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It was the start of a new week, and Makoto was in the kitchen of her family’s apartment making breakfast for everyone. Ren was still in the bathroom getting ready for work, though she was concerned at how long he was taking. He was having trouble with his own tie. Most of the time, she would end up helping him anyway since he always did his tie in a clumsy way. Makoto was still in her pajamas because she didn’t any work today at the police department, so she could stay home and take care of her own family. She heard the sound the sounds of the door to their bedroom fill the room up. She looks towards it and sees her husband walking out with his tie not exactly correctly done.
“Sorry I took so long, even with a video, I still had trouble with the tie.” Ren walked to the kitchen towards his wife. He leans down and plants a quick kiss on her lips. He takes a moment to admire how beautiful his wife is and how they got here. Makoto turned to him face him head on and fix his tie. Who knew that two people who initially were not on good terms with each other would end up as husband and wife ten years later? “Beautiful as always.”
“Seriously, always the charmer, aren’t we?” a slight blush appeared on Makoto’s face, she lightly smacked his chest, and turned away with a smile to keep on making breakfast. She was making her husband’s famous curry for the two of them while their children were having their own food for dinner. Speaking of children, the cries of their son and daughter could be heard coming from their bedroom. This was one of the few times where the parents got up much earlier than their babies. Usually, they only cried once or twice during the night; each time they did Ren and Makoto usually took turns to attend them. “Looks like the little ones have awoken from their slumber.”
“I got it.” Ren said as he went to their bedroom and attend to the little ones who had just woken up. Makoto watches him disappear to their bedroom then turns back to her cooking. After a while, she notices that the crying has stopped meaning that Ren has calmed them down. She finishes preparing their breakfast and places plates of food plus their spoons on the dinner table. She also searched the cabinets for their children’s food and placed it on the table next to their plates of food. Just as she finished preparing the table, she sees Ren carrying their children with each arm.
On his right arm, he’s holding their one-year-old daughter, Rina Amamiya-Niijima. She was leaning against her father with her head laying on the crook of his neck. The little girl was still a bit sleepy but was trying to stay awake. Makoto towards Ren help him out with their daughter. Makoto grabs Rina from her father and holds her in her arms to look at her still sleepy face. Rina rubs her eyes with both eyes and looks up at her mother. Makoto notices Rina reaching out to her mother, Makoto places her hand to allow her daughter to play with her fingers. While her daughter is playing with her hand, Makoto takes a moment to look at Rina.
Rina’s hair was brown just like her mother’s and her eyes resembled Ren’s grey orbs. Her skin was pale white just Makoto and the softness of it made her want to cuddle with Rina all day. Rina was also seen to be quite clingy to her mother to the point that it made Rina sad whenever she was separated from Makoto. So, to please Rina, each time the whole family was sleeping on the bed together, Rina always cuddled closer to Makoto. But there were times where Rina had to learn to sleep in her crib with her little brother. Speaking of little brother, Makoto looks towards her husband and their son in his arms.
Ren shifted their son so that he was leaning from Ren’s left arm to his right arm. Jun Amamiya-Niijima, the youngest member of the Amamiya-Niijima. He was only six-months old and was already starting to resemble her father. His hair was black just like Ren and it was starting to form into that messy style that identified his father while Rina’s was more like Makoto’s. His eyes though, were just like her Makoto’s. The same crimson red rubies that made Ren fall head over heels in love with Makoto. It was a Niijima tradition as Makoto explained. Makoto watches as her husband and son exchange glances at each other like if they were telepathically communicating. If Rina was clingy towards Makoto, then Jun was clingy towards Ren.
“Ma-, ma-ma.” Makoto gets her thought process interrupted by her daughter calling out to her. Makoto looks at her daughter to give her the attention she’s asking for.
“What’s wrong sweetie?” Makoto turns to her daughter. “Are you hungry?”
Rina just cooed in response signaling that yes, she was hungry. Jun seemed to also agree with his older sister. Both parents nodded in response and placed their children in their seats in front of their food. Ren was sitting next to Jun and Makoto was sitting next to Rina. The two of them fed their children first before digging into their own meals. After the whole family was done eating breakfast, the babies were put inside of their crib in the living room. Ren gave Jun a Jack Frost plushie to play with while Makoto gave Rina a Buchimaru plushie.
Makoto and Ren looked at their children playing with their toys. Makoto leans towards Ren to feel his warmth and he wraps his arm around her. Ren looks at the time in his watch and sees that it’s about time for him to go to work. He smiles a bit since it was the same watch Makoto gave him on Christmas when he was son probation.
“I should get going. Don’t wanna upset Old Man Tora.” Ren releases Makoto from his grasp and turns his attention to the prince and princess who were still playing with their plushies. He leans down plant kisses on their foreheads breaking the attention they had to their plushies to look at their father. “I have to get going my little ones. But don’t worry, I’ll be back for dinner.”
Ren waves at his children to say goodbye. Rina waves back at him while Jun tries to reach out to him signaling his father to stay. Ren gives his hand to his son for him to play with it a bit.
“It’s ok Jun, I’ll play with you as much as you want when I get back.” Jun lets go of his father’s hand looks at Makoto.
Ren starts walking towards the entrance of their house and Makoto follows him. Both of them reach the entrance of their apartment to say their goodbyes. Makoto hands Ren his briefcase and he takes it.
“Call me if anything happens.” Ren turns to her with a smile.
“I won’t.” she responds with a smirk. Ren laughs a bit at her response.
“I know. You’re too good of a mother to them.” he returns a signature grin at her.
“And you’re an amazing father.”
They exchange a quick kiss and Ren leaves the apartment with Makoto watching him with a smile until her husband could no longer be seen. She closes and locks the door to begin her day.
She walks over to the crib and picks up Jun from beside Rina. The crib was in front of the couch and Makoto decides to sit on it with Jun still in her arms. Rina gets up on her feet and cautiously walks to the fence of the crib watching her mother holding Jun.
“Mmm-mama” Rina calls out for her mother. Makoto answers the call by looking at her daughter locking eye contact with her. Rina flashed a billion-dollar smile at her mother and Makoto is taken aback. Makoto smiles back at her princess in response.
“I love you.” Makoto tells his daughter. Rina laughs adorably as does Makoto. She turns to look at Jun who was now glaring at her mother. Makoto was now experiencing Jun’s first ever Niijima glare. Even though it wasn’t as fearsome as a Niijima lady’s glare, it still could send fear to the hearts of those who wrong any member of the Niijima family. Makoto keeps the smile on her face, but she was now showing it to her son.
“Don’t worry, I love you too.” she kisses the top of Jun’s head, and he squeals in happiness at his mother’s affectionate action. She grabs the remote with her free hand and turns on the television to one her daughter’s favorite cartoon. Rina turns her attention towards the television to watch her favorite show.
“Now then, it’s time for chores.” Makoto stands up walks over to a storage closet that has the vacuum cleaner. She shifts Jun in her arms so that he’s resting his head on her shoulder facing her neck. She grabs the vacuum cleaner and starts cleaning up the apartment with her son clinging on to her. She runs the vacuum throughout the entire house until she hears her phone ringing. She turns off the machine and goes over to the table in the living room to pick up the phone. The name on the screen is revealed to be the Eiko Takao.
Makoto picks up the phone and holds it up to her ear.
“Good morning, Eiko.” she starts off the conversation.
“Good mornin’, Mako!” Eiko yells through the phone causing Makoto to separate the away from her ear. She smiles and puts the phone back in her ear to listen to the rest. “Do you wanna hang today?”
“I’m sorry Eiko, I have to watch the kids.” As much as Makoto wanted to hang out with her friend, her family always came first in her mind. She’s thankful that Eiko understands well why she can’t go out today.
“It’s ok Mako. Maybe another time!” Eiko responds. She says goodbye to Makoto and hangs up the phone. Makoto puts her phone down and continues vacuuming the house. After a while, Makoto finally finishes up with the machine placing it on the storage closet where it belongs. Makoto sits back down on the couch on the living room in front of the crib where Rina still was. But instead of watching the cartoon, Rina was now playing with her Buchimaru plushie. Makoto watches her daughter playing with the toys until she decides to pick up the little girl from the crib sets her down on the couch. Rina sits on the couch next to Makoto.
Rina puts her plushie away and starts crawling to her mother who was looking down at Jun. She reaches Makoto and crawls onto her lap to watch the cartoon once again. Makoto smiles at her daughter and runs her hand through her hair. She stops when she hears whimpers coming from her son who was still resting on the crook of her neck. Shortly afterwards he was crying now, and Makoto shifted her shirt to allow her son to latch onto her breast to feed him.
Some time passes by, and Jun disconnects from his mother. Makoto looks to Rina on her lap and sees that she’s getting sleepy.
“I think it’s time for a nap you two.” Makoto picks up Rina carries her two children to their bedroom. She tucks them in their blankets inside their cribs and turns on a music box on the table next to their bed. The music makes the kids eye lids heavy as they slowly drift off to sleep. Makoto leans down and plants a kiss on both of their foreheads.
“Have a good rest my loves.” she smiles at them before heading out the door and flipping the light switch off letting her children take a nap for a while. Once out of her bedroom, Makoto walks towards her office on the next to do some paperwork on her job. She sets up a device on her desk that allows to hear everything that’s happening in their bedroom just in case they wake up. Makoto starts to get to work while also allowing her children to get at least two hours of sleep.
Makoto finishes her paperwork and stretches her arms and legs while still sitting at her desk. She looks at the time and sees that the babies should be waking up any minute now.
‘Three
‘Two
‘One.’
She counts down inside head and once she finishes, she hears whimpers coming from Rina and Jun from the tiny device on her desk. Makoto walks to her bedroom to meet their children who had just woken up from their two-hour nap. She picks them both up and rocks them on a sliding chair near the crib. Their cries fill the entire while Makoto tries to soothe them.
“Shh… Shh… It’s ok. Mama’s” Makoto coos at her children and it manages to calm them down a bit. She sighs in relief and takes them both to the living room to relax for a bit.
Ten minutes pass by and Makoto is watching her children in the living room. She was helping Rina with a fairly easy puzzle for a toddler while she Jun in her lap with his favorite Jack Frost plushie. She turns on the television and went to the kitchen to cook dinner for her and Ren. Occasionally, she would attend her children to attend to them to their needs. Makoto, after a while, finished making dinner and came back to finish the puzzle with Rina and wait for Ren to return. She looked at the time in the clock on the wall and saw that her husband should be returning any minute now.
After finishing the puzzle, Makoto took a picture of the puzzle with her daughter next to it. It came out perfectly and she planned on putting it on their scrapbook which they have been collecting pictures of the family and their friends throughout the years since Ren first came to Tokyo. She’ll have to get the picture printed if ever wanted it to be on the scrapbook.
“I’m home.” the sounds of the door interrupt her thought process and Ren walked through it. He hanged his coat near the entrance and took off his shoes to pace them in the shoe rack next to the coat hanger. He looked at his family sitting on the floor in the living room. The sight itself filled him with so much happiness he just had to join them. Putting his briefcase on the dinner table, he walked towards his family afterwards and sat with them.
Rina crawled onto her father’s lap as soon as he sat down on the floor. Even if she was more of a mother’s girl, she still allowed her little brother to have some quality mother time. Don’t get her wrong, she still loves her father with all her heart, but she preferred her mother because of much Makoto loves to tickle her. Jun was also in love with his mother’s tickles.
“Welcome back.” Makoto greeted her husband. Ren scooted much closer to his wife with Rina in his arms. Once their shoulders were close enough to the point that they were almost touching, Ren exchanged a quick kiss with Makoto just like they always did.
“Oh, you guys made a puzzle!” Ren turned his attention to the completed puzzle in front
“We did! And Rina made most of it. I helped.” Makoto said.
“Really! That’s amazing!” he looked at his daughter with a huge smile and she squealed in excitement. “I think Rina deserves a reward.”
“Me too.” she smiled at the two of them. Jun wasn’t looking with his plushie and was now looking at his father with curiosity. “How about a walk in Inokashira Park?” Makoto asked.
“That sounds lovely. What do you think Rina?” he looked at his daughter again. He pressed a kiss to Rina’s cheek, and she laughed. “I think she loves the idea.”
“Then let’s go tomorrow.”
“Sounds good.”
Ren stopped for a moment and smelled the air filling the room. “You made dinner.”
“I did.” she picked up Jun from her lap using her arms to support him. She started walking over to the kitchen to serve the meal. “I suppose you’re hungry.”
“You know it.” he also stood up taking Rina with him.
The whole family had a lovely dinner curtesy of Makoto. Ren had always considered Makoto to be the better cook, but she always reminded him that he was also a great cook with his curry. They finished their meals and both parents took their children for a warm bath. Once everything was done, they tucked their children into their pajamas and placed them on their crib in their bedroom. Ren walked to the music box and turned it on to play the music to helped them sleep. Once they said their goodnights, they kissed their foreheads and exited the bedroom.
Makoto and Ren went to couch to cuddle for a bit. They both were exhausted from their days and the only cure to it was the warmth coming from each other. Her head was resting on his shoulders with her eyes closed. Ren rested his head on hers and breathed in her scent.
“I know I already said this when I left this morning, but you’re an amazing mother.” Ren whispered into her hair. It made her smile, and she laced their fingers together.
“And I have told you before… You’re a terrific father.” she responded. Before they could fall asleep, Makoto got up from the couch and walked over to the kitchen to put away the left-over food. Ren followed her and started washing the dishes. Makoto finished first and went to the bathroom for a much-needed bath. Ren waited for her to finish so that he can enter as well.
After they were both done, the parents finally cuddled in the bed letting the sleep overtake them.
“Goodnight my Joker.”
“Goodnight my Queen.”