Summary: With Kotoko down with the flu, Ryoji sets out to go to the store, only to find he wasn we were plotting RP and it gave me a mental image. That image led to the beginnings of a story plaguing my mind for an hour while I tried to sleep, only to make me give up and do things before sitting down to write this. So. Here we go!
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue please?
Ryoji yawned as he entered the grocery store, one hand reaching up to scratch at the top of his head, short brown hair sticking out every which way. Kotoko hadn't been feeling well the past couple of days, so he was doing everything around the house, more or less. Cooking (or attempting to), cleaning, and taking care of their daughter, Haruhi. He hadn't realized just how much work all that was, until he was doing it on his own. Sure, he'd helped out in the past, rather regularly given his wife's job, but now it seemed overwhelming.
Thankfully, Haruhi was taking a nap, and she was good at taking very precise naps. Always, she slept exactly two hours, unless someone woke her. That was definitely something to be happy for, it would give him more than enough time to get what he needed, get home, and put everything away, so long as Kotoko didn't get sick before reaching the bathroom…again.
Getting a basket and placing it on his arm, he started wandering the aisles, trying to remember where everything was. As he turned down the aisle with the canned vegetables, he paused. There, in the aisle, was an infant, sitting and looking at what appeared to be baked beans with an oddly serious expression upon her face. Ryoji looked around, trying to find the child's parents, but no one else was in the aisle, aside from the two of them. A frown on his face, he walked over to the infant, who looked remarkably like his Haruhi, and crouched down to pick the girl up just as she was trying to crawl away.
"Da! Da!"
He froze. This baby not only looked like Haruhi…she sounded like her, too. There was only one reasonable explanation for this…
"…how in the world did you get all the way here?" The only answer he received was nonsensical babbling. With a sigh and a shake of the head, he smiled down at her as he put the can of beans she had grabbed into the basket.