Jaehee placed two mugs on the coffee table and took a seat on the couch. Hakyeon was still keeping the safe distance between them. “Drink up. I made you a cold drink. It’s not much compare to your porridge but I hope you like it,” Jaehee brought up her mug into and blew to cool her drink down.

Seojun had fallen asleep on the couch but Jaehee had carried him to take a nap in her room. It was a calm and mild afternoon. Hakyeon had been in the house from the morning, helping Jaehee taking care of Seojun. He was happy to take care of Seojun because by doing it, the guilty he had in his heart had lessened a bit.

It was a form of paying back the night that he slept like the dead.

Fortunately, Seojun is a good boy. He rarely cried and didn’t throw tantrum but he loved to tease both of them –asking to be chased around in the house. Even though both of them had cancelled the running plan, but he felt as if he had a whole day marathon.

He found he was breathing loudly and he could hear his heart beating fast. Taking care of a little boy had really the energy out of him, he looked as if he had aged ten years only after playing around with little Seojun. Since Jaehee knew better, she only sat at the sides and laughed along –she knew how tiring it would be and felt bad to see how exhausted Hakyeon looked.

“Thank you,” Hakyeon expressed sincerely and took the mug rested on the coffee table. Drinking in, he felt the cold syrup flowed down his throat. The cold drink made him feel energized a little as he downed his drink, not even leaving any ice cubes. He placed the last ice cube in his mouth and had been biting on it.

The sight made Jaehee smiled and she moved forward to take a look in his mug –the mug was empty. “I misread you. I should have made you a jug,” she spoke. “Do you want more? I can make more for you.”

Hakyeon shook his head and there was a sound of the ice cube crushed in his mouth. “No, thank you,” he rejected as he bit on his ice cube. “I’ll do it myself if I want to have more.”

“You sure?” she asked again, making sure.

He nodded and laid his head on the head of the couch. The sight made Jaehee smiled bitterly. He must be so exhausted and felt sleepy. He even woke up early to make her porridge, and not only that, he had to play around with Seojun. He was paid to work for her at the first place but now he had to take care of another one, she needed to pay him more.

Hakyeon slowly felt drowsy and his eyes gradually shutting.

Seeing that, Jaehee took the opportunity and placed down her mug. Getting up slowly from her seat, she made very minimal sound and walked to sit beside him. His eyes were closed but Jaehee knew he hadn’t really gotten into his unconsciousness state. He was still aware of his surrounding even when his eyes close.

Hakyeon felt movement from the empty seat beside him, as if someone was taking a seat on it but he pretended like he wasn’t feeling anything. He then felt someone grabbed his right hand and his hand was brought to the space beside him. His heart began to race but he continued pretending.

He could feel the softness of the owner’s touch and there was no one else but Jaehee who owned the touch. She pulled his hand gently towards her and from the way she held it, he could tell she was sitting facing him.

Jaehee took his hand with both her hands and held it a little higher to observe his hand. He had a bigger hand than hers and she prevented herself from doing the scene from the ‘Tarzan’ movie and proceeded to her initial intention.

Opening his palm and facing it upwards, she gently massaged his fingers before she took his pinkie fingers and pressed her thumb nail on the end of his fingers, repetitively but gently, ensuring that she covered the whole space at the finger print.

After covering the pinkie finger print, she moved on to the next finger. It was a massage that his father used to do to her when they were watching television. At first, she wondered why her father did it to her fingers. She thought he was hurting her but she always feel relaxed whenever his father massaged on her fingers and most of the time she felt drowsy and she fallen into sleep. Later, she found out that his father wasn’t doing it to hurt her but he did it for love. The massage helped her to calm and relax and she was sure she was doing the same to Hakyeon.

She could see how his expression softened as she kept massaging his fingers. She reached his forefinger and his head fell to his side, indicating that he had really fallen asleep. She couldn’t help but to smile to the sight and helped his head from getting his neck hurt.

Sitting closely to him, she placed his head gently on her shoulder. She knew this was not a best decision because she couldn’t move and would be stuck at this position until Hakyeon was awake but he wouldn’t like it if she helped him lying down on the couch.

He would awake and refused to continue his nap.

Feeling his head on her shoulder somehow brought her to the day when she was with her father. The memory brought tears to her eyes and she blinking hard to keep the tears from falling. She used to sit side by side with her father and she loved to rest her head on his father’s shoulder and in return, his father would rest his head on her shoulder.

But the memory stayed as a memory.

And her father remained in her heart…

---

Hakyeon felt that his neck started killing him and he shifted his head a bit but he suddenly noticed that there was a head on top of his and he had his head rested against a shoulder. He then remembered about what Jaehee had done with his hand and quickly his eyes averted to his hand.

He found out that his fingers interlaced with her fingers and they were sitting very closely. His heart skipped a beat and he had the urge to push her away instantly from him but how could he?

Jaehee remained motionless beside him and he was frozen in his position. His eyes glued at the sight of their connected hands and he was afraid to peel off her hand away from his because his action might woke her up and it would make things awkward.

He raked his brain to think of a way to free himself. He gasped suddenly when Seojun appeared from nowhere. Seojun was looking at him, holding the blank look. He had awaken from his nap and stood in front of them, and Hakyeon made a quiet gesture to Seojun –asking him to be quiet.

Seojun still held a blank stare and didn’t even make a squeak. Slowly, Hakyeon pulled his hand away from Jaehee and hold her head with his hands, and set his head free. Quickly, he got up and set her lying on the couch but she remained in her slumber, not interrupted.

After successfully on resting her down, he went to Seojun and carried him up. “Are you hungry?” Hakyeon whispered to little Seojun. Seojun nodded and pointed his tiny little finger towards the kitchen. His cuteness never failed to melt Hakyeon’s heart and he shuffled to the kitchen to feed the toddler.

---

Hakyeon was doing the dishes while he let Seojun enjoying his dessert. The sound of the chair being pulled on the floor caught his attention and he turned to see Jaehee sitting beside Seojun. His heart skipped a beat and felt blood rushed to his cheeks, the image of their hands intertwined with each other suddenly flashed back in his head.

He looked away from her, pretending that she wasn’t there and he slowed the cleaning, taking a longer time to clean the plates. His ears caught the questions Jaehee asked to little Seojun. “Did something wake you up? You wake up on your own?”

His hand kept the surface of the plate with a sponge; he wasn’t really paying attention on what he was doing but her. He was fully aware of her presence and thinking of how should he act in the situation if she decided to talk to him.

Barely a minute passed and he already got what he prayed wouldn’t happen. “Hakyeon, did Seojun wake on his own?”

He nodded but pretended he was busy doing the dishes and hoped she wouldn’t ask him further questions. She sounded as if she was satisfied with the answer when he heard she continued her conversation with Seojun. “What a good boy,” she complimented and Hakyeon could see she was helping Seojun finishing his dessert from the corner of his eyes.

“What time is it now? Shouldn’t Hongbin show up by now?” she asked and Hakyeon heard the chair at where she was sitting moved. Quickly, he cleaned the dishes and moved to arrange the plates. She walked to the sink and cleaned her hands, she still wasn’t aware that Hakyeon had been avoiding her.

Facing to his back, she tried to start a conversation with him. “Are you going to stay until Seojun’s father shows up?”

Hakyeon kept facing away but he still answered her questions. “I think I’ll go home after Seojun’s father come.”

She nodded and ran out of questions to make the conversation on-going, but she still leaning on the sink, making it harder for Hakyeon to escape. After staring vacantly for a few minutes, Jaehee moved and decided to clean Seojun.

A sigh of relief escaped Hakyeon and he quickly help cleaning the mess Seojun left. No matter how hard he avoided her, he forgot the fact that both of them were under one house –he couldn’t avoid her until he left the main door.

He still hadn’t left the kitchen and was oblivious to Jaehee’s presence behind him. She then sneakily took a seat beside him and stared at him after realising something odd from his behaviour. “You’re okay?” she asked making him to literally jump in his seat. His heart palpitated as he took a deep breath, unintentionally made an eye contact with her.

“What were you thinking about?” she laughed after seeing his shock face. He stared at her, still shock and his entire ‘avoid Jaehee’ mission fell out everywhere.

“Don’t scare me like that,” he warned and still could feel his heart beating fast. He couldn’t recall any moment his heart beat at a regular pace whenever around her. She always knew how to make him feel like he had been chased.

She stopped laughing but the smile lingered. “Okay, I’m sorry. I was joking. I never thought you really have such a weak heart. You’re easily scared.”

Hakyeon shot him a judging look making her to raise her hand in defeat, “Okay. I apologised. I admit I did it on purpose but seriously. What were you thinking?”

She snapped all of sudden. “Don’t tell me you’re still on that topic…” she squinted at him, trying to read the answer from his face but he shook his head.

“Where’s Seojun?” he asked, avoiding her question. He could simply answer and told her that she was wrong but he feared that she started to lecture him about moving on.

“He’s watching his favourite TV show and by the way Sir, you haven’t answer my question,” she caught him and forced him to look at her. He had been avoiding her every way he could but how could he? She had been searching for his eyes.

“What question…?” he acted dumb making Jaehee to palm her face in frustration.

“You have been acting strangely. Do you think I will let it slide?” she questioned with a serious tone, catching his attention. He watched how her face turned from excited to grim in a second. The sight sent a sharp tug to his heart and he felt guilty for acting without thought. He was too caught up with his own feelings and forgot that she had feelings too.

“I’m sorry…” was all he managed to utter.

She made a small nod and forced a smile, “Do I sound like a strict teacher now?”

She chuckled and stood up to check on Seojun. Hakyeon tailed her gaze and saw little Seojun on the mat, watching the show on an iPad. She sat back after ensuring that the little boy was not doing anything harmful.

“I guess Seojun have your traits?” he pulled out a random question. He could see a genuine and motherly smile shone on her face, “What makes you think so? I’m not even his biological mother.”

The time felt as if it had stop for a moment. He furrowed his eyebrows to what his ears just heard.

“You’re what?” he shot her a puzzled look.

She tilted her head slightly to her right, “I’m not Seojun’s biological mother…?” She released a chuckle after catching the hint, “Why? You think I’m Seojun’s real mother? Really?”

He looked stunned for a moment.

Jaehee just told him that she is not Seojun’s biological mother… Wait. What made him to make an assumption that Jaehee gave birth to Seojun? He became confused all of sudden and hoped someone would pinch him to wake him up from this confusing state.

“Hakyeon?” she laughed in amusement. “Oh my God, you really believe that I gave birth to Seojun?” she couldn’t stop laughing from what she was watching. He looked paralyzed on the chair, if only she couldn’t see him chest heaved for air, she would think he had turned to statue.

Seeing that Hakyeon still hadn’t given her any response, she went on to explain the part that he got misunderstood but when she was about to correct the facts he assumed, Seojun interrupted both of them. He walked in the kitchen with the IPad in his hands, whining that his shows had ended.

Jaehee lifted him up and sat him on her lap, letting him to continue watching his favourite shows. Hakyeon had his tongue turned numb as he ran out of words. He averted his gaze to Seojun who had now stopped whining and enjoying his animated show.

The fact that Seojun is not Jaehee’s son made him feel sorry towards the little boy. And the fact that Seojun had called someone else as ‘Mama’ made his heart ached even more. How could someone have the heart to leave the cutest little thing? The revelation made him wonder what happened to Seojun’s real mother.

“It’s true I’m not related to him by blood…” Jaehee broke the train of his thoughts. He looked up and met her eyes, wanting to hear more of the story and cleared all the assumption he had. Assumption happened when he stopped asking questions and if it wasn’t for the random stuff he blurted out, he would still carry the assumption to the grave.

“But I ask him to call me ‘Mama’ because he don’t get to call the special name,” she smiled weakly. “I want him to think that I’m his mother even though one day he would find out that his real mother had abandoned him.”

She Seojun’s hair gently as she broke her eyes from him. Seojun probably heard the entire things she said but he was at the age where things were still blurred.

He took a deep breath while his eyes never left her face. The maternal look shone brightly on her face and it made him softened.

“What happen to his mother?” Hakyeon questioned.

She gazed at Hakyeon who had curiosity look in his eyes. She exhaled audibly, “I don’t know. I heard she left Seojun in front of his father’s door. She even left the notes in Seojun’s bag saying that she couldn’t afford to raise him and ask Hongbin to raise him instead.” She paused for a thought. “Hongbin had no idea that he has a son… and doubted it. He even made a test…”

Tears were b in her eyes, threatening to fall but she looked up to avoid them from falling. Hakyeon glanced at Seojun sympathetically, poor thing, he thought.

She forced a smile, “I’m sorry. I’m not asking these tears to come out.”

He shook his head, gesturing her that it was not her fault that the tears came out. The tears came out for a reason, and she had the reason to shed the tears. Seojun was the victim in the situation but even though the life wasn’t really on his side, he was lucky to have a caring and loving mother that was kind enough to share love.

“You’re doing the right thing, Seojun is lucky to have you by his side,” he pulled a small smile.

She nodded as she wiped her eyes, “Yeah, he’s a lucky little punk.”

Hakyeon chuckled to hear that and ruffled Seojun’s hair. Seojun appeared to be annoyed that he made a face, making both Jaehee and him laugh to the sight.

“His father knows who the mother is?”

Jaehee shrugged, “He dates too many women, I’d bet he can’t even remember the name of the last three girls he dated last month.”

Hakyeon was surprised to hear the news; he wanted to cover Seojun’s ears from hearing the ugly truth of his father. “That was kind of uncalled for…”

She laughed, “He’s not the kind man I thought he was. Well… it was in the past… and people change.”

He saw the frustration and the disappointment in her eyes… So, at least he made a correct assumption, that there was something going on between the two of them but she buried it deep behind her head.

The doorbell rang interrupted the nice conversation both of them made. Quickly, Jaehee stood up, carrying Seojun with her and Hakyeon moved to the living room to pack Seojun’s stuff. Hongbin must be on the door, waiting to shot Hakyeon an irritating look.

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A/N; I wonder if this story still have its readers but anyhow;

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