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Miyoung was only five when she realized that her family was different.
Instead of having a mom and a Dad, she had a Daddie and a Dad, a Da and a Dada, a Papa and a Pa, an Abah, and a Tou-san. Eight men who loved and adored her to the moon and back. Many people thought it was weird and disgusting but Miyoung knew better.
She was five years old when she realized that she wouldn’t trade her eight fathers for anything else in the world. She adored the way Daddie and Papa would share soft kisses after Daddie would sing to his heart’s content. She adored when Da and Tou-san would tickle her until she screamed for them to stop (Tou-san would always mumble something in Japanese afterward, pressing soft kisses to her head). She would clap her hands when Dad and Pa played the piano for her, a bright smile on her small face before turning to Abah, and Dada who rapped flawlessly all while poking her stomach.
She loved her parents without a care in the world and she would always love her parents.
Even when she was seven and got shoved for the first time. Her skinned knees and red rimmed eyes had kisses pressed against them by Papa and Pa. Her hair was stroked by Tou-san while Daddie and Dad went to the school and demanded an apology from the student who hurt their precious angel. Even though Dada, Abah, and Da weren’t at the house at that time, they video called her, their words filled with sweet promises and giant teddy bears when they returned.
She continued to love them when she was nine and hid from her parents that the pushing and the shoving went to name calling and pulling her pigtails. She missed the looks Pa and Tou-san would give her and avoided the gentle touches that came from Dad. She didn’t want them to worry about her. She was a big girl and could take care of herself.
Papa, Daddie, and Dad picked her from school then. They made blanket forts everyone could dream of and snacked on food Daddie’s and Dad’s parents would send. It was her Papa that kissed her head one night and told her the words she lived by.
If someone gets into your face, leave them alone. You ignore them and wait for them to throw the first punch. But you Lee Miyoung, you best throw the last one.
She never really understood his words then.
Maybe it was parallel to everything happening at school that she began questioning the love her parents have for her.
When Miyoung was twelve, she learned that it wasn’t physically possible for all eight of her parents to actually be her parents. Legally (she had to look up what that word meant), only Pa was her father. She cried when she heard that, the words from her peers ringing through her ears.
For a handful of months, she believed that no one truly loved her except her Pa. But everything changed when she overheard Dad and Papa talking in the kitchen one day.
“Lix she,” Papa said, his voice quieter than Miyoung had ever heard. “She doesn’t think we love her.”
“Binnie hyung,” Dad said, his voice quiet.
“Why is she thinking that? We do love her,” Papa had said, his voice filled with tears. He gripped onto the hem of his shirt his fingers beginning to turn white. His body began shaking before his voice cracked “Who cares if legally she isn’t our child and just Minho hyung’s child, she’s still my little girl. I still love her and I don’t know how to prove that to her.”
Miyoung’s Dad doesn’t say anything, only wrapping his arms around her Papa’s shaking form. It hurt Miyoung listening to her Papa’s cries but it was the push she needed in deciding that no longer will she care if someone said something bad about her. She will, however, deal with anyone who harmed her parents in anyway.
Twelve year old Miyoung drew her first picture after she heard two of her parents talk. She drew herself in the middle, smiling the best that she could. She was surrounded by eight people, all of them smiling and holding hands. It looked like a drawing a two year could do but Miyoung was proud of it.
She presented it to them at dinner that night, Papa being the first one to cry. She knew it was happy tears rolling down his cheeks and she didn’t move when he dropped his knees and hugged her tightly. She too cried, telling them that she was sorry and she knows how much they love her.
Now she’s sixteen, that silent promise she told herself when she was twelve screaming at her in her face. Her hands are on her hips and her lips are in a snarl the more she listens to this bitch call her parents names.
“What kind of whores do your parents have to be Kim Miyoung?” the girl laughs, her hand covering her mouth. “I bet they’re all cheating on each other and pretending to love you.”
Miyoung sees red, all caution and the teachings Daddie and Papa taught her leave her mind without a doubt. She doesn’t hear the screams coming from the girl under her nor does she hear the yelling of the teacher to break up the fight. She only comes to when she sees the vermilion against her pale hands.
Momentarily she panics because she’s going to get an earful from her parents but the panic subsides when she remembers why she did it.
“My parents aren’t cheating on each other,” she spits the crowd around her growing silent. “I pity you, though, that you can’t see love for what it’s worth. I would do anything in the world to love the way that my parents do.”
Her bully only stares at her with frightened eyes and a bloodied nose.
Miyoung walks away from her bullies, her teacher walking behind her, sputtering things she can’t make out. She walks the two of them to the teacher’s room where she sits patiently, her ankles crossed and her hands in lap while she listens to her teacher and the principal yell at her.
They tell her that they will call her parents, to which she already knew, she just doesn’t want to see the disappointment on their faces.
It’s Abah, Papa, and Dada that come to the school.
She keeps his eyes down and her folded hands slowly balling into fists when the principal rehashes what happened. Anger flares up in her but she says nothing. Not even when Abah’s hand covers her own and squeezes.
They send her home with a four day suspension.
She walks out of the school with her head held high, Abah’s and Papa's hands in hers. But she says nothing to them and they say nothing to her. Her Dada’s hands are on her shoulders when they enter their home, six pairs of eyes on her. Avoiding their gaze, she let’s go of the hands in hers and walks quietly to her room.
She doesn’t slam the door and she doesn’t let out huffs of frustration. Instead, her eyes land on the drawing she did when she was twelve, questioning her love from her parents. A wave of sadness floods her system as her legs give out on her. Wrapping her arms around them, she sobs into them not understanding why no one could see the love her parents have for her and for each other. She doesn’t understand why so she cries for that.
Arms wrap around her shaking frame and someone kisses her head.
“I don’t get it!” she yells. “I just don’t get it!”
“Mimi,” comes Tou-san’s gentle voice.
“For years I’ve never understood why it’s so hard for people to understand that you all love each other and it hurts me when they call you names and it hurts me that I can’t protect you from their words. I just don’t get it. ”
“Oh, Mimi,” comes Da’s voice. “My sweet, sweet Miyoung, you can’t change people’s opinions and the things they believe. It’s okay if they don’t understand because to us, they don’t matter. What matters is you and us.”
Miyoung let’s go of her knees and throws herself into her Da’s arms while cries for the things she has no control over. She closes her eyes, and the next thing she knows or really feels are fingers carding themselves through dark locks.
“Good evening, angel,” Da says against her head, pressing a soft kiss to her. “Did you sleep well?”
“I suppose,” she says quietly.
“Hmm.” He pauses. “Hyunjinnie, I think this calls for that.”
Miyoung blinks a couple of times.
“Do you think so Innie?” comes Tou-san’s voice. “Maybe you’re right.”
It clicks too late what that is and fingers are at her side, a loud screech of laughter falls from her lips. She wiggles around, trying to get out of their grip when she realizes that she’s going to be okay and they’re okay to be okay. As long as she loves her parents and her parents love her, who cares what other people are going to think of them.
(It’s when Miyoung turns twenty five with her girlfriend’s hand on her hip and her boyfriend’s chin against her shoulder does she watch with extreme fondness her parents interacting with each other.
Daddie, Abah, and Papa sit on the piano stool together, Abah laying across his older lovers hitting piano keys when it’s time. Tou-san, Dad, and Pa are trying to dance like they did when they were younger but their joints cause them to move slower. And Da and Dada belt out some kind of song that makes no sense but the smiles on their faces are enough for her.
They really did end up being okay after all. )