What We've Missed Without You

chapter 26

*sorry for mistakes*

"Your mother will be back later, so I'll be watching all of you until then." Shiori stated as she chopped up a carrot on a wooden cutting board, "We're having stir-fry tonight for dinner! So make sure you don't snack until then!"

"What's that?" Harue asked through chewing a wad of bubblegum, her feet kicked up on the kitchen table. Alongside her was Adam on the left, flipping through a new book he borrowed from the library earlier today, his old one still with him like a bible to a missionary. Yuuta sat across from her, slouched over and arms folded in front of him as a pillow while he snoozed away; a pair of cheap silver headphones plugged into a scratched-up cassette player as some dead pianist played a complicated song leaked through softly in the air. Finally, on the right of Harue was Kumiko scribbling furiously at a piece of notebook paper with a wax crayon, drawing something incoherent. Shiori looked over from her cutting board and smiled, an amount of smile lines forming into her skin. "A bunch of stuff fried in a pan with sauce; specifically, we're having chicken stir-fry. There's obviously chicken, peas, miniature corn, carrots-"

Before the older woman could finish, a disgusted groan came from Harue.

"Why do we gotta eat nasty stuff like that?!"

"So you can actually grow up strong and healthy to defend against all of that sugar you eat." Shiori huffed, "Honestly, how do you not get sick with the amount of candy you eat in a day? Goodness, You and Fumuki have a sugar addiction. And who told you to put your feet up on the table? Were you raised in a barn?"

On cue, Adam momentarily closed his book and hit his sister's legs to get her to put her feet down onto the floor. She winced and glared at the dark-haired boy and huffed, crossing her arms and still chomping away at her gum.

"If they're 'pose to be good for'ya, then why are they nasty?!"

"Not everything is supposed to taste like candy, Harue. That's what cooking is for! Cooking can help change the flavor of vegetables so that you can eat it. Look, the sauce I'm cooking with is sweet, you won't even taste the vegetables!"

"Just quit bein' a baby 'nd shut up..." Yuuta mumbled as he tried to get comfortable in his position, only for his little sister to smack her hand on the wooden dining table with a glare. "What didja call me?!"

"A baby, Nee-chan." Kumiko absentmindedly replied as she continued her colorful collage of crayon scribbles on the wide-ruled notebook page, causing Yuuta to let out a snicker. Harue grit her teeth and continued to yell at her older brother, no formalities involved while giving him a piece of her mind. After countless insult and insult thrown at the sleepy blonde, Adam eventually had enough of Harue's blabbering. He stood up and closed his book temporarily, going in to smack her upside the head with the used hardback book. The chestnut-haired girl held the back of her head, glaring at Adam who calmly sat back down and opened back up to the page he left off of, bluntly telling her, "Harue, you're being too loud."

"Ya didn't have'ta hit me y'know!"

"It's the only way to shut you up." Another sarcastic comment left Yuuta mouth, smirking while he slowly opened his ocean-blue eyes. Before Harue was going to fall into the trap again, she felt small hands tug on her dirt-stained blue jeans. Her brown eyes traveled down to see three pairs of eyes similar to hers and one set of vivid velvet-pink ones. Four small children smiled (well, the last one wasn't) up at her and continuously tugged at her jeans. They chanting in sync to get their older sister's attention, trying to convince her. "Nee-chan! Nee-chan! Let's play! Let's play!"

"Whaddya want, you gremlins?" She bend down and picked up Kaoru, her arms supporting his bottom while his limbs hung loosely in the air. Fumuki jumped as she continued to grab at Harue's jeans while she excitedly asked (more like demanded). "Play with us, Nee-chan! We're bored!"