Mirai woke up from the stale surrounding and found herself cuddled by the broad-shouldered Ryosuke. She, not finding any comfort, slowly wriggled her body out of his arms. At the same time, she wondered why couples like to cuddle to sleep. The only reason why they had ended up cuddling was that…they had a passionate make-out session from the living room to the bedroom.

When she recalled how they had ended up on the same bed and were sleeping together, her face turned hot and she pulled the blanket halfway over her head as if someone could see her cherry-colored face in the middle of the dark. But what got her most was that she had continued the kiss after he had pulled away. She had never thought she’d be that kind of person—to be the first to initiate something so…suggestive. She blamed him for turning her into this kind of shameful person.

But then again, he was the only one who had the power to make her discover new sides of herself. Back then, it was his words that had given her courage and power to continue each day as she babysat her nieces and nephews. He had even given her the strength and the support to become a virtual mother to Natsu. And he had become the sole dedication and reason as to why she became a single mother.

He had always been the basis of her everything.

And for that, she could never come to hate him.

Because she loved him.

And because she loved him, she had to choose Natsu.

*

Hours later, Mirai woke up to the noises from her kitchen. She saw the closed blinds, giving her room a bit of a gray touch everywhere. The smell of food then occupied her mind, and she got up to head out of her room in a daze. However, seeing that she was in her white, spaghetti-strapped tank top and her zipper of her jeans had become undone—due to yesterday—she blushed and frantically searched for a cardigan in her closet before heading out.

When she reached the kitchen, she saw her friend patiently set up the table with plates filled with delicious-looking foods. She covered to hide her happiness as she stayed at the side to watch him.

He caught sight of her as he carried two cups of water. “Morning, beautiful.”

She greeted back with a shy smirk, trying to stay as composed as ever. She pulled the chair closest to her and sat. “Has your cooking gotten better?”

“Hey,” he said, coming to stand beside her.

She looked up at him in response and received a peck at the lips. She pulled away, frowning. “What are you doing?”

“What are you doing?” He pointed to her, raising a brow. “You know better than to eat before brushing up.”

“Eh?” She had seen this before. More like she had done this before. To him.

“Come on,” he said, pulling her up. “Let’s go wash up.”

“I can brush up after I eat,” she whined, determined to not get up from her seat at all. “Onegai?” She rested her upper body on the table to show her exhaustion.

He squatted down to her eye level and sulked as he tapped on her arm. “Oi, we didn’t get to do it yesterday, so why are you pretending to be tired?”

She cleared and sat up straight. “I’m—I’m going to wash up now.” She lightly shoved him out of her way and left him in a rush to hide her embarrassment. She knew that he was smirking in victory from behind her, and it annoyed her.

Upon reaching the bathroom sink, she the faucet, splashed the lukewarm water on her face, dried her face with a pink washcloth hung nearby, and then reached for her toothbrush. When she looked up at the mirror in front of her, she flinched at the sight of her friend staring at her from the side. “What?”

“Nothing,” he answered. He raised his brows at her to tell her to ignore him and continue.

She did so. She dotted her toothbrush with a pea-sized toothpaste and started brushing her teeth. From the mirror, she watched him walk to stand behind her, and she tried her best to not lock eyes with him.

“So, when can we do it?”

In response to his absurd question, she almost choked on the foam, and because of this, she had to cut brushing her teeth short as she rinsed .

He didn’t bother to help her at all. In fact, he kept his calm. He finally had a reaction when she turned to face him with disgust.

She scoffed. “What did you say?”

“When can we do it?” He repeated. Blankly.

“Are you stupid?” She sensed her cheeks getting hot.

“You’re the stupid one.” He casually wrapped his arms around her waist and took a step forward to close the distance. “You stopped me again, and although I didn’t fall asleep like last time, you suggested for us to go to sleep.” He clicked his tongue and quietly murmured, “We got further this time since your shirt and pants were undone.”

“O-of course!” She weakly pushed him away. “Sleeping was the right thing to do.”

One of his arms removed itself from her waist to pinch her chin to raise it to face him.

She locked eyes with him, but his beautiful pupils disappear from her sight as he leaned in for a kiss. The hand that gently held her chin slowly slid down to the side of her neck and then to her nape as he pulled her close. Although she responded for a while, as he had expected, she broke off their kiss again.

With only a few centimeters between their noses, and his hands still at her neck and waist, he sensually whispered to her, “This is right for me too. Isn’t it for you?”

She bit her lower lip to stop herself from being honest. “It’s not.”

*

“Ryosuke.” Mrs. Yamada stepped inside Mirai’s house and was surprised to see her son with Mirai. She had come to drop off her grandson. “Why are you here?” She found herself answering her own question when she remembered that her son loved the lady who lived here.

“Uncle Ryosuke,” said Natsu. “Is Daddy Kota with you?”

Ryosuke held back from pouting in front of the innocent boy, but the two women could see the internal wounds the young boy had unintentionally caused because Ryosuke was once the “Daddy” and Kota was once the “Uncle”. He gave the little boy an answer about “Daddy Kota.” “He’s not here. It’s just me today.”

“Oh.” Natsu then looked at his mother. “Mom.” He showed his mother a box of new shoes. “Look what Grandma bought me!”

“We went shopping before we came here,” said Mrs. Yamada, “and I wanted to splurge on my grandson. I haven’t done that in a while.”

Mirai brightened up her smile at her son. “Did you thank grandma properly?”

Natsu nodded.

Mrs. Yamada smiled. “Oh, Mirai. There’s no need. I love him, that’s why.”

Natsu ran to his grandma and hugged her. “I love you too!”

Mrs. Yamada patted her grandson’s back as she reciprocated the hug. “Oh, Mirai-san, Kota said that you have something you’d like to give me.”

Ryosuke perked his ears up as he wondered what it’d be.

“Yes, I do,” answered Mirai. She headed to the kitchen table and grabbed three huge cooking bowls. Two of them were of steel, and one was a green, plastic cooking bowl. “I won’t get a chance to see him until the end of this week because he’s been busy, so may you please pass these to him?”

“Kota owns these?” Mrs. Yamada had never seen any of her sons cook. In fact, she had barely started cooking ever since she had become a full-time mother. Although she still had a lot to learn, she had improved immensely after recording cooking shows and re-watching them repeatedly.

“When Kota helps in the countryside, he usually comes back with various fruits and vegetables, and he shares them with us.”

Ryosuke finally stepped into the conversation. “He’s still working over there?”

Mirai nodded. “Mainly during the summer though.”

“I thought they had promoted him to become their ambassador or something?”

“That too.”

“So, he doesn’t have any wishes to become a lawyer anymore?”

“He…was a lawyer?”

Mrs. Yamada sighed. “I don’t know about now, but that was his dream. He got into one of the top three law schools, but he suddenly dropped out after a year or so.”

“I think,” added Ryosuke, “it was around the time we had Natsu.”

Mirai’s eyes lowered. “Ah…”

“Is something wrong?” asked Mrs. Yamada, who was close enough to hear Mirai’s escaped mumble, and Mirai shook her head with a smile. Mrs. Yamada took the bowls. “I’ll be taking my leave now.”

“Hai.” Mirai escorted Mrs. Yamada outside, and right when Mrs. Yamada got to her car, Mrs. Yamada remembered something.

“Is tomorrow Natsu’s game?”

“Game?” asked Ryosuke, who had followed them.

Behind him was Natsu, playing around on the grass.

“What game?”

Mirai kept quiet while his mother explained.

“Natsu-kun’s in Tokyo’s Baseball Little League.” Mrs. Yamada disarmed her car. “Is it still the same time, Mirai-san?”

“Hai.”

“I probably can’t make it this time. Is that okay?”

“Of course. It’s not the big game yet.”

“I’ll be sure to be there for that one.” Mrs. Yamada waved goodbye to her grandson and got in her car, and everyone watched her drive off.

Natsu walked to the young man and tapped him. “Uncle, do you want to come and see me play?”

Mirai overheard and turned her head in the boys’ direction. “Natsu, Uncle’s—”

“Of course!” interrupted Ryosuke. He glanced at her and twitched a taunting brow at her before squatting down to Natsu’s eye level. “I didn’t know you like baseball.” He quickly analyzed his son’s small stature and concluded that if Natsu was in a sport, that meant Natsu’s small size shouldn’t be underestimated.

“I like it because Dad was in baseball,” confessed the boy.

“Eh?” Ryosuke was surprised. He was sure his brother wasn’t in baseball. In fact, his brother had never played any sports at all. Kota was the nerd, and he was the jock. Well, that was as much as he knew. He and his brother were pretty much opposites in everything. “Your dad plays baseball?”

“Yeah. Mom said that Dad was the best baseball player in school and that he was very handsome and cool when he played, so I want to be cool and handsome like him too!” He took a step back and got into a batting position.

Ryosuke watched the young boy pretend to clutch onto an imaginary bat to hit an imaginary ball and run in a circle on the grass to celebrate an imaginary victory. Thanks to what Natsu had said, Ryosuke knew which “Daddy” Natsu was told of. While Natsu cheered around on the grass, Ryosuke looked at Mirai and grinned. “So, Daddy was cool and handsome when he played baseball?” He lightly chuckled.

She looked away. She knew he had gotten a bit happy. Too happy.

He went to her and wrapped his arms at her waist, and she tried to push him away because Natsu was there with them.

“Go away,” she whispered to him.

He ignored her and asked, “So, you liked it when I played baseball? Why didn’t you tell me? We could’ve dated then.”

“I didn’t like you back then,” she growled at him. “And let go!” She pinched his arm, and he whisked his arms away, hurt. “I warned you.”

“Why can’t we hug? I didn’t kiss you.” He purposely leaned in and whispered, “Or did you want that instead?”

She laughed and pressed her fingers at his lips to move his head away from hers as she walked away from him. She called out to her son. “Natsu, let’s go inside.”

“Wait for me!” Ryosuke began to chase the mother and son, and a game of running away from Ryosuke started. He aimed for her and caught her by the arm and pulled her into an embrace as he said to Natsu, “I’m going to have your mom, Natsu!”

Natsu played along. “If you want her, you have to fight me!” He pumped his tiny fists into the air.

During the childish and playful fight between Ryosuke and Natsu, she, in the middle of them, laughed because Ryosuke tickled her sides while sneaking sly kisses at her shoulders and neck, which her son didn’t catch—he was too busily trying to save his mother.

Natsu punched with all of his might at Ryosuke’s knees and thighs, shouting, “Let! Mommy! Go!”

Ryosuke pretended to be in pain, and as he confirmed Natsu’s focus at his knees, he swiftly turned Mirai’s head to him and smooched her before falling to the ground and surrendering to the young boy.

She stood still in shock as she hadn’t expected him to do such a thing while playing around. It made her recall that the man with her was someone she needed to be away from and yet, here she was, with him. She knew that they—no, she—couldn’t expect a happy ending if she chose him. With the kisses she had just received, flashes of their past flew through her mind as the soft touch of his lips lingered on hers.

She had to put a stop to it.

“Natsu,” said Ryosuke, laying on the ground, pretending to be wounded. “Can I ask you something?”

Natsu perked up. “What is it, Uncle?”

“Can…” He sat up and looked at him with gentle and honest eyes. “Can you…call me Dad too?”

Mirai broke away from her mental flashes when she heard her friend’s request. She wanted to interrupt, but guilt stopped her. Guilt told her that Ryosuke had every right to ask for this from Natsu—the son he had found, the gift he had given her, and the happiness she had taken and given to someone else.

Natsu, however, was confused. To him, there was only one Mommy. And one Daddy.

And he already had both.

At the same time, the gentle eyes of the man in front of Natsu expressed much doubt and pain, making Natsu unable to tell Ryosuke that he couldn’t have two dads.

“Umm…” Natsu fidgeted.

Ryosuke let out a laugh and blinked his pain and tears away as he looked down for a quick second to hide his torn emotions.

Gomen ne, Ryosuke. Mirai wanted to look away, but she told herself that she had to see it. It was the least of what she could and should do. She had run away once, and that had hurt both boys and everyone around her. She couldn’t look away and turn a blind eye now.

“Umm…” Natsu quietly said again. No words follow it though. Because he didn’t know what to say. And he didn’t know how to soothe an adult. How would he comfort an adult anyway? But since he couldn’t give an answer or say the answer, the older man couldn’t know how he felt, right? It was a simple and innocent assumption of the little boy.

But to his mother and to the man who had asked, they knew that Natsu’s silence was an answer, an answer that they couldn’t and didn’t blame Natsu for.

Because he was the only victim of this virtual family playground.

Ryosuke, still looking down, laughed after he had calmed himself. He continued to look down as he brought a hand to rest on top of the young boy’s head. “I’m joking, Natsu.”

Water filled Mirai’s eyes.

“I can never be your Dad.” He looked up at the boy whom he had once called son and whom he had once believed would grow up with him. It was here that he realized that somewhere along the days of that one year with Natsu, he had come to love Natsu like a real father. And it stabbed his heart to know that h