Days turned to weeks turned to months. I glanced over at the calendar, which this month was displaying a picture of a Dalmatian puppy, and sighed. My sigh slipped into the noisy air before disappearing into the chatter of the children who were running around the room.

I watched them intently, partially because it was, in fact, my job to do so but also in mindless wonder. Many of them stubbled carelessly around the room, spouting whatever popped into their mind, fearless of any repercussions from the weight of their meaningless words. Their heedless actions almost made them appear like they were floating, almost looking down on the rest of us. Like they were above us.

And I guess, in a way, they were. They had the ability that most lose in the procedure of aging, the ability to be careless. Both with words and actions. And in that way, their wrath was more feared than those of glare from the eyes God herself.

At first, I found myself envious of this power. Holding my tongue had developed into a talent and I swallowed my words like they were pills. After so long, compliance became my standard.

It didn't take too long for my compliance to be put to the test. The negligence of the children eventually rubbed off on me. It started with a small smudge, coming out of my comfort zone to ask something of others. And when the smoke had been rubbed into a full stain, I had been doing things I would have never even dreamed of doing. However, this was one of the first times, in all my years of being a daycare teacher, that this was the case.

It was almost a snowball effect. When I first started this job, I would never even imagine staying here with the mindset that I have right now, experiencing things I never even could imagine.

Lost in the time of my own thoughts, I hadn't noticed the amount of time that had come and gone. I glanced mindlessly at my wrist checking the time. Almost as if on queue a pair of parents waltzed through the doorway, their kids automatically dropping everything and ran to them.

I let a small smile make its way onto my lips as I wordlessly waved them off.

More parents came and the number of kids in the room was now down to just a handful, the amount of noise dwindled down as the numbers decreased. And when most of those kids left, all that remained was Shoyou and Tobio.

This was something that I was used to, and knowing their family situations I knew exactly why.

I let myself relax as I slowly walked behind my desk and fell into my chair. I watched the pair carefully out of the corner of my eye, knowing that the two of them were usually well behaved but Shoyou had his slip-ups at times.

I watched as Shoyou carelessly passed off a toy that Tobio had asked him for, ranting and raving to him about nothing in particular. My mind wandered curiously, imagining them in their later years. They had such an interesting bond, even at such a young age. A slight pang of jealousy struck me due to the fact that I could only imagine feeling that when I was that young, but quickly flattered.

In my thought, I failed to notice that Asahi had quietly walked into the room, directly followed by Daichi. The sight of the tanner man caused my heart to quicken in its pace and my body to become antsy, causing me to stand up from my chair.

I watched Daichi intently, almost commanding him with my mind to speak to me but he didn't. He walked directly towards Tobio and pulled him up into his large arms, causing Tobio to stubbornly protest claiming that he was 'too old to be carried'. Daichi chuckled at this, explaining to the boy that he would never be too old due to the fact that he would always be his 'little guy' in his eyes but complied and dropped the boy from his grasp.

At this point, I was practically staring holes into Daichi's body, to the point that he could probably feel the weight of my gaze against him. He pulled his eyes from Tobio and moved them to me.

Months ago, this move would have intimidated me. It would have made me pull my eyes away immediately, saving myself the embarrassment of blushing but now it was different. I was different. Now, I stood still staring into the brown pools of his eyes, wordlessly challenging him to say something to me.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Asahi eyeing the two of us awkwardly as he gathered Shoyou. I heard him mumble out a goodbye to Daichi catching Daichi off guard making him pull his eyes away from me and move them towards Asahi.

As I moved my way out from behind my desk, the two shared a brief farewell. Slowly, I walked over to them silently waiting for them to finish up talking.

Asahi moved his eyes from Daichi and moved them to me. He abruptly stopped the conversation and began to walk in my direction.

He looked at me, his expression looking almost as if he was pitying me, and muttered a quick goodbye before making his way out the door. It had been a while since I had seen Asahi, due to the fact that Yuu was typically the one who picked Shoyou up, but I assumed Daichi had told him what was going on between us.

I watched Asahi walk through the door, waiting until I was certain he was out of earshot before turning my eyes back to Daichi. His eyes were glued to me but as soon as mine met his, he pulled them from me. A heavy sigh slipped past my lips.

"Daichi, are you really still doing this?" I asked, annoyance dripping from off my words.

His head hung, stubbornly letting my words fall into silent air.

I stepped closer to him.

"You have to talk to me at some point."

My words were met with more silence, I stepped closer. The closer I got, the harder it got for him to avoid my eyes. Another sigh fell through my lips.

"What can I do to make this better?" I asked, desperation falling through in my words. At this point, the silence was killing me. He, once again, moved his head stopping momentarily to look at me before pulling his eyes away. I waited, but just before I was about to lose hope he spoke.

"I want you to apologize."

I mentally rolled my eyes, not wanting to risk making him angrier.

Mustering up false sincerity, I found the words that were requested. Stepping closer to Daichi, closing what little space that had remained between us, I let the apology fill the silence.

Daichi, knowing the falseness of this apology still refused to look at me. I gingerly moved my hands upwards towards him and pulled his face towards mine making it almost impossible for him not to look at me. I stared up at him, my eyes falling soft, before leaning forward to capture his lips in a soft kiss.

"Are you really going to stay mad at me?" I asked, already knowing the answer to the question.

A thoughtful look painted its way on his face before erasing itself, replacing itself with a playful smile. His arms snaked their way around my waist and he leaned down, pulling me even closer, pulling me into another kiss.

Pulling away he said, "just admit that I'm a good cook and well call it even."

Not even really meaning too, a giggle erupted and Daichi glared down at me playfully.

"Sorry, but you and I both know that's not true. That stuff you made this morning was atrocious.", this caused a deep agreeing laugh to erupt from Daichi and with that, our petty argument from this morning had been forgotten.

"Y'all are nasty," Tobio mumbled quietly. In all honesty, I had almost forgotten that he was in the room.

Daichi's grip on me loosened, "Did you just say y'all? what are you a cowboy?" he asked playfully.

Tobio shrugged, "I might be."

Daichi let another laugh out and fully released me, my hand falling from his face and back down to my side.

"Alright then, cowboy. Are you ready to go home."

Wordlessly, Tobio walked forward in front of us towards the door. Daichi took that opportunity to lean over and kiss me again before following Tobio's lead.

"Alright babe, let's go home."

For a second, my feet didn't move. I just stood there staring at Daichi's back.

I stood there, warmth filling every inch of my body. There had been many moments in my life that I never thought that I'd ever been able to truly be in love or be loved by another person but looking at Daichi, my chest physically hurt.

In the past couple of months, everything that I had experienced was beyond anything that I could ever comprehend. Being with Daichi, even being around Daichi, made me question if the word 'love' was powerful enough to truly describe this feeling.

I watched as Daichi turned to look at me, noticing I wasn't following in his lead and he urged me to hurry up. And finally, following his command, my feet moved.

I jogged over to him and reached my desk to grab my belongings.

And with that, we started our way home.

My home.

With my family.