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It's almost five when Bambam comes in for that evening, and to be honest, part of his mind’s still on that wild 21st birthday party Mino had promised him during school earlier, one that he'd turned down for this, up until the time he arrives at the doorstep of the orphanage, climbing the steps up the rather dilapidated old building.
For a moment, he can almost feel the thrilling burn of cherry cocktails on his tongue, smell the heavy fragrance of expensive perfumes on branded clothes and wafting from scented candles, feel the breathless heat and hear the mindless thrum of music from the dancing, and for that moment only he wonders if he’s made the right choice. Then he opens the door and, as usual, everything else is swept clear from his mind as four of the children playing by themselves in the main hall cheer promptly drop their toys and scramble up to swarm him, their words tumbling over one another in their excitement to say them and eyes alight with excitement.
"Bambam hyung!"
"Hyung, you came!"
"Bambam hyung, can we go bake the cookies now that you're here?"
Kunpimook chuckles as he smoothes down the dark strands of Jinyoung's hair, and the child's eyes crinkle into sparkling crescents as he leans into the fond touch, still clutching to the front of his shirt.
"Why not?" he smiles, without missing a beat, turning to hang his knapsack on the latch behind the door beside the other volunteers', and the crowd of kids around him cheer, giggling and scrambling over one another in their haste to put back their toys so they can go bake as well.
Well, most of them, anyway.
"Baking is for girls," Jackson complains loudly from where he picks up his cars, and Bambam gives a knowing smile as he helps Youngjae reach to put one of his trucks on a particularly high shelf.
"Well, then, I guess we'll just have to have fun all together without Jacksonnie," he shrugs, unhooking the faded superhero apron he’d claimed after their first venture together into the orphanage main kitchen from its latch behind the door, and Jinyoung laughs sharply as he drags a toddling Mark, who's still clutching on to the baby blue blanket that the caretakers had told him to stop carrying around weeks ago, by the hand to their kitchen, not before shooting a sneer at the younger boy.
(When Jackson does reappear in the spartan kitchen later, albeit rather grumpily, Bambam doesn't say a word, instead letting him shape cookie dough at the table with the rest of the kids.)
Kunpimook watches the middle child quietly, already standing up and loudly telling Mark he’s not rolling the dough right, and that he’ll roll it for him, smiling slightly as Jinyoung interjects with a snarky comment about how Jackson probably can’t do it right either anyway. It’s just another one of the many quirks that make the boy almost an enigma, even by Kunpimook’s standards, even at the tender age of six, a bright, effervescent source of energy and light that seems to draw people in like moths to a flame.
Kunpimook had never been able to stop wondering how Jackson could be so cheerful despite being in a life like this, how he could bear the pain and the anger and plaster a smile on his face anyway, and his questions had only been resolved the day the bright-eyed, raucous boy had come to him one night in the orphanage main kitchen when he was washing the dishes. He’d proceeded to pull the still relatively new caretaker into what started as a light-hearted, thoughtless conversation about the usual disjointed, seemingly nonsensical things that were always on his mind, before Jackson started raising his voice in annoyance, as if Kunpimook wasn’t answering his questions, and before Kunpimook knew it, started shouting, tears streaming down his face, asking him over and over again why his parents didn’t love him enough to keep him, if it’d been his fault, if they would take him back if he said sorry enough.
Jackson’s abandonment had been the last one Kunpimook came to know of after getting here, and to anyone else, it would’ve sounded like a cliché, how the fragile two-year-old had been left in a bundle of newspapers on the orphanage doorstep, but only the caretakers and perhaps the other children understood the fear and depression it had driven the young boy into. Kunpimook had later learned that the smiles and laughter were nothing but elaborate masks, deceptively crafted to lure people into needing Jackson, needing his energy and infectious mirth, so they’d never be able to leave him ever again. Instead of feeling hurt or betrayed like Kunpimook thought he would, however, he’d been overcome by the overpowering sense of purpose to make the laughter real, to make the smiles that lit up the young boy’s face genuine, sincere ones.
Yugyeom had smiled when Kunpimook spilled his thoughts to the older boy, had taken his hand shyly and said how impressed he was by how fast he was learning, and Kunpimook had felt warm in ways distant but strangely familiar that night.
Right then, however, Kunpimook’s so focused on half-shouting over the excited trill of little boys’ voices in the cramped kitchen for them to wash your hands before touching the dough and to stop sneaking bites of the batter, Jackson, that he almost doesn’t notice the one empty spot at the table, almost doesn’t notice how one voice isn’t clamouring impatiently for his attention, almost doesn’t notice the absence of a presence that would’ve otherwise been easily overlooked anyway, and his heart sinks ever so slightly.
He lets his gaze travel to where Jinyoung's now loudly instructing Mark on how to perfectly push out the batter from the cookie cutters, then reluctantly thinks back to the stormy atmosphere that’d hung around the boys’ rooms the previous evening, emanating especially from the bunk above Youngjae’s bed. Jaebum's difficult to manage on good days, and on the bad ones, when he has nightmares about his father or when he's had a fight with Jinyoung, it's near impossible to even get near him.
"Seen Jaebummie?" he asks Youngjae conversationally as he passes by the oven, where the oldest of the five is fixated on twirling the temperature and time dial. The child's face darkens alarmingly at the mention of the orphanage's reputed trouble kid, before he sighs in a manner that sounds far too exhausted for any child his age.
"He and Jinyoungie argued again," Youngjae mutters, tiptoeing to squint at the faded digital display showing the temperature, which had been covered in grease smudges and scratches long before the oven had even been donated. Kunpimook exhales slowly, feeling weight work its way into his shoulders at the words. When he’d first come in two months ago, it’d been the hardest being in the same proximity as the second youngest boy, let alone reach out to him, and even now, he finds he’s never been able to truly understand the temperamental child’s mind.
"I'll talk to him later okay?" he forces on a smile despite the heaviness of his heart, reaching out to ruffle the younger boy's hair affectionately. "Don't you worry about a thing."
Youngjae finally turns to him then, wide eyes full of uncertainty and hurt and perhaps just a bit of regret, and it's then Bambam notices the dark blue patch just under his eye, and the puffiness of the skin around it.
"Who did this to you?" he asks at once, frowning in concern as he reaches out to smooth a thumb over the bruise, and Youngjae winces.
"Jaebum," he mumbles quietly, as though admitting a crime, and Bambam's heart sinks.
"Why?"
"I tried to stop him from hitting Jinyoungie!" Youngjae starts out strong, as though arguing his point, then adds on in a lower tone, head lowered, as though ashamed. "Then I yelled at him after he hit me.”
Kunpimook waits, sensing Youngjae isn’t quite finished with his story, and watches in slight apprehension as the younger boy draws a steadying breath, as though it’s taking him all the effort in the world to say what he has to next.
“I said it was why no one wanted to adopt him."
"Oh Youngjae," Kunpimook says, voice reproachful, and Youngjae immediately looks back up at him, eyes a startling red and brimming with tears, like he’s been holding back the tears all day and Kunpimook’s just broken the dam by confirming his worst fears.
"It wasn't my fault! I'm just sick of him losing his temper so much! It’s so unfair, why does no one ever listen to me?!” Youngjae’s voice is trembling dangerously, and the way his eyes crumple into desperate, angry reddened slashes makes Kunpimook’s heart break a little more than it already has after the precious window of time he’d spent here. “I'm so sick of being hit and shouted at when I just want to care for them! Should I have just let him hit Jinyoung, then? Why can’t anyone care about me too, hyung?”
“Hey, hey,” Kunpimook says, voice low with urgency and reassurance, as he cups the nine-year-old’s cheeks, gently brushing away tear tracks with his thumbs, shifting so his body hides Youngjae from the curious stares of the other boys in the kitchen. “I never said I didn’t appreciate what you do for us, right, Youngjae-ah? You’re like our little hero, you know that? You’ve no idea how grateful all of us are for helping to manage the boys while the other caretakers and I are busy with the other kids, you know that?”
Youngjae’s bottom lip trembles, as his delicate fingers wrap around Kunpimook’s wrists, clinging onto him as though never wanting him to go again.
“But I made him cry,” Youngjae’s voice breaks as he says it, eyes wide and liquid guilt leaking freely from their edges. “I made Jaebummie cry, hyung, now he’ll never listen to me ever again.”
Kunpimook bites his lip- adoption is a touchy subject here, succeeded only, perhaps, by the mention of their birth parents, so it’s no wonder Youngjae feels so terrible about it.
“Well, we’re going to have to apologise to him later, won’t we?” Kunpimook says softly, giving Youngjae as encouraging a smile as he can muster, before gently pulling him into a hug, rubbing soothing patterns into the younger boy’s shaking back. “C’mon, everyone makes mistakes, and we learn things from them, right? It’s not your fault you were stressed, and you were trying to protect Jinyoungie, weren’t you? So don’t think too much about that now, and let’s focus on saying sorry to Jaebum, okay?”
Youngjae nods numbly after a moment, breaths shaky, and turns back to the oven as Kunpimook straightens, and Jinyoung and Jackson quickly turn back to their respective mounds of cookie dough, as if they hadn’t been listening in. Mark is frowning, oblivious, as he tries to push a cookie cutter through the circle of dough that Jackson had rolled out for him with chubby fingers (bravely overcoming the fact that only his nose and eyes can be seen when he sits at the table), but midway notices a few of the crumbs that stick to his tiny fingernails and promptly gets distracted, wide eyes studying the sticky batter like he’s discovered the secret to the universe.
Kunpimook sighs, turning back to the messy bowl he’d been making more cookie batter in, and at that point in time, can’t help but wish Yugyeom’s here. It’s strange, how much his life has changed after meeting the tall boy in the corridor who’d been passing out flyers, asking for volunteers and donations for the orphanage, with a quiet, sweet enthusiasm that had forced Kunpimook to stop in his tracks on the way to his History of Arts lecture to take one and think it over carefully. Up till then, his college life had mostly consisted of fashion design, going to rich kids’ birthday parties, casually flirting with smoking hot fraternity guys, and he liked to joke with the older boy about how uncool he’d become ever since he’d signed up for the extra community service hours (and perhaps to get to know the tall, soft-spoken boy a little better).
There’s just something, something about the steady way Yugyeom works, the quiet, sincere confidence that takes Kunpimook’s breath away more than any edgy, smouldering grins or crooked charisma ever can, that makes the glitter and glitz of the material world pale and flake away in comparison to the way he glows. Something Kunpimook had never thought he’d fall so deeply in love with when he was nineteen and on top of the world with his friends, drinks, and parties.
Then, of course, then came along his makeshift family here, whose bright smiles and innocent words reignited something in Kunpimook that he thought he’d lost a long time ago. Youngjae had been a main perpetrator of those ideals- it’s ironic, Kunpimook thinks, how a child whose life had been torn apart by his parents’ divorce would know so much about love. He’d been Kunpimook’s main source of support from the children during his transition into the family, persuading the other kids to accept the uncertain, reluctant new caretaker into their hearts and lives, and day by day, watching him struggle to take care of the other kids in their division despite only being nine years old, it’d touched something in the older boy that he never knew even existed. Unlike the other kids, Youngjae’d been old enough to remember what a mother’s and father’s love felt like before it’d been forcefully taken away from him when they both refused to take custody of him after their divorce, and sometimes when Kunpimook stayed late enough to kiss the kids goodnight, he would hear the oldest child crying into his pillow under the blankets.
It made Kunpimook want to promise he’d be there for the boy forever, though he knew he’d never be able to fulfil that vow.
He’s busy mulling over the thought, listlessly mixing the next batch of cookie batter, when he sees Mark perk up from the corner of his eye, eyes bright and wondering as he turns and cranes his neck to look into the main hall. Then he hears it- the rattle of the main gate as it opens, then shuts quietly, lock carefully sliding back into place, and something clicks amongst the boys as they turn to share excited looks, before there’s a loud groan of chairs being pushed back and they’re scuttling out, joyful shouts echoing down the corridor.
“Yugyeom hyung!”
And Kunpimook walks over to stand by the doorway, watching with a rather content smile as Yugyeom steps in, eyes lighting up at the sight of the kids already there to greet him, and of the tiniest of the four children toddling up excitedly, arms already outstretched.
In moments, Yugyeom’s lifted Mark up off the floor, nuzzling the boy’s nose with his own with a smile, eliciting a delighted squeal from the boy, and groans from the other boys about how it’s so unfair, Mark always gets the special treatment, and Yugyeom chuckles, shifting Mark to one arm to envelop the rest of the kids in a warm hug that kind of makes Kunpimook want to melt into this gooey puddle on the floor.
“We’re baking cookies!” Jinyoung says informatively, as Yugyeom straightens, and the rest of the kids scatter to get ahead.
“They’re sugar cookies!” Jackson adds, as though searching for something to say that would make him important as well, and Youngjae nods. “Bambam hyung made the batter and we’re cutting it now!”
Then Yugyeom’s eyes flick up to Kunpimook, and all over again, the rush of bashful affection that Kunpimook thought he’d left behind with his prepubescent hormonal days hits him like a tidal wave at the unspoken gratefulness he conveys.
“Hey,” Yugyeom grins, fingers gently brushing against Kunpimook’s knuckles as he passes by, still carrying Mark in one arm, who’s cooing happily into his blanket over Yugyeom’s shoulder now, ignoring the remaining cookie dough crumbs on his hands. “Smells good.”
“I know, right?” Kunpimook sends him a sideways smile as he tears off a piece of the paper towels in the kitchen, soaking it in tap water, before going over to wipe Mark’s hands clean. “So how was the paper?”
Yugyeom lets out a relieved exhale, still grinning. “Can’t say I’ll ace the exams, but it was okay. I’m just glad they’re over, to be honest, so I can finally spend time with the kids.”
“Spend time with Mark,” Mark says cheerfully, and Kunpimook stifles a laugh when Mark pushes his blanket into Yugyeom’s face, and the older boy pretends to faint.
“Didn’t they tell you to keep that in your bed after you wake up some time ago?” Yugyeom grins, his words lecturing but his tone light, and Mark smiles gleefully, clutching his blanket tight, before saying a cute “no!” and burying his face in Yugyeom’s shoulder.
Kunpimook starts when he looks at the clock next and realises it’s almost six, and that they’re going to have to clear out soon for the staff to start preparing dinner for the whole orphanage of kids, and shooes Jackson and Jinyoung off to wash their hands as he puts the last batch of cookies into the oven and wraps the rest of the dough in cellophane.
They’re watching television in the living room with the rest of the orphanage kids by the time he comes out, hanging his apron on the latch absently, as the Power Rangers onscreen combine their plastic looking vehicles to form some giant robot to combat the even more giant monster that’s come out of nowhere. Youngjae makes space on the couch next to Yugyeom for him to sit, and he thanks the younger boy as he fits himself in the tight space, chuckling softly when the boys let out a collective awed sound as something big explodes on the screen.
Kunpimook only turns slightly to look at Yugyeom a while later, at the relaxed, contented look in his eyes as he gently pats a calming rhythm against Mark’s back, then at the three-year-old snuggled into his chest, eyes lidded and face half-hidden by his blanket.
Mark’s the only one in their division whose parents hadn’t willingly left him- they’d been on holiday in Australia with his older brother Joey, leaving a two-year-old Mark with his aunt for the one week they were away, when they’d died in a car crash along a long stretch of road during a night drive, landing him in the orphanage when his aunt said she’d had no means of supporting him, being unemployed and studying. Kunpimook had heard stories from the permanent staff here, how the youngest boy would wake up crying in the middle of the night, confused and teary and frustrated that he was unable to understand why his parents weren’t ever coming back from their holiday for him. They’d explained his family was gone, gone to somewhere they could never return from, somewhere Mark would go to too after a long while, and Mark would ask why over and over again but Kunpimook could never find a way to explain.
He’d only learned about how much the event had affected the youngest boy when he’d let it slip about how he wouldn’t be around for a week to go to Japan for a study trip, and Mark had promptly gone white and clutched on to his sleeve, eyes wide and fearful and teary, demanding that Kunpimook promise he wouldn’t go, because then he might leave Mark and never be able to come back too.
(Kunpimook had gone, in the end, less for the purpose of incorporating the oriental summer scenery into his designs and more to prove to Mark that people could come back after they’d left, too.)
Kunpimook almost doesn’t want to disturb the serenity of the scene before him, but the thought of one of their five precious kids holed up in one of the many identical rooms above, seething and broken and all alone, forces him to lean closer to Yugyeom, tapping the older boy’s shoulder.
“Jaebum’s angry again,” he says in a low voice, wincing slightly when he feels the tension work its way into Yugyeom’s back at the words.
“Yeah,” Yugyeom mutters, hands stilling in their peaceful rhythm against Mark’s back. “I figured as much when I didn’t see him around just now. Any idea why?”
“Jae says that he and Jinyoung argued last night, and probably fought this morning,” Kunpimook hopes his words are sufficiently obscured by the obnoxious sounds of laser gunfire from the television, and thankfully, none of the boys turn to stare curiously at them. Drawing attention to Jaebum is the last thing he wants to do at a time like this. “No idea why, though.”
Yugyeom sighs, front teeth worrying at his lower lip as he sinks into a moment of deep thought, before he straightens, lifting Mark off his lap and chuckling faintly when the younger boy lets out a disappointed whine, before snuggling up to Jinyoung.
“Thanks,” he says absently, fingers once more ghosting across Kunpimook’s own as he stands. “Hey, be around for later okay? I’ll probably need you.”
“You’ll always need me,” Kunpimook says dryly, flashing a grin which he hopes lightens at least some of the load on Yugyeom’s shoulders, and feels a trickle of relief at the way Yugyeom lets out a laugh, cheeks reddening slightly under the cold ceiling light.
“Yah, you know what I mean,” the older boy says, slightly embarrassed, lips quirking slightly in a quick, shy smile, before he turns, disappearing silently up the stairs.
And inexplicably, of course, Kunpimook does.
It’s almost dinner by the time Kunpimook heads upstairs, heart thudding nervously as he pads silently across the floorboards to the room shared by the five boys. The door’s slightly ajar- Yugyeom would never close the door alone in a room with Jaebum, because he knows it triggers bad memories, and he can hear soft words, muffled by distance, travelling out the crack.
He stops just outside the room, and he can hear Jaebum as well now, can hear the anger forced out in his voice, the hoarseness induced from crying for a day, and Kunpimook doesn’t dare to move lest he shatter the moment, shatter whatever meagre amount of trust he’s managed to build between himself and the wary boy.
Jaebum had been one of the few abuse cases the orphanage had taken in- most abuse cases were left to relatives or foster homes or even social service centres, but he’d been left here, silent and furious and heartbroken beyond repair. Kunpimook had been carefully warned about Jaebum when he’d come in, how to never mention his father or raise his voice around him or touch him anywhere, and he’d been terrified of the fierce-eyed boy.
According to the other caretakers, before he got used to the system, he’d fly into rages, smashing things and shouting and hitting anyone that came close to him. He was disrespectful, constantly suspicious, violent, and it was sad, almost, one of them had commented, how much he was starting to become like the person he hated the most in his life.
Right now, however, Kunpimook listens to the soft lull of Yugyeom’s voice, the weight of the sincerity behind every word, and he hopes with all his heart that Jaebum can hear it as clearly as he does.
He jumps when the door opens slightly, half-darting behind a broom closet to hide, but it’s only Yugyeom, looking relieved that Kunpimook’s there and beckoning for him to come in.
Kunpimook goes in, slightly puzzled, and mimics Yugyeom to kneel in front of the boy, whose eyes are painfully red and regarding the younger caretaker with suspicion.
“Let’s tell Bambam-hyung what we said, okay?” Kunpimook feels Yugyeom’s gentle touch on his shoulder, and tries his best to keep up with the situation. “We’ll always be around for Jaebummie, won’t we? Even if we aren’t properly here in the orphanage, we’ll be there for Jaebum if he needs us, right?”
“Yeah, of course,” Kunpimook affirms immediately, and the worry that’d sunken in his heart this whole evening bubbles out in that one phrase, as he turns to face the boy, straightening in earnest. “Jaebum-ah, no matter what, we’re going to be there for you when you need us, okay?” he inhales, struggling to find the words to convey the anxiety in his heart. “How you feel matters to us, okay? If you’re angry, upset, anything, you can always tell us, you know that?”
“He’s right,” Yugyeom agrees, and Kunpimook feels a wave of relief, that he’s said the right thing. “When you’re hurt, or upset, the other caretakers and us will be around to listen to you, okay? But no matter what,” Yugyeom’s tone takes on one of firm but still warm authority here. “We must never hit someone else out of anger, no matter how angry we feel, right?”
Jaebum’s face darkens here, and Kunpimook steals a nervous glance over at the older boy, but he’s holding fast, countenance unchanging.
“When you hit people, you hurt them, right?” Yugyeom says slowly. “When you hit Youngjae today, you hurt him, do you know that?”
“He told me I’d never get adopted,” Jaebum snarls, almost spitting the words out, and Kunpimook feels a wave of pity for the boy at the venom that had been grafted into his words by years of taking blows and harsh words.
“He was protecting Jinyoung,” Yugyeom says firmly, before his gaze softens. “People can get angry when they’re trying to protect something that means a lot to them, and when they get angry they tend to say things they don’t really mean, right? Youngjae’s trying his best to protect all of you, you know that?”
Jaebum averts Kunpimook’s eyes, staring defiantly at the floor, but even so, the caretaker can see the younger boy thinking Yugyeom’s words over, can see the heart that’d hardened to stone in him slowly softening around the edges.
“So, if Youngjae says sorry to you for saying that to you later,” Yugyeom says softly. “Will you say sorry to him for hitting him too?”
Jaebum remains silent for a while longer, jaw set and eyes dark, before he gives a single, reluctant nod, and looks up at Yugyeom, uncertainty unconsciously showing in his eyes.
Kunpimook watches as Yugyeom lifts up his hands slightly, as one would just before hugging someone, his own eyes reflecting nothing but honesty and hopefulness, but remaining unmoving, waiting for Jaebum to close the gap between them.
After a second’s pause, Jaebum takes a step forward, as Kunpimook knows he’s done many times before, accepting the affectionate gesture stiffly, but all it takes is one look into his eyes during the warm contact and Kunpimook knows he appreciates it, that he craves the loving touch as much as Mark or Jinyoung does, but just doesn’t know how to react to it.
When they separate, Kunpimook holds out his own hands hesitantly, hope overriding the fear still residing in him, and his heart leaps when, after a few nerve-wrecking seconds, Jaebum steps forward hesitantly, leaning into Kunpimook’s embrace, and for a moment all the older boy can feel is a frail, shaking five-year-old boy wanting love as much as any other child would, before Jaebum shifts and Kunpimook relinquishes him reluctantly.
(Jaebum apologises to the two oldest children brusquely later, and Youngjae almost cries, but dinner goes on with the other kids otherwise without event, and Kunpimook has never felt so relieved.)
“So, what was the issue?” Kunpimook asks sometime after dinner, when he’s washing the dishes and the boys in their division are clattering around in the kitchen, excitedly slathering sugar water icing on their cookies. Jinyoung’s seated beside Jaebum again, bossing the younger boy around about how to put the icing on such that it doesn’t drip onto the plate, and though it doesn’t show, Kunpimook knows Jaebum’s relieved things are back to normal.
Yugyeom sighs as he picks up a plate and dries it off with the towel in his hands, voice lowering.
“Jinyoung might be getting adopted.”
Kunpimook blinks, hands stilling in their automatic movements with the dishes. He hadn’t seen that coming. Adopted? No wonder Jaebum had been so bitter.
“And, y’know, to this day, Jaebum hasn’t been able to properly get close to any of the kids other than Jinyoung,” Yugyeom mutters, stacking the plate with the rest in the cupboard. “I guess it seemed like Jinyoung was leaving him, so I think it reminded him of his mother.”
Kunpimook feels something sink inside him at the mention of Jaebum’s mother- who’d left early on in the relationship for another man, despite knowing about how violent her husband could get, how violent he could get with her son.
“Well, I’m just glad he understands now,” Kunpimook murmurs, resuming in the mundane chore, and Yugyeom nods, drying another bowl. Despite the worry that’s rising in his chest for Jaebum, Kunpimook can’t help but feel happy about Jinyoung’s adoption. He turns slightly, catching sight of the boy now biting on a cat-shaped cookie, encouraging Jaebum to take one too.
When the other caretakers spoke about Jinyoung’s abandonment, they usually only talked about his father, and how he’d left the family to pursue a relationship with some other woman. They talked about how irresponsible the man was, how Jinyoung and his sisters had suffered, how broken Jinyoung had become from losing his father.
They never spoke about his mother.
Kunpimook had only learned from Yugyeom sometime later that the deciding factor for Jinyoung’s residence at the orphanage had never truly been his father. His mother had been distraught after the family had been abandoned, and while everyone expected that this carry on for some time, then for her to pick herself up and carry on taking care of her three young children, it’s like the period of rest had been extended indefinitely for the woman.
She’d been fired after weeks of not turning up to work, during which she’d forget to give the children meals, neglect taking them to school or forget they were there after she’d dropped them off, and it wasn’t hard to tell after a while that she was cracking under the pressure of the loss. That, or she’d just stopped taking responsibility for her children.
Either way, at the age of eight, Jinyoung’d had to fend for his two younger sisters and himself. The neighbours had to get used to the little boy wandering around the apartment at dinnertime, asking for leftovers. The other children would tell their parents that they saw Jinyoung walking his two sisters to school in the morning. The ladies at the provision shops nearby saw him coming over so often, carrying his mother’s wallet and asking for people’s help to get things off shelves, that they’d gotten worried and started talking amongst themselves.
Before long, social services had gotten to the root of the situation, and it’d taken a lot of persuasion to get Jinyoung to willingly separate from his sisters and, by that time, mentally unstable mother, to come here. No one knows where his mother’d gone, and Yugyeom had told Kunpimook his sisters had been left at a girls’ convent orphanage a few neighbourhoods away. But Jinyoung’d been strangely calm on the day of his arrival here, conducting himself with an eerie detachment that had unnerved even Yugyeom.
It was only later that they realized how he’d been forced to control the family, control his mother, lie to her and distract her long enough to get money and other necessities to keep the family alive. He’d speak easily with the other caretakers, who’d find themselves leaning towards bending over backwards to provide for the charismatic young boy. He’s extraordinarily like Jackson, Kunpimook realizes, only he’s long moved past the stage of coaxing and begging and progressed onto outright manipulation to get what he wants.
Kunpimook has rare few chances when he’s beside Jinyoung, or gets to hold his hand or speak with him only, but when he does, he tries his best to convey the sincerity of his words, tries his best to show him that when it comes to him and Yugyeom, none of the lies, none of the choice words and calculated expressions are needed. At times like these, he’ll see the shame in Jinyoung’s eyes, the flashes of uncertainty, the trust that makes him both leap in hope and wonder if he’s being taken in by another one of the younger boy’s tricks at the same time.
The thought makes his heart sink lower than it already has in the entirety of the day.
Kunpimook suddenly drops his hands in the soapy mixture, sighing, and feels the questioning, and slightly alarmed, stare on the side of his face from the older boy.
“It’s just-…” Kunpimook feels something wind up like elastic inside him, hopelessly knotted and tense and a lump rises painfully in his throat. “They’re just kids and they need to understand how to be happy for someone else when they feel loss, they need to learn to cope with the death of the only people they’ve known all their life, they’re lying and cheating because it’s the only way they know how to survive and it’s so-…” his voice wavers slightly, tone hollow and deadened. “It’s so unfair, hyung. No kid their age should ever have to deal with anything like this.”
“Hey, that’s why we’re here, isn’t it?” Yugyeom says gently, leaning a little closer, so Kunpimook can feel the inevitably calming warmth of his body wash over him, like a blanket on a cold night or a mug of hot chocolate, soothing and sweet and tangible.
“But we can’t always be here, Gyeom,” Kunpimook says, voice dropping to an urgent whisper, turning to look at the boy fully in the eyes, desperation leaking through in his words. “What if I need to move back to Thailand? What about when you need to go for national service? What’s going to happen to them, hyung?”
“Hey,” Yugyeom’s voice softens, and the way he looks at Kunpimook then is reminiscent of the way he looks at the kids, making the younger boy feel strangely naïve and childish once more, a sensation he’d thought he’d never be able to experience again once he’d turned sixteen and deliberately cut that part of his life away from him. “You know, we’re not here to just take away the pain, right? The kind of scars they have can’t be erased even if we spend years we don’t have trying to heal them. We’re here to teach them that even if they’ve been beaten or abandoned or hurt, they can come back from it all and start again, right? We’re teaching them to put the pain behind them and live, with or without us around.”
Kunpimook blinks at the weight of those words, letting them slowly sink into his mind as he stares up in wonder at the older boy, and Yugyeom chuckles, morphing back into the shy, easily embarrassed boy, cheeks colouring. Kunpimook feels a surge, then, of something he can’t for the life of him identify, for the other boy, so strong and warm and uncontrollable he has to turn back to the dishes, continuing in the robotic scrubbing motions though most of him is shaking from the magnitude of what he feels.
He doesn’t have to keep it up for long though, because after a moment, Jackson’s running up with Mark in tow, balancing a plate of carefully iced heart-shaped cookies, a winning smile on his face, and before long all seven of them are at the rickety old wooden table in the center of the kitchen, usually used to prepare food, eating cookies and talking and laughing, and somewhere in the midst of it all, Kunpimook finds Yugyeom’s hand under the table, and holds on tight, feeling the same rush of warmth as before when the other boy’s fingers tighten around his, as though assuring him he’s here, he’s here with him and the kids and that he won’t be leaving anytime soon.
They stay to tuck the kids in (it’s Friday and exams are over, Yugyeom shrugs when Kunpimook asks) and Kunpimook’s pressing a kiss against Jackson’s forehead, feeling a flutter of gratification at the peaceful smile on the younger boy’s face, as Yugyeom’s carrying Mark into his cot, affectionately swathing the sleepy boy in blankets and his favourite teddy bear. Kunpimook hesitates when he tiptoes to look into Jaebum’s bunk, but very slowly presses a kiss onto the boy’s head as well, feeling a mixture of relief and hope when the child doesn’t recoil or pull away, instead leaning ever so slightly into the touch, eyes closed. Jinyoung gives him a usual dose of cutesy aegyo when he kisses him goodnight, and Youngjae beams, so by the time Kunpimook’s picking up his knapsack downstairs with Yugyeom, he’s feeling slightly giddy with a general contentment he hasn’t experienced in a while.
They walk home together in silence- the buses are still running but they live close enough by, Yugyeom just a few blocks down from where Kunpimook lives, and it’s peaceful.
“You did great today,” Yugyeom comments shyly, as they walk past the row of identical apartments, cars rolling by on the road obliviously. “First time being able to hold Jaebum, right? I don’t think even the other caretakers have gotten there yet.”
“Yeah, well,” Kunpimook flushes slightly, pleased at the praise. “You’re really the expert here, I mean, with the way you managed to talk him into it-…”
“No, I’m just-…” Yugyeom laughs nervously, rubbing the back of his neck. “I guess I got lucky. I really didn’t know what I was doing, so I guess I’m just glad things worked out in the end.”
Kunpimook’s about to argue that Yugyeom’s the only one whose able to communicate properly with Jaebum when the breeze picks up, and a strong gust of frigid air strikes his bare arms, making him shiver involuntarily.
He’s barely had the time to open his mouth to jokingly comment about how he should’ve just listened to his mom when she asked him to wear a sweater this morning, when he hears the shifting of fabric, and Yugyeom’s tugged off his jacket, sliding it onto the younger boy despite his protests.
Kunpimook blushes as he shrugs on the thick, soft material gratefully, unable to hold back a thought about how comforting the smell is and how he’d probably keep the jacket just to smell it and feel happy every so often.
They stop outside Kunpimook’s apartment block, standing close to the main door to absorb heat from inside, and he’s just returning the jacket when something possesses him to grab onto Yugyeom’s hand just before he withdraws it, taking a deep breath to tiptoe slightly and press a soft kiss onto the older boy’s lips.
A kiss that would’ve meant nothing to him had it been for anyone else, a kiss that’s shy and uncertain and everything Kunpimook’s promised himself never to be again until he’d met Yugyeom, a kiss that’s raw affection and hope which conveys everything Kunpimook’s become, after the jaded, snarky boy he once used to be, until the stunning simplicity that was Kim Yugyeom came in and shattered every last wall he’d built to hide himself from the world.
“I love you,” it’s Yugyeom who says it this time, blinking and flushing as though it’d come out before he could stop it, and Kunpimook laughs breathlessly, clutching onto the other boy’s hand tightly, and as he thinks back to the smiles of the five children at the light that the boy before him had brought into their lives, leaning in to capture another soft, chaste kiss, he can’t help but think about how it’s almost like Yugyeom’s healed him too, as though he’d been any of the other children- set him on his feet again to be ready to face the world, opened his eyes to the intangible whispers of meaning people usually took years of searching to understand, so he’s quite sure he’s telling the truth when he replies him, quiet and sincere and hopeful, cheeks colouring and voice soft, foreheads touching when he speaks.
“I love you too.”