Chapter Text
Jeongguk could feel a sob building up in his chest, but he tried his best to suppress it, not wanting to wake the baby that was sleeping on him. The baby. He breathed in slowly, staring up at the ceiling. Unsurprisingly it didn’t stop the tears pooling in his eyes. The baby, his baby, Taehyung. Taking another deep breath, he turned his head to look at the message Misook had sent him.
I can’t do this, Jeongguk. I’m sorry.
It wasn’t the first time she had sent a message like that, not by far. The first time had been around the time that she had found out she was pregnant, then again when she started her third trimester, her belly growing so big she struggled to move around a lot. Both times Jeongguk had sat down with her and they had had a calm conversation about what they both wanted. He knew her family was pressuring her as well, he wanted her to really think her options through. The first few months after Taehyung was born everything seemed to be fine. They stayed mainly at Jeongguk’s parents’ place and he gave her the chance to see her son as much as she wanted without forcing her to be a mother.
But then Taehyung got sick and those messages came more often. They stayed up all night because Taehyung’s fever just wouldn’t go down – I can’t do this, Jeongguk. The doctor’s diagnosed him with meningitis – I can’t do this, Jeongguk. There was a 20 to 30 percent chance that Taehyung could die, that the person he loved most in the world could just disappear after only six months – I can’t do this, Jeongguk. He survived. His brave little fighter had survived. But something was off, something he couldn’t put his finger on until the doctor’s examined him and told him Taehyung had lost his hearing, that he was completely deaf – I can’t do this, Jeongguk. I’m sorry.
This time Jeongguk didn’t want to message Misook back that they’d talk and figure everything out. He was tired of fighting, fighting for his son who already had enough to fight on his own. The last thing he wanted to do was force Misook to stay when she clearly didn’t want to. He didn’t even have the energy to hate her for wanting to leave.
He allowed himself one selfish second to wish he could leave as well. Misook couldn’t do this, she didn’t want to be a parent, let alone the parent of a now deaf boy. She didn’t care to ask whether Jeongguk could do it.
He couldn’t, he didn’t think he could. He was 18, his 19th birthday slowly approaching. He had just started his first job and it barely paid all of his bills. He had needed help with his taxes, and he was sure there were a few insurances he was supposed to get soon or something. He wasn’t an adult, maybe he was old enough to be one but…
But he was a father now. He had fucked up, had gotten his girlfriend pregnant and now there was a beautiful baby sleeping on his chest. It didn’t matter whether he could do it or not. He had to. From the first moment that he had held this baby, from the moment that Misook and he decided that he looked more like a Taehyung than a Kyungho, he had sworn to himself he’d do everything in his power to keep his boy safe. It was a big promise to make for someone his age, but he had believed in himself.
Jeongguk was tired and exhausted and mad at the world – but it wasn’t enough to bring him down. It wasn’t enough to make him leave his son. Taehyung had two moles on his right arm and if you pinched the skin underneath, it looked like he had an elephant growing out of his arm. Jeongguk had two similar moles on his thigh. It was probably a coincidence, nothing genetical, but he knew that if he ever were to give Taehyung away – would he even know it was an elephant? Would he know to pinch the skin on his arm?
Slowly, he sat up on his small bed, one arm securing Taehyung. When the baby let out a small huff, Jeongguk could feel his eyes tear up again. Pressing his nose into Taehyung’s thin baby hair, he took a shaky breath.
“I love you,” he whispered, his heart hurting because Taehyung couldn’t hear it. “I love you, I love you, I love you.” Maybe if he said it enough, his breath hitting Taehyung’s head, he would understand.
They’d be fine. This wasn’t the end of the world. Taehyung had survived. There had been a 30 percent chance that he’d never leave the hospital, but he did. Being deaf wasn’t an illness, it was a disability – and people, kids, could live with disabilities. Taehyung loved to laugh at Jeongguk’s grimaces, loved to be tickled. He didn’t need his hearing for that. They’d be fine. They’d be happy.