This morning Yuuma caught Ami yelling and having a tantrum in the hall. It was pure coincidence especially on the day he wanted to invite his siblings to lunch.
The panicked maids tried calming her down but Ami kept screaming drowning out their frantic voices. It was clearly the little girl who was in control of the situation. Before long Ami started hitting them with flushed distorted features, tears, and snot running down her whiny face out of anger at whatever had happened. And when the maid tried stopping the painless hits she screamed in such a high-pitched cry that one would think she surely was getting tortured. She attracted everyone's attention who was around, it reminded Yuuma of the toddlers in a store causing a fuss, screaming, and crying just like what was happening now. The old people in the store would whisper about how spoiled the child probably is and how they probably don't get enough spanks with the wooden bat.
Then they would gossip on and on about the ill-mannered child like they weren't just like that when they were young.
Yuuma thinks it's perfectly natural for ordinary children to have bad days every once in a while. Well, you could say even as a child Yuuma was abnormal but he doesn't remember much from his childhood. His aunt ran a daycare and sometimes when he was forced to get out of the house he would volunteer there. Most of the time he would end up falling asleep on the soft mat of the ABC rug or the carpet train rug and would wake up with doodles all over his skin. Those kids drew on him in his sleep! Even so, Yuuma never managed to get mad at the children especially since one time he caught the girls in the preschool protecting him from the naughty boys who tried to draw on him. It was quite amusing seeing the little girl's faces look in a serious mom scold manner at the boys while using shielded arms protecting Yuuma's curled-up body while the boys pouted and exaggerated their already baby voices in grumpy whines. Although children seemed to never stick to one emotion or thought at a time because most of the time the kids would try to tackle him onto the floor in a dog pile or the girls would pretend he was their baby and wrap him up in blankets or played doctor and he was the sick patient. He was far too tired to stop them and ultimately became the victim of the whole preschool.
Yuuma had cupped his ears with his palms to deafen the screaming that shook his eardrums in an uncomfortably loud way. While he thought to the past the girl had stomped her feet and then got on the floor kicking her legs in the air wildly, the maids tried their best to calm her. But it was useless, Ami's dead weight couldn't be picked up and her legs kept flinging up, raging until Ami was out of breath.
This was different from what Yuuma expected from Ami although in his memories of her he didn't see much of her. In fact, the siblings of this home can be considered strangers. But from his earlier interactions with her, he had thought she was a shy nervous little girl who looked up to her mother. it turns out not very surprisingly in Yuumas's opinion, that the children in this new mythical world didn't change from his last.
With a sigh from Yuuma, Ami started to calm down but was still unwilling to be picked up and had a few hiccups and cries when a maid got too close almost restarting the hectic tantrum. Yuuma sleepily blinked and came up behind the girl whose vision wasn't focused on him and lifted her up from her armpits. He was a weak seven years old and picking up a six year old was a challenge that drained his energy almost instantly. His small muscles were definitely not prepared! Even so, he persisted by scooting her up a couple of times before getting in a comfortable position with her resting on his belly legs wrapped around his hips, and facing him. Ami was definitely surprised at her abruptly being picked up but when she saw it was her elder brother her face that originally was morphed in a permanent frown froze.
'She must be a bit embarrassed,' Yuuma mused internally. This is all because the little girl tried acting quite big with her older brother. Probably getting fed poison from her mother to act in a certain way around Yuuma obliterating any other relationship except a formal or a passive one.
The girl's originally flushed face became even redder to the point her tears stopped and she desperately tried wiping the evidence of a tantrum away from her baby face. Yuuma laughed at her actions making Ami freeze again and look up in surprise.
'Why is he laughing at me!?' Ami almost cried again as her head felt it had a heartbeat from the previous tantrum and could barely think straight. But with her brother's appearance, it was like a cold bucket of water was thrown on the girl making her spell break consecutively. When she met his eyes to question him, her little brain that was a broken motor at the moment couldn't look away.
Yuumas peach eyes were glittering and softly curved with not-so-subtle amusement. The little girl's mouth hung agape and suddenly the gentle lavender eyes weren't a cold bucket of water but a warm refreshing spring.
To the maids who watched the encounter, they could only sigh in relief as it appeared the moment Ami was picked up all anger was washed away from the little girl, Yuuma was their heavenly savior! She no longer fussed and obediently stared at Yuuma like she was mesmerized. Ami looked to be a six year old distracted by patterned marbles or tape stuck on a flat surface trying to peel off in concentration.
Yuuma laughed again and said, "little Ami have you calmed down?"
The little girl was broken from yet another spell and nodded in a fluster her cheeks sill burning red from her previous tantrum. Yuuma hummed trying to make his actions as understanding and direct as possible for Ami whose emotions got out of control. "Then can you let Yuuma clean you up? I won't let the meany maids near you again," Yuuma didn't mean to offend the maids at all, this was just the best choice to calm down the child. Experience from previously working with kids even if most the time he was asleep he picked up a few things.
As Yuuma took the little girl into her room that she had a tantrum in front of, he began to wipe her nose and face with a washcloth. He feels somewhat guilty because he let old Yuumas memories cloud his behavior around his siblings. He should have considered it more.
"Tell Yuuma what happened?" Yuuma cupped the girl's cheeks giving it a few squeezes as compensation for getting his clothes wet with snot and tear stains. Ami hiccuped and a fresh line of tears swelled up making the already puffy red eyes slightly damp. Yuuma frowned but tried keeping his voice as natural and kind as possible.
"Mommy grounded me..." Ami sniffed with choked-up tears and a sore dry throat from all the screaming, her words were squeezed out with difficulty. Yuuma couldn't help his frown deepening as he narrowed his eyes but seeing the child in front of him he suppressed his sneer to not scare her. "Why did she do that?" Yuuma expressed with tightly knitted brows.
"B-because you didn't go to her room like you said you would a-and she got angry a-a-and said I didn't do a good job," she squawked with a shaky voice and rubbing at her eyes to get the tears away. Yuuma sighed and grabbed her firsts from rubbing at her eyes and blew at her tears like they would be blown away.
"What happens when you're grounded?"
"I'm not allowed to play or leave my room for a lot of days," She sniffed again with a hiccup and Yuuma decided to stop his questioning and tend to her a bit more changing her overly puffy clothes. The dress looked like an adult in little form and Yuuma selected a breezy little summer dress that would fit a six year old best over the corsets and ugly attire that the rich people wear for some reason. Yuuma doesn't understand why people torture themselves by wearing uncomfortable clothing. Who even puts this stuff on a six year old? Yuuma wanted to scold the mother but realized the mother is basically his mother now too. It's a bit strange. He's never had a sibling so it's weird to look at these children and see them as that role in his new life. If he were to say right now that Ami is his little sister he would be doubtful on the inside.
He isn't their real siblings he's just an unfortunate lazy imposter! But Yuuma felt a warm feeling after seeing a blossom small smile tug at the previously devasted face when he got Ami a strawberry banana cake. Yuuma felt like he did something right and good, maybe this was the feeling of a parent but Yuuma discarded that thought. This is the feeling of being an older sibling!
He stayed with Ami until he knew it was ready to go. Yuuma promised her to have a long talk with their mother about her being grounded and talked about a tea party with all their siblings tomorrow. Ami was especially happy with that idea getting all giddy and excited for tomorrow looking nothing like she had earlier.
Yuuma had changed his plans because lunch had long passed and he was feeling tired from having to deal with Ami. It wasn't a bad thing being with her, it was just tiring. But before even thinking about resting he ordered his butler who seemed to slack at his job lately to carry him to the wicked witches' room!
'Miss madam de vil!' Yuuma huffed a snicker getting a confused stare from Kenji.