here for you//Shindeku

»4«

We walked back to our apartment. Yeah, we can afford something else, but we preferred our two bedroom apartment. It just seemed better.

As we entered, said apartment, we were met with Dads boyfriend cooking something. I wonder if he knows sign language, the topic never came up so I never found out.

Noticing us, he turned and said something. I waved at him and gave him that 'perfect' smile that I got from my dad.

He kept talking, I assume to dad, so I sat down at a bar stool by the kitchen.

I watched as they did their normal greeting, a hug, and a conversation.

I couldn't hear them but it was probably the normal conversation they have everyday.

"Hey, how are you? What happened today?" His boyfriend would ask

"Nothing happened. What about you? Did you get hurt again?" My dad would answer, a look of worry in his eyes.

They would both reassure each other that they're okay and then they'd notice me.

But that's not how it went today.

There was a hug, and it lasted longer than normal but, they haven't seen each other in a while, right?

When they pulled away, my dad was ranting about something and I saw the tears in his eyes. I stood nervously, walking around the island to the two of them.

I looked between the two of them frantically, trying to figure out what they could be talking about.

All of a sudden, I was pulled into a hug. This- this isn't normal.

I hugged back, not knowing what to do. I felt my dad's boyfriends scars as he pulled me close.

What were they talking about? Was it about me?

'Is everything okay?' I signed when I was released from the hug.

'No it's not.' Dad's hands were shaking as he signed, but I still caught it.

'I am sorry. It is my fault, isn't it?' I signed, looking down to the ground.

Someone moved my head so I was looking back up at them.

'No of course not. You have done nothing wrong. We promise, it is just the situation you are in right now that we are trying to solve.' Oh, so he does know sign language.

I looked away from the patchwork villain and at my dad who was still crying. I don't like this situation. It's not how we work. We are supposed to be that happy family that never has these kinds of problems.

Before I knew it, I was throwing myself into my dad's arms.

He stood like that, his wings curling to surround the both of us. As I felt his uneasy breaths, it felt like I was going to cry too, and I don't even know why.

We stood there, nearly everything was frozen in time. Luckily, his breath calmed and he started smiling again. We can all go back to normal.

Once all the emotion was over with, I sat and watched as they worked together to finish cooking dinner.

They joined me at the bar and we ate our dinner, Katsudon, my personal favorite.

After dinner and helping with cleaning up, I retreated to my bedroom.

It was a simple room. The walls were gray, I had a full sized bed with a black bedframe that had a shelf at the head of it. There was a black wooden desk pushed against wall on the far side of the room. My closet didn't have any doors on it so I had some shelves in there where the cloths weren't. Next to the window was a black beanbag with a wind variety of books next to it.

I fell onto the bed, pulling out my phone to see a text message.

Shin 💜
hey, I wanted to check
up on you. You
doing okay?

Me
I'm fine, but thank you.
You are the one who
found me so
yeah, thank you.

Shin 💜
No need to thank
me,, it just felt like the
right thing to do.

Me
But still, thank you.
I didn't know you knew
sign language?

Shin 💜
Oh, about that
I just picked it up
over time. I don't
know everything
though. sadly

Me
Haha, yeah. I could teach
you some stuff sometime?

Shin 💜
Yeah. That would
be nice.

Shin 💜
It's getting late. You've
had a long day. why
don't you head to bed?
Goodnight.

Me
You're right. Goodnight
Shinso!!

I set my phone down my my shelf after making sure it was plugged in.

I close my eyes, trying to block out all of my thoughts and eventually, I drift to sleep.