Single Father • Namjoon + BTS!Kids

xvii.

"Woah! Your drawing is so good!" Yugyeom said, staring at Tae's piece of paper, which was covered in colorful scribbles. "But...why is there an egg?"

Tae just sighed, rolling his eyes. "It's art. You wouldn't understand."

"I-I understand," Kunpimook quickly spoke up, desperate for some attention after Yoongi had shut him down.

Tae turned his gaze to him, and he shrank down in his chair. "Who are you again?"

Kunpimook swallowed. "I'm-" He hesitated. The kids in his class always teased him about his name since it was so weird compared to theirs. "I'm..."

"Bam! Bam! Bam!" Hobi yelled, throwing crayons at Yoongi. "You're dead! Now you have to die! Hurry up! You gotta lay down. Like this," Hobi said, throwing himself onto the ground and making fake choking and gagging noises before falling silent in his usual dramatic fashion. Then he hopped back up. "C'mon, your turn!"

"I'm...BamBam," Kunpimook said, turning back to Tae. Yugyeom gave Kunpimook a weird look, but Kunpimook just made puppy eyes at him. "BamBam," Kunpimook repeated.

"Yeah, I heard it the first time," Tae said sassily, turning back to his coloring.

Jin draped himself over Tae's back, resting his elbows on the table and his head on top of Tae's head. "He's just being annoying because he doesn't know you guys. Just ignore him."

"Hyung! Get off of me!" Tae said, struggling - and failing - against Jin's weight. "Hyunggg."

Jin stuck his tongue out and got off of Tae, grabbing his drawing and running off with it. "I'm telling Daddy that you drew him as an egg again!"

"No! Give it back to me! I'm going to put it up on the fridge when we get home!" Tae protested, jumping off his chair and running after Jin.

Jungkook swallowed, turning to the two boys he'd just met. As the youngest, he had been sheltered from social interaction. Jin had always taken care of dealing with adults and other kids. So trying to do it by himself was kind of scary. "I- I-" I want to be friends. Jungkook sank lower in his seat. "Can you pass the purple crayon?" he asked instead, too shy to demand friendship.

"Sure," Kunpimook - who would forever be known as BamBam thereafter - said, passing Jungkook the requested crayon.

"Thanks," he said, smiling shyly.

"Bunny," BamBam immediately said, blinking.

"What?"

"Your teeth. They look like a bunny," BamBam said, turning to Yugyeom. "Right, Yuggie? Don't his teeth look like a bunny's?"

Yugyeom frowned unsurely. "I don't know, hyung, that sounds mean...Don't say that..."

"Or Yoongi will take all of your crayons," Sehun muttered from the other side of the table, crayonless. "He already got me. I couldn't stop him."

Jungkook swallowed. "Y-you can use my crayon," he said, looking over at Sehun. "It's purple."

"I don't want purple."

"O-oh." Jungkook looked down at his paper. If he doesn't the purple crayon, is that his way of saying he doesn't like me? What does that mean?

"But. I'll take it," Sehun said, his eyes darting over to Jungkook. "The crayon. The purple one. But if you have green, I want green."

"I just have purple."

"Oh. Okay. I'll take purple."

"Okay." Jungkook tentatively tried to hand over the purple crayon, but his short arms couldn't reach so he had to roll it across the table.

"Thanks," Sehun said, easily trapping it in his fingers as he immediately began to color the grass purple.

Jimin, meanwhile, had been sitting by himself at the table, silent. He had wanted to make friends, but all of his brothers had already taken the strangers. Yugyeom and BamBam were getting along with Jungkook, and Tae had also talked to them. Hobi, Jungkook, and Yoongi had already talked to Sehun. And Jin, of course, had already talked to everybody since he was the oldest and bravest.

Jimin wanted to talk with them. He wanted to color with them. But he was too shy. He knew that Jungkook was also shy, but the maknae had already gotten to the point where he could share crayons with them. Nobody would share their crayons with Jimin.

Jimin stared down at the white sheet of paper. He wanted to cry, but he didn't know where his daddy was, and he was afraid that the other kids would make fun of him.

Just then, a handful of crayons fell onto the table in front of him, some of them rolling off the edge and falling on the floor.

"I just found these," Yoongi said. "Now you can color too."

Jimin turned and hugged Yoongi tightly. He knew that Yoongi seemed mean sometimes - okay, well sometimes he was just flat-out mean - but he was also one of Jimin's special older brothers that always looked after him and took care of him. "Thank you, hyung," Jimin said, but the words came out muffled because he was talking into Yoongi's t-shirt.

Jimin felt Yoongi's hands pushing on Jimin's head, trying to pry him off. "Aish, all I did was give you some crayons," Yoongi muttered. "Don't make it a big deal."

Jimin smiled before pulling back and nodding. "Okay, hyung. Can I draw a picture of you?"

Yoongi narrowed his eyes. "Okay?"

Five minutes later, Jimin held up his paper.

"Why do I look like a turtle?" Yoongi asked, frowning.

***

Namjoon checked his watch. 10:00 PM. "It's been two hours. I'm going to check on the kids, okay?" he asked, checking with PD-nim, who laughed and nodded.

"You've asked to check on them ten times already. Just go."

Namjoon nodded, mumbling a "thank you" and speed-walking to the place he'd left them last. He expected to see them all hyped up because they were able to stay up past their bedtime.

When he got there, however, he had to stop and smile.

Nine little faces - six of his plus Mark's and Xiumin's sons - were pressed against the coloring table, eyes closed. Namjoon quickly took a few pictures before turning to walk away.

That's when he saw it.

"What the hell? The little brat drew me as an egg again!"

***

"Wakey wakey," Namjoon cooed, gently shaking his kids away. "It's 6:00. Time to get up for school."

Jin blinked and yawned before shaking Yoongi, who shook Hobi, who shook Jimin, who shook Taehyung, who shook Jungkook.

The last to wake up lifted his head, and Namjoon laughed.

"What?" Jungkook asked, crabby after being woken up.

"Nothing, nothing," Namjoon said, turning quickly, but he couldn't get the image of a sleepy Jungkook with a purple crayon stuck to his cheek out of his head.