Byun Baekhyun

May 6th 1992

Conman

Baekhyun couldn't sleep, he laid on his side clutching his tattered teddy bear to his chest. It was the only present his parents have gotten him on their own free will, without complaining about wasting money and how he was them dry. The three of them didn't have much of a strong relationship but Baekhyun still loved his parents even if they didn't pay him much attention. The noise from downstairs drifted up and through his slightly opened bedroom door, his parents were having friends over; they did this almost every night but he was never allowed to be downstairs at those times. Baekhyun wasn't one to disobey his parents because they could be quite scary when troubled. He held up his teddy bear over his head and stared into the black beady eyes that new all his secrets while listening to the laughter drifting into his room.

"What should we do, teddy?" Baekhyun shook the stuffed toy before bringing it to his ear. He listened before he answered, "yes, I'm scared". Baekhyun didn't like the dark much and sometimes the things in his room made scary looking figures on the night's like these when he couldn't sleep. 

Baekhyun clutched the teddy to his chest and glanced towards his door, he wanted to be with his parents but Baekhyun didn't want to be scolded. He took a deep breath and sat up before scooting off his bed and shuffling towards the door. He clung to his teddy as he silently made his way to the top of the stairs, the living room lights were still on signaling where everyone resided. Baekhyun made his way downstairs and poked his head into the open area a little ways from the kitchen. 

His parents were sitting on the couches that they positioned around a beat up looking table, there was three other people; two dudes and a woman who sat in the other couches. The place was a mess of snacks and beer as they all leant over an array of cards and stacks of money. The laughter was louder now as they all seemed to be drunk, the lady put down the cards in her hands on the table and she leaned back heaving a hearty and sloppy laugh.

"Ah, you, Sana!" Baekhyun saw his mother point accusingly at the woman "you cheated." her face was red.

"You just ing , Chaeyoung" the woman waved still grinning and already reaching over to scoop up all the money. 

"Mom? Dad?" Baekhyun spoke up unsure of the situation. All their heads whip over to see the small boy standing their clutching his tattered stuffed toy. 

His mom and dad shoot up from their chairs "Baekhyun" his mom says bypassing his dad and hurriedly coming over. "Why are you up?" she gripped his shoulder hard and he winced as she pushed him back to the stairs. 

"But I'm scared" Baekhyun said looking back to the living room where he saw his father frowning with his arms crossed.  "Just hide under your covers, Baekhyun. You're nine; too old to be coddled" his mom kept pushing him. Baekhyun abruptly spun away from her and ran towards his dad, who stood tall near the entrance. 

"Go back to bed, boy" he said unmoving but Baekhyun wasn't even feeling sleepy anymore. He gripped his dads arms and looked at him pleadingly, "please" he said. 

They stared at each other for a while, "Oi, are you guys going to come play another round or what?" Baekhyun glanced between his dad and the wall to see one of the males raise an eyebrow, his eyes slid down to Baekhyun and the boy quickly shifted to be hidden by his dad. 

Baekhyun hears both his parents sigh. "Yeah we're coming" his mother said going back into the room, "Jaehyuk, handle him" she said. His dad looked down at him and frowned, "you can stay for a little bit".

Baekhyun felt elated as he followed his parents back to the table, he took a seat in his dads lap and looked across the table finally getting a better look at the other people. The woman was pretty, she had red hair and fair skin with pretty pink lips and brown eyes; the two dudes looked exactly the same with black hair done into the same undercut style, the same facial features but one had light hazel eyes while the other had dark brown eyes. Twins. These were the type of people is parents hung out with? They looked very intimidating with their dark makeup and bold outfits.

"Who's dealing?" he heard his dad say behind him and he looked back into his face. He noticed the familiar scruff of a beard he always sported in the morning; did he not shave? His parent's had him at a young age and most times they liked to keep that youthful look. "What's that?" he asked, he saw his dad glance down towards him before sighing. 

"It's when you give out the cards" he said and Baekhyun looked back to the table to see him swiftly go around and give each person cards.  "This isn't how you play Go fish, everybody only gets three cards" Baekhyun said watching his dad give out all the cards. "That's because we aren't playing Go fish, Baekhyun".

"Then, what are you playing?" he questioned. His dad sighed again, "you ask too much questions, boy" he says lifting up his hand of cards. 

"Oh, shut up. Look kid, It's just something we play for fun when we're not in the casino hitting the big bucks" Baekhyun looked over at the pretty woman who spoke up. "We also used to play it in college" she adds. 

Baekhyun tilts his head, "what's a casino?". Everyone's head turned to each other before the woman smirked "it's a place where people go to che-", "Sana" Baekhyun heard his mother cut in and he looked at her confused. "Let's just play" she finished. 

Baekhyun watched the first few minutes of the game. He learned they were playing something called president and whoever won gets all the money in the middle of the table. It was surprisingly easy for Baekhyun to catch on and he looked at his parents hands before looking over at the three other adults who were smirking. Baekhyun knew his parents were going to lose and he found himself not liking that idea. He noticed the woman was playing all her high cards first and the two males were just going with the flow; his parents had all their low cards still and Baekhyun knew that was their disadvantage. 

His mind quickly adjusted to the opposing adults plays; when the woman put down her two kings, Baekhyun quickly took his dads two and places it down and knowing that the two males wouldn't try to play their own two on account of them not seeing the point in wasting a card and his mother not wanting to give hers up; he burned the deck. His dad had all four threes and Baekhyun put those down, he knew no one could go so he burned those, leaving his dad with seven cards. He played three tens to which his mother then put down three kings and the males put down their two deuces to which the woman automatically burned. Baekhyun noticed she had five cards left; she put down an ace probably thinking no one would be able to go but Baekhyun took the joker from his fathers hand and put it down, burning the card then placed his dads two jacks. His mother couldn't go and neither could the two males, of course the woman went; putting down two kings. Baekhyun looked at his dads hand knowing the woman only had one card to go and he grinned; his dad could win. At this point it was a two sided game, Baekhyun didn't know what kind of card the woman had but he could only hope it wasn't a two. He placed down his dads deuce card and looked at his mother who obviously couldn't go and then to the males who shook their heads; he slid his twinkling eyes to the woman and she frowned and shook her head. Baekhyun has never felt so excited to win a card game before but as he burned the deck and put his dads two kings down he felt beyond elated. 

"Dad wins!" he shouted, putting up his two fists in the air and looked around at everyone who had shocked expressions on their faces. "No. I think it's you who won, boy" his dad said behind him. "I didn't know you had a knack for card games".

"Maybe he'll have a knack for gambling and get us some huge bucks" the woman said clearly annoyed that she lost to a kid. 

Baekhyun looked behind him, fully turning on his dads lap "what's gambling?" he asked. At that time Baekhyun didn't comprehend the sly grins that his parents gave each other. 

After that night Baekhyun started accompanying his parent's to their night outings on their encouragement, going to the casino to which Baekhyun couldn't believe how big and crowded it was. There was so much people everywhere playing different games, some that Baekhyun didn't know about. His parent's would go to the card tables and tell him what the game was and how you played, they would let him in and each time he would win the piles of money in the middle and his parents would praise him and buy him ice cream or candy afterwards. They would go home with bags full of money but still Baekhyun didn't fully understand the concept of gambling except that it was very easy and didn't understand why sometimes people got mad. Once a man got so Josey Baekhyun had won that it started a whole fight throughout the club; his parents had to rush him out but not without getting a few punches in. The constant nights at the casino kept going as Baekhyun grew older and understood more and more of how evil this game of gambling really was as his parent's started telling him how to con others of their money and soon the cash flow didn't come in because Baekhyun won but because he cheated and out witted; he started questioning his part in his parents ordeals and why this was the only thing they did together. 

 One day on his tenth birthday, Baekhyun went down the hall to their room ready to tell his parents he didn't want join their act anymore but when he opened the door the space was empty. Confusion drew on his face, did they go to the casino this early? He questioned as he entered noticing that the sheets were uninterrupted as if no one has been in them. Baekhyun exited the room and went downstairs, 

"Mom? Dad?" he called, popping his head into the kitchen to see the space also empty. The faucet dripped loudly in the quiet house, did they really leave this early? Something didn't seem right though, it was like everything was untouched since they came home last night and Baekhyun went straight to bed, exhausted. 

Baekhyun noticed his parents shoes and jackets gone from the area by the door, his heart rate was picking up for some reason as he walked around the quiet, still house and there were no signs of his parents anywhere, even their toothbrushes were gone. He made his way slowly, like a dazed zombie, back up the stairs towards his parent's room as a sickening thought came to his mind. As he walked closer to the door it seemed to taunt him and give off a dark shadow. He pushed opened the door and walked in heading for the closet; he opened it slowly and his heart sank to his feet as he fell to the carpeted floor. The closet was void of any clothes and the duffel bags of money they've collected were also missing, Baekhyun's mind was reeling and his heart was thumping but the only thing that he took notice of was the water that slipped from his eyes. 

His parents were gone