"That was a nice thing," Jungkook said. "That you did with the football. It was, um, very good. Very skillful."

"Mmhm," Tae said, nodding and trying to look like he knew what he was talking about. "You were the best one out there."

"If you're talking about the fumble, then no, that was not a good thing, that's actually a bad thing, and the fact that I fumbled three times is proof that I'm definitely not the best one out there," Jin said with a sigh, adjusting his duffel back to rest more comfortably on his shoulder while his two brothers tagged along behind him on their way to the car.

"Well, you looked like you were working hard," Jungkook offered.

Jin sighed again. "I wasn't focused," he mumbled. "That stupid scholarship..."

Jungkook looked over at Tae with a raised eyebrow. They weren't supposed to know about the scholarship, but Namjoon had told them about Jin's source of stress, and they'd decided to try and help support him. Although, at the moment, it didn't seem like they'd managed to help at all.

But it certainly didn't help that neither Jungkook nor Tae knew a single thing about the sport between the two of them.

Jin's phone started to ring, and he sent it a brief glance, prepared to ignore it, but then he saw the caller and fumbled to pick it up. "Hi, Dad, what's up?" he asked, leaning slightly sideways to keep his balance as his duffel slipped from his shoulder to his elbow. "What? What is it?" He blinked. "All right, we'll be home in fifteen minutes then..."

Jin struggled end the call before dropping the phone in his duffel. "Dad said there's a surprise waiting for us at home."

Tae clapped his hands. "Oh, goody. I bet the new toaster came in."

Jungkook just laughed as the three got in Jin's car and headed home.

***

"Ta-da," Namjoon said weakly. "Surprise..."

Jimin looked up from the couch, where he was sitting next to Namjoon. "Hi guys," he said before taking in Jin's duffel bag. "How was p-practice?"

"Not great," Tae announced bluntly before wincing at Jungkook's glare. "I mean, that's another way of saying not bad, and not bad means pretty good, right?"

Jimin blinked. "Okay..."

"So you're the surprise?" Jungkook asked, smiling as he sat down next to Jimin. "Not that I'm complaining. But don't you have speech therapy today?"

Jimin pauses before shaking his head, a small smile appearing on his lips. "M-Mom told me I could stop g-going."

Jungkook's eyebrow raised. He wasn't sure which surprised him more; that their mother had actually won over Jimin or that she'd let him quit speech therapy after several unsuccessful years of appointments. "That's cool," he finally said, still unsure. He didn't understand how someone who had caused them so much pain at a young age was just wriggling her way back into their lives.

Maybe it's just Jimin because he's a softie, Jungkook thought to himself. Surely Hobi and Yoongi don't like her...impossible, right? Yoongi hated her the most...

"Your mom..." Namjoon started, but the words felt weird on his tongue. Still, he had to finish what he started, so he trudged onward. "She's letting us borrow Jimin for a few hours while she runs errands."

"Why would she do that?" Jungkook mumbled. "I thought she kept them on the shortest leash there was so they didn't come running back to you."

Namjoon gave Jungkook a look but sighed while Jimin just frowned, his lips pouting downwards. "I asked her for a favor, actually, and she was very generous in letting Jimin come over today."

"What's this about?" Tae asked, avoiding talk of their mother entirely since, like Jungkook, he still didn't know where to stand on the issue, and it was far easier if he just avoided the whole topic.

"Well-" Namjoon paused to give Jin a tired smile. "You're free to go, Jin. I know you're busy, and this is just about the triplets anyway."

"Oh..." Jin nodded slowly and turned to head to their room, frowning without knowing the cause.

Namjoon turned back to the triplets. "I met with the principal the other day, and we were discussing you three and what your schedules might look like for the next few years." He hesitated. "The principal had a suggestion, but I wanted to talk it over with you guys before we came to any firm decision."

"What s-suggestion?" Jimin asked, looking more worried the longer Namjoon failed to just announce it directly.

"Well..." Namjoon paused to grab a piece of paper from the coffee table. "Look. Here's a list of all the electives the school offers."

And sure enough, Namjoon watched as each child's eyes lit up at a different spot on the page.

"You all will probably want to take different classes, and it's not fair to make you all take the same course just to keep you together, so...you're going to be split up for your classes," Namjoon said slowly, keeping his eyes on them to watch their reactions.

"Split up?" Jimin asked, frowning, but he seemed fairly stable.

"I guess it makes sense," Tae said.

"It had to happen eventually," Jungkook agreed.

Only Jimin looked concerned, although Namjoon a bit worried about Tae as well.

"It'll be okay since you guys have friends in other classes," Namjoon said. "And I was talking with the principal to see if we could keep you all in one class together for each year."

"What class would that be?" Tae asked, scanning the sheet in front of him. "I don't see any electives that all three of us would be interested in, let alone three electives, one for each year."

"Right," Namjoon said, already wincing. "It's not an elective, but actually a graduation requirement class, one that you all need each year."

Three clueless eyes.

Namjoon sighed. "Gym. You would all have gym together."

Jungkook and Tae met eyes and grinned, high-fiving, but Jimin seemed to shrink back into the couch, staring at Namjoon with betrayed eyes. "N-No," he said, already shaking his head. "I'm not going b-back to gym."

"Jimin-" Namjoon began, worried that Jimin might have a meltdown, but Jimin, it seemed, had grown up without him.

Jimin didn't cry or shout or beg one of the others to take his side. Instead, Jimin, who had always been his least independent son, got up and quickly skirted around the couch. He was out of the living room before Jungkook and Tae even turned to notice his absence.

"Where'd Jimin go?" Jungkook asked, frowning. "Gym isn't that bad. I don't get why he's so upset."

"I know," Tae said. "Think of the future: dodge ball, Kim family take all."

Jungkook grinned. "We are going to own gym class."

Namjoon sighed. Neither Tae nor Jungkook had been in Jimin's previous gym class, and it had been around the time that their mom had gotten custody. Maybe Hobi and Yoongi knew, but it was evident that the others didn't. "Jimin had a rough time in gym class, but the principal really seems to think that it would be a good idea for Jimin to take gym starting next year." Namjoon craned his neck to look over his shoulder. "Jimin, come back in here," he said in a louder voice. "Let's talk about it, okay? Okay? Jimin?"

Namjoon frowned and got up to check the other rooms, but no Jimin.

However, the front door was unlocked, and it seemed likely that Jimin had already left.

The thought of Jimin fleeing from the home that had always been his safe haven hurt Namjoon's heart in a way he hadn't felt before, and he'd felt plenty of pain from the day Jin was born.

"Jimin left?" Tae asked, joining Namjoon in looking at the door.

"I thought he was going to stay for dinner," Jungkook said with a frown, and Namjoon's clips curled downward at the edges.

"I thought so too," he said. After all, he only got one night a week with all of his children and one full day with the other three. He'd wanted to do something special tonight while they had Jimin on loan. He knew Jin was stressed and busy, but maybe he could cajole Jin into cooking something for them. They could play a board game, or...or...

"I thought so too," he repeated, exhaling slowly as his hopes for the night dissipated into the air along with his breath.

***

Jimin was walking down the sidewalk, looking down, frowning. "I thought it was around here s-somewhere..." he muttered before looking up at the sun and squinting. He wasn't quite sure as to where he was going, as he only had a collection of stories from the others to fill in for a memory he'd never experienced, but something drove him on all the same.

It was a few minutes later that he stumbled upon it, quite literally, almost tripping over the cement-locked shoe, but he caught himself and took a few steps back before squatting down on the ground and staring at the size five stuck in the sidewalk.

It was Tae's old shoe from years and years ago, the coloring worn down by rain and dirt, and a collection of weeds sprouting from the opening, ants trailing up one of the corroded laces.

Jimin didn't know what it meant to him. He knew it meant something to all of the others because they'd been there. They'd had to walk Tae home with only one shoe. They'd probably laughed about it, gotten some strange looks, laughed some more.

But to Jimin, it was just a shoe. A legendary shoe, sure, but just a shoe all the same.

Jimin stopped squatting and just sat down on the sidewalk next to the shoe. He wasn't sure what he'd thought that he would accomplish by finding the shoe. It wasn't as though just seeing the shoe would somehow make him a part of the memory, just like being found at the Song's house didn't integrate him into the five years of family that he'd lost.

All that it made clear to Jimin was that he couldn't change the past, couldn't insert himself into moments he hadn't been present for. But that wasn't a horrible thing, was it? He'd had his own life. He'd created his own memories. Just as he wasn't a part of some of their memories, they weren't a part of some of his.

He wasn't sure what that meant to him, either.

Jimin sighed and laid down so his hair was resting on the grass before pulling out his cell phone and selecting a contact.

It rang twice before the person on the other end picked up.

"Jimin? Are you all right?"

"Yeah, Mom, I'm f-fine," Jimin said, staring at the sky and watching the clouds pass overhead.

"Where are you, Jimin? Aren't you supposed to be with your dad?"

"I'm somewhere," Jimin said, which was true enough. He couldn't remember which street he was on.

"Jimin, are you okay? You sound strange..."

"I don't know, M-Mom..." Jimin thought he saw a cloud shaped like a bicycle. He couldn't remember if he'd ever had one. He'd been too little when he'd been growing up with Namjoon, and he hadn't been permitted outside with the Songs, and when he returned to Namjoon, he was already 9, past the age of learning. The idea of a bicycle - of balancing, of stay upright - was scary to him. "I don't want to go b-back to gym, Mom," Jimin said suddenly, the fear of the bicycle constricting his heart, parallel to his fear of gym.

"Gym? Who's making you go back to gym?"

"Dad. He said I had to s-start taking gym." Jimin blinked, and the bicycle was gone. It was just a cloud once more. "I don't want to g-go through that again, Mom."

The bicycle was gone, but Jimin couldn't help but fixated on it. He was scared of riding a bike because he'd never learned. He was scared of the ocean because he'd never learned to swim.

And maybe he was scared of gym because he'd hadn't done it before, only the once, and it had been a bad experience. But fear of riding a bike hadn't stopped humans from conquering the vehicle, and fear of the ocean hadn't stopped humans from diving down into its depths. So what was stopping him?

"Your dad said you have to?"

"Well he said we should t-talk about it," Jimin amended, looking for the bicycle cloud, but it was long gone. "But I don't want to talk about it, I want t-t-to forget it."

A pause on the other end. "But if you forget, you can't learn from it, Jimin," she said softly. "That's how life works. It can be painful, but we need to remember our experiences so we learn from them, about what to do next time, about what not to do next time, about who you are as a person."

Jimin thought about what she'd said. What had he learned from the few days he'd been in gym? "I'm weak," he said.

"But you won't always be. You're growing up every day, Jimin. You're going to be strong. And honestly, your dad has done everything possible to protect you and make you happy, so if your dad thinks that it's a good idea, it's probably a good idea, Jimin." Another pause. "Why don't you go back and talk it over with him? I know it's scary for you, but that's part of growing up too. And like I said, you know your dad wants the best for you, just like I do, okay?"

"The fact that you h-have to tell me that makes me think there's a p-problem," Jimin said. "Since when were you d-defending Dad?" He let out a sad chuckle. "He was always defending y-you. I guess I thought..."

I guess I thought he was perfect, Jimin finished for himself. Namjoon had always been a strong father figure to him; caring, worried, protective...Jimin had never had any reason to doubt that. Namjoon had always done his best. But Namjoon was human too, although Jimin hadn't been able to see past his label as father to see the flawed humanity underneath. Every child comes to a point in their life, however, when they have to realize that their parents aren't raising them to be just like them; they're raising them to be better, because parents aren't perfect either.

And maybe Namjoon wasn't perfect, but he had always done what was best for his kids, and maybe - even though it seemed like a horrible idea to Jimin - maybe this wasn't an exception.

"Okay," Jimin said after a long moment. "I'll t-talk to him about it."

"Good boy. I'll pick you up after dinner, okay? You know your dad loves spending time with you."

Jimin nodded even though she couldn't see him, and he said his goodbye and hung up a few moments later. It was still a little too soon for him to add "I love you," but maybe one day it would come more naturally.

Now he just had to find his way home. Wherever the hell that was.

***

The sound of the door opening made Namjoon look up from his seat at the kitchen table. "Oh, thank God, Jimin, I was worried about where you'd gone-"

"S-Sorry," Jimin apologized, bowing his head in both regret and in shame.

Namjoon waved his hands defensively. "No, you're okay, you're right, maybe it was too soon to ask you to-"

"I'll do it," Jimin said, meeting Namjoon's eyes. "You d-don't have to treat me so d-delicately. If you hadn't asked and j-just signed me up, I'd do it anyway, but you asked s-so I decided my answer is y-yes. If you think it's the r-right thing to do."

Namjoon opened and closed his mouth before nodding slowly. "I do. I think it'll be good for you in a lot of ways. And I know that it was a mess last time, but Tae and Kookie will be there with you, and...well...I agree with the principal."

"Okay, D-Dad," Jimin said, nodding his head forward.

Namjoon hesitated. "That's it? You're not going to tell me to keep you out of gym or tell me how awful it was?"

"You're my dad and I t-trust you," Jimin said, although he was frowning slightly at the thought of returning to a locker room. "And good sons obey their p-parents, right?"

Namjoon was at a lost as for what to say. The result was what he'd wanted; he had the green light to sign Jimin up for gym, but... "Did you decide this on your own?"

Jimin paused. "I called M-Mom," he answered honestly.

Namjoon froze. He still wasn't used to them calling her Mom, and he didn't know if he'd ever be used to them taking her advice, especially when her advice supported his decision.

Were they on good terms now?

It was hard to imagine after ten years of hostility between them. She'd left at a vulnerable time in their lives and had wanted custody of Jin for her and her replacement Namjoon.

And yet she'd eventually sent money to support the family she'd opted out of before taking custody of three children, none of which were Jin, and it was her words that had made Jimin return to his house - to his home - to give Namjoon permission.

It was a strange world, indeed.

"Well...I'm glad you decided to take gym," Namjoon said, glossing over the mention of his ex-wife. He was torn; part of him was angry and jealous because it felt like she was stealing his sons away from him, the sons that he'd raised in her absence, but he knew it was for the best that they developed a good relationship with their mom, if only for their mental health. It was easy to forget that they were still just kids, vulnerable and easily hurt, holding on to decade-old wounds leaking the blood of abandonment, of starvation of love.

But it worried him just a bit, because starvation creates desperation, and maybe they were too desperate for her love to protect themselves against being hurt again.

But that was mostly his overprotective, jealous side talking. He knew, intellectually at least, that getting along with their mom, trusting their mom, establishing emotional ties with their mom, that it all went a long way towards fixing the broken shards inside their hearts.

Namjoon just wished that it was something he'd been capable of doing so they didn't require her to do it, but he knew that he had to learn how to share with her, for the sake of their children.

Even if he'd always think of them as his children, whether they carried her DNA or not.

She'd given birth to them, but he'd raised them, and he didn't think anything could replace that.

At least, he hoped not. But within that jealousy hid insecurity, and within that insecurity hid fear, fear of losing three of his children forever.

His most recent nightmares were filled with Friday night dinners where their seats were all empty because they'd stopped coming.

Namjoon knew he was supposed to be happy as long as his kids were happy, but he didn't think he could ever be happy if he knew his kids were happy with her and that they wouldn't be returning to him.