Chapter Text
SEVEN YEARS LATER
“Appa! Come in quick, they have the big tree in the window, and it’s all lit up, hurry and look!”
“One moment, Yoonseo!” Jeongguk directs his call over his shoulder toward his daughter, who’s standing on Hoseok and Namjoon’s porch shouting her head off. She looks so miniature and polite in her outfit, all pinks and reds and the tiny ribbons Jimin braided into her hair, but her personality is an amusingly far cry from her dollish appearance. For being four years old, she’s one of the most fiery, outspoken and witty people Jeongguk knows.
She reminds him an awful lot of someone else.
“Darling,” Jimin nudges Jeongguk’s arm, pulling his attention. “Do you want to get the car seat or the diaper bag?”
Jeongguk turns an exaggerated pout to his husband before glancing back at the chunky car seat carrier in front of them containing their newest addition. “I want to hold him.”
“Okay, hold him,” Jimin breaks into an easy smile. He nudges Jeongguk out of the way, unclips the padded restraints keeping Sujin tucked safe and sound in his seat, and lifts him up to kiss his petal soft pink cheek. Sujin scrunches at the waist, drawing his tiny, pajama-clad feet up to his tummy even in his sleep. Coming in at a tender three weeks old, he’s usually asleep.
“There’s appa,” Jimin murmurs melodically, shushing Sujin with a little bouncing motion as he passes him along to Jeongguk. “Look at that little face,” he coos as he reaches back into the car for Sujin’s blanket and tucks it around him neatly. “I could eat him.”
“He’s perfect,” Jeongguk agrees in a heartbeat, adjusting Sujin to a comfortable position in the crook of his elbow and taking careful steps over the snow toward the front steps. “Don’t forget his bag, please.”
“Already have it,” Jimin replies, fondly exasperated. “We’ve done this entire having a child thing before, you know.”
“My doooongsaaeeengs!”
Hoseok’s trademark shrill cry of delight shatters the frigid morning air, and the front door all but explodes open. A second later, Hoseok appears, Namjoon and Taehyung on his heels. Hoseok scoops Yoonseo up as if she weighs nothing, swinging her around and around.
“Do you need help carrying anything?” Namjoon calls as they approach. He takes a step back, making room for Jeongguk and the baby.
Taehyung snaps to him in an instant, like a magnet for the little one in his arms. “Sujin looks heavy, let me give you a hand with that.”
Jeongguk rolls his eyes. He’s barely gotten to hold his own son today, but he’s not going to be the one to stand between Kim Taehyung and holding a baby at every available opportunity, so he passes Sujin along carefully, forgoing the usual list of instructions he’d give to someone ( Make sure to support his neck! Don’t hold him too low! Make sure his head is steady!) Taehyung doesn’t need all that, he knows . He’s a natural.
“Are Seokjin-hyung and Yoongi-hyung here yet?” Jimin asks, passing a round of hugs from Hoseok, to Namjoon, and then Taehyung’s arm so as not to disturb Sujin’s continued nap.
“They’re cooking up a storm right now,” Hoseok jerks his thumb over his shoulder to the hallway behind him. “Said they didn’t want any help, but I should probably set the table or something at least so it doesn’t feel like they’re hosting me in my own house.”
“ I can set the table, keunabeoji!” Yoonseo announces, puffing her chest proudly.
“Yes, you can , princess, can’t you? Come on inside, let’s go figure it out right now.”
The two of them disappear indoors, leaving the quiet behind on the sprawling front porch. Namjoon sighs happily and tips his head to the side, eyes fixed on Sujin.
“How’s baby life been? Easier the second time around?”
“Much easier,” Jimin nods his affirmation. “We know what we’re doing this time around.”
“And he’s a good baby,” Jeongguk chimes in, fond gaze directed at the tiny bundle in Taehyung’s arms. “Sleeps a lot, doesn’t cry very often. Yoonseo is obsessed with him, you know. She thinks he’s her very own doll.”
Namjoon laughs. “Isn’t she?”
“Ah, hyung,” Taehyung shivers and coddles Sujin closer to his chest. “It’s cold outside, why don’t we go in?”
The five of them move as a shuffling unit, Jeongguk and Jimin shedding coat and boots in the hallway. From the dining room, Yoonseo and Hoseok can be heard chattering away, while Yoongi and Seokjin’s endeared bickering sounds off from the kitchen. The familiar sounds of family and festivities, more dear to Jeongguk’s heart than almost anything else.
“Look at their tree,” Jimin nods toward the massive, light adorned spectacle in the corner of the living room, illuminating a soft glow onto his face. “Yoonseo was right, it is exquisite.”
“It’s beautiful,” Jeongguk hums in agreement. He’s only really looking at Jimin though.
“Aish, Jeongguk-ah,” Taehyung laments as he shifts Sujin from one arm to the other, nuzzling the baby’s wispy puff of hair. “He makes me want one of my own.”
Jimin tips his head to the side and raises his eyebrows, though he can’t seem to contain his smile. “That’s what you said when Yoonseo was born, too.”
“And I mean it,” Taehyung whines. “How could I not want one of them?”
“Hoseok wants a baby,” Namjoon interjects mildly, offering a hand to take Jeongguk’s and Jimin’s coats. He peers through the doorway at his boyfriend and lifts a shoulder. “Ever since you two told us you were having Sujin he’s been bringing it up every other day.”
“Yeah?” Jeongguk asks softly. Namjoon and Hoseok only got together two years ago after what they self-describe as a decade of mutual pining , which Jeongguk, as someone who has been friends with them both for almost as long, can confirm. They’ve had their own bumpy little story, like many other people do in love. Med school by each other’s sides, internship and residency at the same hospital. The two of them plus Jeongguk and Taehyung moving into Hoseok’s grandfather’s place all together which, of course got them Jimin (which in the long run, Jeongguk supposes, got them Yoonseo and Sujin).
When Jimin got his body back, when he got life back, he and Jeongguk moved out quickly. Not to get away from any of their roommates, but because Jimin had been stuck in that house for a hundred years and, well, it was high time for him to experience something else. A while after they left, Namjoon started seeing someone new and since he and Hoseok were apparently incapable of talking to one another and screaming Hey, I have feelings for you! Instead of wallowing in silence, tensions arose and for a moment (AKA one unbearable year) they hardly spoke to each other at all until Namjoon ditched the guy he was seeing, resolved to be single for a while and focus on himself, rekindled his friendship with Hoseok and things were normal after that for so long that everyone almost forgot anything ever happened in the first place until Namjoon and Hoseok boldly announced at dinner with everyone one night that he was moving back in with Hoseok because the two of them were happily dating.
And now they’re here. Now. Namjoon and Hoseok in their place, the one that’s become the sort of hub for when they all want to get together. Jeongguk and Jimin have a house some fifteen minutes away, one with a yard big enough for Yoonseo to run around in to her heart’s content, and the doors removed from half of the rooms because even seven years separated from being a spirit, Park Jimin still tries to walk through solid surfaces when he isn’t paying attention. It’s mostly fine when it’s only his own forehead he’s scuffing up, but less fortunate when a baby is added to the equation. Safe to say they learned the hard way that infants don’t often appreciate being walked into unyielding wood.
Taehyung has an apartment in downtown Gangnam where the nightlife is constant, and he’s never bored on his off days. He adopted a little Pomeranian last year named Yeontan that he dotes on like he birthed the puppy personally. Half the time he can be found in one of their houses, though, because some things never change, and the fact remains that Taehyung never does enjoy being alone.
Yoongi and Seokjin are still Yoongi and Seokjin, as unshifting as they always have been. Same house, same life, same consistency that Jeongguk grows to appreciate more and more as he gets older. The biggest change for them is the fact that the number of people that Yoongi can have in his life without kicking up questions has quadrupled since they all merged into one strange, unlikely family. It’s not full freedom for him, but it’s something more than he had before, and Jeongguk knows he’s grateful for it.
Every holiday spent together. Every birthday. Every achievement celebrated together and losses commiserated leaning on one another.
“Yeah,” Namjoon lifts a shoulder. His reply shakes Jeongguk out of his thoughtful brew, drawing him back to the conversation at hand.
“I never thought I wanted kids,” Namjoon admits sheepishly. At their side, Sujin begins fussing and Jimin extracts him carefully from Taehyung’s arms, bringing the baby back to his chest and shushing him sweetly. “But then I see you and Jimin and how happy you guys are, and I think of how good Hoseok is with the little ones and…I dunno, it makes me think a lot.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, hyung,” Jeongguk begins, side stepping a little closer to Jimin and looping an arm around his shoulders. “I think you and hyung would be amazing parents, if that’s what you decide. And if not, you’ll always be Yoonseo and Sujin’s best uncles.”
“Thought I was the best uncle,” Taehyung grumbles, disgruntled by the statement. Jeongguk moves the toe of his sneaker out and kicks Taehyung’s calf gently.
“You’re all the best uncles to them,” he promises. And he means every word.
“Damn right,” Namjoon breaks into a dimpled smile and nods. He takes Taehyung by the arm and tugs. “Come on, I’ll finish with the table if you go helps hyungs finish breakfast.”
“Aish, hyung, you know I can’t cook,” Taehyung admonishes but allows himself to be led down the hall anyway, leaving Jeongguk and Jimin with Sujin’s mewling sounds of discontentment. Finally waking up from his first nap of the day, Jeongguk would guess.
“Alone again,” Jimin sighs, tipping his head back on the wall behind him.
“We can go sit down, you know,” Jeongguk nudges his arm. “I’ll warm up one of Sujinie’s bottles, he’ll be hungry in a moment.”
“I know,” Jimin hums, tilting to the side so he can glance at Jeongguk, lazily fond. “Just thinking for a moment while it’s quiet.”
“Thinking?”
“About being here. How it feels…strange to come back sometimes. Everything is so different, but the house is still the same.”
“I don’t think it’s the same,” Jeongguk shrugs. He holds out a hand and lets Sujin wrap his tiny fist around his pinky finger, waggling his fat baby palm. “It’s warmer than it was before. More love, don’t you think?”
Jimin smiles, a little wistful. “A lot more love,” he agrees.
As if to accentuate their point, Jeongguk leans across the barely-there gap between them and kisses Jimin, soft and fleeting on his slightly chapped lips. Hardly a second later, Jimin laughs and pulls away, pushing Jeongguk back a little.
“Your necklace,” he chuckles. “It’s on Sujin’s forehead.”
Jeongguk glances down. Sure enough, the silver pendant is resting on the slope of Sujin’s round head, and he plucks it off quickly, thumbing over Jimin’s initials engraved there the way he finds himself doing often.
Seven years, and Jeongguk can count the number of times he’s taken this necklace off on one hand. Even after Jimin was brought back to the living, when he got that beautiful heartbeat of his own back, Jeongguk still wore the locket for months like a safety blanket and at some point it just felt wrong to take it off, so he never did.
Sometimes, though, when it’s quiet, and they’re alone together, usually late at night when they’re in bed side by side, Jeongguk will scoot down and rest his head on Jimin’s chest to listen to his pulse the way that Jimin could listen to Jeongguk’s when he was a spirit and the necklace kept them connected like a single thread weaving them both together. In those small moments, Jeongguk feels almost impossibly grateful for all the life they get to experience together.
For second chances, and love, for family, good health, and their beautiful children. The list could go on forever, a million things that Jeongguk was sure they’d never get to share with one another, by some miracle they have it all.
They have everything . Together.
“Jeongguk-ah! Jimin-ah!” Seokjin’s bossy voice floats from the kitchen, shattering the quiet. “Food’s ready, come eat!
Jeongguk loops his arm through Jimin’s, careful not to jostle Sujin, who is fully awake and blinking up at them with pretty, dark eyes. Jimin’s eyes , Jeongguk thinks fondly.
“Come on,” he tells Jimin, leaning in once more to kiss his cheek, and this time he keeps his necklace tucked under his collar where it won’t bump Sujin again. “Let’s go eat.”
“With our family,” Jimin adds on, face softening as if he’s savoring the way the word falls on his tongue.
“Always,” Jeongguk breaks into a smile that feels like the sun is balled in his chest, so warm it radiates out of him in waves. “With our family.”