Hi. I know it's been a while since I've updated this story. When did I first start writing this? 2013? Was it really 5 years ago? Life got crazy... I feel sorry for creating this story and never finishing it. With Jonghyun's death recently, I remembered about the stories I used to read and write about him. The fans' love was is so strong for our Jonghyun. This story has almost nothing to do with Jonghyun and it's been a few years since I've read fanfiction and I don't even know if this website is still active with readers and writers, but I think I owe it to my readers to continue this story. 

In these last 5 years, I got married. I graduated from college and I'm now living in Korea with our four (yes, four!) children. Life is still pretty crazy. Our kids keep me busy and I'm in graduate school now. I started re-reading this story and was disappointed with the way I just left it hanging. I can't promise this story will be as elaborate as For You in Full Bloom and I can't promise it'll be as long or that I can update as much as I'd like to, but I'd like to finish it. Life is fleeting and there's only so much that we can do and leave behind. It's hard to feel like we make a difference. For You in Full Bloom was the first thing I ever wrote for an audience to read and it did much better than I ever imagined. To this day it still gets comments and subscribers to my page. I can't thank my readers enough. 

Please enjoy, finally, chapter 9 of  The Loved and the Lost. 

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Minho didn’t answer his phone for eight days. Eight days of absolute panic for Taemin. What was it about him that made people leave? Why couldn’t he just keep his damn mouth shut? Minho had done all he could to accept Taemin, who was practically a stranger at this point, and the child Taemin had with a random woman who had the nerve to abandon her own son. Minho had increased his hours at work just so he could support his new family. Minho waited for years and years for Taemin to come back and accepted him with loving arms when he returned with a son. All of this, and Taemin had just gone and said something so stupid that he wished he’d never opened his mouth.

“You’re not his father!” echoed continuously in Minho’s mind. The depression he’d struggled with for years suddenly came crashing back. He laid in that dark motel room for those eight days, only getting up to use the bathroom and answer the door when the food delivery man came. No TV. No music. Nothing but Taemin’s harsh words and fits of tiring sleep. The thing that hurt Minho the most was that he genuinely knew he wasn’t Inho’s father. He knew that and didn’t need Taemin to tell him.  

Inho was always a mild-tempered child but the day that Minho left, he began to act out. He stopped eating almost everything Taemin offered him. He screamed and threw toys when Taemin tried to stop him from watching TV. Taemin was at his absolute wit’s end with Inho and couldn't think of any possible way to make his son listen to him. He was so tired. He was infuriated and scared and worried and frustrated with himself.

Inho and Taemin had gotten into a furious battle that started when Taemin told Inho to take a bath, something he’d recently started to do with his Minho Appa. Inho refused. Taemin insisted. Inho yelled and Taemin screamed. He grabbed Inho and forced him into the bath, doused him with cold water and scrubbed his skin until it was red while Inho hollered about how much he hated Taemin and how much he wished he just had Minho Appa and his mom. That was when Taemin absolutely lost it. He did what he promised he never would do.

He hurt his son. He yanked Inho out of the bath by his arm and a loud pop radiated through the bathroom. The two were silent for a second while they registered what happened. Then Inho began shrieking in pain, cradling his arm with his other arm, his face red and splotchy and wet from tears and shower water. Taemin instantly regretted everything he’d done. Taemin picked Inho up, but the boy started thrashing in his father’s arms, afraid and in immense pain.

“Oh, God, Inho, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry, baby,” Taemin began, rushing to dry his son off so he could inspect whatever had happened to the boy. Inho resisted his father’s touch and continued screaming until Taemin decided he couldn’t deal with this on his own and wrapped the boy in a towel, grabbed his phone and the car keys, threw his son over his shoulder and ran downstairs to the garage. He sped through intersections until he arrived at the hospital, with Inho still howling. Taemin kept apologising but Inho either didn’t hear or didn’t care.

The doctors determined that Inho’s arm was broken and once they learned how the accident occurred, they called Child Protective Services. Taemin insisted that Inho’s malnourishment was because Inho refused to eat. He pleaded with the agents and explained that Inho was dirty because he refused to bathe. When agents threatened to take Inho away, Taemin panicked.

The text message got Minho’s attention. Unlike the contrite paragraphs that Taemin had been sending for the last week, this message was short and terse. “They’re taking our baby away.” The fatherly instincts that Minho didn’t know he had suddenly erupted. He immediately called Taemin back and was met by the heart-wrenching sound of a parent about to lose their child. Minho too immediately began crying when he heard Taemin’s strained voice and heavy breathing.

By the time Minho arrived at the hospital, Inho was gone. They took him. Taemin sat with his head between his knees, his sobs wracking his body and wails filling the hallway. Minho’s heart broke into a million pieces immediately. He rushed over to Taemin, feeling such sorrow, feeling like it was all his fault for leaving his family behind like that, like none of this would have happened if he hadn’t pressed Taemin to tell Inho the truth about his mother. Minho said nothing, sat next to Taemin, and enveloped him into a deep hug. Both fathers provided each other comfort in this moment but, without Inho, were they really fathers anymore?

Eventually their sobs lightened to sniffles and the first words out of Taemin’s mouth were, “I shouldn’t have said that to you.” Minho shook his head and wiped Taemin’s tears with his thumb.

“No, it’s your decision when to tell him the truth. I’m sorry for pushing you when you weren’t ready.”

Taemin just sighed and buried his face in his hands. “I just… I just don’t know what to… How to get him back?”

Minho rubbed Taemin’s back. “I have lawyer friends. I have the company lawyer. We don’t abuse our son and we can prove that.” He paused for a moment. “He got hurt, okay? Kids get hurt all the time. Parents get frustrated all the time.”

A long, muffled sigh came from Taemin again. “Hyung, I just always thought I was the better parent, compared to her, I mean. I took care of Inho from the day he was born and she didn’t do anything. But that’s just the thing. She’s never done anything to him. I hurt him. I hurt my baby.”

Minho chewed on his lip and thought. “She didn’t do anything to him but she didn’t do anything for him either. You loved him. You fed him and clothed him and sang him songs. We play with him. We do everything we can for him. No parent is perfect. My mom is much better than my dad, even though my dad never did anything because she loved me.”

Taemin shrugged, feeling so small and stupid. “I just wish I was better,”

“We will be, babe. We will be.”