#68 Hair
It's hard being a mother. Harder still when one of your kids is so intensely intelligent that she understands things no five-year- old should.
Misa was having a hard time with this in the case of her and L's youngest child, Tsuki.
They'd worked out fairly early on that she had aspergers syndrome, much like her father, it had been pretty obvious even when she was a baby, in the way she would stare for hours at a time at one object, and her strange little quirks.
And again, they learnt of her high IQ at an early age too, when she started trying to form words when she was barely six months old.
Since then it had been surprise after surprise for Misa. As many times as she reminded herself that her little girl was a genius, it still surprised her when the child wandered over and calmly used a word like 'forensic' and knew what it meant.
Misa supposed it was the reverse of her husband's situation with their son. Jay had never been overly-bright, more interested in playing and posing for cameras than learning. L had never understood it.
Now Tsuki was sitting by her father's side as he solved cases, happy to camp under his desk with a pile of paper and crayons. That wasn't the weird part.
The weird part was when she would hand him one of her drawings that demonstrated her own theories on the cases he was working on. She usually drew flowers and bunnies around the calculations, almost as an afterthought.
L always seemed very proud of them. Misa just got concerned that her daughter was too obsessed with her father's job.
No amount of reassurances from L or the other detectives could calm her down about Tsuki's sleeping patterns, which had altered rapidly over the last few years to the point where the little girl barely slept at all. Dark rings were growing under her eyes and Misa was anxious that they'd never go away.
L just blinked at her when she told him her worries and replied that so long as Tsuki was happy and (according to her doctor) in good health, what was the problem?
Misa didn't want to tell him that the real reason behind it was her own jealousy. She didn't mind Tsuki adoring her father as she obviously did, but the dark-haired little girl barely ever wanted to spend time with her mother. The closest Misa got to a hug from her daughter these days was a steady blink of those big blue eyes across the breakfast table.
All of this was running around the model's head as she laid haphazardly on the sofa of her apartment (actually it was an entire floor of the investigation building, more than enough space for her small family), flicking through the t.v. channels while Jay sat, slumped, in the armchair, happily texting his boyfriend.
They both looked up as they heard the door open, and upon seeing who it was, Jay's head when back to his phone, while Misa smiled sweetly and chirped. "Hi Eru~ Hi Tsuki-chan!"
L smiled back, his dark-haired daughter clinging to his shirt as he carried her in. "The case was solved earlier than we thought." He patted the little girl's back, "Tsuki-chan was very useful today."
Tsuki didn't seem to respond beyond burrowing closer to her father.
What followed was a very comfy evening by the Lawliet's standards, ordering in their favourite take-out, listening to Jay complain about the weight gain while at the same time stuffing his face, having a small argument about which movie to put on, and finally snuggling into the plush sofa together, Jay back in his armchair with his phone, and Tsuki on the floor doing a jigsaw.
It was halfway through the movie when the little girl soundlessly got up and wandered out of the room, scurrying back a moment later with her mother's hairbrush in her hand.
Misa looked at her quizzically.
Tsuki shuffled slightly, suddenly awkward and vaguely shy, she mumbled, "Will Mummy brush my hair like hers?"
Misa beamed and instantly picked her daughter into her lap, smiling as she brushed the long black hair into pigtails, and smiling more when she saw the reflection in the t.v, seeing for the first time in a long time, herself in her daughter's face.