CONTRACT POSITION

27. Two

They had said goodbye at the airport. The two had promised to see each other in two weeks upon Teresa's return and get married, but through no fault of their own, two weeks turned into two months, then sadly, two years. 

When Teresa was in Puerto Rico, a big hurricane passed through, leaving her and many others stranded on the island for months, due to the damage to the airport. Her family was lucky. They didn't lose their home and did not need to seek refuge outside of the island. 

Once she helped her family, friends, and local community recover from the initial emergency, a COVID outbreak on the island due to foreign visitors and volunteers prevented her from flying to Korea and prevented Chris from initially flying to Puerto Rico. 

Once travel opened up about thirty to thirty-three weeks after she had left, he took a hiatus citing a family emergency, and immediately flew to see her. He stayed with her for about a month, before he reluctantly returned to Korea without her.

By then, her working visa had expired, and Teresa had no legal way back to Korea other than a travel visa, as the work visa process had been backed up for months. 

The couple decided to begin her citizenship visa process, so they could get married and she could become a Korean citizen. By the time the visa procedures were finalized two years had passed. 

By then, a new CEO had been appointed, and Chris, Changbin, and Han were now directors at JYPE in charge of music production. 

Another thing that changed was Chris’ live broadcasts. He had stopped doing them weekly, but he had begun going live with Teresa to get the fandom used to her. He introduced his fiancée to Stay, which caused a firestorm of criticism, but he didn't care, and neither did most of Stay. 

After a while though, the news of Stray Kids Bang Chan's fiancée had died down, and he slowly stopped doing individual lives altogether. He'd only appear in other member's broadcasts or OT8 lives.

Chris called or texted Teresa almost daily, and video-called every night without fail. The kids still took virtual lessons with her and were doing well with their respective languages. 

The time had finally come for Stray Kids to have a U.S. tour, and Chris arranged for her to be their travel English teacher and meet them at their first stop. He could not forget her. He loved her, and she loved him. Neither had dated anyone, and their love had multiplied. He was very excited for the reunion. 

The first stop of their tour was in Las Vegas, Nevada. This was intentional. Chris arranged for him and Teresa to get married in one of Vegas' finest wedding chapels. 

The 7 members were witnesses and maids of honor —they insisted they'd be called that, except for Jeongin, Changbin, and Seungmin. They'd be the best men— and they even had a little ring bearer and a little flower girl.

Christopher Lucas and Lixie Hannah Bahng Figueroa were born 30 weeks after Teresa left Korea, in Juana Díaz, Puerto Rico, her hometown.

The news was bittersweet for Chris, not being able to be there for Teresa during her pregnancy, and he almost missed his twins’ birth, but he was the happiest man alive when travel restrictions were lifted just in time for him to be there, and meet his babies when they came into the world. 

During her pregnancy, Teresa's best friend helped her throughout the whole process. She was terrified. Not only was she pregnant at forty-one years old, but she was carrying twins. Chris did everything in his power to support them from afar.

He video chatted daily, talked to and sang to his babies every night from the womb until the present, and Teresa always put them to sleep to the sound of his music. He wrote a full album of lullabies for and about them, and he added new songs almost weekly.