count on me

it's not right, but it's okay

𝖙𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖌𝖊𝖗 𝖜𝖆𝖗𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌𝖘 𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖊𝖉 𝖎𝖓 𝖔𝖕𝖊𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌 𝖆𝖚𝖙𝖍𝖔𝖗'𝖘 𝖓𝖔𝖙𝖊

✭・.・✫・

dream shuffles his socks down the hallway, drawn in by the sound of rosie crying.

he finds himself in the kitchen, seeing sapnap sitting at the island and going through his emails whilst the toddler is sitting in her high chair across from him, balling her eyes out.

the blonde's brows furrow, walking over to sapnap's side which prompts the ravenette to look up at him with a smile. "hey," sapnap greets casually.

"is she okay?" dream asks, moving around the kitchen island to the toddler. he holds his hand out and she grabs onto one of his fingers, pulling it towards her mouth which he easily pulls away from.

"yeah, i think she's just hungry," sapnap says and dream looks over to see him at the end of a shrug, eyes still on his work.

the blonde's brows pull together, creasing the skin in the middle. "have you fed her?"

through tears, rosie mumbles out a hardly coherent, "napnap."

"no," sapnap answers easily, still keeping his attention on his laptop, rather than dream and the sobbing girl just a few feet away from him.

"why not?" dream asks, his tone defensive as he feels his chest go tight.

"i was waiting till she stopped crying," sapnap answered, only now looking up at dream, "she needs to learn that crying won't get her stuff, you know?"

dream's heart feels like it drops into his stomach, his blood boiling. "sapnap, what the hell?" he says, trying not to let his voice sound too angry so he doesn't alarm the baby. he beelines over to their cabinet. "that's neglect."

the ravenette has the audacity to scoff, his gaze following dream around the room. "what? no it isn't," he argues with certainty.

"yes it is," dream argues straight back as he gets an applesauce and a baby spoon out. "it's neglect, sapnap. you can't deprive a child of food because it's crying, that's her only way of telling us she's hungry," he tells the ravenette, feeling some kind of instinct kick in towards the safety of the little brunette.

"i wasn't depriving her," the ravenette retorts, saying the word as if it's a joke. "if you just feed her when she cries she'll think that crying gets her everything, which it won't."

"she's a f-" dream cuts himself off before he can curse. he takes a grounding breath to try and stabilise his rapidly growing anger. "she's a baby, sapnap. if she didn't cry, we wouldn't know she was hungry and she would starve."

"no, crying isn't her only form of communication, like, she holds her hands up if she wants picking up and stuff, she just needs to learn," the ravenette contradicts.

"i can't believe you right now sapnap," dream mutters disappointedly, holding a spoonful up to rosie's mouth and watching as her crying immediately cut out as she eats. she eats so quickly that her mouth is open before dream has served the next spoon. "maybe you shouldn't watch her on your own anymore."