This one may be a little drawn out and boring, but it's a continuation of the last story. Here's the summery:
Heba and Yugi are too close, and will not socialize with other children their age, so their parents decide to do an experiment to see if one could function without the other.
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Things had been going well for the first few months since the twins' first birthday. The seemed to be getting even closer as each day came and went. Heba seemed to become the more vocal of the two. He was always standing up for his younger brother, Yugi, who was very relaxed and did as he was told; even if it was Heba who told him.
The two were best friends. They had other friends, of course, but they always stayed together when they were out in public or in their play group. One could not be seen without the other. However, this closeness was beginning to worry their parents, especially the way Heba would act around other children when it came to Yugi. Whenever Yugi would try to play with another child in their play group, Heba would yell at the child and escort Yugi away. It seemed that he was very possessive about his younger brother. Miyuki had discussed this with Atem, and talking to other parents of twins, they decided that Heba and Yugi needed some time apart from each other.
So it was agreed that for the next week, at least, Heba would live with Miyuki and Yugi would live with Atem. This followed one of the weekends the twins spent with Atem.
As the young father looked at his twin sons, playing blocks with each other and speaking their own little language, Atem let out a sigh. He really did not want to separate them, but both boys needed to learn that there were other people in the world, no just each other. So the next morning, when Miyuki came over to pick the boys up, only one of them would go. Suddenly, there came a screaming sound from the living room. One of Atem's sons had screamed. With his parental instincts kicking in to overdrive, Atem rushed down the stairs. While he did, another scream came from the living room. Atem came to a screeching halt when he entered the living room.
"Boys, are you alright?!" But what he saw made his adrenaline stop in its tracks. Yugi as the one that was screaming. Heba stood on the couch, holding a block up in the air away from his brother while he jumped up and down, trying to get the toy that was being denied to him.
"EEEHHHEE!!!!" Yugi screamed. Heba smirked down at his younger brother and blew a raspberry. Yugi screamed again, this time in anger. As the two toddlers continued with their spew, Atem slapped his face with his hand. He thought that this was an actual emergency. But, as father, he needed to interfere.
"Alright, that's enough! Heba, you come down from there this instant!" Hebe blew another raspberry, only this time it was aimed at his father. Both twins laughed at this. "Hey! Knock that off! Heba, get down from the couch right now and give Yugi his block back!" Being the rebel that Heba was, he began to jump up and down on the couch. Atem's anger struck. He really hated it when Heba disobeyed him. He marched into the living room and picked the elder twin up, causing him to drop the block.
Heba screamed as Atem picked him up. He kicked his legs, trying to make Atem put him down.
"Heba, stop acting like this!" Atem continued to try and manhandle Heba, Yugi quickly scooped up the block and ran off. He did not like to get in the middle of arguments between his brother and his daddy.
Heba continued to throw a tantrum in Atem's arms. Why did Heba have to act this way with him?! He never acted like this for Miyuki; he was always a little angel with her. This was one of the reasons, if not the number one reason, why they had decided that Heba would stay with their mother. "Heba, for the last time, stop acting like this, or you're going to get a time out!" Heba screamed again. Yugi watched his brother and his daddy fight from a safe corner. Finally, Atem was able to get Heba's form under his arm, quite literally kicking and screaming. The two went upstairs, leaving Yugi all by himself. Realizing this, the youngest twin waddled after the two.
The twins had just learned to climb the stairs. Still, Yugi was a little afraid of all the stairs he had to climb. There were so many, and they were so big. Heba and Yugi were considerably small for their age. Yugi whimpered a little bit, but decided to try and climb the stairs. He could still hear Atem and Heba yell at each other.
So, very carefully, Yugi picked up his tiny left leg and pulled himself onto the first step. Mission accomplished; one down, too many to go.
Yugi continued this cycle until he reached the top of the stairs. He followed the sounds of Heba's tantrum and was lead to their room, where Atem was trying to sit Heba down in a chair to put him in time-out.
"Heba, I have had it up to here with your attitude! Now you keep that little butt of yours in that chair, and you don't move until I say so!" Heba blew a raspberry at his father, but did as he was told; but that did not mean that he was going to be quiet. Atem rolled his eyes and turned to leave when he saw Yugi standing in the doorway with a frightened look in his eyes. He had heard Daddy yell at Heba before, but never that loud, and never that threatening. It was so scary that it even made Heba cooperate … a little.
At seeing the look of horror in his younger son's eyes, Atem's heart sank. "Yugi … what are you doing here?" Yugi did not answer. He ran as fast as his little legs could carry him. "Yugi, wait!" Atem reached the hall and his younger son was nowhere to be seen. "He vanished …" Atem whispered to himself. He looked around before he heard a small noise coming from his own room. He rolled his eyes. "My room …" He whispered to himself again.
The young father walked into his room and looked around before he saw two tiny feet quickly pull themselves under the bed. Atem smiled a little bit; he would have thought this was an adorable sight had he not been beating himself up inside for scaring the little boy. Atem sighed. He went over to the bed and knelt down to the floor. He lifted the blankets to see a scared little Yugi shaking in the corner. Atem's heart broke.
"Yugi, please come out from under there …" Yugi replied by scooting further into the corner. "Yugi, please don't be scared, I'm sorry I yelled. I didn't mean to yell so loud, but Heba does not listen unless I do." Yugi began to whine softly, tears forming in his eyes. His constant quivering forced them to fall down his round, pink cheeks. "Oh, baby, please don't cry … I promise, I never meant to scare you." Atem scooted closer, but that just caused Yugi to scoot further away. Atem sighed again. Just then, he heard footsteps behind him. He turned around to see that it was Grandpa.
"Atem, what are you doing?"
"Yugi's hiding under the bed because I accidently scared him."
"How did you do that?" Atem stood up; he had lost the feeling in his knees anyway.
"Well, Heba was teasing Yugi, so I"---
"Oh don't tell me you two began to yell again …" Now he understood why Yugi was so scared. Yugi hated loud noises, and could not stand yelling.
"Well, he wouldn't listen to me! He kept Yugi's favorite toy from him and then he started jumping up and down on the couch when I told him to get off!" Solomon had to hold back a chuckle. Heba really knew how to push Atem's buttons and he enjoyed ever minute of it.
"Well now look what happened." Atem sighed.
"Well, what am I supposed to do? Heba won't listen to me unless I yell." Solomon stood with his arms folded in a way that suggested that he knew something that Atem did not.
"Heba pushes your buttons because you let him; ignore him once in a while and his behavior will improve."
"How do you know?"
"Because that's what I did to you." Atem was taken back for a second.
"What? You ignored me?!" Solomon chuckled.
"I'll go check on Heba. You fix things here with Yugi." And with that he walked away. Atem sighed and returned to trying to coax Yugi out from under the bed.
At seeing how scared Yugi actually was, Atem could hardly take it anymore. "Baby, please don't be scared; it hurts me to think that you might be scared of me …" A tear fell down Atem's face and he smiled. "Look, I'm sad now … you don't want Daddy to be sad, do you?"
Yugi tilted his head in confusion. Why was Daddy crying? Yugi had made him cry, so he had to make Daddy feel better. Yugi crawled out from under the bed and approached his father. Atem so badly wanted to pull his younger son into his arms and tell him that everything would be alight but resisted the urge so as not to frighten little Yugi even more.
Yugi was the one who broke the ice. He waddled over to his father and hugged him. Carefully, Atem wrapped his arms around Yugi and smiled. Yugi was not scared of him anymore.
"I'm sorry, Yugi; I promise I won't yell like that again." Yugi squealed happily.
"Eeeyaay!" Atem laughed, which caused Yugi to laugh too. Now that that problem was settled, perhaps he could fix the problem with Heba. "Let's go see if Heba's ready to play nicely." Yugi did not reply, so Atem picked him up and walked back into the twins' room.
Inside, he saw Heba playing with his little farm figurines.
"Heba!" Heba looked at Atem as if asking him what he wanted and then returned to playing. "I thought I told you to--!"
"Atem," Grandpa stood outside the room with his arms folded.
"What did I tell you?"
"But he's"--- Solomon just shook his head. Atem sighed and put Yugi down so that he could go play. As he watched his twin son play, giggle and communicate through that little language of theirs, he decided to let Heba's behavior go this time. It seemed that Heba only behaved around his mother and his brother. He hoped that this separation would help with that.
---
About an hour later, Miyuki arrived to pick the boys up ... well, one of the boys. As soon as Miyuki opened the door to the apartment adjacent to the game shop, the boys were ecstatic.
"MAMA!" They yelled in happy unison. Both boys ran into their mother's arms as fast as they could.
"My babies, I missed you!" She had an arm around each one of them. Atem came down as soon as he heard the soft knock on the door.
"Hello, Miyuki." Said woman smiled.
"Hello, Atem. Have you taken care of my boys?" Atem rolled his eyes.
"No, I killed one and cloned the other. Yes, I took care of them!" Miyuki laughed.
"So, is Heba ready to go?" She was talking to Atem, but the boys heard her, hardly understanding what she was saying. Atem picked up Heba's backpack and gave it to the mother of his children.
"Yes, everything he needs is in his backpack." Heba and Yugi recognized their backpacks. Yugi was given the color purple and Heba was given the color blue. Usually the two bags were always together, but seeing only Heba's bag was giving them a strange message. Miyuki took the little bag and Heba's hand.
"Okay, we're all ready to go." She bent down and gave Yugi a kiss on the cheek. "You be good for Daddy, okay?" Yugi looked at Heba with wide eyes. Both twins finally understood what was happening. They looked at each other in horror.
Before the two parents could say anything else from each other, Heba ripped his hand out of Miyuki's.
"NO!" He yelled before he ran over to Yugi and pulled him into a hug. Yugi hugged his brother back, both tight enough and practically impossible to pull apart.
"Heba, what are you doing? We have to go." Miyuki said. Both twins shook their heads.
"NO!" They exclaimed in unison. Atem glared at his sons.
"Now, boys, don't act like this; you need some time apart." The boys did not really understand what Atem was saying, all they understood was the idea that they were not going to be together. At seeing that there was hardly a move from the twins, Atem and Miyuki walked to the boys and pulled them apart. Both baby twins screamed for each other. Atem held into Yugi while Miyuki held Heba. Heba kicked and screamed for his brother while Yugi just screamed with his arms reaching out.
"You better go while you have the chance." Atem said. Miyuki nodded and walked out the door with Heba.
Yugi screamed even louder. He could not believe that his mother forgot to take him with her. And even worse, he could not believe that she had taken Heba away from him. The younger twin was scared. Who was going to protect him? He was not as aggressive as Heba, and was not as brave. Soon, Yugi began to kick like crazy just as his twin brother did for Miyuki and Atem had to put him down. Yugi ran, or quickly waddled, over to the window to see if his mother and brother were still there. He could not see either of them.
"Mama! Abah!" He screamed for his mother and Heba.
Atem watched as Yugi continued to call out for said family members. His heart broke again. As much as he loved Heba, he did not think that they would get along too well all week if they were left alone with each other.
He realized that Heba and Yugi completed each other. Heba was the old, more protective one that stood up for Yugi and never took any crap from anyone, much like himself. And Yugi was the younger, gentler, one that just wanted to make everyone happy. In a way, they completed each other. Atem knew that his boys were special, but like all twins, they needed time apart so that they could develop their individuality and not be so dependant on one another. Yugi needed to learn to stand up for himself, and Heba needed to learn to get along better with others. But both Atem and Miyuki knew that one of them could not achieve their goal if the other gets in the way. So they decided to separate the two.
Yugi continued to look out the window in hopes that his mother and Heba would come back.
"Mama … 'Abah …" Atem sighed as he walked over to Yugi. Yugi looked at him with as sad face. " …No Mama …"
"I know, Baby …" Yugi began to whimper sadly, tears becoming too much for his young eyes as they fell down his cheeks. Atem picked Yugi up. "Come on, Yugi. We'll have a lot of fun, just the two of us." He wanted to sound convincing, but he did not believe that he had achieved his goal. Yugi rested his head on his father's shoulder and groaned. "Come on, let's go get some dinner."
---
Once the table was set and dinner was on the table, Atem collected Yugi and placed him in one of the two highchairs. Solomon and Atem started off by talking about nothing in particular, but then Solomon noticed that his great-grandson was not eating the little chopped up pieces of ham in front of him, but more like just moving them around. Atem observed this too. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair.
"Yugi, you need to eat, Baby." Yugi looked at his father with large, sad eyes.
"'abah …"
"Heba's not here, he's with Mommy. You'll see him again in a week." Yugi did not understand what his father was saying. All he knew was that his big brother, the person he had never been apart from at all in his life, was not with him now. Yugi still refused to eat his food, but Solomon made the baby eat at least five bites of food before he could get out of the highchair and go watch the window again, just in case Mommy and Heba came back.
---
Later, Atem had Yugi take a bath, and he added extra toys to try and cheer Yugi up, but that did not work very well. It was late in the night when Atem was awoken by the voice of his younger son.
"D'da, D'da!" he called. Atem sighed. He knew that Yugi would eventually wake him up in the night, but that still did not mean that he liked it. Sluggishly, Atem rose from his bed and made his way to the twins' room.
When he opened the door, he saw the adorable sight of Yugi standing at the edge of the crib in his little blue feetie pyjamas. The bars on the crib came up to about the twins' height since the boys were very small themselves. Yugi's eyes looked red, showing that he had been softly crying.
"What's the matter, Yugi?" Yugi tried to hold out his arms towards his father, but the bars were too tall. Atem sighed.
"I should have known; you're not used to sleeping alone. Heba's been right by your side ever since you were born." Yugi started jumping up and down in impatience. Atem was correct; Yugi was not used to being alone, and as a result, he hated being alone. Atem picked Yugi up, not forgetting to take the little panda bear stuffed animal that Yugi loved as he did. He took Yugi back into his room and placed him on the bed. As Atem settled down under the covers, he saw Yugi looking at him with a sad look in his eyes, clutching the panda bear.
"Yugi, please stop looking at me like that." Yugi just cuddled into his father's side even more. He really hated being alone. Atem ran his fingers through what little hair Yugi's head had.
"You were really scared, weren't you?" Yugi did not answer but his shivering was enough to answer the question on its own. The young father sighed again as Yugi tried to climb up onto his stomach. Atem let Yugi do what he wanted as he tried to get comfortable. Once Yugi was comfortable, Atem ran his hand through his son's short hair. This was going to be a long week.
---
Just as Atem predicted, the week of separation was a long one. With Miyuki, Heba kept throwing fit, after fit, after fit. Miyuki was forced to discipline him almost every day. She had to miss three days of school that week due to her son's behavior. This was his way of telling her that he missed his brother and he wanted him now. This was a side of Heba that Miyuki had never seen before; he was always a little angel around her. Now she saw what Atem kept telling her all the time.
Atem was not much better. Although Yugi did not go on a destructive rampage like his brother, he sat by the window all day, watching and waiting for his mother and brother to come back. Every time a car passed by, he would mutter 'mama' in a question form, and look heartbroken when it passed. Because Yugi would not eat or play, Atem had to miss school as well, just to make sure that his little baby was alright. On Wednesday, Atem almost cracked and took Yugi to see Miyuki and Heba, but Solomon stopped him before he could reach the one-and-a-half year old.
Thank God it was Saturday; the day the twins would be reunited. In Atem's mind, this experiment had completely blown the second Heba and Yugi left sight of each other. Once again, Yugi sat perched at the window, watching cars pass by and wishing that at least one of them would turn out to be Mommy's car. Atem sighed and went to sit with his baby boy.
"Baby, what are you doing?" He asked, already knowing. Yugi did not look at him; he just kept staring out the window.
"Mama …" Atem sighed again and gave Yugi a kiss on the head. Yugi did not even acknowledge it. He just continued to stare out the window. His little fingerprints were smeared all over the same spot.
"Do you want to go outside?"
"No …"
"Now about a walk in the park?"
"No …" Tears were starting to fill his eyes. Atem gave up. In a few minutes, things would be back to normal.
He went into the kitchen to get himself a glass of water when he heard the muffled roar of an engine as a car pulled into the driveway. Then he heard that sweet little voice that he had been trying to get Yugi to use all week.
"MAMA!" Atem quickly ran into the room as Miyuki and a screaming Heba walked in. As soon as Heba saw Yugi, his screaming stopped.
"Eegi!"
"Abah!" The twins ran towards each other and quickly embraced one another in a big hug. Atem smiled and then looked at Miyuki; she looked exhausted. The young father's smile turned into a smirk.
"What's got you all screwed up?" He asked with a sly voice. Miyuki glared at him. She had dark circles under her eyes, her hair was messed up, and she did not have any makeup on.
"Shut up!" She snapped. Atem continued to smirk.
"Not so easy with him, is it?" Miyuki scoffed.
"Okay, okay … you were right; Heba has anger management issues. The two teenage parents watched as their boys began chatting to each other in their own little language. Yugi soon pulled away and ran to his mother, who scooped him up in a big hug. Atem did the same with Heba. Atem looked up at Miyuki.
"This experiment failed miserably." Miyuki nodded.
"Agreed." The boys ran into their little playroom together and laughed and giggled. It was official: Heba and Yugi Moto could not function without each other, and their parents found that out the hard way.
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The End
