Secret Son / Bang Chan

Part 11

Tears stung my eyes and I smiled brightly as he pulled me into a tight hug. We both laughed through our tears. Han Jisung was my childhood best friend, we had grown up together. We had drifted apart for a little bit but he was there for me when after I got pregnant with Grey.

"MOMMA, I WON!" Grey suddenly came round the corner of the hallway but suddenly froze when he saw me hugging Jisung and crying, "momma?"

Jisung let go of me and we both wiped the tears from our eyes. I approached Grey and gently picked him up. He stared at me with concern all over his little face.

Grey, this is my friend Jisung. You don't remember it but he took really good care of us when you were born." I explained to him. Jisung waved at him and smiled but Grey just stared blankly between the two.

"Your face is funny." Grey mumbled while glaring at Jisung.
"Grey that's not nice." I scolded. The toddler just looked at me with a blank face and continued to dig himself into a hole.
"But it is Momma."
"Greyson!"
I was absolutely floored by his comments, he had never acted like this before. I had raised him to not judge people based on their appearances and most certainly not to make comments about others like that.

The little boy squirmed in my arms so that I would put him down, he immediately ran over to Felix and clung to his leg. I gave Jisung an apologetic look.
"Sorry, he's not usually like this." I spoke softly, Jisung just laughed off Grey's behavior and gave me another hug.
"Seems like we have a lot to catch up on huh?"

Jisung and I sat together on the patio of Felix, Seungmin, and Jeongin's apartment. The others were inside with Grey watching a movie together. Grey had fallen asleep on Felix's lap early on during the movie and it gave Jisung and I the perfect opportunity to sneak away and catch up with one another.

"So how have you been? I haven't heard from you much over the past year?" I was the one to start the conversation. Jisung smiled softly as he looked out on the skyline.

"I've been good, really good actually. I'm actually back because Yeji and I are engaged." A shy smile crossed Jisung's face and I couldn't help the excitement that crossed mine at the news. 

Hwang Yeji had been Jisung's girlfriend for the past six years. Back in our middle school days, our friend group had consisted of Jisung, Felix, Yeji, her twin brother Hyunjin, and me. Chan joined the mix halfway through our sophomore year of high school when he came as a foreign exchange student from Australia. After high school we all went out different ways but still tried to keep in touch with each other, the only exception being Chan because of everything that happened. Jisung, Yeji, and Felix helped take care of me when I was pregnant with Grey but both left Seoul before I had him; after that I had only seen Jisung a couple of times before him  and Yeji moved to the States a year ago.

I was happy to know that they were living the life they had talked so much about having on high school, but at the same time I felt a little sad that I wasn't fortunate enough to have the same thing.

"Jisung that's amazing! I always knew you two were gonna get married one day! How did Hyunjin take the news?"

"He took it well given the history between him and I. He's really warmed up to me since we were kids." I giggled at the memories of Hyunjin and Jisung bickering as kids. "But what about you, Y/N, how are you doing?" 

My smile quickly dropped and Jisung's turned more serious, "Well, Chan's back."

I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye and saw his eyes go wide. I could tell he hand many questions.

"Are you guys-" "No, we aren't back together. In fact he's engaged. To a famous model. Lucky him."

"Does he know about Grey?" "Yes. Grey knows Chan but he doesn't know he's his dad, we haven't told him yet."

"How does Grey feel about him?" "Absolutely adores him. Practically worships the ground he walks on."

"And you? How do you feel about him?"

Jisung's question took me by surprise and left me absolutely speechless as tears pricked my eyes.

"I don't know. There are times where it all feels so easy and nice, like we're a family, but then he goes home to her and I get angry for deluding myself into thinking like that."

Jisung held my hands as I spoke as silent was of letting me know he was there. It felt relieving to let it out like that, like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders and I could breathe again. I couldn't really talk to anyone about it like this, Felix could only off so much advice, and besides him I didn't really have anyone.

"Y/N, it may not be my place to say this, but have you ever thought that you may still be in love with him? Even after all this time?"