Kaede walked in the door, calling out a soft, "tadaima," as she took off her shoes, noting that her dad's shoes were haphazardly kicked off in the entranceway. She had come home from school during lunch hour, having forgotten to grab hers from the fridge that morning, she used her borrowed hundred power to dash home. By the time lunch hour was up her power would be recharged and she could skip back to school and no one would be the wiser. As long as her dad didn't catch her, not that he was ever one to discipline her.
She made her way towards the kitchen, tippy-toeing her way across the wooden floors, when she heard a soft moan from upstairs. She froze and listened, what had made that sound? She stayed frozen for a moment longer, was about to start walking again, when she heard it again, this time more distinctly as she had been waiting for it. It was the guttural sound of her father groaning. She felt her heart race with fear, was he hurt? Was he in pain? Had his injuries from last year not actually healed properly? She threw herself towards the stairs, taking them three at a time leaping up them with all the strength her body possessed. She came to a skidding halt in front of his door and was about to burst in when she heard it again, this time clear as day through the door. The sounds of her father sobbing his eyes out, weeping as she had only ever seen or heard him weep once before, at her mother's funeral over top her grave.
His voice carried through the frame of the door as if no barrier stood between them, the heart-wrenching sobs only broken by the equally heart-breaking sounds of her father desperately whispering her mother's name over and over.
"Tomoe… Tomoe… oh my Tomoe…" she pressed herself up against the door, wanting to go to him, but knowing he would hate that, would hate to be seen in this weak state. She wondered if this was how he spent all his afternoons? Crying by himself? The tone of his sobs changed to a low whine of longing, and just once she heard it, the name she hadn't heard her father say in almost a year.
"Bunny…" she held her breath, not daring to trust her own body, tears welling up in her eyes. She knew her dad missed Sternbild, missed his partner. He used to ask Uncle Antonio, as well as the other Heroes now and then, about him, but always called him Barnaby, never Bunny. He had stopped asking when the answer was always the same. He had gotten even quieter after that. She didn't say anything to him, but she had spoken to uncle Masa about it, and he had told her to not worry about it, that her dad would spring back with time like he always did. But she wasn't so sure, her father had never been like this, this shell of himself, putting on fake smiles and fake jokes, even after her mother died he had been less of a husk than he was now.
Hearing him sob like this, calling out for his missing loved ones, she knew something had to be done, he couldn't keep living with them like a ghost of himself. But she didn't know what could be done, didn't know how to help him. She felt the tears roll down her cheeks, he had come home for her, to be with her, and all she had done was push him away. Was she the reason he was so miserable?
His sobbing was slowing now, and she dared not get caught by him, so she slid her socked feet across the floor as quietly as she could, making her way down the stairs and into the kitchen. She grabbed her lunch box out of the fridge, slid back to the front door and into her shoes. Her face was still tear-streaked as she stepped out of the house, locking the door behind her as she went.