I had the urge to write a bit more about young Hayate and his mother. This is not quite contiguous with the Scarlet Spiral timeline, as the time of Shizuka's first break is set two years earlier than that. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: Naruto does not belong to me; I just borrow it sometimes. The setting and characters belong to Kishimoto Masashi, with the exception of Gekkou Shizuka, who is my own creation.
Big Feet
"Hayate!" Shizuka's brassy voice rang through the walls of the house from outside, always far louder than it had to be. It was an almost painfully brilliant mid-spring morning, the scent of cherry blossoms hanging faintly in the still air. "Hayate, hurry up and get your sandals on! You're going to be late for the first day of the new school year!"
She could hear a distinct rustling noise from inside, as well as a few muffled coughs, as her nine year old son shuffled around the genkan. "They won't fit, Mom!" he called back a few moments later in his dry, reedy voice. Shizuka frowned, her brow creasing slightly as though suspicious.
"What do you mean, they won't fit?" she shouted back through the door, not even bothering to go back inside to see the problem. Her son was nine years old already; certainly, he could take care of this himself.
"They're too small, Mom! My feet won't go in them!" Shizuka heard her son cough again, and she sighed. Well, maybe he couldn't take care of this one on his own, then. She stepped forward and slid open the front door, coming back into the house. She looked down at her son with a largely unfazed expression - the boy was sitting at the edge of the genkan looking mildly frustrated, his foot sticking half out of one sandal that was, indeed, too small. She bent down and plucked it from his foot, shaking her head.
"You must have grown again, Hayate. You'll have to wear your zouri to school today." She put the sandal down next to its partner, taking her son by the wrist and pulling him to his feet. "Come here. I'll measure your feet, and while you're at school today I'll go to Ueno-san's and get you new sandals."
Hayate nodded and sniffled, following his mother back into the house as she led him to the tatami room. At her command, he sat down on the stool in the corner as she rummaged around in a junk drawer and produced a roll of measuring tape. Compliantly, Hayate stuck out his foot and tried not to squirm at all as Shizuka took hold of it firmly in her hand, lining the tape up against his foot. It always tickled a little.
Shizuka's eyes were mostly on the tape, but every moment or so her gaze flickered up to her son's face, an expression of vague interest - perplexed curiosity, even - on her face. It didn't take long to measure his feet, and she was soon rolling the tape back up to put away. Sure enough, his feet had grown a good amount since - when was the last time she'd measured his feet? It couldn't have been much more than six months ago, she mused. Nine years old, and he's already growing so fast.
Her expression was bordering on pensive as she ushered him back toward the genkan and stood at the door, watching him as he shuffled off to school in his zouri. She'd lost nearly six months of watching him grow after her last mission in ANBU and her subsequent stay in the psych ward, and countless others in various other hospital stays and long-term missions for ANBU. He was growing up too fast, she thought. Nine years old, and he was already taking care of his own tea plants and taking responsibility for his health. Nine years old, and he was already progressing so quickly in his kenjutsu training that they'd begun to call him the Gekkou prodigy. Nine years old, and he was already outgrowing his shoes at an alarming rate.
He'd started his training when he was four. She had been away on a mission. He'd mastered his first kenjutsu-based genjutsu when he was six. She had been in the hospital recovering from mission-related injuries. He'd completed mastering his first real sword dance when he was eight. She had been in the psych ward, screaming senselessly at things that weren't there.
What else had she missed? What else would she miss?