It was the day after Nagisa had accepted the task of babysitting Nanami while her mother wasn't home. They had another lesson in math today and Nagisa kept struggling about the same problem, just staring at it, finding it to be an impossible obstacle.

"Hazuki-kun," the teacher stopped by his desk. "You don't appear to be doing anything," His tone wasn't particularly strict, but Nagisa felt slightly offended by the words he said.

"I'm stuck at this problem," he said and pointed it out.

The teacher looked at it. "I didn't think this would trouble you at all," he smiled kindly, but to Nagisa it seemed like he was feeling amused about the whole thing.

"I don't understand it," Nagisa answered honestly.

"Why is that?" Again Nagisa noticed the smile.

"Because!" The last word was an outburst of both frustration and anger. Frustration that he didn't understand and anger because the teacher was annoying.

"Hazuki-kun, I am not tolerating that kind of behavior in my class," their teacher was also speaking loudly now. The entire class had stopped doing what they were doing to stare at the arguing teacher and student. "Gather your things and don't come back to the math lessons until you can figure out what correct behavior is,"

Nagisa demonstratively gathered his things and left the classroom. He received humored looks from some of the boys in his class while looks of pity could be seen on Chigusa's and Momotaro's faces. Gou, on the other hand, had a puzzled look on her face, like she was trying to figure something out. Nagisa didn't notice any of this though, because he was too ashamed to look at his classmates.

The hallways were empty once Nagisa got outside the classroom and he headed down the hallway, past the other 2nd year classrooms. Rin and Haruka could be located somewhere above. He wanted to go and talk to them about this matter, but they were in class.

Rei would of course have been the preferable choice to go talk to. Nagisa could only imagine what Rei could do. For some reason it seemed to Nagisa, like if Rei was here, he could clear out every single trouble he was facing and make everything okay. He had always had more faith in Rei than any of his other family members.

But Rei wasn't here. Neither was Makoto for that matter. Nagisa was on his own, and at the rate things were going, it didn't seem like he would have anyone to rely on anytime soon. He headed towards the elementary school building for reasons unknown.

Outside he noticed that the elementary school children were having a short break from class. They were all 3rd graders. He looked at them, watching their playfulness. He wished he could join, but in the same time he knew what Rei would say about it.

"No, Nagisa-kun, you're way too old for that,"

Nagisa smiled at the thought. He wasn't gonna do it anyway. He would just watch them for a short while, while wishing he and the others could grow back to that age.

"Hazuki-san?" a small voice came from beside Nagisa.

"Nana-chan?" Nagisa looked down at the small girl. "What do you want?" he asked.

"What are you doing here?" the girl asked in return.

"I'm on break too," Nagisa answered while smiling. He didn't want to tell he had been kicked out of math class and been told to never come back. It wasn't something he needed to make little girls like Nanami worry about.

"Momma says that I should tell you that she is not gonna be home until 8 tonight. She asked me to wait for you until you were off and you would take care of me 'till she came home," the little girl said.

Nagisa smiled. "Sure, I'll look after you all I can," he said. "Maybe we can buy something on the way to your place?" he suggested.

"Strawberries?" Nanami asked curiously.

Nagisa smiled. "That's what I was thinking!" he exclaimed. As he finished, the bell at the high school building started ringing, marking the beginning of lunch break. Nagisa turned to Nanami. "Wait over here, I'll come pick you up after school," he said.

"Okay," the girl nodded before turning around and heading back to class. So did Nagisa.

After school Nagisa went to pick Nanami up. She was sitting and patiently waiting just outside the elementary school gates. It had been a while since her schoolmates had walked home. High school ended way later than elementary school did.

Nagisa felt bad for the girl and decided to hurry up and buy the strawberries for her as she could get home soon and not sit there and be bored. While he was at it, maybe he should buy an extra pack of strawberries, just because she deserved it, and because he was gonna eat half the strawberries anyway.

Nobody noticed them leave. Nagisa had been out of the classroom way before anyone else and nobody had even managed to leave the school building by then.

As they reached the apartment, Nanami opened the door with a tiny bit difficulty. Nagisa could tell she had rarely tried unlocking a door before and he remembered the door used to be tricky.

"Hazuki-san, you used to live here?" Nanami asked as she opened the door.

"Yeah," Nagisa said. "Until two years ago, we moved in here after moving to Tokyo," he said and both he and Nanami headed inside.

The two spent the afternoon watching TV and Nagisa even helped Nanami with her homework. This situation was new to him and he wasn't very confident about it. He had always received help from Rei or Makoto, depending on how much homework Rei had to do.

They heated up the miso soup Miyano-san had left behind for them. According to Nanami, it was leftovers from the day before. Afterwards they had the strawberries.

Nagisa had put a DVD on about penguins, Nanami had requested it, and they were sitting and watching it when a realization suddenly hit Nagisa. He had never told his family about this new job and none of them knew that he had gone off to babysit Nanami. It was already way past dinner time and he was probably having them worried by now.

He looked to the watch in the kitchen. It was five minutes before 8. Miyano-san would be home soon. Then he checked his phone to see if he had any missed calls, but discovered that it was out of battery.

"What's wrong, Nagisa-san?" Nanami had turned to call Nagisa by first name somewhere along the way. Nagisa had enjoyed that. It felt awkward with the formality, but with the honorific –san attached to it, he still felt slightly uncomfortable. Then again, Nanami also called Haruka by Nanase-sama. Maybe he had no need to complain.

"Nothing's wrong, I just wondered if my family got worried about me," Nagisa answered.

"Did you tell them where you go?" Nanami asked.

Nagisa shook his head. "I kinda forgot to do that," he laughed.

"Then I'm sure they're worried," the girl answered.

Then the door opened and Miyano-san entered the apartment. She had an exhausted look on her face which Nagisa recognized from the time when he and his family had lived here. Makoto used to look like that.

"Thanks for taking care of Nanami," Miyano-san said before handing Nagisa 2000 yen. She smiled at him. "It meant a lot to me. Has she caused too much trouble?" she asked.

Nagisa shook his head with a smile. "No, I had a lot of fun today," he informed the woman. "I hope to do this some more," he said.

"You shall be welcome," Miyano-san answered. "It's a huge help,"

Shortly after this, Nagisa went home, full of nervousness. How would the others feel when he came home this late without informing them of where he had been?

His worries were of no use though.

"Welcome back, Nagisa," Makoto said as Nagisa entered the apartment. The others didn't even bother to greet him. Haruka and Rin were busy doing something, probably homework. Rei was in the room he shared with Nagisa, and Kisumi was somewhere else in the apartment, out of Nagisa's sight. It was obvious from the reactions from his family members that none of them had worried about him, not one bit.

So, I still hope you like this story and don't find it too weird or too hard to keep up with. If you do, please tell me if there is something I can do better in the future, to improve my own work.

Anyways, thanks for sticking to it so far.

Jackie