Sanemi watched you as you slept, wondering if he could trust you to be alone on your own when he heads out for a mission tomorrow. Then thinking that maybe you should have someone around your age to hang out with instead of being a loner and cooped up in the house all the time, he decided to send Sourai to ask Tengen’s wives if they were alright with you staying over at their home for a couple of days at the break of dawn. He lets you continue you slumber as he gets into his daily training, there was no point waking you up to train since you have lost your sight. You needed time to process things and he wasn’t sure if he’ll know how to deal with your breakdown if you had one. The whole thing was uneasy for him and he was sure that your calmness was just a facade. Sourai returned with the women’s replies when Sanemi was taking a break and Sanemi felt a large boulder was lifted off his shoulder when the women extended their welcome. Cutting his training short, he went to wake you up, wanting to bring you to their house before it was time for him to set off for his mission. He almost couldn’t bear to wake you up when he saw how peaceful you looked asleep.
“Y/n,” He poked you at your cheek lightly, “Y/n, it’s time to wake up.”
You groaned and turned the other way, shivering as you pulled the covers over your head. It was too early where everything was still dark and your body felt sore from the events the day before, you wanted more time to rest and to forget about the pain. And the best way to do that is to sleep in. Your tendency to get as much sleep as you can mostly came from your previous lifestyle, sleeping provided a temporary escape from reality for you. You didn’t need to bear with the hunger in your stomach, the constant throbbing pain all over your body or the tea dates you always had to attend with the other rich girls of the neighbourhood that fueled your anxiety further. Sanemi had been trying to break you out of this horrible habit, saying that you were just wasting your life away if you’re always huddled underneath the blankets, but you still couldn’t help it, it was one of the places where you truly felt that you were protected from the horrors of the world. You felt him peeling the covers from your head as he called your name again, caressing your head as he did so. You briefly wondered why he wasn’t in his usual state of bad temper when he’s trying to wake you up. He should be ripping away your pillow and futon by now. Lazily, you cracked an eye open, followed by the other and was greeted by darkness. Still wondering why Sanemi had woken you up before dawn, you held your hand out in front of your face, bringing it closer and frowning at it as you tried to spot the lines of your fingers in the dark. You felt Sanemi entangling your hand with his before he brought the back of your hand to his mouth, pressing a lingering kiss on it. Your breath hitched when the previous day’s events came flooding in your mind. A tear slid down your cheek and stained your futon.
He tried to cheer you up. “I’m bringing you to meet a few… acquaintances of mine today. They’re very nice people.”
“I don’t want to meet new people.” You sniffed, hugging your pillow tighter against your chest. “I just want to sleep.”
That can’t be good for your mind, especially if you’ll be left alone for a while. “Do it for me?” He pleaded.
“You said you didn’t feel sympathetic towards me when you took me under your wing. Did you change your mind? Are you throwing me away somewhere and am never coming back?”
Sanemi looked at you, astounded by the words that came out of your mouth. How could you said that after what both of you have done last night? Before he could reply, you already stood up and was making your way to the bathroom for a shower.
“Y/n, wait-”
“No, I understand. You don’t have to explain yourself.” You turned around to smile at him. “Truly I’m grateful that you took me in when I had nowhere to go, but I musn’t trouble you further. You’re a pillar and have a bright future ahead of you, you don’t need to have someone like me around to weight you down. I’ll be fine on my own, really. I’ll just pack up and go, I only have a few things so it will be quick. Oh, I hope you can bring me somewhere near a river, it’ll be easier-”
You gasped when you felt a pair of strong arms hugging you from behind.
Sanemi growled. “Listen to me carefully, because I’m not going to repeat myself. I’m… I can never throw you away. Never say shit like that ever again. So what if you’re blind? You’re important to me, it’s so easy to love you that it fucking scares me sometimes. I don’t want to let you go, don’t take this from me. Don’t do this to me y/n, do you know fucking hard it was to hear you said what you said? I fucking hate it when you mope around being scared of the world, I know why you like staying in bed, I know why you don’t like leaving the house. Leave your past behind y/n, stop letting it haunt you. Life is shit to everyone, but you’ll always have me to rely on if it’s too much.”
You held onto his arm, letting him bury his face into the crook of your neck as you felt warm tears staining your skin. “I promise I’ll be brave, please stop crying.” You told him softly, a hand reaching up to pat his head. “It must have been a nuisance holding all those emotions in, you poor thing. I’m sorry that I worried you, Nemi. I just thought it was better for me to go.”
“That thought is shit.”
“Yes, yes it was.”
~
You were practically hiding behind him the entire time Sanemi and the three strangers were greeting each other. While the ladies were kind towards the both of you, you could tell that Sanemi felt awkward during the entire exchange. You followed Sanemi out of the door as he was leaving with a hand hanging onto the back of his haori, wanting to see him off and to lessen the time you have to spend with those three strangers. He stopped in his footsteps and turned around to give you a quizzical look and saw that you held a hand over your stomach, an action of yours that he came to be familiar with whenever you felt frightened. He rubbed your stomach to ease your anxiousness, waiting for you to say whatever’s on your mind.
“Stay safe.” You whispered to him. After giving you a pat on the head and a hasty promise that he’ll come back for you soon, he was off like the wind. You stood and listened for his disappearing footsteps and eventually decided to suck it up and go back inside the compound, a hand against the wall to guide yourself.
The three women, whose names are Suma, Hina and Makio were certainly a busy lot and it didn’t take you long before you felt comfortable around them. While you thought Suma’s exaggerated thoughts and whines were hilarious and adorable and Makio’s aggressive side amusing, you prefer sticking with Hina for she was quiet and gentle. You wanted to make yourself useful in their home, not wanting to leach off them and offered to help, but they were insistent on letting you rest as Sanemi had explained to them that you ran into a demon not too long ago. So you ended up tagging along with Hina wherever she went, hoping she wouldn’t find your presence annoying. It was like having an older sister and you enjoyed her doting on you. With the ruckus that was always going on in the house, time certainty passed by quickly and you soon lost track of how many days Sanemi was gone. It was lovely staying with the girls and you enjoyed the girls’ talk you will have with them before bedtime.
“The three of you share a husband?” You choked on your tea, coughing wildly as you tried to process the information. Hina patted your back as your tried to regain your composure. “You’re lying to me.” It’s not possible for wives to get along with each other. Hell, your stepmother always had something bad to say about your deceased mom, someone whom she has never even met. How are these three even able to live together in harmony?
“It’s true! Tengen-sama is just the best! He loves all of us the same!” Suma told you. While you were happy to hear that the three of them were treated well by their husband, you couldn’t help but feel nervous about their relationship.
Hina seemed to be the one who noticed your concern and patted you on the head. “It’s true, y/n. We’re one big happy family.”
“You would see that when Tengen-sama comes back tomorrow.” Makio added. “Suma is always the noisiest when welcoming him home.”
“I am not! Makio, stop staying things that are untrue about me!”
“Shut up!”
The night ended with you and Hina trying to wrestle Makio away from Suma when Suma tried to place your futon next to hers so that she can cuddle you. Although you sleep in the same room as them, your futon was placed against the wall away from the girls. Makio insisted on that placement as Suma moves a lot in her sleep and she didn’t want her hurting you accidentally. Relieved that they had no ill intentions of isolating you, you gladly took the bed. Hours after you had fallen asleep, you stirred awake to the sound of something moving in the house. Was that the sound of beads? You laid still in your bed and listened carefully. After confirming that you could still hear Hina, Makio and Suma’s breathing near you, you grew alert and slid out of your futon to investigate on the noise. You didn’t want to wake Hina, Makio and Suma up just in case you misheard it and let them continue sleeping. Silently, you made your way to the kitchen as fast as possible, grabbing the kitchen knife as your weapon. You froze when you heard the door of the girls’ bedroom being slid open.
Shit! Who the hell was this to be able to walk so silently? There was only one way to the kitchen, did you and the intruder somehow passed each other without noticing? You cursed inwardly as you rushed back to where you had came from, hoping that you weren’t too late to catch the intruder before he could do something to the girls. This isn’t some simple robbery. The three women were still sleeping in their futons when you returned to their room. You grew inceasingly puzzled at the scenario and lowered your weapon, you were sure that you definitely heard someone sliding the bedroom door open. The hair on the back of your neck stood up when you felt a presence looming over you from behind. Before you could react, the knife was knocked out of your hand and a bulging arm had enclosed itself around your neck, locking you in a chokehold. Your fingernails dug into the stanger’s flesh as you struggled to free yourself.
“Run!” You tried to scream, feeling sick in your stomach when the figure behind you started to carry you out of the room. You frailed and kicked wildly and caught the man between his legs. He yelled in pain but still held onto you tightly. “Fuck off! Who the fuck are you? Get out of here!” You seethed, trying to scratch his face.
“I can ask you the same thing! OW!” The man roared in pain when you sunk your teeth into his arm. He tried to pry you off him, but you wouldn’t let go and bit down on him harder. Suma, Hina and Makio should be awake by now, you can buy some more time for them to run away, hopefully the man was alone. Instead, you heard their hurried footsteps came rushing to your direction.
“Y/n?”
“Tengen-sama!”
“Stop! Stop!”
You halted when you heard them calling the name of their husband and immediately stopped fighting. Shit, you attacked one of the owners of this house. You’ll be in trouble now and could only hope that it wouldn’t implicate Sanemi.
Tengen, on the other hand, looked at the younger girl he had been holding up, recognising your name immediately when Hina called it. After seeing that you had calmed down and stopped moving, he let you down gently on the floor.
“I’m sorry. I-I thought there was an intruder.” You whispered, trembling from head to toe. You could feel how tall the man was and was squeezing your eyes shut tightly, deathly afraid of him due to his size. From what you could tell, he has huge muscles too and it will definitely hurt when he hits you, and you deserved it for attacking your host. You wondered what Suma, Hina and Makio thought of you now for attacking their husband and thought it would be any time now they will lose their cherry selves and turn you out of the house. Your stomach was starting to hurt again and you hugged yourself, waiting for their verdict and wanting to be on your way back to Sanemi’s house again.
Suma looked at your worriedly. “Did Tengen-sama hurt you somewhere, y/n? You looked pale.” You immediately shook your head frantically and hugged your stomach tighter, debating if you should just run away before your hosts turn you out. The seconds passed by slowly and you felt like you were being burned alive.
Makio gave you a quick lookover, “I don’t see any blood on her.” You thought you heard her sounding relived.
“Huh? Suma, she bit me! I’m the one who’s hurt, see!” You heard the man exclaimed angrily and assumed that he showed his arm to her. You heard the girls gasped and it was then you realised you could taste blood in your mouth.
You immediately kneeled on the ground, shaking as your forehead touched the floor. “I’m sorry for the misunderstanding, I will gladly take any punishments issued to me. Please don’t think badly of Shinazugawa-sama! I will take full responsibility for my actions. Please hit me until you anger diminishes! I will not make a sound and if Shinazugawa-sama asks, I will say I fell into a hole in the mountains!”
God, you haven’t felt this scared for a really long time. It felt like you were in your old home over again, where you had to beg to be punished to avoid more severe punishments.
“Y/n! What are you saying? Get up!” Hina was next to you in an instant, trying to pull you up. When she touched your arm, she felt how cold it was.
“Please hit me until you are in a good mood again, Tengen-sama!” You shouted, resisting Hina’s pull. You yelped when you felt someone yanked you up and hit you on the head, hearing Hina yelling at Makio shortly after. Before you could explain that you made a noise because you were surprised, Makio had already started speaking.
“What kind of people do you think we are, y/n?” Makio asked you. You shook in your position as you could feel her glaring at you. “It was just a misunderstanding, we didn’t tell Tengen-sama what you look like, and we should have told you that you cannot hear him when he moves. It’s not your fault that you thought it was an intruder.”
“Yeah! Please stop asking to be punished! It’s scary to see you like this! You can’t be hit with your condition!” Suma starting crying, giving you a tight hug from the side. Still scared, you held your tears in but put on an emotionless look, bracing yourself for any impact.
You heard some beads shook as Tengen squated down to speak to you, finally deducing that the noise came from him. “My apologies for startling you like that, y/n. I was shocked to see someone standing in our bedroom with a knife in her hand and reacted instinctively.”
“It’s alright, I’m okay.” You tried to stop your voice from shaking. Tengen attacking and restraining you did make sense, you wouldn’t expect him stay calm if he sees someone standing near his wives with a knife over their heads.
“But that was quite flamboyant of you! Biting me in the arm until I bleed! Your canine teeth is especially sharp!” You blinked at the change of Tengen’s voice, uncertain on how you should react to his sudden enthusiasm.
“Er… thanks?”
“Why are you looking at the wall? Look at my arm! Be proud of your achievement!”
“Tengen-sama, y/n here can only see darkness.” Hina explained patiently.
“Wow! No wonder you could hear me coming back home, a heightened sense of hearing!” Tengen said, waving a hand in front of you. You felt the heat radiating off his palms and resisted the urge to swat his hands away, settling for a frown instead. “Say y/n, did you happen to pass by me at the corridor?”
“I’m not sure, I went to get a knife from the kitchen, but I didn’t feel like I walked past anyone.”
“Interesting.” Tengen rests his chin on his hand. “Come on, let’s go test something out before bed. Suma, put out the light, please and y/n, I want you to throw hits if you feel something passed you by.”
You nodded and stood up, following Tengen’s footsteps out to the corridor. You heard Suma blow the candle out and was sure that the girls were watching you from the side as the bedroom door did not close. Tengen led you to the middle of the corridor and had you stand there. You tried to feel the change of the wind. Tried as you may, you couldn’t even hear the pillar’s breathing, but at one point you just had a feeling he was standing at your right and quickly shot your arm out and caught him by his uniform. You squeaked in surprise and quickly let go, backing away.
The girls’ claps and cheers echoed through the air, followed by Tengen’s chuckle. “One more trial, y/n. I want you to sneak past me, but I’ll play fair and cover my eyes. Let me know if you reached the end of the corridor.”
You were able to walk past him in less than two minutes, having to stand as still as a statue at one point when you felt him on your left. Although you couldn’t see him, but you felt that he had a cocky expression on his face when he thought he had successfully blocked your way to get to the end of the corridor. Since you hadn’t had the chance to feel the structure of he roof, you ended up having to crawl past him, almost bumping into his foot when he moved.
“Great job, y/n! You’re like a shinobi, wow!” Suma cheered the loudest, coming over and squeezing the air out of you. You smiled and thanked her quietly as you returned the hug. Tengen gave you a pat on the head before tousling your hair, giving you the impression that he was like an older brother. “As an apology for startling you earlier, I will teach you a new technique y/n. It’s called Echolocation, like its name suggests, you analyse the sounds based on the reflections. Super useful to locate people and count the number of your enemies. What do you say? Do you want to learn it?”
“I’m honoured, but I don’t think you should waste time on someone like me, Tengen-sama.” Guessing the man had a confused look on him, you continued. “I can’t be a slayer anymore now that I’m blind.”
He tsked you and flicked you hard on the forehead, causing you to winced and rubbed at the sore spot. “What nonsense! The rock pillar himself is blind and yet he’s the strongest out of all of us! How un-flamboyant of you, y/n!”
“I’m more of a blend-in with the background kind of person.” You laughed nervously, clutching your stomach again.
You winced when Tengen clapped. “Even better! If you can perfect the technique, you can easily ambush your enemies without breaking a sweat! Enough said! We’ll start tomorrow! Everyone off to bed!”
“But-”
“I said everyone off to bed!”
~
Sanemi was on his way to Tengen’s house, walking at a leisurely pace with Sourai perched on his shoulder. For once, he didn’t feel the need to hurry back to check on you after his missions and was happy with his decision of leaving you with Tengen’s wives. He hoped that you would come out of your shell and bond with them, briefly wondering who you will get along with the most. Maybe he should bring you to visit Shinobu and the girls at the Butterfly mansion soon, or maybe even Kanroji. He shuddered at the thought of meeting the pink and green hair girl and hoped that day would come later. She is always chatty and he didn’t really know how to deal with her. He had finished his mission the previous evening and had intended to come fetch you home, but figured it wouldn’t hurt for you to hang out with girls a little while longer. He had passed by a night market the night before and had intended to leave after buying dinner for himself. However, he stopped walking and watched a couple who were standing in front of a stall. The young woman was giggling as the man with her was comparing between two hair pins, trying to see which one suited her better. The old lady who was looking after the store waved for his attention and beckoned him over. Normally, Sanemi would have turned and left, but he thought that it would be a good idea to surprise you with something nice. Besides, wasn’t Tengen the one who said it’s nice to buy pretty gifts for his wives because he would get to see how happy they are?
And so, that was how Sanemi ended up with a pretty golden hair pin with pink, purple and white flowers engraved on it. He had realised in horror that he didn’t know what was your favourite colour while he was trying to get you a hairpin and it was the old woman who picked the pin out for him. Being colour blind himself, Sanemi couldn’t see the colours of the hairpin and had the old woman point out the colours on the hairpin to him, just so he can describe what it looks like to you later on. Even before Tengen’s house came into view, Sanemi could already hear the ruckus that was going on. He quickened his footsteps, wondering what was the fuss about. He knocked loudly on the front door and waited for someone to come and open the door for him, a foot tapping against the ground impatiently. When he heard no approaching footsteps and could no longer wait to find out what the noise was about, he let himself in by jumping over the walls. The noise seemed to came from the back garden and Sanemi’s eyes widened in anger when turned around the corner.
Unlike Sanemi, Tengen seemed to love sleeping in just as much as you do and both of you ended up with his training session late morning. It has been a while since you have sparred and it did take you some time getting used to, and you mostly focused on defending yourself and dodging away from Tengen’s attacks instead of attacking him. Your temporary sensei did yell encouragements for you to try to attack him, but you weren’t confident that you could win in a battle of brawl against him. Over breakfast, Tengen had explained to you about how the technique he was going to teach you works and it took you a while before you found out that in order for you to use the technique to see where things were properly, you had to slam both of your feet hard to the ground. You almost cried in happiness the first time it worked and you were able to ‘see’ what Tengen, Hina, Suma and Makio’s house was like and where they were standing. However, the technique didn’t last very long and you had to keep finding openings to slam your feet to the ground as you practice fighting with Tengen. On a few occasions, Tengen had told you to watch your stamina, but you were too excited to be able to see the world again to care. You were about to dodge from Tengen’s punch when you suddenly felt your legs going weak and instead of jumping sideways, you cursed when you ended up faltering and didn’t mange to make it out of his range of attack. Your breath got knocked out of your stomach and your body flew upwards when Tengen’s fist collided with your stomach. You heard Suma screamed and Makio and Hina gasped in horror as you landed heavily on the ground.
“Y/N!”
“Oh my god, check her legs! Is she bleeding?”
“Talk to us y/n, are you okay? Tengen-sama, you should have gone easy on her!”
“I thought she was able to dodge my attacks like she usually did! Bring her to the Butterfly mansion first!”
“TENGEN!”
Several voices boomed from different directions at once, and you wondered why Makio had said to check your legs to see if you were bleeding. From where she was standing, did she somehow saw wrongly where Tengen had landed a blow on you? A punch from him wouldn’t lead to internal bleeding right? And was the Sanemi’s voice you heard? Before you knew it, you heard the familiar voice letting out a stream of cusses, followed by Tengen explaining himself as punches and hits were thrown.
“I’m fine.” You wheezed and quickly tried to sit up to show that you were alright, just knocked out of breath. “It didn’t hurt, really. Stop! Stop!”
Sanemi was next to you in a flash, a hand rubbing your stomach to help soothe the pain. You smiled at him, “Hey, you’re back.” He paused and you could feel that he was widening his eyes at you, he likes doing that to show you that he was displeased or annoyed with you.
“Don’t ‘Hey me’!” Sanemi blew up, yelling at your ear and causing you to cover them with your hands. “What the hell were you guys doing? You were supposed to rest, for god’s sake!”
“Sparring, as you may have seen. Tengen-sama was teaching me a new technique, I can see now!” You hurriedly explained yourself as you latched onto his arm, half afraid that he’ll go on a rampage and fight the sound pillar again.
Sanemi must have given you a confused look and you heard Tengen started speaking. “I was trying to help her. Taught her how to use Echolocation so that she has a sense of where she is.”
“It was my fault. Tengen-sama warned me not to stomp my feet too hard and I didn’t listen. He was trying to help. I like everyone here, Hina, Suma and Makio are super nice to me!”
“Tengen-sama?” You thought you heard irritation in his tone. “You guys on first name basis now?”
“Isn’t that his last name?” You asked, puzzled. “I followed what the girls called him.”
Suma started giggling, “You’re so cute, y/n, why would we call our husband by his last name?”
“Oh my god,” You hid your face behind your hands and blushed furiously. Oh god, why did they address their husband so formally? “Why didn’t anyone correct me? This is embarrassing!”
“Small matter, how’s your stomach?” Tengen asked before sending a curious look at Makio. “Why did you say to check her legs earlier? I didn’t hit her there.”
“Oh, nothing. I just misunderstood something. Luckily I was wrong, I really thought something bad had happened to y/n.” Makio coughed.
“What was it?” Tengen pressed on, his curiosity growing.
“We thought y/n was pregnant!” Suma blurted out, causing you to choke on your spit when you heard it. Sanemi patted your back as you coughed uncontrollably but he had a bewildered look on his face too. “We saw Shinazugawa-sama rubbed her belly before he left her with us, and she was always covering her stomach with her hands.”
“I’m not pre- pregnant.” You stuttered, wanting to dig a hole and hide yourself. “I just hug my stomach a lot when I get scared.”
You probably would have died of embarassement on the spot if Hina hadn’t changed the topic. She had walked off in the middle of the conversation to pick something up from the ground. “Shinazugawa-sama, did you drop this?” She asked, handing over something Sanemi had wrapped in his handkerchief.
Tengen spotted part of the hairpin that poked out from the corner, a grin took over his face. “My, Sanemi, isn’t that a-”
“I’ll fucking kill you if you don’t shut your damn mouth!” Sanemi snarled at him before he could finish his sentence, but the sound pillar only laughed in response and slapped Sanemi on the back as Sanemi retrieved his possession politely back from Hina. Sanemi took a deep breath and refrained himself from turning around to punch the man.
“I was wondering why y/n has such a foul mouth, seems like she learned it from you. Anyways, that aside, I’m more interested to know why does a tough man like you carry something like that around?” Tengen began to tease him, clearly not intimidated. “But your hair seemed a bit too short to use that hairpin, I’m afraid.”
“I’ll kill you!” Sanemi raged, lauching a rock at Tengen but Tengen dodged it easily.
“Do you want to stay for lunch, Shinazugawa-sama?” asked Hina kindly. You smiled at her tone for she sounded used to the brash exchange between Sanemi and Tengen. What you wouldn’t give to be able to properly see them fight.
“Of course he’ll stay for lunch! I don’t want y/n to go yet!” Suma pouted, hugging you and not wanting to let go. You laughed and held onto her, enjoying her affection. Sanemi took a look at you and nodded, taking up the invitation after seeing how happy you were under the women’s company.
Lunch somehow seemed more luxurious than usual when Tengen’s home and you honestly wished you can stay here forever and pig yourself out with Hina’s cooking. As you savoured the food, you made a mental promise to further develop the technique Tengen had taught you, hoping for the day where you can use echolocation 24 hours with just touching the ground to come sooner. With Tengen home, the house was much louder than usual and Sanemi found himself glancing at your direction ever so often, waiting to step in as soon as you flinched at the loud noises. Perhaps you didn’t notice it yourself, but he knew that loud noises added onto your anxiety because of your old household. But surprisingly you were enjoying yourself and seemed to take a liking to the noisy environment. He smiled lightly as he dug into his food, at eased with the decision to bring you here. When lunch was over, Tengen and his wives left the two of you alone as they cleaned up the table and went to fetch dessert. Much to Sanemi’s surprise, you came over and climbed into his lap. Before you settled, you gave him a hug and whispered ‘Welcome back.” at his ear, causing the man’s face to flush in red as he covered his face behind his hand. His hand automatically went behind your back when you settled down and you laid your head at his chest, keeping your eyes shut as you listened to his heartbeat. You also kept an ear out for the rest, ready to jump off Sanemi as soon as someone is heading back to the dining room. You felt Sanemi shifted as he pulled something out from his side pocket before handing it to you. Since you weren’t able to see, he had to bump it against your arm for your attention. You reached over, wondering what it was as you felt over the cloth. Had Sanemi given you a handkerchief?
“Open it.” Sanemi tells you patiently, watching you as you slowly feel over the gift. You grinned when you felt that it was a hairpin. Sanemi took your other hand and used it to guide you to the flowers. “This is the biggest flower on the hairpin, it’s pink, the tinier ones are white and the tiniest are purple. The whole thing is gold.”
You gasped, “Not actually gold right? I don’t want to get knocked over the head and robbed.”
Sanemi grew silent and you poked him at his cheek. “I’ll pulverize anyone who even dares to try to knock you over the head.” He told you quietly. “No worries, it’s not real gold. Do you want something with real gold?”
“No!” You replied immediately. “I like anything you give me, thanks Nemi. No wait, I’ll love anything!” He froze when you pressed your lips against his cheek, feeling the spot burned after you pulled away. Your fingers danced over the flowers of the hairpin and you again wished that you could see what it looks like instead of relying on your imagination. “I’ll treasure this forever.”
Sanemi said nothing and took the hairpin out of your hand. Your hair was done up in a half up and half down manner today and he tenderly pushed it in between your hair, admiring how pretty it looks on you. He sent a quizzical look in your direction when you suddenly hopped off his lap and sat in the empty spot next to him, but before he could question you, Tengen slid the door open and came in with a tray of desserts.
“Have you children been good in our absence?” Tengen teased.
“Shut the hell up.” Sanemi’s reply was instant.
All of you waited for Hina, Makio and Suma to return before you began eating your dessert. You had to resist the urge to shrieked in excitement when you found out that it was mochi. Hina laughed at your jovial expression and gave you more when she guessed that mochi was your favourite dessert.
“Marry me, Hina!” You hugged her and almost start to cry in happiness.
“Unfortunately she is already the wife of the God of Festivals,” Tengen interjected, pushing you away and hugging Hina against him. Hina titter when he started to pamper her with kisses. “As expected of my girl with her flamboyant cooking!”
“Greedy pig.” You mumbled quietly as you ate another mochi, smirking as you know Tengen could hear you.
“Well this greedy pig still got Hinatsuru as his wife.” He stuck a tongue at you although you couldn’t see it. “Run home and be forever alone, loser.”
You were about to retort when you suddenly felt your bowl getting heavier. Before you could wonder what happened, Suma shrieked. “Y/n, Shinazugawa-sama gave you his mochi! How cute!”
Tengen nodded in approval, “Hm-hm! Shinazugawa’s being flashy!” He caught the bowl Sanemi had aimed at his face easily.
“Thanks Nemi,” You beamed at him. “Here, have one more before I eat the rest. Hina’s food is honestly the best, we have to eat as much as we can while we’re here.”
Sanemi shot a warning glare at Tengen, demanding him to shut up silently as you held a mochi between your fingers at him. Then with a flustered look and under the Uzui family’s cheerful gaze, he leaned in and allowed you to feed him. Suma was about to squeal from excitement when Makio shoved a few mochi into her mouth to keep her quiet. Sanemi barely chewed through the mochi before swallowing it, badly wishing for this moment to be a private one between you two.
“It’s yummy, right?” You smile at him.
“Hm.” He grunted, looking the other way despite the fact that you couldn’t see his redden cheeks.
“Tengen-sama! Makio’s bullying me! Did you see that? She shoved food in my mouth!” Suma yelled as soon as she was able to pry Makio’s hands off her mouth, a hand holding onto Tengen’s sleeve as she complained..
Suma’s horrified and aggrieved scream filled the house when Tengen made a face and looked away guiltily, “I didn’t see that, sorry.”
