Warning & Disclaimer: Contains mentions of child neglect.ย This fanfiction draws from real characters and events however its connections are purely the work of the authorโs imagination.
If you have not read Chapter 1, you can read itย here.
My Playdate with V
by J.H. Pyo
CHAPTERย 2: 7 BECOMESย 8
Early next morning we were scheduled to meet Mr. Warren G, so I woke the boys up at half past six to get ready and have breakfast. During breakfast, V, Suga, and Kookie talked about the little girl they had met at the laundromat.
โ์ด์ ๋ถํฐ ๊ทธ ์ ๋ฅผ ‘ํ์ดํ์ด’๋ผ๊ณ ๋ถ๋ฅผ ๊ฑฐ์ผ. ‘Mini-me’์ธ ๊ฒ์ฒ๋ผ ๋ด ์ด๋ฆ์ด๋ ๋น์ทํ๊ธฐ๋ ํ๊ณ . (Iโm going to call her Tay Tay, cause it sounds like my name, like a mini-me!)โ V gave his classic eye smile and continued eating his breakfast.
He and Kookie finished early to skateboard a little before leaving. I followed them out since I had already eaten and wanted to make sure our ride was here.
As soon as we stepped into the hallway, we could see Talayiah sitting in front of her door with her arms wrapped around her knees and her little head resting above them fast asleep. V immediately ran toward her and gently patted her on her shoulder, โTay Tay, ๊ด์ฐฎ์? (Tay Tay, are you ok?)โ

Talayiah began to wake up. โ์ด, ๊ด์ฐฎ์. (Uh, Iโm okay.)โ
V was in a panic and asked, โ๋ฌด์จ ์ผ์ด์ผ? ์ ์ฌ๊ธฐ์ ์๊ณ ์์ด? (What happened? Why are you out here sleeping?)โ
Talayiah, still in a sleepy state, said, โ๋ฐ์์ ๊ธฐ๋ค๋ฆฌ๋ผ๊ณ ํด์ ๊ธฐ๋ค๋ฆฌ๊ณ ์์๋๋ฐ ์ ๋ค์๋๋ด. (They told me to wait outside and I fell asleep.)โ
At this point, V was clearly angry, ย โ๊ทธ๋ผ, ๋ ๋ฐ๋ฆฌ๋ฌ ๋์ค์ง๋ ์์๋ค๋ ๋ง์ด์ผ? ๋ ๋ฐค์ ์ฌ๊ธฐ์์ ์์๋ค๋ ๋ง์ด์ผ? (And they never came out to get you? You stayed out here all night?!)โ He lifted her up and carried her back to their unit, shaking his head in disbelief.
As we came into the dormitory, Tony the tutor, and one of the bodyguards approached us, โWhat happened?โ V signaled for them to be quiet. He sat on the couch and placed Talayiahโs sleepy head on his lap while I explained to them what happened.
Rap Monster asked, โHow can this happen? How can they just leave her out there like that?โ
Carlos, one of the production crew asked me to translate, โMy sister is a social worker and she tells me things like this happen all the time. Severe neglect is the number one reason kids enter the foster system.โ
Looking shocked Jimin asked, โ๋๊ฐ ๊ฒฝ์ฐฐ์ด๋ ๋๊ตฌ์๊ฒ ์ ๊ณ ํ ์ ์์ด์? But canโt someone report it to the police or something?โ
Carlos explained, โEven if they do, Child Protective Services will most likely continue to let her live with her aunt. They do not like to pull kids out of their relatives homes especially when placement is so hard to come by.โ
โPlaceu? ment? ๊ทธ๊ฒ ๋ฌด์จ ๋ป์ด์ผ?? (What does that mean?)โ asked J-hope.
Carlos continued as I tried my best to translate, โPlacement. They are temporary homes for kids who are taken away from abusive situations, or in this case, neglectful homes like Talayiahโs. But the numberย of children that need homes isย staggeringly greaterย than the number of homes available. Children are often left to sleep in the social workerโs office or in hospitals. The Department of Children and Family Services is woefully underfunded and just donโt have the resources or manpower to meet these needs.โ
As I translated, the room was silent. The boys looked sad and angry at the same time. While Talayiah slept on Vโs lap, he patted her gently on the arm as if to soothe her in her sleep; however, it woke her up instead.
โ์ข์ ์์นจ, (Good Morning,)โ she said with a smile.
V didnโt want her to know what they were talking about, so he immediately perked up and said brightly. ย โ์ค๋ ์ฐ๋ฆฌ๋ ๊ฐ์ด ๋๋? (Do you want to play with us today?)โ
The boys all agreed with this idea, but I interjected and reminded them of our full schedule. V flipped his puppy eyes setting to super begging and andย I turned towards Carlos and asked, โDo you think it would be ok to take her with us?โ
He nodded and whispered to me, โYou can ask the aunt to be safe, but quite honestly, I donโt think they would even notice sheโs gone.โ
Truth be told, I was glad to hear that Talayiahย might be able to come with us. I couldnโt bear to leave her here alone like this. She was better off with us than wandering around by herself. This poor girl. Even while I was talking to Carlos, I saw her eyeing the leftover breakfast. Jin and his motherly tendencies had noticed as well and gathered a plate of food for her. I wondered when she had last eaten. In the time it took me to say, “I’ll be back,” she was already going for seconds. โEat slowly, ok? We have more you can take with you later. I am going to ask your aunt to see if you can come out with us today, ok?โ
โOkโฆโ mumbled Talayiah with her mouth full. ย
Carlos accompanied me as I headed to Talayiahโs unit.
โTake her! Take her for as long as you want,โ was the answer I got after getting all my courage up to ask her nicely. I couldnโt believe people like her existed! I felt like I was in some over-dramatized tvย show. Except I wasnโt. This was real.
Walking back into the unit I hurried everyone downstairs to stay on schedule. The production crew told me to keep her by my side and that they would keep her out of all the shots.
We packed into the van with Talayiah at the center. The boys were unbelievably sweet to her. Even Suga, the grumpy grandpa of the group couldnโt keep a loving smile off his face. The car was filled with laughter as J-hope tried to speakeu english to her and she would come back with perfect Korean. Even I couldnโt keep my laughter in.

CHAPTER 3: BABYSITTER G
Illustrated by:ย Sandee
Edited by: Telumiel & C. Moon
There have been many theories given about the Spring Day MV, from โThe Ones Who Walk Away from Omelasโ to Sewol Ferry tributes. There is one theory no one has ever explored. Why the Laundromat?
