Sungjong had had a new set of parents for almost every Christmas, until he turned six.

And when he didn’t have new parents and a fancy house to go with expensive pudding and wrapped presents, he would spend Christmas at the under-funded orphanage, sharing one stocking, half filled with cheap candies with ten other kids.

Sometimes when the charities took pity on them, they’d get puddings on Christmas, but they never tasted like the ones he had in the big houses.

In any case, those instances were rare privileges and until three, his Christmas entertainment included eating stale candy corn and watching Cinderella in the poorly furnished library of the orphanage with the other kids.

Like the other children who lived in the orphanage, Sungjong’s story was no different. Abandoned by parents he had never known, he had found residence in the dilapidated orphanage building. Besides being a roof above his head, the orphanage provided him with the bare necessities, food and clothing, and education.

Home wouldn’t be the right word for the orphanage though – temporary asylum would more suit the whole affair.

As was common with most other orphans, Sungjong would pray for his parents to miraculously appear. He didn’t want new parents like the other kids wished for – new rich parents; he just wanted his real ones back, even though he had never known them.

He was sure heaven was a beautiful place – the way the matron described heaven left no doubt in his mind about that. She also said that his parents were in heaven. He couldn’t understand why his parents would go to such a wonderful place without him. He wanted his parents to come back and take him there. In that way, they could be a family again.

What set him apart from the other kids was that he didn’t talk. He wasn’t mute, he talked when it was necessary, like during interviews with the moms and dads who would ask him his name even though they knew it already.

They had read his file – the one that the matrons and teachers threatened the orphans with. Apparently, if they wrote something bad about them in the files, they would never get adopted. The orphans had grown up thinking about the files as monsters – if they were disturbed too much, they would never get parents and toys and candies.

So in order to keep their files clean, they had to listen to the matrons and do everything they said. That way, the orphans were told, they would have greater chances of being adopted.

Sungjong was polite during the interviews; he was always polite to everyone. But honestly he didn’t like answering their questions – they were always the same. Boring, repetitive and most of the things were already written in his file. The matron had told them not to lie during interviews because the potential parents had already read through their files. So Sungjong didn't know what was the point of the interviews. Didn't the parents already know everything they needed to about him?

He hated pretending that he liked their cheerful smiles or their enthusiasm as if they were choosing a new toy from the brand new store in town. He detested all sorts of pretenses and he could recognise pretenses from a very early age.

Sungjong was the best-behaved child at the orphanage and all the matrons there always suggested his name when the parents came in for adoption. Sungjong’s tame and pleasing appearance made for a good first impression. And since he was very courteous and gentle, more than once he got chosen to be adopted.

He always took his teddy bear with him wherever he went, and hugged it closely during interviews, as if it was his support and good-luck charm. Perhaps that teddy bear, which was pretty much all of his worldly possessions, in the hands of a young boy appealed to the parents. Or maybe the missing eye and torn bow-tie of the teddy bear made the parents realize that Sungjong didn’t stand much chance at the orphanage.

Whatever the reason, most of his interviews were successful.

But for some strange reason, every time he got adopted, he was returned after a few months, or maybe even weeks. The parents had no complaints about him; he listened to them well, didn’t bother them at all. He didn’t even cry at night or ask for toys or candies. He was the perfect definition of an angelic child.

When the director of the orphanage would ask the parents why they were returning Sungjong, they would simply look nervous and embarrassed and mumble something that sounded like ‘not completely normal’.

The last time had to face an interview and was adopted, Sungjong was six.