chapter one; 
  ☆ accepting change

THE WAY YOU MAKE ME MELT ♡ 

Kyuhyun was smart for his age; he understood things he really shouldn't have, and he had opinions on things most adults would have figured would be reserved for when he got older. It might have something to do with the fact that he had been through a lot as a child, but don't think for a second that it was all bad.  He had just been forced to take responsibility a little earlier than most his age.

It started when he was really little. His parents, despite both loving him and caring for him, didn't get along with one another. As the years progressed, they continued to fight and it escalated to the point of them both being very unhappy in their marriage. He could tell both of them were unhappy, despite them smiling when they were in front of him. He could see that the smile didn't quite reach either of their eyes. Sometimes he would hear them whisper-yelling at one another in the hallway, and when he would appear, they would pretend none of it happened.

Eventually, his parents decided to divorce. He would stay with his mother and see his father on holidays. He was fine with this, since he didn't really see much of his father in the first place. He was a very busy business man always traveling and working late nights.  And Kyuhyun loved his mother very, very much. He would follow her into whatever predicament that she would lead them into, without question and without hesitation.

With his parents separating meant that his mother would need to work extra hard and now on late nights so they could survive without his father's income. He remembered these two years as being very quiet. He tried his best to be good boy and clean the house and make his own dinners before his mother would come home. He tried to be responsible and always finish his homework before she could ask him if he did. 

She would often be coming home right when he was going to bed, but Kyuhyun remembered fondly that he was always tucked in at night, and she always kissed him and told him how much she loved him. She cried time in and time out, apologizing to him that she's a bad mother for missing out on these important days, but he still loved her dearly. She was very precious to him, because he could see all of the stresses and hardships she was enduring to support them both.

What did surprise him was when she told him she was going out one night on her day off from work.  It was a day normally reserved for the two of them to watch a movie and bake sweets.  She told him that she met a really nice man at work whom had asked her out to dinner, and she really wanted to go and have a good time with him.  Kyuhyun was jealous, but didn't cry about it.  He watched her try to pretty herself up and leave with a kiss on his cheek, promising to bake with him when she got home.

He baked by himself that night; the first time using the oven by himself in his nine years, and he wanted to surprise her when she came home with something yummy. He wanted her to be proud of him for making them himself, and maybe stay home with him next time if he could prove he could do it.

"I'm so sorry, Kyu!" She cried as she pulled her heels off at the door when she returned. 

She got home very late, right before he went to bed, and he was nearly stewing in his anger, but he was very quiet about how he felt. She apologized over and over to him, explaining how she lost the track of the time and would make it up to him. 

He could see the light flush in her cheeks, and the smile that was still threatening to explode onto her glossy pink lips.  Kyuhyun couldn't be angry with her when she looked so happy like that.  He forgave her begrudgingly, and the next weekend, and the following, and the following after that.  He was becoming used to bidding her farewell now, and telling her she looked beautiful before she dashed out the door smelling of sweet watermelon and sandalwood. He had come to expect her to not come home when she promsied that she would.

It was only about a month or so later that there was a knock at their front door to their apartment, and his mother was fussing with her h