If It Hurts This Much (Chaelisa)

SEASON 2 : Chapter 13

The doorbell rings whilst Lisa's sitting on the floor with Liam, playing with some toys.

It's not out of the ordinary for someone to visit unexpectedly. Hell, the last time it happened she opened the door to Jennie who was standing there with a scowl, a bottle of red wine in her hand and a mouth moving a mile a minute, complaining about how Jisoo was doing her head in. The only reason it was even remotely enjoyable was because Lisa got to spend the entire night listening to Jennie bitching about Jisoo and, well, honestly, it was a nice change. Was a little weird when she started defending Jisoo but that's neither here nor there.

She gets up and dusts off her hands, but then Liam pouts up at her and she rolls her eyes, but smiles at the same time and ducks down to pick him up. He never likes being left somewhere, especially not when he knows something's going on and Lisa hitches him against her hip, kissing him on the nose when he squirms and shuffles further into her (he's a really cuddly kid, just like his mommy.) His tiny fingers immediately begin toying with the necklace laying between her collarbones and she moves toward the door, smiling and making silly faces at her son to make him giggle.

It's three days until Liam's first birthday and she can't believe how quickly it's gone. Her little baby boy has changed considerably; his thick, dark and curly hair is now past his ears and sweeping across his forehead—she nor Chaeyoung can bring themselves to take him for his first haircut—and though he's sort of still got that 'baby' appearance, he can't walk but he can say a plethora of different words and even merge them into a few sentences. Granted they don't always make sense but he's getting there.

He's also become more active, and Lisa has noticed that recently his feet have started pointing forward as he bum shuffles along the floor and though she and Chaeyoung have been taking turns in teaching him to walk, he hasn't taken his first steps but Lisa has this feeling it's not that far off. It's just an inkling and they're both more than excited for it. In fact, when he said his first word—Mama—they both burst into tears and squished him between their chests as they hugged him, so the first steps will probably be another one of those times.

Anyway, she gets to the door as Liam begins flicking at the diamond on the chain of her necklace, and she takes a moment to grab his hand and peel it away before the doorbell rings again and she whips it open, ready to tell whoever it is to calm their tits.

Except when she registers who is standing there, her jaw clenches, eyes harden and nostrils flare.

Because it's not Jennie with another bottle of wine and a stick up her ass because Jisoo's done something incredible annoying, which apparently is still a shock to Jennie.

It's not the superintendent telling them that a floor up someones bath overran and it's dripping through the ceilings so they should watch out because their ceiling might fall through.

No. Instead, it's something much worse.

It's her mother.

And as Lisa stands here and stares at her so called 'parent', she thinks that she'd actually prefer the superintendent being on the other side of the door, telling her the apartment's ceiling was about to cave in.

"Lisa," Maria says slowly, slipping her thumb beneath the chain of her handbag strap and lugging it further up her shoulder.

Lisa's jaw clenches tighter, teeth grinding together. "What are you doing here?" She deadpans as Liam wiggles in her arms, burying his face into her neck shyly.

It's then that faded, brown eyes dart to the little boy and Maria gasps, hand coming up to press to her chest in shock. She stares at Liam for a long moment, her breath coming out shallow and face contorting into many different expressions, shocked, hurt, scared, all of the above, yet Lisa feels no sympathy for the woman. Maria isn't a part of her daughters life anymore so why should she be a part of her grandchild's life?