#74 – Alone

Munhee checked the clock again and fidgeted, before grabbing a pillow off of the couch and clutching it to himself and turning on the TV.

Usually Papa was home when Munhee came back from school.  Or Mrs. Kim, the nice old lady who sometimes watched him.  But she was visiting her daughter who had just had surgery in another part of the country.  And Papa was on a trip to Thailand for his latest assignment from work. 

Jinae had offered to skip her English hakwon today and come straight home from school so she would get there about the same time, but Munhee had told her that he was old enough to be home on his own for a couple of hours. 

Appa had asked him just that morning if he was really alright with being home alone and Munhee had yelled at the man for thinking that he was a baby. 

But he noticed now that the apartment made weird noises when there was no one else making any noise to cover it up.

The refrigerator cycled, making an echoing clucking noise every so often.  The air conditioner whined as the thermostat kicked it back on to keep the temperature constant.  A drop of water would occasionally splattered from the faucet in the kitchen, making a dull ‘thunk’ sound as it landed on the metal below.

Munhee turned the volume up on the TV hoping to drown out the other noises.

The nine year old decided that he didn’t like being alone.

Munhee glanced at the clock again.  Appa said that he would skip lunch today and come home an hour earlier than normal.  Munhee only had to wait another 30 minutes for his Appa.

Munhee’s eyes watched the images move across the screen but his mind didn’t take any of it in.

He thought that being home alone meant that he was grown up, and as the baby of the family he was always striving to be more grown up than he really was.  But it was scary being alone.  Maybe they wouldn’t come back? 

He knew that the thought was silly, that his Appa and Papa and Noona loved him and would come home, but that niggling thought wouldn’t leave.    

4:30, when Appa should have come home came and went.  Appa should have been back by now…

By 4:40 Munhee was on the verge of tears as a massive storm began to whip up outside and began to pound angrily against the windows of the apartment.

At 4:45 the phone rang, startling the boy and causing him to leap off the couch almost like a cat in a cartoon.  He read the caller idea and saw Appa in big letters and smiled, quickly grabbing the phone.

“Where are you?” he asked in lieu of a greeting.

“Sorry kiddo, I was late leaving and now the storm is holding up traffic, I am on my way home though I promise.”

Munhee pouted, even though his father could not see him. 

“But Appa, you promised…” he whined.

Kibum sighed slightly on his end of the phone, “I know and I’m sorry, but Appa’s mess up sometimes too.”

A big crash of thunder rolled through the city, loud enough to make the windows shake in their frames and force an involuntary yelp from the young boy. 

“I don’t like storms…” Munhee whispered, as though the storm might hear him and get angry for him saying it and get worse just to spite him.

“I know Munhee, I’ll be home in a few minutes.  I’ll stay on the phone with you until I walk through the door alright?”

“Promise?” Munhee asked, taking the portable phone into his room and curling up on his bed, with a sheet thrown over his head as though it would protect him from the sight of the storm.

Kibum smiled at the phone on his end, “Nothing could stop me.”

Kibum kept the boy calm as he urged his taxi driver to go faster and directed him to different short cuts to get him home to his son. 

Finally Kibum walked through the door and called out to Munhee who raced out of his room and slammed hard into Kibum’s mid-section, wrapping his arms as tightly as he could manage around Kibum’s waist and hugging the man desperately.

“I don’t like storms.” He said again as Kibum placed one hand on his head and the other on his back in an awkward hug. 

When the boy finally pulled back he added, “And I really don’t like being alone in storms.”

“You know…” Kibum started, ruffling the boy’s hair lightly, “I used to be terrified of storms when I was younger, just like you.”

“Really Appa?  You were scared too?” 

Kibum nodded sagely, “I watched too many disaster movies, and every time we had a storm, I thought that something horrible was going to happen to us.”

“Is that why you don’t like scary movies?” Munhee asked as they moved out of the entryway and into the apartment.

“That was the start of it.” Kibum agreed. 

When they had been on the phone, Kibum could tell that little Munhee had been on the edge, but now that Kibum was here, the child had relaxed considerably.  But Munhee had always been like that, Kibum thought as he watched the boy pull out his homework and begin to work on it now that his Appa was home. 

Even as a child, Jinae would just run off without a backward glance when they took her to the park.  But Munhee would always look over his shoulder and would situate himself so that he could see at least one of them at all times. 

Where Jinae had always tugged at their hands and wanted to go off exploring, Munhee had always reached out his hand first to grab one of his fathers’ before they went anywhere. 

As Kibum sank into the couch he felt the startling realization, that Munhee, as well adjusted as they thought he was, must still harbor a little of that fear from his early loss of his parents – that maybe it could happen again.  He doubted that the boy even realized what he was doing, after all it had taken Kibum literally years to see the connection himself.

Not that he could blame the boy – for a year after Taemin moved back with SHINee, Kibum would find himself waking up in the middle of the night, just to star at Taemin and trace the man’s features in the dead of night, having been so sure that Taemin’s continued recovery had been a figment of a dream and that he would wake up cold and alone in their bedroom. 

It was a very normal reaction to what had become his greatest fear – the loss of Taemin.

For Munhee, it seemed that his greatest fear was being alone. 

Kibum smiled as he watched Munhee’s little tongue slip out of the corner of his mouth as he concentrated on his homework.

A warm feeling overtook Kibum’s heart as Munhee glanced up, giving the man a quick grin before darting his eyes back down.  Kibum knew that the boy would never be alone again – that Munhee would be a part of this family for the rest of his life and would add to it when he grew and married himself.  None of them would ever have to worry about being alone again.