yeah i know it's 2am but enjoy reading!!! 🌻✨❤️

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🐨 BEDTIME STORIES 🐨
[aera: 5 years old]

"one more, p'ease oppa," aera pouts, staring at the elder male with her head tilted to the side and eyes shimmering in anticipation, wanting to hear another story before she can finally sleep in peace.

namjoon sighs deeply, out of stories now, as he stares at the little girl who's watching him all so eagerly. he smiles eventually, glancing up at the ceiling, trying to think of a new story to tell aera. she waits patiently, although her gaze builds up pressure on namjoon, making him sigh, nodding slowly with a tiny 'ah' as he remembers one, "alright, this will be the last story for tonight," he says and aera nods like a good girl.

she wriggles in her spot and lays her head on his muscular arm again, staring up at his face with a wide smile, letting him know that she's listening, "there used to be a bunny," he smiles with his story as he makes it up, having used all the animals in the jungle each day he tells aera a new story. yesterday it was a tiger, before that a goat, and before that it was a fox and so on. namjoon wonders how rabbit is still left.

"a bunny?" aera asks, getting a nod from namjoon, "bunnies are so cute. riri wan' bunny tomorrow,"

"no, where are we going to keep a bunny? it's only for the story, kiddo," he chuckles.

"why? i like bunny..."

"okay, we'll let riri have a bunny in the story. is that okay?"

aera smiles, nodding her head, happy to have a bunny even if it was in a story. namjoon ruffles her hair, continuing, "so, this bunny used to live in a town called... uhm,"

"carrot town!" aera chimes.

"yes, carrot town," namjoon laughs, "there were a lot of carrots. everyone ate carrots at home, the venders sold carrots, and even the houses and cars were shaped like carrots,"

"ew..." aera scrunches her face, "no, joonie oppa, bunny live in chocolate town,"

"no, baby. bunnies live in carrot town. naughty babies live in chocolate town," aera doesn't agree with that, but stays quiet as namjoon carries on with the story, "so one day, bunny went to the market to get some carrot chocolates for his baby,"

"nooo!" aera pouts, sitting up as she expresses her disapproval with the storyline so far, "carrot chocolate is yucky! baby no' wike that!"

"they do, aera. they're good babies. they like carrots," namjoon says, "now i want you to be quiet and listen to the story, or you'll have to sleep without it. do you want that?"

"no..." she mumbles, laying down but this time on namjoon's chest. he pats her back gently, trying his best to put her to sleep.

"good girl. now where were we?"

"bunny get carrot chocolate for his baby,"

"yes, right. so when he went to the market, his wife told him get some extra carrots as well because they were going to have a delicious dinner. it was their baby's birthday. but as he arrived in the supermarket, he found that they were all out of carrots. the shelf that was always full of carrots was empty,"

"yes!" aera giggles, "then bunny go to 'nother store and he takes chocolate for baby!"

"no, hang on," he sighs, resting her head down again and says, "the bunny got worried because he wanted to celebrate his baby's birthday with their favourite carrot dinner. the other stores were closed and another supermarket was too far as it was already late. then a girl came by, holding a basket of carrots,"

"why?"

"she was getting something," namjoon replies briefly, "she saw the bunny upset and asked him what happened. he told her that he wanted carrots to celebrate his baby's birthday tonight. the girl smiled and offered him the carrots from her basket,"

"she's good," aera mumbles, yawning and closes her eyes.

"the bunny said that too. he thanked her and asked her name. she told him it was aera, but he can call him riri," aera laughs lightly, not reacting too much as she's getting sleepy and nuzzles against namjoon's chest, " the bunny invited aera to the birthday party with him. they went home together, sang happy birthday for the baby bunny and enjoyed the birthday dinner. the bunny also told aera that carrots are really good for her health. her eyes will be healthy is she eats lots of carrots. from that day, aera promised to eat more carrots,"

"riri no' wike carrot... riri no' bunny..." aera mumbles falling asleep and namjoon chuckles, kissing her forehead.

"sleep well little bunny,"

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🐨 "WHO BROKE THAT?" 🐨
[aera: 04 years old]

aera shrugs her shoulders, stepping back casually as she goes back to pushing her toy car down from the little slide in her playroom. she climbs quickly, following the car down the slide then slides her doll. namjoon sighs at how unbothered she is regarding the broken dishwasher. yes, a broken dishwasher. nobody knows what happened or how aera's cars and building blocks ended up inside the machine along with a few dirty dishes. some black magic happened, the machine turned on, made weird noises until namjoon had to come and check, regretting that he was home alone with the four year old during this.

he tries again, crouching down near the little girl and forces a smile, holding aera's hand, "please tell me, aera. were you playing in the kitchen?"

aera nods once, but doesn't really pay attention to his words, picking up her car and hands to namjoon, "oppa put it there," she instructs him, pointing on top of the tiny slide of her height while she runs herself to get her pokemon plushies.

"and did you touch the dishwasher in the kitchen?"

"no," she shakes her head, making all the pokemons sit in a line and faces them, sitting with her legs crossed, including namjoon in their circle. "cha'mander saying somethin'. oppa, he said— he said there's car in the kitchen,"

"how did the cars get in the kitchen?" namjoon asks.

"because riri was playing," aera giggles, "riri like car! oppa has big car— riri get big car when i g'ow up!" she stands up in determination and namjoon groans at the negligible progress they're making with the problem of the dishwasher.

"okay, come here," he says, carrying her up and walks to the kitchen, showing her the dishwasher that no longer works the way it did,  "did you put your toys here?"

"yeah," aera nods now as he lets her stand on her own. she walks to the dishwasher, peeking inside and giggles, throwing a squishy pineapple rubber toy inside. "this my place to hide,"

"god! no, princess. it's used to wash dishes," namjoon sighs, massaging his temples, "you don't hide your toys here... what are we gonna tell jinnie oppa now? you broke the dishwasher,"

"no, i— i'— y'know oppa, riri is baby. riri no' bweak anything," she states, raising up her arms and namjoon ends up carrying her, "joonie oppa is big. joonie oppa bweak it,"

"but i didn't break it!" namjoon gasps.

"p'ease?" aera pouts, cupping his cheeks with her tiny hands, "i' just a baby..."

namjoon closes his eyes, sighing deeply at how easily melted for this kid. as he lets her go play and decides to actually tell jin the truth, how he got too invested in reading a book than looking after aera and pulled a 'tae-kook babysitting riri' himself.

•••

"what the hell happened to my dishwasher?!" jin yells in surprise, taking out aera's toys from inside, staring at it confusedly.

"jinnie oppa!" aera chimes, running to hug jin and sticks to him without a plan to let go any time soon, "taetae and koo did that! he put that— my car in the this... this..."

"dishwasher," jin says.

"mm," aera nods, hugging jin again, "joonie oppa and riri no' did anything. we sleeping when koo and taetae bweak it— thiswasher,"

"yeah?" jin arches up a brow, getting another nod from the four old, holding his laugh as he glances at namjoon and the rest of the boys. namjoon smiling thankfully at aera, jungkook and taehyung gasp in shock, shaking their heads in denial and the rest three are busy laughing at aera's cute little story.

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🐨 HOMEWORK 🐨
[aera: 08 years old]

when namjoon returns from the washroom, peaking over aera's head, also sparing a brief glance to jimin, they communicate through their eyes, making him sigh on seeing jimin's virtual complain. "aera, do your homework, kiddo," the elder reminds the child, making her sigh deeply with discontentment and get back to writing the words opposite to the ones her english teacher gave.

"oppa," she puts the pencil down, slipping down from the chair and stands beside jimin, holding his hand, "i'm tired, my hand hurts..."

"no, it doesn't. sit back and finish your homework," the brother says, making her sit back down and pulls her chair closer, "what is the opposite of... wait— a dog?" he gives his hyungs a questioning look, "is that even okay?"

namjoon bursts out laughing while aera frowns at them with her head tilted slightly at an angle, "what?" she asks, "miss sunhi said bitch. i thought it's doggy,"

jimin breathes out in embarrassment, shaking his head and tells her to write it down. namjoon takes a seat nearby, letting jimin off as he's here to watch over aera now and even jin is there for supervision.

aera writes down a few more words until she's bored again and slouches on the chair, slowly lifting up her gaze from her notebook to namjoon, shaking her head gradually as a pout rests on her lips, "no, princess, don't be like that. good kids always do their homework,"

"but i don't want to..." she mumbles, swinging her legs back and forth, her hand clutching on the long purple colored pencil, "miss sunhi never tells us to play— for homework. just write, write, write!"

"playing is not homework, honey," namjoon sighs, "it's almost over, c'mon, do it quickly."

"no, let's go to the park," aera says, standing up and puts her pencil down, closing the notebook. her hands already holding namjoon's larger ones and pulling him up too.

"aera," jin speaks this time, tired of watching the eight-year-old struggling for an hour to do her homework. first math and now english. the girl looks at him, pushing a strand of her out of her face, "do your homework first, then you'll go to the park alright?"

"now...!" aera pouts at him.

"then finish your work quickly," namjoon says patting her head and hands her the pencil, "it's just five more words. it won't take that long,"

"only five?" aera looks at him, holding out her palm, showing five fingers to him, making him smile as he nods to promise that they'll be done after five more words, "okay," she agrees, opening the notebook and bites her lip under pressure and the urgency to complete the homework, but ends up whining when she doesn't know the right answer.

"it's not small," namjoon says, picking up the eraser and gives it to the girl, "the opposite of long is short,"

"i know," aera grumbles, writing down the correct word and looks at him again, "and happy is sad, right joonie oppa?"

"yes, and it can unhappy too," he tells her, almost going to add more but stops with a defeated sigh as aera pushes her notebook away from her again. "what—"

"i'm doing it, i'm doing it, oppa wait," she says, removing his arm from the front and sits on his lap, grinning back at his face. namjoon smiles at her too, making her sit properly as his one arms wraps around her waist and he kisses her cheek.

in a few more minutes, she finally puts her pencil down, smiling widely as the homework is done for today, which means she can go and play now! namjoon ruffles her hair, standing up with her and holds her hand, "good job, riri,"

"good job, riri!" aera giggles, jumping towards namjoon, making him chuckle as he carries her up and kisses her cheek, "now we'll go to the park!"

"yes, let's go," he smiles, glancing at jin who gives a nod and waves at them.

"no, jinnie oppa go with us," aera stares at the eldest.

"not today, sweetheart. we'll go there tomorrow again, then i'll join you,"

aera hums slowly, staring up at the tall male with her head tilted slightly and her round eyes watch the smile unfolding on his full lips, "you're busy?" she asks, getting a chuckle as jin crouches down and holds her gently from the sides, nodding his head, "it's okay, we'll go there together when you have time, jinnie oppa,"

"sure. you're so understanding, little one. thank you,"

"thank you," aera giggles, turning back to namjoon and he smiles at her. she holds his hand quickly, waving at jin and skips her way out of the kitchen, staying beside namjoon, busy telling him that she has learned a new 'stunt' on the monkey bars which she'll show him today and he should try doing it too.

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a/n- i personally really this chapter out of the memories so far lol 🐨✨ do you like aera's interaction with namjoon based on this book so far?

also from whatever interactions you've seen so far, who do you think among the side characters gets along with riri the most?

after this chapter i'll try to upload the 'surprise' emotional wreck chapter because i get that you guys might want some cute, happy chapters after that and i can't leave you hurting forever. sigh 😔 but yeah, those of you who are suckers for emotional shit and trauma like me, good luck u're gonna love it. i'll also explain the whole plot and story line at the end for anyone who couldn't catch everything  understand (sigh×2 😔)

no matter when you read that chapter, it's gonna have the same effect lol. 😌💅✨ i'm so excited shskshjajwhss to watch your reaction shsjsjshs 😌💅✨lemme know when you're ready?