Chapter Text
waxing crescent (n.)
1. the moon's first step towards fullness.
2. a major opportunity for change.
Jisung sees the way stars residing back into his mother’s eyes the further they get from home.
His eyes travel around, taste of dusty leather the car seat was made of lingers in the bridge of his nose along with the faint scent of blooming flowers. His feet swinging back and forth on where he sits, as he observes his mother pulling out luggage from the back seat and dragging them into the house.
Running his fingers through the sweat-soaked hair from the merciless sunlight, he crouches down to the hot sidewalk, hand reaching out to the daisy flowers blooming on the soil next to the front gate. The green tendril is soft under his touch, fleeting and fluttering against the dry wind.
There is a rowdy sound, then, coming from the basement right where his mother went earlier. Voice talking, he recognizes, his mother’s and another sound he doesn’t know.
High notes and loud voices always resulting in the stars in his mother’s eyes leaving.
So he runs, thin soles scraping against the rough pavement while trying to fight his poor balance. His steps’ echoes are pricking into him like arrows being loaded as soon as he enters the basement, goosebumps rising until he finally finds the sight of his mother; standing with hands around waist.
His fingers cling around his mother’s wrist immediately, gripping tightly to the edge of the long sleeve she wears and drawing out a yelp from his sudden appearance.
“Sungie? I told you to stay on the bench, why are you here?” she asks, lowering the tone she used earlier to the man in front of her.
Jisung doesn’t answer, he has his eyes cast to the ground, fingers fiddling with the soft fabric whilst his feet make a soft drilling motion of his soles against the brown soil. “Sun’ie scawed,” he mutters finally. “Ma angwy?”
The sigh his mother lets out makes him glance upwards slightly, feeling bad for not complying with what she said earlier. He looks aside to the man, curiosity filling his eyes but it all disappears as he finds that the man is staring at him too.
There is a sheet of paper on his hand, and another—with an identical look—on his mother’s. The white color looks soft to be held around his mother’s fingertips but rough and damaged—corner crumpling and a small torn—on the man’s.
He thinks of the screaming rippling the air from his parents’ room when he woke up with moon shining next to his window.
He doesn’t know what happened—given by how the adult always finds a way to shoo him away from their discussion—but the look on his mother’s face is similar now, fire creeping on her cheeks and temple with brows drawn in together.
“He is Mr.Choi, Sungie,” she says, gesturing politely at the man before adding, “we will live in his building starts from now. Be nice, okay?”
Jisung looks at her with glossy eyes, bottom lip caught in between his teeth as he whispers—in the softest and smallest voice she ever heard—, “Sun’ie scared.”
“There’s no need to be scared, kid,” the man says. Even in the softest voice he tried to form, there are still some hints of rough and sharp edges in there. “I’m not going to eat you,” he laughs, his attempt of humor only makes Jisung’s fear grow stronger.
There’s a strong scent coming from him when he talks. Jisung doesn’t like how it smells like the plastic bag full of bottles his mother often throws away every morning with a heavy sigh.
Jisung hides his face on his mother’s back again, whining incoherent words and almost literally crying.
“Hey,” there’s suddenly a small voice coming from behind, along with a—almost too hard—poke on his shoulder.
Jisung turns his head to the back, blinking hard to get rid of the tears blurring his sight.
And suddenly, even without having a chance to wipe out the tears running down his cheeks, Jisung breaks into a laughing mess.
In front of him, there is a boy; slightly taller than him, with a face that is full of black marker ink, every scratch forming a random pattern or a poor attempt of drawing, but some of them seem like an already given up artwork; just a block of huge black tint around his eyes.
It seems like Jisung’s sudden burst of laughter is startling to the boy in front of him a little, given by the little jolt he makes and how his eyebrows furrowed together as he sees Jisung endearingly laughing, rolling on the ground with a hand holding his stomach.
“What’s so funny?” he asks, crouching down and narrowing his eyes onto Jisung, who has soft blush spreading across his puffy cheeks, and some remained staccato laughter still slipping out past his pink lips.
Seeming to be pulled back into his wits upon the other’s annoyed look, Jisung’s laughter immediately stops. He looks down to the ground again, lower lip chewed in between his teeth as he uses his hands to stand up from the ground.
“Sun’ie s sowwy,” he mumbles, his face beet red in embarrassment.
The boy in front of him tilts his head to the side, offering a confused look to Jisung before asking, “Sun’ie s sowwy is funny?”
“Eung?”
“I asked you what’s funny,” he explains, pointing to himself. He stares at Jisung again with an ominous smirk, before repeating Jisung’s slurred answer in a mocking tone. “You said Sun’ie s sowwy.”
Jisung’s lips part into the shape of an “o” before saying, “Your face,” with the same tiny voice, shyly pointing at the other boy in front of him. And just now Jisung realizes the other boy is holding a little kitten in his arms, with eyes barely opened, the kitten nuzzles its face contently onto his soft hands.
It looks really comfy.
“My friends are stupid,” he says. Jisung doesn’t understand what does stupid means, but he can ask his mother later. “They draw things on my face whenever I’m asleep.”
Jisung hums softly, not really understanding anything the boy in front of him says when his mind is too focused on the little kitten.
“Kitty,” he mumbles, staring at the other boy with a little smile on his face. “Can Sun’ie touch?”
“Yeah,” he easily allows, crouching down and sitting on the ground; ignoring the pecks of dust sticking on his jeans. “Come here then, Sunny.”
Sunny? Jisung looks at him with confusion, but he simply brushes it off. It still sounds pretty, he doesn’t mind if the boy is calling him with that.
So he crouches down too, with eyes sparkled in overflowing excitement and staring at the other boy with much expectation.
“Oh,” the taller boy says, staring at Jisung for a few seconds before saying, “I’m Minho, by the way.”
He offers Jisung a hand, and Jisung happily takes the offer and shakes their hands together; almost too hard for Minho’s liking, but he doesn’t mind.
“Sun’ie,” he says, with a wide and hearty smile on his face. His smile is wide from ear to ear, revealing his cute bunny teeth and the smile seems to enlighten the entire dimming apartment basement where they are sitting together.
Minho tries his best to smile as well, although it isn’t that hard for a little smile and soft blush to appear naturally upon Jisung’s bright look.
He chuckles softly, patting the kitten’s head for a few strokes, before taking Jisung’s smaller hand and guiding the younger boy’s hand to do the same thing.
Jisung’s face lights up so brightly, his eyes widen in adoration as he feels the kitten’s soft furs on his fingertips. It feels so soft, something Jisung definitely never touched before.
His family never has any pets, but Jisung always has a fond spot for cats, seeing little kittens from documentary footage his father used to leave on television makes him love cats in a huge amount.
Minho’s palm above his own is also warm. It’s soft too, similar to the kitten he is touching right now. When Jisung looks up at Minho’s face, the older has his gaze cast on Jisung, his eyes immediately narrowed in a defense when Jisung simply beams back innocently into his eyes.
“What?” he asks, one eyebrow arises.
“Kitty eyes,” Jisung simply says, pointing at Minho’s eyes.
“Ah,” he answers.
Jisung waits for his explanation, not peeling his eyes away from the sharp and pointy eyes with dark brown irises Minho has.
They remind him of the dark soil next to his old house, the damp loam that would have their dark specks sticking around his ankles and up to his calves whenever he helps his grandmother to water the flowers.
They remind Jisung of the reef near the oceans too, where the waves would sweep and break down into much smaller and weaker waves, carrying white foamy bubbles to the soft sand.
“Yours look like the sun,” Minho points out, evincing Jisung’s pair of eyes with a slight movement of his chin and pointing at the sun above.
“Perfectly round,” he explains, intensely observing Jisung’s eyes. “And shiny.”
“Sun?” Jisung asks, tilting his head to the side with the same confused look crossing his features.
“Yeah.”
Again, Minho doesn’t give him any further explanation.
Not so long later, Jisung lets out a sneeze. He stares apologetically at Minho, seeing how a few droplets from his sneeze accidentally make their way across him since Jisung doesn’t get enough time to cover his nose. “Sun’nie sow-”
He sneezes again. A lot harder this time, and he feels like his airway is being clogged by some kind of lump.
He sucks a breath in, trying to convince himself that he can breathe and it’s only a weird feeling he never experiences before but then another sneeze comes out.
Another sneeze.
And another.
“Are you allergic to cats?” Minho asks, Jisung can see how his eyebrows furrowed together in a frown, worry prominent in his strong features as he lets the cat free and approaches Jisung—who is now sitting on the ground instead of crouching, with both hands covering his stinging nose—and yanking Jisung’s hands away from his nose.
“N- no-” Jisung tries to say, trying to stop Minho from pulling his hands away; but he sneezes again, his eyes watering from the force and the embarrassment of spraying snots across the other boy again.
“I’ll call your mom,” Minho says, putting Jisung’s hands on his lap and standing up, wincing a little when Jisung starts to let out a panicked cry.
He looks down again, finding the younger boy is looking at him with such despair, runny nose flaring red and swollen eyes in his sight, with a tight grip of the younger’s fingers around his ankle.
“N- No Sun- sunnie-,” he tries to say in between sobs and gasps before another sneeze comes out and drawing more tears from his eyes. “Don’t- leave-”
Minho sighs. He leans down a bit to the crying boy, staring fondly right into his eyes before saying, “Can you count to thirty?” which Jisung answers with a soft nod, a look of confusion bleeds into his flushed face.
“Count slowly from one and I’ll be back before thirty.”
Jisung’s neck is all red, his breath shallow and slow. With tears still streaming down his face, he finally lets Minho’s ankle free from his grip, pulling his knees onto his chest and whimpering with his cracked voice, “One…”
And Minho rushes, running at the speed of a lightning right before his eyes. The fear of being left alone consumes Jisung almost immediately, grips on the rough fabric of jeans his knees wrapped in tightens, knuckles white and his fingers sore.
Tears running down his cheeks again, rolling softly and steadily like the river where his father usually brings him in the last two days when he doesn’t have to go to work.
Jisung doesn’t like the cold.
He doesn’t like the empty feeling when he is alone, with no hands holding him and keeping him warm. He doesn’t like the way the snowflakes inside his chest would grow uncontrollably, melting into clear substance falling down his cheeks and hurting his throat with the frostbite burn as he gasps for air.
He doesn’t like to be alone.
“Fourteen…”
Why isn’t Minho coming back yet? Thirty is approaching. What if he leaves Jisung alone and never comes back?
Jisung braces himself to look around, searching for any glimpse of human existence—especially Minho, or anyone he knows—within the dimming overhead lamp of the basement. But there is none, and it only makes him want to cry harder, the increasing cold makes him shiver from head to toe.
He can’t even bring himself to care about the counting anymore.
And after what seems like an hour for Jisung—although it’s only a few seconds more—he hears two frantic running steps, the echoes overlapping on each other inside the caving walls as the sound is getting nearer and nearer, piercing through the silence and melting the coldness of lone, the two presence quickly drenching Jisung with warmth.
He looks up, finding two faces he recognizes; his mother and Minho, and he starts crying again, making grabby hands towards his mother as she calls him softly.
“Ma! Ma!” he cries out, his sobs getting louder when his mother picks him up, but his body visibly relaxed inside the familiar embrace. He sneezes again, rubbing his flaring red nose violently; which is only resulting in more sneezes coming out.
“I think he has a cat allergy,” Minho says.
“Jisung,” his mother calls him, pulling his head away from the crook of her shoulder to look at him properly.
She tilts her head to the side, observing Jisung’s swollen eyes, red nose, and flushed cheeks carefully. She puts a delicate finger on Jisung’s chin, prompting him to look up so she can see his neck, grazing the same delicate finger across his swollen neck with a soft sigh.
“I’m sorry Sungie,” she whispers. “Never knew you have a cat allergy. I’ll take you to the nearest clinic, okay?”
Jisung nods weakly, leaning his head on his mother’s chest with his hands gripping on the collar.
Letting out a soft exhale, he closes his eyes slowly, relaxing inside the warmth and evening out his breath with the steady heartbeat pounding from his mother’s chest to his ears as a guide.
A hand is placed on his small back, rubbing through his shirt fabric softly before letting go as he is being moved in another direction.
“Thanks, Minho,” he hears his mother says, although her delicate voice sounds more like a faint murmur in his ears.
He loves to let himself drown completely inside the warmth his mother’s presence holds, letting the familiarity of each fiber blanketing him whole, like the moon glowing in the darkest times, careful to not be too bright; for her children to still be able to sleep under her pale moonlight.
Jisung is five. He hates the cold, hates how the chilly breeze slapping his skin and sending shivers, mocking over his loneliness.
But he loves the moon. Loving how the moon never leaves him alone, bathing him with the soft light without causing any harm.
Later that night, with a hearty shaped smile and a pair of eyes finding a new hue of shine, Jisung tells the moon about another story; one with a visiting guest in the form of word he had never said before—friend.
*.·:·.☽✧☾.·:·.*
Minho is never good at dealing with tears, or emotions.
He doesn’t like being with a crier. It’s like walking on thin ice, being calculative about every step he makes with the fear of ruining everything clouding on the back of his mind.
Emotions are weird. They’re not easy to control, like water with unexpected ways to fall. And people with overflowing emotions are just like a plate full of water, every jolt can make the water spill and flood everywhere.
Minho chooses to not deal with them.
But it’s different here. Jisung is different.
He cries so easily, even when he’s laughing a drop of tears can roll down his puffy cheeks without any hesitation or even any attempt of stopping them. Minho never complains, though. As long as he doesn’t have to deal with his sobbing mess like the first time they meet, Minho doesn’t mind spending some time with him.
He doesn’t have any other friends to make a fool of anyway.
So here they are, sitting together inside the caving hole under the playground’s highest slide, with an enamored look plastered on Jisung’s face as Minho shows him more magic tricks he learned from Mr. Choi.
“Okay, Sunny,” Minho starts, blowing the coin inside his right fist with a mischievous smirk. “Ready for more magic?”
Jisung nods, eyes widening and sparkling with excitement, making his face slightly shine under the dim tunnel. He claps his hands together, trying to imitate a baby seal he watched last night; clapping its fins together when the other seals were jumping through the hoop; that he simply thinks is really adorable.
“Show show show!” he exclaims, inching his face closer to Minho’s palm.
Minho sits back a little, leaning his back to the plastic material the walls are made of. He smiles again, really enjoying the way Jisung is so easy to fool, his round eyes full of the innocence and purity of a little child.
Noticing the impatient look Jisung gives him, he finally opens both of his fists, showing Jisung where the coin is.
The round metal is sitting right in the middle of his right palm, with a faint reflection of the sunshine being filtered through the plastic slide along with Jisung’s distorted reflection on the shiny surface. Jisung takes a glance at his reflection, giggling softly before his gaze adverts back to Minho.
Minho holds back his own laughter, focusing his eyes on the coin instead of Jisung.
“Now, Sunny, hyung will make this coin… disappear.”
Jisung gasps, eyes going wide, and Minho is sure if he doesn’t have a high level of self-control he might be laughing over Jisung right now.
He shows Jisung the coin, waving it slowly to grab the boy’s attention. Then he places it on his fingers and passes it to his other hand. Or pretends to. Jisung attentively watches his closed hand, where he believes the coin is. With another triumphant smirk, Minho puts his hand near the younger’s face.
“Sunny, blow for me.”
Jisung blows Minho’s hand excitedly, his soft breath hitting the tan skin. Minho pulls his hand back and looks at him, who is still, unfortunately—or fortunately?—focusing on his hand. Then Minho wiggles his fingers and slowly opens his hand and shows… nothing.
Jisung’s squeal startles him, making him jolt a little in his place as a peal of laughter slips past his lips when he comes back to his wits and realizing that his magic trick is succeeding once again. Jisung’s eyes are wide open and he grabs Minho’s other hand, opening it to see inside.
When he finds nothing, he looks at Minho with wide shining eyes, clearly excited but also confused about where the coin goes.
Minho laughs, shifting his seat a little forward so he can sit on the coin he hides under his lap as he ruffles Jisung’s black hair, enjoying the soft and silk feeling it gives.
The gesture that he does with a short time adoring purpose only soon shifts into a long last period, a little smile blooms on Minho’s face upon the comfort he gets just from Jisung staring at him with such respect and amazement, along with the way Jisung’s hair feels so appealing under his touch.
It’s comforting.
And Minho suddenly misses his home.
“Hyungie,” Jisung calls him softly.
Minho looks at the younger boy, retreating his hand almost immediately when he realizes he’s still marveling around the comfort it gives.
“What?” he asks, curious.
“Does Min-hyung have a kitty?”
A frown appears on Minho’s face from the question, staring at Jisung who is now fiddling with his small fingers, with his lower lip caught in between his white teeth.
Jisung is looking down, his question comes out more like a slurred mumble, but with the minimum distance they are being separated, Minho hears it.
“No,” his answer is short. Not even minding to give any further explanation.
Jisung hums, still not looking at Minho’s face.
“That kitten,” Minho starts suddenly, swallowing back a laugh when Jisung jumps a little. He sees Jisung is now staring back at him, and continues, “His name is Soonie. I put him in the shelter across the street because I can’t keep him.”
“Pretty kitty,” Jisung mumbles, his eyes lost; probably recalling how soft Soonie’s fur feels under his touch, how the kitten nuzzles happily into his palm.
“Yeah,” Minho says. “He’s pretty.”
“Can Sun’ie see?”
“You can’t,” Minho scowls, guilt slightly hovering in the back of his mind from seeing Jisung’s starry eyes quickly dimming from the straightforward inhibition. “You’ll get sick again,” he continues, his hand making its way towards Jisung’s head, carding his fingers through the soft hair and smiling when Jisung lets out a sigh of content; leaning into the touch.
After a few seconds in silence, Jisung pouts and starts to complain again. “But, Min-hyung can play with kitty. Why Sun’ie can’t?”
“You’ll get sick again, remember? If you get sick you’ll have to go to the clinic again, and you’ll have to eat those tiny bitter pills.”
He sees Jisung visibly swallows, grimacing as he remembers the strong taste of the medicines. He looks at Minho again, this time with a pout.
“Why Min-hyung don’t sick?”
“It’s Min-hyung doesn’t, Sunny. Not don’t,” Minho corrects him.
Jisung’s pout deepens.
“I don’t get sick because I have to take care of them,” he explains, fully knowing his answer will not satisfy Jisung at all. He is surprised, though. Because Jisung just simply nods, with no further complaints leaving his pink lips. He’s calm.
Until he’s not anymore.
Minho is all but calm when tears start bubbling inside Jisung’s eyes, frozen in place as he watches the younger wiping his tears violently with the back of his shaky hands.
Jisung tries to stop his tears, pressing the heel of his palms on his eyelids in hopes that the tears will stop forming. But it doesn’t. Even when he sees stars of phosphenes in the back of his eyelids, the tears still stream down his cheeks.
“Don’t-” Minho starts, using his fingers to release Jisung’s bottom lip from being chewed harshly by his teeth. “Don’t bite your lip,” he finishes.
Jisung looks up to him with glassy eyes, almost bringing his finger to biting on his nails before Minho stops him again, the gentle act only makes him cry harder. It feels like home, like the way his father will shush him whenever he cries and not letting Jisung to fiddle with his fingers or biting his lip until they bleed.
Minho doesn’t like dealing with tears.
But he can’t just leave Jisung there anyway, so he sighs, trying to release some tension building inside every inch of fiber in his body through the mist of air before leaning closer to the younger boy, cupping his soft cheeks and wiping his tears. It’s soft and squishy, his thumb is slightly sinking into Jisung’s pillow cheeks, and Minho once again finds himself marveling with the softness.
Jisung’s soft cries are what brought him back to reality.
“Don’t cry,” he tries to say, the awkwardness and tension audible in his tone, failing to bring any sort of comfort he is supposed to give. Another distressed sigh comes out of his lips, followed by another sob of crying Jisung, and Minho leans back; releasing Jisung’s face from his hands.
Jisung looks up at him again, whining from the sudden loss of warmth and starts making grabby hands towards the older.
Minho crawls quickly from the tunnel, hopping a little to the ground and standing straight, before his right-hand shoving and rummaging deep inside his oversized jeans’ pocket. He pulls out a white stick with a huge circle sticking on the end of it. The color is a mix of red and white, spiraling from the center to the outside.
With a proud smile on his face, Minho crawls inside again, unwrapping the plastic wrap around the circle thing—he accidentally breaks a little piece of the circle from his hurried movement—and shoving it in front of Jisung’s face.
“Look,” he says, pointing at the—now slightly crooked and broken—circle with a white stick where his hand is gripping tightly. “It’s a lollipop.”
“Eung?” Jisung hums in confusion, tilting his head to the side while beaming consecutively from the thing Minho calls lollipop and Minho.
Minho doesn’t give him any explanation, he taps Jisung’s chin gently, mouthing an “Aaaa” to Jisung so he would open his mouth, and shoving the candy inside, smiling when Jisung’s lips immediately wrapping around the remaining stick; his cheeks puffing up with traces of tears still visible, glistening under the sunlight.
“Tasty?” Minho asks as he hears a soft sucking sound.
Jisung nods, making a muffled affirmative sound around the lollipop. He sucks the candy more, circling his tongue around and inhaling the sweet scent it has for a while before pulling it out, beaming towards Minho.
“Hyung wanna?”
Minho laughs, grabbing Jisung’s hand and shoving the candy back into his mouth. “I have another one,” he says, patting on his empty pocket.
Jisung believes him, the candy seems to be a more successful way to stop his crying than words.
It’s the first time Minho deals with tears again after deciding to avoid it.
And this time, he wins.
*.·:·.☽✧☾.·:·.*
Jisung loves the night.
He would rather be a nocturnal if life ever allows him, blissfully unconscious when the world is spinning on its busiest time and sitting comfortably in the dark of the night, alone with the moon and his own thoughts.
The night who accepts him as it is, who gave him the most breathtakingly beautiful sonata; with the soothing sound of the distant frogs and crickets. He loves to gaze up to the sky, wondering what could be out there despite the thought that makes him feel almost unbearably small upon the unknown garden of celestials.
He loves to watch the stars splattering across the sky like a splash of gold paint he used to play with in his grandmother’s house, although the painting of the night sky mother nature made is more alive, each star twinkling periodically; captivating his eyes to never leave any of them.
Stars are pretty.
But the moon, the moon is generous.
Jisung thinks a lot about the moon; watching how its shape is always changing every single day. Twenty-nine days of shining and one day of resting. He learned from a video his father showed him that the moon gets its shine from the sun, and from there, the same thought always lingers in his curious mind.
How generous the moon is? She isn't even able to produce her own shine, but she still shares the shine she got from the sun with everyone; glowing as a main source of light in the darkest part of the day. Along with the stars. So he asked his father again, do stars also get their shine from the sun?
His father shook his head no.
It was how little Jisung fell in love with the moon.
And now here he is, sitting neatly on the wooden chair next to his window; knees flushed against his chest with his chin resting comfortably on top of the folded legs. Little circles filled with pale, silver light reflecting on both of his sparkly lenses.
“Played with Min-hyung today,” he mutters, voice soft as the night breeze.
A small smile visits his soft features for a while, the edge of his lips still lifting up when he continues, “Shows Sun’ie magic and gives lollipop.” His smile only gets wider as he goes through his day, reminiscing about how he was playing with the sand and plucking some flowers with Minho.
But then his hearty smile breaks.
“Sun’ie…” he starts, in a smaller and the last excitement evaporating from his tone. He looks down to his hands, fingers toying with the bracelet—little stars and moon ornament embroidered along the chains—wrapping loosely around his right wrist. The ornaments are shining under the moonlight, it almost looks like the crafter took the real stars and moon to be embroidered in there.
He remembers the soft touch coming from the rough and calloused fingertips wrapping the bracelet around his wrist the last Christmas.
“Sun’ie misses…” he mumbles, before burying his entire face into his knees with a silent cry.
“Jisungie?” he hears a familiar voice from the door.
A little yelp slips past his lips, as he quickly wipes the stray tears from his cheeks and rubbing his eyes in what he hopes would look like an act of sleepiness. He puts his feet down to the tiles, still sitting on the chair when the door is opened in a gentle manner.
“Is my baby boy already asleep?” his mother peeks her head in with a sweet look glowing on her face.
Jisung smiles, shaking his head a no and making grabby hands towards his mother. “Nu-uh! Sun’ie still awake! Was waiting for ma!”
She laughs, pushing the door open and quickly crouching down in front of her son. She beams softly into Jisung’s eyes, where Jisung can see some stars that usually twinkling inside her eyes are not there. The way she runs her thin fingers along his hair feels a little shaky, but Jisung doesn’t ask why.
He smiles, making another grabby hand towards her; asking to be picked up.
“You’re gonna give me back pain, baby boy,” she teases, chuckles that are leaving her lips sounding too bitter for Jisung’s likings, but he doesn’t mind.
“How was your day?” she asks, leaning on the headboard as she pulls the starry blanket up to Jisung’s shoulder.
Jisung hums, squirming a little to adjust his position and resting his head on his mother’s thigh, fingers toying with the edge of his starry blanket. “Min-hyung played with Sun’ie,” he says, eyes widening again as the rush of excitement flows under his skin.
“Min-hyung can do magic Ma!!” he exclaims loudly, giggling when his mother shushes him and putting her pointer finger on his lips. “Sowwy,” he whispers, a hearty smile appears along with a soft blush of embarrassment spreading across his face.
“It’s okay Sungie, no yelling at night, remember?”
“Mhm! Oh! Also, Min-hyung gave Sun’ie lollipop!”
“What a nice boy,” she grins, and Jisung smiles wider when he sees the stars inside his mother’s eyes are starting to show.
“Mhm!! Sun’ie likes Min-hyung!”
“Was it tasty, Sungie?”
Jisung nods a couple of times, clearly too much given by the little spinning sensation his head experiences when he stops.
“Have you said thank you?”
“AH!” he practically screams, jumping from his mother’s lap—almost bumping into her chin if only she doesn’t have a good reflex—and staring at his mother in a disappointed look. His eyebrows furrowed together, lifting up in the middle and a deep pout visible on his face.
He looks down, soft sniffs coming from him as he says, “Sun’ie… forgot…” his bottom lip quivering.
“Hey now,” she gently shushes him, pulling Jisung back to her lap and soothingly rubbing his side. “It’s okay to forget things, Sungie. Make sure to let Minho know that you’re thankful about it tomorrow, okay?”
Jisung timidly nods, eyes brimming with tears already. “But…” he trails off, clearing his throat from the metaphorical lump before saying, “What if Min-hyung hates Sun’ie..?”
“Trust me, baby boy he won't,” she reassures him, wiping the glistening tears from his cheeks.
Jisung looks up, eyes still glazed with tears and lips still slightly quivering. He swallows bile, and sticks out his hand towards his mother, offering a pinky finger.
“Pwomise?”
She kindly takes Jisung’s finger and intertwines it with her own, a soft smile on her face as he says, “Promise. Now let's go to sleep, okay?”
“Otay. Ma stay?”
“I’m not going anywhere baby, now close those pretty eyes and let's meet the dragons in the magic land, okay?”
Jisung nods, glancing at the—now-closed—window, seeing the moon is still smiling at him from there; shining relentlessly even when the world is slowly falling asleep.
“Night night, Ma.”
“Night night, Sungie. Love you.”
The kiss his mother plants on his forehead is light and tender. It reminds him of Minho’s touch on his hair earlier. Soft and light as a moonlight, but engulfing him in a bubble of warmth.
“Sun’ie loves Ma too.”
Jisung wakes up to the gentle sunlight making its way through his opened window, a spot where the moon was smiling and lulling him to sleep last night is now being replaced by the sun; golden rays slightly blinding that Jisung has to squint his eyes a little.
The sound of sweet chirping birds makes their way into his ears, delicately singing a sonata only they know the tune of, and it's always different on each day. The sound brushes across his eardrums delicately, along with the spring breeze carrying the morning dew caressing his skin.
He shivers a little, his body trying to warm itself despite the season is already on the brink of summer. The starry blanket is soft under his palms, the faint scent of fabric softener pervading his nose, it's similar to the flower fragrance he used to smell near his old house.
The sky outside is blue, the sun looks like it's stretching its golden petals outwards, ready to start its day and radiating positive energy to the living.
Dawn always has a pretty look; faint hints of the night's presence are still visible far above, while the horizon is perfectly golden from the sun's petals; creating a beautiful gradient of scarlet, crimson and yellow hues in the sky canvas. The clouds forming from multiple creases collided into one huge puff, traveling and grazing in front of the sun as the rays of lights outlined their silver lines beautifully.
Jisung yawns, pulling his hands from under the comfy starry blanket and sits up, stretching his hands upwards with a groan. He realizes the bed next to him is already cold, meaning his mother has already left for quite a while. This makes him jump down the bed instantly with a little thud, pulling the door open and running outside as fast as he can.
“Ma?” he calls out, voices shaky from the fear that starts to make itself known.
He looks around the living room; the couch is empty, there's no hint of egg smells his mother always makes every day as breakfast, even the pan is still sitting neatly in the open cabinet. “Ma!” he calls once again, the way his own voice resonating inside the four walls makes him feel smaller than he already is, the fear and cold feeling swallowing him whole.
“Ma...” he trembles, the sight of the living room blurs from his tears as he crouches down in the middle of the room, whimpering quietly into his palms.
“Jisung?” he hears a voice, the familiarity of the soft and delicate tone makes him jump instantly, turning his head back to the source of the voice and breaks into tears when he sees his mother, still dresses in her pajama set with water dripping down her drenched hair.
“Ma! Ma!” he cries out, wrapping his arms around her legs and tucking his face in her thigh, his flowing hot tears seeping through the thin fabric.
“Hey now baby boy, why are you crying?”
Jisung sniffles, wiping his tears with the edge of his sleeve where it already has no remaining dry spot from his tears; making him feel all sticky and gross. “Ma wasn' there,” he hiccups, burying his head more into the side of her thigh before mumbling, “Sun'ie scawed Ma will- leave-”
His mother grimaced, picking up Jisung from clinging onto her thigh and carrying him in front of her, wrapping his small body securely with her arms. Jisung tucks his face onto her neck instantly, silent cry still coming from him given by the increasingly warm and wet feelings she feels on her shoulder.
“I’m not leaving you anywhere Sungie… Why are you saying that? I will never leave you.” The reassuring words are thrown with warmth dripping in her tone, drenching Jisung with the comfort he absolutely needs.
Jisung doesn’t say anything but a quiet whimper, he holds onto his mother tight, curling inside her embrace comfortably while tears still rolling down his cheeks. “P- Pwomise?” he mumbles, clutching onto the collar of his mother’s pajamas and pressing his ear on her chest.
“Promise,” She kisses the crown of Jisung’s head, rubbing his back in a soothing manner as she moves to their room, leaning against the headboard. Jisung isn’t even flinching, he just tucks himself even closer, curling on his mother’s lap with his fingers still curling around the soft fabric of his mother’s collar, the mix of fear and despair inside his soft sniffles bouncing around the four walls.