun Yi,” Bradley said with a sigh, “She didn’t have the most creative of parents.”

 

“Plus Sakura Eun does suit her, a whole lot better,” Jongki smiled gently, “So the company fined you, you had the medical bills and the legal fees...wow that is a lot.”

 

Bradley nodded, “Then add rent on top of that, other medication and the essentials to stay alive...I’m amazed that I actually have a place to live right now. Well had a place I should say.”

 

“Brad...why didn’t you go home?” Jongki knew that he was starting to get onto really hot ground with the other but he had to tell them something.

 

Slowly the red head chewed his lip, “It would have cost too much...plus Saki needs to be here. She’s still getting regular check ups and whilst the info could be transferred across to Busan hospital...there were a few legal problems that they didn’t quite like the idea of. Now that it’s all sorta sorted out I could go home but...”

 

“There’s that word again,” Jongki said, glaring at Bradley warningly though he got the impression that he was going to have more than just a headache by the time he finished this talk.

 

He received an equal glare back from the other, “I couldn’t afford it. Even with the two jobs that I run currently. By the time I’ve paid off rent, sorted out the other bills, gotten food in and everything else I barely have enough to keep Saki going, let alone me,” he stared down at his arms, “I know I’m a wreck and I know in the long run it’s not going to be easy but what other choice do I have?”

 

“Calling out to your friends and family is a good place to start,” Jongki said, putting his cup down, “I know you don’t like it but there’s no shame is asking for help. Especially for someone like you who does so much for everyone else.”

 

Bradley started to shake his head, “But I don’t want to...”

 

“Bradley,” Jongki got firm, moving close, “You listen to me. You’re not a burden on anyone and no one would ever think to ever call you that. Stop worrying about everyone else for once and worry about yourself. Okay you’re circumstances aren’t that good at the moment but it’s not through lack of you trying and you don’t have to stand and take this by yourself, you silly goose. We’re here for you, your family is here for you and you’re not on your own in the slightest.”

 

Tears welled up in Bradley’s eyes and once again he broke down but this time is was clear that it was more a case of the dam breaking at long last after being carefully built up. Jongki held Bradley tightly, allowing the other to cry and just be weak and vulnerable. He knew that there was no way he would have ever managed to get half of the truth out of the other if the others had been around because Bradley was always the strong one, the one who kept them all together and didn’t get flustered. It was hard keeping up that wall, especially when things were going as wrong as what they were for Bradley and Jongki was more than relieved that the other was finally able to just break past everything.

 

After a while the crying subsided, as well as the inane babble that Bradley had been coming out with, and the pair just enjoyed the silence between them. It was comfortable and allowed for quiet reflection. “Do you want a cookie Mama Bear?” Jongki asked gently, grinning at the air of confusion which came from the other which turned into an unexpected laugh, “You been talking to Davey again?”

 

“No, Jae said I was to give you a cookie,” Jongki said, patting the other on the arm as he moved to dig through the cupboards, “From all of the others.”

 

“But you’re the only one who...” Bradley’s eyes widened, “Oh heck, Saki’s with them isn’t she?”

 

Jongki nodded, handing over a packet of Oreo cookies which he always kept hidden, “Yup, so expect to get lots thrown your way cause they all know now.”

 

Bradley shook his head but grinned all the more, “Hmmm, my cookies.”

 

“Hey, give them back!” Jongki said, realising that Mama Bear was making movements as if to horde the cookies, “They’re mine.”

 

“Not anymore,” Bradley said, ducking back off the stool he was sitting on as Jongki made a grab before half-fleeing from the other. If anyone else had been in the place, they would have gotten some of the best aeygo of the two eldest of the group as they prated around with one another. It had been an age and a half since they had gotten to pretend that they were kids.

 

Sometimes being responsible was so demanding that something had to give.  

 

“Gimme my cookies!”

 

“No!”

 

“I’m going to kill you when I get a hold of you!”

 

“Gonna have to catch me first!”

 

“Ha! Got’ya! Gimme!”

 

“You’re choking me!”

 

“Gimme my cookies back”

 

“Only if you give me a kiss!”

 

“Ugh! Like I would give you a kiss.”

 

“You did that one time...”

 

“Shut up and give me my cookies”

 

“Yah! That hurt!”

 

“Victory is mine.”

 

“They’re all broken.”

 

“Really...that . You broke the cookies!”

 

“Gerroff you big lug!”

 

“Not until I get you back for breaking the cookies!”

 

Unsurprisingly they were perfectly happy, mucking about like a couple of Maknea’s and Bradley knew that he could always rely on the other regardless of what happened in his life.