Kuga Raimei has got a checklist in her head, she is sure, of all the things they have never done together; should have been able to do together; would have done together if Natsuki stayed home more often. It's in the way that she smiles over the simplest of things, even the ones that are unremarkable to her — the first time she actually cooks for all three of them, after everything is settled in the coven and making sure those Exorcists are busy with their mechanical allies instead of them. The first time Natsuki has to do was to chase her daughter down to make her take a bath, because everyone else is just too busy to bring a wild eleven-year-old to heel (don't ask Natsuki who she gets her behavior from). There's a glimmer in her eyes as they count down the firsts, and she doesn't bother to hide it.
So when Raimei sits down on the edge of her parents' bed, holds out her hairbrush and ribbons and asks her father to fix her hair for her politely, Natsuki can tell that it's just another missing childhood moment on her to-do list and not a deliberate attempt to give her a heart attack.
She sits very patiently for her and she picks up the brush and tries not to panic. She has seen girls do this. Shizuru did this for her on a regular basis once. It should really just be a matter of figuring out how much strength to use (considering that she isn't even human).
Natsuki has broken a sweat before the bristles even touch her hair, and as she puts her free hand on her daughter's shoulder to steady herself, she gnaws at her lower lip where she cannot see her do it. This is a thing that mothers do for their daughters. This is something even Mikoto knows how to do. This shouldn't be any big deal.
She makes herself breathe normally and moves the brush with a little bit more confidence, and Raimei squirms immediately with a whined oww, and Natsuki suddenly lurches back immediately with her heart slamming against her ribs so powerfully it sends black spots across her vision.
Legitimately the next thing she is aware of when she opened her eyes, her face is being cupped between a pair of fine-fingered hands she would know anywhere, and Raimei, together with Shizuru, are kneeling in front of her half an arm's length away.
"Oh, Sh-Shizuru..." Natsuki stammered, and she takes a deep shuddering breath and buries her face in both hands. Her head aches powerfully. Her ribcage is strangling his lungs. Her whole right side is bursting with pins and needles.
Definitely that god thrice damned Taoist's handiwork, thought Natsuki, he did say that he was going to make sure Natsuki won't harm anyone else ever again; by hurting her with a special, permanent parchment.
Cool fingers pry her hands away from her face and into her lap. Shizuru and Raimei are staring up at her. They are on their knees on the bedroom floor and she has no idea at all how it is they got there.
"Shizuru?" Natsuki says again, more loudly this time — she's seeking a response.
Shizuru can guess at what happened during the lapse, then. It's blessedly infrequent nowadays, but the parchment still sneaks up on her at inopportune times. Natsuki is lucky to have patient loved ones who know how to handle it when the world skips out on her.
"I — yeah, I am fine now. But..." She stares at the space between their knees, and Natsuki laces their fingers together. The knot that they make is incongruent. Natsuki's hands are very fine and delicate, but they are clumsy hands; they are hands that are only good for hurting others. She wants to pull away from her family and at least bury her face in them again, but she is fearful of moving. It feels as though the world itself will break if she touches it in just the wrong way.
"It's all right," Shizuru says to her.
"It's not."
"It's all right."
"I hurt her. Our daughter. That pain... Almost made me want to... to kill..." Her voice shakes, and then her shoulders, and then her hands. The whole of her follows suit. She is wretched.
"It's not the same." Shizuru's words are soft with understanding. "It was a small hurt that you didn't mean to inflict. It is not the same."
Natsuki does not reply. She glares instead at her hands. Shizuru squeezes them, briefly.
"Your power — your strength is meant to protect. To build. That is the truth, and you mustn't lose sight of it." And as the words leave them, Shizuru's lips curl. "You are better than you believe yourself to be. You are beloved,and that is not a fact that will change after a small mistake anyone in your position could make."
It's not as though she consciously wants to doubt Shizuru's kind words. It's just that the memory of pain and fear and hate still lurks at his heels, choking everything else out of her heart.
When she raises her head — subconsciously — and her gaze catches and holds. Raimei, just beside her mother, fidgeting, leaning close to her mother worriedly, when their eyes locked, Raimei reaches out for her father, and then her vision is eclipsed (and her breathing muffled) against her middle as she hugs her close.
"Papa... Papa are you ok?" she says worriedly to the point of tears.
"Sorry kid, but I am ok now..." Natsuki replied.
Raimei didn't release her father for quite some time. By the time she has, Shizuru is smiling at them both with her chin rested upon Natsuki's hands. Her face is bright with relief.
"Now that we're quite done with all the theatrics," she says, "-might Natsuki be amenable to a demonstration of the proper use of a hairbrush? As the both of you are rather disheveled, and it's a life skill that you might find worth acquiring, Natsuki?"
"Yeah Papa!," Raimei added, "You promised that you would brush my hair for me!", Natsuki finds it in herself to smile a little.
She reaches out and grasps Shizuru's right hand in her left, curls up her own right hand around Raimei's tiny left fist, and waits until they're both looking at her.
"Give me that hairbrush."
Shortly later...
"You use it like this," Shizuru murmurs, and guides Natsuki's hand — firm, smooth, and with care. "Gentle. Like using a scale or drying your bike."
"Like using crayons for drawing a picture!" Raimei supplies, and Shizuru hushes her, making her sit still once again as her parents brushes her hair together.
"Like ruling over a nation, and taking care of your family." Natsuki muses in an undertone.