Act 4: A beginning of sorts

Nana held back a giggle as the elder child yelped when the tower of blocks fell. The other child watched on with amusement, then pushed herself up to help the older boy out.

The woman watching them turned over to face her husband, who was downing a cup of coffee, and sighed, "She looks just like her, doesn't she?"

Iemitsu looked up from his empty cup, "I guess so. The resemblance is uncanny. But then," he glanced over at the children, "The letter she wrote to you at that time had hinted that she wanted you to take care of Rellatia-chan. The adoption process was faster than usual...probably due to Rosia acknowledging you in her will..." 'And I pulled some strings as well,' the man sheepishly thought.

Both children were now stacking the blocks again, but with the younger girl placing the blocks while the older boy passed her those found on the floor.

Nana smiled, "I suppose so. At least we have another family member now! Tsu-kun won't feel so lonely anymore."

They continued watching the two children play-then Iemitsu stupidly decided it was a good time to tell Nana.

"Dear, I'll be leaving in a week."

Cue sigh from Nana.

"Again? Where to, this time?"

~XD~XD~XD~

Living with my new family was... an interesting experience to say the least. It wasn't particularly boring, yet it wasn't all too exciting either. For some reason I felt satisfied with what I ended up with. I guess it was some kind of motherly instinct in me that found taking care of Tsunayoshi to be fun. My new mother and father left us to our own devices almost all the time.

But there was one thing I've almost forgotten-the fact that we both were starting elementary school in a few days, and also the fact that Iemitsu should be leaving soon.

To be honest, I wasn't all too surprised when I heard that he was leaving on the same day Tsunayoshi and I were supposed to start school. Thankfully enough it was early in the morning, about dawn, when Iemitsu left, because I definitely did not want to see both my parents sprouting love anecdotes to each other. Call me immature, but hey, I've never liked the idea of romance in the first place.

And so the second sitting-through school begun, the first hadn't even finished for me. This time, I wondered if I should use my knowledge and ace everything therefore becoming a child prodigy. Nahh, I doubt it would even work. I had only eight years of educational knowledge anyway, and by high school I wouldn't be keeping up. Maybe I should read up more?

Either way, as Tsunayoshi trailed behind me, I thought I'd lay low. Something nagged at me that going full out wasn't the best idea. We were walking to school, our mother following behind us. She was still upset that Iemitsu had left; she did a good job of covering that up with her usual facade though. Both of us gave occasional glances towards Mom, keeping our worried frowns to ourselves. I decided this tense atmosphere was not going to help us much at all, so I grabbed Tsunayoshi's hand. He let out a squeak of surprise, and I immediately shushed him.

I gestured towards Mom, who didn't notice Tsunayoshi's squeal, and whispered, "Play along." His look was that of curiosity, but he still nodded. I turned around and stopped, effectively bringing Mom out of her thoughts.

"'Kaa-san, it's okay if you miss if 'tou-san. Me and Tsuna-nii are still here for you, right?" I looked back at the mentioned boy, and he nodded enthusiastically. I, too, gave a small smile.

Mom's face was that of astonishment, but it quickly turned into happiness. "Thank you, you two," she said softly.

Job done, I nodded firmly and started pulling Tsunayoshi along the way to school.

~aren't linebreaks like this useful?~

The whole day was boring. With a capital B. The teacher-in-charge had made us introduce ourselves one by one.

"Alright class," she had said with a bright smile, "Today we're going to introduce ourselves. First of all, I am your teacher, Karashi Yokino-sensei. Please introduce your full name, what you like to do, and what you like the most!"

The introductions went by our sitting order. Each child stood up at their desks (which Karashi-sensei had let us choose at the beginning), had declared their name, what their hobbies were, and their favourite object. Most were rather common: their parents were their favourite, and toys cropped up as well. My turn was after a tiny girl who looked rather familiar. I stood up.

"My name is Sawada Rellatia, I like reading and I like my books." Short and simple, just how I liked it. Sitting back down, Tsuna, who was sitting next to me, reluctantly stood up.

"M-my name is S-Sawada Tsunayoshi, I, uh, like," here he paused, cast a side glance at me, and continued, "playing with my toys, uhm, my s-sister, and my o-okaa..." He blushed in embarrassment and quickly sat down.

The next person behind Tsunayoshi stood up and so the cycle continued.

After introductions were over, Karashi-sensei made us play a few icebreaker games (to which the mature part of myself groaned about) and we then started lessons.

The first subject was math, and we were just learning addition. They were really easy problems, and I almost wanted to puke as Karashi-sensei started giving nicknames for the numbers.

To save myself from having a mental meltdown at the simple equations, I decided to doodle. Picking up a pencil, I started to shut out everything.


A/N: Short chapter this time, I didn't have anything else. This is just a filler chapter to answer some questions.

-RRH42

Word count: 987