The sun came back up. Dad still wasn't home.
Which suited Sho just fine. Let dad be gone on his super-secret mission or whatever. Things were better without him around getting mad all the time and bossing them around. Really, they were. So what if he was gone and nobody had any idea of where he had gone to or when he was coming back? That just meant that they got to have a break from him for once. It wasn't like he was just never coming back. All of his stuff was still right where he left it.
Mom only took her yellow dress with her when she left.
Dad was coming back. Sho knew that dad was coming back. He had to come back. He was their dad and they needed at least one parent. Otherwise they would be orphans and he did not want to be an orphan. He had parents. Well he had a dad and his dad was going to come back and probably yell at him and hit him a bunch of times too but that was ok. That was normal for dad. He'd been that way for as long as Sho could remember.
Sho didn't know what was worse. Being all alone in the world or having dad come back.
"Sho? Can you feed her for me please? I really, REALLY, have to go to the bathroom." Said big sis. She was sitting on the couch and holding Mukai. Frozen in Korean was on even though the baby really needed to learn Japanese. Mostly because Sho didn't want to study Korean ever again. Too complicated, much too complicated. Also he didn't want to do any schoolwork today. There wasn't any point if dad wasn't around.
That was the good part of dad being gone.
"Fine." Said Sho. He used his powers to try and bring her over to his spot on the floor. He had been drawing, well he was always drawing, but this time he had been drawing her. Big sis had been taking pictures but drawings were better. There was more love in them. Also he needed to be able to draw her from life while she was still there. Dad would probably give her to someone else when he came back. He hated loud noises and messes and stuff like that. Baby Mukai was all loud noises and messes.
Like now.
Really this was big sis' fault. She was the one who had put up a barrier. He didn't know why. It wasn't like he was going to do anything stupid like drop the baby. What did she take him for? One of the Awakened? His powers were a lot stronger than theirs. His powers were also a lot more stable than hers. He saw the way her barrier shook, how it was wonky shaped, and how the colors of her aura were moving. She was unstable, dad had said, because a power that big came with a bigger expense. He also said that Sho was lucky not to be that powerful.
Which felt like an insult, really, even though dad said that it wasn't.
"Don't use your powers. She could accidentally get hurt." Said big sis. She was thinking more of herself than of him. He never, well almost never, lost control of his powers. Not like her.
"I'm not going to hurt her, big sis, so go pee or whatever. I know how to feed a baby." Said Sho. He got up and picked little sis up by hand, though, because big sis would not leave him alone to go and pee until he did. She watched him the whole time even though if you held it for too long your kidneys would explode. Little sis got that. Big sis didn't. She thought that Sho was too little to hold the baby and feed her without accidentally hurting her.
If she didn't want his held then she should not have asked for his help.
She was like dad. Dad asked for people's help but then he complained and called them incompetent and stuff like that. Big sis didn't call him any names but she did watch him until he picked Mukai up the normal way, sat down on the floor the normal way, and fed her the normal way. He could have used his powers like that. He had much better control over his powers since the day he had gotten them. Dad never had to tell him to control his powers, that power was nothing without control, and dad would have been proud of him for using his powers and stuff.
Dad would have been proud of him.
Maybe. This was a girl's job, though, taking care of a baby. Dad had said, once, that it would have made more sense for big sis to ask nonstop for a pet because girls were nurturing like that. That didn't mean that she got a pet, no, she got a baby…even though a baby was a lot more work than a pet. A hamster, specifically. Sho knew how to take care of a hamster. Sho had seen so many YouTube shows about hamsters and how to take care of them and how cute they were and stuff like that. A hamster would have been a lot easier to take care of than a baby.
Not that he didn't love little sis.
Mukai wasn't his for real little sis. She couldn't be. Mom was gone and dad hated her now so, of course, they wouldn't have made him a little sister. Also girls didn't like dad like that. He had never seen a girl chase dad around and try to kiss him or hold his hand or anything like that. That was how girls showed you that they liked you. No girl had ever been like that with dad that he remembered and dad would not have let some girl be like that with him. He didn't even let his own kids hug him.
She wasn't his little sis for real but he still loved her.
"Come on, keep eating. If you don't finish this then you're just going to start crying later because you're hungry." Said Sho. Mukai was turning her head from side to side when he tried to feed her. He didn't get it. She liked formula. The note had said so. They had made her a full bottle, too, one of the big ones. It would have made much more sense for her to eat a whole lot at once than to get up fifty or sixty times a night because she was hungry.
"Stop turning your head like that. You're just going to be hungry later. I don't want you to start crying because you're hungry so just eat. Come on, it's good. The baby on the can liked it." Said Sho. He tried to feed her again but her mouth was closed and she was shaking her head. This made no sense. She ate when big sis tried to feed her.
Maybe she just liked big sis better.
The thought of someone else liking big sis, especially his new pretend little sis, liking big sis even better…it makes him slam her bottle down on the ground. But that's all. Because she's so little. She's there sitting in his lap. She's there and she's small and he's not going to hurt her. He loves her. He loves her even though he just met her. He loves her and he is not ever going to do anything to hurt her…because she's just a baby. Even if she does like big sis better…but maybe it was just because big sis was a girl and reminded baby Mukai of her mom. That made sense. Mukai probably really missed her mom and stuff. He knew he did…even though he was not supposed to. Even though mom had left him all alone with big sis and dad. Even though Mom had just left one day and…and maybe that was just how moms were.
He didn't know.
What he did know now was that Mukai was done eating. She could and would cry later for food, she ate every ten minutes it felt like, but now she'd had her fill. Now she was just kicking her little baby legs and looking up at him. He smiled at her. She smiled back at him. He loved her little smiles so much. Her whole face scrunched up when she smiled. She was slapping him on the stomach now. She wasn't trying to be mean. Maybe she just wanted to play or something. She could never be mean to him and he would never be mean to her.
For as long as he knew her, anyway.
Dad would come back from whatever secret mission he was on and he would take Mukai from them and bring her to her new family. If he didn't want pets then he would absolutely say no to keeping a baby. Even if he had been the one who had given big sis a baby for a birthday present in the first place. He didn't know for sure what dad would do…
He didn't know what he wanted dad to do.
"Stop hitting me and I'll show you how to draw. How's that sound?" asked Sho. As usual Mukai didn't say anything. He even said that in Korean so that she would understand but she still didn't say anything. She was too little to talk. He didn't know if she would stay with them until she was big enough to talk. He knew dad and he knew how dad hated loud noises and messes and things like that. Babies were nothing but loud noises and messes. Sho was amazed that dad hadn't dropped him down a well when he was born. He had seen the movies of himself when he was little. He was a loud baby. He was so loud that big sis wasn't even in the movies that he saw. She didn't like loud noises either.
Dad wouldn't let Mukai stay.
He had known her for only a day, now, because he had come home yesterday and now it was today…but he loved her. Even if she did cry all the time. Even if she did pee on him when he tried to change her diapers. Even if she did throw up in big sis' hair…actually that part was pretty funny. He loved Mukai and he didn't want her to go…
But he didn't know what would happen if she ended up staying.
Sho was grateful that she was a girl. Dad already had a girl so big sis would be the one in trouble if Mukai was more of a prodigy than she was. She already had an aura. She didn't have any powers but her aura as a baby was brighter than his had ever been. Well since before he went into the Awakening machine thing. She was already a prodigy and he knew that because she was a girl she would be competing with big sis but…but he also got the feeling that she would be competing with him, too.
And he already had enough competition as it was.
"Sho, I said to feed her. She needs to eat the whole thing or she's going to be hungry later." Said big sis. She came up to him and held her hands out like she just expected him to hand Mukai over. Well he wasn't going to. She wasn't the boss of him even though dad had left her in charge. She wasn't the boss of the baby, either, even though dad had given the baby to her.
"She doesn't want to eat any more. She wants to draw." Said Sho. He knew that she needed to eat, she had kept him up all night with her crying, but he also knew that he did not need to be bossed around. If Mukai wanted to learn how to draw then he would teach her how to draw.
Even if she was just chewing on his pencil and kicking.
"She needs to eat or she'll be hungry. She only ate half of her bottle. If she eats only half of her bottle then she's going to be hungry later." Said big sis. She reached down for Mukai again but he put up a barrier. She pulled her hands back really fast. He didn't get why. It wasn't like he had done anything to hurt her. Putting up a barrier couldn't hurt you.
"She'll eat when she's ready to eat, you're not the boss of her stomach." Said Sho
"Don't put a barrier like that. You might accidentally-" said big sis
"My control is a lot better than yours and you know it. Go and watch Frozen or whatever, me and Mukai are hanging out." Said Sho. He waved his hand at her which meant 'leave me alone'. Thankfully she got a clue. She was so worried over nothing. So what if Mukai cried later? When wasn't she crying? She cried when she was tired and she cried when she woke up and she cried when she needed a change and she cried when you, well when big sis, changed her and she cried when she was lonely and she cried when you tried to play with her.
Babies just cried a lot.
But she wasn't crying now. Sho sat her up in his lap. She couldn't sit up on her own yet. She was just little, not stupid, so she would learn how to sit up on her own. He'd teach her. Sho was very good at sitting up even though dad said that he had terrible posture and couldn't be taken anywhere. Dad always had things like that to say…but Sho would never say mean things like that to Mukai.
"You're good at this even if you're not. You'll learn." Said Sho quietly as he helped Mukai sit up. She kept on trying to flop to the side. She was still so little…but she would learn. She would learn a lot of important things. Like sitting up and holding her own head up and walking and talking and climbing and running and drawing and using her powers and all of that.
He would be a good big brother…a good pretend big brother.
"She's too little to do that, Sho, the internet said so. She can't even hold her own head up yet." Said big sis. She didn't know everything. She had the same amount of baby knowledge that he did. They had both only had this baby for one day. She didn't need to boss him around about Mukai, too. He could figure things out. It was mean, too, to tell Mukai that she was too little to do things. Dad had told him since he was little that he wasn't as good as big sis. Well he wouldn't compare Mukai to anyone. She was fine the way she was.
"She is not too little." Said Sho
"Yes she is. She's only three months old. She's not old enough to learn how to hold her head up yet." said big sis. She was being mean even if she didn't realize it. She was saying that Mukai couldn't learn but she could and she would and Sho would help her. Like how he was helping her now. He could help her. He could be helpful. He could be a good pretend big brother.
"She can learn and I can help her. Don't make her feel bad about herself like that. She's only a baby." Said Sho
"I didn't mean that…that I wanted to make her feel bad about herself. I just meant that she's little and she's not ready to sit up on her own yet." Said big sis
"Well she wants to learn. Keep watching Frozen and leave us alone." Said Sho. He wanted to take Mukai's half full bottle and throw it at big sis. Not in a mean way. Not like the time she drank the soda that he had been saving for breakfast so he threw the can in her face as hard as he could…and then she got a cut…and he had been meaning to do that until she started bleeding. Then he took it back. That was him trying to be mean.
He mostly just wanted her to leave him alone.
There was a way of throwing things at people to get them to leave you alone. Like when he threw his shoes at her when she tried to make him take them off and come inside for some boring reason, usually for school work and stuff. When he did that he didn't mean to hurt her. That was why he had aimed for her body and not her face. He wanted throw Mukai's bottle at big sis…and he had it in his hand…
But then Mukai flopped to the side again.
He put her bottle down and steadied her. She could have hurt herself if she tipped over. Fukuda was gone and that meant that they had no healer. He didn't care if he got hurt, he was a boy and he could take it, but she was just a baby. Not only that but a girl baby. Girls couldn't deal with getting hurt. Not like how boys could. That was why big sis always cried and stuff when dad barely even touched her. Like how she would lay in her bed and cry whenever dad dragged her around by her hair and stuff.
She didn't know what real hurt was.
And there was no reason for Mukai to know what real hurt was. Not yet, anyway. She was only three months old. Sho had no idea what he was doing three months ago. He had probably been drawing and playing stuff. Normal stuff. He had been normal and she had been being born. She was born on just another normal day for him…it was weird. It was a weird thing to think about, how people could just come into the world like that.
He wondered what it was like before he was born.
"She's going to choke." Said big sis. Mukai was eating his pencil. He wanted to tell big sis to watch Frozen for the millionth time but he didn't. She was right. Mukai was chewing on the side with the chip now and if that went down her throat she would choke and die…and that would not have been good at all…
"Don't eat my pencil, it's not a food. If you want to eat something then eat some more of your bottle and if not just give me back my pencil. I don't care if you eat or not, it's your stomach, but don't wake me up in the middle of the night again. That wasn't cool. When the sun goes down then you need to sleep." Said Sho. He wondered if mom had told him that when he was a baby. He used to draw things when he was a baby, scribble on pieces of paper, mom had showed him his old drawings. She told him that he had always been an artist. Mom used to draw too, before she'd had him and big sis, and now he was…he wondered what else she had done. He wondered what it had been like for her and dad in the time before he and big sis had been born.
It was weird thinking about how things were normal but also different before he was born.
"She's too young to draw, Sho. Can you please give her back to me? I just needed you to watch her while I went to the bathroom." Said big sis
"Well I want to hold her now and she is not too little to draw. She just needs someone to show her how. She's not dumb just because she's little." Said Sho
"I wasn't calling her dumb. I think that she's really smart, actually, like how she takes off her own socks because she doesn't like that and also while you were brushing your hair she picked up her own pacifier this morning. I have a picture if you want to see." Said big sis. She had been taking nonstop pictures of Mukai. Taking pictures was all well and good but drawing them was better. That was what he had been doing, drawing pictures of Mukai. That way he would be able to remember her even if dad took her away.
There had been a lot of pictures when Sho had been a baby but no drawings.
At some point mom had stopped drawing pictures. He wondered why. He wondered if, when you had a baby, you had to stop doing things that you liked. They hadn't done any schoolwork at all that day and big sis hadn't played with her dolls even once. Babies were a lot of work. He wondered if he would have to stop drawing when he had to have a baby…or maybe it was just a girl thing. He couldn't imagine dad ever giving up the things that he loved just for Sho.
Big sis, maybe, but not him.
"Show me later. I'm teaching her to draw right now. Even if she can only scribble that's still better than nothing. I started off scribbling. Don't you remember?" asked Sho
"No but I was a baby when you were born. I don't really remember anything from back then." Said big sis
"Well I remember you from when I was a baby. I remember how we used to share a room and you would make me float out of my crib and stuff." Said Sho
"You weren't a baby then, you were two and I was three. That wasn't a crib, too, that was a bed with sides on it that mom got for you so you wouldn't escape. She took the sides off because you kept on climbing out. Remember how the sides of your bed had those things in the sides?" asked big sis. Sho didn't know what to say for a moment. She had mentioned mom…they were not allowed to mention mom…but dad was gone. He had been tense. He relaxed. Mukai smiled at him again. She did that a lot. He smiled back.
He loved her smiles.
"Bed with sides, crib, it's all the same. Right, Mukai?" asked Sho. She didn't say anything. She just slapped him on the chest and smiled. That was normal for her. She didn't mean to hurt him. He had no idea what that meant. He figured it meant 'pay attention to me' or 'I want to play with you, big brother' or something like that. Well he would. Because that was what big brothers did. Even pretend big brothers.
"I don't think that she knows the difference…and also she sleeps in a drawer." Said big sis
"She knows the difference. Just because she can't talk doesn't mean that she doesn't know things." Said Sho. She was poking him in the stomach with a pencil now. He used his powers to hold his sketchbook in front of her. He flipped to a blank paged and used his powers to press her hand, the one with the pencil in it, but he didn't make her draw anything. He wasn't going to be the bossy sort of big brother. He knew firsthand how hard it was when your older sibling was bossy as all else.
Like now.
She was looking at him and her aura was on him. She should have been watching TV since Frozen was on and she loved that movie out of all the other movies in the whole world. He was glad that Mukai wasn't watching with her. She had much better taste than big sis. She liked that Black Cauldron thing. It was much cooler. She was more like him than big sis.
And not just because of her red hair, red aura, and blue eyes.
"Be careful. I know that you have really good control but it can be so easy to lose control. It's like it happens before you even know it. Like your powers just stop listening and-" said big sis. Why didn't she get it? They were different people. Just because her powers were too big to control it did not mean that he was the same way. They may have been brother and sister but that did not mean that they were alike. They looked different and acted different and just were different people entirely.
He was not going to lose control and hurt little sis.
"Will you please stop it? I have complete control." Said Sho
"I know but…but I don't want-" said big sis
"I'm fine." Said Sho. If he didn't need both hands to hold up little sis then he would have thrown that bottle at big sis. He wanted to. Not to hurt her, no, he would aim for her stomach just to get her to shut up. He was still in control. He never lost control of his powers, only his feelings, and that was only because of her. Little sis could never make him lose control of her feelings.
"Ok….but if you want to hand her back to me….I mean she still needs to burp. Even if she didn't finish her whole bottle she still needs to burp." Said big sis
"Why? If she doesn't want to burp then she doesn't have to burp. You can't force someone to burp. That's bossy." Said Sho. People burped when they needed to burp. He was not going to boss her around like that. She was happy now. She was kicking a little but she was happy. She was even drawing something…a lot of lines. He wondered what she could have been trying to draw. She was only three months old. She hadn't seen much of life or the world…
Maybe she was trying to draw her old life.
Maybe she was getting upset, those were her fussy noises, because she was thinking about her old life. Maybe she had a big brother and big sister back in Korea. Maybe she missed her mom, too, and her dad. Not that Sho could even imagine missing your dad. His dad was gone and it felt like he could breathe. Sure this was a Claw living space, there were upper echelon people and Awakened in the houses around them, but there was no dad there to yell at him. Also he trusted those guys not tell on him if he did things that dad wouldn't like…which was just about everything.
"She has to burp or else she gets fussy…and I think that she's stating to get fussy. Please give her back, Sho, she has to burp if she's done eating. She has to burp and then the internet said that she has to sleep after eating so I'm going to try and put her down for a nap…and then I might take a nap…but I have so much schoolwork to do…and I haven't made lunch yet either…" said big sis
"Just tell the Awakened to get us something." Said Sho
"I tried that already with breakfast, remember? They came back late with the wrong thig and they wouldn't stop asking about dad. I don't know why they want dad to come back so badly. It's not like he's nice to them or anything like that." Said big sis. It was nice to hear her making sense for once. It was so weird how the Awakened wanted dad to come back. He was mean to them, meaner to them than he was to any other members of Claw, but then again they were kind of dumb sometimes…or a lot of the times.
How they could come back with waffles when he said that he wanted pancakes he would never know.
You did not mess with breakfast. Even dad agreed with that. Breakfast was the most important meal of the day and you could not mess that up. They had messed up so bad…and they had even brought dad's breakfast even though they had auras and they could see that dad wasn't anywhere near them. They asked about him and seemed sad, one of them even cried, when Sho said that he had no idea where dad had gone to or when he would be back.
The Awakened were so weird sometimes…most of the times.
"We have food, it's just junk food. We'll be fine and Mukai will be fine. She shouldn't sleep so much during the day, anyway, since if she sleeps all day she'll be up all night like she was last night." Said Sho. Really, it was obvious. If they wanted Mukai to sleep during the night then they would have to cut down on her naps. Besides, she was having fun. She was kicking and making all of those noises because she was having fun.
He bounced her up and down, though, because she was getting kind of loud.
She was so loud that she could be heard from next door. Shimazaki had teleported into their house while the sun was coming up and told them that he couldn't take it anymore. He gave big sis something that looked like water in a clear bottle but Sho didn't think was water and told her to give it to the baby so that she would go to sleep already. Big sis said no and also sorry, and then she had stuck whatever that was in her sock drawer.
If it was something that could help the baby sleep at night then he had no idea why she had said no.
Maybe it was because she didn't much like Shimazaki. Dad didn't either. Sho could not begin to understand his family members. Shimazaki was the coolest guy ever! Ok, Shibata was cool but he also cried at the end of Frozen so that lost him some cool points in Sho's book. Shimazaki never cried. Not even when he got shot in the face. Well his barrier was really close but it was so cool that he didn't even flinch. Also he could fly, too, if he wanted to. Also he was really strong. He could lift Sho up with one hand and throw him. Not as strong as Shibata thought but Shimazaki was cooler because he wasn't as tall and muscular. Not that Shimazaki wasn't tall. He was tall enough to reach over the fridge to where big sis kept on hiding them because he was eating them instead of the other food groups…even though it was his body and he could eat whatever he wanted…and dad didn't care what he ate…but still it was so cool of Shimazaki to get them out of their hiding spot and share the whole box with him. He was so cool and stuff…
Maybe he wanted to hang out later.
"Um…I'm pretty sure that babies need their naps, little brother, and she needs to eat a lot either way so she's doing to wake us up either way." said big sis. Mukai was fussing now, the way that she fussed when she was about to cry, and he had no idea why. They were having fun. They were having so much fun and she was drawing and it was so hard to have bad feelings when you were drawing pictures. Baby sis was fine and big sis was just being all bossy like she always was.
"Well she's fine. Aren't you Mukai?" asked Sho as he bounced her a little harder. Maybe she was getting upset. Maybe he should have just given up and passed her back to big sis. Maybe she was better at this than he was…but he was good at this too. He treated baby sis like she was a person and not just a series of needs that needed to be fulfilled. He cared about who she was as a person and he loved her and-and she was fine and-
She was not fine.
She threw up on his sketchbook. She threw up on his sketchbook and then she started to cry. He was very still. She just threw up on so much of his work…and now she was crying…and big sis had yanked her off of his lap…his sketchbook hit the ground. How could she!? How could she just throw up on his stuff when he was being so nice to her!? Why would she-
"Sho…please be mad at me and not her….because she's a baby and…and you can hit me or kick me or bite me or something…but not her…" said big sis. Well Sho hadn't wanted to hit her before but he wanted to hit her now more than anything. She seriously thought that he could hit a baby? What was the matter with her? He was not going to hit Mukai because she was a baby and he loved her and he would never do anything to hurt her.
It wasn't ok.
And he was not going to lose control, either, even though you could lose control and hurt someone and it was ok just so long as you said sorry to them like Fukuda said. Well even if he said sorry to Mukai it wouldn't make him less of a terrible excuse for a human being. Hitting your big sis was alright but…but he wasn't going to do that either because baby sis was watching….
"Don't be dumb." Said Sho
"I-I just meant that you get mad sometimes…and a lot of the time even if I'm not the one who made you mad you still-" said big sis
"I'm not going to hit anyone now go put little sis to be. I have to see what I can save in this." said Sho. He tried to sound happier than he was. He had worked hard on this sketchbook but…but little sis hadn't meant anything by this and big sis had been trying to keep this from happening. He had almost lost control at big sis in front of little sis…and if he had done that then little sis would have been scared of him. He never wanted to see her looking scared of anything or anyone…especially not him.
He was not dad, he would never be dad, and he did not need anyone to be scared of him.
He tore out the ruined pages and went back to drawing. He wasn't mad at all anymore.
Dad wasn't home. Mom was gone and now so was dad. Big sis may have been trying her best to pretend to be mom but he had no urge at all to fill the space that dad had left.