Work Text:
“What do you think?”
Chan frowns up as he takes in the sign above their restaurant. The words BANG’S BURGERS in big letters and an atrociously bright red against a yellow background that clashes with the green paint of their building. It’s hideous.
And really, the color scheme and the name are not what they agreed on.
In fact, he doesn’t understand why Minho’s chosen only his name for the name since this whole endeavor was Minho’s idea in the first place. Truly when Minho had brought up opening their very own restaurant, Chan’s exact words had been: no, I hate that. But of course, like most things when it comes to Minho, Chan had given in almost easily after his initial rejection.
“This isn’t what we agreed on,” he finally says, turning towards Minho.
Minho blinks rapidly a few times, before turning back towards the sign, he tilts his head and gives a small pleased smile. “I like it. The alliteration is good. Makes it memorable and marketable.”
Chan’s brows furrow as takes that in. “Where’d you hear that?”
“Jisung,” Minho answers, then after a pause, “Well, actually he said alliteration makes a catchy jingle for commercials. But that's basically the same thing.”
“We’re not making a commercial.”
“Way to crush Jisungie’s dreams,” he argues, crossing his arms over his chest and glaring at Chan. “What? You don’t think our son deserves to create a jingle?”
Chan opens his mouth, ready to argue despite knowing no matter what he says Minho will twist it into something else, even though he knows that is not what Chan had meant in the first place. He’s clearly in one of his more annoying moods, if the slight smirk and look in his eyes is anything to go off.
Suddenly there’s a large crash coming from inside the restaurant, he glances through the windows and sees that nobody is in the main area. There’s another crashing noise followed by some shouts, particularly Jeongin’s high pitched scream and then Jisung yelling.
He sighs, already hoping that whatever the three of them are doing has not caused any harm or damage. Although, something tells him that it’s already a lost cause, he’s wondering if it’s too late to change his mind and ditch this whole business plan to avoid having to deal with whatever chaos the kids will manage to create. In fact, he wonders if it’s not too late to give the kids back up for adoption. Or even perhaps he can go down to the wharf and drown himself in the ocean, he’s always liked the ocean. He won’t have to deal with any of this anymore. He turns to see Minho already walking through the opened door.
“Hey! What did you do?” he yells as he walks towards the source of the noise.
Chan takes a moment to admire the anger that Minho’s exuding, he finds it cute when Minho’s angry, even though he knows that any shred of anger will immediately melt away as soon as he starts talking to the kids. As much as he tries to pretend he’s the tough dad, there’s no denying that he’s a sucker for the kids.
So, that’ll leave Chan to be the bad guy in every situation that requires discipline, he sighs heavily as he thinks that the ocean isn’t sounding like such a bad idea after all.
Then, he looks up at their brightly colored sign and goes through his door, he hears Minho’s voice equal parts chiding and calming, as he says, “It’s okay, but no more playing in the kitchen, alright?”
Chan knows that he won’t be ditching them any time soon, not even for the ocean.
🍔
The grand opening comes along without any mishaps.
That’s a lie. There’s a lot of small mishaps, but nothing that wasn’t easily dealt with. And so, they get there without any major disaster which is far better than Chan could ask for. It’s going fine. He thinks that they’ll be okay after all.
Their first customer is the vaguely familiar man that works at the tattoo parlor next door; Chan remembers seeing him through the windows when they’d been first moving in. And right now, he comes through the door wearing all black and tattoos on full display, he stands out in their brightly colored diner.
“Hey, welcome!” Chan greets, smiling as the guy comes over to the counter, he sits in one of the stools. He notices the kids are sitting on the floor behind the counter, he’d told them to organize the shelves but he’s pretty sure they’re just making a bigger mess than anything as they giggle and try balancing the spare salt shakers on top of each other.
“Hi, I’m Chan,” he introduces, now that he’s moved over to where the man is sitting, “Welcome to Bang’s Burgers.”
“Hey,” the man replies, nodding, “You did a good job with fixing this place up,” he adds, glancing around. “It’s been empty for a long time.”
“Yeah, it was a lot of work,” he answers, “Uh, can I get you anything to drink?” He looks down and nudges the closest kid to him with his foot. Which is Jisung, who pouts at him before turning to his brothers.
“Rock paper scissors?”
Chan turns to the stranger, who frowns, brows creasing as he looks down, although from his angle Chan doubts that he can see any of them. They do a round and Jeongin seems to lose, the other two teasing as he huffs while standing up.
“What do you want to drink?”
“Jeongin,” he chides, staring at him.
Jeongin blinks at him, before grinning brightly, and asking, “What would you like to drink, sir?”
Chan snorts and rolls his eyes, he doesn’t know where they went wrong, Jeongin was their sweet and shy baby, now growing into a smartass. They raised a trio of adorable menaces. While the stranger grins back, he glances at Chan, before answering, “Coke, please.”
“Got it,” he answers, nodding, before going on his way towards the cups and drink machines.
“Cute kid,” the guy comments.
Chan smiles, “Yeah, when he isn’t being a menace,” then he looks around for the menus before frowning when they’re not in the spot where he’d left them. He looks down at Jisung and Felix and spots an oddly shaped pile of menus on the shelf beside them. “Can you give the man a menu?”
Immediately, Jisung’s hand shoots up with a menu in hand, waving it slightly; the stranger hesitates before grabbing it. “Thanks,” he says, earning a quick no problem and a thumbs up from Jisung, “How many kids you got back there?”
“What are you, a cop?” Jisung asks.
“Ten million!” Felix says, giggling.
"He likes to collect strays," Minho calls from the back.
The stranger’s eyes widen slightly, he leans a bit forward, likely to check, and then Chan sighs, “We have three kids.”
“Aw, that’s nice,” he says, “How are they liking the move?”
Chan frowns, tilting his head. The stranger shakes his head, and quickly adds, “I own the tattoo parlor next door. I saw you guys moving in months ago.”
“Ah, right,” Chan says, as Jeongin comes back with the cup of soda, “We’ve all been adjusting.”
“It’s okay,” Jeongin admits, “We started at a new school and have to work here now.”
The stranger laughs as he takes the straw Jeongin offers. “Well, you guys could make new friends. School can be fun.”
Jeongin wrinkles his nose clearly wanting to disagree, then his eyes widen, and he points to the tattoos lettering the man’s arms. “Woah, are they real?” he asks, standing on his tiptoes to get a better look.
The man laughs, nodding while extending his arm out for Jeongin to get a better look, “Yeah, they’re real tattoos.”
Felix’s head pops up, him peeking over the counter to get a look, and eyes wide as he comes up some more.
“Cool!” Jeongin looks on and then says, “Your arm is huge! It’s bigger than Jisung’s head, he has a big one.”
Jisung makes an offended noise, “Hey!” And Jeongin yelps, likely because Jisung smacks his leg.
“What’s that?” Felix asks, pointing at one of the figures tattooed below the guy’s elbow. It looks like a misshapen bunny.
The guy grins, and says, "That's dwaekki! He's a pig rabbit."
"That's dumb," Jeongin says, "Do you have any dragons? Or swords? Or dragons with swords?"
The guy laughs, tilting his arms around, "No, sorry to disappoint but I don't have any dragon tattoos."
Jeongin pouts slightly, clearly disappointed. And then, perks up, looking up at Chan, "Can I get a tattoo, dad?"
"Uh, no, you're too young," he answers, ruffling his hair. And he huffs, disappointed once again.
Then: "You should get a tattoo!"
The guy laughs, and Felix even looks over seeming intrigued by this thought. "Are you getting a tattoo, dad?"
"You can come to my shop," the guy says, almost eagerly, "I can show you my portfolio."
"Uh, no, that's—"
"Oh, what are you getting?" Felix asks, bouncing slightly.
"A dragon with a sword, obviously," Jeongin states.
"I'm—"
"You could get Jureumi!" Jisung adds, "He could be riding the dragon!"
"I'm not getting a tattoo, kids," Chan insists.
And the guy asks, "what's a Jureumi?"
"That!" Jisung points towards the chalkboard with the specials of the day. And sure enough, Minho's drawing that's been haunting Chan's life for as long as they've known each other is right there under the burger of the day. He's almost as bad as the kids when it comes to leaving the board alone.
The guy makes a face, but quickly grins, and asks, "Oh, that's nice. Which one of you drew it?"
"Our Appa," Felix says, happily.
The guy looks at Chan and makes a face, "You should think about the tattoo ideas a bit more."
"Again, not getting one," Chan says, then clarifies: "Also, not my drawing. Their other dad."
"Ah, okay."
Suddenly, Minho pops up in the window to the kitchen, and holds out his spatula. "You got something to say about my drawing?"
The guy's eyes widen a bit and he abruptly shakes his head. "Nope, no. It's an interesting piece of art."
Minho squints at him. "Hm, careful. I can always spit in your food."
"He's joking!" Chan says, sending a glare to Minho, "It's a joke, no spitting in food, alright?"
Minho huffs, rolls his eyes, and gives him a mock salute. Then, points at his eyes with his two fingers and back at the guy in a I'm watching you fashion.
"He's not going to poison me, is he?" the guy asks quietly.
"Yes," Jeongin says.
"No, of course not," Chan insists, when the guy looks torn between being alarmed and amused. "You'd have to order something for that to happen."
That's how Changbin becomes their first regular. (“Our only regular,” Jisung says matter of factly, which is not appreciated.) And it’s nice, he occasionally stops in for lunch, but usually he comes in after he’s clocked out and closed down for the day. Claiming the same spot at the counter each time, and steadily making his way through their entire menu.
🍔
“Okay, kiddos, family meeting,” Chan announces, clapping his hands as he attempts to gain their attention, they’re in one of the booths. And what they should be doing is cleaning the menus, refilling the condiment containers, and refilling the napkin holders; instead Jisung is busy playing random notes and noises on his keyboard as Jeongin sings along. Or more so, singing nonsense words, like he’s a jazz musician riffing. They stop only when Chan comes up to the table, though, Jisung presses a few keys here and there.
Felix is swaying slightly as he watches them.
"Kids!" Chan says again.
It's no use. Jeongin continue to sing and dance with Jisung now adding his own adlibs.
"Yah, boys!" Minho shouts from where he's sitting at the counter with Changbin, "Listen to your father!"
That gets them to stop abruptly, Jisung's fingers fumbling and causing a loud awkward note to ring throughout the restaurant.
The kids all look at him expectantly.
"Alright," he says, "We need to come up with ideas on how to get business."
"What's that got to do with us?" Jeongin asks, slumping down into the booth.
"We can do a performance!" Jisung eagerly offers.
"That's not what I was thinking, Sungie," Chan says, "We'll put a pin in that idea."
Jisung heaves a sigh, rolling his eyes, "Why'd you even ask for suggestions?"
"I was thinking more like you could go down to the warf and hand out fliers," Chan said, gesturing to Changbin who spins around to proudly show of the fliers he designed and printed for them. "Maybe spread the word at school."
Felix frowns. "Kids don't care about these kinds of places. We barely care and we work here."
"Yeah, but they tell their parents about it," Changbin counters.
"Make our place seem cool and they'll bother them until they come here," Minho adds, shaking his heads. "Trust me, I've got kids."
"Yeah, we know," Jisung says, then sighs, "Dad, I don't think fliers will cut it."
"Well, if you come up with something better let me know," he says, gesturing towards Changbin, "For now though you're all on flier duty. Got it?"
Jeongin groans as he slinks out of the booth and goes to Changbin. Felix hops out to do the same. Jisung plays a few notes on his keyboard.
"I still think performance night would draw a crowd," he suggests.
"We'll think about it," Chan says. "Now go hand out fliers with your brothers and stick together."
They watch as the three of them trail out of the restaurant with various levels of enthusiasm. Once out of sight, Minho says, "Half of those fliers are ending up in the trash. I hope you know that."
"Don't you have burgers to flip," he grumbles.
Minho smirks, "Ah, yeah, for our zero customers. How could I forget?"
"Uh, we have one loyal customer," he argues, squeezing Changbin's shoulder.
"It's Changbin," Minho says, waving him off, "He barely counts."
"Hey!" Changbin shouts, standing from his seat, "Don't be so rude, I'm your only paying customer!"
"Alright, alright," Chan says, pushing at his shoulders to get him to sit down. "Calm down."
🍔
It's another usual Friday as they get ready for a hopefully busy weekend. Chan sends the kids to school, he and Minho deal with the early afternoon rush. Which isn't much of a rush since they still haven't got much business despite the kids giving out all the fliers. (Felix later admitted that Jeongin had tripped and they lost a good chunk of them to the street and wind. Jisung had chimed in that "nature was helping them spread the word".)
The kids get out of school and come to help out for the last few hours of the day.
Just their normal routine.
What he isn't counting on is the appearance of the health inspectors walking into the restaurant around closing time.
"Kim Seungmin from the health department," one of them introduces himself as, then gestures to his partner, "That's Hwang Hyunjin. Can we talk to whoever is in charge?"
"Uh, yeah, that'd be me," Chan says, smiling politely, "I'm Chris Bang, one of the owners."
He hums, nodding as he looks around the restaurant and jots something down onto his notepad.
"What's this about?" Chan asks, feeling worry gnaw at his gut. "We passed our inspection and we're no due for another for months."
Hyunjin smiles, glancing at Changbin, who's eating his food at the counter. "Is there somewhere we can talk?"
"It's fine," Jisung says, from behind the counter, "Changbin's basically family."
"Aw, really?" Changbin asks, clearly happy about this revelation.
"It's not a compliment," Jeongin tells him, he's sitting beside him, cleaning off the menus.
Chan shakes his head. "It's fine, we can go to the back," he says, leading them towards the kitchen, although if he's honest the only veil of privacy would be the fans running loudly. And depending on how loud they talk, some of the conversation will carry.
They follow him.
"So, what's with the surprise visit?"
Seungmin is pausing, eyes narrowing as he looks around the kitchen. He lingers on Felix, who was put in charge of wrapping up the foods in the kitchen. The stove and other equipment already shut down for the night.
"Well, uh, we've been privy to some complaints," Hyunjin says, looking a bit uncomfortable.
Chan frowns, crossing his arms as he tilts his head, trying to think over what they've possibly could've done to garner complaints to the Health Department. "Um. Okay, what kind of complaints?"
"There's a very disturbing rumor going around about your burgers," Hyunjin says slowly, looking more uncomfortable by the second. "Not sure how to say this delicately."
"What—"
"There's a rumor your burgers are made with human remains from the crematorium next door," Seungmin says.
And Chan can't help the awkward laugh that escapes him. Then, he hears a squeak from where the window is, he spots Changbin carrying Jisung and sees Jeongin ducking down immediately. He lets out a heavy sigh.
"I wonder how a rumor like that gets started," he says, glaring towards the window.
Jeongin peeks his head up again. "Who knows? Kids say crazy things!"
He sighs again, feeling the beginning of a headache forming. He supposes this is what he gets for trusting his nine year old to create buzz for their resturaunt.
"I don't care how it started," Seungmin says firmly, "We just need to clear this up by testing your meat. But if it does contain human meat, you'll be shut down and sent to jail."
"We don't serve human meat," Chan says, "Go ahead and test it."
"Alright, we can get this sorted out. It's a simple test," Seungmin says.
"What's going on?" he hears Minho ask. Then, "Kim Seungmin?"
"Minho," Seungmin says curtly, looking caught off guard, his professional mannerisms forgotten for an instant. "What are you doing here?"
"I own this place. What are you doing here?"
"Uh, how do you two know each other?" Chan asks, frowning as he watches a glare form on Seungmin's face.
"I'm the health inspector," Seungmin says, then frowns, "I thought you ran off with that hot shot wannabe musician Chris."
"Yeah," Minho says, "Now we own a resturaunt."
Seungmin looks at Chan, giving him a quick once over, and scoffs, "This old man? Seriously?"
Chan huffs, crossing his arms over his chest, he feels a small hand tugging at his shirt and looks to see Felix half hugging him, he relaxes slightly. "We're not that far in age."
"What is going on?" Hyunjin asks, looking between them.
"We were briefly engaged," Minho says, as if he's just commenting on the weather and not revealing a huge thing.
Seungmin cuts in: "You left me for him."
"Wait, you left someone for me?" Chan asks, this is news to him. He turns to see Minho over dramatically roll his eyes.
"He doesn't even know," Seungmin continues, scoffing.
"Not everything's about you, Chan," Minho says, "But yeah, I guess, I may have left him because I met you. It's whatever. It happened."
"You almost married someone that wasn't Dad?" Felic asks, eyes wide as he looks over at Seungmin.
"Yeah, I had a life, you know."
"You had a life before us?" Jeongin asks, now fully in view of the window. "Before dad? You're joking, right?"
"It's like we don't even know who you are!" Jisung exclaims, "Next we'll find out we're not even your kids!"
"He could've been our dad?" Felix asks, and Minho laughs which makes Seungmin glare.
"Are you forgetting he dumped me during our engagement?" Seungmin asks, which is seriously not something to say to a kid about their father.
"Oh my god," Minho says, "It was years ago, get over it."
"Uh, well, maybe let's stay on topic," Hyunjin interrupts, "Let's focus on why we're here."
"Why are you here?"
"Yes, let's just get the test done and move this along," Chan says, and Hyunjin nods abruptly.
"Okay, yeah, let's—"
"The lab's closed until Monday," Seungmin interrupts, and Hyunjin frowns, "So, we're shutting you down for the weekend."
"I'm sorry, what?"
🍔
The sign is like a large scarlet letter on their window letting the entire town know that they're under investigation and to steer clear. Chan can feel the migrane forming, he wonders if they'll even be able to bounce back from this.
He groans as he slinks further into the booth, laying across the seat. He's using a clean apron to cover his face because they can't even get a customer in at all.
"Is Seungmin going to send you and Dad to jail?" Felix asks.
"No," Minho answers, "We just have to wait for the test on the meat."
Jisung hums, "What's going to happen to us if you go to jail?"
"We're not going to jail."
"But if you did," Jisung insists.
"I've watched a ton of prison break movies, I'll get out of there," Minho says, "But you gotta look after your brothers until I do. No more ugly rumors about this place."
Chan groans and sits up, looking at the counter where they're all gathered. Jeongin quietly kicking his feet and looking solemn.
"Innie," he says, Jeongin ignores him. "Innie, why would you start that rumor?"
Jeongin hums, looking over. "What?"
Chan narrows his eyes at him.
Jeongin stares back, for several seconds, then shrinks slightly. He looks down at his shoes, and mumbles something.
"What was that?" Chan asks.
Jeongin huffs. "It was show and tell and everyone had all these cool stuff to show off and talk about. I didn't have anything!"
"That doesn't mean you tell people we cook humans," Chan says, his temples throbbing and he's pretty sure this headache is now going to be a permanent part of his life.
"You did want us to get word out about the restaurant," Felix chimes in.
Jisung nods. "Any publicity is good publicity!"
"It's really not," he huffs. He lands back into the booth, shutting his eyes, maybe if he goes to sleep he'll find that this has been a terrible, terrible dream.
"Why doesn't Appa just talk to Seungmin?" Jeongin asks.
"What?" Minho asks, "why would I do that?"
"He's mad at you," Jeongin says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world.
"Oooh," Felix says, "He is clearly hung up on you dumping him for Dad. You broke his heart, Appa."
"Sometimes it happens," Minho says.
"You're the one always telling us to be the bigger person and apologize or whatever," Jeongin argues.
"Yeah, but I'm an adult," Minho says, "I don't have to listen to my advice. I make the mistakes so you can learn from them. Don't be like me."
"Dad's going to go to jail and we're going to die, if you don't apologize!" Jisung shouts dramatically, "Is that what you want?"
And Chan can't help but laugh at the over dramatic guilt trip.
"Hey, what are you laughing at?" Minho asks.
Chan feels something land on him, he opens his eyes to see a rag lying on him. He huffs. "The kids are right, you should talk to him. See if you can talk him into speeding up the investigation."
"I'd rather stab my eyes with chopsticks than apologize to Kim Seungmin."
Felix makes a noise, part distressed. Minho gently says, "I won't actually do that."
(It turns out that sending Minho on the mission to save their restaurant and speed up the investigation is the absolute worse thing they could've done. He's not sure what exactly happened other than some yelling and Seungmin adding a new sign that says exactly why they're being investigated. It's resulted in a small angry mob outside.
"Oh my God," Chan groans, "This is really bad."
"We'll be fine," Minho insists.
"How?")
🍔
"What if we lean into the cannibalism?" Jisung asks over dinner, "We could make it a theme!"
"Oh, like Hannibal Lector," Jeongin adds, nodding.
"How do you know about Hannibal?" Chan asks, frowning down at him, "Have you watched it?"
"Uh, no," Jeongin says, shaking his head. "Nope."
Chan frowns, squinting at Jeongin suspiciously, "That's really not appropriate for 9 year olds."
"It's a good thing I've never seen it then," Jeongin says, offering his adorable and bright grin.
Chan does not have the patience to deal with this specific, and frankly minor problem considering what's happening.
Minho glares. "That asshole can end this. He's being a spiteful bastard."
"Gee, I wonder why," Chan deadpans.
Minho shoves him slightly. "You're my husband, you're supposed to be on my side. For richer or poorer, for right or wrong and all that."
Chan rolls his eyes.
Felix frowns from where he's clinging to Minho's side, being a lot more clingier since this whole situation started. Although, he's always been a bit clingy.
"Are you sure we don't use humans?" Felix asks, brows pinched in worry.
"No, of course not," Chan answers, "It's just a really dumb thing your brother made up. I promise."
"So, you won't go to jail?" Felix asks.
"I'd run from the law," Minho says, shifting to pat his hair. "Obviously, I'd take you and Sungie and Innie on the run with me."
Felix seems satisfied with that. "And Dad too?"
Minho makes a face like he's deep in thought, he glances over to Chan. "I dunno. Do you think we should?"
Felix hums, squinting at him as if considering it.
"Seriously? What happened to for better or worse?"
Minho shrugs. "If you end up bringing us down, you get left behind."
Chan sighs heavily shaking his head.
"Dad, Appa," Jeongin says, voice quiet as he looks up from his plate. "I'm sorry I told everyone we make burgers out of human flesh."
And it's such a ridiculous thing now that Jeongin says it. All of this mess started because their youngest son wanted to be share something exciting with his class.
It makes him want to laugh as he reaches out and ruffles Jeongin's hair. "It's okay, kid," he says, "We'll get through this."
"Oh, now you believe we can get through this?" Minho teases.
"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Chan says.
🍔
A bus pulls up to the curb, and an older woman is knocking on their door, Chan sighs as he goes to open it.
"Excuse me," she says, "Do you still have human burgers?"
"Oh, no, we never—"
"Why do you want to know?" Minho asks, frowning as he comes closer.
"Well, I'm part of a group of adventurous eaters," she explains, "We like to travel around and try wild foods. That kind of thing. So, if you still have them, the twenty of us would love to try."
"Uh, no, sorry," Chan starts to say.
"It'll cost $50 per burger," Minho interrupts, smiling politely and very pointedly avoiding Chan's glare.
"Sounds good!" she says, then calls out to the others.
As they start streaming in, Hyunjin seems to appear from nowhere. "Hi Chan, hi Minho," he greets, "So, uh, we got the test expedited and it's clear that your meat is—"
"Great, thanks," Minho says loudly, as he ushers the others in. "Good seeing you."
"Yeah, I just wanted to say sorry for Seungmin," he continues, "And that everything got out of hand. Here's the paperwork clearing you and proving you serve—"
"Okay, great," Minho says again, grabbing the paperwork from Hyunjin with a grin. "Now leave before I shove you into the fryer."
"I just—"
"The fryer," he repeats, glaring, and Hyunjin nods and quickly moves away.
🍔
This weekend has been proof of just how much of a mess things can get, but at least this weekend ended in pretty good way for them. They're no longer suspected of being cannibals, and sure, they may have scammed a bit, but it's not like they ever actually said it was humans.
So, maybe things won't always be perfect, and maybe they'll have to deal with a lot more crazy situations, but at least they'll always have each other at the end of the day, even when Minho jokingly says he'd abandon Chan and take the kids if they're running from the law.
And right here, as they walk down the boardwalk of the wharf, the kids groaning when he and Minho act a bit too lovey dovey for their tastes. Before falling into fits of giggles as they tell them which rides are worth the hype and which prizes they want to try for.
This is nice.
He thinks moments like this makes all the craziness worth it.
Chan wouldn't give up any of his boys for anything in the world. Even if it meant he'd actually have some peace in his life, it wouldn't be worth it if he didn't have Minho and their kids.