6 YEARS INTO THE FUTURE

The Christmas party continued around me as I watched my friends mingle and carry on throughout the night. Kids played in the corner next to the Christmas tree with their newly opened presents while the adults drank and, as cliche as it is, be merry. Holiday music played throughout the speakers in the walls and all of the Christmas decor glimmered and gleamed.

It was our now sixth annual Christmas party and this year everyone was married. Jimin and Jungkook have have their respectable wives, Madison and Justin were still going strong, Emma with her devilishly handsome husband, Megan just got married last month, and even Taehyung's parents wanted to visit this year like they have every other year.

"Daddy? Appa?" The little voice speaks out over the music.

"Yes, Min-Junnie?" Taehyung replies as I watch him walk over to our son craning his neck up at his father.

"We haven't taken our picture together this year. We take one every year." Min-Jun cutely pouts and at the same time wrapping Taehyung completely around his finger. I absolutely live for these adorable father/son moments I get to witness on a daily basis.

"Mianhaeyo." Taehyung bends down to pick up his little boy. "Ready?" He holds the phone up at an angle.

"Ready!" Our son replies, "Hana, dul, set."

Taehyung snaps the picture with our son held up on his hip, eliciting an heart warming smile out of both of them once they view the photo together.

"Appa saranghaeyo!" He kisses his father's cheek just as his tiny feet touch back on to the floor.

"I love you more, son." Taehyung fondly smiles as he gives him a pat on the head, directing him back to the other group of kids.

"Impossible." Min-Jun replies as he sits down cross legged and picks back up the action figure Uncle Jungkook bought him this year.

"Daddy?" Min-Jun's twin sister, Jisoo, speaks up before Taehyung had a chance to walk away.

"Yes, my princess?" He acknowledges her with that same smile that he always does whenever she calls out for his attention.

"I have a question." She gestures for him to get down on her level and he obeys her command.

"Okay, let's hear it." He says as he stares into her innocent eyes.

"If me and Junnie are good, can we stay up a little later and play with the dogs?" She bats her eyelashes at him and glances over at me. I give her a shrug and wink towards Taehyung. "I want to show Uncle Jimin the new puppy!"

"If you're good, I think your mother and I would be okay with that." He leans up and kisses her forehead.

"Thank you, Appa!" Jisoo throws her tiny arms around his neck and Taehyung looks like he's about to burst with the amount of affection he's getting from our twins tonight.

I inhale and exhale deeply with a smile as I stand up from the couch. Trying to find a bit of space in the crowded home, I squeeze through the people I love so dearly after briefly making eye contact with Taehyung and sigh out in relief when I make my way into the quiet kitchen.

I have my back leaned up against the kitchen wall as I sip on my water and listen to all of the laughs and chatter in the other room. At least it was a little quieter in here and I could hear myself think. As much as I love our holiday parties, this year in particular is a little harder on me than the rest.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see my husband also walk into the kitchen. The time seemed to have slowed down as he strides in and grabs a snowman shaped frosted cookie and places it into his mouth.

His ethereal beauty never ceases to make me swoon.

He locks eyes with mine and I try to nonchalantly look in another direction to not make it seem like he had me completely entranced. I take another sip from my cup to ease my suddenly dry throat and he walks closer to me until he's standing just a couple of feet away.

"Hi." He smiles his adorable boxy grin and waves at me with the rest of his snowman cookie still in his hand.

"Hello." I smile back at him, noticing the little piece of frosting on the corner of his mouth that he slowly licks away.

"Do you mind if I stand over here with you? It's crazy out there." He nods towards the living room.

"Sure." I nod my head to gesture for him to stand next to me and scoot over to give him room.

"My name is Kim Taehyung, but you can call me Tae if you'd like. What's your name?" He turns his body, putting his hand on the wall by my head and looking deep into my eyes.

"Reenacting our first meeting, huh?" I smile up at him, "I don't remember you being this bold. You were a little shy the first time you spoke to me."

"Well, this is how it happened in my mind." He laughs, leaning down to give me a kiss. "How are you doing tonight, Mrs. Kim?"

With a sigh, I straighten out my posture, "I'm uncomfortable."

He rubs my pregnant belly lovingly as he looks at me with a concerned look, "Have you been timing them?"

"Yeah." I exhale a few times as I feel another contraction coming along and close my eyes tightly until it passes along about a minute later, "Every seven minutes."

Taehyung gently turns me around to rub my back, making my head fall forward as I steady my breaths. This baby is making it harder and harder for me to breathe and I swear if he or she doesn't come along soon, I'm going to go crazy.

"They said every four minutes, right?" He questions as his hands expertly glide over my sore muscles.

With the twins, I only got to thirty five weeks and four days before my water broke and they were ready to make their entrance into the world. With this little one, they're trying to stay in mommy's tummy as long as possible. Tomorrow would mark forty one weeks and I am exhausted!

"Yep. Four....ah-" I deeply furrow my brow as I grab a hold of the wall, feeling like this contraction was much stronger than the last. After about a minute, I continue to do my breathing exercises until I feel like I can look back up at my worried husband, "Four minutes."

He glances at his watch before turning his wrist so that I can see, "Uh, gongju. Four minutes."

I nod, but brush it off. We've already had three false alarms this month and I really don't feel like making the trek to the hospital again just to be turned around for a fourth time. Taehyung, however, looks like he's ready to go put our hospital bags back into the car.

"Everything okay in here?" Jimin asks as he and Jungkook walk in together to refill their beverages.

Jungkook's mouth hangs open as he stares at the pained expression on my face, knowing that his newly pregnant wife will also soon be going through this in just a matter of a few months. Jimin grabs a bottle of water out of the fridge and one of the slices of pizza out of the box before walking over to me with both of them extended.

"Here, Ava. Looks like you might be having a baby tonight. You should probably eat something while you can." Jimin smiles his sweet smile at me, forcing me to be unable to say no to the items he's offering, "My wife looked just like this the night she had our son. Is it too late to change my guess for the due date?"

I giggle as I take a bite of the pepperoni pizza and roll my eyes at all of the men surrounding me in this room, "First of all, thank you Jimin. Second of all, Tae, can you rub a little lower? Third, I don't know why you look so scared Jungkook. You haven't seen anything yet."

Taehyung and Jimin both laugh out at the truth I just laid out for the inexperienced friend standing a few feet away.

"It's true." They both say in unison, making Jungkook grin briefly before continuing to look horrified.

"Do...um...do you need anything?" Jungkook asks, trying his best to join in on the support.

"No, thank you Kook. I'm...holy shit!" I yell out as another contraction comes barreling in and I drop my things on the floor as I quickly grab onto Taehyung's shoulders for leverage while I yell out in agony.

I hear the rest of the party run into the kitchen to see what the fuss was all about, but I'm in too much pain right now to give a damn about anyone watching all this go down. The contractions are no doubt getting stronger, but they'll just subside later like they kept doing before.

"How far apart Taehyungie?" His mother calls out to him worriedly.

Taehyung looks at his watch, "A little under four minutes."

"How long are they lasting?" Madison questions, adjusting her toddler on her hip.

"A minute." He replies without tearing his gaze away from me as I begin to rock back and forth in place.

I take a deep breath and slowly lift my face back up to meet his, sweat pooling up at my brow, "I'm good. It's just another false alarm."

"Jagiya..." He hesitates, showing how he doesn't really believe me this time without being too pushy, "I don't know."

"Taehyungie is right. Ava, sweetie...it may be time to go into the hospital." His dad chimes in and I look at him for a moment before meeting every other worried gaze fixated on me in this room including our twins.

"I'll go if another one comes around four minutes." I agree and Taehyung's shoulders visibly sag in relief.

I release my death grip on him and straighten my posture back up. Glancing beside me on the floor, I see my slice of pizza splattered across the tile and groan out in disappointment. That was the last damn slice, too.

No one's eyes leave me as the sounds of Frank Sinatra singing Christmas carols rings through the house at a much louder volume than it seemed like when everyone was talking a moment ago.

"I love you." Taehyung whispers for only my ears to hear.

"I love you, too." I softly smile up at him as he holds onto my hips, swaying along with me as I try to ease my own discomfort.

"You're amazing." He adds.

"Thank-" I stop mid sentence when I feel liquid begin to trickle in between my legs and my eyes widen with shock.

"Your water just broke gongju." Taehyung states as he quickly looks back towards his mother, "Watch the kids, Eomma. I told Jisoo that she and Min-Jun can stay up to play with the puppy and show Uncle Jimin."

"I got the kids. Go! We'll be okay." She swats for us to leave and Jungkook makes a mad dash to grab our hospital bags out of the coat closet.

"We'll clean up, Ava!" Megan yells out as I round the corner towards the front door.

"Good luck, you guys!" Madison and Emma say as Justin and Jimin help us slowly make our way to the car.

Thankfully, our loved ones knew not to block the driveway just in case I went into labor tonight. With my water breaking this time, I now know this isn't a false alarm and a wave of emotion hits me all of the sudden. I'm excited and terrified at the same time. It had been almost five years since I last went through this process and it suddenly feels new to me all over again.

Another contraction comes in forcefully as Taehyung turns off of our street on the way to the hospital and I begin to cry.

"We'll be there soon baby. Hang in there a little bit longer for mommy and daddy, okay? We can't wait to meet you!" Taehyung talks to my belly sweetly as his hand rubs over my hardened beach ball like abs.

"Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Kim. It's a boy!" Doctor Torrez smiles as he holds up a beautifully chunky baby boy crying out loudly.

Taehyung and I both begin to sob as love fills our hearts and emotions take over us while we stare at our newborn son being placed in my arms. Almost instantly, his crying stops and he lazily opens up his eyes to stare into mine for the first time.

"He's got your eyes." Taehyung smiles proudly as he notices the same hazel colored eyes that I have.

"He's got your mole." I boop the tiny little dot at the tip of his perfect nose in the same spot that Taehyung has the identical mark.

"Thank you, jagi. Thank you for giving me this beautiful family." He leans in and kisses my lips before resting his head on mine as we stare down at our son cutely yawning and scrunching up his small face.

"We're forever yours." I softly whisper down to our sleepy baby with the blue beanie on his head.

"Forever yours." Taehyung adds as our newborn wraps his whole hand around his index finger.

THE END