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The first night of his new life, Nanami didn’t sleep. It wasn't the fact that Yuuji was crying a lot, though that was extremely normal at his tender age. It being his only way of communicating was through shrill, ear-splitting cries was expected. Nanami stayed awake entirely due to his own insatiable curiosity. He wanted to know exactly how a creature so small could take up so much precious space in his tumultuous mind.
So, he stayed up, watched Yuuji when he was quiet, flitted around the kitchen making a bottle of formula when the child began to let out these short bursts of displeasure. Put your finger in his mouth. If he wants to feed he will try to suck it. Yuuji wanted to feed, all right. He nearly grabbed Nanami's finger with his chubby hands. He was strong for a babe not even six months old. Nanami fed him in bed, the light soft, but still, sleep was the furthest thing on his mind. He brushed the soft tufts of hair sprouting from odd places in Yuuji's head, wondering what kind of a person Yuuji would be in a month, or a year, or even a decade.
Finished feeding, Yuuji smiled sleepily and ignored all of Nanami's attempts at burping him, the gentle taps on his back simply lulling him to sleep. Once deeply snoring—no one ever could have prepared Nanami for snoring babies and how lovely the sound was—Nanami placed him in his basket, though he loathed to be free of the new sensation that was Yuuji's weight in his arms, and moved about the place, picking up items he couldn't remember misplacing.
There was so much Yuuji around the place already. It hadn't even been twenty-four hours since the social worker kindly dropped off the awaited child. He found tissues and tissues of his attempt to feed Yuuji some of that fancy food, which the kid had gladly spat out, furious for a second then placating when Nanami scraped an apple with a spoon and a hopeful heart. At least Yuuji's taste was affordable.
The curiosity was hardly answered in one night so Nanami forwent sleep for the entire week.
The next night, after what was now certainly a routine, he changed, bathed, fed, burped—finally!—and put Yuuji to sleep, Nanami went online and bought fifty-three outfits that should last him a year or six months judging by the speed with which Yuuji was growing. He nearly emptied his bank account on an expensive body sling. Then, when there weren’t any more bottles and pacifiers to buy, Nanami sat and waited as if the little piggy-patterned bodysuits would be magically delivered at five in the morning. (He paid for express delivery so they were at the apartment at six in the evening instead.) He was efficient like that.
He baby-proofed the entire apartment though “there wasn't much to it”—as Gojo said—but Gojo didn’t see how a baby so small—seriously, how was Yuuji so small and yet so big already—could slip behind the couch and possible hurt himself or, worse, disappear. Nanami couldn't have that.
He threw away any glassware he had ever owned, and, with a sleeping Yuuji strapped to his chest (the baby sling receives a five-starred review) tiny breaths mere puffs against Nanami's neck, he went shopping for those plastic latches, which he installed pretty successfully.
Over breakfast, Nanami fought with the fridge door for a solid minute before he realized that he sometimes did a job too well. He gave up on jam and had his toast plain.
He ignored Mrs. Miura's curious glances when he dropped the baby off. She was very likely wondering why he had black circles under his eyes since Yuuji was such a good sleeper but he wasn't obliged to answer. Though he was deeply thankful, she had been taking good care of Yuuji under such short notice. He bid her goodbye but he stood there, holding Yuuji's hand, looking into his big eyes, and wanting to ruffle the sparse hair under his little pink hat.
“Well then, I should get going,” Nanami said for the third time.
Mrs. Miura hummed agreeably, seeming unperturbed by his clear lack of want to move.
Then, with a defeated sigh, he held his hands out and Yuuji, beautiful, lovely Yuuji, brightened up and threw himself out of Mrs. Miura's arms, a soft gurgle in his throat. Nanami held Yuuji in his arms, inhaling deeply, taking in the baby shampoo, the apple he had for breakfast, and there, faintly, under it all, Nanami's own brand of shampoo. It was a wondrous thing to find. He was misty-eyed as he handd Yuuji over, quickly turning around so he would not be tempted again.
Nanami's chest hurt the rest of the day as he walked to the station, pretending there wasn't an infant-sized hole right where his heart should be.
Wrongness permeated the air. It wasn't even the curses that tried to groan their way into his attention.
By lunchtime, after buying a sandwich and eating it on a bench five minutes outside the nondescript, identical buildings downtown, Nanami realized that the ball in his throat was deep longing for a sweet-smelling, sticky little thing named Yuuji.
He handed in his letter of resignation the second he was back in the office.
He'd waited all his life to have a purpose. He wasn't about to drop him off to the neighbor's while he worked for 8 hours a day, was he?
Yuuji smelled faintly too sweet, Mrs. Miura's perfume maybe, so Nanami gently laid him on the padded tub and gave him a bath. Yuuji gurgled and spat, eyes so wide and shiny they drove tiny arrows into Nanami's heart.
He hadn’t always wanted a child. He’d considered it briefly through several moments in his life. Times when he’d hear the distinct giggle of a toddler, barely stable on their two feet, running after their mommy in the playground so close to where Nanami sometimes sat and pondered his life, or when he’d go shopping and he’d see socks that weren’t any longer than his thumb and he’d wonder if that was even possible. That a thing this small could exist. Could grow. Could be loved.
Now, he chose a mint green bodysuit, with a tiny little frog in the front—he was aware of his little biasness for the amphibians—and carefully dressed a drowsy Yuuji.
“Are you hungry, Yuuji?” he asked the warm bundle. Yuuji liked to be swaddled, and Nanami wondered if his son felt safer for it. If so, then Nanami would swaddle him, blanket and arms and heart, for as long as Yuuji liked, for as long as he felt safe.
This is love, Nanami decided as he tucked a changed, fed, sated Yuuji to his chest, then they both fell asleep.