PSYCHE-KSJ•JHS✔️

|Epilogue|

FOUR YEARS LATER

"Where the hell...." Hoseok mumbles scans the large hanging signs of the local Target. He feels like they move stuff each new time that he comes into the building.

"Marco!" He calls out as he walks.

"Polo!"

He stops walking suddenly and looks around at the sound of his daughter's voice. She sounds further than from him than she needs to be.

"Mina?" He calls her name as he starts walking back the way he heard her voice.

"Daddy."

"Where are you?"

"Please?" Mina's voice is closer as he turns the corner of the toy aisle. "This?"

Hoseok looks to find her pointing to a slime set. She can make her own in various colors.

"You have one of those already. Come on. We have to find Mommy a new throw blanket." He holds his hand out for hers and she pouts.

Mina crosses her arms over chest as her eyebrows pull together. She puts her head down and just her lip out, frowning.

"Mina, seriously?"

"I wan' it." She whines.

Hoseok squats to her eye level as he talks to her.  "But Mina, you have that already. You barely play with the one you've got."

"But I want this one." Mina points to the box and Hoseok watches her eyebrows pull together more. Her mouth opens and she inhales. "It has yellow."

Hoseok intakes a drag of a breath as he smiles. "You only ran out of yellow?"

"And blue." Her frown begins to slowly dissipate seeing her father's excitement.

"So you need both? What colors do you have left?"

"Pink and purple."

"So I'll buy you a new one this time but next time, we'll watch YouTube videos to make it from home, okay?"

"Okay, Daddy."

He grabs the box off the shelf and hands it to her.

She giggles as she runs off down the aisle.

"And where's your brother?" Hoseok asks, sounding exasperated.

It's always like this. Every time they come into Target, he gets swindled and loses one or both of them.

"I don't know." Mina calls as she drops her box into the cart on top of the groceries. She hugs her father's leg as he pushes the cart, looking for his son.

"I love you."

"You just sucka'd me." He points out and she giggles.

She doesn't know exactly what it means but she knows that he often says it after he gives in to whatever she asked for. He's been saying it since she was about two so she's grown up hearing it frequently.

"Your mom gonna beat me up. You know that?" He looks at her and she puts her thumb in her mouth. "You have to keep your slime in the play room, Mina. I'm serious. If the stuff gets into the carpet again or stains it, she's not gonna be happy. You need to use the craft table that she got you, alright?"

"Yes, Daddy. Can we get ice cream after this?"

Hoseok sighs, knowing that she only listened to him to ask for ice cream.

"Did you hear what I said?"

"Yes. No slime on the carpet 'cause Mommy don't like it. Can we?"

"Yeah. If you help me find Khari."