baby doll - nct, markhyuck

🎀 10 🎀

mark's whole body tensed when he heard the doorbell ringing.

maria who was sitting on the living room floor in front of him lifted her head up with a bright smile. "they're here?!" she exclaimed, letting haechan fall to the floor as she jumped on her feet.

"yes, sweetie, they're here." jane nodded, gesturing to maria to come with her to open the door.

as his little sister bounced towards their mother, mark stood up from the sofa and collected the doll that his sister had left on the floor.

"god, i'm so stressed for nothing..." mark mumbled, placing the doll over the table. "if mom loves him, there's no reason i won't like him too, you know? but i can't help being stressed..." he continued, looking at the lifeless eyes of the doll.

"hello!"

mark sighed before standing up properly and heading towards the door, where his mother was smiling at a man.

"welcome, jaesun. let me introduce my children. this is maria, she's 8 years old, and that's mark. he's 18." jane said as both maria and mark bowed respectfully to the new partner of their mother.

"good evening mark and maria. i'm jaesun, and this is sungchan, my son. he's 16." jaesun smiled at jane's children.

"nice to meet you sir." mark smiled back as maria nodded next to him.

"come on, don't be shy, and call me jaesun, please."

"well, now that everybody introduced themselves, how about we get to the living room to get a little aperitif?" jane suggested to which mark ndded.

"with pleasure." jaesun agreed.

all five of them headed to the living room, taking a seat on the sofas and armchairs around as jane brought a tray from the kitchen on which were placed bowls of crisps as well as empty glasses for them to have a drink.

mark sat comfortably with sungchan next to him as maria clung onto her mother's side while she was sitting next to her new partner.

the aperitif was going well, consisting mostly of jane and jaesun talking, and sometimes letting the younger boys talk – maria too, but she was too shy.

after what seemed like hours for her – but was in fact 10 minutes – maria tugged on her mother's sleeve, cutting short the conversation jane and jaesun were having.

"what is it, sweetie?" jane asked, caressing her mother's head.

"c-can i go play in my room...?" she stuttered, glancing from time to time at the new partner of her mother.

"sure. how about you show it to sungchan?"

maria nodded slowly as she jumped on her feet, grabbing haechan that was still resting on top of the table.

"mark, go in maria's room with sungchan. this way you'll be able to talk about things of your age."

"okay." mark stood up. "you're coming?" he asked, looking at sungchan.

the teenager nodded before standing up as well, and following mark and maria towards the girl's room.

as soon as they got there, maria sat down on the floor, pulling out her collection of dolls and starting to play.

"do you want to play with me, s-sungchan...?" she asked hesitantly.

"huh... okay." the 16-year-old nodded.

"cool! you do you want to play with?" maria continued, showing him all of her dolls.

"i don't know..." sungchan shrugged, looking at the many dolls.

"take this one. my favourite doll." maria handed to sungchan the beautiful doll.

"oh, it's a male doll." sungchan let out, rather surprised.

"yeah. his name is haechan." maria nodded.

mark kept an eye on this particular doll, looking carefully at how sungchan studied the plastic toy. mark had no idea why, but he was feeling quite protective over this very doll, perhaps because he was aware of the fact it wasn't actually a doll...

"don't you think he's beautiful?" maria asked again.

mark nodded in silence. in fact, haechan was beautiful, but he was even more when he was in his human form. he looked almost surreal.

"yeah, he's very pretty." sungchan said with a smile, his eyes still on the toy.

mark's jaw clenched at sungchan's words. he didn't even know why he had such a reaction, when sungchan had probably only said that to make his sister smile. mark himself had done the same when he didn't know donghyuck.

"you don't want to play?"

mark lifted his head when sungchan spoke. "h-huh... no, thanks. i'm okay watching."

"oh okay." sungchan nodded.

"and you don't have to play too much either if you don't want to." mark specified. "maria always forget when someone plays with her, and she ends up playing alone."

"oh, alright. i don't even know how to play dolls." sungchan admitted, glancing at haechan in his hand.

"she's in her own world while playing that. don't worry." mark chuckled. "i don't get all those girls' things."

sungchan laughed along with mark. "i think i can understand. sadly, i have no little sister to live it at home..."

"well..." mark sighed. "i don't know how your dad and you talked about it, but my mother said that she believed their relationship would last. and... i don't know, but this could mean there is a slight possibility we could become siblings..." mark explained, glancing at sungchan from time to time.

"yeah, my father told me already." he nodded. "it made me stress quite a lot at first, because i've always been an only child, alone with my father, and i wasn't sure i'd be able to get a new motherly figure, and siblings... but now that i know you two, and your mother, i am guessing that this can't be the worst choice my father has made. i've never seen him this happy since mom's death... and that was 10 years ago..."

mark's eyes widened as he stared at sungchan.

he had no idea sungchan's mother had died.

he had no idea sungchan had lost his mother at 6.

he had no idea sungchan had grown alone.

mark and maria had 'lost' their father 6 years ago, after their parent's divorce, and they didn't even know where he was now. it had been painful, but their father made them suffer more than when he wasn't actually there.

but sungchan's story was on another lever. the poor boy had lost his mother whom he loved.

"i-i'm sorry, i didn't know..." mark apologised.

"it's okay." sungchan smiled at him. "i learned to live with it. and now that my father has found someone else, i guess we can be happy again."

mark nodded, smiling back at sungchan as he placed his hand on the boy's shoulder to reassure him.

he had been stressing for this very moment.

he wasn't sure he felt ready to meet the people who made his mother happy.

but now that he had met them, he was glad.

glad that they seemed to be good people.

glad that they accepted them.

and just glad that he could see his mother being truly happy again.