"Nao, daddy and mommy have to go to an important meeting at my workplace. My students are going to watch over you, so don't be scared!" Daddy patted my head then pinched my cheek.

"Ouch! That hurts!" I winced in pain, trying to claw his hand away from my cheek, but he refused to let go as he pulled farther.

"I don't want to~ I love your baby cheeks!" Daddy cooed, talking to me as if I was a baby rather than a smart five years old son. I'm more mature than most kids; I'm not a helpless baby.

Hitting his hand, it did nothing to him. My hits may feel like tickles to him. Daddy wasn't budging at all, and the pain started to increase. "MOMMY!" I shouted to my last resort—mama bear. I knew daddy didn't want to deal with her wrath. He's going to back away due to fear.

Mommy's voice was heard around the corner. "Yes, baby? What is it?" Her soothing and calm voice had no clue what daddy was doing to me.

Hastily, daddy retracted his hand back to his side. He knew the fear iced his spine.

"Hi mommy!" She appeared right behind daddy's crouching body, and I jumped in her arms as she caught me. Mommy hoisted me up on her hips while I embraced her. She always smelled like flowers when I went to hug her. "It's nothing. I just wanted to see you before you go with daddy."

"Awww! That's my sweet baby!" Mommy giggled, twirling me around. "I really don't want to let you go, but I have to..." Her arms secured me when she said that.

Ding dong!

"Oh! Those are my students!" Daddy stood up and rushed to the door with mommy taking me there.

"You get to play with Yuji, Brother Megumi, and Kugisaki!" Mommy excitedly told me, but I wanted to play with Sukuna because I hadn't seen him for a while. If I told my parents this, they would be confused and upset about it.

Once daddy opened the front door, I saw my trio waiting for me.

"Yo!" Yuji greeted with a big smile like always.

"Hey buddy," Megumi warmly looked at me with soft eyes. He loves and cherishes me.

"Hey kid," I remember her at the beach. She's very loud, and her personality is bold. I'm not too sure how to describe her when I haven't played with her before. I feel like she's a complainer.

The trio walked inside the house, taking off their shoes as daddy locked the front door, and mommy took me to the living room. She put me down, allowing me to hug all of them.

"Alright, we will be back in a few hours. Don't set our house on fire, don't lose sight of him, and do have fun with him!" Mommy laid out the ground rules before heading out with daddy.

After they left, hearing the door click, Kugisaki stepped towards me and asked, "So what do you want to play today?"

"Let's play uno! You all are going to lose to me!" I boldly declared, and Kugisaki clenched her teeth. I knew how to pick fights with others, and she was my bait.

"Oh, you're on!"

The uno cards were shuffled out, and we began playing. Kugisaki sat across from me while Brother Megumi was on my left and Yuji on my right.

"How'd you learn how to play uno?" Yuji curiously asked, dropping down a blue 7.

"My daddy introduced it to me and mommy a while ago. So ever since then, we play when we have the time. My mommy sucks at this game. It's so easy, but I don't know how she loses. I've never seen her so angry over a small game." When mommy loses one round, she refuses to play onwards. She gets very salty and bitter, and I feel like she might cry on the spot. She's the embodiment of the term: sore loser.

"Heheeeee," Kugisaki giggled devilishly as she glared at Megumi since it was her turn. "PICK UP TWO CARDS!!" She slammed her special card and laughed.

Big brother's face twitched and then apologized to me. "I'm sorry, Nao... But, pick up four." He placed another plus 2 but in a different color. His eyes looked apologetic yet not at the same time. This sly brother of mine didn't want to pick up two to save me. I see how it was. I need to destroy Kugisaki first then big brother; I'm going to win this.

I grinned widely at everyone. "I'm not picking up four because Yuji will pick up six!!" I also slammed down my plus 2 card as well. "Yuji, if you have the same card, let Kugisaki pick up eight!!" He better have one or else he messed up and has to pick up six.

"You're right. Let's take down Kugisaki first! Pick up eight!" Yuji put down a red plus 2 card.

Kugisaki grunted, feeling defeated as she picked up eight cards. I love when strategies backfired on people. I've never felt like a king until this game.

We continued our first round until I had one card in my hand. "Hu hu hu~" I sang out, feeling really confident with the last card I had. It was a wild card, so I'm going to win no matter what. These losers don't see what's coming in their way.

"There's no way I'm letting you win, Naozumi!" Kugisaki's competitive side was showing—a fierce lioness out to kill her prey. If only she knew what card I held, then she'll die from shock.

Big brother put down a red 5 card, and I laughed victoriously. "You losers didn't see this coming!" The wild card slowly dropped to the pile and once it laid flat on the stacked cards, everyone was lost at words. Big brother and Yuji were speechless, whereas Kugisaki fell on her back and fake cried. "Didn't I tell you? You all were going to lose to me in the first place!! Think smarter not harder!"

After 7 rounds of taking mainly first or sometimes second place, never third or last, we ended it since they couldn't over throw me. "Geez... He really is Gojo-sensei's kid." Kugisaki sighed in realization and ultimate defeat.

"Can we go to the playground? It gets really stuffy in this house." I've been caged up in the house for a long time. I need to see the outside world before I die. Plus, on the bright side, if I manage to get big brother and Kugisaki to do some task, I can ask Yuji to switch with Sukuna so I can talk to him for a bit.

"Sure since you won the majority of the game..." Big brother said, and the other complied.

I held big brother's hand as we all walked to a playground in the area.

The sun was out, but it wasn't too hot. It was very breezy which felt great if I were to play and get sweaty. I wonder how mommy and daddy was doing?

< His parents...

"Satoru! You are one grown adult! Stop messing with Utahime!" Ena tackled Gojo from irritating Utahime any further. She hooked her arms underneath his armpits and wrapped her legs around his waist. "Yaga! Help me restrain your former student!"

"But you're his wife. He listens to you more than us." Yaga simply said.

"Correction. I'm not married to him yet, meaning I'm still his long-term fiancée!"

Utahime pointed her finger at Gojo. "You're lucky that Ena is here!"

"Utahime, men don't like when girls are aggressive and scary." Gojo teasingly said, asking for a death wish from her.

"28 years old, Mister Gojo Satoru! If you don't get your act together, I am leaving your ass for good and taking my son with me! Because if you remember, we're not married! I have the free will to leave when I want!"

"BABE, YOU CAN'T LEAVE ME!!" Gojo turned into slush as he melted in Ena's grip, and he flipped around to cage her. "NO ONE CAN LOVE YOU BETTER THAN I CAN!" He cried on her chest.

Ena resisted his hold, pushing him away from her. "Oh yeah? Let's see about that! I'm going to find a sugar daddy then!"

"BUT I'M YOUR SUGAR DADDY!" >

At the playground, Yuji was pushing me on the swing as my legs swung back and forth. Brother Megumi and Kugisaki were sitting at a bench watching us. They looked so bored with their life. Do they not know what fun was? Or do they feel like they were too old to have fun?

I turned my head to the side and talked to him. "Hey Yuji,"

"Yes, Nao?"

"How's Sukuna? Is he being nice to you?"

A nervous chuckle slipped from his lips. "I mean... It really depends. Most of the time he's quiet, but he does talk often which annoys me. He likes to rip my clothes a lot too."

"Does he miss me?" I quietly mumbled, feeling a bit shy actually saying it out loud.

Yuji paused for a second before replying, "Of course he does! He's just very shy to admit it. Did you want to talk to him?" Did Yuji finally get the hint without me being straightforward?

"Yes... I want to."

"Mmm... Maybe when Fushiguro and Kugisaki aren't here I can switch with Sukuna."

"Okay!" I happily replied. I knew the exact plan to execute this...

After the swing, I forced everyone to play tag with me. I'm going to make them all tired, then ask Brother Megumi and Kugisaki to fetch some water at the convenience store.

Kugisaki lost in the game of rock, paper, scissors so she had to chase us while the rest ran. "Mannnn... I feel like my luck is gone today," She sighed in defeat before she began counting, allowing us to get a head start. "1, 2, 3..."

I ran as far as my leg could take me, not too far to worry the others, but far enough that Kugisaki would be too tired to catch up with me.

"10! I'm coming to get you!" Kugisaki announced loudly, as she began the chase of tag.

Everyone scattered all over the place when Kugisaki found us. We were like mice running away from the big cat, Kugisaki. I can hear her snarl a mile away. "Kugisaki, run faster! How are you going to keep up with killing spirits if you can't catch up to us—ACK! OUCH!" A quick cry released from my mouth as I realized that I tripped over a medium sized rock.

Staring down at my right knee, I was bleeding a lot. I scraped my knee badly. Seeing the sight of blood made my lips quiver. "Big boys don't cry!" My eyes swelled, blurring my vision.

Kugisaki's footsteps approached me while she sounded disappointed about my claim. "Hey, you told me to run faster, but now you're— You're bleeding!! Fushiguro! Itadori! Naozumi is bleeding!!"

Fast feet ran over to me, and they all were panicking as heck. "That's a lot of blood," Yuji murmured, examining my ripped skin.

"Nao, it's okay to cry if it's painful. Don't hold it in..." Big brother smiled gently at me, wiping my in-coming tears while I sniffled. His tender expression made me feel assured that I'm going to be okay. Sometimes he had the same aura as mommy. Brother Megumi knew how to handle any situation that involved me. "Itadori, you stay with Naozumi. Kugisaki, come with me! We're going to get some bandages, water, and rubbing alcohol." The two ran off to get the items which were going to stop my bleeding.

For the time being, Yuji wet sheets of toilet paper and pressed it on my knee cap as we sat on a bench. My head was clouded by my injured knee. I've never been so careless about running; I'm usually careful. I'm so clumsy to trip over a rock.

Keeping quiet and my eyes locked on my knee, I noticed Yuji's wrist had tattoo stripes and his nails were painted. A big shocking expression took over my gloomy face as I stared up at Sukuna. "Grandpa, you're back!" When I was going to reach out and hug him, he stopped me from moving forward.

"You hurt your knee. Do you think I'm going to let you move?"

I brightly grinned at him. "Yes, because I know you can heal me. Why don't you do that?"

Sukuna threw the bloody, wet toilet paper aside and stared at me with his hand propping his face. "And why would I?"

"Because you like me. I know you heard me saying that I miss you... Why would you have come out if you didn't?" It's not that hard to know that he misses me too. Sukuna always has to be so stubborn about it like geez put your guard down. "I'm pretty sure I've told you this before. Just because I call you 'grandpa' doesn't really mean that you really have to have memory loss."

"Why you?!" Sukuna's fingers pinched the cheek daddy grabbed earlier.

"GRANDPA!" I whined, patting his forearm to stop. He didn't put a lot of strength into it because it could possibly kill me, but he put a tiny bit for it to hurt me. "Stop being so mean to me! I thought you loved me?!"

"What if I don't? Are you going to cry?" He released my cheek, and I rubbed it quickly.

"I mean... I'm not sure. It's going to hurt since I really like you, but if you don't like me anymore I can't do anything about that. Besides, I did force you to play with me by using my mommy..." I shrugged, feeling my heart ache a bit. I can't force him to like me, just like how he couldn't force my mommy to like him back. It's just the way of life. "I heard that you found Nozomi. I'm happy you did..." Then I had a sad idea of why he said what he said earlier. Nozomi may be the reason why he doesn't like me anymore. Now that Sukuna doesn't need my mommy, he doesn't want to associate himself with me. The idea of losing Sukuna as my grandpa really, really hurt my feelings. Concealing my thoughts from leaking to my voice, I quickly excused myself. "I need to use the bathroom so I'll be back... Sukuna," I whispered out his name, hopping off carefully and darting to the bathroom as I limped.

In the bathroom stall, I sat on the toilet just thinking about what if I never met Sukuna? How different would my life be? It's sad that I have to let him go. It was fun while it lasted...

"Nao? Are you in the bathroom?" It was Brother Megumi's voice echoing from the walls.

"Yeah I'm coming out!"

After getting patched up, we went back home since daddy called them. Big brother carried me on his back as today's event tired me out. Sukuna really bummed me when he said that, but it made sense. I thought maybe even after he found Nozomi, he would want to still be my friend but it's fine. I'll manage to be happier on my own.

"Thanks for the fun..." I sadly murmured as I thought about the good time with Sukuna. They were fun memories that I will always cherish in my heart.

"Yeah no problem and don't be sad, Nao. We can always come over," Big brother replied, sensing my downcast voice.

It wasn't for him, but I can't tell big brother that.