Chapter 28: The Secret Spills
The Lego castle was finally complete, its plastic battlements towering precariously over the coffee table. Jisung sat back on his heels, surveying his work with the critical eye of a master builder. He reached for his dragon, placing it at the gate.
Hyukjae watched from the doorway, a dish towel slung over his shoulder. The scene was so perfectly ordinary it made his heart ache. Donghae was curled in the corner of the sofa, grading student worksheets, a pencil tucked behind his ear. He’d been quieter than usual all evening, his free hand occasionally drifting to rest low on his abdomen.
It was time.
“Jisung-ah,” Hyukjae said, his voice carefully light. “Come sit for a minute. We want to talk to you about something.”
Donghae looked up, their eyes meeting. He set the papers aside and patted the cushion next to him. The gentle gesture steadied Hyukjae.
Jisung’s brows knitted, a miniature version of Hyukjae’s own concerned expression. He scrambled onto the couch, sitting ramrod straight between them, his dragon clutched to his chest. “Am I in trouble?” he asked, looking from his Appa to Donghae.
“No, no trouble at all,” Donghae said softly. He reached over and smoothed Jisung’s hair. “It’s good news. Very good news.”
Hyukjae took a breath. He’d rehearsed this in his head a dozen times, but the words felt clumsy now. “You know how much we love you, right? And how much Teacher Hae loves being with us?”
Jisung nodded, his eyes wide and unblinking.
“And you know that families… they can grow. They can change shape.” Hyukjae continued. He saw Donghae’s hand slip into Jisung’s, their fingers linking. “Well, our family is going to grow.”
Jisung blinked. “Are we getting a dog?”
A surprised laugh burst from Donghae, bright and sudden. It broke the tension like a sunbeam through clouds. Hyukjae felt his own shoulders relax.
“Not a dog,” Hyukjae said, a smile tugging at his mouth. “Though maybe one day. This is different.” He glanced at Donghae, who gave him a small, encouraging nod. “Teacher Hae… he’s going to have a baby. A little brother or sister for you. They’re growing right now, inside his tummy.”
The room went very still. The only sound was the faint hum of the slow cooker, the cinnamon scent now feeling thick and sweet in the air. Jisung’s face was a blank canvas of concentration. He looked at Donghae’s stomach, then back up at his face.
“A baby?” he whispered.
“Yes,” Donghae said, his voice warm but tinged with a vulnerability Hyukjae rarely heard. “It’s very early. And it will take many months before they’re ready to meet us. But they’re here.”
Jisung processed this. He slid off the couch and stood directly in front of Donghae, his small face serious. “Does it hurt?”
“Not right now,” Donghae said. “Sometimes my stomach feels funny. But it doesn’t hurt.”
“Oh.” Jisung chewed his lip. “Can they hear me?”
“Not yet. But soon.”
Another long pause. Hyukjae held his breath. This was the moment that could tip any which way—confusion, jealousy, delight. He realized, with a jolt, that he was more afraid of his son’s reaction than any board meeting or client pitch he’d ever faced.
Then Jisung’s eyes, dark and sharp like his own, lit up with a sudden, practical curiosity. “Will they like dinosaurs?”
The air rushed back into Hyukjae’s lungs. Donghae’s composure broke into a watery, joyful smile. “I really, really hope so,” he said, a tear escaping down his cheek. “I think you’ll have to teach them.”
Jisung nodded, a solemn duty accepted. He stepped closer, then very carefully, as if approaching something made of glass and starlight, he placed his small hand on the soft knit of Donghae’s sweater. He left it there for a moment, feeling.
“Hello, baby,” he whispered. Then he looked up at Donghae. “I have a lot to show you. I have all the best dinosaurs. And I can teach you piano, but only the easy songs first.” He turned to Hyukjae, his expression turning slightly worried. “Appa, where will the baby sleep? My room is kind of messy. I can clean a corner.”
The planning had begun. Hyukjae reached out, pulling his son onto his lap and wrapping an arm around Donghae’s shoulders, drawing his small, perfect world in close. “We’ll figure all of that out. Together.”
That night, the rituals felt different. Brushing teeth took longer because Jisung had questions about whether babies had teeth. Story time involved a book about animal families. When they tucked him in, he snuggled deep under his comforter, his dragon under his arm.
“Appa?” he murmured, his voice already slurry with sleep.
“Yes, Sungie?”
“Teacher Hae is staying forever now, right? Because babies need their appa, too.”
The simple logic of a child. It shattered the last fragile pane of fear in Hyukjae’s heart. He looked at Donghae, who was standing in the doorway, backlit by the hall light, his hand once again resting protectively over his middle. He looked like a promise.
“Yeah,” Hyukjae said, his own voice thick. “He’s staying forever.”
Jisung smiled, satisfied. His eyes fluttered closed. “Good. I’m gonna be the best big brother.”
In the quiet dark of the hallway, Hyukjae didn’t speak. He simply turned and gathered Donghae into his arms, burying his face in the omega’s scent—now tinged with something new, something deeper and profoundly theirs. He didn’t kiss him. He just held on, his strong frame trembling just once, a silent earthquake of relief and awe.
Donghae understood. He held him back, his fingers splaying across the tense muscles of Hyukjae’s back. “He’s okay,” he whispered into Hyukjae’s shoulder. “We’re all okay.”
Later, in their own bed, Hyukjae lay on his side, his palm spread wide over Donghae’s still-flat stomach. The city lights painted shifting patterns on the ceiling.
“He called me ‘Appa’,” Donghae said into the darkness, the words hushed with disbelief.
Hyukjae’s hand stilled. He hadn’t even processed it. In his son’s seamless vision of the future, Donghae had already been given the title. The role.
“You are,” Hyukjae said, the truth of it solid as bedrock. “You have been for a while.”
He felt Donghae’s body soften, a quiet sob caught in his chest. Hyukjae pulled him closer, slotting their bodies together like two pieces of a puzzle finally clicked into place. The fear wasn’t gone. There were a hundred appointments to schedule, a nursery to plan, a future to secure. But the foundation, he realized now, was unshakeable. It was built not just on the heat of passion, but on the quiet moments in sunlit kitchens, on piano lessons, on the weight of a child’s hand in trust, on the unspoken vow thrumming between them in the dark.
Outside, a car alarm blared briefly and went silent. The world continued, noisy and indifferent. But here, in this room, a new world was quietly, stubbornly, beginning to turn.
The morning sickness, when it came again, was a brutal and punctual thing. It arrived not with a gentle wave but a sudden, throat-clenching surge that had Donghae scrambling from the warm tangle of sheets, a hand clamped over his mouth. He barely made it to the toilet, knees hitting the cool tile as his body convulsed, expelling nothing but acidic remorse.
Hyukjae was there in an instant, a steady presence kneeling behind him, gathering Donghae’s sweat-damp hair back with one hand while the other rubbed slow, firm circles between his shoulder blades.
“Easy,” Hyukjae murmured, his voice still thick with sleep. “Just breathe through it. I’ve got you.”
The bout passed, leaving Donghae shaky and hollow. He leaned back into Hyukjae’s chest, the solidity of him an anchor. “It’s like my stomach has declared mutiny,” Donghae gasped, accepting a glass of water. “And the captain is a sadist.”
A small, worried voice piped up from the doorway. “Daddy?”
Jisung stood there, his dinosaur pajamas rumpled, one fist rubbing a sleepy eye. He took in the scene: his Appa on the floor holding Daddy, who was pale and breathing funny. His little brow furrowed in serious contemplation.
Donghae managed a weak smile. “Good morning, Sungie. Daddy’s just… his tummy is being silly.”
Jisung padded forward, his small feet silent on the tile. He stopped in front of Donghae, his expression shifting from concern to a mild, disapproving sternness that was a perfect mirror of Hyukjae’s. He pointed a tiny finger at Donghae’s abdomen.
“Bad tummy,” Jisung announced, his tone scolding. “You stop it. Don’t make Daddy sick!” He leaned closer, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper directed at Donghae’s stomach. “Appa has to take care of Daddy if he’s sick. That’s a big job. You be good.”
The sheer absurdity of it, the profound sweetness, cut through the nausea’s miserable haze. A laugh bubbled out of Donghae, weak at first, then genuine, shaking his slender frame. He pulled Jisung into a hug, burying his face in the boy’s soft, sleep-scented hair.
“I’ll tell it to behave,” Donghae promised, laughing into his hair. “You’re a very good boss, Jisung-ah.”
Hyukjae watched them, his dark eyes soft. He pressed a kiss to Donghae’s temple. “The boss has spoken. You heard him. Be good.”
The worry came later, as worries often do, in the deep blue quiet of their shared bed. The moon cast long silver shapes across the duvet. Hyukjae’s arm was a heavy, comforting weight across Donghae’s waist, his palm instinctively splayed over the place where their child was quietly, ceaselessly dividing cells.
Donghae stared at the ceiling. “Hyukjae?”
“Hmm?”
“What if…” The words felt dangerous, blasphemous even in the safety of the dark. “What if I love this baby more than Jisung?”
Hyukjae went still behind him. Not tense, but listening.
“It’s a stupid thought, I know it’s stupid,” Donghae rushed on, the fear tumbling out now that the dam was cracked. “I love him so much it aches. He’s my son. But what if it’s biological? What if it’s out of my control? This one… it’s ours, from the very first second. And Jisung, he’s yours, and he’s mine, but he wasn’t this. What if I look at this baby and something just… clicks differently? Or what if I don’t have enough? What if the new baby takes all my time and he feels pushed out? He just got used to having me.”
The silence stretched, filled only with the hum of the night and the frantic beat of Donghae’s heart. Then Hyukjae’s chest vibrated against his back. A low, warm sound. He was laughing.
Donghae twisted, offended. “Why are you laughing? It’s a real worry!”
Hyukjae pulled him closer, his laughter softening into a breath against Donghae’s neck. “Because,” he said, his voice rich with amusement and affection, “only you would lie awake terrified you’ll love our children too much. In different, treasonous ways.”
“It’s not funny.”
“It’s a little funny.” Hyukjae shifted, propping himself up on an elbow to look down at Donghae. The moonlight caught the planes of his face. “Do you know what Jisung told me at school today? He told his teacher that his Daddy has a secret magic in his tummy that’s making him tired, and that he’s in charge of making sure I do a good job helping. He is planning your care schedule, Donghae. He drew me a chart.”
Donghae’s eyes stung.
“Love isn’t a pie,” Hyukjae said, his thumb brushing a tear from Donghae’s cheekbone. “You don’t have to divide it into smaller pieces. It grows. It makes more of itself. When Jisung was born, I thought my heart would explode. I didn’t know a person could hold that much. And then you walked into our living room, all gentle hands and patience, and you looked at my son like he was the most fascinating thing you’d ever seen… and my heart didn’t explode. It just got bigger. It made room.”
He leaned down, his forehead touching Donghae’s. “You will love this baby with a ferocity that will scare you. And you will look at Jisung, and you will love him with all the history you’ve built, all the trust he’s given you, all the piano lessons and the scoldings he gives your stomach. It won’t be the same. It shouldn’t be. It will be deeper. Wider. We’ll be tired, and we’ll make mistakes, and he might feel jealous for a day. But he will never, for one second, doubt that he is your son.”
Donghae let out a shuddering breath, the tight knot of fear in his chest loosening, dissolving under the simple, unwavering certainty in Hyukjae’s voice. He wasn’t just being comforted; he was being taught. Shown the map of a heart he already possessed.
“Okay,” Donghae whispered.
“Okay,” Hyukjae echoed. He settled back, pulling Donghae snug against him. “Now sleep. The boss and the secret magic both need you rested.”
Donghae closed his eyes, Hyukjae’s steady heartbeat against his back, his own hand covering Hyukjae’s over their growing, silent promise. The fear wasn’t gone, but it was quiet now, outshone by a larger, brighter, more expansive hope.