Episode 4

The day is loud, and the day is a blur. Taehyung has a friend and he tries to introduce him to Jeongguk, but both of them together have too much energy for him to handle and he recoils away from interaction. There is another boy who is quiet, not as quiet as Jeongguk as in borderline mute, but he allows him to sit next to him and watch TV in silence. Jeongguk doesn’t learn his name until he crosses paths with him again several years later when both of them have changed so much. 

The grinning lady brings him his suitcase. The first thing he does is brush his teeth with his toothbrush and not with his finger.

At night Jeongguk is too shy to ask Taehyung to sleep next to him again. He is still next to that boy on the couch and they are watching an American cartoon that is not meant for children, but Mrs. Park does not necessarily care as long as they are entertained enough not to interrupt her business of arranging newspapers in her basement. There is a gentle tap to his shoulder from behind and he turns to a yawning Taehyung.

“I’m going to bed,” he says. “Are you coming?”

They fit themselves in it easier this night and when all the lights are out and the boys are sleeping, Jeongguk feels better.

He knows by Taehyung’s breathing that he has yet to drift off. Then, he knows by his whispers, “Do you like it here?” 

Jeongguk opens his eyes. He thought if he held them closed for long enough, he’d trick himself into falling asleep. He held them closed for one thousand a hundred and forty-two seconds before Taehyung spoke. He shakes his head into the pillow. “I don’t know,” he murmurs back to him.

He doesn’t know, but he is certain he prefers Taehyung to the grinning lady. There is some familiarity in slipping into that bed the second night. It smells the same as the previous one, smells like Taehyung.

“You’ll get used to it,” Taehyung mutters back to him, whisper ghostly on Jeongguk’s nose. “I always do.”

I always do, he says, and it is the first time it hits Jeongguk that those other boys are actually orphans, too. They have as much as he does, suitcases of their belongings and simply memories of their parents that cared about them and not about outdated newspapers. I always do, he says, and suddenly it is even easier for Jeongguk to lie next to this boy.

He speaks his name for the first time. “Taehyung,” he whispers tentatively when he sees his eyes fall closed.

They part again. Taehyung has his hand between their cheeks, resting gingerly on the surface of the pillow and Jeongguk cannot stop staring at the outlines of his fingers.

“Yes?” he prompts into the silence that follows.

Jeongguk swallows. “Can I hold your hand?”

Taehyung says nothing and, in the darkness, Jeongguk gets so nervous he almost turns his back to him. He cannot gauge anything but the shininess in his eyes, the moon seems weaker today. He’s almost told him to forget it when he sees the hand between them move. It slips down the mattress, searches the space between them, meets Jeongguk’s shuffling one by their stomachs. Their palms slide together, fingers touch. He doesn’t know if it is too bold to intertwine them, but Taehyung is doing it before he can consider.

His palm is wide, and his fingers are long, thin. The skin of it is a little dry, but so very soft, warm. It’s universally different from his mother’s hand, but Jeongguk clings onto it, perhaps he squeezes too hard, but he can’t not. 

He holds his hand. He holds Taehyung’s hand, finally has a hand to hold, and he thinks, maybe, perhaps, doubtfully, but yet possibly, he could get used to this as well. Maybe things will get better. 

But they find him an aunt. 

She is his mother’s cousin apparently, and she gets paid to take him in, just like Mrs. Park does. She gets monthly payment for having him as she is not his legal guardian, just a foster parent. That’s how the system works. The money is supposed to be used for caring expenses for Jeongguk. Mrs. Park gets the same amount for every boy she takes in. But this aunt of his apparently has more rights to have him. He doesn’t want anyone to have him really. 

He doesn’t get to say goodbye to Taehyung. The grinning lady is glad he says words from time to time now. 

His aunt wears a lot of mascara and it gathers in the corners of her eyes. She smokes a lot inside the house. This is what that house smells like to him in the construct of his memories, smokesmokesmoke. He doesn’t like cigarettes. 

One of the boys in the school he goes to smokes as well. He is thirteen, but he is in his grade. Jeongguk does not like smoke at all. 

It starts to settle in his head what it means that his mother is gone. That she is dead. She doesn’t come back. She doesn’t physically, materially exist anymore. She can’t hold his hand. Taehyung can’t either. With the state of his aunt’s nails, he gives up entirely on hand holding. Instead, he starts running. 

First, he starts running track. Next, he starts running away. 

He doesn’t know where he expects the latter to take him—he always ends up in the car of the grinning lady. The former does him better. It gets him teammates and it gets him medals. Apparently, he’s good at running. 

He’s good at running track, not that good at running drugs, but that doesn’t become a problem until later.

The second foster home he goes to, when his aunt marries and gives up on him, is different. It’s larger, has as many as fourteen boys and bunk beds for them all. Jeongguk is number fourteen and this time there is a bed meant for him. 

He stays there for a week and a half when one of the boys gets adopted.

Adopted. 

Capital A, adopted. Supposedly that’s the dream when you’re in the system. It means you get permanence. This permanence, of course, can be a gift and a curse. You can get loving parents who are unable to have children who will appreciate you. You can get a broken home.

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