13.

When I first got my housemates, it was the late winter, just when the winds struck up their final fits before dying out. Junhong had been sick back then, hacking up everything in his poor stomach from his flu, always a little red around the eyes and nose.

How long had it been since I first found Yongguk outside my door and helped him tuck a coughing Junhong in bed? Since Junhong threw his first fit and bitten my hand?

Days? Weeks? Months?

It feels like it’s been forever. A good forever.

Watching Junhong squirm under the sheets every morning had become my schedule, his slobbery kisses my wake up call. It’d become almost weird, wondering what Junhong was up to at his kindergarten - what surprises he’d have for me when I went to pick him up later - and not being able to be the first one to find out.

I’d met a lot of new people, his classmates and their parents. Their wary lines crinkling the edges of their smiles, they’d always smiled and pat me on the back. Unlike some others, the more rude others, they had always been so nice, offering Junhong kind words and sweets.

I didn’t mind them as much as I did everyone else.

(Maybe Kyuhyun was right, I had changed if I didn’t care.)

Picking him up from classes, we’d play a little in the nearby playground with the others before getting Junhong home, dressed and ready for bed - or, in our case, the blankets spread thick in the living room we’d given up trying to put away. Dinner would come, and thirty minutes later, we’d brush our teeth (he would, every day, want me to brush his teeth for him, giggling and spitting foam everywhere) and then roll around waiting for Yongguk. Most times, we’d give up and end up falling asleep.

(When the front door did crack open - quiet and slowly, just in case Junhong woke -, all sleep would escape and a group hug would be a routinely welcome home to a exhaust worker.)

It was a part of my schedule now. Turning back on it now would be awkward and weird.

It would spin everything out of whack.

But how much longer would it be until they decided to get up and leave?

Back when I first decided to let Yongguk in - it had been a haste decision, a now-or-never type of deal - I hadn’t much been thinking of the consequences. It didn’t occur to me back then that they’d one day decide to walk out of my life again, just like Yongguk had done back in high school.

What had mattered was the date of their walk in, and not their check-out.

I’d gone and made it my business, watching Junhong and worrying whenever he tripped - which, turned out to be quite the often, his extraordinary growth spurt doing wonders to his legs. When he got bullied at school or even just by the neighborhood kids, or if someone as much as badmouthed Yongguk. Was it wrong that I got upset when that happened? As if I should step in and take sides?

But why should I? It wouldn’t like Junhong was mine.

That’s maybe why I was so worried when we ran again into Jieun.

And then even later, when Yongguk again met her.

Jieun was rightfully Junhong’s mother, his birth mother. Sure, she was absent the whole of his life, but since she hadn’t a single clue he was even still alive, no one could blame her. Not even me. It hadn’t been her fault her parents didn’t accept teenage parents.

It was like waiting for an inevitable storm you knew was coming - just not when.

As much as I wanted to place blames and point fingers, I just couldn’t.

Not at Jieun.

Now that she knew Junhong was still alive, how Yongguk hadn’t left her because of the miscarriage, would she want back into their lives? For sure then, I would have to let them go (they weren’t mine in the first place anyways).

The best I could do was hope that it was never mentioned, to prolong the little facade of a happyfamily I had while I still could. I’d always known they’d leave the day they’d come anyways. No use getting emotional now.

But no matter how much I tried to take my mind off of it - it wasn’t as if they were disappearing, just not living with me anymore -, when it really happened, I wasn’t at all sure what I was supposed to do.

Since Yongguk had gone and gotten himself injured, something shook me straight to my socked toes that night, he’d been put on a medical leave - all thanks to an insistent doctor, more stubborn than Yongguk himself -, my schedule was slowly falling apart from my usual weeks with Junhong in school.

(He’d scared me. He was an idiot.)

It was a lot more free now, leaving me with all this free time I wasn’t quite sure what to do with.

It was weird not having to finish reports at the last second, burning through papers and tearing fragile pages while erasing unwanted pencil scratches.

Once released from the hospital, he’d taken back his job as a father, his lips jutted out in annoyance at his mandated house rest. He was restless, constantly pacing around the small space of my apartment, manning the frying pans and pots at the kitchen, doing the dirty laundry around the house, and vacuuming the living room. I swear I’d even caught him dusting the silverware last night.

With all that free time, my job babysitting Junhong wasn’t necessary anymore; after all, Yongguk was there to watch his kid now. I didn’t have to shuttle him back and forth from kindergarten anymore.

It didn’t stop the fact I still found myself walking toward the old school building once classes let out.

After a few days of living my renewed freedom, I began missing the bound schedule I used to live by. There was just too much free time. I missed rushing from class to the kindergarten, laughing out an apology to Kyuhyun for missing another appointment with him.

In an attempt to make use of all the extra time, I tried working harder on school. Papers were finished the day they were announced, my afternoons spent hunched over the school library with energy drinks to accompany me. I tried talking to friends more often, letting Hyungjun drag me to clubs and or concerts, even welcoming it when Kwanghee called for work just hours before the date of.

Eventually though, staying out for too long just wasn’t reasonable. There was only so much money I could waste on buying non-caffeinated drinks just to stay a couple extra hours in the cafe (and my friends were too cheap to pay for me for long).

All in all, it still left too much time.

So maybe it was just my ego getting to me that I spent as much time outside the house as possible. I didn’t want Yongguk to think that I didn’t have anything to do at all. I had no intentions of being labeled as a loser to the ex loser’s eyes.

Whenever I came home late - late being at eleven, just an hour or two past Junhong’s supposed bedtime (not that he ever used to be asleep by that time anyways) -, I’d found the house still brightly lit, just the way Junhong and I used to keep it when it was Yongguk out at nights. It was weird, walking into a fully lit house; a good weird. Was this how Yongguk felt, returning back home in the middle of the night?

Taking off my shoes, I found Junhong and Yongguk on the living room couch, Junhong’s head resting on Yongguk’s thighs and Yongguk’s head tilt over the back of the sofa. Yongguk was drooling.

That night, I took at least a good minute just standing and staring. Junhong’s hair had been neatly combed out, even dried, after his nightly shower. His shirt was on properly and not left hanging awkwardly over his shoulder. I could practically smell his bubble bath from the room away.

I’d been worried, but it turned out that Yongguk was plenty capable of taking care of his child. Of course, Junhong would be perfectly well and safe with his dad. I shouldn’t have been so anxious about it.

(So why was I so disappointed?)

When Yongguk stirred, smacking his lips and pressing them together to a pleased line, I tore away from the image, shuffling to the restroom.

I was being a total creeper.

I took a long, lonely, shower that night. I sat in the bath until all the hot water went cold. I brushed my teeth without Junhong giggling and poking at my ribs.

It was lonely.

Maybe I should consider investing in a cat.

By the time I was done with my shower, hair thoroughly dried - a little fluffy from being over dried -, it was a little past midnight, meaning my supposed long shower had lasted maybe a total of an hour and a little. They did say that time passed by slowly when you were lonely.

When I stepped out into the living room, the father son duo, my invasive housemates, were still knocked out on the couch, their positions now switched so that the two lay out into an way I was almost positive wasn’t comfortable in the least. I was going to laugh when Yongguk complained about stiff arms (though, he already had issues dealing with his cast) in the morning.

(Junhong wouldn’t know why, but he’d laugh with me, poking his dad in the gut before sliding behind me in defense, just as he did every other day whenever I had extra time in the mornings or returned home from classes early.)

If maybe it had been Hyungjun or even my nonexistent little brother, I may have kicked them awake, banishing them the living room to their rooms to sleep properly, I couldn’t bring myself to stir Yongguk and Junhong. So I let them be.

I’d taken maybe a step outside the living room area, toward my own room - because sleeping in the living room with the blankets spread out, all together, wouldn’t at all help me prepare for our eventual good bye - when Yongguk groaned.

I froze and he shifted.

I blinked and so did he.

“Himchan?” I ‘hmn’ed in response, putting a quiet finger to my lips and nodding toward Junhong.

He yawned.

His voice was thick with sleep … … well, more so than usual, and making out his sleepy mumbles took past years of experience to do. “When did you get back?” If I wasn’t me, I wouldn’t have understood his lazy drawl.

“Not too long ago.” Maybe just an hour or so, but long, as it turned out, was just a subjective measure of time. “Go back to sleep.”

He gave a little grunt, but did the opposite of my instructions, tucking his hand under Junhong’s head and replacing a nearby cushion where his legs were. Picking up his jacket tossed lazily over the couch arm, he covered Junhong and stumbled on over to where I was, knocking his fist against his left thigh to get the blood flowing in it again.

He totally ignored the roll of eyes and glare I gave him, nudging me lightly with his free arm. “Didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

I guess the shove was his sort of way of giving a mute sorry - it was getting impossible being able to differentiate all the different meanings of his shoves.

“Happens,” I shrugged right back, twisting him around and toward the empty guest room. “If you’re tired, you don’t have stay up for me you know. Go to sleep.” I gave a sort of emphasis to the last sentence, meaning it as a command. Though, let’s be honest, we all knew Yongguk wasn’t going to listen anyways.

My hands on his back, I pushed him to the half opened room, turning back around to get Junhong - as good as Yongguk was, let’s face it, it wasn’t so easy to pick up a growing kid with just one arm -, just to have Yongguk twist with me, hot on my heels like an abandoned puppy. Really, it was just too late for this.

“Yongguk,” I frowned, giving a side glare.

He was tired, I could see it from the dark bags hanging from just under his eyes. If he was tired, he shouldn’t have been awake, never mind playing stupid games.

“We made dinner.”

I lifted a brow. Yongguk always made dinner, claiming my food tasted oddly burnt, even while having the consistency of raw ingredients (I say that takes talent, no matter how useless a talent it is).

Chuckling from the low of his throat, this time, he pushed me around, using his uninjured shoulder to guide me toward the un-lit kitchen, using his head to headbutt the dining room lights on. “We made dinner,” he sure to repeat, his stupid grin pulling up his lips.

He wasn’t lying.

Dinner was on the table, each dish wrapped up nice and tight in clear wrap, even the rice. In the center was what probably used to be a boiling pot of jjigae, surrounded by smaller wrapped side dishes (kimchi, seaweed and the likes) accompanied by bowls of omurice at each respective seat, the smallest plate probably being meant for Junhong. And soons, all three of them.

“Junhong demanded that he gets to do the ketchup,” Yongguk chuckled, nodding toward the plate seated just in front of where I usually sat.

The clear wrap had rubbed the ketchup up a bit, but the intention was still clear, each squiggly line still precise with five year of concentration. It was a face, the same weird tongue stuck out face Junhong and I’d draw with maple syrup on his pancakes.

(It made me smile.)

“You guys should have just eaten without me.”

“Well, Junhong said he wouldn’t eat unless you were there too. So we were gonna stay up until you came home, but,”

“But I came home late, sorry.”

Yongguk shrugged, again nudging me (this time, from what I supposed was his mute way of saying it’s okay) in the side. “We had red-bean paste bread earlier while picking up groceries.” I’m pretty sure this was supposed to be reassuring - it wasn’t, not really anyways.

“It wouldn’t have been much of a dinner without you anyways.”

They were all corny, cheesy saps. The whole lot of them.

After that, I made it a deal to get back home, no matter what the excuse, before six in the afternoon. It wasn’t much of a problem; I’d gone home way before them too many times to count anyways. Plus, it gave me an excuse to procrastinate again - really, who cared for doing work on time anyways, it was at just seconds before class started when my best effort came out (I’m pretty sure the concept worked for everyone else too).

Hyungjun wasn’t so pleased I found a way to slip out of his choking grip whenever he wanted to go to the clubs to pick up girls (he wasn’t quite so smart, was he), but learned to do with Suhoon. Even if Suhoon wasn’t quite as much as elated at his new job.

Every night, coming back home, Junhong would come to greet me with Yongguk manning the kitchen. It wasn’t exactly like the past, but for a while, I’d thought that maybe things would return back to normal.

So I shouldn’t have been quite so surprised when Junhong came running at me, teary eyed, jumping my legs and clinging with Yongguk, frowning, right behind him.

“No! No, no, no!”

Dropping - nearly tripping over Junhong on the way down - to my knees, I pulled him to my arms, letting him slobber all over my jacket, digging blunt nails into my shoulder. I looked up at Yongguk, but couldn’t quite exactly find an answer in his scrunched face. His eyes were unreadable.

But then again, when were they ever?

“Junhong.”

Yongguk’s voice was stern, the sort of tone he never used on Junhong anymore, not since they’d come to live with me. It was surprising to see it come back, same with the hard pressed worry lines against his forehead.

“What? What happened?”

I didn’t exactly get a reply, Junhong’s whines cutting me off.

“No, no, no! I don’t want her!” Junhong’s arms around my neck tightened, his legs crawling forward to wrap around my waist, throwing the full of his weight against me. It was worth all of a grunt. “Junhong has Himchannie! Don’t want her!”

Untangling Junhong from me, wiping his eyes with my sleeve, I looked back up at Yongguk.

“I told him about Jie-,”

“No!”

It wasn’t every day that Junhong cut Yongguk off. He practically worshipped everything his father stood for, even if Yongguk wasn’t exactly always in the best of situations. (When Yongguk had returned home with his arm wrapped tight in a cast, Junhong demanded the same, claiming it was a cool fashion statement and that his father shouldn’t be the only one allowed to do it. I ended up making a makeshift cast out of newspaper and glue.)

He gave his father a hard glare and stole my hand, ignoring the fact I hadn’t a chance to pull off my shoes to drag me to the guestroom - now again residence to Yongguk (who I had refused to let sleep on the floor anymore) and Junhong.

I ended up in a dark room alone with Junhong, crouched under hung jackets in the closet. With his head pressed up against my shoulder, Junhong sniffled, digging his nose into my jacket.

“Don’t go away Himchannie.”

“Shh, it’s okay. I’m not going anywhere.”

I was more worried about it the other way around.

a/n: hi. (hides in a corner) sorry for suddenly disappearing, leaving two chapters to the story. there was school to worry about - first day of school and the orientation - plus something else that demanded my attention.

this isn’t applied to any of my readers directly, but i really felt the need to say this. if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all. i’m sorry, this isn’t directed to any of my readers directly, as i mentioned. you guys have been nothing but perfect, precious angels to me and all. i have a mild case of paranoia. it’s not diagnosed, but there’s always been a sort of nagging voice in the back of my head. i constantly have this feeling that people are talking badly about me. so when i actually do find out that someone’s been speaking badly of me to the general public, i have a sort of mental breakdown. i’ve been getting over it - because really, i’m just stupid and why would anyone really even care about me anyways - but i just wanted to put this out there. please, for anyone else out there who could be like me, or even worse. at least, don’t post it in a publicly accessible location.

constructive criticism and just downright insulting someone are two whole different things.

i don’t mind if you don’t like how i write or the way i go about my storyline, but if you’re insulting my person and being directly, that’s just wrong. i’m sorry but more than likely not all of you know i am in reality. there’s maybe a whole total of three people i speak to in private conversations. if those select three claimed that my personality is , then … … well , i must be some ed up , but for people who’ve never spoken to me before to talk about me doesn’t quite sit well. it makes me actually feel like a worthless piece of . and not the good kind either.

but on a brighter note, we’ve reached two hundred subscribers. wow. like. i don’t know how to thank you guys. i really don’t. if i can do anything for you guys, just throw it at me. really. since all i can do is write ty little stories, if there’s ever anything you want to see me write, throw it at me. (i don’t have a lot of karma, but if anyone needs … …)

you’re all amazing. i'll just shut up over this matter now. next chapter won’t take as long as it did this to be updated. there is no specific date i’ll update. just whenever i’m done with the next chapter (and the day after will be the afternote). + sorry for the short chapter. more than likely, the last chapter will be short too. i'm a disgrace otl.

ps. i'm still on a semi hiatus until i figure out a proper loop to my college schedule.

(guess what, i'm identifying verbs and nouns in my english class. i'm an english major. there is something seriously wrong with my class)