"That's the point, you never listen!"

As soon as Taehyung had opened the door to his house, he immediately heard his mom's exasperated shout. He closed the door behind him taking a deep breath in.

His parents were fighting. Again.

"And you never consider my propositions," Mr. Kim shot back.

Taehyung cautiously stood in their foyer, trying his best not to make a sound. This had been happening a lot lately that he didn't know how to feel about it. If anything, it weighed him down.

"You know what, we don't need to talk about this anymore," Mrs. Kim said defeatedly. She was too tired of the same argument; there wasn't any sense to bother with it anymore. Too much damage had been done.

"I suppose so," stated Mr. Kim. "The papers will arrive soon anyway."

Soon, his father appeared on the staircase, making his way down. Taehyung's gaze met Mr. Kim's distant and indifferent expression. He gave a small nod to his son, and a minute later, he was out of sight.

Where was he going? Who knew. But it probably had something to do with his business. That's the thing about Mr. Kim. His business always came first.

Taehyung went up to check on his mom. After two knocks, Mrs. Kim opened the door. She sent a small smile towards Taehyung's way, and he immediately noticed how watery his mother's eyes were.

"I'm okay, honey. Don't worry about me," she said.

Taehyung prevented a frown from showing. This was something Taehyung didn't like about his mom: lying about how she really feels.

Perhaps Taehyung hadn't noticed it himself—That he was actually just the same.

In the end, he could only nod at his mom. He knew he couldn't do anything anymore. He tried.
But his attempts weren't so successful.

"I'm going out for a while. Please call me if anything's up," Taehyung told his mom. "Literally anything, mom."

Mrs. Kim nodded assuringly as she whispered a soft 'thank you' to his son.

☁︎ ☁︎ ☁︎

"You look so stiff, is anything wrong?" Kyungmin raised a brow, mouth twitched upwards as she waited for Taehyung's answer.

That same afternoon, Taehyung had met with Kyungmin at the park nearby. It was funny for both of them; their houses were next to each other, yet they'd have their rendezvous at the said location.

"No," Taehyung simply muttered, sitting on a metal bar with Kyungmin standing in front of him.

"Really?" She shot Taehyung a meaningful look. "I might do silly things most of the time and be totally childish, but you know you can rely on me right? It's gonna be unfair if it's only me who always relies on you, Taetae."

"I know."

"Then what's the problem?"

"My parents..."

"Mhmm?" Kyungmin urged him to continue.

"They had a...big fight."

Kyungmin's face fell, not knowing the right words to say. Right words that wouldn't sound forced or aloof. She had known about the Kims having arguments lately, but for Taehyung to open it up was a different thing.

Failing to find the right words, she held Taehyung's hand and patted him.

"Things will get better. I'm sure it would pass," she said in the sincerest way she could as much as she hoped it would.

Oh, Taehyung knew it would. Just perhaps not the same way as Kyungmin had perceived it. Because in reality, Taehyung's parents had already found a remedy to it.

Divorce.

But that was only the first problem Taehyung had on his plate.

It was common nowadays, the concept of divorce. Two married people dissolving their ties, and perhaps heading to separate paths to start anew. Most often than not, it involved a case of fighting over custody. Because in reality, rather than the two couples bolting their way out of the marriage, it would always be the children who'd suffer the repercussions.

In this situation, it was no other than Taehyung.

Together with the separation of his parents, was his father flying back to the US, and his mother staying in Korea with her other relatives.

Unluckily, it just so happened that Taehyung would have to live with his dad, and under no circumstance could he argue with this. He did try, but to no avail, sadly.

Taehyung was going to stay with his father. And he just couldn't will himself to tell Kyungmin. Heck, he didn't know if he'd ever be back. There was just no way he could tell her.

Especially not when he could already see the way Kyungmin's glum eyes fell, and he knew too well that Kyungmin would overthink about it despite encouraging him that it would get better.

"You could share me your thoughts if that would make you feel better," encouraged Kyungmin, trying to cheer him up with a smile.

As soon as Taehyung saw Kyungmin's expression, he held his words back. He didn't want to take away the smile he had always seen on Kyungmin's face. Be it for genuine happiness or something childish. Her smile was too precious, and it always kept him going. He dared not to risk not seeing it anymore.

"Aish, don't worry about me. That's my job."

Taehyung stood up and pinched Kyungmin's cheeks, pulling them apart. She felt that they'd leave her face any instant now. But Kyungmin let him.

If this is what will make him smile today, then I'll let it slip, she thought.

Before Taehyung could find a way to tell Kyungmin, it was already too late. And perhaps Taehyung had realized sometime later...that he deserved it.

~*~
Present Time

LEE KYUNGMIN

The next day, I woke up feeling aloof towards everything. I sat up straight, massaging my temples. It didn't even feel like I had just gotten out of slumber. It was as if I had only closed my eyes for a while.

"My parents divorced," Taehyung had said, "but that was just the start of it."

An agonizing feeling twisted on my gut and I pulled my legs closer to my chest, hugging the comforter tighter. My gaze landed on Aeri, swaddled in her blanket. I ran a finger through her hair, resting my chin on my knees as I freed her arms out of the blanket.

If Taehyung had a younger sibling, he or she would've been around the age of four right now. And maybe Aeri would have another playmate. I wanted to smile at the thought, but I couldn't. Instead, I felt grief over it.

Because sadly, Taehyung's sibling didn't make it.

I still didn't know how to take it all in. A lot of things bothered my mind: from before Taehyung had left up until the present.

Taehyung left because his father took custody over him by the time his parents separated. From that moment, my fault was failing to see how Taehyung had been keeping up despite his family about to fall apart.

How could I even call myself his best friend back then if I hadn't even noticed it? I mean, I knew that his parents were getting into arguments that time. But how come I let Taehyung assure me that he was fine? Why didn't I tore his wall down so he'd open up to me about what he truly felt? I shouldn't have trusted his words back then.

Leaving me without a word was one of Taehyung's source of guilt, but when he arrived in US, he didn't think he'd find another reason to blame himself.

Taehyung had discovered that the actual root of his parents' divorce was his mother's miscarriage. I couldn't even go deeper on that thought; it brought a rather bitter taste to my mouth.

"Sorry..." I hummed when I realized I had squeezed Aeri's hand a little to tight accidentally.

Taehyung admitted that when he saw me and figured my dilemma, he offered his hand because he wanted to help us for two reasons. He wanted to make it up to me and together with that, the feeling of his mom losing her child—Taehyung losing his supposed to be sibling—mixed up.

Though he made it clear that after a while, his reasons had changed.

"I was just too drawn to Aeri. After a while, I realized it wasn't just because of my guilt anymore. Call me crazy but sometimes I wish she really were my daughter."

Still, had his reasons not changed, I wouldn't blame him for it. We had our own emptiness; we two were broken in our own ways. And both of us just struggled to cope up.

I came to understand why Taehyung often spoiled Aeri.

No one should be blamed for simply trying to find ways to be happy; to feel better, to seek answers — As long as you meant no harm, I might add.

"Taehyung's been through a lot, little Aeri," I said as if the child could hear and understand me. "He couldn't even tell his mom that he knows about her miscarriage."

I wiped the tear that had escaped from my eye.

"He couldn't even apologize to her and tell her how much he's sorry for not being there for his mom," I continued, swallowing the lump on my throat, "It must be killing him inside. Feeling sorry but not being able to expresses it openly."

"Isn't it too much though?" I wondered out loud, burying my head on my knees afterwards.

"He set his own atonement by cutting off his connections. But he didn't have anybody there to comfort him." My voice was muffled against the comforter and I could hear my own pulses ringing on my ear.

"So how...?" I took a deep breath in, coughing the sob away and continued in an almost inaudible voice, "...how had he been all this time? Who was there to tell him it wasn't his fault?"

Aeri shifted on her side, and I slid myself down to face her. As I soothed her cotton-like cheeks, my nerves somehow relaxed.

"He's been through a lot, little Aeri. Smile more for him, okay? I'm sure he'd love that."