Shoutout and thanks to genie610 for giving me direction on this one (oh so long ago…).  This is definitely a kind of fluffy goofy one, meant more for laughs than anything else.  Hope it makes you smile!

#87 – Chalk Dust

Taemin tapped his toe against the wooden floor, his head propped up on his hand as he sat at the kitchen table waiting for Kibum to finished adjusting his outfit.

The man may not be a fashion designer anymore, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t still try to take care of his, and by extension Taemin’s, appearance at all times. 

“Bummie…” Taemin whined, knowing full well that he sounded like a petulant child.  He huffed and placed his forehead on the table, arms splayed out in front of him as he began to tap his fingers along the wood at Kibum’s continued silence. 

After a few moments he felt a couple of fingers dancing against the back of his neck.  He craned his head up to see an amused Kibum smirked down at him.  “Come on,” he mocked, “We’re going to be late,” before turning to put on his shoes.

Taemin shook his head and rose to his feet following after Kibum – the nerve of Kibum for blaming any latest on him.

Kibum and Taemin walked into the grade school that was milling with parents, and the occasional child.  It was a back-to-school night, a time for the parents to see their child’s classroom where they will spend hours and hours of each day and meet the teacher who would be in charge of their child and many others in that room. 

Taemin and Kibum always felt a little uncomfortable at these but still went to each one.  Most students would only have one parent show up, the other being off at work or caring for the children at home (whereas Jinae and Munhee had gone with Jinki and his family for dinner tonight while they were out).  But they always stood out for being a same-gendered couple, and they had yet to see another pair like them at their children’s schools.

Taemin and Kibum walked hand in hand down the hall, pointedly ignoring the stares of other people as they searched for their son’s classroom. 

“Ah!” Kibum exclaimed with a pointed finger, “Look, there it is!” 

Taemin and Kibum entered a mostly empty classroom, the smell of chalk dust and disinfectant heavy in the air – the smell of classrooms everywhere.  The desks were arranged in groupings of six with little names stuck in the upper right-hand corners, indicating which child should sit there.  The men found Munhee’s desk and Kibum smiled, pulling out a pad of post-it notes that he always traveled with and wrote a short note to their son, placing it inside the desk for him to find the next morning during school. 

The couple waited around, wanting to speak with the teacher and introduce themselves but she was busy talking to a harried-looking mother whose belly was full with a little brother or sister for Munhee’s classmate.

The parent finally departed and the teacher let loose an almost undetectable sigh of relief.  The woman, a newer teacher in her later twenties, turned around to face her next set of parents, fixing a smile to her face as she turned.

But the smile soon froze into place and the woman’s eyes flew wide and Taemin thought that he wasn’t going to have to face a teacher who would judge his son based on his parent’s relationship. 

As the wheels in his brain began to turn wondering if he should request a switching of teachers for his son he heard a sharply gasped, “Omo…SHINee!” which stopped him dead in his tracks. 

Taemin snorted and Kibum laughed outright. 

“Um…yeah…” Kibum cleared his throat with a smile, walking forward with his hand outstretched.  “Hi, we’re Munhee’s parents.”

The woman stared at the offered hand for a moment as though she had never seen one before, finally shaking her head as though to clear it and reaching out to shake in greeting. 

“Um…hello…Mr. Kim…it’s nice to…meet you…” She spoke slowly, her eyes trained on Kibum’s face, as though she was trying to memorize every nuance of his face.

Taemin cleared his throat and laughed lightly, “Should I be jealous?” he joked, breaking the woman out of her stupor and causing a furious blush to completely cover her face. 

“I’m sorry…Mr. Lee…”

Taemin held out his own hand, “It’s fine, we understand it must be a surprise for you.”

Her eyes flew wide again and she glanced around the room as though looking for a camera to see if this was some kind of joke. 

Taemin was glad that they were the only parents in the room at that moment because it could easily have become so much more awkward than it already was.

The teacher stuttered he way through an introduction (Ms. Ahn), and walked through her philosophy for teaching her students for the men.  The more she talked, the less awkward it became, but Taemin couldn’t clear the amused smile from his face.

As time went on, and their SHINee days grew more distant, Taemin and Kibum weren’t being recognized as frequently as they had been.  They had grown older and didn’t seek out the same stylized appearance (no hair and make-up) that they had once been made to don.  But sometimes still, their fans would spot them and would get giggly and hyper and be suddenly reminded of their teenage school days when they used to swoon over the idol boys who filled their television screens and covered their magazines.

They just hadn’t run into it as a teacher of one of their children yet. 

Their meeting over, the men turned to leave but were stopped by a muffled squeal from behind them.

They half-turned to see Ms. Ahn with a semi-pained expression on her face.  “Could I have your autographs?”  She blurted out, looking incredibly embarrassed to do so. 

Kibum laughed and smiled good-naturedly sure.  “Sure.” He responded before asking if she wanted him to write anything in particular. 

Taemin came along behind him, scrawling something upon a simple white sheet of paper that had been hastily tugged out of a printer, smiling at the memory of mass fan-sign events that had filled his days all those years ago.

“Be proud of your past,” SHINee Taemin.