Home Is Where the Heart Is

Chapter Eight

"I need your help."

Jeongguk's face lit up so brilliantly that Seokjin secretly resolved to ask the younger man for help more often.

It was Wednesday night, the first of their bi-weekly adult club meetings, and their one (1) full day with Jimin at the house had been filled with copious amounts of — things.

The first thing was Jimin's inability to stop eating, even when he was full. More accurately, his ability to find more food somehow, gorge on it in secret, and throw up, even when he was full. Cleaning up a sick-covered toddler was never fun. Cleaning up a sick-covered toddler who was crying over the loss of food and the hunger he was feeling was a thousand times worse. Seokjin had locked the pantry after breakfast and quickly requisitioned all the foodstuffs to high shelves after Jeongguk came over after lunch.

The second thing was Jimin's sassiness. He was so frustratingly dramatic it took everything Seokjin had in him not to laugh when he was trying to be stern and scold the boys. How did you sternly tell two toddlers that they couldn't put their hand prints on the walls when one of them had a quip for every argument?

"The art man do too!" Jimin had argued, pointing at the museum art book Taehyung got from Dr. Howard at their first session. It was already open to the page with a slab of rock covered in handprints.

"Yes, they did," Seokjin agreed. "But that's art in a museum, sweetie. We don't live in a museum or a cave. We live in a house."

"What's museum?" Taehyung asked quietly. He was sitting down, holding his knees with his currently yellow and red hands.

"It's a place where they keep art," Seokjin explained.

Jimin had pointed wildly at all the crafts Seokjin had taped onto Taehyung's wall. "Taetae's room keep art!" he argued back. "It's a museum!"

And what was he supposed to say? No, his children's art wasn't art? No, it wasn't worthy to put in a museum? No, the room technically was a museum, but this was different from that? Taehyung's eyes were already watering, waiting for his answer.

So Seokjin did what any sensible, loving, fully rested, responsible parent would do. He looked at Taehyung and Jimin and gently asked, "What color should Appa be?"

He texted Jeongguk about it afterward. Jeongguk sent back eight laughing emojis and one crying one, and when he came over, with permission from the twins, he slapped his own handprints on the wall in red and black.

(Seokjin also, secretly, didn't have the heart to remove their handprints. Jeongguk had mentioned something like a setting glaze that would help them stay permanently, and they'd agreed to do that over the weekend the next time Jeongguk took Taehyung out for shifting practice.)

The third thing was Jimin's moodiness. He would swing into moments of quiet and sadness at the drop of a hat. Curl into a ball and stare at the ground, seeing nothing, for several minutes. He wasn't unresponsive, 'just sad,' as he'd explained once when Seokjin asked.

Taehyung was right by Jimin's side whenever it happened. The two boys hugged until Jimin felt better and resumed their play like nothing had happened.

Seokjin couldn't determine a rhyme or reason for it. He'd already called Dr. Howard's office today and scheduled a psychiatric evaluation.

Which brought him back to now. The kids were asleep. Jimin's new bed and bedroom were gleefully ignored for a second night of cuddling with Taehyung instead, and he and Jeongguk were playing video games.

"What is it?" Jeongguk asked, pausing their game.

"Yah!" Seokjin protested, pointing at the screen. "You can't pause Mario Kart, that's against the rules!"