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Getou’s attention is caught by the sound of the doorbell.
It’s late at night, so he wonders if it’s Shoko stopping by since every now and then she opts to chat with him for a few seconds before heading to work. Getou doesn’t tend to cross paths with her even if they are neighbors. Shoko has a night shift while his work requires his presence throughout the day. Differences aside, he has created a good relationship with her. The twins like her and Shoko spares them a small smile despite the characteristic tiredness of her gaze.
He opens the door expecting to run into someone he already considers his friend, a person with whom he doesn’t hesitate to share a few words when they have the chance to do so, only to find a teenage girl with long black hair tied in a ponytail, watching him with her hands clasped behind his lower back. Huh, she seems to be the same age as the twins, Getou thinks.
“Good night, I'm Fushiguro Tsumiki,” She introduces herself. “I just moved into the apartment near towards the end of the hall.” Her words explain why her face doesn't sound familiar. Getou remembers that the apartment next to Shoko's had been for sale for over three months. “Sorry to bother you so late, but we've run out of eggs because my dad has broken all the ones we had. He doesn't know how to be gentle with food. Could you, by any chance, give me an egg?”
Getou avoids chuckling upon hearing her and draws his best smile on his face.
“Hello Tsukimi, I’m Getou Suguru. Sure, wait here.”
The people in the building tend to stay within their own limits. Getou knows this from his own experience. He hasn’t heard whispered words about the twins and the twins have never appeared in front of him to assure him that the neighbors have conjectured unpleasant sentences about them. Anyway, there’s always the small group of gossiping neighbors who seek to know everything about you, who don’t hesitate to talk to you as soon as they see you crossing the elevator doors, so a new family means new questions.
Maybe some other neighbor has stopped him to tell him that considering that he himself is young, being the father of teenage twins turns out to be surprising. Furthermore, with his hair usually tied in a bun and his ears pierced, he knows that he and the twins don’t represent the typical happy family. Still, Getou thinks he can't complain. At night it’s quiet and the twins like the neighborhood.
He promptly heads to his kitchen to come back with a box of eggs, not really knowing how many eggs Tsumiki will want because as she has mentioned, her dad doesn’t seem to know how to be careful.
Surely, they are different from us, is the only thought Getou is able to hold at the moment. He shakes his head. If he doesn't like being judged, then he doesn't want to become the judge just after hearing a few words.
A new conversation is what he hears as he makes his way towards the door.
“Yes, we will make pancakes.”
“That's awesome,” He recognizes one of the twins’ voices.
He finds the twins chatting with their new neighbor. He’s not surprised, they are usually like that. Outgoing, they make friends easily, even if problems often find them. He can’t blame them, problems tend to find him too. He must admit, though, that many other times he exposes himself to them.
The twins turn to him when they hear him approach.
“Tsumiki, these are my daughters,” He introduces them. “Mimiko and Nanako.”
“We've already introduced ourselves,” Nanako tells him. Getou wonders when he went from being the cool father, the one of whom his daughters are proud because he is young and is not ashamed, to the one who must stay out of the conversation because apparently he is already out of fashion as well. “Tsukimi-kun told us that they will have pancakes for dinner. Can we make pancakes too?”
“You can have pancakes with us if you want.” The three of them rest their attention on Tsukimi. With both hands still behind her back, feet together, and back straight. Getou thinks she’s nothing like his daughters. Nanako doesn’t let go of her phone. Mimiko can’t be without her stuffed toy. “My dad doesn't know how to measure things so he always cooks way too much.”
“Can we go?” Nanako asks him, clasping both hands. Her phone still between her fingers.
“Please, can we go?" Mimiko copies her.
A sigh makes its way past Getou's mouth. You would think that as the twins grow, it’s easier for him to refuse and shake his head because he has already gotten used to their expressions, but the opposite happens. The years go by and his daughters don’t hesitate to join their hands and watch him along with their best expressions of sorrow in order to convince him to take decisions.
Surrendered, he knows his answer. “We'll go say hello and introduce ourselves and then we'll come back, okay?”
“And we'll make pancakes.” Nanako insists.
“It's nine o’clock.”
“For dessert,” Mimiko proposes. It’s impossible for them not to act as allies.
“Fine.”
The twins share a look, satisfied and happy with themselves after knowing that they keep having the power to convince him no matter what they want. Getou thinks that maybe he should be a little more rigid, a little stricter. But after all, saying hello to the new neighbors is a good decision. Moving is tiring for both the mind and body, and strangers presenting themselves as allies is reassuring for anyone, so he walks behind the girls as they move down the hall.
“When did you get here?” Mimiko asks Tsumiki.
“A few hours ago,” Tsukimi replies.
They probably hadn't heard the noise involved after being busy watching television. Again, the twins know how to convince him to stay up late watching movies that, much to his dismay or not, turn out to be entertaining.
“Your building is nice.” Tsukimi adds.
“Our building,” Nanako corrects her.
One corner of Getou's mouth curls up.
He soon finds himself standing in front of a door to an apartment that doesn’t belong to him. He chooses to glance toward the door at the end of the hall. Shoko already seems to have left. He knows that otherwise she would have opened the door of her apartment to greet the girls.
He wishes he could say that Shoko has patience with the twins whereas with him the concept of patience doesn’t exist since she usually looks at him looking done, but Getou knows that if Shoko didn’t really like him the way she likes the twins, she would walk past him without greeting him when they see each other in the hallway.
Getou knows that losing friends hurts. Perhaps it’s true that he is still young despite having a pair of twins under his care, but that doesn’t mean that he doesn’t know what it means to make mistakes and live with its consequences. Shoko seems to have committed her own too. For that reason, they get along.
“Dad, the neighbors came to introduce themselves.” Tsumiki's voice regains his attention. “Come in, watch out for the boxes.”
The twins follow her without hesitation as he takes a step. Boxes are taking up the majority of the living room space. The furniture already seems to have been arranged but still many things seem to be missing to unpack. Getou makes a small bow with his head and moves.
“Tsumiki, did you get any eggs?”
Finally a voice that is not Tsumiki's is what catches his attention, and he heads towards the kitchen after following the steps already marked by the twins and Tsukimi. He wonders if Tsumiki's father will accept strangers being invited by her without prior notice although it’s true that he continues to hold in his hands the reason why Tsukimi had appeared in the first place. Any existing question leaves Getou's head as soon as he walks through the kitchen door.
“Oh, you got more than eggs,” Getou listens.
Without being able to absorb those words because his eyes meet the sky itself.
In front of him, a person of probably the same age as him, stands. With somewhat disheveled white hair, with cheeks painted with traces of flour and a spatula in hand, Getou blinks several times but doesn’t move from his place.
He believes that he is a difficult person to impress, to surprise. After having added a pair of twins to his live who have accustomed him to making him sigh because every day they appear before him with crazy ideas, and after being aware that he doesn’t have a life free of difficulties or nights uninterrupted by nightmares, leaving an impression on him is difficult.
However, blue eyes protected by white lashes leave him impressed.
“A puppy!”
The exclamation expressed by one of the twins finally gets him to blink and this time he does look away to see a black dog pacing the kitchen.
“Two puppies!” The other twin adds.
Getou is sure that he sees a white tail and a black tail as well as a mop of black hair before his daughters follow the same, followed by Tsukimi and the twins.
“Girls, no,” Getou tries. He fails. And again, he finds himself sighing. “Ugh. I'm sorry,” He adds, again meeting unique eyes.
“It's okay,” The person in front of him assures him. “Don’t worry, your children don't want to listen to you? Trust me, I'm an expert on that." Getou raises both eyebrows.
“I’m Gojo, Satoru Gojo.”
“Getou Suguru,” He curls the corners of his mouth when Gojo gives him a small, carefree smile. “I brought eggs,” He remembers to mention.
“Thank you so much. I can be such a mess sometimes. If Tsukimi tells you that, though, don’t believe her. The three of you will stay for dinner then?” Gojo asks, and Getou assumes that his daughters have taken advantage of the time he’s felt lost to assure the new neighbors that they will stay for dinner. “I know, pancakes for dinner, right? Who does that? Well, me.” Gojo continues, taking his apparent silence as a sign of rejection. “But salty pancakes are tasty you know, you add sausages and a little sauce. We are new here so we don’t know places to call for takeout food. We don't even know where to order ice cream from.”
Getou finds himself unable to avoid the smile that appears on his face.
He's used to three types of interactions. Shoko, with her melancholic and entertaining words, with cigarettes in between and the occasional laugh. The neighbors who occasionally give him a meal or two because being a single father of twins must be so difficult and you always do such a good job. The neighbors who think he should get a partner because he's still young and he has his own charms.
A neighbor who seems used to dealing with comments that assure him that he is not a cool person? That's new.
“Well, neither do I,” Getou mentions as he leaves the eggs on the counter.
“You're kidding,” Gojo says, leaving his free hand on his own waist.
“I'm not a big fan of sweet things,”
“Good thing I didn't decide to make sweet pancakes then.”
“Doesn't it really bother you?” Getou asks him just in case, since it's not his idea to scare him away just because the twins know him well enough to know when to ask the right questions, as well as to mention the answers he probably doesn’t agree with. “My daughters want pancakes since yours said you will make them. Was he her brother?” He asks after recalling seeing hair similar to Tsukimi's color.
Gojo's hair is white. His last name is different.
Getou scolds himself for being curious.
“Stepbrother,” Gojo corrects him. “Megumi.”
“Oh.”
Maybe that explains the hair color. And the last name.
“Before you think about it, I'm not divorced or married. I promise that no ex-partner will show up knocking on your door at three in the morning because I have forgotten about the kids or because I have given the wrong address.”
Getou chuckles, wondering if his facial features showed enough doubt for Gojo to answer the question that had popped into his head. “I didn't think about it,” He lies.
Gojo narrows his gaze, a confident smile on his face. “They are the kids of a...” He tilts his head from side to side, “A friend.” Gojo manages to explain after seeming to find the right word. “He is not here anymore so I adopted them.”
Getou thinks there is no need for Gojo to justify himself. Not only because they hardly know each other, but also because he knows what it feels like to have to give explanations of the same kind.
“Oh well, me too. I mean, they are adopted,” He tells him, referring to the twins.
“Oh.”
“Yeah, a supposed wife won't show up at your door if that's what you've been expecting.”
Gojo laughs. “Not really.”
“Well, I wasn't expecting something or someone to show up either, it's hard to think of someone else or... something else when you've got flour over there,” He says with a laugh, pointing to his own cheeks.
He likes the fact that instead of trying to get it off, Gojo chooses to laugh before speaking. “And here I thought you would say that the dogs have stolen your attention.”
“That too. So two kids, single, then?” He asks him. “Like me.” He clarifies, without knowing why. Or maybe knowing why. Definitely knowing why. “We need wine more than pancakes,” He tells Gojo. It’s true that perhaps they don’t know each other and that it’s the first time they see each other, but when the people around him seem to come from perfect families without any problems, finding someone similar to him and in the same situation, feeling comfortable becomes natural.
“I don’t drink, sorry,” Gojo denies with the spatula in hand.
“Oh.”
“I can always have orange juice or water, though,” He assures him. “I do have that.”
Again one of the corners of Getou's mouth lifts up. Gojo still hasn’t moved to grab the eggs he has brought while he hasn’t nodded at them to indicate that he can take them.
“I'm sorry, I have to say it,” Getou says when their gazes meet again. “Your eyes are—”
“Pretty, perfect, flashy?” Gojo interrupts him.
He blinks on purpose, the white color of his eyelashes making Getou laugh.
“Hard to forget,” Getou chooses to mention.
Gojo smiles, those words being news to his ears no matter how many people he has come across throughout his life. Sure, the sky and the sea are easy to forget. His eyes, however, even though they have the same color, no.
“Well, we're neighbors, I think you'll have a hard time not seeing me unless you ignore me.”
“You asked me for eggs so I won't be able to ignore you until you give them back.”
“You’re staying for dinner,” Gojo reminds him. “Doesn’t that leaves us tied?”
Getou tilts his head, pretending to be thinking. Ironically, he feels that he has forgotten what it means to think since he has run into Gojo. “That depends on how the pancakes come out.”
“Then you are staying.”
“I think my daughters won't like me if I don't let them continue with the dogs.” Getou sighs, once again, exhausted. He doesn't think it's a bad thing. “Do you want me to help you with the table or something?”
“Sure, we already got some of the boxes out so the dishes are there.” Gojo points to the shelves above the fridge with the spatula and finally moves to accept the eggs he had brought.
Getou opens the cupboards and remembers Tsukimi's words. His dad doesn’t know how to be gentle with food, he doesn’t know how to measure the exact amount.
He casts a sideways glance at Gojo to find him extremely focused, with the tip of his tongue sticking out that is quickly replaced by a satisfied smile when instead of breaking the egg, he manages to make the white part fall into the pot in front of him without any kind of incident.
“Hey,” Already with the dishes in his hands, Getou looks at him. “What do you think if you give me your phone number?” He asks him.
He thinks Shoko would probably laugh at him if she heard him mention those words. What are his intentions? He doesn’t know. But he does know that his question can’t be taken as an attempt at flirting because he doesn't remember the last time he did it and he doesn't want Gojo to take it that way either. He is a friendly neighbor. Nothing more, nothing else. “That way you won’t have to send Tsumiki next time, or in case it's late and she's sleeping,” He adds.
Gojo watches him, his raised eyebrows quickly turning into an expression of understanding. “Sure,” He agrees with a smile.
Getou nods at the promise of a phone numbers exchange. He turns to head for the living room but stops and turns after remembering that he really wants to be a nice neighbor, because he is. “Oh, and welcome to the neighborhood,” He says.