“Umma, come on. Let’s go.” Yunho stomps a foot, trying to get his shoes on faster. Sometimes he can tie the laces by himself, but it’s hard and it takes too long.

“Calm down,” his mother tells him patiently, putting Jihye in her bouncy chair and coming over to help. “We won’t be late. There’s no rush.” She bends down and unties his shoe.

“But I wanna get there fast,” Yunho says, lifting his feet so she can put his shoes on and then trying his best to stand still as she ties the laces.

His mother sighs. “We’ll get there plenty fast enough,” she says, standing up again and going back for Jihye. “If you hurry too much, you’ll forget things. Now, where’s your coat?”

Most days it’s warm enough by noon that he doesn’t need his coat to play outside, but it’s colder in the mornings and umma says it’s good to have a coat in case it rains, anyway. Yunho hurries over to the closet and pulls his coat off the hanger and puts it on.

“And your lunch?” his mother asks.

Yunho groans and runs to the kitchen. When he gets back, his mother is wrapping a light blanket around Jihye.

“That’s all, right?” Yunho says. “Now we can go?”

“Hand me your sister’s hat.”

Yunho looks around and grabs it out of the bouncy chair and gives it to her.

“Alright,” his mother says, pulling the hat down onto Jihye’s head. “Now we can go.”

Finally. Yunho pushes the door open for his mother and Jihye, then runs down the hall to the push the button for the elevator.

When they get outside, his mother takes his hand. Yunho tugs, trying to get her to walk faster.

“Yunho, don’t pull,” she scolds.

“But umma—”

“Do you want to see the twins this weekend?” she asks. Yunho nods. “Then stop pulling.”

Yunho sighs and falls in beside her.

Yunho thinks it probably doesn’t actually take that long to get to school. Mr. Choi isn’t out with his dog so Yunho doesn’t get distracted petting her, and he holds his mother’s hand the whole way so he doesn’t wander off looking at things. So he knows it probably doesn’t take long.

But it feels long. He wants to run ahead and get there fast, faster than anyone, but his mother just walks steadily along and he doesn’t want to get into trouble so he does his best not to pull.

It still feels like forever before the school gates come into view.

“Alright,” his mother says, opening the gate and then bending down. “Be good for your teachers.”

“I will,” Yunho promises, looking around at the kids on the playground. He doesn’t see Jaejoong anywhere.

“Yunho.”

Yunho looks back at his mother. She sighs and shakes her head.

“Give your sister a kiss,” she says smiling. “Have fun with your friend.”

Yunho leans in and kisses Jihye on the cheek. Then he waves to his mother and rushes off.

He thinks he probably won’t find Jaejoong outside, but he checks anyway, just in case. But he can’t find him anywhere on the playground, not even in the tunnels (he checks them all), and none of the others have seen him. So this time, Yunho tries inside.

It feels weird going inside the school when everyone else is still outside playing. It maybe feels especially weird since the teachers are outside too. The school feels much bigger and a little bit scary almost when it’s all empty like this. Yunho pauses by his cubby; he’s not really sure if he needs to take off his coat and shoes but it feels too strange to keep them on inside. He takes them off and stuffs them inside the cubby as quick as he can, then hurries through the empty common play areas and meeting rug to peek around the classroom door.

Jaejoong is in the classroom, sitting at the desk in the corner and staring at his hands in his lap. He’s all by himself again. Yunho doesn’t know why that makes him mad, or who or what it is he’s mad at, but it does. Jaejoong shouldn’t be alone. But the mad only last for a little and then Yunho is grinning again, because the last two times he looked, he couldn’t find Jaejoong, and today he did. He steps around the door and skips across the room.

“Found you,” he says happily, planting his elbows on the desk and leaning in, trying to see Jaejoong’s face.

Jaejoong looks up at him. His eyes are all wide again and he looks surprised, and maybe also confused. “Huh?” he says.

“Because last time I couldn’t find where you were,” Yunho explains. “But today I did.”

The wide eyes blink and stare, and then slide away from Yunho’s, back down to Jaejoong’s lap. “You,” he starts, one fist wandering up to hover by his mouth. His eyes dart up to peek out at Yunho again. “You looked for me?”

“Uh-huh,” Yunho says, smiling big. “Wanna come outside?” He thinks probably Jaejoong won’t want to, but that’s okay. He’ll ask anyway.

Jaejoong’s eyes fall back down to his lap again. He says nothing.

“Or we can play in here,” Yunho says, still smiling. “We could do more blocks. Wanna finish the city now?”

Jaejoong peeks up at him again, then shakes his head. Yunho frowns a little, confused. Jaejoong made him promise they’d finish that game, why doesn’t he want to? But maybe he just doesn’t want to right now. Maybe blocks is too noisy for this early? Yunho knows his umma sometimes really doesn’t like noise in the mornings. Maybe it’s the same thing. He tries to think of quieter things to do. It’s actually kind of hard to think of quiet things. Trains are noisy and pirates is really noisy and they’d probably need more people anyway.

“There’s coloring,” he offers. “Or there’s cards. Like dominos only with pictures.”

Jaejoong his lower lip into his mouth. “Are there books?” he asks. “For coloring?”

Yunho nods. “Yeah,” he says, and maybe he says it a little too loud because Jaejoong’s eyes go a little wide again, but he can’t help it. He’s happy to have found something Jaejoong wants to do. “There’s all kinds. With animals and cars and trucks and people from all over the world. And dinosaurs.”

“Dinosaurs?” Jaejoong echoes, looking up.

“Uh-huh,” Yunho says, getting up off the desk and grinning. “Come on.” He trots away from the desk to the arts and crafts shelf and starts sorting through the coloring books. Jaejoong hesitates, then comes over too, standing behind Yunho and toeing the rug. Yunho finds the book with the dinosaur pictures and pulls it out.

“See?” he says, opening it to show Jaejoong. “Some of the pictures are already done, but there’s lots left.”

Jaejoong reaches out and Yunho hands him the coloring book, then grabs one of the cups of crayons and sprawls out on the floor on his front. Jaejoong sits down beside him, eyes still glued to the book as he flips through the pages. Yunho waits for a moment, then reaches up and gently tugs on the book til Jaejoong lowers it to the floor between them.

“You pick one,” he says, “and then I’ll do the one on the other page, okay?”

Jaejoong nods, then flips through til he finds a page with three different kinds of dinosaurs on it: one long-necked dinosaur eating a tree, one that stands like a T-rex but looks a lot smaller and more friendly guarding a nest, and one little T-rex in the background.

Yunho grins; his own page has two horned dinosaurs fighting. He dumps the cup of crayons on the floor where they can both reach them and grabs the green.

By the time Yunho hears the teachers and the other kids coming in for morning meeting, he and Jaejoong have colored two pictures each and are starting on a third. At first Jaejoong’s were much more careful than Yunho’s; more inside the lines and more realistically colored, but after Yunho’s second picture had a blue polka dotted T-rex, he seems to have relaxed some. The picture he’s working on now has a dinosaur with all bony scales coming up off its back, and Jaejoong seems to be trying to use a different color for each one.

At the sound of all the noise, though, Jaejoong jumps and drops his crayon. His eyes go wide again and he stares at the door like he half-expects one of the dinosaurs they’ve been coloring to come in, instead of their classmates.

Yunho sighs and puts down his crayon. “We have to clean up now,” he says. Wide eyes snap to him.

“How come?” Jaejoong asks, and Yunho thinks he maybe sounds a little upset. Like he doesn’t want to have to stop.

“Cause we have to go to morning meeting,” Yunho says.

“How come?” Jaejoong says again.

“I don’t know,” Yunho says. “Because we do.” He picks up the cup and starts putting the crayons back inside.

“But I’m not finished,” Jaejoong says, looking back down at his picture.

“Me, either,” Yunho says. “But we’re supposed to. And it’s fun. We sing and stuff.”

Jaejoong picks up his crayons and adds them to Yunho’s in the cup. Yunho puts the cup back on the shelf and Jaejoong closes the coloring book and puts that back too.

Yunho stands and starts to lead the way to the door, then stops when he realizes Jaejoong isn’t following. He’s still standing by the craft shelf.

“But—” Jaejoong hesitates, then says all in a rush, “But what if someone takes my seat?”

Yunho blinks. They don’t have assigned seats so they can sit wherever they want. But he guesses maybe Jaejoong doesn’t know that since he’s still new.

“It’s okay,” he says. “We’ll just sit somewhere else.”

“We will?” Jaejoong says, eyes finally focusing on Yunho.

“Uh-huh,” Yunho nods. Then he holds out his hand. They have to go or they’ll be late for the meeting. “Come on.”

This time Jaejoong doesn’t hesitate, hurrying over. Yunho takes his hand and heads out to the meeting rug. And when he sits, Jaejoong sits right next to him and doesn’t let go of his hand.

“Where are we exploring?”

It’s the end of the day and they’re on the hill again, but this time Jaejoong seems less unhappy. They found some sticks that kind of look like animals or maybe people and now the grass is a jungle. Only Yunho wants to know which one. It matters because of what animals their stick people might run into.

Jaejoong gives him a strange look. “A jungle,” he says, and he sounds a little unsure, like he thinks Yunho might have suddenly changed the rules or something.

Yunho shakes his head. “I know,” he says. “I mean where is the jungle? ‘Cause we should know what animals to look for.”

“Oh.” The confusion leaves Jaejoong’s face and he frowns, thinking now. “I don’t know. It should be dangerous, probably.”

Yunho grins. “Yeah,” he says. “Maybe…maybe there’s lions.” He was reading about lions with his appa a while ago. He thinks some more about that, then says, “But lions don’t live in jungles, so maybe not.”

“Bats live in jungles,” Jaejoong says. “Bats can be scary.”

“Yeah,” Yunho agrees. “We’ll have to build a place to be safe for at night.”

“Maybe it’s a new jungle,” Jaejoong says. “Maybe no one’s ever explored it before and there’s all sorts of things in it.”

“Dinosaurs,” Yunho says eagerly. “Maybe some of them survived and now we’ve found them and they’ll all want to eat us!”

Jaejoong nods and starts grabbing more sticks. “Yeah,” he says. “We’ll need spears.” He hands Yunho a small stick-spear for his stick-person, then points to a rock about the size of a fist a little way away.

“Dinosaur?” Yunho asks and Jaejoong nods.

“We have to be quiet,” he whispers. “Or it’ll hear us.”

Yunho nods carefully and then starts to creep closer, just a little. “Do you think we could catch it?” he asks as quietly as he can. “What kind is it?”

“Big,” Jaejoong whispers back. “Like the one in the book with the long neck. If we could catch it we could maybe ride it.”

“Yeah,” Yunho agrees, excited about this idea. “And maybe we could teach it to protect us from the ones that want to eat us.”

Jaejoong nods. “We’ll have to build a trap,” he decides. “But we don’t have any rope.”

“Maybe we could dig a hole and put sticks around it?” Yunho suggests.

“Okay,” Jaejoong says. “And then we can cover it with leaves so you can’t see the hole.”

They get to work. Their stick-people don’t have any shovels, so they have to dig the hole with sticks, but there are always lots of sticks in jungles so that’s okay. It has to be a pretty big hole though, to catch a dinosaur in, so it takes a while. They’re just getting to the stick-fence around it when footsteps sound nearby.

“Yunho, didn’t you hear me calling?”

Yunho looks around. His mother is coming up the hill, Jihye in her arms, a blanket covering her head. To protect her from the sun, his mother says. Yunho smiles to see her.

“What are you two doing?” she asks, reaching them and crouching down.

“Look, umma,” Yunho says happily, “it’s a dinosaur trap. We’re gonna catch one and try to ride it.” He points to the hole and then to the rock that’s the dinosaur.

“Sounds difficult,” his mother says, smiling. “I hope you’re being careful. Is this your friend?”

Yunho grins some more. “Uh-huh,” he says. “This is Jaejoong.”

Yunho’s mother smiles. “Hello, Jaejoong,” she says. “It’s nice to meet you. Yunho’s been telling us about you.”

Yunho grins and looks around at Jaejoong. Jaejoong’s eyes are wide, wide again and when Yunho’s mother moves a bit closer, Jaejoong edges away, backward away from her. And also sideways, towards Yunho. And Yunho remembers about Jaejoong’s shy-not-shyness.

“It’s okay,” he says. He reaches out and takes Jaejoong’s hand. “She’s my umma.”

Jaejoong stops moving. He blinks and his fingers go tight on Yunho’s hand. “Your umma?” he echoes.

Yunho smiles big and nods. “Uh-huh,” he says. “And my sister.” He turns back to his mother and reaches out his free hand for the blanket. “Umma, move the blanket. Is Jihye sleeping?”

“Sister?” Jaejoong asks, now shifting closer to peer over Yunho’s shoulder.

“Her name is Jihye,” says Yunho proudly, tugging at the edge of the blanket. “Umma—”

“Stop pulling,” his mother scolds mildly, gently pushing Yunho’s hand away and then shifting the blanket carefully out of the way so they can see. Jihye blinks up at them with wide, dark eyes.

“See?” Yunho says.

“She’s so little!” Jaejoong says, staring with his own wide eyes. “All my noonas are bigger than me.”

“All of them?” Yunho repeats, confused. “You have more than one?”

Jaejoong nods, still staring at Jihye. “I have lots,” he says. “They’re bossy. Can I touch her?” he asks, looking uncertainly at Yunho’s mother.

“Gently,” she says.

Jaejoong reaches out and carefully pats Jihye’s face. “She’s soft,” he whispers.

“Uh-huh,” Yunho says. “And she smells nice. Umma says it’s because she’s still just a baby.”

Jaejoong pats Jihye’s head and Jihye smiles gummily up at them, then stuffs the fingers of one hand into .

“Even her hair is soft,” Jaejoong says.

“She doesn’t do much,” Yunho admits. “Because she’s so little still. But I’m teaching her to crawl. And when she gets a little bigger umma says maybe I can help feed her, right umma?”

“Maybe,” his mother says with a smile. “I could certainly use the help.”

Yunho nods. “She doesn’t like peas.”

Jaejoong wrinkles his nose. “Me, either,” he says.

“I do,” Yunho says. “They’re squishy.”

Jaejoong gives him a disgusted look and Yunho giggles. “Jihye makes that face for peas, too.”

Jaejoong’s eyes go wide and he drops his gaze to the ground. But his fingers are still tight on Yunho’s and Yunho thinks he peeks up again maybe, so he just smiles some more.

“Yes, well,” Yunho’s mother says, “whether you like them or not, peas are good for you. Yunho, come and get your things. It’s time to go now.”

Yunho looks around at her. He doesn’t want to go home. “Can’t we play a little longer?”

His mother shakes her head. “You can play more tomorrow,” she says. “Right now it’s time to go home.”

“But, umma—“ Yunho starts, but his mother gives him a stern look. He sighs. He wants to play more, but he doesn’t want his mother to be mad at him. “Okay.”

His mother stands back up and reaches down for his hand. “It was nice to meet you, Jaejoong,” she says. “Yunho, tell your friend goodbye.”

Yunho turns to Jaejoong and carefully tugs his other hand back. “Bye,” he says.

Jaejoong looks down at the ground. “Bye.”

“We’ll play more tomorrow, okay?” Yunho says. “Okay, Jaejoong?”

Jaejoong looks up at him for a moment, his face blank the way it gets sometimes, and Yunho doesn’t know what to call it when you make a face like you really mean it, but he tries to do it anyway.

“Promise,” he says, holding out his hand and gripping his other fingers with his thumb to make his pinky stick out.

Jaejoong hesitates then reaches up and winds their pinkies together. “Okay,” he says. “Bye.”

Yunho beams at him and waves. “See you tomorrow!” Then he turns and follows his mother back down the hill and towards the gate.

“So that’s your new friend?” his mother asks as they walk.

“Uh-huh,” Yunho says. They pause by the gate and she lets go of his hand for a moment to open it.

“He seems very quiet.”

Yunho turns back from trying to wave to Jaejoong again. Quiet? His mother takes his hand again. “I guess,” he says as they walk home. Jaejoong definitely isn’t noisy like the twins are noisy. “But just at first and then it’s fun.” Thinking of the twins reminds him. “Did you ask if I can play at Junho and Junsu’s house?”

His mother nods. “Mrs. Kim says you can come for the afternoon on Saturday.”

Yunho skips happily. He likes playing with the twins. They’re really loud but sometimes loud is fun. Then he remembers something else.

“Can Jaejoong come next week?” he asks.

“We’ll see,” his mother says. “Why don’t you tell me and Jihye what you did today.”

Yunho thinks for a moment. He thinks the dinosaurs he and Jaejoong colored and then later hunted in the jungle were his favorite thing about the day, but he’s not sure if Jihye will like dinosaurs. But Hyojin likes pirates and she’s a girl, so probably Jihye can like dinosaurs, right? He smiles and holds his mother’s hand and tells her and Jihye about dinosaurs all the way home.

It rains on Friday. Yunho likes rain sometimes; it’s fun to go out and run around in when it’s not too cold, and he likes jumping in the puddles. He’s not sure why but he thinks it has something to do with the way the water goes whoosh all over everything and with the interesting sounds it makes.

And maybe also a little bit because of the way, if he gets in a really good splash, it makes everyone around him yell and wave their arms around. Yunho thinks maybe he’s not supposed to like that part, but he kind of does. And sometimes they laugh, so it can’t be that bad after all (although the fourth time he splashes really good on the way to school, his mother makes a huffing sound and grabs him by his hand and doesn’t let go again until they get to school, so maybe sometimes it is).

As soon as his mother lets him go and tells him goodbye, he runs for the doors. His rain boots squeak loudly on floor as he scampers through the empty hall to his classroom, but he doesn’t bother stopping to take them or his raincoat off. Not this time.

“Jaejoong!” He rounds the door and rushes into the room. “Jaejoong, it’s raining!”

Jaejoong is sitting at his desk in the corner again by himself, but he looks up when Yunho calls his name. Yunho skips over to him and grins. “Ah, I knew you’d be here,” he says proudly. He likes that he knows where to look for the other boy now. It feels like it means something. “It’s raining,” he says again. “Wanna come out and jump in puddles?”

Jaejoong opens his mouth, then closes it and looks away. He shakes his head.

“Oh,” Yunho says. “It’s fun,” he tries. “I jumped in them all the way to school. Well,” he amends, “I tried. Umma made me stop after a little. But we could go where it wouldn’t splash anyone so no one would be mad.”

Jaejoong shakes his head again. His eyes flick up to Yunho’s face for a moment before darting back down again, and Yunho feels a little sad, though he’s not sure why. He thinks for a moment, but Jaejoong doesn’t usually want to go outside in the mornings anyway and maybe he doesn’t like getting wet.

“Okay,” he says. “We can play in here. Wanna?”

Wide eyes snap to his face again and this time they stay there, staring. Jaejoong nods, a little hesitantly, but Yunho just smiles big at him and holds out a hand. Jaejoong slides out of his seat and comes around the desk, then stops and frowns.

“You’re all wet,” he says. Yunho looks at his hands, then remembers he’s still in his coat and boots.

“Uh oh,” he says. He takes them off. If he gets the rug all dirty, he might get in trouble with Miss Seung. He picks up one of the boots by the handles, but can’t seem to get the other one in his hand. The coat keeps getting in the way. He frowns and tries again, managing to get one finger through the loop, but drops it when he tries to lift it. He bends down again.

As he struggles to get his fingers around both boot-loops, Jaejoong crouches down. Reaches out a tentative hand. Looks up at Yunho, like he’s not sure it’s okay. Yunho smiles again and Jaejoong’s fingers curl around the loop of the fallen boot. They both stand up and Yunho hoists his coat up so he won’t drop that too.

“Thanks,” he says. “Come on, my cubby’s over here.” Jaejoong follows him back out the classroom door and to the cubbies set against the wall. Yunho’s is on the bottom row on the left, closer to the door. He puts the boot down and carefully hangs his raincoat up on the little wooden pegs above the cubbies. Then he turns back to Jaejoong, who’s picked up his other boot too now.

“That one’s mine,” he says, pointing. Jaejoong looks, then crouches down and looks up at him to be sure before he puts the boots away. Yunho grins some more, then looks around. “Which one is yours?” he asks.

Jaejoong points down the row of cubbies and Yunho nods. He wishes it was closer to his own, but they’re already taken and Jaejoong came in the middle of the year so he supposes it can’t be helped.

“Next year we should try to be closer,” he says.

Jaejoong his head like he’s confused. “Closer to what?” he asks.

“Each other,” Yunho says. “You came late this year but they let us pick our cubbies each time when school starts. Next time we should get ones right next to each other.”

Jaejoong’s face does the strange blank thing again and the fingers of one hand twist into the hem of his shirt. “Why?” he asks.

Yunho stares at him. “Cuz then we could always be next to each other,” he says. Why else would you get cubbies next to each other? Heechul was older so Yunho never got to pick a cubby right next to his, but he wanted to. He never told Heechul though. And then Heechul left.

Yunho fiddles with his own hem. “Friends should stay together,” he says quietly.

Jaejoong doesn’t say anything. And when Yunho looks at him, his expression is strange, like he’s confused, but also maybe a little sad. And Yunho remembers that he just moved. And that he misses home.

“Do you miss your friends, too?” he asks without thinking.

Jaejoong blinks. “I—” He looks at Yunho for a moment, then away again, his face going blank. Almost careful. Like maybe this time it’s on purpose. “I don’t know.”

It’s the face he makes sometimes when Yunho asks about his home or his family. He’s not sure what it means, exactly, but he knows when it happens, Jaejoong gets quieter. Harder to reach, somehow. And Yunho doesn’t want that.

“Next time we’ll be next to each other,” he decides. “We can have the same desk and cubbies next to each other and maybe I’ll be good enough at writing and we can leave each other notes. Like secrets.”

Jaejoong stares at him. But he doesn’t look so closed off anymore. So Yunho smiles.

“Let’s play,” he says. “What do you want to do?”

Jaejoong hesitates, then says, “Color. I want to finish my dinosaur.”

“Okay,” Yunho says. He leads the way back to the classroom and they get down the coloring book and the crayons and find the page with they were on.

“How come he’s all different colors?” Yunho asks, sprawling out on his stomach and grabbing a crayon.

Jaejoong thinks for a minute then says, “Each one is different.” He points to the scale that’s green. “This one’s cuz there’s stuff growing all on it. It’s good since they eat plants so it’s a snack. And this,” he points to the red scale, “is a present. For helping another dinosaur. And the blue one is ‘cause he walked too far once and got stuck in the sky.”

Yunho smiles and kicks his feet up behind him and starts coloring a plant purple and listens.

“Yunho!”

It’s snack time. Yunho and Jaejoong are sitting at the end of the snack table with juice boxes and fruit while Yunho tells Jaejoong about Jihye some more. He sort of hopes if he talks about Jihye, Jaejoong might tell him about what it’s like having older sisters, but Jaejoong seems content to listen and eat his share of banana and orange slices. Yunho doesn’t really mind, though. He likes talking about Jihye. Sometimes when he’s not trying to teach her to crawl, he tries to teach her to say his name. Jihye doesn’t seem to understand, but she smiles when he talks to her and she makes noises back. His mother says she might not actually say words for a while. She’s still little, umma says. But Yunho doesn’t mind trying anyway. He wants his name to be one of the first things his baby sister ever says.

He stops talking and looks around though when he hears someone calling his name. Jaejoong’s eyes go wide and one hand curls into a fist around his orange piece as Junsu comes skipping up to them, Junho not far behind.

“Yunho!” Junsu says, voice loud and excited as he runs right into Yunho’s chair and leans on the back. “Yunho, you’re coming over. Umma said. She said you’re coming tomorrow.”

Yunho grins and nods. Junsu is always so excited when they play. It makes him even louder than usual, but Yunho doesn’t mind. He likes Junsu happy.

“Uh-huh,” he says. “My umma doesn’t have to work, but she said I could come play anyway.”

“We have a new bike,” Junsu says, letting go of Yunho’s chair and putting his arms out. “It’s huge and the wheels are red. When you come you have to see.”

“We can ride it inside,” Junho adds. “Umma says if we keep it inside so it doesn’t get dirty then she’ll let us ride it in the playroom and maybe in the halls.”

Yunho stares. His eyes are probably as wide as Jaejoong’s right now. “Inside?” he says. “There’s bikes you can ride inside?” Yunho’s own bike — a gift from his parents for his last birthday — is blue, which he likes, but he only ever gets to ride it if one of his parents goes outside with him. Their street isn’t too busy, but umma says Yunho is too distractible to play out by himself so either she or appa has to go with him. (Yunho likes it when appa goes with him. Sometimes they race, with Yunho on his bike and his father running. Sometimes appa runs backwards to be silly. But he never falls down.) But he’s definitely not allowed to ride his bike inside.

Junsu nods excitedly. “If we’re careful,” he says. “You have to see. When you come I’ll show you, okay?”

Yunho nods. “Yeah,” he says. He wants to see what kind of bike you can ride inside. “Can I try it? When I come over, can I ride too?”

Junsu sits down in the seat next to Yunho and pulls Junho down on his other side. “Okay,” he says. “We can take turns, right Junho? Like the scooters.”

Junho nods and grabs some fruit for himself and his twin. “We can take turns,” he agrees. “But no pushing. You made me tip last time.”

“I didn’t mean to.” Junsu pouts, then takes a piece of banana.

Yunho eats some more of his own fruit. The bananas and oranges taste good together.

“Do bananas go good with everything?” he wonders.

“It’s good with oranges,” Junsu says, smiling and putting more in his mouth.

“But they’re both fruit,” Yunho says. “So that makes sense. But sometimes my umma puts bananas in her cereal and we had bananas with pe- peanut butter—” he trips slightly over the unfamiliar word, “—once. Remember? That was good, too.”

“I guess.” Junho doesn’t like peanut butter as much as Yunho does.

Junsu stuffs the last of his banana in his mouth. “Hyung. Hyung, let’s go race cars.”

Junho’s face lights up. He likes cars. And races. “Yeah!” he says. He takes Junsu’s hand and gets up.

“Yunho, are you coming?” Junsu asks, looking back, but Yunho shakes his head.

“I still have banana,” he says. The twins eat so fast. They like to do everything fast. Yunho likes some things fast, but he can’t eat that quickly.

“Come play when you finish!” They rush off to the playrug and grab the box of cars and trains. Yunho turns back to the table and takes a piece of orange. Then he sees Jaejoong. His eyes aren’t wide anymore. Instead he’s staring at his fingers, picking apart a piece of orange.

“You’re going to play with them?” he asks. He doesn’t look at Yunho.

“Uh-huh,” Yunho says, trying to figure out what bothering Jaejoong. “They’re noisy, but it’s fun. Mostly I only go there if umma has to work, but sometimes it’s just for fun.”

“Oh.” Jaejoong still isn’t looking at him. And Yunho still doesn’t understand what’s bothering him. Then he remembers when Heechul used to talk about going to play with Youngwoon or Donghee. Yunho always kept waiting for Heechul to say that Yunho should come play too, but he never did. They only played together at school.

“You should come, too,” he says to Jaejoong. Then he remembers what his mother said. “But I’m not allowed to invite people over if it’s not my house. But she says maybe you can come over next week. One of our neighbors has a dog. He might let us play with her. And you could see my room. I have my own.”

When Jihye was first born, Yunho was afraid he might have to share his room with her. He loves his baby sister, but she cries a lot. And he’s not sure he wants to share his room. He likes it being just his.

“The bed’s good,” he tells Jaejoong. “You can jump real high on it.”

Now Jaejoong is staring at him. “I can really come?” he asks. “You — you want me to come?”

Yunho smiles really big at him. “Yeah!” he says. “We’d have fun. Umma says your umma has to say it’s okay, but if she does you should come and play. Next week, umma says.” He swallows the last of his banana. “Are you done?” he asks.

Jaejoong grabs the last bit of orange and nods.

“Let’s go,” Yunho says. “Wanna build the city again now?”

Jaejoong’s face goes blank again. He shakes his head. Yunho frowns and doesn’t understand.

“Why not?” he asks. “You made us promise, remember? We promised we’d finish the city and the battle with the sea monster. Why don’t you want to?”

Jaejoong hesitates and bites his lip. “But—” he starts, then stops and peeks up at Yunho before looking away again fast. “But what happens after?” he says all in a rush. “When we finish the city, then what happens?”

Yunho stares. What does that mean? He shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says. “Probably Junsu smashes it. And then we get to play something new.”

Dark eyes snap to his face. “We do?” Jaejoong says.

“Yeah,” Yunho says. “Like, maybe after the city we could build a jungle. For the dinosaurs. Or maybe a ship in the sky, like pirates, only in outer space!”

Jaejoong’s eyes are wide again, but this time Yunho doesn’t think it’s anything to do with fear or his strange shy-not-shyness. He holds out his hand.

“Wanna?” he asks.

Jaejoong nods slowly, his eyes never leaving Yunho’s face. “Yeah,” he says. And he reaches out and slips his fingers into Yunho’s.

Yunho smiles big. “Come on!” he says. “Let’s go.”

A/N: there is a reason we made no promises about updates or schedules or anything. this would be that reason. we still make no promises. this kind of long delay may and probably will happen again. but we are sorry. hopefully the next chap will happen at least a little faster. we hope. (also, at this point we think we just give up apologizing for weird age/behavior inconsistencies. we try, but it's really hard to write kids, especially w/out things getting really repetative and a little boring. or at least not very plot-ful. so yeah, we give up. it's just a thing.)