07.

When I’d said ASAP to Jaehyo, I didn’t realize he’d seriously get it done the next day.

Waking up, Junhong and I were in for a too big of a surprise, tripping over our clumped sheets in the living room to get dressed and out the door before he was late for his first day of god damned school. (Plus waving Yongguk out in the middle, hissing at him for laughing at my tripping over a pillow.)

Or actually, it may have been just me doing the tripping.

“Junhong? Hey, where are you?” Shoving down a hat over my head, I pushed the dirty dishes in the sink (for later, when I cared a little more about hygiene), a frown and looking for the tiny man usually glued to my legs. “Junhong?” It wasn’t like him to suddenly disappear (not since we’d actually begun to get along).

I found him only seconds later in the living room, the blankets thrown over his carefully made head. His lump only just stuck out like a sore thumb amidst sprawl of our bedsheets spread out gingerly from the night before (that had been a funny sight, Junhong trying to drag over sheets sizes bigger than him from the other rooms, catching all the dust on the way there).

Even as I called him, feigning ignorance and offering him treats if he came out real quick - his lump wiggled a little, the temptation hard. And that alone was a surprise to me; Junhong never could resist the lure of chocolate and sweets.

And that’s when I began to worry.

“Junhong?” Sitting down on the sheets, I pulled the one over Junhong’s head down, dropping it over his shoulders and fluffing his already crinkled hair. “What’s wrong Junhong?”

His big eyes were squinted, staring down at his fingers as he twiddled them anxiously. “Dun’ wanna’ go.” He was mumbling, chewing down at the insides of his cheeks, brows pulled together in serious thought.

“Huh?”

He looked up at me, his frown still distinct (in all seriousness a kid his age shouldn’t have), “Junhong no want to go.”

Over the past days I’d spent rolling around with Junhong, I’d learned a thing or two about the little guy. One thing was that he had a tendency to bite whenever something went against his will; another being that giving him too much sugar would result in a five year old destroying my apartment. But another thing was that he had a tendency to speak in third person when scared (or when he really wanted something).

This time, I could only guess that: Junhong didn’t want to go to school.

Again, I frowned, pulling him cover to my side and eventually on my lap, soothing a hand over his head, trying to calm the static that stuck it in every direction. “Why not?”

When I had been Junhong’s age - albeit, it had been years in the past - I used to love going to school. Home had been boring, often spent around the living room, a book in hand because all my parents ever wanted to watch on the television had been the news. The only other fun I had was playing house with my sister (it never ended too well).

On the other hand, school was fun, interesting. There were others my age (namely, a certain Hwang Kwanghee, who’d followed me throughout the majority of life - and still to this day never failed to bother me) to talk and play with. The teachers were nice and studying came easy when it consisted mostly of guiding (illogical) talking animals through adventurous quests by playing stickers in their appropriate locations.

I used to love school.

(Quote unquote, used to.)

I didn’t quite get a proper response back from Junhong, instead met with a squirming child on my lap, repeating the same “don’t want to go” over and over again like a broken record. He at least got his point across: he didn’t want to go.

“You’ll like school, Junhong. You’ll meet new friends and have loads of fun!” Because back in Junhong’s age, screaming and running around in circles equaled to amazing fun. Life was easy back at his age.

It took at least ten minutes to convincing before Junhong finally agreed to give school a go. Only after I’d promised him that he could call at any minute of the day to pick him up (only and only when he was having the worst of times) did he let me lead him out the door and towards his new to-be school.

The whole way there, Junhong kept quiet, his brows scrunched and fingers tightly wrapped around mine. You could practically feel his anxiety radiating off of him.

I could only wonder why.

What could have happened, for him to have such a horrid memory of school?

Approaching the perimeter of school (oh the memories), we were met with a whole group of parents, usually mothers, and their children, laughing and snickering, everyone excited. Today was a sort of meet and greet, a day for the kids to get to know their new classmates and teachers; everyone was dressed their best, bright smiles coloring their cheeks.

This reminded me, I should take Junhong out shopping for new clothes some time soon. Kids his age grew fast, each day a good centimeter or two taller (not literally).

“You ready to go?”

He frowned, so obviously not, but nodded slowly, turning to look up at me. “Can hyung stay?”

I shook my head, squatting to his height and straightening out his clothes. “Sorry, the teachers probably won’t like that. But don’t worry, hyung’ll tell the teachers to take extra good care of Junhong, alright?” Otherwise, I’d have Jaehyo’s .

It was too clear that Junhong didn’t want to be sent off, but he seemed to it up, finishing the last few steps toward the teacher, letting go when a particular male instructor smiled and reached out for him.

“Hi there.” He had big eyes, the extra white in his eyes making me do a double take. “My name’s Kyungsoo, what’s your name?” He waved cheerfully at Junhong with this wide smile before turning up to me, his grin not falling (almost creepy).

When Junhong refused to respond, instead turning back to stare up at me (mirroring the look on my face, the surprised one), Kyungsoo, tilt his head a little, repeating his name and taking a hand out for me to shake. I’d never admit the look was cute (almost).

“Junhong.” I took his hand, shaking it. “Him I mean. His name’s Junhong, Choi Junhong. I’m Himchan, his … … er … … I’m his … uncle?”

Kyungsoo nodded, snickering a little under his breath before releasing my hand and pulling away to rest both on Junhong’s shoulder. He’d never not be laughing at me. “I’ll take that as a “it’s complicated”.”

I did a little wail here. “I’m not his dad, not his biological dad - or his dad at all I mean.” And I was blabbing now, a horrible habit I’d picked up. My hands were everywhere, trying so desperately to explain a situation that didn’t need explaining.

I blamed Kyungsoo for this, Kyungsoo and Jaehyo - everything was Jaehyo’s fault.

Mister owl eyes only laughed at me, waving away my frustrations with a snicker. “It’s alright, you don’t need to explain anything.”

I huffed. Of course I didn’t need to explain.

(I was an idiot.)

Calming the rump of my chest, I tried out a smile down at Junhong, squatting and petting the brown fluff on his head. “Be a good boy, alright? Hyung’ll come and pick you up right when class ends. In,” I checked my watch, remembering only then that I don’t wear watches (“In eight hours”), “eight hours. You be good and listen to Kyungsoo until then, alright?”

Junhong wanted to say no, I could tell by the defiant look in his eyes (the insecurity), but he nodded anyways, taking Kyungsoo’s hand with a slight pout.

He made me promise him ice cream if he was a good boy.

Eight hours; that gave me a good three hours to work properly at peace on my group project (the rest five being spent rolling around doing some wailing).

I’d only just waved Junhong off, watching him interact shyly with Kyungsoo, when a too familiar voice caught me off guard. “Himchan! Is that you?” A hand and a face.

Leave it to him to run straight into me.

I had to thank Junhong for his obsessive need to constantly run into me for enhancing my reflexes; otherwise, I would’ve spent a good second now sprawled over the floor housing a sprained ankle and a mouthful of curses (deja-vu).

“Sorry,” was the little whine that greeted me as I helped my tackler off and onto his feet with a grunt (a certain scoff coming from somewhere below). Before I got a good look at his face though (because running into me didn’t give me nearly enough time to register), he’d already turned to the source of the snickering, “I told you not to trip me Yifan! I’m going to tell your mother you’re not playing nice again.”

“Kris,” was the only reply (correction?) he got, in combination with a sharp kick to the shin and stick out of tongue. “Loser.” That, and the shrimp was off, cackling something about how his cousin was a (not at all a proper set of vocabulary for a five year old).

“I swear he’s going to be some supreme world dictator or something. I told aunt that the little demon needed to be aborted.” A gruff sigh, then attention was back on me, the bright too familiar smiling face lighting up. “Sorry about that!”

It was Joonmyun, the clumsy friend I’d made back in freshman year.

A year back, just after finishing my kingly years as a high school senior, freshman year of college had started, throwing me off my A game and dropping me back down to the bottom of the human food chain. Back then, on the first days on campus, lost and confused, I’d found himself a new friend be lost and confused with.

That said friend, was the same one who stood with me now, Kim Joonmyun.

He’d gotten me both in and out of so many sticky situations, getting lost and trapped in buildings and rooms. I’d probably spent more of freshman year being lost with him than actually studying (but somehow we’d both managed with flying colors). After finding Hyungjun in classes, when my grades took a rollercoaster down to meet with a certain friend from elementary school, the three of us (four, including Suhoon) had made a total mess out of everything in school.

But once major classes began, I’d seen less and less of him.

It was nice running into him again (quite literally).

“My aunt’s paying me to watch him while she’s out doing yoga. Should’ve suspected something was up when she offered a hundred thousand won to watch him for just a few hours.” He sighed, glaring a little towards the direction Yifan (or Kris, as the kid’s so spitefully spat at Joonmyun) had scrambled off to. “Kyungsoo says that Yifan’s an angel; just never to me.”

The exhaustion was clear in his eyes.

“Oh! But it’s nice to see you! I haven’t seen you since last semester,” a frown. “Hyungjun trashed your finals report didn’t he? What happened to that?”

I groaned. Loudly. As loud as I god damned could.

(Cause at that moment, I realized, I hadn’t nearly beat Hyungjun up enough for that.)

“Don’t remind me. I’m taking winter courses.”

Junmyoon cringed, giving me a sympathetic pat on the back. “Least it’s almost over?”

I grunted. Yes, it was almost over, but with it, it had taken away my whole break.

Ugh.

He smiled anyways, pointing out a coffee shop nearby, offering to buy coffee. He knew me too well; free coffee - no matter what Kyuhyun said - was an offer I would never refuse.

“So you’re babysitting too?”

I shrugged, sipping on the long missed mug of Americano. It would have been an understatement to just say I missed it. I nearly died without it. (Kyuhyun didn’t know he was really killing me instead of helping.)

“Sort of. It’s complicated.”

And luckily, before Joonmyun had me explain, my phone went off, making me stick a finger in Joonmyun’s face in signal for “just a second”.

See, but the thing was that the phone call wasn’t a good one. So it was a question as to whether not explaining was a lucky thing, or not.

“What?” I deadpanned into the phone, voice pitching and gaining the attention of half the customers in the store with it. “What do you mean? He’s not there?”

Yongguk was going to kill me.

The voice on the other end started panicking then, screeching with the equal pitch I had then. “Oh god. He took off after you! I thought you’d called him!” Kyungsoo was panicking, and that really wasn’t helping.

Joonmyun frowned, staring at me in confusion, mouthing a series of “what?” and “is everything okay?” No, everything was not okay.

Junhong was gone.

The call was ended, muttering out to Kyungsoo that I’d go and look for him. It wasn’t as if Kyungsoo could do anything about it anyways; he couldn’t leave the other kids alone. Promising to call when I found him, I scrambled for my jacket, tugging it on and stuttering out the story to Joonmyun, apologizing, though not quite sure why.

Leaving our drinks abandoned, Joonmyun - deciding to help - and I set off, frowning and shooting one sided conversations as to where Junhong could possibly be. He couldn’t have gotten too far, right? Junhong barely knew the area, it wasn’t as if there was anywhere he could possible be.

Oh god Yongguk was going to murder me.

We ran around town for an hour, calling everyone we knew and asking if they’d possibly seen a tiny brown haired five year old kid. He had say five jackets on and had to sort of waddle to compensate for the extreme layers. It couldn’t have been too hard to find him.

“Did you try the park?”

Taking Hyungjun’s advice (he had been of help the last time Junhong decided to be a cat), after our hour of going through the nearby stores, we set out for the park, panting and sweating buckets despite the brisk (still) winter weather.

I was going to have to get a leash for Junhong.

Again, to our relief, Hyunjun had hit the mark. Junhong was there, dangling awkwardly from the swing, tiny fingers wrapped around the cold metal hanging from the top of the wooden bar. He looked unharmed; maybe Yongguk wouldn’t murder me after all.

“Junhong!” I paused for a minute, catching my breath when he came in my line of sight. He was alive. He hadn’t been kidnapped by some weird e. Thank heavens he was still safe.

To my - our, judging the gasp from my side - surprise, Junhong scrambled off the swings and crawled into one of the playground sets, too small for me to crawl in properly (without destroying either me or the plastic). Why would Junhong run away like that?

Sharing a look, we hunched around the opening and squinted in, finding Junhong crawled up into a tiny ball at the very end of the slide (how he crawled up it so fast, I’d never understand).

“Junhong? Can you come down from there?” This time, I didn’t reach out, very aware of the last time I’d tried to get Junhong out by force when he’d bitten me. When Joonmyun tried reaching out in my stead, I slapped his hand away, shaking my head - not a good idea. “He bites.” The look on Joonmyun’s face could only be described as understanding - Yifan must bite too.

Despite our trying to sweet talk him out, Junhong refused, whining and kicking at the sides of the slid in his obvious disapproval. I couldn’t tell what was wrong this time; and worse, there was no Hyungseok to make things better.

“Junhong, you can’t stay there forever.”

It was past trying to sweet talk him out and exhaustion was starting to pile, as well as a good layer of annoyance. It was past noon now, all hopes of getting my project done before working on dinner had literally flown out the window.

I’d never get the project done on time at this rate (and heavens knew I didn’t want to repeat this class again, screw credits).

When Joonmyun suggested that he crawl up the slide - he was smaller than me, so it wasn’t totally a mission impossible for him - and try and talk Junhong out of his temper tantrum, I suggested against, deciding better of Joonmyun’s physical health - he was underestimating Junhong’s temper - but eventually lost. Joonmyun held a good point, I couldn’t let Junhong sit there forever.

So watching my smaller friend crawl up the tiny hole, I could only frown, pressing my ear up against the plastic ride to see if I could catch what they were talking about. All I got were muffled whines and hisses, both from Junhong, I supposed.

A long ten minutes - more, it felt like - and I got a warning to clear my face before I got it kicked in, the duo sliding down (awkwardly, seeing as Joonmyun was too obviously big for this). Both in one piece, thank heavens.

Automatically, I got a face full of Junhong, who pulled his arms up in demand to be picked up. A Junhong who smelled vaguely of chocolate and sweets. He glared a little at Joonmyun but returned to tucking his face in the crook between my neck and shoulder, biting me just enough to make me wince.

I didn’t have much room to complain.

“What happened?”

Joonmyun shrugged, a smug smile on his lips. “Nothing much. We had a bit of a trade.”

“A trade?”

Would explain the chocolate smell.

Another shrug, “I get you for the day next week, so given he gets to tag along.”

“What?” I frowned. “Let me get this straight, he sold me for chocolate?”

A kid who didn’t even own me, might I add.

“He sold you for chocolate.” A confirmation. He was laughing now, too amused by the look that’d come across my face (he was pointing, and laughing). I was a little tempted to punch him for it. “So you’d better be free tomorrow, or I want a hundred percent chocolate refund.”

I groaned, rubbing the space between my eyes (another habit, I was picking up a lot of these recently). “Why do you even carry chocolate on you anyways?”

“Yifan doesn’t ever listen to me unless I give him chocolate. Apparently, candy’s not his style.”

Yifan sounded like a harder customer than Junhong.

“Anyways, I have class tomorrow.”

“Next week then. It’s a date, you’re not allowed to kick me without giving me a chance.”

Junhong made a noise and we laughed.

Junhong was in my arms and safe. Yongguk wasn’t going to skin me alive. All was well.

Checking the time and deciding it was too late to send Junhong back to Kyungsoo, we gave him a call, telling him that we’d found Junhong and not to worry. He was relieved, his already wide eyes, I’m sure, going bigger at the news. (He apologized say about a million times and would have continued to do so, until I cut him off, reminding him he was killing my phone bill.)

Joonmyun walked us home, shrugging and saying he’d got nothing to do while waiting for Yifan to finish class anyways. I let him. We grab a burger (and Junhong’s happy meal toy) on the way back and wave Joonmyun good bye just below the apartment.

And there, he’s sticking his hand out (with a cheesy smile).

And me, I’m staring at him, a brow raised curiously. “You ask me out on a date,” it’s a joke (Junhong’s making that weird noise again), “and you won’t even give me a hug? I’m hurt.”

He laughing at this, shrugging and urging I take his hand. I do and it’s then he decides to explain.

“I’m all out of chocolate to bargain with your little body guard there.”

a/n: this chapter was supposed to come yesterday morning. sorry about that. i was out drinking with my friend until late yesterday - because stress. (strawberry soju tastes nice) i literately just wrote this now. hot off my keyboard.

today's the last day of 2013! the last day i get to mark the dates on my stories with 20130000. also the last day before i break out my new seasons greeting calendar. (and possibly get my kicked because of a sleeping youngjae on page one lol) happy almost new year. i've got approximately four and a half hours of 2013 left. i feel old. i'm turning 21 in four hours. ugh. (korean age of course) thanks to all my lovely subscribers who followed these last days. you're all amazing. 

also, i won't be updating this coming monday. i'll be going on a train ride to chooncheon and will apparently be spending the all of saturday and sunday there. why not write before i leave? my aunt's coming a little later today and leaving tomorrow night. and then my brother's returning from the military on a holiday this thursday. so busy. 

 i made a twitter account, just for the sake of getting bap updates again (and the first picture i see is bang on a tiny mini car). i'll be making posts there for any updates. like when i can't post, or any questions. just to complain. cough. i mean. otl. hopefully, i can actually keep up with it this time. since i fail to updating these things. /loser.

anyways. hope everyone had a good 2013 and will have an even better 2014. ♥