Work Text:
He’s little, maybe three. Red hair. Soft-looking cheeks. Wearing Shouto’s baby clothes. Well, they’re not Shouto's, they were his, Touya’s, first. Even though Shouto wore them at two, not three, since he was big and healthy, even then. And Touya was weaker. Small.
He makes grabby hands towards Enji. It’s been so many years since one of his kids reached for him like that, he would have expected not to know what to do—but he does. A father never forgets. Even a bad one, an awful, pathetic, low-life like him.
He picks up his squirming boy like muscle memory.
Holds him to his chest. “There. I’ve got you.”
“Train now?” Touya asks, excitement bubbling over. He punches Enji's chest with his tiny fists. “Fight! Fight!”
“Later,” Enji says. “Dad’s tired.”
Touya grabs his face. Looks at the big gash that rips his face wide open. “That’s a bad scar.”
It's funny. They're brothers. Of course they might say the same thing.
But Touya looks more concerned than Shouto did. Scared. “You don't look like Dad. You’re old.”
“I’m your dad,” Enji says. “I’m yours. Never gonna let you go.”
He sobs. And Touya clings to him.
“Why you crying?” Touya asks after a while.
Enji doesn't know how to explain. He doesn’t know how he got this chance. His boy. Back with him again. Whole.
Shouto steps up beside them, looks to Touya. “He’s crying because he’s happy. He’s happy he has a kid like you.”
“Thassa dumb reason to cry,” Touya says.
Shouto puts a hand on Enji’s shoulder. He smiles at Touya. “Your old man cries for dumb reasons all the time.”
“Who are you?” Touya demands, raising an eyebrow. “Do I know you?”
“Sort of,” Shouto says. “We’re related.”
“Huh,” Touya says, then he loses interest in Shouto entirely, focusing back on Enji. “I’m hungry.”
The old things Touya used to like. Enji can probably still get them. Make them if he has to. Have them made.
“I'll take you home,” Enji promises. “We’ll eat there.”
“I CAN WALK!” Touya screams, kicking out his legs.
“I know,” Enji says. “Just this once, okay?”
“If you say so,” Touya says. “You're acting weird today.”
“He acts weird all the time,” Shouto volunteers. He pats Enji on the back. “I’ll meet you at home, okay, Endeavour?”
“I don't deserve you,” Enji tells him, in a lowered voice so Touya doesn’t hear.
“But you have me,” Shouto says. “It’s not about the past anymore. It’s about our future.”
-
Enji takes Touya home, where he asks why things are different. Where is his bike? His red chair in the kitchen. Where’s mom? Where’s the baby?
Enji answers what he can. He scrapes together a meal that, if memory serves, Touya will like. And they eat together.
“Where is everyone?” Touya asks.
He eats so messy.
“Here,” Enji says. “Let me.”
He feeds him bite by bite. This is how he should have loved his children. But maybe...maybe there's still time.
“There was a lot of fighting, so everybody’s…gone, to where they'll be safe.”
“Villains?” Touya asks.
“Yes.”
“No one can beat you,” Touya says proudly.
“Right,” Enji wipes off Touya’s mouth with a napkin. He doesn’t know what to say to that.
It doesn’t take long before Touya asks where the baby is, again. Enji doesn’t know what to say. The baby in his head must be Fuyumi. Touya doesn’t know there were two more. Enji’s babies. And look what he did to them.
Shouto comes in an hour.
“You don't have to be here,” Enji tells him. “You don't have to help me.”
“Stop feeling sorry for yourself,” Shouto says. “Start setting up Monopoly.”
They have a board, and the pieces, in the kid’s old game room. Enji doesn’t know how Shouto knew, he was never allowed in there.
Because you were cruel.
Enji doesn't know Monopoly rules. Neither does Shouto. Neither does Touya, but then again, he’s a child. He isn’t supposed to.
They set up the board. And Shouto and him figure out the rules. But it’s all for nothing.
Touya doesn’t like the rules. He steals money from the bank, from Shouto. He thinks he’s being sneaky, but he isn’t. He changes his mind on what his game piece is halfway through.
Enji should say something. This isn’t right. And he’s the adult here.
“He’s having fun,” Shouto says, right as he’s about to tell Touya he can’t steal his brother’s money. “Let him.”
Enji loses the game. Touya makes Shouto count out his winnings, and Enji watches Shouto separate the ones from the twos, he’s so, so patient.
After Monopoly, Touya wants to play another game. He asks about Mom again. The baby.
This time he asks Shouto. Since Enji won’t tell him. At least not a good enough answer.
He grabs Shouto’s face and says. “You look like me.”
“We’re related,” Shouto repeats.
“Nii-chan?” Touya guesses. “I think…you are.”
“Kind of,” Shouto says. “Sure.”
“Where’s my mom?” Touya asks. “And my dumb sister.”
“Um,” Shouto says, a pained look passes over his face.
“What happened to your eye?” Touya races into the next question.
“Your mom and your sister are safe. They’re just not here. Right now,” Shouto says.
Enji looks at him. Really looks.
He spent so many years thinking Shouto was his prize. His perfect legacy. And that wasn't true but this is: Shouto is one of the only good things that came of him. He is the karma that Enji never deserved in this life.
“Oh,” Touya says. “Weird.”
Then he jabs Enji in the chest. “Oi. Story, story, story!”
“What?” Shouto asks.
Shouto never got the same.
“Well,” Shouto says. “We’re waiting.”
“YEAH,” Touya says.
Then he comes and sits on Enji’s lap. On his knee, cuddled close. Enji holds him back, as best he can. He remembers this part. This boy.
He looks at Shouto, staring at them. He wants to ask if—
“Nii-chan, come on already!” Touya demands, annoyed.
Shouto shifts closer, still a little stiff. Enji reaches for his hand, pats it once, awkwardly, draws back before he’s unwelcome.
He’s sorry. He’s so sorry. And he knows that might never be enough. Knows that what little he gets is more than he deserves. But…he can’t help but want—
“Go on,” Shouto says, sure, his eyes are on Touya.
“There was a hero once,” Enji says. “Named Crimson Riot…”
-
Touya falls asleep first. Not a surprise. He was going to crash eventually.
Always did. Enji’s kids, even Shouto, apparently, they…get sleepy, can fall asleep almost anywhere.
Rei used to tuck Touya in, some of the time. But mostly it was him. Enji was the one Touya always needed.
“Are you staying the night?” he asks Shouto.
His room is still set up, ready. Enji makes sure of it. This isn’t home for him anymore, maybe it never was. But they’re…trying.
He doesn’t dare hope, but.
“Yes,” Shouto says. “He seems to have taken a liking to me. Knowing him, that doesn't happen a lot.”
“Do you...uh, since you're not asleep. Do you want another, um. Nevermind,” Enji says.
“Are you asking me if I want you to tell me a story until I fall asleep too?” Shouto asks.
“Yes,” Enji says, feeling more useless and pathetic by the minute. “That.”
“Okay,” Shouto says. “But I'm not sitting on your lap.”
This is a joke. In any case, that spot is already taken. Touya’s still there. Snoozing.
“They were hero stories because he liked—because I wanted him to idolize heroes,” Enji says. “I don't know what you like.”
He should…what kind of father doesn’t, oh…god. All that time.
“I like heroes too,” Shouto says. “They’re not all bad.”
“Like me.”
Shouto gives him a pointed look.
Right.
No feeling sorry for himself.
He starts another story from the top. He thinks about how lucky he is to have this, a second chance. With not just Touya, but with Shouto too.