Memories Best Forgotten

One year later…

            “Dad!”

            I looked over from where I was walking the floor with Soojin, our omega daughter, who was being fussy because she was teething. 

            Daehyun came over and yanked on the hem of my shirt.  “Dad, can I go over to the den?”  A couple months after we’d arrived home with the kids, we sat them down and explained to them that we were adopting them, so Ryeowook and I would be their new parents.  They could either continue to call us uncle or they could call us dad.  The boys made the change within a few weeks of the conversation.  They sometimes went back and forth between uncle and dad, but it was becoming dad most of the time now.  Amber still called us uncle most of the time.  Perhaps because she was older and had called Ryeowook uncle longer, the change seemed harder to make or perhaps she felt it was wrong to dismiss her own parents so easily.  No one would accuse her of forgetting her parents, but I completely sympathized with her struggle.  I never did call Sooman and Eunjin dad or mom.  But every once in a while, when we were alone together, I noticed she tested out calling me dad instead.  We were all slowly getting accustomed to our new life, one day at a time.         

            “Only if your sister goes with you.  I can’t walk you there at the moment,” I told him.  Daehyun liked playing with Leeteuk and Sora’s sons, although they were a little younger.  The den had a lot of fun equipment to play on, in the park out back, and I preferred him running around outside burning off energy instead of sitting around inside.

            “I want to go, too!” Dongmin yelled, running to get his shoes on.  Ever since he’d arrived, he’d been rather taken with Miyoung.  I was still trying to figure out how normal that was.  Yesung kept saying that it reminded him of how Leeteuk and Sora acted as children, whenever they would see each other.  Neither Leeteuk or I were very thrilled to hear that.  We were going to have to keep our eyes on them as they got older.  I didn’t mind if they wanted to mate someday, but I wanted them to wait until they were at least adults.

            “I didn’t say you couldn’t go,” I reminded him.  “Quiet down or you’re going to wake your brother and sister up.”  The other two were miraculously sleeping at the same time.  Usually none of them took naps at the same time when I was watching them.  Only when Ryeowook was home.  It was some kind of conspiracy against me.

            “Amber!  Dad says you have to take us to the den!” Daehyun shouted up the stairs.

            “That is not what I said,” I reminded him, “and I meant neither of you should shout.  Go up the stairs and ask her if she’ll take you.”

            But thankfully, Amber heard her brother and came running down the stairs.  “We can go to the den,” she quickly agreed.  Henry must be teaching music lessons at the den.  That was Amber’s main motivation for going there.  It certainly wasn’t because he was the only musician she could learn from because Ryeowook had been teaching her to play the piano since she was four.  She was clearly smitten with him, but he was a teenager!  And Henry certainly only regarded her as a child, for the moment, but I worried about what would happen when she got older.

            “Behave yourselves and come home by dinnertime or daddy Wook will be pissed at me,” I said.  They were already out the door or I wouldn’t have said the word pissed.  Ryeowook would kick my if I said stuff like that in front of them. 

            Soojin started fussing again and I bounced her in my arms.  “My demanding girl,” I sighed, kissing her head.  “Whoever suspected you’d be the loudest one after almost losing you.”  Then again, I grew up with all alpha cousins in the house, aside from my one omega cousin, Heechul.  No one would argue that he wasn’t the loudest, whiniest one of the whole group of us.  So, I guess I shouldn’t have been that surprised.

            Ryeowook and I also had a beta boy and a beta girl.  So, we had five beta children and one omega.  This wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, of course.  Most pups end up being betas, but I remember Ryeowook nervously asking me about it shortly after the triplets were born.  “Are you okay with not having an alpha pup?”

            We were alone in bed for a change, so I turned to face him and wrapped my arm around him.  “Of course!  Did I give you the impression that I wasn’t?”

            He shook his head.  “No, I just thought, with my niece and nephews all being betas, that maybe you were hoping one of the pups would be an alpha.”

            I smirked at him and leaned in to kiss him.  “I’m perfectly fine being the alpha in this house.”

            Ryeowook smacked my chest.  “Why are you like this?” he asked.

            I laughed at him, grabbing onto his hands and kissing him again.  “I love making fun of you.  It’s always been one of my favorite things to do.  But I’m being honest with you.  I am not the leader of this pack, so if I never have an alpha child, it won’t matter.  I don’t need any alpha heirs.  Soojin can pass on my genes to her pups when she mates and that will be good enough.  We have an omega daughter.  We’ll still have grandchildren to spoil when we’re old.”

            “We probably won’t be old,” Ryeowook grumbled.  “If we let her mate when she’s our age, we’ll only be in our early forties when we have grandchildren.”  That thought didn’t set well with me.  Soojin waited longer than that, but we still found ourselves being called grandfathers by our mid-forties.  Thankfully, our last litter of pups was still only ten years old at that point, so I didn’t feel that ancient.  I was still helping my kids with math homework after dinner for many years afterwards. 

            Soojin was still softly sobbing, so I sang a song I’d learned from Victoria, called ‘Stars Appear…’ which I’d grown fond of, since it spoke of making unfulfilled dreams happen with the one you loved.  I felt like that was what Ryeowook and I were finally doing.

            As I finished singing, Ryeowook was thankfully returning.  “I got it!” Ryeowook said, holding up a little glass bottle as he walked in.  “Victoria says that we just need to rub this over the area and it will numb it.  But said to bring her in if she spikes a fever.”

            Victoria insisted on coming with us back to our territory, since the journey was long and we had both a pregnant omega and several young children in the group.  She never did go back to her pack.  Changmin and her mated shortly after they arrived and she joined his practice.  We’ve been reliant on her ever since. 

            I turned Soojin to face Ryeowook as he put some of the gel on his finger and then stuck it in .  She made a face and tried to spit it out.  It clearly didn’t taste good.  Smelled like cloves to me and I knew I wouldn’t want it in my mouth either.  Although I did stick it in my mouth when I ended up with a toothache a few months late