Work Text
Enchanted with the baby now wiggling happily and squeezing his hand, Bum smiles and looks over at his mom. But she’s still busy on the phone, looking off into the other direction.
The baby coos softly and bounces in his stroller, swinging his feet. He tugs at Bum’s hand, pulling him closer.
Bum giggles. Maybe the baby’s mom will let him play with him. He looks over at the woman seated on the bench, but she’s slid over to the farthest part of the bench now - even farther away from the baby than she had been when Bum last glanced in her direction. Bum frowns. Was that not the baby’s mom? Why was she so far away?
Moms usually stay within arm’s length of their babies. At least, that’s what he saw at the playground near his home. The moms would spend all their time paying attention to their babies from the sidelines of the benches while the bigger kids like him played on the swings and slides and in the sandbox. His own mom would mostly pay attention to her phone, but that’s okay because he’s a big kid. He could reach the seat of the swings all by himself now.
But this woman hasn’t looked in the baby’s direction once. She stares down at the ground between her feet and seems… tired. Or sad. Just completely uninterested in what is going on with the baby. …And she hadn’t responded when the baby was crying. Maybe she wasn’t the baby’s mom…
Maybe that was why the baby was crying! He didn’t know where his mom or dad were.
Bum gives the baby’s hand a reassuring squeeze. But a gust of wind sends a chill through the air and sweeps more snow into both their faces.
Movement at the far end of the bench grabs Bum’s attention as the woman he’d thought was the baby’s mom stands up. Bum gasps and drags the stroller closer to himself, fearing he’ll have to say goodbye. He likes this baby. It’s a cute baby. Not like the baby that belongs to the neighbor down the hall. That baby has a squished up face. Or he is always scowling. Either way, that one doesn’t seem like a nice baby. Not like this one. He wants to keep this baby with him a little longer. Bum pulls at the side of the stroller, turning it to face towards his own mom and braces himself, expecting the woman to shoo him away and take the baby with her.
But she doesn’t seem put off by his actions. She doesn’t seem to even notice at all. She just walks away, not looking back. Huh. Well, clearly she wasn’t the mom. She didn’t take the baby with her.
Bum grins down at the baby. He’s all alone and Bum found him. He’s keeping him.
“Come on,” Bum says, and gets behind the stroller to grab hold of the handles. He pushes the baby over towards his mom.
His mom huffs, flips her phone shut, and taps her foot, still facing away with her back towards him. Uh oh. Tapping her foot means she’s mad. And sure enough, she calls out, her voice raised in anger, “Bum, I said come here! How many times do I have to—“ And then, she turns to glare back at him, but cuts off abruptly mid-question.
She looks wide-eyed in puzzlement as Bum continues forward, pushing a stroller with a baby in it right up to her. “What are you doing? Where’s…” She glances around the area and trails off. There are no other adults nearby.
Flustered, she looks down at Bum’s earnest face. “Where did you get him?” She’s trying to sound stern but it comes out baffled.
“I found him over there. He was all alone and crying,” Bum says. He lets go of the handles and comes around the stroller to take hold of the baby’s left hand. “I want to keep him,” he declares. “Let’s take him home with us.” Bum looks up at her, plaintive as if asking for a new toy.
She frowns. “His stroller probably rolled away from his parents, Bum. They’re probably looking for him right now.”
The windchill picks up, sending a flurry of snowflakes onto their exposed skin, and stinging her cheeks and hands with cold.
“Unngh,” the baby cries out. He clenches his little fists - one latched tightly with Bum’s hand - and brings them in against his body. Bum follows the movement and leans into the baby’s side.
Brow furrowed in worry, Bum’s mom stuffs her phone into the pocket of her coat and crouches down in front of the baby. She strokes a gentle hand over his head, lightly brushing back his hair and feeling his forehead. No fever. “He must be cold.”
She searches the various compartments and pouches of the stroller, dismayed to find no jackets, no blankets, not even a soft beanie cap to keep his head warm.
Finding herself disgusted at the absent parents who would not only lose track of their child, but also fail to outfit him properly for the weather, she unwraps her scarf from her neck and tucks it snugly around the baby. She turns to Bum and pulls him closer by the front of his open jacket. Then, she buttons his jacket closed, smoothes it straight against his small chest, and sighs.
She stands. “Let’s go find an information desk. They should help us locate his parents.”
Bum’s shoulders slump and he pouts in dismay, immediately crestfallen. He huffs and sighs loudly several times along the way, while following his mom as she guides him and the stroller all the way to the other end of the place and up to an information counter.
——
Unbeknownst to them, a man returns to the area they just left - two warm Starbucks coffee drinks now in hand - only to discover his wife and child are not there. He’s rattled with anger and jerks his head around, searching the surrounding area but not seeing either his wife or child anywhere. The man sets both drinks down on a bench and digs his phone out of his pocket. He calls and it only takes a few rings before his wife answers.
“What?”
“Where are you?” he shouts.
“Home,” she replies.
“At home?!” He yells, incredulous. “You just left without me? You took the car?”
“Mmhm,” she mumbles in the affirmative, nonchalant.
He groans and starts walking to the exit, abandoning the drinks, “I guess I’ll get a cab and see you both at home,” he says and hangs up in seething irritation. His annoyed demeanor and powerful strides clear a path to the exit easily.
——
Bum’s mom knocks her knuckles against the wooden counter to get the attention of the bored teenager behind it.
The teenager sighs in resignation and closes the magazine she was flipping through. “What?”
Thirty minutes of explanations and phone calls to management and the authorities later and someone has shown up to deal with the situation.
An officer enters management’s meager office along with a harried social worker who stomps her feet on the office floor and brushes snow from her head and shoulders. The officer starts questioning the staff while the social worker shuffles over to where they wait seated.
“Mrs. Yoon?” the woman asks.
And Mrs. Yoon nods, tired from the long day. At least they are out of the cold in here, but the seats aren’t cushioned enough to be comfortable. She and the social worker look over at Bum and the baby curled asleep together in the other chair. Luckily there had been milk packed in the stroller - stored in a thermos labelled “Sangwoo” rather than a bottle - and the baby had taken the drink eagerly with no problems. Bum had been very insistent on helping, carefully holding the baby in his lap while the little face stared intensely up at him over the top of the thermos. The baby was big enough to barely fit on his lap, but he held him tight. And she had to admit - it was pretty adorable. Especially once they had fallen into exhausted sleep bundled together on the seat like puppies.
The social worker smiles down at the sleeping young boys. She turns to Mrs. Yoon and confirms, “And this is Sangwoo?” She gestures to the baby.
Mrs. Yoon hands the empty thermos to her, the sloppy writing on the label indicating it was for Sangwoo.
The woman sighs and looks briefly for another chair but there isn’t one. She leans heavily onto a nearby desk. “Well, we’ve checked and there have been no Missing Persons report made for a ‘Sangwoo’. Not yet at least,” she says, shrugging. “We also haven’t had any reports of missing babies for the last two months. And the only recent report that would match the baby’s age range is a missing girl.”
Mrs. Yoon rubs her the temple of her forehead. The staff had found a diaper for the baby and she had changed him just minutes ago. There had been no diapers in the stroller and now there had apparently been no report made by the parents to try to find him. She shakes her head. “Well, you can check,” she says, “but I’ve just changed his diaper. This baby’s a boy.”
Sighing, the older woman admits, “In cases like this, we’ll have to have him examined by a doctor and find a temporary home for him. Unfortunately, we’re a bit short on homes we can send him to at the moment. If you’d be willing to foster him, we can set you up with some paperwork to do that.” She pulls a card from her pocket and hands it over, smiling.
Mrs. Yoon takes the card, glancing at Bum and the child snuggled together. Bum’s father has been wanting his mother to move in with them lately. It would have been to take care of Bum. Maybe if she agrees to this and allowing the old woman to live with them, it will get her mother in law to finally stop making subtly rude remarks in an effort to get them to give her another grandchild. Having Bum was hard enough on her career. A second pregnancy would only hinder her efforts at work. Thoughtfully considering that this could be the solution to her problems, she smiles at the boys and looks up at the social worker. “I’d love to.”
——
Arrangements are made; and several days and several background checks later, Sangwoo is welcomed into his new foster home - to live with Bum and Bum’s mother, father, and grandmother.
Days later and on the other side of the city, police will discover the scene of a gruesome murder-suicide, where Oh Eunseo has killed her husband and then herself. Meanwhile, the Yoon family will enjoy a meal together, unaware that the change in their routine - the dinner to celebrate both Sangwoo and Bum’s grandmother coming to live with them - has altered events. Unaware that Bum’s mother and father would have dropped Bum off at his uncle’s, where his grandmother would have babysat him, while Mr and Mrs Yoon dined at a restaurant, only to have died together in an accident on the car ride back. Unaware of what this rippling change in their life has spared them.
But here and now, Bum and Sangwoo play, innocent and blissfully unaware.
“Mmm Bah!” Sangwoo grins and reaches for a block, cooing with delight as he smacks it against another block.
Bum laughs, seated next to him on the blanket. He grabs one of the blocks that has tumbled out of Sangwoo’s reach and holds it out for the baby, offering him the colorful block.
Sangwoo carefully latches onto it with his free hand, picking it up to stare at it in fascination. With a block in each hand, he smashes them together and giggles up at Bum.
Bum hugs him possessively and smiles.
-end-