An Extra Beat of Love

15. Memories

Jeongguk sat in his car with his phone in his hands, even though he couldn't concentrate on the article that he was trying to read. 

It had been ten minutes since Taehyung entered the gigantic hospital, and he had a feeling it would take a lot more time for him to return. 

He desperately wanted to know why Taehyung took so many tablets. He wanted to know why Taehyung was going to a hospital. He wanted to help if he could. But he knew it wasn't his place to ask him such details. 

He knew that Taehyung was born premature and sick. He could never forget the hate that he had felt (and still does) for Taehyung's father, who had left his wife and son after his son's birth when he had been the reason his son was born prematurely. 

He thought back to his own daughter. To how his ex-girlfriend would have aborted her if he had not rushed to the hospital that day after coming to know about it an hour before she was going to abort her. 

He had no idea what he would have done if Seokjin hadn't been with him at that time. He had no clue how to even work his legs to get the car started. He just remembered being overwhelmed by the fact that he was going to be a father, even though he wasn't ready for it, and knowing that his girlfriend was going to abort the baby. 

He never blamed her, though. She wasn't ready for a baby and she had mentioned it to Jeongguk about 1584 times until then. Thus, he didn't blame her for wanting to abort the baby. Hell, he wasn't ready either. But he didn't want her to do it. It was his baby too, after all. 

He recalled how he had sobbed and begged her on his knees, in front of everyone in the hospital, not to abort the baby and that he would take care of her all by himself and that he wouldn't even contact her after the baby was born. 

His girlfriend didn't want to break up with him because of the baby, but the fact that she would have to take care of the baby if she stayed with him terrified her enough to break up with him right away with the promise of signing the rights over to him the second the baby was out. 

He named her Hana, which meant 'one'. The only precious one in his life. The one who was born literally for him. Because he wanted her to step onto the earth. His 'number one'. 

Of course, the journey up until the present day wasn't easy. He had spent a lot of nights not knowing how to pacify a days-old baby girl, who was missing her mother's warmth. He had spent countless nights crying along with her when she couldn't fall asleep in her cradle. 

He remembered how terrified he had felt when the doctor had placed a bundled, peanut-sized creature into his arms along with the documents that the peanut's mother, aka his ex-girlfriend, had signed for him. 

If his parents and friends hadn't been present for him at that time, he would have been lost without even realizing it. 

He could never forget the day she spoke her first word either. 

Bad boy. 

It had been a pleasant Sunday afternoon, close to a year after she was born. Well, about as pleasant as it could get with a furious Hana sitting next to the shoe rack with an angry frown on her face. 

She had been hell-bent on wanting to chew his shoe and he had been hell-bent on keeping his shoe away from her mouth. She had tried crying and shouting at him, but when it didn't work, she yelled at him that he was a "Ba' boi". 

It had taken him a few seconds to register the fact that she had uttered her first words. After registering that, he had realized that her first word wasn't 'Appa' as he had hoped it would be. It was 'bad boy' instead. 

Upon understanding what she had said, he had burst out laughing, not realizing the fact that he had let go of the shoe that he was trying so hard to hold away from her. It had taken about five minutes for him to calm down, and by then his shoe had gotten a pretty little chew mark on it. 

And he definitely did not have the shoe even now in the bottommost shelf of his closet. 

He shook his head fondly at the memory. His daughter was a naughty one. Just like he had been. She loved playing, even though she was forced to spend most of her time watching TV (before Taehyung entered her life). 

He recalled this other time when she had tried to pull her grandmother's hair out because she had told her that Jeongguk was 'her' son. Hana had been absolutely furious at that. How could he be her 'grandmother's son' when he was 'her' father? 

She had tried to make her point by telling her grandmother that Jeongguk was hers and that he couldn't be her grandmother's son because he was her father, but when she had finally had enough of arguing, she just yelled and climbed onto the table. 

She had walked over like she was going to bop her grandmother's nose, but she grabbed her hair instead and tried to pull it out angrily. 

She had been too young for Jeongguk to scold her. And honestly, he couldn't find it in him to scold her when she was just trying to tell her grandmother that he belonged to Hana and not to Jihyo, even if she had done that by trying to pull her hair out. 

He remembered all those times when she would wrap her tiny arms around his leg and beg him not to go back to Seoul after dropping her at her grandparents' house. 

She had eventually gotten used to it, but Jeongguk still remembered wanting to just sell his company off and sit with her and spend the rest of his life with her in his arms every single time she cried and begged him not to go. 

After a lot of months, he had seen the same desperateness in her the previous night when she had realized that she was going to leave Taehyung behind and go to Seoul. And it had hurt him. 

It had even hurt his heart when Hana cried an hour ago when Jeongguk and Taehyung left for Seoul. They had to promise her that they would bring her a huge bar of chocolate and a tub of ice cream from Seoul to get her to cool down. 

'What if I just ask hyung to stay in our house instead?' a fleeting thought passed his mind, but it had him backtracking right away to get back to that thought. 

It didn't seem like a bad idea. In fact, it felt like the perfect idea he had ever come up with. 

He wouldn't have to travel to and from Ilsan every week. He wouldn't have to worry about Hana every waking moment. Not that his parents weren't taking good care of her, but if she stayed in Seoul, he wouldn't have to miss her every single week-night. 

'If he doesn't wanna stay for free, he can cook for me and Hana instead. Eomma and Appa can hire back the old cook' he thought.

He suddenly couldn't sit still. The idea was exciting. The idea of having Taehyung around all the time......was very exciting. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and bounced his leg impatiently. 

He couldn't wait to ask Taehyung if he would be willing to come and live in Seoul instead. 

He hoped Taehyung would say yes. 

He desperately wished Taehyung would say yes.