Warning: None

16 years later…

“Little bunny…please…” Baekhyun called out to his daughter in desperate voice as he sighed and his forefinger and his thumb began to rub at his forehead to calm down the headache he had gotten since earlier.

“I’m 15 dad, not a kid. I can’t be a little bunny anymore.”

Baekhyun’s defeated and a little bit betrayed face softened the frown on his daughter’s face. “Don’t ever say that. You’re always my little bunny. I don’t care how old you are. You’re always going to be my little bunny. This is something you can never take away from me. No!” He shook his head.

She sighed and plopped down onto the chair in their kitchen in front of her dad. “I know you’re worried. I promise you. My new friends aren’t bad people. You don’t have to be stressed over me so much.”

“Seonmi, baby, you went out at midnight without my permission and came back an hour later with red paint splattered over your clothes.” He frowned and pursed his lips for a second at the thought of it when he woke up late at night to get a glass of water and saw his daughter was absent. “How on earth is that not a bad thing? I don’t know them. I don’t know if the Alphas and Betas in your group of friends are to be trusted. And do I really need to remind you that people don’t need to be bad in order to do bad things?”

“I know.” She whined and kicked her legs in frustration like she used to do when she was much younger. Baekhyun always found it a little too cute. She bit her lip and looked up at his dad with a guilty face. “Will you promise me to not overthink things if I tell you the reason behind this little stupid thing I did?”

“Exactly because you think I’m gonna overthink this, means it’s something bad.” Baekhyun sighed and leaned on the counter. “Where did you go with them that late at night Seonmi?”

“Okay, fine.” She sighed. “The thing is, I was kind of bullied at school for a while.” She started but that sentence was enough to make Baekhyun’s body go completely cold. His eyes widened and in only a second, he was kneeling beside his daughter, her face in his hands as he tried to look at her a little more carefully.

“What??” He frowned with worried face, his voice a bit too frantic. “By who? Why didn’t you tell me sooner? What did they do to you? Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

“Daaaaad!!” Seonmi let out a small chuckle and grabbed Baekhyun’s too cold to be normal hands. “I’m fine, just listen.”

Even though that sentence had made him too uneasy to remain silent and not ask questions, he chose to stay calm and let her continue.

“I was lucky that this group of people noticed me being uncomfortable and stood up for me. But the thing is, we’re not exactly strong in general. So, in order to welcome me in their group they decided to do something very stupid none of us has ever done before and throw red paint all over my bully’s white bicycle late at night.” She chuckled at the surprised face of her dad. “I promise you. We’re all a bunch of nerds who love video games and talk about different comic books a bit too much. This was really a onetime thing.”

 Baekhyun sighed and enveloped her into a big hug. He kissed her long black hair and tightened his arms around her. “I’m sorry you were bullied.” He whispered. “I wish you had told me sooner.”

“It’s okay dad. I knew you would worry too much. It was just a spoiled Alpha boy who had to show everyone how strong he actually was by mistreating everybody. I can handle this much. You don’t need to worry about it.”

Pulling himself back to grab the girl by her face, Baekhyun looked at her with a big pout on his lips. “I wish he already had a white car so you could throw poopy paint on it instead. It would have been much more worth it.” He complained. “How dare he bully my little girl?”

Seonmi let out a small laugh and grabbed her dad’s hands that were still on her cheeks. “I’ll protect myself.” She promised. “And I’ll protect you too dad. I may be an Omega, but I have more Alpha energy in me than all of the Alphas in my school.”

Baekhyun rolled his eyes and shook his head, obviously the emotional moment long gone now that Seonmi deemed it ready to joke around. “Oh please.” He got up from the ground while looking at her with narrowed eyes. “Just eat your breakfast and go to school already.”

The smile that came onto his lips couldn’t have been helped after Seonmi began laughing out loud at his reaction. His sweet girl was the sole reason he could still smile in his life anyway. How could he possibly resist?

--

“Why do you look extra pale today Baekhyun?” Jongdae asked with a frown. The Beta had his fancy robe around him and his usual wine glass in one hand as he walked closer to the Baekhyun who was tending to the garden.

“I’m fine.” Baekhyun chuckled and brushed off the comment. Because it was true. He was feeling a little weaker than usual. He was a bit dizzy and he may have overworked himself a bit in the last couple of weeks to gather more money. Tending to people’s gardens wasn’t the ideal job and although it paid enough for him and Seonmi to have a decent life, it wasn’t enough to get his daughter the presents she deserved. Like the brand-new graphics card for her PC that she has her eyes on but never told him about it just because of the price.

“Are you sure?”

“Just tired, I guess. I had extra customers in the past few days.”

“You should have told me then; I would have given you the day off.” Jongdae scolded him lightly. He may technically be just his boss but throughout the months he had been working for him, tending to his big beautiful garden, he had become the closest person he could call a friend. Not an Omega who judged him for his life choices and throwing away his future by bringing his child to life, not a Beta who gave him dirty glances and gave him promises of a good night only to throw him away the next morning and not an Alpha to intimidate him with his gaze and ridicule him for being on his own.

No…Jongdae was just a normal Beta, sick of all the supposed traditions and so-called taboos in their society. Just a normal Beta who had a great fortune, a huge house, a beautiful garden and enough money to give him the greatest life possible. He was probably the only person he knew who purposely stayed single and deemed life would be much easier if he was on his own.

Baekhyun gave the man a small smile and shook his head. “I need to change the soil of some of the flowers in the pots before I attend the garden. This cannot wait.” He bent down to grab the relatively medium sized fresh soil packet but as he pushed himself more to hold it up and take it towards the flower pots, he felt himself getting more drained and more light headed.

Before he could actually put the soil back down, his knees bent and both him and the packet fell down onto the grass filled ground. Jongdae was beside him in a second, also on his knees and his arms held onto his upper body before he could completely fall down face first.

“Baekhyun!!!” Jongdae’s alarmed voice only made Baekhyun realize he was in a lot of trouble. He could have had one his many faints in someone else’s house and they wouldn’t give a damn about him. He could rest for a few minutes and continue like he always did. Just not in Jongdae’s house. He actually cared about him. He was so going to make him see a doctor…doctors were expensive.

“You’re bleeding Baek, what have you done to yourself??!”

It was only after that little information that Baekhyun felt the warm trail of blood coming down from his nose and down his chin. This was new. This hadn’t happened before. It was always only the fainting, the weakness and the light headedness. He was always a weak boy anyway. He had to take a lot of medicine right from when he was young. Medicine that never cured him completely and only got more expensive every time they noticed him being a single Omega dad. Because who else could be easier to manipulate and get more money from than a defenseless Omega?

“That’s it.” Jongdae huffed and helped Baekhyun up to his feet by holding his upper body. He slung one arm around his neck and basically dragged the boy towards the house where he could give the boy some tissues to hold against his nose and throw on some pants and a shirt in just seconds before they were in his car, speeding towards the hospital.

“Please don’t die on me.”

Baekhyun let out a small, barely heard chuckle. His head was leaning against the backrest, his chin a bit high in hopes of it helping the bleeding to stop and his fingers were gripping the bloody tissues tight against his nose. “I’m fine.” He said, his voice a bit nasal.

“You look nothing like it. How much did you overwork yourself?” Jongdae complained and stepped more onto the gas when the traffic light turned green. “If you need money that badly just tell me. How many times do I have to remind you?”

“I have the best boss anyone could ever have.” Baekhyun joked but his half smile turned into a grimace when he tasted the blood in his mouth now that his head was tilted up.

“I’m serious. What’s going on? Are you even taking your medicine?”

“I am.” Baekhyun lied. No, he wasn’t. He hadn’t even bothered going to the pharmacy to buy the prescribed medicines. Every time that Jongdae forced him into going to the hospital either the doctors would add to the list of the things he needs to take or they change them entirely. It’s been more than 6 months that he hasn’t taken any of them. Not even one. And even before that it was never regular. His body became worse after the pregnancy. They said it was normal. Babies take a lot of the vitamins off the Omegas’ bodies. The only time he probably took his medicine on time and with the right ratio was probably during his pregnancy, just so he wouldn’t harm his little baby. After that, he needed to save up for all the other expenses.

“Baek!”

“Huh?” He was snapped out of his thoughts and turned to see Jongdae was already out of the car and had already opened his door for him.

“Come on buddy, we’re here.”

Walking into the emergency section of the hospital, they saw a swarm of people there. It was always very crowded there, but this time it was worse than it had ever been.

“Holy .” Jongdae mumbled. “You’re gonna bleed out before a doctor can get to see you.”

Baekhyun sighed and checked to see if his nose was still bleeding or not. It was less than before, so he figured he would be fine in a couple of minutes maybe. “It’s fine. We can just go back. You don’t need to wait for me in here.”

“Don’t even think about it.” Jongdae’s eyes glaring at him, made him surrender completely. The arm around his body tightened and Jongdae’s hand held onto his with a better grip. They walked towards the reception and were handed a form to fill.

“I’m afraid there are a lot of emergency visits today so you will have to wait. I’ll try to squeeze you in as soon as the patients with worse conditions are taken care of.” The woman behind the counter told them with an apologetic smile.

She then turned to the tall man standing beside them from earlier and her smile turned into a shy one almost. Baekhyun was too lightheaded to differentiate between them.

“Doctor Oh, did your 36-hour shift just end?”

Baekhyun’s head was way too dizzy to hold him up right. He should have just sat on one of the chairs and let Jongdae deal with everything. His right hand was still holding the way too bloody napkin and his left hand was holding onto the counter as Jongdae had started filling in the form on his behalf. But his trembling non dominant hand was too weak to hold him upright.

“Excuse me ma’am, but could you please give us a doctor sooner?” Jongdae who had already started filling the form asked. “I’m willing to accept a bigger hospital bill if it helps. He really needs a doctor right now.” His voice was urgent and Baekhyun saw the woman give him another guilty smile and a shake of her head. She may have also said something, but Baekhyun was focusing too much on not falling that he didn’t hear a thing.

He tried to hold on tighter. His knuckles had turned white from gripping hard and his forehead was beaded with cold sweat. Before he could warn Jongdae, his knees had already given out and his body was pulled towards the ground. It was only for a second however…the feeling of falling backwards, only lasted for just a second before the tall man beside him grabbed him with both arms and stopped it all.

A little groan left his mouth and his droopy eyes opened to look at his savior, only to stare into two very familiar, a little too wide from shock eyes. Was he hallucinating as well? To what level had he somehow descended to actually see the face of Sehun in front of him? But no matter how many times he blinked and how many times Jongdae called out to him to ask if he was alright, the face didn’t change.

The shocked eyes stayed the same. The warm hands on his back that slowly guided him to stand on his own feet again still stayed around him like a shield protecting him from another eminent fall. The soft pink lips he remembered a little too well were parted and his breathing was as heavy as his.

“Baekhyun?”

It was barely above whisper. His voice had become a bit deeper but it still was familiar to him. This familiarity was enough to make his heart sting. It really was him. He suddenly avoided the man’s gaze and turned towards Jongdae.

“Let’s just go home.” He said with the most desperate tone he had ever heard of himself. He shouldn’t be there. He couldn’t be there.

“Ms. Yin.” Sehun voice sent dagger into Baekhyun’s chest. Multiple, sharp and poisonous daggers that began to open up wounds he had thought he had treated completely, beyond the need of them ever resurfacing. “Please these gentlemen to my room.”

“But your shift is over already doctor. I’ll try to squeeze them in with doctor Cha, you can go home and rest already.”

“Please do as I said.” He replied with a sterner voice. “The emergency room is way too crowded for me to leave.”

“Thank you so much doctor!” Jongdae bowed down at him, so obviously oblivious to how Baekhyun was panicking from inside and out.

He was taken down the hall and inside one of the rooms. The lights were off, indicating that the man really had aimed on leaving. In just a few seconds Sehun entered the room and Baekhyun couldn’t help but to keep his head lowered and his eyes closed. He won’t cry. Not in front of him. It didn’t matter that he was seeing the father of his daughter, the father who had no idea he actually was a father, after 16 years.

Sehun shrugged off his jacket and grabbed his white doctor coat to put on again from the rack close to the door. He then sat behind his desk while his eyes never left Baekhyun’s face. He could even feel the heavy stare with his eyes closed.

“Were you hit by something?” Came the first question and Jongdae saved him from talking.

“No,” Jongdae sat a bit straighter. “He’s been overworking himself. He looked really pale earlier so I suggested him to see a doctor. But then he had a nosebleed and fainted a little bit.”

Baekhyun opened his eyes and looked up only enough to see Sehun’s hands onto his desk, a pen in his hand already but his left hand remained fisted.

“What’s his career?” He asked. What did that have to do with anything? “Forgive me for asking, I just need to know if you handle heavy things on a day-to-day basis.” Sehun apologized before Baekhyun could even frown in confusion. Oh…

“He’s my personal gardener and yeah he was picking up big packets of soil to move around.”

“Have you been doing that during the past few days as well?” Sehun asked, this time facing him again and Baekhyun knew there was no way Jongdae could answer this on his behalf as well.

So, he looked up into those warm brown eyes and his mouth reluctantly opened. “Yes.” He replied.

“Alright, could you do me favor and help him sit on the unit please?” He asked Jongdae and the Beta did as he was told immediately. The uncomfortable, hard and little too narrow examination bed was probably at the right height, but Baekhyun still struggled a little to hop on it and sit. Thankfully Jongdae managed to help him before Sehun walked up to them.

“May I?” Sehun’s right hand was hovering over the bloody napkins and all Baekhyun could do was give him a small nod.

The napkins were gone and the Alpha returned with a damp cloth to wipe away the dried blood that stuck to his skin above his lips, on his chin and even some on his neck. He was incredibly gentle with how he cleaned him up and his touch that aided him into tilting his chin up so he could observe his nose better was almost feathery. Was he concerned that he would be upset for being touched by him? The only thing concerning Baekhyun at that moment was how his heart was beating too fast…not being touched by a doctor.

“You popped a blood vessel.” Sehun informed them and threw the bloody cloth on the little steel table where he had a number of things for examinations. “Do you take any prescribed medications?”

“Yes.” Baekhyun’s voice was a bit too low but Sehun was too close to him to have a hard time hearing him. And above all, it wasn’t a question Sehun didn’t know the answer to. He was the one who always reminded him to take his medicines. He was the one who always scolded him for not taking it on time. He was the one who knew the exact day he would run out and would come to him with a sunflower bouquet and all of his medicines in hand.

“Do you have the names of them with you now?”

Baekhyun shook his head and stole glance of the man’s face. He looked concerned. That only made Baekhyun feel worse. At this rate, his heart would soon give out on him. “The last doctor I saw changed them. I don’t remember the names.”

Sehun grabbed another clean cloth and wiped his nose for him again. At least the bleeding had stopped. “When was the last time you had a full checkup?”

“I…” Baekhyun frowned. “I don’t remember.”

“Too long ago then.” Sehun threw the bloody cloth into the trash can. “You need to take a break for now and rest for at least a weak. You need more healthy meals in your diet and it looks like you don’t drink as much water as you should. Don’t over work, don’t forget your meals, don’t substitute fluids with coffee only and listen to your body when it’s so clearly telling you it cannot handle it anymore.”

He beckoned both Jongdae and Baekhyun to sit at the chairs again before he went to sit at his own desk again. He picked up his pen and began to write down the supposed prescription for him.

“I can’t give you any definite answer right now until I know what medications you use. For now, you need to do the checkup as soon as possible to be sure where the problems are and then I can see your medication and see if needs any more changing or not.”

“So, the nose bleed was also because of his condition?” Jongdae asked.

“The nose bleed happened because of dehydration and over working. Your body’s telling you to stop mistreating him basically.” He gave a very small smile that Baekhyun couldn’t help but stare at hopelessly. “The bleeding has stopped but it would be ideal to spend the night here so I can check on your vitals personally and have your checkup answers as soon as possible.”

“No!” Baekhyun shook his head immediately which only made him dizzy.

“Baekhyun.” Jongdae sighed. “It’s just one night. It’s for your own good.”

The checkup was going to be expensive enough. He didn’t need the bill for staying a night there as well. And he couldn’t just leave Seonmi alone at home. She would worry too much and her nagging over everything he does after he’s discharged would be unbearable.

“I can’t leave Seonmi at home alone, you know that.” He said and realized his mistake a little too late.

“You have a kid?” Sehun asked, his voice low and so plainly portraying his shock.

Oh no…

Baekhyun’s heart gave out. He gulped, his hands trembled even more, his mind kept on reminding him how much of an idiot he was and his breathing got a little too loud. He could have said so many other things as excuses. Why did his stupid mouth betray him like that?

“Yes.” He breathed out and gulped.

“Oh…” He almost sounded disappointed. “In that case…please do the checkup now and I’ll give you another appointment to come back. Make sure you bring your medications with you.”

Wanting to get out of the situation and avoid further questions he didn’t want to answer, he just nodded his head and stood up on his feet immediately but staggered a bit due to still feeling a bit dizzy. “Okay.”

He looked into Sehun’s concerned eyes and the man lowered his gaze after a few seconds only to grab the phone set onto his desk. His fingers tapped a few digits and the phone that was set to speaker rang until a woman answered.

“Yes doctor?”

“Send Ms. Han to my room please.”

“Right away doctor.”

The call ended and Sehun handed a piece of paper he had been writing on to him. “Give this to the nurse that’s coming. She’ll guide you to every room you need to go in order to do your checkup.”

Baekhyun took the paper and stared at the beautiful handwriting. Was it normal that he had even missed his handwriting? Tightening his grip onto the paper, he gulped and nodded his head. “Thank you.” He quietly mumbled.

The door to Sehun’s office opened after a couple of knocks and a woman, close to Baekhyun’s mother’s age entered the room with a beautiful, kind smile. She approached them and greeted them all.

“It’s a full checkup Ms. Han.”

“Sure, doctor Oh.” She nodded her head and beckoned both Baekhyun and Jongdae towards the door. “This way, gentlemen.”

Jongdae was quick to hold onto Baekhyun’s arm and let him put a little bit of his weight on him instead. “Thank you so much doctor Oh.”

Baekhyun didn’t look up at the man anymore and since he didn’t hear him say anything he suspected he had only provided an answer for Jongdae with just a nod of his head. As they got out of the room Baekhyun still kept his head lowered and his eyes downwards. He ignored the screaming in his head, begging him to steal just one more glance of his former love and felt his heart break a little when the door of his room closed behind him.

How could he possibly still feel like this after these many years?...

--

It had been almost half an hour of examinations. They had tested basically everything and Baekhyun was panicking about how expensive the bill was going to be. He hadn’t done any checkup as thorough as this one was before. The last test however was the one he was dreading the most. He had never been good with needles and blood tests were the most frequent test he had to do.

He had been taken to a room that had big windows and the curtains weren’t covering it. It had a view of the narrow garden the hospital had in the back and the beautiful sun was shining through, giving Baekhyun’s cold body a good kind of warmth. He enjoyed the sunshine with his eyes closed until he heard the sound of a door opening and closing. He looked up to see the nurse that was going to take his blood, only to come face to face with Sehun again.

His worried eyes momentarily went to Jongdae who frowned at his expression in confusion. A nurse should have been taking the blood. Why was Sehun approaching him instead? True that he was meant to see him again for their next appointment just like he told him, but Baekhyun wasn’t really planning on meeting him again or any other doctor as a matter of fact. He truly thought the moment he left his room would be the last time he would ever see him again.

“I heard you’re not really good with needles.” Sehun said and Baekhyun felt his eyes sting just like his heart. There was no way he had heard it from the nurses. He may have sounded nervous when the nurse was explaining all the steps and that the blood taking was going to be the last one. He may have fidgeted upon hearing about it but he never said anything about his discomfort.

Sehun already knew about it from before. After all he was the one who held on to him when he needed to have something injected and he was the one always beside him when the doctors took blood from him for the endless tests. He was the one who whispered sweet things in his ear of how he was going to reward him later on. He was the one who would always….always…take him for ice cream afterwards.

The Alpha pulled out a chair to put right in front of Baekhyun and sat down. Baekhyun however kept his eyes downwards and tried his absolute best not to cry and not to give in to the crippling urge of bawling his eyes out. Why must he torture himself more by reminding himself of all the good memories instead of the bad?

His hand was very gently grabbed by the warm hand of Sehun and the man slowly pushed the long sleeve of his shirt up until it reached a little above his elbow. Then a thick band was wrapped tightly around his upper arm before the cool feeling of an alcohol pad sanitizing his skin came and Baekhyun knew what was gonna come next. His eyes scrunched shut and his body stiffened significantly.

However, the stinging pain of the needle, piercing his skin didn’t come and instead Sehun’s hand helped his hand to ball up into a fist and with a gentle squeeze around his fist, he was silently told to have it fisted for now.

“Any suggestions for our dying garden Mr. Byun?”

Baekhyun looked up at Sehun and saw him staring out of the window instead of reaching for the syringe. He too looked out of the window as well and appreciated the distraction for the time being by staring at the withering plants, bushes and almost dried up trees. This was the garden in the back and obviously less in sight so no one probably cared much about how it looked. It looked sad to Baekhyun. Sad, because how could they deprive them of a simple water from time to time?

“Water.” He mumbled and his eyebrows furrowed. “Some fertilizer would do them good. Maybe add Hippo Rose Polka Dot plants and Nemesia flowers since they don’t need a ton of sun to survive.” He smiled at the thought of how that little garden could look cute with the smallest effort and barely noticed Sehun loosening his fist for him. “Despite it being a small garden in the back that isn’t in the view all the time, it could be a bad image for your hospital. My suggestion would probably be to simply take care of it a bit more.”

He stared at the garden for a few more seconds, still lost in his own thoughts until Sehun finally provided him an answer of his own.

“Alright, I’ll definitely let your suggestions be heard by the staff.” He said with a gentle smile on his lips and Baekhyun suddenly felt something being pressed against the inside of his elbow where the blood was to be taken. Sehun was pressing a small folded piece of gauze on his skin. He looked to his left and saw a nurse there already taking the vial of blood he had no idea when was taken from him, away towards a small machine in there that had more vials of blood on it, sitting atop a counter where they had more things, he had no idea what they were.

He distracted him completely until he was done…He didn’t feel any of the steps. Not even one…No…He couldn’t possibly cry at that as well. He refused to cry from feeling cared for by a man after so long. He couldn’t possibly show Sehun that side of him anymore.

“The result of your checkup will be ready in two days. So, I expect to see you on Wednesday, with all the medicines you take and also the prescriptions you’ve have from before if you still have them.” Sehun said and Baekhyun still kept his eyes downwards, still staring at the gauze that got replaced with a small circular band-aid a few seconds later.

“Take it easy for the time being. Take some time off of work. Rest at home, eat well, drink your water, cut back on coffee and enjoy your day until I see you again. Alright?”

Baekhyun nodded his head while still looking down at his lap.

“And I insist to stop for some ice cream before you go home.”

Baekhyun’s head snapped up in shock. That was a wrong move. His eyes were half way filled with tears, his cheeks, despite having a faint pink color were an absolute contrast to his pale skin. His dry lips parted as he stared at the man before him and tried to comprehend the suggestion. He saw Sehun’s body deflate upon seeing his eyes and he saw how more concern was added to his facial features. None of it helped Baekhyun from stopping that one tear that refused to be blinked back.

He quickly wiped it with the back of his hand, gave the man a small bow before leaving the room on his own. Jongdae was quick to follow him after he thanked Sehun on his behalf as well and ran towards Baekhyun who was going towards the front counter to deal with the bill.

“Baekhyun!”

“Don’t…” Baekhyun shook his head and wiped his cheek again. “Don’t ask…not now. Not in here.”

And so Jongdae complied. They silently waited in the line as Jongdae filled the form they were handed out earlier and managed to see a doctor without completely filling it. They handed it out to the woman behind counter and watched her give them a big smile.

“The bill is already paid sir; you don’t have to pay for anything.”

--

“Baek…”

Jongdae held the sobbing boy tight.

“Please, just take a deep breath.”

He was probably worrying Jongdae to no end with how he was crying his eyes out. And for what? Just because the former love of his life remembered as many details as he did? Just because Sehun hadn’t forgotten about a thing and even after 16 years of being apart managed to make him comfortable and be at ease? Just because his brown eyes melted him from inside and out?

“Was he an ex Baekhyun?” Jongdae asked after Baekhyun managed to calm down a little. Both of them were leaning on Jongdae’s car in the parking lot of the hospital.

He nodded his head.

“Is he…is he Seonmi’s dad?”

Baekhyun let out another sob before he nodded his head again.

--

“Surprise!!!!” Seonmi shouted the moment Baekhyun entered the back yard after his work that day. “Happy birthday!!” This time everyone present said in union.

“Little bunny!” Baekhyun’s lower lip trembled slightly and his eyes glistened with fresh tears. He stared at their small back yard that was decorated with balloons and flowers. He admired the beautiful cake set atop a table she had brought into the yard from their living room and gently embraced the girl to show his appreciation. “Thank you love.” He mumbled, his hand her back. “I completely forgot it was my birthday today.”

“I know.” Seonmi laughed. “You always forget your own birthday but remember mine.”

Baekhyun squeezed her daughter more into his arms and rocked their bodies from side to side. “I love you…so much.” He pulled back to stare at her beautiful face with a soft smile. “I’m so lucky to have you as my daughter, you know that?”

“I love you too daddy.” She grinned widely.

Jongdae who already had his wine in his hand approached them with a big grin on his face. “Such a lovely encounter.” He nodded his head. “As lovely as this is, can we cut the cake extra early? It’s begging me to have some of it.”

Seonmi laughed again and shook her head immediately. “No chance. We’re gonna get lots of pictures with it first.”

Baekhyun chuckled and leaned in to press a kiss on her forehead. He then proceeded to greet all the other guests. There weren’t that many of them since the circle of their friends was quite small. Not that many people still accepted his life choices even though Seonmi was 15 years old already. He greeted the Beta woman he knew from his earlier job when he cleaned houses for people. Ji Ho was probably one of the earliest friends he had made. She helped him through so much and always managed to find more jobs for him to do back when his gardening job wasn’t accepted by his clients.

He then proceeded to greet a couple of Seonmi’s friends that she usually brings home. Their schools were different so she rarely saw them anymore and only invited them over a couple times a month. He was offered a bottle of beer by Kyungsoo, the Omega boy who he oddly met at a bar not long ago and their friendship just suddenly made so much sense when they were drunk. He always made time for him during important events and whenever he needed someone to talk to. He couldn’t possibly nag and whine about everything to Seonmi. She was too young to know about financial problems.

The last woman who was sitting on one of the chairs provided in their backyard, was Ye Jun. She was probably Seonmi’s most favorite person. She was pregnant with her child when they met at the hospital. Her husband was the most unfortunate person since he got run over by a car that was driven by a drunk man. She was alone, Baekhyun was alone, they both knew what loss meant and how hard it was going to be when theirs kids are born.

They spent a lot of their times together, being there for each other and Baekhyun made sure to be there for her when she had a miscarriage. She lost her daughter too soon. But no matter how hard their situation became and how long the mourning continued, they still stayed together. Seonmi was almost Ye Jun’s daughter as well. She doted on her so much that Baekhyun sometimes had no idea how to compensate her.

“Happy birthday Baekhyun.” She gave her a big smile, grabbed her wine glass and stood up to give him a big hug. “It’s crazy how quickly time flies huh?”

“Yeah.” Baekhyun nodded his head with a gentle smile. “Thank you for coming Ye Jun.”

“Always my little boy. I’ll always be here for you.”

Baekhyun rolled his eyes and shook his head. “I’m only 5 years younger than you. Really? Little boy?”

“You don’t look a tiny bit different than when you were 19 and pregnant. Are you kidding me?” She laughed. “If you look 19, then you’re still 19 to me.”

It wasn’t a grand ceremony but in Baekhyun’s eyes everything was just so incredibly perfect. He allowed the unending number of pictures that Seonmi took of him and made others take of them. He blew the candles, wished for a bright, happy and healthy future for Seonmi, cut the cake and laughed when his daughter smeared some of the frosting on his cheek. They drank, ate the cake, talked and laughed. Everything was going to stay as one of the best memories he’s ever had in his mind, until their doorbell rang and Baekhyun stood up quickly.

“I’ll get it.” He said.

He opened the door with a wide smile but it disappeared the moment his eyes fell on the man before him. Involuntarily he took a step back and his eyes remained a bit too wide. Sehun…Sehun was there with a sunflower bouquet in his hands and his face too obviously showed the nervousness inside him.

“Hi.” He said with a low voice and Baekhyun’s heart bled from how vulnerable he looked.

“Hi.” He replied and his hand gripped the door handle a bit too tight.

“I’m sorry to bother you at home. But-”

“How do you know where I live?” Baekhyun interrupted his sentence.

“I…” Sehun gulped and his lower lip. “I may have misused my power as a doctor to look at the form you filled with your information. Please forgive me. I don’t mean to intrude o