"Yummylicious!" Hai licked his butter-coated fingers. "Guiren is such an awesome cook~"
Everyone was back at the dining table, enjoying sweets and snacks.
Jinhai asked seriously, "Did Uncle want to become a chef?"
Guiren paused. "I wanted to be a full-time professor. Then your father pushed me out of it to join his business ventures. I still teach though here and there."
"Why didn't you punch him?"
"Jinhai, my dearest son, you shouldn't talk about your father being smacked and punched."
"He can be quite persuasive," Guiren answered.
Hai sheepishly grinned. "Thanks to my charm."
Liling, who just stepped out holding a tray of coffee cups, snorted. "Go hell your charm. Guiren felt bad for you, that's all. You were practically begging him at that point, and he didn't want to leave you alone."
"Gu…Guiren…" tears pooled in his eyes, the tip of his nose turning redder. "Guiren, you love me so much…Let's kisssss!!!"
His hyper-excited gesture of claiming Guiren's lips was met with a violent force he didn't see coming. For the second time of the day, Hai lay bloody and lifeless on the floor.
Meanwhile, Jinhai found the tray trembling in his aunt's hands.
"I knew it…"
"Aunt?" Jinhai blinked, tugging at her hand.
"All this time my rival was none other than my own brother…" Liling was fighting her own battles in her mind.
She glared at her useless brother. "Bro! Don't forget you have a wife and two sons."
He glared back. "Guiren is the first love of my life! What will you know?"
A shadow crept over him slowly. "...Is that so?"
Hai turned. "Chunhua!!!"
The said wife, as she held baby Jing in her arms, trembled quite distinctly.
"Mom?" Jinhai looked up, only to find the same dread washing across his mother's face now.
"I knew it…" she held Jing tighter, murmuring to herself. "I knew I wasn't e-enough for Hai…"
"Mom?"
"Oh, no. What will I do? This is terrible. Did I…separate two men in love?" The harsh realization of being a third-wheeler crashed like a tornado hitting the shore.
"Baaaa?" Jing tilted his head.
Guiren threw another kick on his back and studied her ashen face. "Your marriage is safe, Chunhua. Don't worry."
Chunhua eyed him and her husband and so did Liling.
"I don't th-think so."
"Yes, we are not safe till Bro is here! Let's kick him out!"
Hai pouted. "What do you mean? How can you kick this lovely and adorable face," he pointed at himself.
Chunhua's eyes narrowed. "It's easy when I come to know that someone skipped school today."
Her gaze fell upon Jinhai once, who promptly looked away, expecting Hai to sort the mess he created.
Hai beamed. "It was school bunk day!"
"Who declared it?"
"Yours truly!"
At this point after being subjected to repeated violence from his best friend and now - his wife, Hai physically became unrecognizable.
"Baaaaaaa!!"
Jinhai looked up, watching Jing flail his chubby arms towards him with a sparkling excitement.
"It's Jing!" Jianyu shone and poked at his cheek, giggling.
"Aaaaaaaa…"
Chunhua chuckled. "Hold him, Jinhai. He missed you a lot, you know? He was crying almost the entire day. Mom actually kicked us out. I tried telling him a story, but he didn't like it that much," she pouted. "He only loves it when you narrate it."
Jing's two black eyes glimmered mistily like beautiful black pearls.
"Aaaaaaa…"
Jinhai's gaze turned somber. His cheek certainly looked much better and healed than yesterday. Yet a tinge of guilt remained.
"Aaaaaaaa?"
Jing continued wrestling in his mother's arms, waiting for his brother to hold him.
"Aaaaa…iiiiii…Jiiiii…aaaaiiiiii…" he laughed heartily.
Everyone else - "..."
Hai, who lay dead until this point, jolted as if lightning struck on his very being. Chunhua's jaw dropped extremely slowly, trying to process what just happened. Liling's hand had already flown to her mouth. Only Guiren remained composed.
Chunhua whispered with a gasp, "I-Is he saying his first word…?"
"Jiiiiiaaaaaiiiii…."
Jinhai held a dumbfounded look. He had heard that babies call Ma or Da as their first word.
"Oh my God. He called you first, Jinhai…He called your name…" the flood of tears was impossible to stop.
While the others slowly came to rejoice this milestone moment, it was only Hai, for whom the distance between his lips and words only kept increasing with the thump of his heartbeats.
Hai pushed himself up from the floor, ignoring the dull ache in his back. His unblinking eyes kept fixed at his sons with a tremor coursing through his veins.
Jing giggled again, delighted with the reactions around him. His tiny hands flailed towards his brother, repeating broken syllables.
"Jiiii…hai…!"
Chunhua was already crying openly now, clutching Jing closer before gently passing him into Jinhai's arms. "See? He loves you the most…"
Jinhai hesitated for a brief second before holding him. Carefully. Steadily. Jing immediately nestled against his chest as if that was where he always belonged.
The room filled with laughter and chatter, Liling gushing with joy and cheer, Jianyu bouncing excitedly and Guiren quietly observing - not at the children but at his friend.
Hai heard none of it. His gaze was fixed on his two boys. Jinhai. Jing.
A name that sent him nightmares once upon a time now sounded sweet from his youngest's lips. A name that had become a wall between two brothers had now…shattered into dust. For a fleeting second, something old and ugly tried to crawl back into his mind. But it didn't stay.
Because right in front of him was his son. Calm. Gentle. Protective. Holding his brother with a quiet warmth.
"…He said your name," Hai murmured again, almost to himself.
Hai's throat moved, but the words that followed were different this time.
"Good," he said. "He…he said his name first…"
His fingers curled slightly at his side, as if grounding himself. Silence lingered for him and he found himself stumbling back into the abyss - only this time, he felt his hands being tiny fingers. Jing's hearty squeals seemed to drown the nauseous voice that was dragging him from behind.
'My name will never be your salvation.'
But for the first time in years since Jinhai was born, Hai chose to not believe in those words. His salvation was right in front of him. A bond between two brothers was forging right before his very eyes.
And the name he had once carried like a bludgeoning weight finally found a place where it didn't feel…so heavy anymore.
