Chapter Text
They were born on the eve of a New Year. The fresh winter blossoms scattered on the grounds and the sweet scent of newborn filled the hospital room despite the overlapping taste of disinfectants and blood. Joyous laughter emerged from the confines of a young man; ringing softly amidst the cold winter night.
Two lives for the price of one. Perhaps it was a bad deal for some people, but this young man could care less and gave such an expression of extreme happiness that the people around him didn’t know how to interfere to take the twins away from him. He kept on cradling them as though they were the most precious of his possessions, and from far away a young child with pale blond hair watched the entire ordeal with a blank expression.
Adam—as he had been called from the beginning of his memories that he could remember—observed what would become his siblings in the future: They were both pale in colour and had a tuft of black hair that would probably become raven black in their opacity in the future. Small in size and softly crying from the very start of their lives.
He felt something akin to affection brewing inside of him, but looking back to their father’s happy face, Adam dared not to move closer to break the warm atmosphere.
Thunderous sound of fireworks exploded in the distance, and he turned to the windows that oversaw a lovely lake which reflected the expanding diverse colours. They brought a wonderful sheen to the night sky and made for a picture that kept itself afloat in Adam’s mind in the years to come.
From the start of his first words to the action that he later made, Amon made himself renown to be quite an attention-seeking person. His first action had led to making his twin, Klein, cry for hours to no end until Klein himself decided to unleash a revenge so heinous that it in turn made Amon bawl his eyes until they were both pacified back to sleep.
It was an interesting experience, to say the least.
Adam had been known as a quiet child since well, forever, so seeing his two younger brothers being a hassle was something so new to both parent and child that it took ages for them to be able to pacify either.
At the end of the day, it had left both of them mentally drained to the point where their father decided to ask a friend of his to help him in taking care of these two toddlers: a telephone call that had almost lasted for more than two hours had occurred just for this reason alone.
Which in turn, gave way to this day: Adam standing on the front porch looking at a red-haired man whose expression seemed to be made into a perpetual scowl. Or maybe that was just his own observation, seeing as said man decided that it was a great idea to give a scowl to a young child.
“So, you’re the good kid?” The red-haired man said after he closed the door shut. Adam only stared at him, and in return the other’s lips twitched but he mustered a grin. Adam’s ears caught the muttered words that he whispered, “Great; all of them are weirdos.”
Adam felt like punching his father’s red-haired friend.
But he doesn’t need this idiot to think worse of him anymore. Besides, it wasn’t Adam that needed babysitting; it was his younger twin siblings who were currently pulling at each other’s hair with Amon bearing the expression of extreme joy and Klein glaring at his twin with so much hatred in his eyes that Adam almost froze in his steps.
Luckily the adult behind him was blind and couldn’t see that he had stopped moving and bumped into him, making them both stumble and fall down to the soft floor. A fortunate thing was the fact that their little stunt managed to break the siblings’ fight. The unfortunate thing was that despite looking not so muscular, Adam felt his breath stuck in his chest because of how heavy the red-haired man was.
Amon snickered.
Still glaring at his twin, Klein glanced away just to see Adam’s rather red face and decided to kick the stranger from his better and older sibling.
The red-haired man yelped out loud and thought that it was in his best interest to lower his intelligence to that of a three year old . “Hahaha, your kick didn’t even hurt a single bit!”
Klein gave him a blank stare, before ignoring the other’s very existence in front of him and turned to Adam, “Are you okay, Brother?”
Adam steadied himself and stood up. He too, ignored the man who was sitting just right beside him, and answered Klein, “I’m fine.”
Klein nodded while Amon, who looked much more adorable than he should have been as he was a devil, decided that it was high time to ask, “Who’s this guy, Adam?” He pointed straight at the red-haired man's nose.
From the corner of his eyes Adam can see a frown in Klein’s face, but he ignored the implications that it meant and answered Amon, “Your babysitter—” Realising that he didn’t know the other’s name, Adam turned to look at the nameless babysitter.
The nameless person apparently wasn’t as stupid as he had thought as he gave a shit-eating grin and introduced himself, “I’m Medici, your new babysitter.”
Klein held on to his blank stare and perhaps it was his blood-related condition with Amon and the fact that they both share a special bond that made him say, “Do we have a better candidate?”
Medici’s smile turned weird, or at least that was the observation that Adam could currently make with how hard it was for him to fully see the other as they were standing side-by-side and the red hair was well, an adult and heads taller than him. Medici was probably about to say something that will make Klein’s opinion turn even worse than before until Amon decided to burst out into laughter.
Medici redirected his glare to the other twin, and Amon, too used to being given a death glare by Klein, just laughed even harder.
“The hell are you even laughing at, huh?” Maybe the adult decided not to swear. Not that it mattered at all.
Amon grinned at him, “You.”
“Oh?” Medici gave a smile that made Adam want to hit him. “Says the three year old with a raven’s butt for a hair.”
Amon just smiled even harder, “Says the adult who’s in need of a haircut.”
Medici scoffed at the child in front of him, Are you complaining over your own lack of hair? Don’t worry, by the end of this session of babysitting I’ll make sure that you won’t even be able to cry over your own lack of hair.”
Truly it was an interesting sight to see an already mature man—albeit a bit young—argue with a child perhaps two-thirds his age. Klein, having had enough of Amon’s bullshit, decided to move closer to Adam and stood by him.
He said while looking at the arguing pair, “They’re getting along well.”
Adam didn’t comment on his younger brother’s small smile, “They are, like fire with fire.”
Klein gave a light laugh.
The day ended with Medici setting Amon’s hair on fire before Amon and Klein decided to team up and cut off Medici’s hair with uneven length all around.
One day, when Klein asked an innocent enough question about how babies were made, Medici decided to answer with what was a rather confusing answer for Adam who was already taught and had heard of it from the gossips of other children. He said, “You see, babies are made from eggs.”
Adam put down his textbook to look at the trio of children on his side. Medici, the adult who’s more often in their house than even their own father, had become such a common sight that their house practically became the adult’s second home.
Not that Adam was complaining though, especially since the brunt of the twins’ pranks now became Medici which meant less crying and more pranks.
Right.
That was still a horrible thing.
Sometimes Adam wondered if he was truly related to this family of his. He had blond hair whereas the others had black hair. He was quiet where his siblings were loud. Maybe it was because both Klein and Amon had each other as company that made them so full of life, or that Amon had been born a prankster and Klein, too attached to his sibling or perhaps it was the opposite way, made Klein infected by the same mischief that Amon usually had.
Their father, too absent in their daily life, had made for a hole that cannot be filled, especially for Adam although he had been too used to such treatment. But back then, he still had…
Klein’s voice cut through the room, “Why eggs?”
Medici’s boisterous laughter boomed, “Because babies are round and soft and they need a hard protective outer layer to make sure that nothing hurts them.”
Klein made a scrunched up face, apparently still having issues in trusting anything that comes out of the mouth of him and Amon’s current babysitter who somehow survived their pranks for more than a year.
If Adam knew how, he would praise his younger sibling, but he didn’t know how to speak to them without his words being twisted until even he was unsure of what he was telling them.
So he didn’t.
Medici continued on babbling, “And that is why you two,” he alternated between Amon and Klein with his index finger, “are cruel to have made your mother suffer because of the egg that she held being so big because they had to contain both of you.”
Amon made a thoughtful look, which usually meant a bad thing because it meant that he was getting ideas. And Amon’s ideas are bad.
He said, “Then that must mean that you come from a bad egg.” He paused for dramatical reasons, “Because you smell bad.”
Medici gave his usual smile: It had his eyes curved beyond recognition and his mouth stretched so wide that Adam wondered if it hurt or not. It was a smile that he reserved for the twins, especially more so for Amon, who usually provoked him until they both start chasing after each other in the house and start wrecking stuff that later on Klein and Adam would have to tidy up because both of the former are childish.
Not that Adam minded, but maybe Klein did.
He wasn’t so sure about this sibling of his. Amon was far too easy at times, being someone who enjoys annoying other people while Klein was...Klein.
Quiet, reserved, polite, and having a more vicious side than even Amon’s that Adam pondered if Klein had two different personalities that he kept on switching when around Amon and when not being around Amon. He was someone hard to read, especially more so for the pranks that Klein would conduct as revenge towards Amon or when he was bullying Medici with his twin.
Right now, Amon and Medici had already started a small marathon around the table. They kept on spinning and spinning that Adam felt dizzy even just by looking at it.
While he was watching those two childish people, someone tugged at his shirt and made Adam turn around to find Klein watching him.
He crouched down, “What is it, Klein?”
“Brother,” Klein never once said his name out loud, it was always ‘Brother’ or ‘Big Brother’. Such a curious thing, but Adam wrote it off as him being polite. “Do you want to read a book with me?”
Adam glanced back at the cat and mouse pair, and nodded to Klein’s request.
Maybe today, they would both finish a book when the cat and mouse chase was no longer being heralded.